Box-Office Smash Read online

  Text copyright © 2013 by Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.

  All rights reserved. International copyright secured. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc., except for the inclusion of brief quotations in an acknowledged review.

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  Website address: www.lernerbooks.com

  Cover and interior photographs © Felix Mizioznikov/Dreamstime.com (boy);

  © iStockphoto.com/Jordan McCullough (title texture).

  Main body text set in Janson Text LT Std 12/17.

  Typeface provided by Linotype AG.

  The Cataloging-in-Publication Data for Box-Office Smash is on file at the Library of Congress.

  ISBN: 978–1–4677–1371–9 (LB)

  ISBN: 978–1–4677–1673–4 (EB)

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  1 – SB – 7/15/13

  eISBN: 978-1-4677-1673-4 (pdf)

  eISBN: 978-1-4677-3328-1 (ePub)

  eISBN: 978-1-4677-3327-4 (mobi)

  In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure.

  —Bill Cosby

  Dear Mr. Hart:

  I am pleased to welcome you into the Harmon Holt internship program.

  Jason, unlike the other recipients, you have a GPA well below the top ten percent. But the artistry and intelligence displayed in your videos makes you an ideal candidate for my program.

  Not everyone who succeeds has a perfect GPA or a perfect record of behavior. I don’t know any successful person who hasn’t made mistakes along the way. For you more than anyone, this internship represents a door that you might not have found on your own. I hope you choose to walk through it.

  All internship recipients will be considered for the Henry Holt Scholarship given annually to the student or students who make an extraordinary impression during their internship.

  It may be hard to see it now, but the distance between me and you is hard work and opportunity. I am giving you the opportunity. The rest is up to you.

  Sincerely,

  Harmon Holt

  ONE

  I was in the cafeteria, putting the finishing touches on my project, when it happened. Trig Anderson pushed it onto the floor, and it broke into a million pieces. It was my fault for working on it in public. I wanted to get it done in time for fourth period, and now it would never be done.

  Trig was a bully. He had pretty much avoided me until now, since I had my own reputation to protect me. But my project sitting out on the cafeteria table must have been too hard for him to resist.

  “Oops,” Trig said, when it was completely clear that everything he did was on purpose.

  I leaned down to pick up the pieces, but Trig wasn’t done with me yet. He kicked the box away from me.

  I finally turned to face him. Ignoring him was never going to work.

  “Did I break your dollies?” Trig said with an edge.

  They weren’t dolls. But even I could see how he would think so.

  It started a few months ago. My teacher, Ms. A., taught us some simple animation called Claymation. You move these little figures a tiny bit at a time in front of a stop-motion camera. The result was really cool. My video got me my very first A.

  I’d started out with a parody of those ghost movies; I’d called mine Paranormal Inactivity. My ghosts weren’t scary; they were lazy.

  I kept making the videos long after the project was over. I moved on to other genres—comedy and drama. I was good at it. Ideas kept flooding in out of nowhere. And Mrs. A was cool enough to let me do the final project using stop-motion too. I’d been uploading each video to YouTube, and I’d gotten a few hits.

  Trig was twice my size. Bigger, broader—but I was faster. And the doll remark was the last straw.

  I got in Trig’s face. Or as close as his face as I could. I raised my fist. He laughed and pushed me against the wall. In a few short seconds, people would surround us, someone would yell “fight!” But right now it was just me and Trig.

  He gave me a look that seemed to ask if I was sure I wanted to do this. Because he was definitely capable of wiping the floor with me.

  Vice Principal Masters separated us suddenly, which was surprising because Masters was a good foot shorter than me and two feet shorter than Trig. But he was strong for a little guy.

  Masters took Trig with him to his office but sent me to the counselor’s office.

  I wondered what my punishment would be. Detention. Suspension. The school had a zero-tolerance policy. But my punch never even made contact. Worse than that, I thought of the pieces of my project that were still on the floor of the cafeteria. I could put the pieces back together, but still I felt like I’d lost something I couldn’t quite place. Maybe it was just that I was used to losing. I’d been doing it all my life.

  TWO

  “Look, Mrs. Hamilton. He started it,” I began to explain as I sat down in the chair opposite her desk. The words sounded lame even though they were true. Mrs. Hamilton and I had spent a ton of time together like this. Her looking disappointed, me wondering how she could still seem so surprised that I’d screwed up.

  “You’re not here about that—although we do need to discuss it. We’re here about this.” And with that, she handed me a blue envelope with double Hs on it.

  I took the envelope and turned it over in my hands.

  “What’s this?” I opened the letter and read it, and then I reread it. It still didn’t make any sense. I read a little of it out loud. “I am pleased to welcome you into the Harmon Holt internship program.”

  I looked up from the paper to Mrs. Hamilton’s beaming face.

  “Harmon Holt wants to give me an internship on a movie set in L.A.?”

  “It appears so.”

