Eve & Lucy Ch. 03: Off set

A guy I don't know called Dave turns up shortly afterwards.

"So, like, who would you like to rape today boys?"

I slap her on the arm. "Don't joke about it."

"Aw, come on."

"No, I'm serious. Besides, if you start joking, I might laugh during a scene!"

"Fair enough."

In the end we flip a coin, and I get to work with Dave. Kind of better. I know Baz, so it would feel a bit weird. The boys are worried about having their faces on film - typical! - but Amanda assures them that the focus will be on us.

She and Baz go first. Amanda talks us through what she wants before we begin: close up on her face as her boyfriend mounts her in the missionary position, her left leg pulled up, with his head tucked into her neck on one side. Then a pause, confusion on her face, then "What are you doing?" then Baz needs to say "Just relax. You'll love it." Then pain on her face and "No, stop, stop."

It takes us a while to rig up the camera on a tripod above her. I'm going to have to stand on the bed, straddling them. We end up having to switch the bed around in order to avoid casting shadows over their faces.

Eventually we get it right, and Amanda strips off her top half. Baz and Dave blink a bit at this.

"Oh, like, come on Baz, you've been like, seeing these twice a week."

"Are you sure you're comfortable doing it topless?"

"Yeah. I mean, I don't think we'll get, like, any nipple in shot, but we can, like, blur it if we do. But I just want to make it, like, authentic, you know?"

So Baz strips off his T-shirt and the two get into position. Dave holds the sound boom and I count them down.

Baz starts to move slowly as Amanda mimes enjoyment. She's not overdoing it, not mugging, just opening her mouth, closing her eyes and wrinkling her forehead. A slow build. As agreed they keep this going for 30 seconds, to give us a long edit point.

Then he pauses and shuffles, and, though they are barely in shot, his shoulders show that his hands are moving under them.

Amanda's eyes open, puzzlement creeping over her face, then consternation.

"What are you doing?"

I zoom in slowly on her face as panic starts to appear, her eyes widening, fear showing. My heart is racing in response. Rationally, I know she's acting, but my lizard brain wants me to swoop in to save her.

"Just relax. You'll love it."

She opens her mouth to speak, but instead a gasp of pain comes out, her face screwing up, tears leaking from her eyes.

"No... no... stop, stoooop!"

It takes everything I have to restrain myself from pulling Baz roughly from her.

I'm about to yell cut, when Amanda pushes him off, and dashes from the bed, nearly sending both me and the tripod flying. I stop recording, and follow her out and into the bathroom, where she is vomiting into the toilet.

"It's ok, shhh, it's ok," I repeat as I rub her back. She's crying as she heaves, acid cascading from her. Without losing contact with her, I grab a plastic cup from the sink and fill it one handed with water.

I pass it to her, but she's shaking too hard to hold it, so she just guides my hand to her mouth. She rinses and spits, rinses and spits, flings her arms around me and sobs. I can smell vomit on her, but hold her, rubbing her back, whispering to her that she's ok.

As she seems to be out of danger of hurling again, I get the lid closed and flush.

"Is she ok?" Baz and Dave are peering around the door to the bathroom.

"No, give us a few minutes. Get the kettle on. We could probably all do with a mug of tea."

I carry on holding her, leaning back against the wall, pulling her onto my lap, tucking her head into me, soothing and stroking her as she trembles.

"Sorry," she whispers.

"Don't be. That looked really traumatic."

"Yeah. Like, I hadn't thought I'd get so deep into that character. Well, actually, she wasn't, like, a character; she was me. Like, maybe that's why I couldn't shut off the feeling."

"It was devastating to watch. I wanted to pull Baz off you and smack him around. I can't believe you were able to just turn on the tears."

She sighs and shudders into me, her face wet against my neck.

"Come on, let's get up. I bet you want to brush your teeth and maybe shower after that."

"Yeah. Like, sorry." But she makes no effort to move. "I bet I, like, smell really bad."

"No," I lie.

"Liar." She pulls her head back and I get an eye full of her perfect breasts and have to scold myself to stop letching. "Thanks Carrie."

"No need."

I leave her to clean her teeth and wash the vomit out of her hair. I use the sink in the kitchen to wash my own hands and face: I think some of the vomit from her hair got on my cheek. Glad I had my own tied back.

"Is she ok?" Baz asks. Poor guy: that must have shocked him too.

"Yeah. Are you ok?"

"Oh yeah, of course."

"Liar. Come here." I give him a hug.

He lets out a huge sigh. "Phew, that was intense."

"Well, yeah, I think that's her idea."

Dave has already downloaded the film onto his laptop.

