cancelled.starter

With projects picking back up again, their schedules completely packed, it’s harder to keep an eye over a tiny little kitten. During Boy Venus she was curious but timid, usually happy to simply stay by Jess’ and Julian’s side while the world hustled around her. Now, with a few more months of growth, she thinks she’s queen of the world ready to tackle it all, easy to lose sight of her the moment you turn away. Speaking of.. 

“Appel..” Tomas called out, slightly frantic as he searched high and low for the tiny rascal. If he lost her, he is probably dead to Juno. “Sorry.. have you– uh seen a small orange tabby kitten about -this big? I– I just turned away for a second and..” Tomas flusteredly asked the first person that crossed his path, she couldn’t have run off too far, and she’s quite the squealer, “she’s around here I swear..”

his studio is gleaming and pure. it is the dawning of a new era as young gods go, the last of which he has to conquer is célébrité. he need only look in the mirror to be assure that such a task is possible. his agent has said as much. the heavy studio door swung open, someone else walking on the stage, the first to witness a king on new land. he turned around with a dazzling smile to greet them. “bonjour. you’ve intruded! but i promise i will forgive it, if you can think of a toast for me.” a bottle of champagne is sitting on the counter. flown in from champagne. there’s only one glass but he moves quickly to pull a second from the rack. it is only a display, but that doesn’t mean they should not be used. everything will be eventually, that’s the beautiful of a kitchen. “this is the dawning of a new era, as they say.”

Siobhan had been in the business too long to let it hinder her. Mahogany desk, veneer shining from what was not covered by scripts awaiting to be put into use, to be picked by her good name and brought to life from her funding and supervision. Even the blot at the door could not distract her fully, eyes raising in her own time to catch the face.

“You aren’t scheduled,” she pointed out at first, her normal voice showing no highs or lows, no inflection to betray whatever emotion could be still within her. “Your own schedule is full from what has been relayed to me.”

The flour sacks were on the counter above. Every single one of them was from the spot where the bristles of the brush were scouring, even the ones shoved in the back for no one to find, the ones that were just a little heavier and not as malleable. 10,993 dollars, and somewhere rolling in the bottom of one was seventy-four cents. He counted once, and then broke one of the hundreds to buy a new whisk before Tomas won Masterchef. All of that for nothing when the answer was here all along.

BANG

“Pleurislijer!” Who was here? Whose footsteps were those? His hand rubbed at the top of his wounded head, eyes rounding at the visitor. “You saw me here and didn’t say behind!” His forehead creased, a weird concern that fought his words before he went on, tone adjusting. “What’s the big idea?”

she had been mailed the worn and ducted taped binder for production assistants, memorized every one of the golden rules. they weren’t so terrible, they slotted into the gaps in her guesses quite easily, not so much filling in blanks as illuminating what had always been there. forty seven hours. had she ever been asleep before. 

coffee black, too hot, supposed ask if the cinematographer wanted one too. pretend to nod when she answered yes or no, stare through with hollow tired eyes as if she wasn’t the one doing all of this in the first place. it must have been nice, to be so at ease in the wrong. existing in the problem. “for you.” she offered out what she’d been holding. black coffee, hot too. “if you’d like.”

One sign of movement caused her to bounce up, short heel clunking against the concrete slab, caught on its edge, tote swinging into her side, coffee knocked forward as her balance flailed. She was hardly the viper she wanted to be, hand catching her fall, sacrificing the mocha as trade-off as it splashed. She would have rather had the scratched knee than the waste of five bucks and her lifeline to meeting today’s deadline. The deadline. The person. The door.

“No, no, no!” she grappled with the concrete, pushing herself up, flinging forward to just have her fingertips miss catching the closing door. “Shi-!” she caught herself, wheeling around to have the person finally in her viewpoint, eyes lighting up. “Hi!” She waved. Idiot! She waved! Hand still stained with the mocha she probably spilled on their shoes, and this girl waved! It was retracted, dried off on the back of her skirt. More idiot! “Heh. Fancy seeing you here, huh? …outside… you know…your studio… I mean, a studio. I don’t know whose this is… You busy?”

