"What did the doctor say?" Rowan asked, squinting at Silas as he limped out and sat down beside him.
Silas avoided his eyes. "The sun looks pretty good."
"Sunsets are always good. What did the doctor say?"
"I'm hungryy, Row,"
"Sil," Rowan said, seriously, sitting up.
Silas finally met his eyes, then grinned sheepishly. "Torn ligament."
Rowan sighed deeply. "Partial, right?"
"Yeah, thankfully, just partial."
"What are you told to do about it?"
"Got some medicines and am recommended physiotherapy. And rest from physical activities involving foot outside of rehab for at least two weeks."
Rowan considered that. Then he got out his phone and placed a call.
"Yes, please come here immediately. And no need to tell the agency or Lucas or anyone yet. I want to see how much we can manage this ourselves. Yeah. Yeah, I remember very well. Yes okay."
"Who did you call?" Silas enquired, sitting down on the empty deck chair beside Rowan's.
"Tim. I want to see your schedules and all the work that you got and how much of it is with me and how much we can work through it with your injury without making it public."
"You don't have to think about it so much," Silas told him. "It's my injury, I can deal with it just fine."
"I'm your friend and your acting partner. Let me deal with it," he said. A sudden frown line appeared on his face and he collapsed back on the chair and sighed deeply. "I don't get why the fans can't know you injured yoruself and need two weeks of rest."
"There would be unrest..." Silas said, in a low voice, a small smile on his face. "They would worry."
"More like, shame you. Not all fans are all good and will worry about you," said Rowan roughly.
"But most would," Silas insisted. "I know you're right. There will be comments like 'who cares, we aren't telling him to do photoshoots in that week only', 'we aren't telling him to not get rest', 'we didn't tell him to become an actor', 'he's weak if he can't take it', etc. Let's just say I want to avoid any comment about it, worry or criticism."
Rowan looked at him once. "The way you phrased all those examples make me feel like you must have heard those earlier."
"I have. Just not from fans," Silas said lightly.
"Uh oh, family problems?"
"Not a problem, really. They can't control me. But you know that they were never supportive of me choosing this acting line after finishing engineering at Stanford."
"Why do parents always think any job unrelated to studying is bad?" Rowan groaned.
"They think that following a job after a good degree in science subjects means the future is fixed."
"But it isn't," Rowan said shortly. "My elder sister did MTech in Mechanical Engineering and then finally opened a coffee shop. Being good in studies or having a good degree say nothing about future anymore. It's all uncertain anyway. Besides, the entertainment industry gets a lot more hate than most other stuff."
"Well, can you blame people? This whole thing IS toxic. If we didn't have each other as healthy distractions, think of where we would have been. The industry itself is bothersome. Like, how many actual LGBT+ actors get casted for LGBT+ shows and movies? It's straight people doing it, so that the fans can drool over them. Then comes the constant fanservice. Think of what you would feel if your acting partner wasn't your pre-existing best friend. Imagine a person you just met, having to kiss them on screen and then having to stick to them maximum time off screen as well. Now imagine you really don't like that person, but you'd have to constantly pretend to. Imagine having to play an extrovert character while being an introvert and having to pretend like an extrovert all the time till the show's popularity decreases.
"It's not like people are wrong about the entertainment industry. We both have just been lucky so far."
"I'll probably quit somewhere on the way. Retire and go into some other, quieter job," Rowan said thoughtfully, leaning back.
"Be a thief?" Silas suggested.
"Not exactly a quiet job, but good idea," Rowan said with a little laugh.
He waited for Silas to speak his thoughts.
"Well...we both have to leave early anyway. As we age, our job opportunities here get
slimmer. I'd probably go behind the scenes? I'd like to help the newbies
continue the work."
"Be a better guy like Lucas," Rowan said with a small groan.
"Excuse me?" Kaylie said, appearing behind him and hitting his head with a file. "Are we bitching about the director here?"
"Nah, Kaylie, we were talking of Henry Lee Lucas," Silas said with a wink at Rowan, who massaged his own head.
"I just called Tim, how come you always show up when I'm calling him?" Rowan asked, narrowing his eyes.
Kaylie opened her mouth to speak, but Tim beat her to the punch line.
