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"Feeling better now?" Tom cranked the heat a little higher, his brown hair soft and tousled, falling in perfect messy layers. From the back he looked like he'd just stepped off a magazine cover without trying. "I could tell you were nervous earlier."
"Much better," Joey said, managing a real smile this time. The tension had melted somewhere between the fireplace and that easy grin of his. "It's not every day a girl gets to sit across from Tom Cruise. My brain kept short-circuiting."
He flashed that famous megawatt smile and raised an eyebrow. "I've heard that line a thousand times, but it still sounds good coming from you." He took a sip of his beer and tipped the bottle toward her. "A girl with your kind of guts? I figured you'd be unfazed."
Joey sank deeper into the couch, finally letting her shoulders drop. "Guts, huh? I wish I had as much as you think I do."
"Are you kidding? You've got it in spades." He settled onto the opposite couch, close enough now that she could see every fleck of gold in his eyes. They locked onto hers, warm but curious. "Word is you've been going through hell lately. Everyone thought you'd pack it in and leave town. Instead you went and shot Juno. That takes serious courage."
Joey felt her cheeks burn. "Didn't realize Mr. Cruise followed the gossip pages…"
He laughed softly, swirling the beer so the foam spun. "I don't. Hughes told me."
The name hit like a punch she wasn't ready for. "Hughes…"
"Yeah. He came to me privately, offered to put up money if I'd invest in your movie." Tom watched her reaction carefully. "I said no."
Joey lifted her chin, meeting his gaze dead-on. "Good. I don't need his help. But… thank you for turning him down."
Tom tilted his head, studying her. "You know what's weird? You've got the guts to stare down bankruptcy, bad press, the whole town writing you off… but you can't even say Hughes's name without flinching. Why is that?"
Her fingers tightened around the armrest for a half-second, then relaxed. She gave a breezy laugh that didn't quite reach her eyes. "We just weren't right for each other. Clean break is cleaner."
He let it drop—no point digging into whatever history was hiding behind that smile.
"Juno comes out next week," he said instead. "You confident about the box office? Because between you and me… this might be your last real shot."
"Is that what everyone's saying?" She dragged the words out with a playful smirk, but there was steel underneath. "I don't believe in last shots. As long as I keep swinging, the game's not over." Then, softer, "But yeah… I'm not delusional about the odds."
"It's a warm little movie," Tom admitted. "Heart's definitely there. But audiences are fickle, and the whole 'celebrating glorious failure' angle isn't exactly mainstream comfort food right now. Just… brace yourself."
Joey sighed. "Trust me, I know. Bluebird's barely promoting it. It's a tiny indie—they're treating it like an experiment. If it tanks in the first weekend, it's gone."
Tom gave her a long, quiet look. "I'm rooting for you."
He meant it, too. He wanted the underdog story: washed-up girl drags herself out of the gutter and shocks the world. Classic Hollywood redemption arc. After years of watching this town chew people up and spit them out, her stubborn refusal to quit actually felt… refreshing.
But he'd been around too long to bet on fairy-tale endings. Dreamers usually got crushed here.
He was curious, though. Really curious. Would this kid beat the odds? Or would she crash a second time—and this time stay down for good?
Meanwhile, Joey's brain was somewhere else entirely.
Hughes went to Tom Cruise behind her back.
After everything he'd said—how disappointed he was, how he was done—he still tried to help her.
No, Joey. Stop. You buried those feelings fifty years ago in another lifetime. There's nothing left.
Still… the gesture stung in a way that wasn't entirely unpleasant. Maybe he wasn't as cold as he'd pretended that day in the restaurant.
Which only made her more determined. She was going to make this movie a hit if it killed her—just to prove every ounce of faith he'd ever had in her hadn't been wasted.
The moment stretched, both of them lost in their own thoughts, until Jack Hans cleared his throat loudly in the doorway.
"Am I interrupting a brooding contest?" he asked, smirking.
Tom stood smoothly, straightening his shirt. "Perfect timing, Jack. I'll let you two talk business. I'll catch you later."
He gave Joey a polite nod and that killer smile. "Bye, Joey."
"Bye," she said softly, watching him leave.
Jack barely waited for the door to close before tossing a folder onto the coffee table. "First chunk of the Bluebird money just hit the account. You can finally pay off the house and breathe."
They wrapped the paperwork fast. Twenty minutes later Joey was out the door and heading home.
Back in her living room, she pulled up the list of theaters Juno was opening in next week.
Ninety-eight screens.
All in small-town multiplexes and art houses in the middle of nowhere. Classic limited release—Bluebird wasn't risking a dime one if it flopped.
She opened IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes. Pages were live, but basically empty. A couple comments trickled in:
"Who the hell is Annie Jones?"
"Another no-name indie director? They come and go so fast I can't keep track."
"Kinda cool premise, though. Might check it out."
"Trailer actually looks funny. Fingers crossed."
That was it. Bottom of the page already.
Joey closed the laptop and stared at the Juno one-sheet on her desktop—the moody orange sunset, Rebecca's silhouette flipping the bird at the sky.
Seven or eight movies in her last life, all forgettable. Back then her head hadn't been in the game.
This time was different.
Her stomach twisted with something she hadn't felt in decades: nerves. Real, sweaty-palms, can't-sleep nerves.
Because for the first time in two lifetimes, she desperately, achingly wanted to win.
She wanted the world to see what she could really do when she gave a damn.
She wanted to shove it in the face of every person who'd called her a failure, a has-been, a rich man's ex-arm-candy.
She wanted to climb so high that nobody could ever look down on her again—not because of her face, her race, her past, nothing.
Just her name in big letters and a line out the door.
Yeah… she thought, heart pounding against her ribs.
I want it so bad it hurts.