A Long Way From Here
6
They'd started first thing at Buckingham Palace with a single camera carried by their most competent cameraman. Technically he supposed they should have applied for a permit before filming there, but they'd been there and gone in twenty minutes, just long enough to see the changing of the guard and to get a few good shots of 'Colin' showing it off to 'Erin.' Sonny had been just as delighted as her character should have been, which Chad figured was nothing short of amazing.
He'd learned how to spend sleepless nights and still be presentable for shooting before dawn; he never expected it from Sonny. But then, Chad was never quite sure what to expect from Sonny. For all he knew her time earning her theatre degree had been populated by sleepless nights and full days of class. His stalking hadn't included learning everything about her life between then and now. Just why she'd left Hollywood and him.
But she was there for the days outline at nine and when shooting and her interest in the tidbits of fact he'd fed her as they watched the Corps of Drums escort the change had done little more than endear her further. She'd been fascinated when he'd pointed at the color marches along the Mall and explained that they used different ones when the queen was in residence.
When she'd learned that the queen was the smile she'd given him had lit up his morning more than the sun was already shining. It never failed to amaze him the power of her smile and, for just a few moments, he could almost pretend that she was his sunny Sonny from when they'd been teenagers again. Only this time he wasn't struck with the desire to pick and poke at her just to get her attention.
He already had. Even if it was just for a film.
The little hesitance that had been there at the start was gone and Chad was grateful like that. It almost seemed like giving her a free pass, letting it lie as it had at three in the morning, but Chad wasn't really going try and hash everything between them out before a full day of shooting. Especially since the shooting was practically stalking (in his mind) for all of the friendly and romantic scenes around London that the film was going to call for.
Granted, more than half of it was going to be utter garbage, and another quarter would be cut for minor artistic issues. In the end Chad figured it would take a miracle for more than five minutes of it to be used. Such was the life of a filmmaker. At least Chad would have a say in what stayed and what went, because he had a few ideas up his sleeves that he hadn't told Owen or Sonny about, to try and make the most out of the day.
He was certainly taking advantage of the days film schedule to give Sonny an informal tour of his adopted home—and it was pretty important to him that she love it as much as he did since he considered London his primary residence. Of course, he didn't really want to admit to himself why he needed her to love it so much, but he did know nonetheless.
To sweeten the hectic schedule of costume changes and headlong rushing through the London throngs Chad had even brought his own bit of spending money. He knew that she was working on limited fund (not that he was prying, but why else would she be living with him instead of finding her own space?) and when the crew moved from Buckingham to Camden Market in time for the early lunch crowd he spent an entire hour of the filming taking her into shops and showing her the booths and buying her a few trinkets under the guise of the scene.
He'd tell her later that they were hers to keep, especially the pretty silver bracelet with the blue glass jewel. He'd have to get her to wear it when they moved scene again, he decided as he ushered her to the Lock Market on the canal.
"This is amazing, Chad," she told him as they paused just inside. "Why don't they have places like this in the States?"
He chuckled a little. "I'm pretty sure they do, but I've never been personally." He slipped an arm around her as Jason with the camera moved around to the right. "I usually get mobbed the second I step foot out of my house over there. It's a lot more laid back here."
"It is different," she agreed before dragging him to one of the tables set out with vegetables and fruit.
He just followed her, content to let her lead the way as he rambled on about anything he might know about Camden and the shops there. They ended up in the Levi's Centre next to the Doc Martens front; she bought a pair of jeans that Chad swore he'd pay for and she threatened to kick his shins in. so he let that one go in favor of being able to bribe her with something from Harrods before they hit the Eye.
She wore blue in Camden with black jeans, was shoved into a green sweater and a gray skirt when they toured around Big Ben. "Did you know that if you live the right distance away you can hear the clock chime thirteen on New Years and then again on the television?" he asked her. She shook her head in disbelief and he laughed and pressed a casual kiss to her hair.
