2. When one door closes......another door swings wide open???

>>I wonder if we know

How they live in Tokyo (hai!)

If you see it, AND you mean it,

Then you know you have to go

Fast and furious (kita) (Drift, Drift, Drift)

Fast and furious (kita) (Drift, Drift, Drift)<<

I let my head bob to the beat of the song as I blasted my mp3 through my Beats headphones, which sat round my neck. “TOKYOOOOOOOOOOOO! I’m in freakin’ Tokyo!!!”

“Seriously Camden. This is the 20th time you’ve said this now. Please. Get over it. You’re embarrassing me” I turned my head and stuck my tongue out at Austin. “Don’t stick your tongue out at me.”

“Don’t be such a dick then.” I countered. “How can I get over this?!” I gestured to our surroundings, the busy streets of Akihabara. This was a moment of awesomeness of epic proportions. I WAS IN FREAKIN’ TOKYO!

“Come on we’ve got serious work to do, the camera crew are setting up.” I turned off my mp3 with a playful pout on my face.

“Yeah, yeah. I got this don’t worry.” I started to warm up by stretching out my arms. “All I need to do is somersault off the rooftop of the building, freefall whilst doing a two and a half twist and land on the crash mat in a crouching position.”

“You make it sound risk free.” He rolled his blue green eyes at me sarcastically.

“I know it’s not risk free Austin. But I’m going to nail this. I haven’t been training for the past three years for nothing.”

“I know kid. But you’re still a newbie in this profession. High falls can still be dangerous.”

I scowled as I stretched out my legs. “Don’t call me a kid Austin. I know you’re the stunt coordinator now, but you’re still only seven years older, geeze.”

He reached out and ruffled my wild puffy black hair. “Don’t forget who you’re talking to. If it wasn’t for me you wouldn’t have even been allowed to train. And you wouldn’t have gotten this brake.”

Well he was damn right about that..................Austin had pretty much taken me in. Me, a girl who only new martial arts, had turned up at the action academy expecting to just become a stunt actress like that. I mentally snapped my fingers. Yeah, that was never going to happen. Knowing martial arts was good but it wasn’t enough. Like every other stunt actor registered on the British stunt register I needed six things: Fighting, falling, riding and driving, agility plus strength, swimming and wirework.

Those were three intense years, two of which I had to fit around finishing my degree.

But it had taught me so much, like although martial arts was the only thing I was amazing at naturally, it wasn’t the only thing I had the potential to be good at when I put my all in to it. I had a true passion for this! And no matter what I was going to be the best!

“Earth to Camden.” He flicked me on the forehead, grinning to himself at my zoned out state. “Come on, we need to hook you up to the safety wires. They should have cordoned off the area by now.”

 “ACTION!”

I took a deep breath focussing on the point that I knew I had to land my handspring, so that I could project myself off the side of the building. Breathe, remember your training, and just go for it!

I took three long strides before propelling myself forward and into a two and a half twist as I fell through the air.

This feeling. This feeling right now, was what I lived for.

*

“Hello?”

“Hey Austin, it’s me Tristan. I just thought I’d check on how Camden was doing...”

Austin smiled and leant back in his chair. “She’s doing good Tristan, don’t worry.”

“Good, as in good good? Or good as in she’s just okay?”

“Good as in she’s a lot more herself these days.”

“Good, just keep an eye on her for me okay. I just, I don’t know I.....just look after her over there will you.”

“I will, Tristan. Don’t worry, she means a lot to me too.”

Tristan hung up the phone with a heavy heart. Camden was like a sister to her, and the recent loss of Camden’s father had hurt them all. His death had been sudden and unexpected, and although three months had past, the pain was still all too fresh for all of them...

**

“AGAIN!”

I drew the prop samurai sword from its sheath that hung on my back with my right hand, whilst simultaneously reaching for the one that hung from my waist with my left. Jumping from the one storey high convince shop I twisted mid air and landed in a crouching position before springing up and pretending to strike the guy to my left in the side.

“AGIAN! And this time let’s try you striking two guys. Like before but after the first one turn and strike the second guy who will come from behind.”

I nodded my head in understanding before running to head back up to the roof. This was our third day of filming and I was beyond tired. It seemed never ending today. It wasn’t that the director was indecisive........scratch that this director was definitely indecisive....

For the third time, I drew my samurai swords and propelled myself off the roof. Executing the fall wasn’t a problem until the spilt second before I landed. This time I knew something was off. Shit! From an outsiders perspective everything looked fine, but in reality I had landed awkwardly, with the force of the impact leaving my ankle throbbing. Great...just great.