It's absolutely perfect and absolutely devastating. I find myself tearing up in sympathy.

I exhale loudly when it finishes. "Well thank fuck for that!"

"Yeah," agrees Baz. "We don't need to do that again."

"I don't think we need to do anything to that at all," says Dave, "sounds great, framing is great. We just top and tail it, stick the caption on, and it's done."

"What's the caption?" I ask

"This is what rape looks like."

"Do you want to stick it on, or should we wait for Amanda?"

"What do you think, Carrie?"

"Stick it on. I think the fewer times Amada has to see it the better."

"Where should we stop?"

We watch it back through. I find a frame where her face is contorted in pain and tears are clearly visible on her cheeks. The sight rips at something in me, something primal.

"There. That's it. Freeze it for a couple of seconds, then flash the caption. Then let it run for 5 seconds more."

Dave cuts the clip, freezes the end, drags it, then drops in the caption. He goes for a white font to stand out against her hair and skin.

We watch it through. It's powerful.

Baz shudders and gulps: he's close to losing it. I pull him into me and give him another hug. "It's not me" he manages to get out, "it's her. I'm feeling for her."

"It's because you're a decent human being, Baz. Feel proud of that, don't feel ashamed."

I feel a tap on my shoulder.

"Um, I know we only just met, but can I get in on that hug?" Dave's own eyes look wet. Baz and I open up and pull him in.

"Fuck, I'm not sure I'll be in any state to do our scene."

"Right, come on, let's raid the kitchen. I think we all need sugar."

We're eating muffins when Amanda comes out of the shower.

"Um, I hope it was ok to take these?"

"Yeah, it'll be fine."

She goes into her room, and comes out dressed shortly after, though her hair's still up in a towel. I want to wrap her in another hug, but she's all business.

"Did you watch it? Is it, like, any good?"

"It is hideous and brilliant, Amanda. You're fucking amazing."

I nod along, agreeing with Baz as Dave chips in with a "hell yeah."

"Show me then."

I can't bring myself to watch it again, so keep my eyes on her instead, poised to swoop in if she needs me, but she's impassive, watching with a critical eye. She leans in and tweaks the font size of the caption, adds a couple of weblinks.

"Yep, that's great. Let's render it." She sets that going. "They may get, like, a pro to do the caption, but I mean that's good enough for a showreel."

Then she looks at me. "Are you ready?"

"Yeah. Ok."

My scene is going to be less traumatic. Probably.

The idea is that I'm asleep, and then my boyfriend pulls down my pyjama bottoms and attempts to have sex with me. I wake up and stop him, but then look at him with horror and ask him what he was doing. We practise, so that they can try to show what's happening without showing anything and leave Dave's face out of the shot. It's difficult, but they solve it eventually by having me lie at an angle. We have to use the double bed in another room.

I slip into the bathroom to get some pyjamas on.

This time it's Amanda's turn to film. I don't think I've ever had to act being asleep before, so she coaches me through it from above. "Open your mouth, like, a little more and let it go slack, you know? Slow your breathing. Yep that's good. Ok. Camera roll. And action in 4, 3, 2..."

I don't need to do anything for the first 15 seconds. Then I feel Dave's weight shifting behind me. He's propping himself up, peering over me, to see if I'm asleep, hopefully the top of his head coming into shot. He shifts back. Then I feel his hand slipping under my waistband, pulling my pyjama bottoms down. My heart races, the backs of my hands itch, and I struggle to remain calm and faking sleep. I'm not wearing anything under and, although we've agreed he won't pull them right off my bum (as it won't be visible), I feel hideously vulnerable.

I move my mouth and wriggle a little.

He pauses.

I still myself, resettling.

Then I feel him shift again, and something presses up against me. I know this is acting, but I have to fight down the urge to panic, counting down slowly from 15 in my mind, as my skin feels like it's being bitten by a thousand insects. He bumps and pushes up against me. Staying limp with feigned sleep, my body moves away of its own accord, and he has to hold my hip to pull me to him.

As I hit one I start to stir, a frown forming on my face. Then, I jolt "awake" and pivot, twisting onto my back and clutching the duvet to me,

"Huh!? What... what... were you in me?!"

"Oh yeah, sorry, I didn't want to wake you."

"What the hell!?"

"Hey, it's no big deal. It's not like we haven't done that before."

"Get out."

"Easy, chill babe!"

"Get out!" I scream, sitting up and pushing him, "get out, get out, get out."

He goes, scrabbling out. "Woah, don't get hysterical. Overreacting much."

