Erin Ptah (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ptahrrific) wrote2013-07-11 11:59 pm
ptahrrific) wrote2013-07-11 11:59 pm
Entry tags:
Fake News | ensemble | PG-13 | Shout*For, chapter 13
Title: Shout*For, chapter 13: Don't Look Back
Characters/Pairings: Jon."Stephen", Jimmy, Tina, Olivia+Kristen+Wyatt, Tucker, Brian, cameos, OCs.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: See series Table of Contents.
In which Stephen's friends welcome him home, season finales are filmed, and Olivia focuses hard on everything except her actual problems.
LA, the next day, in the office of MacKenzie McHale.
"Now, before you go to Oregon, we'll need to —"
"Whoa, hang on a second," protested Olivia. Her manager could be scattered sometimes, but she didn't usually forget to let Olivia know about cross-country traveling. "Why am I going to Oregon?"
"Well, because of the contest, of course," said Mac. When Olivia stared blankly at her, she prompted, "The community service contest? Grand prize, Lisa Munn personally visits your school? Did I not mention that the winners were chosen?"
"No, you kinda skipped over that," said Olivia. Now she remembered: she'd filmed both the initial promo videos and the congratulations for the Lisa Munn Rock Your Community! Contest some time last year, and hadn't heard a word about it since. "What was the winning project? Was it good?"
"I certainly hope so." Mac looked between the whiteboard she'd been writing on and the agenda she'd been summarizing, then flipped the agenda over to make sure the project details weren't lurking on the back. No such luck. "Hmm. We'll get you a summary by the time you're on the plane. Any other questions?"
Olivia sat back in her chair. "Nah, we're cool. Continue."
"Yes. Well. As I was saying, before Oregon...." Mac turned back to the whiteboard, added another bullet point, then slashed out the capital letters PURITY RING in green marker. "We get you some new jewelry! Isn't that exciting?"
"Uh, sure," said Olivia, trying not to wince. "Exciting. Just the word I was thinking of."
Her manager broke into an endearing pout. "Oh, surely it isn't all that bad," she said. "You are a healthy and growing young woman, of course, and we appreciate that, but it's not as if we're trying to block you off from all...romantic entanglements. Just look at how supportive we've been of your relationship with Stephen."
"...which you made up," Olivia reminded her.
"But it shows that nobody's going to object to you having a relationship!" said Mac brightly. "And isn't there something romantic and appealing about the idea of these rings? It's the quintessential Disney fantasy, that you're keeping that flame in your heart burning for your One True Love, someone to whom you will be faithful before you've even met them...." A distant look came into her eyes. "...instead of cheating on them with an ex you didn't even like all that much, and ruining the best thing you ever had...." She sniffled.
"You need a tissue?" asked Olivia. There was a box on the corner of Mac's desk, she took it and slid it over.
"Yes, thank you, dear." Mac took a few, dabbed at her wet eyes, and blew her nose.
Olivia looked politely away, and ended up staring at the whiteboard. PURITY RINGS was under GUITAR PRACTICE (she wasn't actually any good at guitar, but her management team hadn't yet given up hope), PHOTOSHOOT (a new set of print ads for Lisa Munn lip gloss), and STAR GIRL REHEARSAL (they finally had the scripts for the season finale), interspersed with BREAK and LUNCH and STUDY* (footnote: *IF TIME).
Sometimes Olivia really missed normal school. Half the kids she worked with had grown up with private tutors (like Stephen), if they hadn't flat-out been "homeschooled", but she had managed to keep attending an honest-to-goodness public school until she was almost thirteen. Sure, parts of it had sucked, but she had at least consistently felt like she was learning something...and her teachers had managed never to spill their personal issues all over class....
...and that was all the time she was going to spend dwelling on it. She was putting her career first, and didn't regret it. Besides, somebody in this room needed to stay focused.
"As I was saying...." Okay, Mac had finally recovered. Phew. "...we have a selection of ring designs here for you to choose from." She handed Olivia a high-res printout covered in images and blocky inscriptions, from the generic to the anviliciously Christian. "It would be particularly lovely if you and Stephen could present them to each other, but of course that depends on whether we can arrange it to look natural."
"Speaking of me and Stephen," said Olivia, as she gave the printout a cursory scan. "Do we have to keep 'walking a dog for a friend'? I mean, it's a little weird, isn't it? Because the gossip blogs think it's weird." It felt weird to her, and she knew that it was technically true, inasmuch as the Star Girl production editor was her 'friend'.
Mac frowned. "Well, I suppose you could just adopt the dog. Although its owners might object."
Olivia made a face. If she didn't have time to learn the fundamentals of biology, she definitely didn't have time to take care of a dog. "I'll pass."
~*~
Jon S.
Having a welcome-back party @ Stephen's. Late flight, so setup starts at 11. You in?
<3 Olivia <3
Wait wait what? is he getting back from Canada?
Jon S.
Didn't he tell you?
<3 Olivia <3
Yeah, just forgot it was now.
<3 Olivia <3
listen boo, this might not b a gr8 idea
<3 Olivia <3
u know how he was not so down w/Canada?
Jon S.
Don't worry, he was over that when we Skyped the other day.
<3 Olivia <3
Well he might still want quiet BFF time 2nite. Not a party. To recover.
Jon S.
Jimmy says a pileon of friends will help, & I trust his Stephen-senses.
Jon S.
But np if you can't make it. We'll give your regards.
Jon S.
Hey did I mention there'll be pie?
<3 Olivia <3
Curse u Jon Stewart u know my greatest weakness
<3 Olivia <3
Im in.
~*~
Jon had his own doubts that they needed quite so many red, white, and blue balloons, but Jimmy insisted that it would be just what Stephen needed.
For a while Jon and Tina blew them up while Jimmy, being the tallest of the three, worked on rigging up a netting to hold them over the front door. Then Steve and Wyatt came along, and Wyatt helped with getting balloons into the netting while Steve applied his impressive lungs to the task of filling them, allowing Jon to make a break for the kitchen and set up the food.
