Next Guy Through the Door

Her lips parted, inviting me in as I explored every inch of her soft mouth. Another low shuddering moan rumbled out of her, and I finally pulled away. Her pretty blue eyes looked hazy.

“Lindsay, I think you’re the only person who has distracted me from work, ever.”

Her face started to fall, but I laughed. “Just for a second now and then, it’s a good thing.”

“What happens after the show?” she asked.

“Everyone comes in here, grabs some sandwiches and beer, and we talked about how it went. Things we should improve, or fix before we start the regular shooting schedule.”

“Oh,” she said, “I guess I should get out of your way.”

I locked my arm around her waist. “No, I need you.”

She grinned. “You don’t need me for work, silly.”

“I really do. We need input from people who aren’t in the industry.” Leading her to a couch that was just big enough for the two of us, I said, “I’ll be back in a minute.”

I flashed her a grin, but she returned it unsteadily. Damn, she really was shy. But I was sure that she could hold on for a couple of minutes without me.

Running out to the van, I hauled in a giant cooler. As I got back to the meeting room, I saw that Steve had already found the beer cooler and wine stash, and had appointed himself bartender.

“Food,” I announced, opening the cooler and taking out several trays of sandwiches, setting them on a long table at the side.

Everyone scrambled to help themselves. Grabbing two sandwiches, I sat back beside Lindsay. “Their caterer makes the most amazing chicken salad. Is that okay?”

She nodded. “Thank you.”

“Lindsay, would you like a beer?” Steve asked. “Or we’ve got red and white wine.”

“White wine, thank you.”

“I see you’ve met my partner in crime,” I chuckled.

“Oh yeah,” Steve said, handing Lindsay a plastic cup of wine. “We go all the way back to three minutes ago when I walked in.”

They laughed as everyone settled down. I introduced Lindsay to Natty, the show’s host, Amy, the producer, and the various camera people and assistants. Once the bunch of us were assembled, we started chatting about how the show went.

I saw that Amy and our director Devon were both taking notes. “Remember folks, all opinions are valid, and there are no wrong answers,” Amy said brightly. “What worked, what didn’t. Fire when ready.”

A lively discussion ensued, and I noticed that Lindsay simply ate her sandwich, quietly taking it all in.

Everyone agreed that it was lively and fun, and the laughter and yelled out comments of the live audience really did add to the energy of the room.

A woman who I think was an assistant’s girlfriend asked, “Is it going to be free for the audience to attend?”

“Absolutely,” Amy said. “We’re going to try to make it seem sort of exclusive, so that it seems like a treat to be chosen. But we’re really just going to randomly select people’s emails once we get going.”

“At first we will be relying on friends, friends of friends, and family,” Devon said.

Steve turned to them. “We were discussing swapping out several sections of the junk wall for every show. Do we still think that’s a good idea?”

Lindsey and Devon stared at each other for a second. “We’d really l

ike every single episode to have its own look. We can do that with the lighting, to some extent, but changing out as many pieces as possible would be preferable. The only thing is, that gets expensive fast. And we don’t have hours to be searching second-hand stores for props.”

I felt a tug at my arm and turned to Lindsay. “What if you asked the audience for help?” she whispered to me. “If you’re having a theme show, ask the audience to bring stuff in. You’d have to work really fast to arrange it, but they’d lend it for free.”

I squeezed her hand, flashing her a wide grin. Turning into the group, I said, “Lindsay is a genius. We contact the audience a few days before, telling them what we need, and if they have a piece we can use, they’ll just show up twenty minutes early so that we can arrange everything.”