Covent Gardens was a little different and took more time than either he or Owen had planned on because of a street performer in the midst of a show. At least half of it was on film and it took Chad and Owen half an hour to talk the man around to signing a waiver in the event the footage was used. He finally consented when Chad, ever the savvy entrepreneur, pointed out that it was like free advertising on movie screens across the world. Neither man mentioned that widespread screenings were still not a done deal.
But inside Covent, Sonny was fascinated with everything, especially the flowers. Chad made another mental note to take her to the flower market on a day they weren't shooting just to buy her something pretty and flowering. At this rate, he thought wryly, I'll be lucky to remember who I am much less all of the places I want to show her.
But they shopped through Covent and then he took her outside to the market area under nothing but air and arched glass. She was in yellow now and the light just danced along her skin and hair. Owen, Chad knew, must be rolling with giddiness over the footage he was getting. Colin was a distant thought in his mind but he was still following Sonny around like a love stricken sop.
Chad let them be wrapped into coats for a quick tour outside of Parliament before moving to Trafalgar Square and the massive fountain there. The sun was beginning to head towards setting and Chad didn't need to check his watch to know that it was nearing four. He'd made the suggestion to put Sonny in red; the thin sweater clung to her like her own skin.
"You look beautiful, you know," he said after a moment of watching the cascade. Chad wasn't sure if she heard him over the crowds of people and tourists around. He wasn't sure if he wanted her to hear; he was half afraid that she would think it was Colin speaking to Erin and not Chad to Sonny. He was half afraid she would know that he meant it, all of it, with everything he was.
The shy sidelong smile she gave him wasn't really reassuring, nor was the hand that reached for his, threading her slender fingers through his own. That was too much like Erin for him, but Chad took it gratefully, not willing to let a chance to touch her pass.
"You're very good at this," she finally said at length. Sonny's fingers were tight in his as Chad let his thumb trace circles on her palm.
"I should be," he informed her. "I'm an actor."
She sent a ghost of a smile his way then leaned against him for a moment. "So you must have all of your female costars weak at the knees with five word sentences."
This part would wind up cut. Chad knew it as the surprise raced across his face. "By saying they're beautiful? Not at all, they hear it all the time. Don't you?" The earnestness in his voice was equally surprising, but Chad couldn't believe that Sonny wasn't well aware of her beauty.
Fine cream skin, sable dark hair, and eyes that you could drown in? Any man, and some women for that matter, would tell her constantly how lovely she was. He told her so and Sonny pulled away from him.
"You'd think that, I'm sure," she told him as she moved to sit on the edge of the massive fountain and sat. "You're the first person who's told me that in a long while."
"Well that's utter shit," Chad blurted out. Sonny's head jerked up, startled eyes wide as he reached out to her and pulled her up. "You're beautiful, you're gorgeous, and anyone who says otherwise or fails to tell you that at least a hundred times a day is a fucking moron."
She stared at him for a moment and Chad realized how close she was, practically pressed up against his body as he stared heatedly at her. "Um, thanks?" She breathed the words out and then chuckled. "I bet Owen's glad that there's going to be sound editing for all of this." She flushed red and Chad let out a laugh.
"Yeah. I'm sure he is." Then he leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to her mouth.
She tasted like the coffee she'd inhaled while they'd travelled to the Square, like the lip gloss Jennifer in costumes must have painted on her lips, but under that Chad could taste the Chapstick that he'd seen Sonny carry around in her purse or her pocket. It was strange, but as Chad pulled back, wondering what Sonny was going to do to him, he knew that he was going to buying a tube of that Chapstick before they made it back to his flat tonight.
For a long few minutes she didn't do anything but watch him with wary eyes, one hand brushing fingers across her lips, the other clenched in his shirt. Then she stepped back and turned away.
"You're very good at that, Chad," she told him. Then she strode back past the camera. Chad heard her telling Owen that she needed a break. He just stood there.
Owen was bound to be pissed about this and Chad wasn't looking forward to what he would have to say. His fears weren't quite founded though, because Owen only strolled over, his viewfinder in hand as he appeared to be considering shots.