Stephen's father had graciously allowed them to have stuff delivered earlier. He was staying out of their way at this point, although Jon had caught him looking in every now and again, presumably to make sure this gang of rambunctious teenagers didn't destroy any of the nice collector pieces on the walls. He didn't appear to be leaving to meet Stephen at LAX, but that wasn't unusual: whenever they got back from a Shout*For trip, it was only Jimmy, and occasionally Jon, who got personally picked up.
Jon arranged the pie (special delivery from Gloria & Jane's), a couple trays of mini cupcakes, and the cups, and was just working on plates when Olivia and Kristen found him in the kitchen.
"Hey, you," said Olivia, as the pair cornered him. "So, just for the record, when I said 'quiet BFF time,' I was also implying 'quiet BF time'."
"Um," said Jon.
"He's not denying it," said Kristen. She was in a particularly shiny dress, white with stripes of pink, yellow, teal, and lavender. It reminded Jon of a multi-layer ice cream cone.
"No, he isn't," agreed Olivia. She had shown up in a light shirt/cardigan set and jeans, pretty normal fare, although to Jon's unpracticed eye the denim seemed to be clinging tighter than usual.
Jon did a quick scan of the room's entrances, confirmed that there was nobody close enough to eavesdrop, and lowered his voice. "My god, you guys, all we've done is make out. Once. Are there rumors already? How far has this gone?"
Kristen lit up. "I knew he thought you were hot!"
"I don't think anyone else we know has any idea," Olivia assured him. "Kristen, can you run interference for a minute?"
"On it." Kristen relieved a still-blindsided Jon of the stack of plates. "I'll take these!" Humming, she carted them out.
Olivia leaned seriously against the counter she'd backed Jon into. "Yo, I don't want this to feel like jumping down your throat or anything, but. You know how Stephen can be kinda...fragile, sometimes?"
"If you're going to give me the 'don't break his heart or I will cut you' speech, don't worry," said Jon dryly. "Jimmy already took care of it."
"Really?" Olivia looked momentarily impressed. "Didn't know he had it in him."
"Trust me, neither did I. And, listen, the last thing I want to do is...." Jon grimaced, considering what kind of promises he wanted to make about protecting the emotional state of someone who got mortally offended when the snack table featured baby carrots. "I mean, we both know that Stephen gets upset over the dumbest things sometimes, right? But if we're talking about genuinely hurting him...I'd cut off my own arm first."
"Okay, you don't need to go that far," said Olivia quickly. "I just wanted to say, he might be extra fragile about, like...boyfriend stuff, at this point. So this is your official reminder to make sure you're being sensitive and empathetic and whatever."
"I will do my best," said Jon, in all sincerity. He wondered vaguely what 'at this point' meant. Something about being in the middle of a whole fake straight relationship rigmarole, probably.
Olivia patted him on the arm. "Good man. Now, come on, let's get out some forks."
~*~
It was jarring for Stephen to suddenly be surrounded by friends, but a relief once he realized they weren't treating him any differently than usual. Plus, it was never not fun to have a hundred balloons showered on your head.
He would have stayed up longer, but between barely sleeping, working all day, and flying all evening, it had been about the longest day of Stephen's life. After only half an hour of sitting with the crowd around a table, eating all-American apple pie and playing a party game whose name he'd forgotten, he was dead on his feet.
It was Olivia who noticed, and announced that everyone had to go home now.
During the general flurry of ferrying stray dishes to the sink and gathering up belongings, she pulled Stephen into a quiet corner and squeezed his hands. "You're okay, right? Tell me you're okay."
"Fine! Fine," insisted Stephen. When she didn't look convinced, he clamped down hard on all the things he didn't want to think about and admitted, "My favorite cardigan got ruined."
"Sucks," said Olivia sympathetically. "Okay, we're gonna take off, but I just wanted to let you know...me and Kristen caught the thing about Mr. Blue-Eyes-And-Dark-Hair." Her eyes flickered in Jon's direction. "So, congratulations on that."
Stephen's eyes widened. "How did you...? I was very subtle!"
She gave him a quick hug. "Sure you were."
Like a whirlwind almost everyone had blown out of there within a few more minutes, leaving only Jimmy and Jon. After Jimmy had hugged Stephen too, he said he'd see Stephen tomorrow — and yes, he and Jon were taking the same car, but Jon didn't have to leave right this second, Jimmy could just meet him outside.
"Um," said Jon, once they were alone in the front hall. "Sorry if this whole thing was a bad idea."
"It was an okay idea," Stephen assured him. It wasn't his friends' fault he was too tired to have fun properly. "Come here?"
Jon took a step closer and rested his hands on Stephen's shoulders, throwing a nervous glance behind them. "Your dad won't...? He was kinda lurking around giving us all the evil eye earlier."
"He's always asleep by now," said Stephen, tipping his head hopefully toward Jon's.
With a soft sigh Jon's lips closed over his, fingers lacing together around the back of his neck. Stephen wrapped his arms around Jon and leaned into it. Jon was so warm. And so gentle. And he tasted so good — like over-sugared apples.
"We should do this more," Stephen breathed when they parted.
"That was my plan, yeah," said Jon, breaking into his adorable crooked smile. "I'll see you tomorrow too, okay?"
"'Kay," said Stephen. And then, just to press the point home, he dropped an extra kiss on Jon's cheek.
~*~
Olivia and Wyatt, both in their superhero costumes, settled into their best dramatic poses in the middle of a set strewn with extras' bodies. At this point in the finale, their stunt doubles had just finished high-kicking, backflipping, and karate-chopping a small army of the Big Bad's minions. "Nice moves!" exclaimed Olivia, for the second time that afternoon.
"Not so bad yourself," said Wyatt, who never had any trouble sounding naturally relaxed no matter how many takes they'd done.
They both turned back to the figures on the raised walkway above them: the villain, wearing ominous red goggles and a black lab coat, and the victim, a terrified-looking Kristen tied to the railing with a whole lot of stage knots. "You're finished, Doctor Darkness!" declared Olivia. "Turn yourself in quietly, and we'll go easy on you!"
