The morning light was cruel. It filtered through gauzy curtains like judgment, catching the shimmer of last night’s eyeliner clinging desperately to Loretta’s lashes. Her lips were still rouged, her curls still sculpted to perfection—a ghost of the woman who had stormed a premiere party and tried to flirt her way into the arms of a billionaire.

She groaned, flopping back onto a satin pillow. “Too pretty to sleep. Too dumb to die,” she muttered.

Her voice was hoarse with regret and champagne. She hadn’t even bothered to undress. Her heels sat accusingly at the foot of the bed, one daintily upturned like it had fainted from secondhand embarrassment.

She picked up her comm unit with a sigh, bracing herself, and called her manager.

He answered after two rings, far too chipper for someone who hadn’t attended the circus she’d created. “Loretta, sweetheart! I heard you were dazzling last night. The trades are already calling it your best performance yet—”

“I need a number,” she said flatly, cutting him off.

There was a beat of silence. “A what?”

“A number. Specifically, Orias Katko’s contact information.”

The other end went quiet. Then, a half-horrified, half-hysterical laugh. “Loretta. Darling. Sweet comet crash of a woman—what in the hell do you need his number for?”

“I… may have said some things,” she said carefully, “and I need to apologize. Like, urgently. Respectfully. Elegantly. In a way that hopefully won’t get me blacklisted by the man who owns half the industry.”

Her manager groaned. “Loretta. You do realize this man is infamous for firing people who so much as wave at him on set? There are actors who lost gigs for standing too close to his driver.”

She winced. “Not helping.”

“He’s untouchable, Loretta. He doesn’t take calls. He doesn’t answer fan mail. He doesn’t exist except on paper and in scandal. The last time someone called his office uninvited, they got reassigned to a supply shuttle on Mercury.”

Loretta dragged a pillow over her face and screamed into it.

“You like him, don’t you?” her manager asked suddenly.

She peeked out from under the pillow. “I don’t know,” she muttered. “He was different. I wanted to impress him, and instead I came off like a pushy fangirl in rhinestones.”

“Well,” her manager sighed, “lucky for you, I do have a contact. His assistant. But if this goes sideways, I’m denying everything and moving to another planet.”

Loretta sat up, her hair still immaculate. “Deal. I’ll owe you a bottle of something expensive if I survive.”

“And if you don’t?”

“Put my best headshot on the gravestone.”

The pillow slid off her face and thumped to the floor with a soft, tragic finality. Loretta groaned, dragging herself up from the sea of silk sheets and regret, her lashes still miraculously intact from the night before. Her head throbbed with embarrassment more than champagne, and her hair—perfectly set for a party, now slightly skewed like a crown at the end of a long reign—was testament to her refusal to take it all down last night.

Her voice rasped against the air. “Coffee. And my pills, darling.”

She smacked the bed’s comm panel, summoning the morning staff. Moments later, a crisp voice responded. “Yes, Miss Lang?”

“Strong coffee. Stronger pills. All the usual. Don’t forget the blue one—today is a blue-pill kind of day.”

As she waited, she reached for her leather-bound notepad—the same one she used to rehearse lines and sketch out dreams when she still believed in them. She clicked her fountain pen open, tapped the page, and began to write the only script that mattered now.

Phone Apology — Draft One (Do not ad-lib. This is war.)

> Hello, this is Loretta Lang—

Yes, that one.

I’m trying to reach Mr. Orias Katko. I understand he’s a very busy man, but I’d like to leave a message.

I wanted to apologize for any misunderstanding at last night’s premiere.

I had the pleasure of meeting him, and, well…

I may have said some things that came off the wrong way.

I didn’t know who he was, of course—not that that excuses anything.

I just wanted to extend my regrets and say I hope I didn’t cause any offense.

Thank you. Please let him know I’d be happy to take him to lunch—just a casual chat, of course.

She paused, staring at the paper. Then scrawled angrily in the margin:

Tone: Light. Sincere. DO NOT SOUND LIKE A DROWNING STARLET.

Magda entered quietly with a silver tray—coffee black as her mood, pills in their dainty crystal dish. Loretta took them wordlessly, scribbling out a few awkward phrasings and underlining “casual chat” twice, then circling “regret” and putting a dramatic question mark next to it.

“This is what my life has become,” she muttered, sipping her coffee. “Drafting apologies to powerful men I vaguely insulted while wearing couture.”

She picked up her private comm, where Orias’s number already lived—burning a hole through the screen.

Loretta folded her note, flattening the paper neatly beside her on the nightstand. She tapped the comm once—hesitated—and tapped it again.

Her thumb hovered over “call.”

“Okay,” she said softly. “He probably has a secretary. That’s good. That’s what this is for.”

Loretta stood at her vanity, brushing out her curls for the third time. The robe had been traded for a silk blouse—just in case. A bit of lipstick. Not too much. Something that said I’m casual, but my lips were born cinematic.

She stared herself down in the mirror.

“It’s a phone call,” she muttered. “Not an audition.”

But still—what if he saw her somehow? What if the communicator glitched and showed her entire apartment? The wine-stained scripts, the heels on the breakfast table, the sinfully large portrait of herself above the fireplace?

No. No, better to be safe. She slipped in her earrings. The gold ones again. They made her feel expensive, even when she felt ridiculous.

She held the notepad in one hand, phone in the other, pacing the length of the rug like a woman awaiting a firing squad.

“Just say the words. Apologize. Be normal. Be charming. Be—oh for the love of starlight, you do not need to look good to speak into a receiver.”

