/Lights, Camera, Kiss Me\|IF_NC_Entry| Ch 1-2 Pg 5 - Page 3

Chapter 1

The Red Carpet, parties, photographers following you everywhere you go, having your name in the headlines of the newspaper daily. This is the life I live now.

Everyone have their own versions why Sarah Malhotra is such a big star today. Some say I bribed the producer, some say that I slept with the director to get a role. Though I was the daughter of a stuntman but I made myself stand out of that mob and after auditioning day and night, slowly as my work started to gain notice today, I was a big name in the industry.

At the age of 23, I have done countless number of films, and a lot of crucial roles and had given 32 blockbuster movies to the film industry as the main heroine in last 5 years. Even I don't remember any life of mine outside these sets since I joined the industry. Lights, Camera and Action was the start of my life and no doubt it has got to be my end.

One of the greatest directors approached me and I couldn't deny his offered. It was a huge break for my career. But destiny played this cruel game. The main lead of the movie is he, with who I never wanted to work with again. 

I still remember my first debut with Sahir Verma. He was a newcomer too. It was the most beautiful time of our lives, at least of my life. None of us could deny the growing attraction between us, the attraction that had spiked up ever since we started shooting.  It was all going amazing for me. My first movie as a lead actress was a blockbuster. I was dating the new national crush, as they called him. I was more than happy. I was living the life I always wanted. But there is a bad norm about good times, it passes very quickly. The success party of our first film, 'Secretly Yours' spoilt everything. 

Sahir had decided to drop me home after the party and had helped me till my bedroom.

"I shouldn't have drunk that last shot." I had plopped myself on the bed and sighed.

The room was spinning and I felt the nausea wanting to resurface. Sahir sat next to me and brushed my hair from my face, cupping my cheek in his palm.

"I need to leave." He had whispered.

We were sitting close to one another, the air thick with our harsh breathing. Sweat dampened my brow and whether it was the alcohol or not, I had leaned in to kiss his cheek but he had turned his face just as my lips descended and our lips had brushed instead.

What happened from there would become nothing but a blur for me, I could hardly remember a thing when I woke but my state of undress told me exactly what my memories couldn't.

I so wished I wasn't over drunk that night. If only I had control my desires.

 It wasn't the party that spoiled everything, it was I.

I stretched and turned on the bed, I was turning into an insomniac! The last few days had been anything but pleasant for me; I could not get him out of my mind, the fact that working with him after 4 long years has left me a little unsettled and promised to bring in chaos.  

I reached to the set and walked towards the director and producer who seemed to be having a conversation.

I came to a stop beside Sahir, staring at the director and producer just as he was.

"You know I'm going to make you regret what you did, right?" He said still looking at them.

"Give it all you got. It won't be anything I haven't been through before." I replied as I realized he was talking about the slap I gave him on last shoot.

I turned my head to stare in his direction as he turned to stare at me in return.

"You haven't seen what I can do Sarah Malhotra."

"I had seen, even experienced, everything you could do." I let out a sarcastic laugh. "I promise you, this will be nothing new to me Sahir Verma."

I noticed him getting angry with every word escaping my mouth. Then suddenly he grabbed me by the waist and pulled me close. My chest crashed into his as I gasped. I was reminded of all our close moments from the past, so it would've surprised me if he weren't reminded of anything at all. After all, our bodies hadn't had that much contact in years.

I stared up at him, with quivering lips. He stared down into my eyes as I stared up into his. His anger filled face disappeared. His grip on my waist went weak and he stepped back. I looked at the ground particularly nowhere and the next moment I watch him entering his vanity van and shutting the door behind him with a thud.

I was a fool to believe that he loved me when we were in a relationship. Every time he said that I was beautiful, I was idiot enough to feel shy. I still why he blamed and left me.

"Sarah." I heard a familiar voice and came back to the real world.

"Rehaan!" I squealed in happiness. "How are you?" I asked as I hug him.

"Superb, as usual." He said with his evergreen smile as he embraced me in a warm hug.

We got seated in chairs. Rehaan was one of my favourite co-star and Sahir's best friend. He was doing a cameo in our film and I was really very excited.

"You're comfortable right?" He asked.

"Yeah, I am. Why do you ask?"

"Because you guys are working together after a long time. See, I know your relationship was never public but some of us close friends knew very well how madly in love you two were. God knows what went wrong." He sighed.