"Not so fast, Star Girl!" cackled "Doctor Darkness". "For you see, I have rigged my machine...to explode! If you follow me, your little friend here will be left to die! Ahahahahaha!" Right on cue, the invisible wires he'd been hooked up to started lifting him off the walkway, carrying him towards the nearest window. (The CGI and sound effects of his rocket boots would be added in later.)
Olivia and Wyatt exchanged a look of shock, then determination. "You disable the machine, Comet Guy," ordered Olivia. "I'll take care of Sadie."
"Cut!" yelled Charlie. "That's it. That was beautiful. Someone get the harness for Lisa, please!"
Wyatt stepped obligingly out of the way, dodging uniformed extras, as one of the techs showed up with Olivia's own set of wires. It was times like this she didn't miss a single thing about her pre-fame life. Sure, this was a far cry from the kind of writing that got you an Emmy nomination, but it was fun. She got to be a five-year-old playing superhero again, and get paid for it, and this time there were a bunch of professionals on hand to lift her into the air.
To make sure she got the fullest enjoyment out of the soaring scene, she hadn't even had any drinks today.
Three takes later, they were pulling her out of the harness up on the platform. "My hero," said Kristen dryly. "Leaving me up here, tied up this whole time, just so you can get some extra flying in."
"Don't question my methods, citizen!" ordered Olivia, ducking to get a strap over her head.
"Hey, keep up that attitude, and I might find some other pop star to be for Halloween."
"We both know you only got that costume to make fun of it," Olivia reminded her. (And it had worked. Olivia had been deeply weirded out over the idea that people were being "her" for Halloween, until Kristen had gotten her to see the whole thing as ridiculous rather than creepy.) "Besides, I deserve some kind of —"
She caught herself held just in time. The harness was all off now; she held still for a minute to let one of the makeup techs fix her hair.
"Some kind of what?" asked Kristen.
Some kind of reward for being so sober, Olivia had been about to say. But that made it sound like her (tiny little bit of) drinking at work was a problem, as opposed to just a thing that made Kristen grouchy. Besides, the climax of the episode was going to involve "Lisa" kissing "Flint", and while Rob Riggle was a nice enough guy, she was still going to need a nip or two to get through it.
"Forget it," she said, and waved over the railing. "We're ready!"
"About time!" called Charlie from the ground. "Places, girls!"
~*~
"Cut!" yelled Craig, for the umpteenth time. Everyone in the fake classroom — Shout*For, Tina, and the usual bunch of extras — slouched in their chairs, a mutter of irritation running through them. Everyone except for Stephen, who had been standing in front of the chalkboard giving a speech. He just went quiet.
The show's final storyline of the year involved the in-series version of Stephen's decision to run for class president. Tina's character, "Taylor", was his main competition, and had leveled the charge that Stephen was way too busy being a pop star to have enough free time to do the job properly. Stephen's counter-argument was to announce that he would keep the workload manageable...by only running for class president of math class.
It was, in Jon's judgment, one of the few genuinely funny things they'd done all season.
Less funny was the way Craig was going off on Stephen. ("What is wrong with your delivery today? You need to enunciate! Stop racing through your speech like you just want to get it over with! How is the audience going to believe you give a damn about this if..." And so on.)
The rest of the cast started trying to spare him some embarrassment by finding other things to look at. In Jon and Tina's case, since they had adjacent desks, it ended up being each other. Jon took the opportunity to lean over and ask, under his breath, "Did the script or something specify to play that as a Sarah Palin impression, or was that all you?"
Tina lit up. "You noticed! No, that was all me. I just thought, okay, my lines are all written real serious, so how do I deliver them in a way that's funny? At least, I hope it's funny. I don't know if it works for viewers who weren't following politics three years ago."
"Well, for what it's worth, I thought it was hilarious," said Jon. He hadn't exactly been a political junkie at thirteen, but his best (only) friend from middle school had been pretty into it. Between that and catching the occasional rerun of The Daily Show, he couldn't help picking a few things up. "And, uh, spot-on. From what I remember, anyway."
Any further conversation was cut off by Craig yelling for everyone to get back into starting positions.
Stephen got through his whole campaign speech without incident this time. He was articulate, he was vivacious, he didn't race through or trip on any of the words...and if to Jon's eye his energy seemed sort of manic, with none of his usual control, well, the viewers probably wouldn't know the difference.
Jon started clapping almost before Stephen had finished. As the rest of the "students" joined in, Stephen broke into a weak grin and took off down one of the aisles, high-fiving the people at the desks he passed.
Until he took a wrong step, barked his shin on one of the desks with a loud bang, and went down, grabbing unsuccessfully at the fake wood desktops around him to break his fall.
"Cut!" shouted Craig, as the cast held its collective breath.
"I'm okay!" called Stephen's muffled voice from the floor.
Jon rocked back in his chair, then forward, trying to get a visual on Stephen through the tangle of desk, chair, and human legs. Two seats ahead of him, Jimmy was doing the same.
"So get up, already!" said Craig.
After several long seconds of Stephen not getting up, Jimmy finally leaped out of his seat. Jon was right on his heels.
They found Stephen pushed halfway up on his elbows, breathing hard. Jimmy dropped to his knees in front of his BFF, who promptly collapsed into his lap. "Hi," he said weakly, reaching for Jimmy's hand. "I don't think I can get up."
"Can we get some water over here?" yelled Jon at the crew. To the frozen actors on either side of them, he added, "Sam, Jason, move your desks over! Let him get some air."
As the cheap desks were dragged across the floor with a screech, Brian shouldered his way into the circle of space opening up around Stephen, water bottle in hand. "Just relax for now," he said as he sank into a crouch at Stephen's side. (Jon could have kissed him for that.) "Lie flat. Are you dizzy? Lightheaded?"
"Wasn't me," mumbled Stephen. "The ground got all wobbly."
