The Silver Screen Wars

5 - Howlers

The last thing Kodi had expected this morning was to end up in the employ of Bishop Cassius. The only thing her agent had told her was that someone (Bud? Boyd?) had been desperately searching for competent auditioners, something about a last-minute alteration in plans. Turned out not to have been a Bud or Boyd at all.

"Do you know who I am?"

Yeah, she knew who he was. An asshole, a bully, a spoiled brat who ended up sliding right on through puberty and was now a brat in a man's body. She knew all about people like him, rich, entitled braggarts who thought they deserved the best of what life had to offer simply because they couldn't imagine not having it.

Bishop Cassius, infamous for his "tough" tactics, among other things. Sure, she'd heard about how gifted he was, the talent he possessed, the unimaginably effective way he drew the best out of his actors and made them truly become their characters, become the story. And sure, she'd also heard about what incredible opportunities opened up to anyone who got even the smallest, most remote speck of his approval.

But all that was more than she needed to hear, period. Because the truth was that people had already given her their first-hand accounts of his particular methods. Right, 'methods.' Shouting matches, throwing food on his actors, putting his hands on them, even -

Yeah, Bishop Cassius. Or howler monkey, as she'd taken to calling him whenever someone brought him up in conversation. The name fit; no one could argue that point. He had a pair of lungs on him.

And, as Kodi pointed out every once in a while, science had proven one special trait of howler monkeys: the louder they were, the smaller their balls.

But what about this? What was the correlation between nut size and having the gall to try to play dress up on her? Kodi watched and followed in silence as the man continued to rifle through clothes, coasting from one streetside stall to the next and picking up whatever caught his fancy. He was spending wads of money without blinking an eye, all but throwing hundred dollar bills down at the sellers and breezing out before they could offer him the remaining change.

Kodi made sure to linger behind long enough to collect the receipts, of course, and hurried after Bishop with quick strides to catch up.

What bothered her most of all, however, was the fact that everyone was giving them a wide berth. He hadn't even said anything - hadn't even looked anyone in the eye. He looked over everyone as if they were all just part of the landscape, things that were simply inconveniently crowding his vision. And yet every time Bishop's head bobbed into a stall, everyone hurried to rush out of his way and wait by the curb instead with wide eyes and hushed whispers.

Okay, that was weird. Since when was a famous man's adoring public so discreet and concerned about personal space? Last month, she'd personally seen Jason Monlavia get mobbed at the Riot Theatre by a mob of fans who wanted to tear his briefs right off his body. And a few weeks before that, she'd heard about a fan crawling through some singer's ventilation to peep him in the shower.

She had no choice but to suppose the rules were different for Bishop for some reason, but he didn't give her any time to dwell on it: he moved briskly from stall to stall on too-long legs, occasionally spinning right back around to leave the same instant. Damn him. She couldn't take her eyes off the guy for even a second. Thankfully, with everyone parting on the sidewalk for him like the Red Sea whenever he moved to pass through, it was easy to catch back up.

"You'll change in the car. Hurry up."

Oh, okay. So he had dragged her off the audition site and walked a block over to a street market to buy things he could dress her up in, and now this? Please. There was only one reason Kodiak didn't stop in her tracks and leave for greener pastures: he still had the clothes on his arm that she fully intended to return later with these receipts in her hand.

"I'm not changing in your car, sir."

"And yet you're following me, and I'm walking to the car."

"Doesn't mean I'm changing in there."

He snorted. "So you'd rather change in the Porta Potty by the set?"

Porta Potty? They were in the middle of upscale Los Angeles right now, where were they going that an outdoor set wouldn't have access to a restroom building? It wasn't as if they were going to drive out into the desert outside the city like this with no warning, right? Kodiak couldn't imagine the posh, spoiled Bishop wanting to spend a single second sweating in the heat; there was no way he was taking her out there without a posse of palm-frond waving women to fan his ass cheeks under a parasol.

"I'll take that as a no, then. Change in the f*****g car, Kodiak Clyde. There's enough room for you to change inside."

Huh. Kodi couldn't tell if he was talking from experience or if he was just assuming he was right about everything, per usual. Well, with a sleazebag like him, it was probably both - no doubt he had gotten at least a few women to strip out of their clothes for him before in the backseat of his car, and not just to change into something that fit his tastes. Ugh. At least she wasn't getting any lecherous vibes from him right now. If she was quick and discreet, she could probably slip into whatever he had bought without flashing anything overmuch.

