Method

He smirks, but not the smirk I love, the smirk I loathe.

“I think that’s obvious,” he says snidely.

“Lucas,” I say, my tears blinding me, “why?”

He lets out an audible sigh. “Look, Mila—”

“Don’t you dare! You fucking promised me! Those are sacred promises we made! Those mean something to me! No fucking tongue, it’s in the contract. We put it specifically in the contract!”

“You need to calm down right now,” h

e says in a tone he’s never, ever used with me. “And if you can’t do that, you need to leave.”

“Leave? Are you fucking serious? No tongue! It was your rule. You’re the one who made it. I watched you kiss her over and over, you bastard! Are you fucking her?”

“You’re embarrassing yourself,” he says, looking back down at his script. “Your husband has never been unfaithful.”

I walk over and clear the table in front of him, loving the horrific crash against the wall. Angrier than I’ve ever been in my life, I lean down so we’re face-to-face. He chuckles dryly, his gaze deadly as he challenges me with a look alone. In those seconds I hate him, and it’s nothing I’ve ever felt for him. “Has Nikki been unfaithful?”

His eyes dull as he looks over at me. “I don’t repeat myself.”

“Far be it from you to stoop so low. You’re purposely sabotaging our marriage, in fact, you’re disrupting all of your relationships and for what? Why? You’re going too far, Lucas! Nova is about to quit, your director probably won’t ever hire you again, and your wife is about to leave you!”

Not even that statement changes anything about his expression, his posture. “I want my husband back, right fucking now! Lucas now!”

Openly, I sob in front of him while he stares at me as if I’ve just spit on his sandwich. I’m a nuisance, a bother, someone he has to deal with.

“This is not what I signed up for,” I say vehemently. The man I married would have swallowed me in his arms by now, taken my face in his hands along with my pain, and done his best to do away with it, but he isn’t here. “So,” I cough out incredulous, “we don’t follow our rules, anymore? Okay, maybe I’ll start breaking them too.”

“Now you’re threatening me?” he says, shaking his head slowly while clicking his tongue.

“Yeah, I am,” I say crossly.

“This is classic,” he scoffs. “Maybe you don’t feel like you’re getting enough attention,” he says with a hiss as he stands and grips my hand jerking me toward him. He presses his bulging cock between us and I hate myself for wanting it, wanting him any way I can get him. He takes my lips, his kiss is violent, and I fight him, disgusted. I pull away from him, covering my mouth in horror.

He harrumphs and slowly shakes his head. “This was about a kiss, right? That one was just for you.” He tilts his head. “But if you’re feeling needy,” he says with a sardonic hiss, “we can take care of that too.”

“Go to hell.”

“Tempting,” he utters without missing a beat, his eyes flaring with sick humor. “I like it warm.” He turns away from me and straightens his tie while I try to calm myself to the point of reason. Anger is getting me nowhere.

Scouring the hotel room, I see very few signs of life. The bed is freshly made but it doesn’t look like it’s been slept in. There is a pillow on the couch he’s squatting on and a blanket folded beneath it.

“Lucas,” I whisper at his rigid back. “I can’t keep going on like this. I need you to hear me. I’m fading. Please just give me some sign that you’re here.”

Without a reply, he walks over to the door and opens it before he picks up his script, dusts off the piece of sandwich that’s stuck to it, and resumes his seat. “Like I told you, not here.”

He doesn’t bother to look up as I stand there watching him sink back into the couch scanning his script. I’m not even an afterthought at this point. Making my way toward the door, I look back as he shells a pistachio before popping it into his mouth. He’s listening but no words will get through, and I’m past the point of caring, the raw betrayal too fresh in my chest.

“I’m so done, I won’t sit back and watch this fucking freak show anymore. You’re on your own, Nikki.” Walking toward the door, I hear the flip of a page and look back to see he’s already reading. I was screaming at a wall.

Shutting the door behind me, I look up and see several of the crew standing at the threshold of their own rooms and crowding the hall. It’s obvious they all heard, and they begin to part like the Red Sea as I walk down the corridor. Not bothering to look up to see the pity in their eyes, I march toward the elevator as a wave of humiliation wipes my every conviction away.

I’m just another Hollywood wife who got jealous, a wife who lost her husband to his career and a possible on-screen romance. Truth from fiction. A month ago, I would have said none of it was true, and I wouldn’t have cared who believed it. I feel the opposite of that now. I want to scream that my husband loves me, that what we have is rare, that we are the exception, that our love story is genuine, that we can’t be fazed, that we are unbreakable, but it’s no longer the truth.

I check into a separate room and fly out the next day.

“In Method acting, you can’t have preconceived ideas. You have to live in the moment. You have to keep yourself open.”—Dennis Hopper