The First Assistant by Clare Naylor, Mimi Hare Read Free Book Online Page A

addicts?” he asked, as though he recognized us from the milling throng.
    “Yes,” Jason said and stood to attention, animated for the first time all day.
    “Me too,” the guy said as he lit his own cigarette and took a painfully long inhale, during which time empires must have risen and fallen for Jason.
    “What did you think?” Jason asked eventually, in what he clearly thought was a measured way but in reality made him sound a little like a psychopath.
    “I thought it was a piece of shit,” the guy said plainly. Jason and I stared at him, unable to comprehend the magnitude of what he’d just said. I wanted to tear his cigarette from his fingers and stub it out on his tongue. Jason just blinked.
    Later, after our sixth whiskey each at St. Nicks, a dark dive bar on Third, Jason’s eyes began to focus again. Until now they’d been glazed and stared longingly ahead at the innumerable bottles of hard liquor be-hind the bar.
    “The thing is, you can’t expect a guy like him to know what he’s talking about. This is an Academy Award–winning movie, Jason. I know it.” “No, it’s not; it’s a piece of shit. That’s what it’ll say on the posters if
    it ever gets released. Which it won’t, but it would if it did. From the director of that piece of shit, Sex Addicts in Love. ”
    “Every genius is misunderstood,” I said flatly as I waved my arm in the air to indicate to the bartender that he should bring us another round.
    “Not driving are you, honey?” the campy guy asked as if he was my mother.
    “Oooh no, I’m not driving. I can’t even find my legs, let alone my car,”
    I reassured him. “Will you just call us a cab when the time comes?” I slurred.
    “Right. I’ll call one now, then.” He nodded pertly and promptly went over to his phone.
    “Asssshhhhole,” I told Jason. “If I want to get blind drunk, then I will. My best friend is in trouble.” And as I said this, Jason turned to me and looked at me as if for the first time in his life.
    “Oh my God, Lizzie. That’s it,” he said. “What’s it?”
    “You’re my best friend. I’m yours. You’re the most loyal girl in the world. And you’re beautiful. And.. .”
    “Whoa there, Jase the Ace. I have a boyfriend,” I reminded him primly.
    “No, I don’t wanna fuck you,” he said as an appalled look flashed across his face.
    “Oh.” I deflated.
    “I wanna make you a producer on my movie.” His eyes shone in the seedy darkness.
    “Again?” I asked.
    “Yes. Again. And again and again,” he said as the bartender arrived with our check and looked quite jealous at what Jason was planning to do to me. Four times.
    “Your cab’s waiting,” the bartender said curtly as Jason handed over a wedge of cash.
    “The Agency, please,” Jason said to the driver as we clambered into the waiting cab. “On Beverly.”
    “What are you talking about?” I said. “I don’t have to be at work un-til tomorrow morning.”
    “What time does Katherine Watson finish work?” he asked me as we closed the cab doors and sped along Third.
    “Late.” I shrugged vaguely. “Exactly.”
    “Lizzie, I should have known all along that you were my champion and that to capriciously kick you off this movie would be bad karma for the project.”
    “Oh come on, Jason, I don’t mind one bit,” I said as we arrived outside The Agency and Jason threw yet more cash at the driver and pulled me through the front doors of the building. It felt very weird arriving at my place of work, not just at nine P . M . but also smashed. And it wasn’t until the elevator doors opened on my very floor that I suddenly started to panic.
    “I can’t get out,” I said as Jason tugged at my arm. “I have business to do,” he barked.
    “Jason. No.” I dug my feet into the ground like a mule, so in the end he had to drag me bodily along the carpet.
    “Come on, baby.”
    “It’s okay for you. You’re a director, you can get away with being hammered and behaving