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David Fantasy #1
by Julianne Lee
Author does not have access to .creative
Something to while away the weeks until the new season...
Kira's hands shook as she buttoned the vest of her
camel-colored suit. Any minute now she would be meeting
him. Today was the day. Any minute. Her palms were slick.
A paper towel. She needed a paper towel to wipe her
hands. No sweat stains on the suit, please. There were no
paper towels; she had to settle for the upholstery on the
dinette in her motor home dressing room.
Why hadn't they let her read with him at the casting
call? Who the hell did he think he was, anyway?
He was in Vancouver, that's who he thought he was. In
Vancouver while she was auditioning in LA. She'd read
with Chris Carter. Carter had been in town, but that
Duchovny guy had been stuck in Vancouver. So she'd read
with Chris. Not David. A deep, shakey sigh escaped her.
Not David. She wondered if she could live through this.
Chris was a nice guy. Would David be so nice? Huh.
Anybody's guess, she figured.
A knock echoed in the trailer. "They're ready for you,
Miss Julian."
Oh, God. Here goes nothing.
Kira opened the trailer door and nearly toppled when
it opened too fast. One hand snatched at the door post and
one foot found the rickety aluminum ladder below. The heel
of her shoe stuck in the step and wouldn't come out. After
a minute or so of trying to wrench it loose, she gave up,
took her foot from the shoe and reached down for a good
yank.
Oh, God.
The shoe back on her foot, she hurried to the set. Her
lines tumbled in her brain: "Come on, Mulder, take a
reality break. Come on, Mulder, take a reality break. Come
on, Mulder, take a reality break." There was more, but
that one line kept repeating. "Come on, Mulder, take a
reality break."
Why had she ever read for this part? Why had she
begged her agent to put her up for this?
She answered her own question: Because I have the
great, screaming hornies for that Duchovny guy, that's
why!
She bemoaned her foolishness. It should have been let
alone. Why did she ever want to meet this guy? Cute guys
were a dime a dozen in LA; why did she have to come all
the way to Vancouver to meet this one?
The front hallway of the house which was today's
location was lined with heavy, black cables tied together
with duct tape. They snaked from the trailers outside to
the lights and other equipment inside and she picked her
way to the living room, her ankles threatening to break if
she tripped.
Crew stood around, waiting for the first team--herself
and David--to take their places. The camera, looking like
the creature from "Alien," all black and covered with
incomprehensible appendages, stood in the corner of the
living room, pointed at t-
$
-Yre she and David would
be doing their first scene together.
There was Chris, looking all blonde and fresh. His
jeans were new and his hair was tres Late Boomer. Same age
as she.
"Hi, Kira. How are you?"
"Fine." She shook his hand and hoped the sweat hadn't
returned.
Carter looked up, past her, and said, "David..."
Kira turned. It felt like slow motion, and when she
saw him the world seemed to freeze. David Duchovny. All 6
feet 1 of him, mild eyes and tentative smile. Too gorgeous
for words. "Hello."
Her heart was in her throat. She swallowed hard. Chris
was saying, "David, this is Kira Julian. Kira, David
Duchovny."
"Julian, not Gillian? Pleased to meet you." He held
out his hand and she took it. Warm and dry, not like hers
which had to be cold and clammy. His smile widened some,
but then his attention turned to Carter, hands on hips,
his jacket gathered behind him. "Chris, we need to talk."
"After this setup. Shoot this one, then come to the
production trailer."
Carter walked away and Duchovny stared after, his lips
thin and his eyes narrowed. Kira knew that look. It was
Mulder's "dammit" face. Something was wrong.
Duchovny turned and went to his mark. Kira followed
and found hers, a T of masking tape stuck to the carpet.
She set her feet on either side of the T stem and looked
up at Duchovny. His eyes were squeezed shut. Then he shook
himself out all over and made a grimace to stretch out his
mouth muscles.
Kira followed suit, trying to loosen up a little. It
wasn't easy in these damned heels. She was four inches
taller than Gillian Anderson, who played Mulder's regular
partner, but they still made her wear four inch heels.
Huh. They should wheel her around on a dolly to keep her
from breaking her ankles.
The heels brought her to 5'10, within some range of
Duchovny's height. A pain in the neck, but it was either
this or stand on a box for the two-shots that included
just their faces.
"Ready for rehearsal!," the director said.
Duchovny glanced over at him, then looked at her. Kira
could see he wasn't seeing her any more, but Shelly
Mardarosian, Mulder's new partner.
"Action."
"Mardarosian, look at this."
"Come on, Mulder, take a..." As soon as the words left
her lips she wanted to cry. David looked at her like she
was the stupidest bimbo he'd ever seen. She moaned, "I'm
sorry."
Okay, she blew it on rehearsal. Now she could go the
rest of the day without blowing a huge number of takes.
They started over.
