The Remaking

by Clay McLeod Chapman

  “Hey…” he starts. “Are you, uh…Are you the gal who played Jessica in—”

  But I didn’t let him finish, forging ahead.

  Plowing through the crowd.

  Run.

  Run.

  I can hear more and more fans start to pick up on my scent. Most times, if I just keep my head low and move in as straight a line as much as humanly possible, pushing past the people as fast as I can, most of these fans won’t even notice me among all the slashers and demons and dead witch girls. I just have to move—

  “Are you Jessica?”

  I don’t answer. I just keep forcing my way through. But once one person notices, more catch on. There’s blood in the water now.

  My blood.

  “Hey! It’s Jessica!”

  “Holy shit! Hey, Jessica!”

  “Jessica!”

  I can feel the smile on my face start to crack. I can’t hold much longer. I have to look like I’m touched by all the attention, that I’m appreciative, thank you, thank you, hello, yes, hi, but it’s too hot in here. There’s not enough air to breathe. It’s so crowded in the aisle. Everyone ambles along, our bodies caught in the general flow, wandering along the convention center.

  But now everyone’s stopping. Everyone’s staring.

  Staring at me.

  “Can I get a picture with you?”

  “Can you sign my arm?”

  “Can you tell me—”

  I can’t breathe.

  Can’t breathe.

  Can’t—

  There’s a back alley behind the snack bar. A pair of doors leads into a long concrete corridor. Convention center employees only. It’s my best shot. My only shot. I push through the doors and wait for them to close, pressing my back against the cream-colored cinder blocks.

  I try waiting for my breathing to balance. Let the inhales even themselves out.

  But they don’t.

  I can’t stop myself from shaking. I’m trembling all over. Practically convulsing. My wrists. My knees. My legs give out. I’m sliding down the wall, my back pressed against the cinder blocks.

  I’m on the floor. In a heap. I can feel the tears running down my cheeks in hot streams. Drowning me.

  The sounds of my sobs echo down the corridor as I lean against the concrete walls.

  So much concrete. Those men poured concrete on top of her, so much concrete, just to keep her down. In the ground. The cold, cold ground. To stop her from digging her way out.

  But she had found a way to come back. Through another.

  Jessica rises.

  THREE

  I finally got the call from my agent a week later. At least I think it was a week. Maybe it was longer. There are a few black patches on my social calendar that I can’t quite account for.

  It’s not like I’ve been waiting around the phone for it to ring all day. Just waiting for him to call me. Waiting for someone, anyone, to call. Break the news to me that this was real.

  That Jessica was back.

  I hadn’t heard from my agent in months. Who am I kidding? It had been closer to a year. I’m surprised he still had my number. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he had to scrounge through the dumpster out back just to find his dusty Rolodex. Our last conversation hadn’t been, ah, shall we say…cordial? Businesslike? I believe I called him a leech or tick or some kind of parasite. An easy dig, I know, but I was sick of these conventions. So sick of the signings. The video store visits. All the screenings of a film that should have been dead. I wanted to move on. Find work. New roles. But my agent, my blessed agent, kindly suggested that fresh roles probably wouldn’t be on my horizon anytime soon. Not unless, of course, I would reconsider my staunch position on which type of roles I constantly turned down. That was when I declared he was draining me of ten percent.

  “Honey,” he purred from the other end of the line, “to be a leech, there’s gotta be some blood in the bank worth sucking on…and you’re just about bone dry.”

  Nobody wants a former child actress. Particularly one still haunted by her most popular role. It didn’t matter how many years had gone by since Don’t Tread on Jessica’s Grave.

  Remember Reagan? Of course you do. Everyone does. How many years did it take Linda Blair to claw her way out from The Exorcist’s shadow?

  Beep. Wrong answer. It was a trick question. She never did. She’s still trapped. She hasn’t crawled out from beneath the eclipse of her most infamous character. That role has haunted her for decades. Even now. She’s still billed on the poster as “…from The Exorcist.”