She tugged the blouse off over her head and threw it across the room. The communicator blinked on the table like a tiny, smug demon.

She lit a cigarette and took one long drag.

“Okay. You’re calling him now. Not because you’re desperate. Not because you want him. But because you’re a professional who insulted an investor, and this is a professional courtesy. That’s it. That’s the whole reason.”

She picked up the communicator.

Then set it back down.

“Stars above, this is going to kill me.”

Loretta exhaled, steadying herself like she was stepping onto a stage. The notepad sat on her lap, carefully written lines staring back up at her in looping, elegant script.

Dear Mister Katko, I just wanted to extend my sincerest apologies for—

“No,” she whispered, adjusting her posture. “You’ve got this. It’s just a secretary. She’ll be cold, clinical, and just eager to get you off the line. You say your piece, hang up, never think of it again.”

With an overly casual finger, she tapped in the number. It rang. Once. Twice.

Then—

Click.

“Hello?”

The voice wasn’t clipped or nasally or businesslike. It was velvet wrapped in thunder. Smooth. Low. Familiar.

Loretta froze.

That was not the secretary.

That was him.

Her throat closed. The words evaporated from the page. Her lipstick suddenly felt too loud.

“Uh—” she croaked, panic short-circuiting her confidence. “Hi. Hello. Is this—this is the number for—”

“You’ve reached Orias,” he said, patient. Curious. Amused, even. “To whom do I owe the pleasure?”

Loretta, who had starred in seven films, had memorized monologues in dead alien tongues, and once performed with a fever of 103, forgot how human speech worked.

Her hand gripped the notepad like a lifeline. Her mouth opened, then closed. The silence grew teeth.

“Miss Lang?” he asked, gentle and just the tiniest bit smug.

She cursed under her breath.

Of course he remembered her name.

Of course he answered his own damn phone.

Of course the universe hated her.

Loretta cleared her throat, forcing herself to sound composed. “Hi, this is Loretta Lang.”

A beat. Then his voice, smooth as satin and just as dangerous:

“Well, Miss Lang. To what do I owe the pleasure? You seemed… confident last night.”

She winced. “Yes, about that.” She sat up straighter, clutching the notepad she’d nearly memorized. “I realized I may have, um… misread the situation. A little. I didn’t know who you were at the time—truly—and if I had known you were the backer, I would’ve handled myself very differently.”

There was a pause. A warm hum of amusement trickled down the line.

“Oh? Well now,” Orias said, his voice laced with irony. “That changes everything.”

“I mean, not everything,” Loretta rushed on. “Just—I would’ve been more professional. Or at least slightly less… intense.”

“You think your behavior was intense?”

She pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’m trying to apologize here.”

“And doing it very earnestly,” he said. “Please, go on. I’m enjoying myself.”

Loretta nearly tossed the phone into the nearest wall. But she pressed forward, reading the scribbled lines of her apology like it was a dramatic monologue.

“I didn’t mean to come across so… presumptuous. And I completely understand if I offended you, or if you’d rather not hear from me again.”

Another pause. He didn’t respond right away.

Then, low and deliberate:

“If I were easily offended, Miss Lang, I would’ve stopped listening a long time ago.”

She blinked. “So you’re not mad?”

“I’m intrigued.”

Loretta blinked harder. “You’re… what?”

Orias chuckled softly. “Not many people talk to me the way you did last night. It was refreshing.”

She exhaled a laugh, half nerves, half disbelief. “So I’m not being blacklisted from every studio you have a stake in?”

“Not unless you plan to repeat your sins on a larger stage,” he teased.

She grinned, rolling her eyes at herself. “Well, in that case… would you maybe like to get lunch sometime?”

A pause. No laughter now. Just warmth.

“I’d like that,” Orias said.

And Loretta, for all her nerves and scrambling charm, sat back in her chair and smiled like a fool.

Loretta blinked. “You would?”

“You sound surprised.”

“I am,” she admitted, laughing a little. “You don’t exactly strike me as the ‘let’s get lunch’ type. More like the ‘vanishes into a black car and never calls again’ type.”

“Ah,” he said, amused. “Mysterious and rude. You're building quite a portrait of me, Loretta.”

“Well, I did meet you in the middle of a room full of drunk producers and desperate models. You were standing in the shadows like a vampire.”

“I prefer ‘enigmatic patron of the arts,’” he teased. “But I’ll allow it.”

“So, tomorrow?” she ventured. “Somewhere public so you can make a dramatic exit halfway through?”

He chuckled low. “Somewhere quiet, actually. Where you won’t have to compete with your own legend. I’ll send you the details.”

Loretta felt heat bloom in her chest—not the blinding blush of last night’s embarrassment, but something steadier, more exciting. She twirled the phone cord between her fingers, smiling.

“Looking forward to it,” she said.

“As am I,” came the reply. “Try not to rehearse this one, Miss Lang.”

“I make no promises.”

The line clicked. Silence returned.

Loretta sat there a moment longer, staring at the receiver like it might burst into song. She let it fall gently into its cradle, then let herself melt backward into the chair.

She was still in her robe, hair half-up, makeup smudged from sleep, and yet… she felt golden. Her grin bloomed, slow and unstoppable.

"Tomorrow," she whispered to herself, giddy.

She didn’t even care that she still hadn’t digested her pills. Or that Maris was going to be unbearable about this. For once, Loretta Lang wasn’t playing a part—she was just a girl with a lunch date, heart fluttering in a way she hadn’t let it in a long time.

And stars help her… she felt good.