"Let's get you on your back, okay? Jon, come on over here and elevate his feet for me." (Jon gave the desk he'd been moving a final shove, and was at Stephen's feet by the time he managed to roll over.) "Does anything hurt? Are you hungry? Thirsty?"
"Tired," breathed Stephen. "Just tired. Gimme...five minutes. And some more coffee."
"No more coffee for you today, young man," said Brian sternly. He rose to his feet and addressed Craig, who had finally had the good grace to come onto the set and get a look at Stephen. "Have everyone take five. Or maybe fifteen."
Shoulder-to-shoulder with Brian, Craig said, "There are other scenes we can film. Stephen isn't in every...please understand, I'm sympathetic, but we're on a tight schedule here, and...."
Jon would have sent him a death glare if he hadn't been so wrapped up in Stephen — who opened his eyes long enough to catch Jon's and give him a hopeful smile before closing them again.
"You're not going to get anything useful out of any of these boys until they know their friend is feeling better," pointed out Brian.
A movement at the corner of Jon's eye caught his attention. He glanced over just long enough to take in Tucker standing awkwardly next to them, hands in pockets. Maybe it really was "any of them" after all.
Craig sighed. "All right, everyone, take five!" he shouted. "Or maybe fifteen! We'll let you know how it goes."
The camera crew and the rest of the cast started flowing out of the studio. Brian was on the phone: "Yes, we're down at studio 30. My guess is he just needs some rest, but someone should come and check him out. All right, thank you." Stephen woke up a little more and felt around for the water bottle; Jimmy helped him sit up enough to get a drink.
"Stephen, do you feel up to walking back to your dressing room?" asked Brian, just as a shadow in the shape of the band's bodyguard loomed over them. "Or should Killer carry you?"
"Feel fantastic," mumbled Stephen. "Fit as a fiddle. Never better. You can keep taping, I'm sure..." He trailed off, bravado withering in the face of Killer's expression. "...okay, you can carry me."
~*~
Jon, Jimmy, and Tucker ended up banished to the practice room. For a while nobody said anything. Tucker picked up his guitar, held it for a few minutes without playing anything, then put it back down.
"Shouldn't have kept him up last night," said Jimmy softly.
Jon had been thinking the same thing. "Yeah, well, we can't take it back now," he snapped. "So we just have to be more —"
The door opened. All three boys snapped to attention.
"You'll be happy to hear that there's nothing seriously wrong," said Brian by way of greeting. "Garden-variety exhaustion, nothing a few days of rest and a little less reliance on caffeine in the future won't fix. His father's coming in to pick him up."
"Oh thank god," breathed Jon.
"We're all taking the rest of the day off, and Stephen will be off on Friday, and under orders to take it easy over the weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if he'll want visitors, but do remember to keep things calm." He took a moment to look each of them in the eye. "As for the rest of you...I want to emphasize that we would rather give you extra downtime before you've worked yourselves to the point of almost passing out. If you feel like your health is suffering, for any reason, you come and talk to me. We'll work something out. You understand?"
Nods all around.
"All right. First test, and be honest with me, now: do you think you would benefit from also having the day off tomorrow?"
Tucker was the first to answer. "I could come in," he said, sounding almost embarrassed about it, a far cry from his usual smugness. "I mean, you know, we can't all be in as high demand as the great Stephen Col-bert, so...I'm ready for whatever."
"Me too." Jon shrugged. "I've got finals coming up, so I could use some extra time to study, but health-wise, I feel okay."
Jimmy didn't answer. When all eyes turned to him, Jon realized with a start that he was tearing up, knuckles white as he gripped the edge of the bench they were sitting on.
"Take your time," said Brian gently.
"I'm fine!" gasped Jimmy. "But — but Stephen's always fine, and —"
Jon hesitated for a second, then put an arm lightly around Jimmy's back. "Hey, uh, he's still fine," he stammered. "Just let him get some sleep, and you'll see, he'll bounce right back."
Jimmy's head was still hanging, but he bit his lip hard and nodded.
"As it happens," said Brian, "the filming scheduled for Friday has been postponed, because the writers need some time to retool what's left of the script so it doesn't rely to heavily on Stephen running around. Tucker, Jon, I'd like you to come in for a half day tomorrow. Do some practice, take a first look at a couple of the songs that are going to be on the next album. Jimmy, take the day off. Do something relaxing. Stream some meditation MP3s and wear your most comfortable hipster vintage clothing, or whatever it is kids do to unwind these days. Now, let's work on getting you three some rides home."
~*~
In the passenger seat, Stephen gazed quietly out the tinted window.
Part of it was because he was still tired, though after a drink and some fruit he felt up for sustaining a conversation, and even, eventually, walking from the driveway to his bed unaided. The other part was that you didn't generally speak around Papa unless you were spoken to, and Papa had yet to say a word.
They were past the checkpoint and moving down the safely gate-enclosed streets that surrounded home when he finally spoke. "I didn't raise you to skip work on a lark any time you feel like it."
"No, sir," said Stephen. Of course this was a special case. He wasn't going to let it give him Ideas.
"You're only getting this because the doctor says you're real worn out. Medically, I mean."
"Yes, sir."
Papa let that sit between them for a while, then added, "You know, a dog's a big responsibility."
Stephen's stomach turned. "You promised."
Silence.
"There are easy dogs. Nice calm lap dogs," he added. He'd done research. He knew. "Pets are good for stressed people. They help you calm down. And..." He gulped. "And I was very good."
More silence. The silhouette of the Col-bert estate cut across the skyline.
As they were pulling into the driveway, Papa finally said, "Let me know when you've decided on a breed."
~*~
Mac caught Olivia as she was coming off the set. "I have good news and I have bad news," she announced, looking far too perky.
"What's wrong?" said Olivia immediately.
"Well, the bad news," admitted Mac, "is that Stephen will not be available for your date tomorrow. He's not feeling well, I'm afraid."
"Why? What happened? Is he sick?"
"I'm sure it's nothing serious! The poor boy's been a bit overworked, that's all. Don't you want to hear the good news?"
