Chapter 4: What’re you dreaming about
The silent morning after was a performance of intimacy. But this next scene was the blueprint of it. Characters picking apart their feelings, physically intimacy.
A PA approached, tentative. “Sam’s ready for you in set.”
The bedroom was different. The lights were lower, warmer, casting long shadows. The city light glow through the window was a deeper blue.
Joseph stood outside of the door with Madelyn getting into character, reading over the scene one last time. The script pages felt flimsy in his hands, the dialogue about fear and desire now laughably simple compared to the static humming in the space between their shoulders.
“Nervous?” he asked, his voice low.
“About the scene? No.” She didn’t look up, but her mouth twitched. “About remembering this is a scene? Maybe.”
Sam’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie on a PA’s belt. “Places. Let’s get this in two, folks. We’re tight on time.” The crew inside the set went quiet, shadows moving behind the fake window. Madelyn exhaled, a slow, controlled breath that fogged briefly in the chilly stage air. She rolled her shoulders back, slipping into Sarah’s skin—a woman who was done talking. Joseph leaned his head back against the wall, letting Asher’s impatient need simmer in his gut.
“Just a minute, okay?” Sam called from the darkness. “Sound set, 3… 2… 1… Action.”
He cupped her cheeks and kissed her. It was a director’s kiss, a story-beat kiss, all meant impulse and narrative function. His hand found the doorknob, opening it, and they tumbled into the bedroom. She closed it behind her, her back against the door. He bent down, his hands gently hooking under her thighs, lifting her up. He captured her lips again, her hands fisted in his hair, tugging gently.
He groaned against her lips and walked over to the bed, laying her down gently, hovering above her. The mattress sighed under their weight. She pulled back for a moment. “Asher.” A breathless whisper. His lips found her neck, kissing softly where the script said it was meant to look rough. Her hands fisted in his hair again, her hips arching up off the mattress to meet his.
“Cut! Hold there!”
The bedroom lights flicked up to a harsh, clinical brightness. Joseph froze, his lips a centimeter from her skin, the scent of her shampoo filling his head. He pushed himself up on his elbows, his breathing ragged. Madelyn’s eyes were wide, her chest rising and falling rapidly beneath him.
Sam’s head appeared around the doorframe. “Joe, the walk to the bed felt a little rushed. Maddie, the arch was perfect, keep that. Let’s do it again from the lift. And maybe, Joe, let the groan sit a second longer. Make us feel it.”
“Right,” Joseph rasped, rolling off her. The cool air of the stage hit the sweat on his back. They reset at the door, a PA smoothing Madelyn’s hair.
“Action.”
His hands were on her face, the kiss starting exactly as before. But it was different now. Short-circuiting the choreography in his head. He broke the kiss, his breathing already uneven.
He didn’t bend down this time, feeling the scene didn’t need it. Asher was tall, much taller than Sarah. He looked at her, his blue eyes dark and certain, and gripped the backs of her thighs, gently lifting her up. Her gasp was swallowed as he captured her lips again.
Her hands fisted in his hair, tugging gently. He groaned against her lips, louder, rougher, a beat longer than any director could have asked for. It was a real sound, ripped from somewhere deep and private.
His mouth didn’t leave hers as he walked over to the bed, his steps sure and steady despite the whirl in his head. He laid her down gently, hovering above her, the length of his body aligned with hers.
“Asher.” A breathless whisper, her voice trembling.
His lips found her neck, kissing a trail along her jaw. She took in a sharp breath, her hands fisting in his hair again, holding him there. Her hips arched off the mattress to meet him, a silent, undeniable answer.
They didn’t hear Sam’s voice. She was still rolling. So he lowered his hips to meet hers, the pressure a sharp, perfect friction through the thin layers of costume. She let out a soft moan, her legs hooking around his hips, pulling him further down. The world dissolved into scent, sound and desperate, heat.
“CUT!”
“That was good, read the next scene continuing on back in three.” Sam said, her voice cutting through the thick silence that had swallowed the set. It was brisk, professional, utterly divorced from what had just transpired under the lights.
Madelyn unhooked her legs, the motion sudden. Joseph rolled to the side, the mattress groaning in relief. The cool air of the soundstage hit his overheated skin like a slap. A PA materialized, his face a careful blank, holding out a small, dark modesty garment.
