I figured I could be late, so I led Kara back to bed. She turned and scooted across the mattress on her butt before getting herself settled and lying flat on her back with her legs open. I moved to kneel between her legs, running my hands over her thighs.
“You’re beautiful,” I said.
Kara looked at me and bit her lower lip as I leaned in and began to pleasure her with my tongue.
“No, I had that last night. I want the real thing,” Kara said.
I grabbed a condom, put it on, and checked to make sure she was ready. She was very wet. I smiled at her as I pushed in.
“Hurry,” she ordered.
I looked at the clock and realized I didn’t have much time. It was a good thing Kara was as ready as I was because it wasn’t long until the countdown began. Three, two, one … launch!
I hurried to get dressed. Jade had cut me a deal to wear their clothes during interviews this week, and Dakora was outfitting me for the premiere. Tyler had worked out the details with Caryn. There was a garment bag with my outfit for today. It seemed no one trusted me to put the right clothes together. I was a little offended because I’d been paying attention and no longer mixed and matched plaids and stripes.
I did get to wear my new $800 tennis shoes that were made to resemble alligator hide.
As soon as I was dressed, I hustled downstairs and found a car waiting. I hoped they’d arranged food for us because I didn’t get a chance to eat. My driver navigated traffic, and we arrived at the St. Regis, where they had set up conference rooms for our interviews. They had three rooms set up for Craig, Bree, and myself. Each room had a different wall-sized poster that featured our character in the movie. I wanted mine when we were done. It showed the movie logo and me in full battle gear with a sword held two-handed.
My room had lights and three cameras set up, one to catch both the interviewer and me and then two others to capture each of us individually. Frank was waiting for me when I walked in.
“You have eighteen interviews scheduled today. Please don’t get bored and get off script today,” Frank begged. “I’ve had actors shoot themselves in the foot more than once at one of these.”
“Where are Craig and Bree?” I asked.
“They didn’t have as many interview requests, so they’ll be down later.”
From the expression on Frank’s face, I was a little worried.
“How many did they get?” I asked.
“Craig has six and Bree four.”
“Is that normal?” I asked.
“Um, let’s just say that if I were them, I would feel slighted.”
I thought about it for a minute.
“Can you call them and have them join me? They can slip out when they have their own interviews.”
Frank gave me a funny look.
“Listen, something I learned in football is that it’s a team game. Every chance I get, I make sure the team is part of activities, events, and especially credit. Even if they aren’t in the interview, I will talk them up. I just don’t want them to feel snubbed,” I said.
“Here are your talking points. It’s mostly the same as what I gave you during the week. I added a few items because there are so many interviews I wanted to make sure you had enough material to keep it fresh,” Frank said. He saw I was serious about sharing the limelight. “Okay, I’ll go see if they’ll join you.”
While Frank did that, Caryn showed up with a plate of food.
“Adrienne said you missed breakfast.”
I really didn’t want to know what those two talked about this morning; I was just happy to see Caryn was taking care of me. While I ate, the guy from the studio showed up.
“I have your talking points for you,” he said, handing me thirty pages.
I just smiled and thanked him. Caryn chuckled when I sat them on the floor while I scanned the ones Frank had given me. I was happy when Bree came down and joined us.
“You ready to do this?” I asked as I put my hand up for a high five.
She rolled her eyes and then snagged my last piece of bacon.
“You bitch!” I said.
Frank hurried over.
“David,” he hissed.
I looked around and saw that several of the press contingent had shown up. Oops. We were ushered in, and Bree looked at me funny when she saw my mug on the wall.
“I hope you don’t expect us to do all the interviews in here.”
“Of course I do. I look awesome.”
“We’ll do some in my room,” she said, leaving no room for doubt.
Frank came in.
“Craig declined. I’ll send the first one in,” he said.
“Dick,” Bree said under her breath.
“Shhh,” I said as a young gal came in.
The studio guy hustled in and took a seat behind the camera. Frank and Caryn had to each get themselves a chair.
“Each of these sessions is twenty minutes,” the studio guy said.
“I guess we should get started,” our interviewer said.
“There’s a process I follow with acting,” I said, getting very serious.
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. After about a minute, Bree nudged me.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“You know I have to meditate for twenty minutes before I do a scene,” I said as if I were irritated, and closed my eyes again.
“But I only have like fifteen more minutes,” our interviewer whined.
“Oh, sorry. You should start asking us questions then,” I said and smiled.
Bree turned into my straight man for the rest of the day. I would get bored and say something goofy, or my interviewers would say something so outrageous I would just go with it, and Bree giggled.
“I just did an interview with Mark Ruffalo, and he told me that the Hulk was going to space,” the interviewer said, at which point I showed my confusion. That caused Bree to snort.
“I’m just curious if you would like the Hulk to join you on your next Star Academy movie. And if he did, how you would think he and Stryker would get along,” she finished.
“Oh, well, hmmm. Uhm, I didn’t, uh, I uh,” I stalled, and then got it together. “I hadn’t heard that. Uh …”
I looked at Bree and could see her shoulders shaking as I tried to come up with an answer.
“I would love to work with Mark Ruffalo. He’s a very believable Hulk,” I said.
“He plays Bruce Banner, not the big green guy,” Bree helped.
“Oh, well, I liked him too. How they would interact with each other, uh, I would guess that would be up to the writers. If I were to guess, Stryker would kick his butt, or maybe I could teach the Hulk how to dance.”
“I can see it now. In the future, you win battles with dance-offs,” Bree shared.
In another interview, I felt like I was in the twilight zone. The guy was weird with a capital ‘W.’
“Hey, how you doing, I’m Bert Carlson?” he asked and held out his hand to shake.
He hung onto my hand and continued to shake it.
“I’m so excited to meet you, David,” he said.
“Uh, me too.”
Bree had an amused expression when he completely ignored her. I ended up having to jerk my hand out of his.
“Can you do me a really personal favor?” he asked.
“Uh, I’m not sure if I should.”
He pulled his phone out and started to dial.
“Can you talk to my mom and tell her I just came out of the closet?” he asked.
Was this guy serious? I looked at Bree, and she snorted, covered her face, and wouldn’t look at me. That was when I figured out he was pranking me.
“I would love to,” I said.
He handed me the phone, and it really said ‘Mom,’ so I was no longer sure. We got her voicemail.
“Hey, Bert’s mom, this is David. He wanted me to call you and let you know that he’s gay. When you get a chance, give him a call so you two can talk about it,” I said.