"Fine," sighed Olivia. "What's the good news?"
Her manager beamed. "Your publicity-related dog worries are over!"
Characters/Pairings: Jon."Stephen", Jimmy, Tina, Olivia+Kristen+Wyatt, Tucker, Brian, cameos, OCs.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: See series Table of Contents.
In which Stephen's friends welcome him home, season finales are filmed, and Olivia focuses hard on everything except her actual problems.
"Now, before you go to Oregon, we'll need to —"
"Whoa, hang on a second," protested Olivia. Her manager could be scattered sometimes, but she didn't usually forget to let Olivia know about cross-country traveling. "Why am I going to Oregon?"
"Well, because of the contest, of course," said Mac. When Olivia stared blankly at her, she prompted, "The community service contest? Grand prize, Lisa Munn personally visits your school? Did I not mention that the winners were chosen?"
"No, you kinda skipped over that," said Olivia. Now she remembered: she'd filmed both the initial promo videos and the congratulations for the Lisa Munn Rock Your Community! Contest some time last year, and hadn't heard a word about it since. "What was the winning project? Was it good?"
"I certainly hope so." Mac looked between the whiteboard she'd been writing on and the agenda she'd been summarizing, then flipped the agenda over to make sure the project details weren't lurking on the back. No such luck. "Hmm. We'll get you a summary by the time you're on the plane. Any other questions?"
Olivia sat back in her chair. "Nah, we're cool. Continue."
"Yes. Well. As I was saying, before Oregon...." Mac turned back to the whiteboard, added another bullet point, then slashed out the capital letters PURITY RING in green marker. "We get you some new jewelry! Isn't that exciting?"
"Uh, sure," said Olivia, trying not to wince. "Exciting. Just the word I was thinking of."
Her manager broke into an endearing pout. "Oh, surely it isn't all that bad," she said. "You are a healthy and growing young woman, of course, and we appreciate that, but it's not as if we're trying to block you off from all...romantic entanglements. Just look at how supportive we've been of your relationship with Stephen."
"...which you made up," Olivia reminded her.
"But it shows that nobody's going to object to you having a relationship!" said Mac brightly. "And isn't there something romantic and appealing about the idea of these rings? It's the quintessential Disney fantasy, that you're keeping that flame in your heart burning for your One True Love, someone to whom you will be faithful before you've even met them...." A distant look came into her eyes. "...instead of cheating on them with an ex you didn't even like all that much, and ruining the best thing you ever had...." She sniffled.
"You need a tissue?" asked Olivia. There was a box on the corner of Mac's desk, she took it and slid it over.
"Yes, thank you, dear." Mac took a few, dabbed at her wet eyes, and blew her nose.
Olivia looked politely away, and ended up staring at the whiteboard. PURITY RINGS was under GUITAR PRACTICE (she wasn't actually any good at guitar, but her management team hadn't yet given up hope), PHOTOSHOOT (a new set of print ads for Lisa Munn lip gloss), and STAR GIRL REHEARSAL (they finally had the scripts for the season finale), interspersed with BREAK and LUNCH and STUDY* (footnote: *IF TIME).
Sometimes Olivia really missed normal school. Half the kids she worked with had grown up with private tutors (like Stephen), if they hadn't flat-out been "homeschooled", but she had managed to keep attending an honest-to-goodness public school until she was almost thirteen. Sure, parts of it had sucked, but she had at least consistently felt like she was learning something...and her teachers had managed never to spill their personal issues all over class....
...and that was all the time she was going to spend dwelling on it. She was putting her career first, and didn't regret it. Besides, somebody in this room needed to stay focused.
"As I was saying...." Okay, Mac had finally recovered. Phew. "...we have a selection of ring designs here for you to choose from." She handed Olivia a high-res printout covered in images and blocky inscriptions, from the generic to the anviliciously Christian. "It would be particularly lovely if you and Stephen could present them to each other, but of course that depends on whether we can arrange it to look natural."
"Speaking of me and Stephen," said Olivia, as she gave the printout a cursory scan. "Do we have to keep 'walking a dog for a friend'? I mean, it's a little weird, isn't it? Because the gossip blogs think it's weird." It felt weird to her, and she knew that it was technically true, inasmuch as the Star Girl production editor was her 'friend'.
Mac frowned. "Well, I suppose you could just adopt the dog. Although its owners might object."
Olivia made a face. If she didn't have time to learn the fundamentals of biology, she definitely didn't have time to take care of a dog. "I'll pass."
~*~
Jon S.
Having a welcome-back party @ Stephen's. Late flight, so setup starts at 11. You in?
<3 Olivia <3
Wait wait what? is he getting back from Canada?
Jon S.
Didn't he tell you?
<3 Olivia <3
Yeah, just forgot it was now.
<3 Olivia <3
listen boo, this might not b a gr8 idea
<3 Olivia <3
u know how he was not so down w/Canada?
Jon S.
Don't worry, he was over that when we Skyped the other day.
<3 Olivia <3
Well he might still want quiet BFF time 2nite. Not a party. To recover.
Jon S.
Jimmy says a pileon of friends will help, & I trust his Stephen-senses.
Jon S.
But np if you can't make it. We'll give your regards.
Jon S.
Hey did I mention there'll be pie?
<3 Olivia <3
Curse u Jon Stewart u know my greatest weakness
<3 Olivia <3
Im in.
~*~
Jon had his own doubts that they needed quite so many red, white, and blue balloons, but Jimmy insisted that it would be just what Stephen needed.
For a while Jon and Tina blew them up while Jimmy, being the tallest of the three, worked on rigging up a netting to hold them over the front door. Then Steve and Wyatt came along, and Wyatt helped with getting balloons into the netting while Steve applied his impressive lungs to the task of filling them, allowing Jon to make a break for the kitchen and set up the food.
