RITA

"Morning," I greet.

"Top of the morning to you," Yvette replies, a hint of snarkiness in her voice, but I can't tell if she's being sarcastic or just making a joke.

Katie grimaces next to me, and I decide that she was probably still hung up about my fake-drunken-ess.

I quickly settle down and start the table read.

"Reagan,about camping…" I start the awkward scene with Yvette.

Surprisingly, Yvette picks up without a beat, almost as if…almost as if nothing at all happened between us.

"Why does your voice sound like that?" Monreal reads off the script.

"Like what?"

"Like you're gonna back out of this trip. Am I moving too fast? Camping is one stop away from U-Haul," Yvette says, delivering her lines in a convincing fashion.

Well, two can play at this game.

Katie pulls me aside after the table read.

"What is your problem? You did NOT mention any sort of mouth on mouth contact?" Stevens demands, looking across my back at Yvette and Greg happily chatting away.

"Well…." I stutter.

"Can you please, just come clean to her?" Katie begs.

I scowl.

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes."

"No, she has a Matador co-star she likes."

"I highly doubt that."

"You are a pain."

Katie allows a grin to slip through, but proceeds to shove me gently.

"MAN UP, RITA. Otherwise you're really going to regret it."

I drive my car and park it next to Yvette's ride while I wait for her to return to her car.

10 minutes later, she strides in, completely ignoring the fact that I was sitting in the car, waiting for her.

"Monreal!" I shout.

"Oh, sorry. I kind of have a phobia for car windows now? Never know when people might just stick their head out and kiss you eh?" she says snidely.

"I was drunk."

Yvette looks at me and snorts.

"Sure you were, shrimp girl."

"Well, you weren't exactly honest about your feelings either, Miss Matador."

I can see her roll her eyes.

"Screw you, Rita. At least I don't go around kissing people and then pretending like it never happened."

"What am I supposed to say?" I shout angrily.

"Just f*cking admit that you like me already, damn it!" Yvette yells.

I pause.

"I can't."

I can't admit that I like her out loud because then this all becomes real. It's no longer some on-screen role. It becomes larger than just a television show. It becomes real and I can't handle that because it's… it's scary to like someone so much.

"Here's the deal, Rita," she says, emphasizing on my name, "I like you. I like you more than you know. I couldn't go home with Rachel because of you. And now that my feelings are out in the open, you either reciprocate them, dismiss them or live with them."

I am shocked by the honesty of her words.

I look at her and her eyes are begging me to say something. Anything. If I reciprocate her feelings, she'll get out of her car and into mine. If I dismiss them, she'll pretend like all of this never happened and we just might be able to go back to being great friends. If I don't choose, then…

I'm possibly buying myself some time to think this through.

"I'll live with them," I say.

Yvette sighs, rolls her eyes and pulls on her seat belt.

"Life's too damn short to give a damn about people who can't make a decision," she says, as she drives out of the lot.

I start to wonder whether we become the characters we play or if the characters are have simply reflections of our own characters all along.

In the final episode before the mid season break, Carter decides to have some sort of dreamception like scene, where I basically make out with everyone. Katie, Gregg and…Yvette.

We've resigned to be on friendly terms. The shallow kind of friendliness (translation: awkward).

Yvette has another filming to get to, so Carter goes ahead and films my steamy scenes with Gregg first. The all-professional English boy satisfies Covington in a mere twelve takes and happily exchanges places with Katie.

"I love camping," I say for the umpteenth time. Katie and I are terrible at make out scenes since all we do is burst into giggles.

"I know," Katie says in her best smouldering accent, and we complete our take with no giggles, leaving Carter slightly less regretful of his casting choice.

"Hey, I'm here," a familiar voice says, just as Katie whacks me with a pillow.

"Perfect timing. Get changed," Carter says, as I prep for the most awkward scene I'll ever film.