  Even as a grown-ass woman, her fans always see her as her twelve-year-old self.

  As a child. As a little girl.

  Not a woman.

  She never grew up. Her fans wouldn’t let her.

  I know that feeling. It’s demeaning, is what it is.

  Infantilizing.

  Suffocating.

  But I bet Reagan never visited Linda in her dreams. I bet Pazuzu or whatever the hell that demon was called never sabotaged Linda’s short-lived and ill-fated marriage with a TV stuntman.

  Or racked up a healthy amount of therapy bills.

  Or led her to freebase off-brand sleep medication.

  Or put her on a first-name basis with the clerk at the liquor store down the block. I bet you there isn’t an autographed headshot of her nine-year-old self tacked up to the wall behind the faux-wood-paneled counter of said liquor store (“Boo! Drink responsibly. Love, Amber Pendleton.”) along with all the other alcoholic actors who patronize this particular spot.

  You’re goddamn right I had sworn off horror. I wasn’t going to subject myself to that form of cinematic servitude. For years, I’ve put my foot down about taking parts that even came close to mimicking Jessica. I refused to do slasher films or killer shark films or haunted house films or zombie films and I most definitely would never, ever do another creepy kid flick.

  I wasn’t some creepy kid, for Christ’s sake.

  I wasn’t a ghost girl.

  I was a human being. A fucking flesh-and-blood, living-and-breathing human being.

  An out-of-work human being.

  The conventions were a necessity. I only booked a horror con if the bank account was looking particularly low. But I was getting pinned for being a tad problematic on the convention scene.

  She’s too demanding, I heard.

  Or how about high-strung.

  Neurotic.

  God, how horror movies just loooooove their neurotic women. Nearly half the horror films getting cranked out there—written by men, might I add—had some emotionally unstable, fucking fragile, porcelain-skinned waif at the center of their narrative. Such a genre trope. Such a torture device. These movies were about making their female characters suffer. Sure, they could survive. They could be the final girl and live through the end credits…But at what cost?

  Look at what it did to Marilyn Burns.

  Or Catherine Deneuve.

  Or Karen Black.

  Or Mia Farrow.

  Let’s hear from Roman Polanski about how he treats his female protagonists, shall we?

  And what would Alfie have to say about his dear Tippi?

  Or how about Dario Argento? First he marries his leading ladies and then he daydreams up all the different and colorful ways he can kill them in supersaturated celluloid.

  Why put us women through this?

  Why torture us?

  Whoever Slew Auntie Roo? Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Trilogy of Terror? The Strange Vengeance of Rosalie? The Strange Possession of Mrs. Oliver? Sisters? Séance on a Wet Afternoon? Play Misty for Me? The Haunting? Burnt Offerings?

  There just haven’t been enough whispers about me, have there? Number one on my Top 5 Don’t-Cast-Amber-Pendleton-in-Anything list: She’s unhireable now. The woman’s
damaged goods.

  Christ, if they knew. If they only knew the truth.

  I’ve never asked for someone to pick out my green M&Ms for me or anything like that. I never demanded my own green room or security detail—even though it definitely would have come in handy. I come to each convention with my own stack of headshots and banner, ready to rock. I do everything myself. All of it. I never ask for anything more than space. For privacy.

  It’s just the fans. The fans are everywhere. Always staring. Always wanting more.

  I have nothing left to give them.

  I feel empty.

  Drained.

  But Jessica isn’t done yet.

  Not with me.

  My agent was just as stunned as I was to be calling. “But here we are,” he said. Water under the bridge, just like that. Bygones. You’re never really truly out of this business. Not these days. Not when someone wants something from you. The producers will always find you.

  The movie always finds you.

  Your sin will find you.

  “So I take it you heard the neeewz.” He started right in, wasting no time getting down to business. Time is money. “Word on the street is Jessica is getting the reboot treatment.”

  “I heard.”