  “What does some rich mystery guy want with me anyway?”

  “Jason, he sees what we all see … a whole lot of potential. I don’t want to still be saying that a year from now or two years from now. I don’t ever want to be saying what a waste. Either you lose it or use it.”

  Mrs. Hamilton’s tough-love routine wasn’t working on me.

  “Let me guess: this is my last chance,” I said bitterly. It wasn’t Mrs. Hamilton’s fault. It was her job to be cheerful and helpful and annoying.

  “In a way, it’s your first one.”

  I looked up at her, surprised.

  “Take it, Jason.”

  For the first time, I was listening to what Mrs. Hamilton had to say.

  THREE

  I didn’t have to ask Stella for permission. Stella wasn’t my mom. I had to call my child services social worker, Nina. In the steady stream of foster mommas and dads, group homes, etc., Nina was the only constant. She’d been placing me since I was a baby.

  I hadn’t had some terrible mom. I just had a teenaged one who was too young to take care of me. And she was gone so early that I didn’t even remember her. I got it. I was seventeen now, and I wasn’t ready to take care of another person. I didn’t think I’d ever be. It was hard enough to take care of myself.

  This house wasn’t a bad one. There was enough food. It was clean. There were a lot of kids. So many that I was mostly left alone—which I preferred.

  When I got in from school, afternoon snacks were already being served assembly-line style in the kitchen. Stella was helping one of the little ones spread almond butter on his sandwich. He was allergic to peanut butter. Without looking, Stella knew I was there.<
br />
  “Jason, you’re late. Was it detention or something else?” She didn’t sound judgy; she just took her mealtimes very seriously.

  I wasn’t ready to tell her about the internship yet. “I think I’ll just head upstairs and start my homework,” I said. She raised her eyebrows, like now she was really worried about me. But she handed me a plate with a sandwich on it and let me go.

  “No crumbs on the bed, mister,” she said and returned to supervising the sandwich line.

  I shared a room with the second-oldest kid, Tim, who was sixteen. We hadn’t become friends exactly. But we respected each other’s space. And every once in a while Tim would show up with tiny things that he thought might work in my videos.

  Tim wasn’t here because he had basketball practice.

  I sank down on my bed and put the plate there, too. I took a bite of the sandwich. Roast beef. And then reached in my pocket and took the letter out again.

  A few minutes later, Stella called from downstairs, “Jason, visitor.”

  Stella was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, her arms crossed over her chest. She put a hand on my shoulder. I couldn’t remember her doing that since the first time I’d met her, a year ago. She knew about the internship. She was already beginning to say good-bye, even though I didn’t leave for a week.

  “Nina’s out on the porch. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  I shrugged.

  “Good news like this. One of my kids being picked by Harmon Holt. Between you and Tim, I’ll have stories to have the other kids to reach up to for years.”

  I shrugged again. Tim was likely to get a scholarship to some college if he kept growing and kept nailing three-pointers.

  “You know me, I’ll probably only last a week.”

  “Bite your tongue, Jason Hart. Those Hollywood types have nothing on you.” Her face fell as if she was thinking of something, “I’ll hold your room as long as I can. I think I can have you back in the fall.”

  I nodded, knowing that there was a very big chance that when I got back someone else would be sleeping in my bed. Stella was a woman of her word. If she said she’d try, then she’d try, but there were no guarantees.

  “We’ll miss you,” Stella said as I pushed my way out the front door.

  Will you miss me, or my check? I thought. I reminded myself that Stella’s house was the one I wanted to live out the rest of my care in. She wasn’t warm and fuzzy, but she didn’t yell or hit—or worse.

  Nina was sitting on the porch, folder in hand. It was open, and I could see a copy of the blue letter inside.

  “Please tell me that I still get to get out of here for the summer.” There was still a chance that someone in child services thought that this opportunity was just an opportunity for me to get into trouble.

  Nina nodded.

  “I’m proud of you. This could be a great opportunity for you. Don’t blow it.”

  “Thanks a lot,” I bit back.

  I sat down beside her.

  “Hey, look at me,” she said quietly.

  I kept my eyes on the cold, hard stone steps.

  “Look at me,” she repeated, her voice switching to that special no-nonsense tone that made me snap to. “I know you better than almost anyone. I know that are brilliant and smart and talented. I also know that sometimes you get in your own way. Give yourself permission to be great.”

  I thought about making a joke about her stealing that line off a poster on Mrs. Hamilton’s wall, or whether she’d been watching the Oprah channel or something. But I kept my mouth shut for once. We sat there for the longest time. She was probably hoping that her words would have time to sink in. Me, I think I was trying to adjust to the idea that for the first time in my life, Nina wasn’t going to be a phone call and a short drive in her beat-up Toyota away. We would be on opposite sides of the country.

  Suddenly, she handed me a small wrapped package.

  Presents were not allowed between social worker and ward of the state, but Nina had made a few exceptions for birthdays and Christmas.