On one hand, there was a part of Cayla that wanted to hurt Miguel, and the keen narrative sense developed over the past year told her that this would be the perfect time to strike. The season finale, if you will.

Life wasn’t a TV show, though, of that Cayla had become keenly aware. Now, hours into trying to write this stupid letter, it had dawned on her that nothing she wrote would ever be able to reach him through the haze of drugs and stupidity. Why should it? Nothing, not her devotion or love, had before. It ached, knowing that he would accept her hatred with the same apathy he had accepted her affection.

There would be no sense in flinging insults that wouldn’t land, in the end. Although she doubted very much that Miguel would bother to report her, she couldn’t be sure if he even read his own e-mails since she’d stopped doing it for him. Nothing could jeopardize her job with the Cancellation department, not even her own futile revenge.

Begrudgingly, Cayla set about editing. Frowning down at her laptop screen, she mumbled, “How do you tell someone politely that they’d be lucky if they choked to death on their own vomit because you’re going to be their boss one day?”

The door closed behind him and he released a small breath before the back of his hand smudged away the faint mark of lipstick on his cheek. It was too late, though. It apparently had already been noticed.

“At least you’re not a paparazzi,” he spoke with a thin smile before he went on with a tilt of his head, taking the last bit of stain off of his skin. “This could have been the start to an awkward conversation.”

they opened their mouth, then closed it. a sigh of exasperation. “okay, to clarify my last comment my mom punched me in the face on live television and i had an emotional outburst and tried to kill us and two other people in the room. it had nothing to do with, like, actual fucking.. just… a matter of speech..” teagan nodded, pointing a thumb in the direction they’d come from. “i’m just gonna go now.” 

Smoke breathes out of Julian’s parted lips, eyes looking down on the city with arms resting over the railing. It’s a lost habit that will become him now, envious of how something can burn but find a sweet release in escaping. He has just been burning and burning, no end in sight, always the last one standing, whether he’s pushed them away or they have been buried by Prometheus.

The pack is turned over in his hand, eyes glossing over the warning label from the surgeon general. Birth defects. Death. Underneath it is the logo of the company that supplies the risk. His gut clutches the same way his hand does before hurtling the pack across the rooftop, hitting the visitor he’s only now paid any attention to. Meanwhile, Steele Tobacco is crumbled but completely unharmed by his hate.

“What is it? What do you want?”

“Ms. Jennings!” he called out to his secretary, only to have no response back. His lips pursed together. What if there was some wildebeest on the other side? Of course not! Impractical, a manifestation of the imagination when running rampant in uncertain times. He stepped closer to the door, adjusting the latex gloves on his hands to hold to them better before opening the door, only to be instantly slobbered on by a Great Dane, followed by another one.

“Blasted! You mongrels! What on earth are you doing here? Begone!” he protested before pushing their mouths away until seeing that it wasn’t just them. Had they done something to the visitor? Were they here to deliver them undoubtedly from his hellish brother? “I genuinely apologize if they caused you any trouble,” he staggered out between his continuous pushes against them to leave him be. “What is the extent of the damage they’re responsible for?”

The trolley wheels ran down the hall with Miguel balanced on the bar connecting the two back ones, skidding to a stop only when the door to one of the rooms opened up. It nearly knocked into them, but Miguel had a face lit up as though he was free of all fault. Whether they were the ones that ordered the drugs that were under the silver dome or not was unknown; losing track of the numbers on the doors. Did they look like a Yaneth? Only time would tell.

“There is special food for you! All for you! Say the special word and it is yours!”

Cleo had just finished unpacking and plopped down in a cushioned chair, staring at the door to the room. It was empty. And then it wasn’t. Whether that was due to someone merely passing by, or due to someone genuinely curious about what was inside Cleo’s shared room, she didn’t know right away. 

What she did know was that she was achingly bored, and that she was willing to bother whoever walked past. 

“Cancellation must be losing its viewership for Samson to turn her contracts’ deaths into a reality show. The stench of desperation is getting harder to hide, even with the rotting flesh.”