"Mardarosian, look at this."
"What?"
Somehow they made it through the scene, got it on
celluloid, and David disappeared like he'd been abducted
by aliens.
Kira picked her way through the cables in her heels
and made it back to her motor home. As she stepped into
the dressing room she heard a muffled shout from the
production trailer. Hard to hear, but it sounded like
Duchovny saying, "Bimbo!" The rest of it she couldn't hear
at all.
Her face flushed hot and she hurried to lock herself
into her dressing room.
On the dinette she sank into a pain-wracked huddle. He
hated her. She wished she could cry, but then she'd have
to get her makeup repaired. More humiliation. Instead she
swallowed the pain and opened her script to the scene
they'd just done. Her lines would be down cold for the
closeup angles, at least.
Later, David wouldn't look at her when he fed her his
lines during her closeup. His delivery was professional,
but he wouldn't look at her. It rattled her so much that
she had to repeat the same line six times. "Keep rolling,"
said the director in a tone dripping with disgust. By the
time the scene was finished she was sweating like a horse
and she knew David really did hate her.
It went like that all week. She hid in her dressing
room. Though she could hear David outside, playing
basketball with some of the crew, she never went out.
Lunch was always a hurried thing: get the food and get
back to the motor home and hope to God David wasn't
around.
Then she sat at the dinette, peeking out the window at
David's lithe, shirtless body jumping for the hoop as she
chewed her fried chicken or spaghetti more than necessary.
Sometimes she would forget to swallow for minutes at a
time as she watched the muscles ripple and the long arms
stretch to control and avoid. David was a wonder to
behold.
Eight working days. That's how long it was. The
weekend was unbearable. Kira sat in her hotel room and
watched TV for two days. Nobody called and she called
nobody.
Wednesday was the last day of shooting on that
episode, and there had been nary a word passed between
herself and David that hadn't been in the script. Kira was
going to go home to LA a failure. She'd alienated the most
attractive straight single man in the entire film
industry, and would probably come off on the show as a
bimbo to boot. She might as well crawl under a rock and
die.
And to make matters worse, she was to spend most of
this day covered in mud. Still with the heels. How very
attractive she would be. If only she could just go home
now and skip this humiliation.
As she and David stood together in spotless wool
suits, waiting for their cue to flee into a mud hole from
what would later be an optical effect, Kira glanced at
him.
He was staring at her, and looked away.
She looked away and could feel her face warm.
"Action!"
They ran. And fell into the mud according to the
script. It took maybe four seconds, then the director
yelled "Cut. Print. Thank you."
David struggled to his feet, a steady stream of foul
language burbling from his mouth. Kira agreed with all her
heart; it was, indeed, extremely cold mud. He helped her
to her feet, mud dripping from his hair and nose onto her.
"Waidaminit, my shoe is still in there."
He plunged a hand into the muck and yanked the mud-
filled shoe from the bottom. "Here." She took it and he
steadied her as they climbed out. His long fingers were
firm on her arm. Strong. Blankets awaited them, and Kira
huddled against a nearby generator for warmth.
David sidled up next to her. "Why don't you go back to
your dressing room?" The words were a shock after a week
and a half of silence.
"I'm too middle class to track mud into it."
"Ah." A slight smile and raised eyebrows told her he
appreciated the humor. "I knew there had to be a reason."
She looked up at him. "Why?"
His eyes narrowed and he stuck his jaw out. He was
about to say something, but though his mouth was open he
wasn't quite ready to say it. The eyes were hooded and he
almost looked tough. Only then did he say what was on his
mind. "You don't like me much, do you?"
Kira laughed. David looked away and chewed on the
corner of his mouth. In a rush, she said, "No, I do like
you. I think. I haven't been able to talk to you much."
"Ah." Again with the raised eyebrows. "Something kept
you in your dressing room all week. I thought you were
avoiding me."
Now she was turning red to her toes. "I was. I can't
believe how bad I've done on this gig. You were
complaining about me to Chris the first day."
David's eyes went blank for a second, then fired with
memory. "Oh. Oh, no, that wasn't you. There was some
dingbat girl following me around. Calls herself Spooky, I
think. Or Mooky...Puky, or something. Chris needed to get
someone to put more security on the set. Stop giving out
locations and stuff."
"Seriously? It wasn't me?"
"I never lie." A wide grin burst onto his face. "Just
the occasional campaign of misinformation. Now how about
letting me next to that generator? I'm freezing! Man,
you'd think they could afford a heater out here, huh?"
With a chuckle, she moved over to let him close. As he
stepped in, he opened his blanket to put it around her and
share the warmth. With a deep, silent sigh she opened her
blanket to put an arm around his waist. There they
shivered in the Vancouver air until the AD called them for
the next setup where they would have to stand hip-deep in
ice-cold mud together.
Kira was in heaven.