Stephen's father had graciously allowed them to have stuff delivered earlier. He was staying out of their way at this point, although Jon had caught him looking in every now and again, presumably to make sure this gang of rambunctious teenagers didn't destroy any of the nice collector pieces on the walls. He didn't appear to be leaving to meet Stephen at LAX, but that wasn't unusual: whenever they got back from a Shout*For trip, it was only Jimmy, and occasionally Jon, who got personally picked up.
Jon arranged the pie (special delivery from Gloria & Jane's), a couple trays of mini cupcakes, and the cups, and was just working on plates when Olivia and Kristen found him in the kitchen.
"Hey, you," said Olivia, as the pair cornered him. "So, just for the record, when I said 'quiet BFF time,' I was also implying 'quiet BF time'."
"Um," said Jon.
"He's not denying it," said Kristen. She was in a particularly shiny dress, white with stripes of pink, yellow, teal, and lavender. It reminded Jon of a multi-layer ice cream cone.
"No, he isn't," agreed Olivia. She had shown up in a light shirt/cardigan set and jeans, pretty normal fare, although to Jon's unpracticed eye the denim seemed to be clinging tighter than usual.
Jon did a quick scan of the room's entrances, confirmed that there was nobody close enough to eavesdrop, and lowered his voice. "My god, you guys, all we've done is make out. Once. Are there rumors already? How far has this gone?"
Kristen lit up. "I knew he thought you were hot!"
"I don't think anyone else we know has any idea," Olivia assured him. "Kristen, can you run interference for a minute?"
"On it." Kristen relieved a still-blindsided Jon of the stack of plates. "I'll take these!" Humming, she carted them out.
Olivia leaned seriously against the counter she'd backed Jon into. "Yo, I don't want this to feel like jumping down your throat or anything, but. You know how Stephen can be kinda...fragile, sometimes?"
"If you're going to give me the 'don't break his heart or I will cut you' speech, don't worry," said Jon dryly. "Jimmy already took care of it."
"Really?" Olivia looked momentarily impressed. "Didn't know he had it in him."
"Trust me, neither did I. And, listen, the last thing I want to do is...." Jon grimaced, considering what kind of promises he wanted to make about protecting the emotional state of someone who got mortally offended when the snack table featured baby carrots. "I mean, we both know that Stephen gets upset over the dumbest things sometimes, right? But if we're talking about genuinely hurting him...I'd cut off my own arm first."
"Okay, you don't need to go that far," said Olivia quickly. "I just wanted to say, he might be extra fragile about, like...boyfriend stuff, at this point. So this is your official reminder to make sure you're being sensitive and empathetic and whatever."
"I will do my best," said Jon, in all sincerity. He wondered vaguely what 'at this point' meant. Something about being in the middle of a whole fake straight relationship rigmarole, probably.
Olivia patted him on the arm. "Good man. Now, come on, let's get out some forks."
~*~
It was jarring for Stephen to suddenly be surrounded by friends, but a relief once he realized they weren't treating him any differently than usual. Plus, it was never not fun to have a hundred balloons showered on your head.
He would have stayed up longer, but between barely sleeping, working all day, and flying all evening, it had been about the longest day of Stephen's life. After only half an hour of sitting with the crowd around a table, eating all-American apple pie and playing a party game whose name he'd forgotten, he was dead on his feet.
It was Olivia who noticed, and announced that everyone had to go home now.
During the general flurry of ferrying stray dishes to the sink and gathering up belongings, she pulled Stephen into a quiet corner and squeezed his hands. "You're okay, right? Tell me you're okay."
"Fine! Fine," insisted Stephen. When she didn't look convinced, he clamped down hard on all the things he didn't want to think about and admitted, "My favorite cardigan got ruined."
"Sucks," said Olivia sympathetically. "Okay, we're gonna take off, but I just wanted to let you know...me and Kristen caught the thing about Mr. Blue-Eyes-And-Dark-Hair." Her eyes flickered in Jon's direction. "So, congratulations on that."
Stephen's eyes widened. "How did you...? I was very subtle!"
She gave him a quick hug. "Sure you were."
Like a whirlwind almost everyone had blown out of there within a few more minutes, leaving only Jimmy and Jon. After Jimmy had hugged Stephen too, he said he'd see Stephen tomorrow — and yes, he and Jon were taking the same car, but Jon didn't have to leave right this second, Jimmy could just meet him outside.
"Um," said Jon, once they were alone in the front hall. "Sorry if this whole thing was a bad idea."
"It was an okay idea," Stephen assured him. It wasn't his friends' fault he was too tired to have fun properly. "Come here?"
Jon took a step closer and rested his hands on Stephen's shoulders, throwing a nervous glance behind them. "Your dad won't...? He was kinda lurking around giving us all the evil eye earlier."
"He's always asleep by now," said Stephen, tipping his head hopefully toward Jon's.
With a soft sigh Jon's lips closed over his, fingers lacing together around the back of his neck. Stephen wrapped his arms around Jon and leaned into it. Jon was so warm. And so gentle. And he tasted so good — like over-sugared apples.
"We should do this more," Stephen breathed when they parted.
"That was my plan, yeah," said Jon, breaking into his adorable crooked smile. "I'll see you tomorrow too, okay?"
"'Kay," said Stephen. And then, just to press the point home, he dropped an extra kiss on Jon's cheek.
~*~
Olivia and Wyatt, both in their superhero costumes, settled into their best dramatic poses in the middle of a set strewn with extras' bodies. At this point in the finale, their stunt doubles had just finished high-kicking, backflipping, and karate-chopping a small army of the Big Bad's minions. "Nice moves!" exclaimed Olivia, for the second time that afternoon.
"Not so bad yourself," said Wyatt, who never had any trouble sounding naturally relaxed no matter how many takes they'd done.
They both turned back to the figures on the raised walkway above them: the villain, wearing ominous red goggles and a black lab coat, and the victim, a terrified-looking Kristen tied to the railing with a whole lot of stage knots. "You're finished, Doctor Darkness!" declared Olivia. "Turn yourself in quietly, and we'll go easy on you!"