I stood up and kept, what I hoped was, a neutral expression on my face as the director walked towards me.

“That was definitely much better. But this time can we try doing a back flip off the roof? I think it’ll add more drama to this scene.”

“Of course!” I smiled, nodded slightly and turned to head back up to the roof.

Positive thinking, positive thinking. Did my ankle hurt, hellayeh. Was I going to let this stop me, hell no!

“OKAY! That’s a wrap guys!” Finally after filming into the late evening I let myself fall down, fully sprawled out, on the side of the street. I shut my eyes as the crew around me got on with clearing away the equipment and props. Any other day I would be lending a hand, but at this very minute my only concern was whether I would be able to get back up again.

“Camden!” Crap. Austin did not look happy. “Cam, come on you need to help put stuff away. We’re a team that means everyone helps set up and clear up.”

“Ey-ey el captain!” I forced myself up with a reluctant smile and regretted it immediately. The pain I had done my best to suppress while shooting was now back with a vengeance. I winced r13;Austin stopped mid walk.

“What’s wrong?” The sharp tone of his voice and the expression on his face told me he was in between anger and concern. Crap...he knew.

I decided to try to bluff my way through the situation. “Nothing Austin. My muscles are just a bit sore.” Looking doubtful he reached out, took me by the hand and forced me to take several steps closer to him. I almost cried out in pain. Immediately he whisked me up and into his arms. I let out a yelp, “Austin!!!”

“You should have bloody told me that you were hurt!”

“Hey! Hey!” I banged on his shoulders. “Put me down!”

He did as told...that was after carrying me all the way to the make-shift tents that we had been using as base camp on location. He plonked me down, grabbed the first aid kit and started bandaging my ankle. “No filming for you for the next two days.”

“WHAT!! NO! Just no! The director will not be happy! It’s not professional!”

“I don’t care what the director thinks! If you keep putting pressure on this you’ll end up seriously hurting yourself! And if you really cared about being professional, then you would have alerted me the minute you realised you’d hurt your ankle! We could have banged it earlier to give you extra support, taken the rest of the afternoon off, and gotten back on track by tomorrow. Instead you decided to be completely unprofessional by hiding your injury!”

I knew that what he said made sense, but I had just wanted to do my best. We both sighed.

“Listen, I know that you’re new and you just didn’t want to be a hindrance. But, an athlete’s body is their temple. Your body is something you have to treasure. So next time you have to say something. Okay?”

“Okay.” I murmured, felling like an idiot. An idiot with good intentions, but an idiot none the less.

“You’re still a kid, kid.” I stuck out my tongue at his teasing, but took in the underlying seriousness of his lecture.

“Sorry Austin. This won’t happen again.” He stood up and gave me a warm smile.

“We live and we learn. I’ll talk to the director, explain the situation, we will just have to reorganise the stunts we’re shooting for the next two days.” He rubbed the back of his neck, “Well the whole crew is going out for drinks tonight, so maybe that’ll help to ease the situation.” He laughed, before his facial expression turned serious. “Apart from you, you need to rest that ankle. Consider it your punishment!” For the hundredth time today I stuck my tongue out at him.

*

This can’t be happening. I had a mild panic attack at my new found situation.

Right now....this very second...I was locked outside my freaking hotel room!

This was an additional low point in my day. Here I stood, in my oversized ‘peanut butter jelly time’ t-shirt, girl boxers and a pair of woolly stripped bed socks.

I paced, well more like limped, the carpeted corridor in mild panic. What the hell was I meant to do? My key and phone were in my room, Austin was out with the crew drinking, and reception was closed at this time....

I was screwed.

This was worst then embarrassing; all I wanted to do was curl up into a ball and be swallowed up by the shadows. I stopped limping about awkwardly and turned to face my room door. You know what that sounded good to me. I plonked myself on to the floor and leaned back against the door opposite mine; glaring at my door as if it might magically open.

All this because I wanted to get some snacks out of the vending machine!

I banged my head back against the door I was resting against without thinking. Stupid! Stupid! Stur13; The door suddenly swung open and I fell backwards with a thump, as the back of my upper body hit the floor and someone’s foot landed on my stomach.

“YA!!! NEO MI-CHEOSS-EO??!!! AISH!!!”

It’s funny, because the first thought that came into my head as I looked up into his handsome yet distinctively angry face was....we’re in Japan, yet this person isn’t speaking Japanese......

The second was, how do I get myself into these situations?

.............Lying on my back definitely gave me a new perspective in life.........and an uninterrupted view of the half naked guy staring down at me.