  But it wasn’t either.

  “I could totally get in trouble for this. So it never happened.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s for your trip.”

  I opened it. A smartphone. An iPhone like the other kids at school had, instead of my government-issued one that didn’t do crap.

  “It’s unlimited minutes and data, so you have no excuse but to check in.”

  I had just turned seventeen, but we both knew what my next birthday meant. It meant that I would age out of the system and Nina would no longer be required by law to check in on me once a month. I believed that she would still check in on me.

  “Thank you, Nina,” I said, not just talking about the phone.

  FOUR

  When I landed in L.A., I was surprised to find a guy holding a card with my name on it, like I was someone famous or important or something.

  “I’m Nick, one of Mr. Holt’s assistants. You must be Jason Hart. Nice to meet you, man.”

  Nick tried to grab my bag, but I held onto it. When we got to the SUV, I couldn’t help but be impressed—it was a fully tricked-out Range Rover.

  “We’ll take you to the home you’ll be staying in.”

  “Home?”

  “The dorms are full this summer. Too many kids taking extension courses. I know that you’ll hate missing out on the dorm experience, but I think we’ve found something that will suit you even better.”

  “I think I already know how to live in small spaces,” I said.

  “I meant hanging with other kids doing internships,” he said, completely ignoring my dig at foster-care life.

  I shrugged, “Why would I want to hang out with kids I will never see again?”

  He laughed. “It’s not the length of time you know someone that matters. It’s quality over quantity in all things. I haven’t known you for long, and I feel like I already know you.”

  I guessed somewhere in my file it said Jason Hart “doesn’t play well with others,” and this guy was prepared for that. Or maybe he was just always this cool. I gave up trying to get a reaction from him.

  “So, where to?” I asked as the car got moving. I was annoyed already. But I might as well get info about my summer while I could.

  FIVE

  We pulled into the driveway in front of a white building that seemed to stretch a whole city block.

  “A hotel?” I asked.

  “The Oakland Apartments. It’s the place most kids stay in when they first land in L.A. for auditions. They lease by the week, and the complex is conveniently located near most of the studios. It will make your commute easier, and you’ll get to know other kids who are in the biz.”

  Was I really a kid who was in the biz now? I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

  Nick kept talking. “They have tutors and acting classes and a floor with an RA for kids whose parents can’t be here with them.”

  Walking down the halls of the Oakland was nothing like walking down the halls of any apartment building back home. Both were noisy, but that was all that they had in common. There were kids everywhere. Little kids singing at the top of their lungs. A girl about my age in full cheerleading costume dong a cartwheel right past me.

  When she was right side up, she looked at me and asked, “What did you think? Would you buy me as a vampire cheerleader?”

  Right side up, she was pretty. Not DC-pretty, like the girls at Clinton High. She was TV-or movie-pretty. Big brown eyes. Full, glossed lips. One of those noses that turned up at the end. Deep brown skin that seemed to be glowing, probably from her gymnastics.

  I shook my head. “You’re way too pretty to be a vampire.”

  She pouted as if I knew nothing. “All the vampires on the CW are gorgeous.”

  “Not as gorgeous as you.”

  She smiled and cartwheeled away. I almost followed, but Nick stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. I’d actually forgotten that he was still in the hallway
with me.

  “Let’s get you unpacked, Romeo.”

  “You’re right. I think I’m going to like it here.”

  SIX

  Nick assured me that the RA would be by later to check on me. He gave me his business card and left me alone. The room was small, but it was the first time I’d had one all to myself.

  There was a package on the table with my name on it.

  I opened it. A top-of-the-line HD camera. The note inside said, “Good luck. —HH.”

  I turned the camera over in my hands. I’d been borrowing one from school all year. I never thought I’d have my own. There had to be a catch. All of it felt unreal somehow.

  I sat down and began to figure out the camera.

  I may have fallen asleep with it.

  The Oakland actually had a car service that dropped kids at the studios in the morning. I took one to Hemingway Studios, where The Subdivision was being shot. It was a horror movie. But a big-budget one.

  My name was on a list at the gate, but when I reached the studio door, no one was there to meet me. Everyone was busy, moving in a million different directions. It looked different than I expected. The actors stayed in trailers—which was funny because I’d thought people spent their lives trying to get out of double-wides, not into them.

  The set itself was pretty awesome. It looked like a house, only with a wall missing. Cameras and lights stood where the wall should have been.

  The crew was getting ready to shoot something.

  I stopped one of the guys with headsets. He was really young, so I wasn’t too afraid to ask him, “Hi, I’m new, I’m Jason. Where do I …”

  The kid got on the headset and mumbled into it, “Jason’s here. By the house set. Stay put, kid. He’ll be right with you.” Then he rushed off.

  I stood by the director’s chair, taking it all in. I stuck my hands in my pockets. It was weird being the only person without a purpose when everyone else had one.