"Not so fast, Star Girl!" cackled "Doctor Darkness". "For you see, I have rigged my machine...to explode! If you follow me, your little friend here will be left to die! Ahahahahaha!" Right on cue, the invisible wires he'd been hooked up to started lifting him off the walkway, carrying him towards the nearest window. (The CGI and sound effects of his rocket boots would be added in later.)
Olivia and Wyatt exchanged a look of shock, then determination. "You disable the machine, Comet Guy," ordered Olivia. "I'll take care of Sadie."
"Cut!" yelled Charlie. "That's it. That was beautiful. Someone get the harness for Lisa, please!"
Wyatt stepped obligingly out of the way, dodging uniformed extras, as one of the techs showed up with Olivia's own set of wires. It was times like this she didn't miss a single thing about her pre-fame life. Sure, this was a far cry from the kind of writing that got you an Emmy nomination, but it was fun. She got to be a five-year-old playing superhero again, and get paid for it, and this time there were a bunch of professionals on hand to lift her into the air.
To make sure she got the fullest enjoyment out of the soaring scene, she hadn't even had any drinks today.
Three takes later, they were pulling her out of the harness up on the platform. "My hero," said Kristen dryly. "Leaving me up here, tied up this whole time, just so you can get some extra flying in."
"Don't question my methods, citizen!" ordered Olivia, ducking to get a strap over her head.
"Hey, keep up that attitude, and I might find some other pop star to be for Halloween."
"We both know you only got that costume to make fun of it," Olivia reminded her. (And it had worked. Olivia had been deeply weirded out over the idea that people were being "her" for Halloween, until Kristen had gotten her to see the whole thing as ridiculous rather than creepy.) "Besides, I deserve some kind of —"
She caught herself held just in time. The harness was all off now; she held still for a minute to let one of the makeup techs fix her hair.
"Some kind of what?" asked Kristen.
Some kind of reward for being so sober, Olivia had been about to say. But that made it sound like her (tiny little bit of) drinking at work was a problem, as opposed to just a thing that made Kristen grouchy. Besides, the climax of the episode was going to involve "Lisa" kissing "Flint", and while Rob Riggle was a nice enough guy, she was still going to need a nip or two to get through it.
"Forget it," she said, and waved over the railing. "We're ready!"
"About time!" called Charlie from the ground. "Places, girls!"
~*~
"Cut!" yelled Craig, for the umpteenth time. Everyone in the fake classroom — Shout*For, Tina, and the usual bunch of extras — slouched in their chairs, a mutter of irritation running through them. Everyone except for Stephen, who had been standing in front of the chalkboard giving a speech. He just went quiet.
The show's final storyline of the year involved the in-series version of Stephen's decision to run for class president. Tina's character, "Taylor", was his main competition, and had leveled the charge that Stephen was way too busy being a pop star to have enough free time to do the job properly. Stephen's counter-argument was to announce that he would keep the workload manageable...by only running for class president of math class.
It was, in Jon's judgment, one of the few genuinely funny things they'd done all season.
Less funny was the way Craig was going off on Stephen. ("What is wrong with your delivery today? You need to enunciate! Stop racing through your speech like you just want to get it over with! How is the audience going to believe you give a damn about this if..." And so on.)
The rest of the cast started trying to spare him some embarrassment by finding other things to look at. In Jon and Tina's case, since they had adjacent desks, it ended up being each other. Jon took the opportunity to lean over and ask, under his breath, "Did the script or something specify to play that as a Sarah Palin impression, or was that all you?"
Tina lit up. "You noticed! No, that was all me. I just thought, okay, my lines are all written real serious, so how do I deliver them in a way that's funny? At least, I hope it's funny. I don't know if it works for viewers who weren't following politics three years ago."
"Well, for what it's worth, I thought it was hilarious," said Jon. He hadn't exactly been a political junkie at thirteen, but his best (only) friend from middle school had been pretty into it. Between that and catching the occasional rerun of The Daily Show, he couldn't help picking a few things up. "And, uh, spot-on. From what I remember, anyway."
Any further conversation was cut off by Craig yelling for everyone to get back into starting positions.
Stephen got through his whole campaign speech without incident this time. He was articulate, he was vivacious, he didn't race through or trip on any of the words...and if to Jon's eye his energy seemed sort of manic, with none of his usual control, well, the viewers probably wouldn't know the difference.
Jon started clapping almost before Stephen had finished. As the rest of the "students" joined in, Stephen broke into a weak grin and took off down one of the aisles, high-fiving the people at the desks he passed.
Until he took a wrong step, barked his shin on one of the desks with a loud bang, and went down, grabbing unsuccessfully at the fake wood desktops around him to break his fall.
"Cut!" shouted Craig, as the cast held its collective breath.
"I'm okay!" called Stephen's muffled voice from the floor.
Jon rocked back in his chair, then forward, trying to get a visual on Stephen through the tangle of desk, chair, and human legs. Two seats ahead of him, Jimmy was doing the same.
"So get up, already!" said Craig.
After several long seconds of Stephen not getting up, Jimmy finally leaped out of his seat. Jon was right on his heels.
They found Stephen pushed halfway up on his elbows, breathing hard. Jimmy dropped to his knees in front of his BFF, who promptly collapsed into his lap. "Hi," he said weakly, reaching for Jimmy's hand. "I don't think I can get up."
"Can we get some water over here?" yelled Jon at the crew. To the frozen actors on either side of them, he added, "Sam, Jason, move your desks over! Let him get some air."
As the cheap desks were dragged across the floor with a screech, Brian shouldered his way into the circle of space opening up around Stephen, water bottle in hand. "Just relax for now," he said as he sank into a crouch at Stephen's side. (Jon could have kissed him for that.) "Lie flat. Are you dizzy? Lightheaded?"
"Wasn't me," mumbled Stephen. "The ground got all wobbly."
"Let's get you on your back, okay? Jon, come on over here and elevate his feet for me." (Jon gave the desk he'd been moving a final shove, and was at Stephen's feet by the time he managed to roll over.) "Does anything hurt? Are you hungry? Thirsty?"