No one except me and Sahir knew about the real reason for our breakup. Actually, I am not sure if I knew it clearly. I didn't share with anyone what he did to me or what he said to me. The ex-girlfriend side of me didn't want anyone to think low of Sahir.

"We are professionals, Rehaan. It's my work." I said trying not to sound annoyed.

"Ma'am, Script." We heard my manager and decided to end our conversation there.

I read the script. The next scene had to be a romantic scene between Kabir and Antara. I looked around to see people running here and there for the preparations. Just then I saw Sahir coming out of his vanity. With goggles on and script in one hand.

"Hey!" he chirped as soon as he saw Rehaan.

Rehaan hugged him. They were chit-chatting something inaudibly when the director said that the shot was ready.

It was good at the start but soon a strange distraction took over me. Doing romantic scenes was normal and any day's work for me but I don't know why I was nervous about it. May be it was because I was going to romance Sahir after a long time, a very long time. I could no longer concentrate. 

"Sarah that was nice, but make the emotions more fluent, let's take another shot." the director said.

"Nice is not a good word." Sahir whispered into my ears. "Concentrate, Sarah."

"Action!"

I looked into his eyes as the scene demanded it. We stared at each other and straight to the eyes. I felt a lot of questions in his eyes which needed answers while I had a pain in mine.

"I Love You... " He said with tears in his eyes.

I felt the pain and intensity of it and raised my hand above to touch his right cheek.

"You should say that often He had happy tears in his own eyes. We looked at each other for some more time and then hugged each other with all the intensity. I was now almost crying while Sahir comforted me as he patted my head lovingly.

"Cut!"

And the trance in which I had lost myself was broken. I shook into the reality and saw the clamouring audience around us. I broke the embrace disheartened to look at him again as if to check whether he was just doing the job or was really giving away the feelings. For a moment, I thought it was all real. I looked at him with painful scrutinizing eyes but just then the director came running to us. He congratulated both of us for the great shot and all I could wonder about was,

What the hell just happened?

Chapter 2

I flipped through the pages, quickly. Not actually reading the script, but skimming my eyes across the letters. Every time I saw the letter 'S', my thoughts turned to Sahir. I pressed it on my face. Soon, I gave up reading.

What did I do to myself? Why did I torture myself? Was I masochistic? No. It was worse. I fell in love. Fell in love with the wrong person, the one who never loved me back. But there is no good thinking about all this now.

I decided to concentrate back on the script. I climbed down the vanity van and my eyes bored on the man standing in front me, busy in talking to director. If I look closely, the distance between us was just few steps but in reality, it's like much more than that. And between us, there was an invisible line which would never let us meet again, a line drawn by him, drawn by us. It was amazing how from stealing glances of each other during shoot, we were now individuals who can go to any extent to get the other one taste the bitterness of defeat.

"Shot Ready." It broke my trance.

In a party Kabir finds a very drunk Antara in a compromising position with his ex-boyfriend Armaan. Kabir already being insecure of their relationship and too very possessive thinks that Antara was never serious.

Dejected and devastated he quietly walks out of there not bothering to stop as she called out to him in a voice that under normal circumstances would have melted his heart and made him run towards him enveloping her in him embrace.

"Kabir, wait. Please listen to me Kabir. " Antara ran behind him but he was too heartbroken to respond.

"I said stop!" And he did.

Antara went behind him and turned him towards herself.

"What the hell do you want now?" He asked with anger as he pushed her away.

"Kabir, I..."

"Dare you try to speak a lie, Antara." He warned. "I loved you with all my heart and what did you do? You are cheating on me with you ex-boyfriend? How can you stoop so low? I can't believe you could turn so filthy."

Those words shook something inside me. I couldn't understand why but I stood there looking at him, saying nothing.

"CUT!" The director said. "Sarah, it was good but slap him.

"How did you felt when I insulted you that day?" I heard Sahir whisper to me. "You wanted to slap me right? Just do it then."

I closed my eyes.

"Ready, Sir" I declared.

"Alright. Lights, Camera and Action!"

  And I slapped him. Not as Antara, but as Sarah.  

"Never show me your face again, you s**t!"

That were the exact word he threw upon me that day. I still couldn't understand why he called me that.

"You are not god so you don't need to give a character certificate to me. And you know what; I don't care what you think about me, because you don't affect me anymore." I said what I wanted to.

As I turned, he grabbed hold of my wrist and pulled me close to himself. I tried to free myself but his grip was too strong.

"Everything will not fall in right place if you slap me. When you are wrong, accept it. And if you are not, then clarify!" He said still holding me tight.