...To be fair, the one positive rumor she had heard about Bishop Cassius was that he couldn't be bought. Not with money, not with s*x - to him, the only currency was competence, and he didn't care if someone crawled backward to ram themselves onto his d**k over and over. If they couldn't play the part the way he wanted them to, the way the role deserved - they were out.

Most Hollywood directors couldn't claim the same integrity. Something to think about, Kodi had been advised time and time again by her well-meaning agent, but she had flatly refused any opportunity to try out for any of his films for the past year anyway. Regardless of his standards, he was still a f*****g asshole, and that was a fact that no one could dare to argue.

Kodi didn't like assholes. If her agent had been honest and told her upfront who was really responsible for the last-minute casting opp, she wouldn't have bothered to show up at all. Especially not after walking into a private parking deck and seeing the car this howler monkey drove. Cute. How much did this cost, a few million? What was the point of expensive cars, anyway -

Her hand was already on the Bugatti's passenger door handle when suddenly, she realized something.

"You don't even have a backseat, sir."

"If I wanted a car with a backseat, I would have gotten one. Get in."

Kodi didn't know whether to scoff or give him an incredulous smile over the roof of the low-sitting vehicle, so she did both - and bingo. She saw the way his jaw clenched, even if she couldn't see whether his eyes were blazing behind those pretentious-ass aviators he had set back on his face. He straightened back up instead of entering the vehicle, and he matched her glare for glare across the way.

"You got a f*****g problem, Kodiak Clyde?" he asked, his voice echoing around the concrete that surrounded them. He wasn't shouting, but he was definitely louder than he'd been before. Predictable, Kodi thought. His reputation really preceded him.

"Yeah, tell me how I'm supposed to change with about three cubic inches of space to move around in. Sir."

"Others have managed it somehow, Kodiak Clyde. I'm sure it's not rocket science. Just put your pants on one leg at a time. The drive's an hour long, so I'm sure you'll figure it out by the time we get there."

"You want me to change while you're driving?" she demanded, only to get a scornfully disbelieving look in response.

Hold up, he was the one getting exasperated? Was he stupid? Kodi scoffed again.

"Forget it," she told him. "Changing in the front seat of a car while we drive through a whole city, new bra, new panties -"

"My windows are f*****g tinted, can you not tell? Are you blind?"

"You're in the car!"

"And?" he snapped. "What the f**k is the problem - oh."

A short bout of silence suddenly fell between them, but instead of giving her a bashful apology for his thickheaded-ness, Bishop gave her the most poisonously mirthful, contemptuous smile that Kodi had ever seen. The hairs on the back of her neck rose from the sheer derision she could feel emanating him even from the other side of the Bugatti.

"Oh, I see," he said again, and the sharp bark of laughter he released made Kodi narrow her eyes at him. Before she could say something cutting about how he evidently couldn't see s**t from behind those dark ass shutters on his face, however, he continued:

"You think I'm going to be staring at you while you change." He leaned his head back and looked around with a disdainful, amazed grin. "You actually think -"

Suddenly, he slammed his hand down on the roof his car, and Kodi would have jumped at the loud slap that resounded around the parking deck if she wasn't already far too aggravated to feel surprised by anything.

"Listen," he said slowly, patronizingly, as if he were talking to a kindergartner. "If I wanted to, I could have anyone that's been featured on the cover of Vogue crawling up here to bounce on my c**k in the next five minutes. I could have anyone - anyone - who's been ranked on the last six lists of the Sexiest Women Alive send me a video of them fingering themselves and screaming my name, and you think I'm going to even look twice at you?"

Kodi was fairly certain her brain stopped working. The concentration of sheer ego and scorn she was listening to - if it hadn't already, it was certainly on the brink of reaching lethal limits right now.

"Don't fret, Kodiak Clyde," he said condescendingly. "Until you find the t**s and the ass to go toe-to-toe with at least Victoria's Secret Angels, you're not enough to tempt me. Get in the car. Change. Make yourself look at least halfway presentable before I put you in front of a camera. You'll thank me later."

And then the conversation was over, just like that. He turned away and slid into the driver's seat, leaving Kodi staring at the spot where he had been before with a stone-dead gaze and eyebrows raised in irreconcilable disbelief.