My face contracts into a sob, and I throw myself back down on the pillow, arms over my face. To my surprise I can feel wetness on my cheeks.

"Cut."

I stay still and feel movement around me, then a pressure on the bed next to me. I lower my arms and see Amanda sitting next to me, watching me.

"Are you, like, ok? Do you need a hug?"

I nod mutely and she clambers in, wrapping me in her arms. I'm not crying, and I don't sob, but this is comfort I realise I so desperately need.

The boys have left the room and so we just lie there for a while, not talking, as she cuddles and strokes me.

"Come on," I say eventually, "let's see how it came out."

It's not bad. Rather long, so we shoot a couple of extreme close ups on my face - my frown as I'm waking; me yelling at Dave; my face collapsing at the end - to intercut the longer take and allow us to shorten it. This takes much longer of course, but by 5 we've got something Amanda is happy with and Dave's added the caption, switching the font to black this time.

There's no whoops and hollers, no high-fiving: instead we all just gather into a hug.

"So what happens next then?" Dave asks.

"Well, I mean, I'm, like, seeing Lucy - she's the woman heading the project - like, tonight. I'll show them to her and, like, see what she says. I'll let you know. I mean, there's one more scene I wanted to shoot - like, a too drunk to give consent scene, you know - and I was hoping Suzy would be, like, up for that. Maybe with Chen if we can, like, find a day when they are both free."

"Why not film it with a same sex couple?" Baz asks.

Amanda looks at him quizzically. "Why? Like, 99% of rapes are like, male on female?"

"Yeah, I know, I know. But... Well, I've hung out a bit online in some dodgy corners of the internet and I just know what the MRA posse will say "oh yeah, but it's not just men!" so if you did a gay male couple and a lesbian couple, then you'd kind of spike their guns a bit. Do you know what I mean?"

Amanda is so silent, so still, that I feel the need to ask if she's ok.

"Yeah." There's a pause. Her voice sounds small. "Just thinking." She blinks. "It's a good idea Baz. I'll see if I can, like, find some other actors to shoot those... that's if Lucy wants to go ahead after she's seen these."

We have another round of tea and biscuits - "I'd offer you all, like, some food, but, I mean, Lucy's taking me out to dinner later, you know" - but the filming has taken a lot out of us, and we're all feeling flat.

We hug goodbye, and then I head for Clifton Down station by myself, my mind and emotions in turmoil.

* * *

Carrie- Wednesday

"Hi! It's me!" I call as I let myself into Jeff and Lisa's house with my key.

"Hey Carrie! We're in the kitchen, come on through."

I hang up my coat and walk down the hallway to their large kitchen and dining room.

"Surprise!!!!"

I jump in shock and let out an embarrassing squeal that brings a gale of laughter from the crowd in the kitchen, then Evie's hugging me around my legs, Gran's kissing me on the cheek and Jeff's clapping me on the back. My eyes track around the room. Cameron's filming me, Karen and Dave are clapping, Mum's smiling at me arm in arm with Charlie, Mike next to them, grinning and sipping a beer, and my mind is struggling to grasp the idea of all these disparate members of my family being in the same room.Then I realise there are more people here. Baz and Suzy, Louise and Sarah, Keith and Lydia, and Amanda. Holy shit, Amanda's here.

"Wha.." I manage to get out, but then the lights go off and Lisa's coming over with a cake and anything I could say is drowned out by voices singing "Happy birthday to you."

I blush and then dutifully blow out the candles.

"Make a wish Carrie!" Evie shouts.

"Speech! Speech!" Charlie yells.

I shoot him a death stare. He shoots me a massive grin. Brothers!

"Um, wow! I really don't know what to say. Thank you all for being here. Just. Wow. Sorry. Really. Um... Thanks." My skin is flushed, but everyone is smiling and laughing.

"Come on Carrie, there's food!" Evie's tugging me over to the table, where Lisa has put on quite a spread.

It's surreal. I overhear Keith, whom I've met once, talking up my performances to Karen. Well, I guess he saw them. Meanwhile, Sarah and Mike are chatting like old pals, which I guess they are. Cameron is mooning over Louise - good luck there bro! Amanda is deep in conversation with Mum and Gran, who are laughing at her jokes. I get cornered by Jeff, who wants to know how rehearsals are going. I try to fob him off with meaningless faff - I want to get over to Amanda, as somehow I suspect she's behind all this - but then Baz and Suzy come over, and start singing my praises, and I find I have to reciprocate. Then Jeff, who has now realised that Suzy played Malvolia and Baz played Sir Toby, wants to hear all the backstage gossip from Twelfth Night, and I can't get away, especially once Charlie joins us. When I do manage to get over to Mum, Amanda's vanished.