“Thanks,” Joseph muttered, his voice rough. He stepped outside the set into the relative darkness of the stage, the concrete floor cold under his bare feet. He fumbled with the garment, his hands unsteady. Putting it on felt absurd, a tiny fig leaf over a seismic event. He took a deep, shuddering breath before walking back in.
Crew members handed them their scripts, the pages flimsy and meaningless. Madelyn took hers without looking, her gaze fixed on a point on the wall. The script supervisor murmured something about picking up from Asher’s line, "You have no idea what you do to me."
“Alright, back to positions.”
Joseph’s stomach tightened. Madelyn laid back on the bed, her movements precise. He hovered over her, bracing his weight on his forearms. She hooked her legs around his waist, the contact now a negotiated, clinical fact. He lowered down slightly, the space between their bodies charged with everything unsaid. They looked at each other. Her eyes were glassy, wide open. His own felt raw.
“Sound set and… action.”
He moved his hips slowly, a prescribed simulation. “Asher.” she gasped, the name a strained breath. Her fingers trailed under his shirt, her nails scraping lightly over the muscles of his back. The touch, though choreographed, sent a live wire sparking down his spine.
He groaned, the sound too real, too close to the one from minutes before. “Sarah.” he whispered into her ear, his lips brushing her skin. She moved her hips against him, a counter-rhythm that felt less like acting and more like a question.
Her hands fisted at the hem of his shirt, tugging. He helped, breaking the scene’s frame for a second to pull it over his head. The air was cool on his skin. He reached for the hem of her camisole, and she lifted her arms, her eyes never leaving his. The fabric slipped away.
“You’re so hot, Sarah.” The line was Asher’s, stupid and obvious, but Joseph’s voice fractured on it, making it sound like a helpless confession.
She wrapped her hands around his neck, her fingers tangling in his hair, and pulled him down to kiss her. This kiss wasn’t the desperate collision from the rain or the frantic blur from the door. It was slow, deep, and searching, a silent conversation of tangled breath and trembling lips. He forgot the camera, the crew, the giant lights. There was only the taste of her, the soft sound she made in the back of her throat, the overwhelming rightness of her skin against his.
His lips trailed down her jaw, to her collarbone slowly down her stomach, across her hipbone. Each point of contact was a lit fuse, burning slowly through the last remnants of the script. His hand splayed against her ribs, feeling the frantic drumbeat of her heart.
He looked up. Her eyes were screwed shut. She opened them, nodding, a silent permission that had nothing to do with Sam or the cameras. He hooked his fingers in the waistband of her shorts, pulling them down and tossing them to the floor.
He kissed her knee, the gesture disarmingly gentle. His hand ran back up the plane of her stomach, coming to rest just below her breast. “What’re you dreaming about?” he said, his voice a rough whisper against her skin.
Her eyes snapped open. The question, a line, had landed like a physical touch in the quiet room. For a heartbeat, there was no sound but the hum of the lights and their shared, unsteady breathing.
“And cut! Perfect! That’s a wrap for today!” Sam’s voice burst the bubble with the force of a gunshot.
The clinical lights slammed back to full brightness. Joseph jerked back, rolling onto his side on the rumpled sheets. Madelyn flinched, curling instinctively, grabbing the discarded sheet to pull over herself. The crew, which had been statue-still, erupted into mundane motion—cables being coiled, a clipboard clicking.
“Tomorrow’s scene will be just off this, when Sarah wakes up from that dream.” Sam was already walking away, talking over her shoulder. “Get some rest, everybody.”
A production assistant approached the bed, holding out Madelyn’s robe like a shield. Madelyn took it, wrapping it tightly around herself without a word. She didn’t look at Joseph. He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed, his back to her. The concrete floor was shockingly cold.
“You guys want anything from crafty before they break it down?” the PA asked, her tone deliberately normal.
“No,” Joseph said, the word coming out too sharp. “Thanks.”
He stood, finding his own robe on a nearby stand. He shoved his arms through the sleeves, the belt dangling. The set was emptying fast, the intimacy of minutes ago now just another work site to be abandoned.
He finally turned.
Madelyn was standing, robe cinched tight, her script clutched in one white-knuckled hand. She was staring at the tossed shorts on the floor.
They walked out of the bedroom set side-by-side, but not touching. The vast, cold soundstage felt like another planet. The mismatched chairs in the corner looked like a trap. The scent of coffee from the now-closed craft services table was stale and bitter.