Plus Size Love

* Locked in *

"- COULD YOU AT LEAST PRETEND THAT YOU'RE INTERESTED AT GETTING OUT OF HERE?!?"

Oh boy...

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy…

He is screaming again. Breath in... Breath out...

I force my eyes open slowly, millimeter by millimeter while remembering myself to count till ten. I was resolved to use my soft but reassuring voice, one more time... Just one more time, before giving up to the dark side.

"Liam... I already told you a few times... I do want to get out...."

"- SO WHY YOU ARE SITTING THERE WITHOUT DOING NOTHING?!"

I could feel my hands immediately getting strained and colder, now just the tips of my fingers were touching the soft carpet where I was sitting with my legs crossed at a meditative posture. My shoulders, relaxed a few seconds before, were now stiff and tensed up. I let out all the air I was holding in at once. Yeah... That's it, time to draw some boundaries here.

"LIAM! STOP. SCREAMING. WITH. ME!"

I watched his body give a little jump. Well, hello, hello mister. Yes, I know how to scream as well. Surprised?

I could tell he was not expecting something like this coming from me by his startled eyes and hanged open jaw. Normally I am a peaceful person and I really don't like to scream like that... but there are moments in life when you just need to do it. And what I can say, I did had some practice in these 30 years.

A little part of my heart got soft when I noticed that big sky-blue eyes staring at me... He seemed as lost as a little boy... Hard to imagine, believe me. A six feet tall, massive men, almost pouting. That was how much this whole situation was affecting him. And God! How someone could be so damn handsome even stressed and sweating like a pig? How? That was so unfair!

"Liam, I told you already!" I spit everything out in one shot, showing him and counting my fingers while I was speaking. "One, I don't know how to open this door. She locked you... us... here. Two, we don't have the key. Three, this room is soundproof. There is no meaning at screaming for help. Four, I don't have house breaker skills. And five, you are acting like a jerk by the way... "

His eyes dropped down and he stared at the floor, his hands hiding inside his trouser's pockets. I could say he was regretting all the screaming act by the way that his shoulders slowly curved down. It took a few moments before he let out a deep sigh, heavily leaning his back against the wall. I could have stopped there but I was too angry.

"Do you know what?" I kept going. "I'm putting a lot of effort right now just to stay calm, it is not like I’m enjoying to be locked here either. We need to relax, there is nothing we can do now. I'm sure someone will come and set us free, as soon as they realize they can't find you..."

"I'm sorry.” He sighed again. “I don't like to be locked... It makes me irrational." He almost whispered.

His eyes were strongly closed, eyebrows twitching. I could see the beads of sweat running down his temples even from across the room. It was starting to seem clear to me that there was something else happening, he was almost having a panic attack. I could bet that there was a painful background story going on there, as I observed him slid to the floor and rest his head on both hands while folding his knees. 

Yep. Definitely.

But, what was it? 

What could be affecting him that much?

I have been working around this guy for a couple of weeks now, not really close... Just now and then, reading the scenes with the cast before shooting the scenes, when someone at the set had a doubt about the script, or if the director wanted to make some last-minute changes at one of the scenes... So I couldn't say I knew him well enough.  But he always seemed confident and centered. Seeing him like this was surprising and was starting to make me really worried. 

It was true that we have been locked here for a couple of hours now, no signal at our phones, no food available... no water. What a f*****g awesome day to decide to skip lunch, Gen! I was already hungry before I got locked here... 

But I needed to try to not panic and find the silver lining... the air conditioning was working so we had no need to worry about suffocating, the lights were still on... that was good too. Someone would come to look for us soon. Please, please, please God. Make someone come to look for us soon.

Well, of course, they would not be looking for me specifically. But for sure someone would notice that "the Liam Levitt", the star of the movie, had suddenly disappeared and couldn't be found anywhere. So my current ability to stay calm was kind of relying on that. In the end, all this would be about having some patience until someone come to release us.

I inhaled deeply and slowly started to unfold my legs from the lotus pose, taking my sweet time massaging them until their sensitivity returned to normal and I could walk again.

I started to move in his direction. Well... What the hell you do in a scenario like this one? If that was one of the scenes in a movie... How to bring a comic relief at this moment? Because we surely needed one! Come on, brain... Let's use our power.  Maybe making fun of the situation could help a little... just a little dose of laughter.

The idea came to me all of a sudden.

"I didn’t want to say anything, you know? But that's a little bit melodramatic don't you think?"

His head shot up really quick and he stared at me.

"What?!"

"Oh, come on!” I said pausing dramatically. “All this sliding towards the wall till the ground and getting huddled on the floor “”thing””. - I exaggerated making a silly gesture with my hands encompassing all of him while showing in my face that I was clearly mocking him. -  “I know you're an amazing actor and all… always in need to express all this amazing talent that you have. But come on, there is no reason to over do it, buddy. It's just me and you here..." I couldn't stop the soft grin that appeared at my face while pointing to myself and to him even if I wanted to. 

It was like seeing a balloon inflating. His posture changed, his back straightened and his head was up again. He stretched one leg onto the floor, his elbow resting on the knee that was still bent. He looked at me sideways, his eyes narrowing slightly while a little smile was forcing its way out.

"So let me see if I got that right? Are you calling ME melodramatic?!"

"Well, yessss..." I said holding my hands behind my body like a little sassy girl. "But shouldn't you try to focus on the part I said you're an amazing and very talented actor instead?"