  “Not the best part, you haven’t. Ever hear of this kid Sergio Gillespie?”

  “Should I?”

  “He’s one of these young, new, hotshot directors. Made a short film right outta NYU that made a splash on the festival circuit. He’s been getting a lot of heat. The studios have been circling him for months and, well, now this kid’s got the keys to the castle. He can direct whatever the hell he wants and…guess what? He wants his first feature to be none other than our little darling Jessica. Back from the dead.”

  “Good for him.” Home for the last three years had been a loft house in Echo Park. I had some cats around here, somewhere. Or maybe they had me. They only came around when there was something worth eating. Them and the junkies. I can hear them rummaging through the trash cans out back at night. Tiny claws scraping against the aluminum: scritch scritch scritch. I think it’s the cats. Please, God, I hope so.

  “This Gillespie wants to do some serious meta-casting,” my agent said. “It’s a complete gas. He actually wants to hire a bunch of former child actors. Like, right from the Mickey Mouse Club or whatever. The bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, totally wholesome types.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “You know how it is. These teen stars are all desperate to be taken seriously. They’re looking to break out from their picture-perfect Disney mold. Horror’s the way to go.”

  No, I thought. No, it isn’t. Not by a long shot.

  “Sounds amazing,” I said in a monotone into the receiver. “Can’t wait to see it on HBO.”

  “Amber? Helloooo…Are you even listening to me, hon? They want you. You, Amber!”

  “For what?”

  “For the movie! I figured you’d be jumping up and down. Dancing in the streets. This is big! Huge! The director demanded, insisted, that you be in Don’t Tread on Jessica…or whatever they’re going to call it now.”

  “Last time I checked, I wasn’t in the Mickey Mouse Club.”

  The sun eased into the living room. A sliver of light passed through the half-polished-off bottle of Smirnoff on the table and refracted itself into several smaller shards of color. A distilled rainbow cast across my bare feet. I could feel its warmth in my toes. I hadn’t realized how thirsty I was. I should put some orange juice in this, I thought, bringing the bottle up for a sip, it’s still morning. Is it still morning? What day is it?

  “I’m a little old to be playing Jessica, don’t you think?” I asked as the vodka blossomed in my empty stomach. “Christ, I’m old enough to play Ella Louise now…”

  It was true. Don’t think I hadn’t done the math in my head a hundred times already.

  A thousand times.

  I was around the same age as Nora Lambert now, maybe a bit older than her. That bitch. She never talked to me after the shoot. Never wanted to see me again. Not after what happened. The hell I put her through on set. With the police. Guess who got grilled the most after I proclaimed that the ghost of Ella Louise Ford had nearly buried me alive? The actress playing her in the movie, of course. Poor Nora…I know she blamed me for that whole fiasco. They all did. Ketchum. The cast. The crew. I nearly ruined their movie.

  What was it that W. C. Fields always said? Never work with animals or children…

  Yeah, well, guess we all learned that lesson the hard way.

  Nobody believed me.

  Nobody listened.

  Nobody saw.

  But here I was. Older now. Alive. The same age as Ella Louise Ford. The real Ella Louise. I could have been Jessica’s mother now. That witch could’ve been my daughter.

  My little girl.

  I hadn’t realized how long the silence from the other end of the line had stretched. Who had spoken last? I’d drifted for a moment, losing myself in my thoughts.

  What the hell is he waiting for?

  “Amber. Darling. Sweetie.”

  Whatever warmth I’d leeched off the vodka went cold.

  “No,” I managed to say.

  “It’s perfect, Amber…” There was a sincerity to his tone. He really believed this BS.

  “I won’t do it.”

  “Ella Louise Ford…It’s genius. Who knows the role better than you? Tell me! Who?”

  “Nora Lambert,” I said.

  “She’s dead, Amber.”

  “Oh.”

  “Two years ago. Cervical cancer.”