"Clarify?" I let out a sarcastic laugh. "Just tell me one thing, what the hell does the love means, the relationship means that need clarifications? If you had ever loved me truly, you wouldn't have any trust issues."

"I have seen everything with my own eyes." He said as he bit on every word.

"Learn to trust more on the one you love than your eyes. Every coin has two sides."

I said as I felt the tears rolling down my eyes and his fingers wiping them off. I looked down and realized I was holding his shirt tightly. I loosened my hold and tried to move away when he pulled me closer.

"Cut!"

And I came back to reality. I looked around only to realise that I again went to my own world. What the hell is happening to me?

"What a shot, guys!" Our director said. "So terrific improvisations with the lines. This scene is going to be the best."

I looked towards Sahir. He was looking at me with mixed emotions. Pain? Hurt? Regret? I couldn't read what.

Then I saw Rehaan going near Sahir and saying something inaudible in his ears. He looked at Rehaan in a plain face and left the place.

Stop doing this to yourself, Sarah. I sighed.

"You are still not over it, right?" I heard Rehaan beside me.

"No! I moved on." I lied.

"Really?"

"Yes." With that, I walked away from there.

I made myself a cup of green tea as I pulled her robe off my body; it was the month of May and the weather was really hot. I sat down on the comfy settee near the window of my apartment and gazed down at the beautiful sight of the Central Park. With the lights on and stars twinkling delightfully in the sky, my thoughts went back to the day that had changed everything in my life. The time that had started with joyful beginnings, ended up sadly. My life became meaningless after I broke up with Sahir. A realization swept through me as days passed on that he was never in love with me. He was happy with his free life and new success after breaking my heart into million pieces. Then I too decided to focus on my career and not turn a modern day Devdas. Pretending to hate Sahir was now a part of my life and the key to mend my broken heart.

A slow rumble of my phone between the cushions wedged my deep thoughts. I viewed Radhika's message.

"Outdoor shoot in Newyork has been finalized ma'am. We need to leave this evening."

I sighed. As per the story, Antara leaves the country after confrontation with Kabir to a foreign country. And Kabir will come in search of her. At first, the venue was Malaysia, but as we have already shot at that place in our first film, the destination was changed to Newyork. It's my first visit there.

I reached the airport and at the same time, I saw Sahir's car stop. Sahir, along with his sister Naina came out. Naina smiled genuinely at me and I smiled back. We came really close during the time me and Sahir were together.  We tried to enter only to be flooded with the media. I was hell pissed with only the thought of the questions they were going to ask because there were news spread out of Sahir and me dating in past. We denied the news every time and the talks stopped after we stopped hanging out together. Now that we're working together again, I was sure they were going to ask baseless questions.

"Relax, just follow my lead." I heard Sahir whisper in my ears.

I just nodded in agreement and we somehow managed to cross the media people. Sahir then signalled me to go inside and that's when I realized that Sahir was holding my hand protectively all the while.

I looked at him and he mouthed a 'go' in assurance. I made my way through the photographers when Sahir turned the media attention to himself.

"Just 5 mins." He said.

I decided not to listen to his conversations with the media and walked past everyone.

I will thank him later, I thought as I walked with Naina.

After landing in Newyork, I shared my vanity with Naina.  Though I and Sahir broke up, the relation between me and Naina never changed. She was like a little sister. We had been so busy in shoot that I didn't have a chance to talk to Sahir or thank him.  Meanwhile, I found Rehaan a little tensed. I tried to talk to him but every time I start the topic, he would just ignore it. And eventually, I decided not to ask him anymore as the schedule was already hectic.

There was a scene in the beach where Antara drowns in the water and Kabir saves her. It went smoothly and we gave a perfect shot. As we both were wet, I wanted to reach my vanity as soon as possible. But I couldn't deny the fact that Sahir looked hot in his wet shirt. He had grown hotter in past years. Suddenly, he went on to remove his Tee exposing himself more in only his vest and shorts. His perfectly toned body, biceps and cuts increased the heat in the surrounding. I didn't miss the girls fanning themselves with their hands after the little stunt he played. 

  That was it. I thought I had learnt not to get affected by him but this man never leaves a chance to make me weak. I was fed up. I needed an end of this. But at the same time, I was not ready to forgive him so easily. With the sights (3000 words) of a shirtless Sahir and the shameless girls drooling over him, I marched towards my vanity and slammed open the door only to find Rehaan kissing the hell out of Naina.

Total Word Count: 3030 words