The sound of his husky laugh reverberates through my body sending shivers through my column. We both smiled in silence at each other for a few seconds. I allowed myself to admire all the details of his chiseled face, squared jaw,  the light honey shade of his blond hair knotted in a men bun, his furry eyebrows, and abnormally long (at least for a guy) eyelashes. 

Wow. I probably will need to… No, no.

What am I thinking? Risk that.

I will DEFINETELY need to put some effort at not forgetting how to breathe while I'm so close to this guy. It's not that I'm feeling nervous or anything like that, after all, I have been working in the movie-making industry for a while now and was already kind of get used to see famous people around me all the time. It's just that he was one of these few ones that have this "aura" of charisma and empowerment that simply draws you in. It takes a lot of concentration to be around people like that and don’t act like an i***t, trust me… I learned in the worst way.

 I slowly knelt beside him and dared to lightly squeeze his forearm noticing in the process how sticky and cold his skin felt. It was my turn of frowning my eyebrows showing a concerned expression. The words were out of my mouth even before I realized.

"You are not well, are you?"

"Not feeling great right now... No." He said with a sad smile avoiding my eyes.

"Do you know that soon someone is going to realize that you are missing and they will start to search everywhere, right? Don’t worry that much. I'm counting with all your fame and glory  to take me out of this one." I did put some irony on my words about his fame and glory and rolled my eyes to make sure he would be aware of my attempt of lightening the mood again. He got it in a second and rolled his eyes as well. Humph. Handsome and intelligent.  "We are going to be fine, this is more like a test of patience. That's why I was so relaxed. The meditation pose was just me showing off a little..."

He laughed softly again, looking directly into my eyes, putting his cold palm on top of my own hand that was STILL on his forearm. Damn Gen! For how long are you going to keep his hands on him?! Get a hold on yourself! As subtly as possible I slid my hand off his arm, secretly hoping that he wouldn’t notice my sudden discomfort.

"It's Genevieve, right?" –He asked softly and I confirmed with a slight movement of my head completely stunned that he already got my name in such a short time working together, where normally he has dozens of different people floating around him every day. Uhm... Weird. - "I know you're trying to cheer me up... and I appreciate it.  The point is, though... As I believe you are aware of, that all the staff and the cast were meant to leave this house two hours ago... Using the helicopters, because as you also know, we are currently in the middle of nowhere...  So if nobody came till now, it's because we are the only ones left behind. That means that nobody is coming to free us..."

"No." - I laughed with his weird idea - "There is no way of something like this being even possible to happen. They have the checklists to guarantee that everybody got at the helicopters, if all the material and equipment was packed, it's the standard procedure every time we finish shooting at an isolated location! It was exactly why I ended here at the wrong place and the wrong time! I had my own checklists to take care of before we could leave. And oh! Come on! There is no way they would let YOU behind... It’s you that we are talking about! " I spoke pointing my free hand in his direction.

He looked at me and frowned.

"Look, I think you are overestimating how important I am in the big picture. And did you already forgot how we got stuck here in the first place?"

"Of course not!" I reacted in a snap. That would be something I wouldn't forget that easily. "But she… She couldn't do something like this..."

"Trust me." He pinched his nose, starting to breathe quicker. "Me and her, we are not in a relationship, but we have been dating for a while now... I got to know Camille well enough by this point... She could for sure pull off something like this. She knows how to convince people of anything she wants them to believe."

"But how?" It was hard to imagine how a young girl like her could trick the staff... 

"As simple as saying that I left at any of the previous flights, and probably someone forgot to mark my name... After all, everybody knows by this point that I don't have a personal assistant ant that we are having a "fling". She is young, but she IS a good actress." 

My jaw dropped in a mix of denial and surprise while the meaning of what he said started to sink in.

"That f*****g b***h! Oh.... " – When I noticed what I just had said, I quickly covered my mouth with my hand in a conditioned habit, it's never wise to say things like this about the people you're working with. It just creates a lot of unnecessary troubles and I will not even mention all the gossip that can explode around if you are diligent about that. I felt my face getting warm, I was probably blushing now. - "I'm sorry!"

"Don't be! She. is. a. f*****g. b***h!" - he said with the anger bringing back some color to his face.- "God help me when I see that little prick again... I... She... Uhhhhgrrrrr!" 

The tension on his body and his hands going into this claw weird shape was enough to give me a clear idea of what he would do to her if he could. I must say that for his own good I was happy that she was not anywhere around us.

We both got silent for a moment. A thousand things were going through my mind at the same time in light speed. If his theory was right... Damn, we would have a big problem... In theory, no one would be at the house for the whole weekend... But maybe after that, someone would pass by the house to check if the house was damaged in some way. If that really happened we could be locked here for at least 50 hours, maybe more.

We wouldn't die.

Would we?

No. No… No?! Right?!

At least I think we wouldn't, of course, we wouldn't be in good condition either. But we would at least survive. My mind was going crazy, I had to control myself or we would be two having a panic attack. Ok. Breath in, breath out. Relax for God’s sake! Yes, we would survive.

There are people that stay in the ocean, with no water under a boiling hot sun, no food and they survive. Yes! We can handle this. I felt so happy when my brain came up with this old piece of information. But…

And if nobody comes on Monday? And if anyone comes at all?! And what I’m going to do if I need to go to the bathroom…. Oh, please. This can’t happen!

All the implications of what could happen were starting to freak me out. Unconsciously I began to mumble to myself, letting my bump touch the ground in very an unflattering movement.

I wasn’t able to stop myself from blabbering like a crazy person. "f**k, f**k, fuck..."  I was freaking out.

"Always a good idea of how to spend the time." He grinned at me. "If you know what I mean..."