  “Oh. I—I didn’t know.” Of course I knew. There wasn’t any mention in the trades. Nothing beyond an obit in her hometown newspaper. Lambert never escaped her role, either, but she got to walk away. She never reached out for the limelight again…by choice.

  She was the lucky one, I thought. At least she ran when she had the chance. I was trapped. That movie kidnapped me. Erased me. I was like that terrorist heiress. What was her name? The one who lost herself and joined her captors’ cause? Patty Hearst! For me, I’d been shanghaied by a horror movie. The world lost Amber Pendleton. The world was brainwashed into believing I was Jessica Ford.

  “It’s what Nora would’ve wanted,” my agent said. “To honor her legacy.”

  I had no idea what he meant by that. Nora wouldn’t have wanted me anywhere near that movie. I had been invited to her memorial service but I chose not to go. Not to see her.

  In the open casket.

  In the ground.

  I felt so small. My body felt so small. My voice, where was my voice? I couldn’t find it. I couldn’t find the air to take into my lungs, to breathe back out and manifest the sounds that would take shape in my mouth to say the word I needed to say over and over and over and…

  No…

  No.

  NO.

  “Amber. Please. Take a moment. Think this through. It’s perfect. You played Jessica in the original…And now you’ll play Ella Louise in the remake. The fans will love it. Absolutely go rabid for it. Instant box office success. Boom. You’re back on top. Hello, new roles. Hello, work!”

  A very, very dark thought took root in my head just then. I couldn’t shake it loose the longer it wrapped around my brain.

  What If I wasn’t actually talking to my agent?

  What if this was all in my head?

  This could have been just another one of my childhood episodes. A mental lapse, the doctor suggested to Mom, a momentary rift from reality. Sometimes, one’s imagination breaks from the truth. A snap. That fissure quickly fills in with its own alternate reality. A story made up in one’s mind to make sense of the trauma they’ve been subjected to. A fantasy.

  A ghost story.

  What if, after all these years, af
ter all the conventions and autographs, I had finally cracked? What if I was holding my phone up to my ear and there was nobody there, no agent, nothing but a dial tone, and I was having this entire conversation with myself, with my own fragmented personality?

  What if I was crazy?

  God, I wanted that to be the case. So wanted it to be true. If I was nuts, if I really was just a loony tune here, my mind lost to the funnies, then it would have been me doing this to myself. It would be my mind’s fault. Not some movie. Not some real ghost.

  I could finally be free.

  Free of her.

  With the right medication, the proper prescription, some time to rest in the hospital—

  “Amber,” my agent said into the phone. “Still with me, hon? Hellooooo.”

  “I won’t do it,” I croaked.

  “Can you tell me why? Why you’re not taking this seriously? Why you’re not even considering it? They’re coming to us with this. You know that, right? This is not me banging down their door. The director wants you, Amber. You. He asked for you and nobody else.”

  “I—I can’t. I just can’t.”

  “The studio absolutely loves the idea. The director wants you to come in right away. Read some pages. Get in front of the camera again. It misses you, Amber. It’s time. Time to come back…”

  “Please.” Was I crying? I couldn’t tell, but it felt like it. “Please don’t make me do this.”

  Why did my voice sound so little? Why did I sound like a child?

  Just a girl…

  “They’re offering low six figures,” he said. “I think I can talk them up at bit. At least to lower-mid. You can’t turn this down. I know you need this, Amber. It’s good money. The best payday you’ve seen in years. Speaking frankly, hon, it’s the best payday you’re liable to get from here on out. So take it. Please. Just consider it.”

  I told my agent I would, just to get him off the phone. “Don’t sit on it for too long,” he warned. “The offer won’t stay on the table forever.”

  My bare feet were still on the table. I was staring at them. My toes. I can remember the wet leaves clinging to them. How cold it felt running through those woods. All that mud. The cuts and scrapes. The blood. Little slices up and down my legs. The kudzu and thorns reaching for me, holding me back. Pulling me down into the ground. Into the soil.