“Yeah, we’re dating, just like you think,” he said, rolling his eyes and putting his bag down on the ground. He put an arm around Kaylie.
Kaylie shook her head and went straight for the point. “So, why did you call? What did the doctor tell you, Silas?”
“Uhh, partial tear in the ankle ligament. Bed rest and mild physiotherapy. No physical stunts or dances for at least a month.”
Tim’s eyes widened in alarm and horror. Kaylie looked at him sideways and extended a hand to hold his.
“And what’s your plan, Rowan? You are thinking of something, right?” Kaylie asked him.
Rowan smiled. Thank you for always knowing and understanding me, Kaylie, he thought.
“So, we know how the fans may not take this well. And well…making it public can come off as whiny, or make it sound like we’re blaming the agencies for overworking us, or the fans for asking for too much. While the blame falls for all the categories-” he tried to say, but was cut off by Silas’ glare. “Basically, we have to keep this hidden. What we could do is…well, we could rearrange the schedules a bit. This one week settles one out of the four required weeks of rest. Can you talk to Lucas and all and, you know, put all the singing concerts and fan meets and photo shoots and stuff first, and postpone the dances and acrobatics ones for later?”
“That means rearranging everything,” Tim said, as the light shifted slightly, making his dark circles more pronounced.
Silas and Rowan hung their heads, knowing full well that their managers were just as overworked as they were. Probably more, because they share more than half the mental stress. And don’t even get enough credit for it. I mean, everyone knows the actor’s names, but how many know their managers’ names and give them credit for their hard work?
“We can tell this to Lucas,” Kaylie suggested.
“He’d just give Silas a hard time for ‘not being careful enough’” Rowan said, with air quotes, looking quite annoyed.
“And if my parents get to know…well, I’m already a problem child and they’d start worrying and complaining about my career choices,” Silas suddenly said in a low voice.
“You have a lot of internalized depression about your family issues, don’t you?” Kaylie asked.
“I won’t say depression exactly. But I get so tired and frustrated just from thinking about them sometimes, you know…”
Rowan put an arm around his shoulder. “Come on, it’ll all be okay very soon and you’ll be back to dancing. Tim. I’m so sorry for asking for this…but you know it’s for the best, right?”
Tim nodded. “Yeah, cuz the other option is getting Silas kicked out of the industry, and no one’s gonna like THAT one. Anyways, I’ll go and call the agency, telling them to post about the new dates.”
“Have you rearranged already?” Rowan said, his voice filled with surprise.
“What the hell is my brain for if I need pen and paper for everything?” Tim said with a tired smile. “I got a more or less rough idea of what I need to do. Kaylie…will you help me out a bit? If you don’t mind, that is.”
“Of course,” Kaylie said, jumping up immediately with a kind smile.
Silas nudged Rowan lightly.
“Tim, we both wanna help too,” he piped up, as Silas nodded vigorously. Tim ruffled their hair and smiled.
“This is our work, you don’t need to worry.”
“We don’t have anything to do right now anyway,” Silas said hurriedly.
“Then go study, you got upcoming exams.”
“He’s like a dad,” Rowan muttered. Silas laughed.
"One last advice, tell them that the plan rearrangement is because Rowan want it and not any other bs. People know me for being impulsive and very easily moved by emotions. The fans won't object much this way," Rowan called out.
Kaylie gave him a thumbs up and called back out "That's actually a good idea."
"Did mom just mock me?" Rowan wondered aloud, tilting his head.
“Nice family I have here,” he said, taking a deep breath and smiling, staring out at the sunset.
"Nice sunset you have here too. And nice best friend. And nice a lot of things. So what now, wanna go study?"
"Sure, I'll help you out with your pending homeworks there too."
"Oh yes please, I'd fail without you. Need me to carry you?"
"Uh, I'd rather break my other leg trying to hop on one. You're too unreliable," Silas laughed.
Rowan sighed. "Then come let's go."
Silas nodded and limped along behind him.
***
How many people actually care as much as they say they do? How many actually love the people they say they love? The unreachable, far away people?
Your favorite actors on screen, who do so much for you, sacrificing their own self and shedding their skin to be someone else regularly...they deserve more respect from us, don't you think so?
So why not give it to them?~