"Do you have any idea what you're doing, mate?" Owen asked as he sighted through the lens without looking at Chad.
Chad's eyebrows lifted, a sarcastic comment ready to come out.
"Because if you're going to tell me that whole scene was for the courtesy of the camera I'm going to have to call you a liar."
"Well, fuck," Chad exhaled.
Owen smirked. "Well, said, Coop. When she comes back try and remember her name is Erin, not Allison or Sonny or anything but that. I'll have Natalie talk to her so we can get this finished. I want to get to the eye before the sun sets. We won't need ambient light in Harrods and the West End is always best at night."
"Bastard," Chad groused halfheartedly.
"Prick would be more like," Owen corrected him with a smug smile. "Tell her about the pigeons when we start shooting again. That ought to give us some good raw film."
Chad resisted the urge to flip Owen off as he sauntered back to Jason. Directing was in the man's blood. He'd already let the little… Spat? Would that be what it was called? Whatever it was, it wasn't on Owen's mind anymore as he talked to Jason and framed desired angles with his hands, checking and rechecking with the viewfinder. Only in the busy heart of London could a man be directing a scene in a movie with barely an eye batted.
When Sonny came back out she was freshly glossed, hair smooth around her face and eyes distant. Chad sighed. It was going to be a long afternoon.
xXx
Jennifer put Sonny back in blue for the Eye. Chad refused to complain because he'd told Jennifer that Sonny needed to wear the bracelet he'd bought in Camden. It was a good segue for the montage, once it was printed, since it would obviously show Colin buying it for Erin. It was fitting that Erin was wearing it now, especially since Chad had Owen's blessing to kiss her again.
He was looking forward to that one a great deal more than he should. It irked Chad that he couldn't tell if Sonny was at all, one way or the other.
"So you expect me just to walk onto it and let it take me hundreds of feet up in the air?" she was asking him. Sonny hands were in an iron grip around his wrist. If he could have been amused at her nerves Chad might have laughed, or just teased her into annoyance so that she would forget the part where she was four-hundred feet in the air. As it was he was still trying not to look too pleased at the way the fading sun made the blue glass shine prettily against her shirt.
"Chad," she hissed. "Are you serious? I have to go on this thing?"
"Hundreds of people do it every day, Sonny-girl," he pointed out. "I'm sure that the imp of the perverse isn't waiting for you to hop on before making it tumble into the Thames."
"Why did you have to say that?" she almost wailed.
"Come on, Sonny." Chad pulled her hands from his wrist and wrapped her arm around his. "It's easy, you just step on and enjoy the view. Nothing simpler."
Sonny grumbled as she followed him uneasily. "Falling into the Thames is a lot simpler."
This time Chad couldn't find any way to stop the laugh. "After all of the money they've invested in this, I doubt we're going to be taking a swim. Come on, Sonny. We can't start filming till we're all on."
Her eyes were clenched closed but Chad paid it no mind as he took her to one of the ends of the oval carriage. "I can distract you really well. It'll put you to sleep. It's like geometry, just without the math."
One eye cracked open. "Did you really just say that?"
"Mmhm. I say things like that all the time."
"So you sound stupid all the time?"
Chad poked her nose. "Touché, funny-Sonny. Insulting me is only going to make me tell you exactly how high we're about to go."
She whimpered.
"Alright, moving on." As the carriage rose in the air Chad slipped behind her, his arms wrapping around her waist. The camera started rolling as soon as they cleared the first twenty feet, but Chad ignored it in favor of distracting the tense woman in his arms.
"So I've shown you the bright side of London so far, but the Eye itself has a really sordid history, did you know that?" He didn't wait for an answer, just continued to plow on ahead. The story of the rent raising for one of the land a single strut was on did much to take her mind away from it, and by the time they reached the top Sonny was relaxed. He smiled and pressed his lips to the smooth skin of her neck just above the collar of the blue shirt.