"Happy B-b-b-birthday darling!" She kisses me.

"Thanks. Are you ok being here?"

"Of course. It was really... really thoughtful of your b-b... Cameron and Charlie to... to organise it all."

Oh they did, did they? Little brats! "Um, did you see where Amanda went?"

"Oh, she's so... so lovely."

"Yeah." I roll my eyes. "Just friends Mum."

She looks at me sadly. "Just don't... don't make the same mistakes I did."

"I won't." What does she think I've been doing my whole life except trying to avoid her mistakes? "I'm going to try to find her."

I pop into the sitting room. There's a woman there I don't recognise reading on a Kindle. "Er... Hi?"

"Oh. Hello Carrie. Happy birthday. Are you enjoying your birthday party?"

Her voice is really odd, like she's been auditioning for an elf role in a Lord of the Rings' spin off. "Yes. Thanks. Um... I don't think we've been introduced?"

"Oh. No. You are correct. I am Samantha. I am Sarah's girlfriend and Amanda's flatmate."

"Right. Nice to meet you. Are you ok in here by yourself?"

"Yes. I am fine thank you. I wanted to come, but then I found it smelled too noisy with so many people I was unfamiliar with. I thought it best to come and read by myself. Louise was with me for a while and the older man I assume is your Grandfather. We had an interesting conversation about traffic flows."

Wow. Ok. "Can I bring you some food?"

"Oh. Thank you. That would be kind of you. Anything vegetarian will be suitable."

So I find myself playing waitress, and then end up chatting with Samantha, then Sarah who joins us. It's wonderful watching the two of them together: Samantha stares at Sarah with unbridled desire, while Sarah is constantly looking forward in the conversation, anticipating areas where Samantha might struggle and smoothing them over in advance. It's heart-warming.

Karen and my Gran wander in looking for somewhere to sit down and end up joining us, which I find surreal. I can't think when the last time I saw those two together was, but then they've both always lived in Sea Mills, so I guess they see each other around all the time. Plus Mike and Mum went to school together. Actually, now that I think about it, it's not that strange.

The evening wears on, and I still don't get a chance to talk to Amanda. I catch flashes of her: suffering Charlie's clumsy attempts to flirt with her; being dragged around by an increasingly hyper Evie; having a real heart-to-heart with Mum while I'm stuck helping Lisa. When I escape, she's gone again. I chat to Louise about her plans to stay in Bristol next year, Mum eying me significantly when she mentions that she's looking for potential flatmates. I try to talk to Cameron about his college plans, but he just pesters me about whether Louise has a boyfriend. I tell him to stay in his league.

Around 9 people start to go and I'm busy thanking them and saying goodbye. As they leave I get given presents: mostly gift cards for clothes shops. Are they trying to tell me something? Mike is first to go. Karen and Dave aren't far behind.

Sarah starts dropping hints to Keith, and then he, Samantha, Lydia and Louise are off. I'm touched they came, and found me a collection of Sarah Kane plays as a present, but can't really imagine why. I suspect Amanda, but still haven't been able to speak with her.

Suddenly, she's there.

"Hey! So, like, did you have fun?"

"Yeah I did. Thank you so much for coming! It meant a lot."

"Good. I mean, I'm glad. Listen, I've, like, got to go. I got a lift with Baz and - "

"Don't go!" I grab her hand. "Look, I can drive you back. Obviously, I'm sober!"

"Well, um, like..."

"Please Amanda? I haven't had a chance to chat to you all evening. I'm more than happy to drive you back."

"Oh, ok."

Then we're both saying bye to Baz and Suzy, who give us both a look and me a box of chocolates. Then my Mum and Gran, who give me an even more obvious look. Fuck, way to be subtle people!

"Your present hasn't arrived yet I'm afraid Carrie," Gran says. "Well, that's.... What I mean is the paperwork hasn't arrived."

I look puzzled.

"The car, my love. I'm giving you the car. The VC5 hasn't arrived yet though."

"Oh my days Gran! That's amazing. Are you sure? What about the boys?"

"I love the boys but... well... let me do this Carrie. It's what Bill would have wanted. I did talk to Jeff about it before I made the decision and, not that it matters what he thinks, but he agrees."

"And I'm paying... paying the tax, MOT and... and insurance," Mum adds. "Happy b-b-b-birthday!"

I crush them into a hug. Oh my days! The car is mine. Wow! I feel a bit guilty, but I can still let the boys borrow it for special occasions I guess.

Amanda's wandered off while I'm seeing them out, but I find her again in the kitchen helping to clear up.