Page 104 of If the World Was Ending

Hunter

Hope you’re good. Take care.

You too. x

He shouldn’t have added a fucking kiss. That was lame. Ridiculous. He could say it was a typo? He was about to type that when Hunter sent one last text.

Hunter

x

Chapter 34

That’s a slippery slope

Colby’s Oscar nomination for Best Original Song in a movie was announced the day Hunter got on a flight to start filming the superhero movie in Croatia. He couldn’t stop smiling as he sat in a baseball cap and shades at the bar of the first-class lounge in Los Angeles. Luckily, a super famous comedian was also in the lounge and not hiding at all, so she drew the attention of the other flyers in the lounge, and Hunter was left alone.

Still, someone would eventually notice the weirdo smiling like a loon at his phone, so he forced himself to relax his face. Then he called Brendan. He’d hired Brendan, an old friend from UCLA, to be his assistant over Christmas. Brendan had taken the film program and had cast Hunter in a lot of his student projects. He’d made a very low-budget horror set in the Catskills, which showed promise on the low-tier festival circuit but hadn’t earned him enough buzz that he’d gotten much more work. He needed the dreaded “day job,” and being Hunter’s assistant was perfect.

“Hey. I need you to do me a favor,” he said when Brendan answered the phone with “Hi, boss.” Which Hunter hated but Brendan loved. “I need you to go into my house and grab the Tupperware marked breakfast burritos out of the freezer.”

“You’re bringing those to Croatia?” Brendan asked, concerned. “I don’t think you can bring eggs into a foreign country. Let me check.”

“No, Bren. I’m already at the airport, so no.” Hunter shook his head. Brendan was actually incredibly competent, but sometimes he sounded like a dummy. “I need you to deliver them, along with a bottle of champagne and orange juice and a note.”

“Okay…”

“Actually buy a card. A blank one, not like a fancy one. And no hearts or shit, got it?”

“Yeah. Sure, boss,” Brendan replied easily. “Today?”

“As soon as possible, yeah. I know it’s barely eight in the morning, but that’s good. He’ll still be home. Probably,” Hunter replied. “I’ll text you the address and the note for the card.”

He hung up with Brendan and immediately called Briar.

“Our boy is a fucking Oscar nominee!” she sang so loudly into the phone as soon as she picked up that Hunter had to pull it back from his ear.

“I know. It’s amazing. I need his address.”

“Oh,” Briar said, her tone settling.

“I’m at the airport, so don’t worry, I’m not going to go over there and fuck anything up. I just wanted to send him a?—”

“8001 Rothdell Trail,” Briar announced, cutting him off. Hunter dug a pen out of his carry-on bag and wrote the address on a cocktail napkin. “And I’m disappointed you’re not going over there. You’re the only thing that would make this day even better for him.”

“We both know that would make it worse. Besides, I’ll be on location for the next long while.”

She just sighed. “What am I going to do with you two?”

“Nothing. We’re living our best lives, Bri,” Hunter reminded her, but his tone was lifeless.

“As long as you’re both happy,” she muttered, each syllable swimming in sarcasm, and then she hung up.

He texted Brendan the address and then the words for the card, which took him a little longer than he’d have liked. He settled on something simple that only Colby would get and that Brendan wouldn’t think was too weird.

The only thing you want more than an Oscar. Now you can have both. Proud of you.

Brendan typed back as soon as Hunter hit send.