"Now that you're not scared to death, look," he told her. The way she breathed in at the sunset from the Eye made knowing the useless information he'd just imparted worth the boredom that had driven him to learn it years before.
"It's beautiful."
He couldn't have agreed more, but Chad didn't say anything, just held onto her and laid his head against hers as he watched the sun sinking. She sighed and Chad almost jumped when her hands dropped to cover his at her waist.
"Do you remember that thing with James?" He nodded with his chin pressed in to her shoulder. "It was so over the top. We're much better at it now."
xXx
He still had to find a way to tell her that tomorrow would be a non-shooting morning, a lunch scene in the afternoon, and a love scene after the sun set for the night. Oh, that was going to go over so well. They'd known each other again for barely a week, been on truly friendly terms for less than that, and they already had to play to passion and love.
Actually, Chad wasn't worried about doing it himself so much as how she would take the news. He should never have listened to Owen when the man had told him to tell her "It'll come better from you, Coop, you've known her for years." Bullshit. And he was going to have to break it to her without letting it slip how much he was looking forward to it. Sure, it would be utterly fake on her part. He had faith that it wouldn't appear so.
He just really hoped that no one, Owen included even if his friend had to have suspicions by now, and Sonny especially, realized that it wasn't mere acting on his part.
He pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind as he slipped an arm around her waist. She leaned into him as if she was completely infatuated with him as he smiled. "And this is Harrods," he instructed her as he ushered her inside, the cameras rolling as Owen and the much beleaguered Jason followed them in.
"I have it on good authority that you can buy anything here, up to and including masochistic goats if you want one."
"Oh, god," she laughed at him. "That's insane. And oh my god, it's so expensive here! Is that tie really a hundred pounds?"
He hmm'd and leaned over to inspect the tag on it. "It's Hermes. And it's a hundred and seven pounds."
"That's what? Two hundred American?"
"More like a hundred and seventy-five."
"Oh. A big difference. Do people actually pay that much for a tie?" Chad shrugged a she fingered the material.
"Ooh, pretty," she suddenly squealed, every bit the girl he'd known five years ago as she saw a table of scarves and headed for them, dragging him along as her hand automatically slid to his to pull.
"You're such a girl," he teased, and she huffed before ignoring him in favor of the bright colors.
"So do these get worn as actual scarves?" she asked him, a bright red and orange one in her hands as she slid her fingers along the smooth silky material. "They're awful thin. How do you keep your neck warm?"
"These are more for fashion, not for warmth."
"Oh." Her eyes glanced up at him. "Wisconsin girl. I'm used to scarves being for cold weather."
Chad pulled the scarf from her hands before looping it around her neck and letting it slide down her shoulders and back. It settled on her waist and he held his hands together as if to tie it off. "They've got lots of uses, even if it's just decoration. At your waist if you're wearing a dress or a long sweater."
She bit her lip as he slipped the scarf loose and then draped it over her hair. "You can use them to hold your hair back, or just to accent it. This color is amazing on yours."
It was slight, but he could see her pulse beating faster against her neck. The kiss that Owen had told him to give her on the Eye, the kiss that he hadn't, rested heavy in Chad's mind.
"But it's still the height of fashion to wear it at the neck," he told her, trying not to think about how soft he was talking to her, the need that ached through his veins.
The scarf was too delicate in his hands as he tugged on it a little, the loose fabric at the back of her neck sliding forward until she came with it, closer to him as he lowered his head infinitesimally. In that moment Chad didn't really care that there was a camera filming them, that he was supposed to be Colin, Sonny was supposed to be Erin, and that they were supposed to be acting.
When his lips met hers for the second time that day he stifled the needy groan in the back of his throat as he kissed her, trying for all the world not to frighten her, not to make her want to tell him to stop. She didn't, her mouth moving under his and her hands coming to rest at his hips, the sweater he was wearing bunched in her hands and her nails gripping his sides.
She was kissing him back. Or she was kissing Colin. He didn't much care, really. All he could think that was that she was a damned good actress, and how much he wished she weren't.