The Casting Call
The Mustang's engine growled as Alex eased it through the Warner Bros. gate, the guard waving him through with the kind of recognition that still, after all these years, sent a small thrill up his spine. Cherry red paint gleamed under the California sun, a 1967 fastback he'd bought with his first real paycheck, back when every dollar felt like proof he'd escaped something. He'd kept it not for nostalgia, but as armor. When the tabloids came calling, when the world seemed intent on reducing him to a punchline, he could always slide behind that wheel and remember who he'd been before any of it started.
He parked in his designated spot, cut the engine, and sat for a moment with his hands still gripping ten and two, knuckles pale.
Two years. It had been two years since the photos leaked—him stumbling out of a club at four in the morning, some starlet's hand fisted in his shirt, his own face slack with the kind of oblivion that made headlines write themselves. ALEX KANE'S DOWNWARD SPIRAL. THE FALL OF HOLLYWOOD'S GOLDEN BOY. He'd read every single one, masochistically, scrolling through his own destruction with a bottle of scotch at his elbow, as if punishing himself might somehow…