"Tired," breathed Stephen. "Just tired. Gimme...five minutes. And some more coffee."
"No more coffee for you today, young man," said Brian sternly. He rose to his feet and addressed Craig, who had finally had the good grace to come onto the set and get a look at Stephen. "Have everyone take five. Or maybe fifteen."
Shoulder-to-shoulder with Brian, Craig said, "There are other scenes we can film. Stephen isn't in every...please understand, I'm sympathetic, but we're on a tight schedule here, and...."
Jon would have sent him a death glare if he hadn't been so wrapped up in Stephen — who opened his eyes long enough to catch Jon's and give him a hopeful smile before closing them again.
"You're not going to get anything useful out of any of these boys until they know their friend is feeling better," pointed out Brian.
A movement at the corner of Jon's eye caught his attention. He glanced over just long enough to take in Tucker standing awkwardly next to them, hands in pockets. Maybe it really was "any of them" after all.
Craig sighed. "All right, everyone, take five!" he shouted. "Or maybe fifteen! We'll let you know how it goes."
The camera crew and the rest of the cast started flowing out of the studio. Brian was on the phone: "Yes, we're down at studio 30. My guess is he just needs some rest, but someone should come and check him out. All right, thank you." Stephen woke up a little more and felt around for the water bottle; Jimmy helped him sit up enough to get a drink.
"Stephen, do you feel up to walking back to your dressing room?" asked Brian, just as a shadow in the shape of the band's bodyguard loomed over them. "Or should Killer carry you?"
"Feel fantastic," mumbled Stephen. "Fit as a fiddle. Never better. You can keep taping, I'm sure..." He trailed off, bravado withering in the face of Killer's expression. "...okay, you can carry me."
~*~
Jon, Jimmy, and Tucker ended up banished to the practice room. For a while nobody said anything. Tucker picked up his guitar, held it for a few minutes without playing anything, then put it back down.
"Shouldn't have kept him up last night," said Jimmy softly.
Jon had been thinking the same thing. "Yeah, well, we can't take it back now," he snapped. "So we just have to be more —"
The door opened. All three boys snapped to attention.
"You'll be happy to hear that there's nothing seriously wrong," said Brian by way of greeting. "Garden-variety exhaustion, nothing a few days of rest and a little less reliance on caffeine in the future won't fix. His father's coming in to pick him up."
"Oh thank god," breathed Jon.
"We're all taking the rest of the day off, and Stephen will be off on Friday, and under orders to take it easy over the weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if he'll want visitors, but do remember to keep things calm." He took a moment to look each of them in the eye. "As for the rest of you...I want to emphasize that we would rather give you extra downtime before you've worked yourselves to the point of almost passing out. If you feel like your health is suffering, for any reason, you come and talk to me. We'll work something out. You understand?"
Nods all around.
"All right. First test, and be honest with me, now: do you think you would benefit from also having the day off tomorrow?"
Tucker was the first to answer. "I could come in," he said, sounding almost embarrassed about it, a far cry from his usual smugness. "I mean, you know, we can't all be in as high demand as the great Stephen Col-bert, so...I'm ready for whatever."
"Me too." Jon shrugged. "I've got finals coming up, so I could use some extra time to study, but health-wise, I feel okay."
Jimmy didn't answer. When all eyes turned to him, Jon realized with a start that he was tearing up, knuckles white as he gripped the edge of the bench they were sitting on.
"Take your time," said Brian gently.
"I'm fine!" gasped Jimmy. "But — but Stephen's always fine, and —"
Jon hesitated for a second, then put an arm lightly around Jimmy's back. "Hey, uh, he's still fine," he stammered. "Just let him get some sleep, and you'll see, he'll bounce right back."
Jimmy's head was still hanging, but he bit his lip hard and nodded.
"As it happens," said Brian, "the filming scheduled for Friday has been postponed, because the writers need some time to retool what's left of the script so it doesn't rely to heavily on Stephen running around. Tucker, Jon, I'd like you to come in for a half day tomorrow. Do some practice, take a first look at a couple of the songs that are going to be on the next album. Jimmy, take the day off. Do something relaxing. Stream some meditation MP3s and wear your most comfortable hipster vintage clothing, or whatever it is kids do to unwind these days. Now, let's work on getting you three some rides home."
~*~
In the passenger seat, Stephen gazed quietly out the tinted window.
Part of it was because he was still tired, though after a drink and some fruit he felt up for sustaining a conversation, and even, eventually, walking from the driveway to his bed unaided. The other part was that you didn't generally speak around Papa unless you were spoken to, and Papa had yet to say a word.
They were past the checkpoint and moving down the safely gate-enclosed streets that surrounded home when he finally spoke. "I didn't raise you to skip work on a lark any time you feel like it."
"No, sir," said Stephen. Of course this was a special case. He wasn't going to let it give him Ideas.
"You're only getting this because the doctor says you're real worn out. Medically, I mean."
"Yes, sir."
Papa let that sit between them for a while, then added, "You know, a dog's a big responsibility."
Stephen's stomach turned. "You promised."
Silence.
"There are easy dogs. Nice calm lap dogs," he added. He'd done research. He knew. "Pets are good for stressed people. They help you calm down. And..." He gulped. "And I was very good."
More silence. The silhouette of the Col-bert estate cut across the skyline.
As they were pulling into the driveway, Papa finally said, "Let me know when you've decided on a breed."
~*~
Mac caught Olivia as she was coming off the set. "I have good news and I have bad news," she announced, looking far too perky.
"What's wrong?" said Olivia immediately.
"Well, the bad news," admitted Mac, "is that Stephen will not be available for your date tomorrow. He's not feeling well, I'm afraid."
"Why? What happened? Is he sick?"
"I'm sure it's nothing serious! The poor boy's been a bit overworked, that's all. Don't you want to hear the good news?"
"Fine," sighed Olivia. "What's the good news?"
Her manager beamed. "Your publicity-related dog worries are over!"