by Marian Keyes
‘But why?’
‘I’m gay’
Gay. Lara was a lesbian. I’d never met a real-life lesbian before. Not knowingly, anyway. Plenty of gay men, of course, but this was a new one on me and I had no clue what to say. Congratulations? Get lost, you’re too good-looking?
‘I’m sorry’ Lara roared with laughter. ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’
‘So you’re not gay?’ Suddenly I was comfortable again.
‘No, I am.’
9
The following morning dawned bright and sunny. I was beginning to spot a pattern here.
‘How are you today?’ asked Emily, handing me my breakfast smoothie.
How was I? Goofed, knackered, fearful, disoriented… ‘Jet-lagged,’ I settled on.
‘Give it a couple of days, then you’ll be fine.’
I could only hope so.
After breakfast, Emily took me to hire a car, but to my disappointment it wasn’t as foxy as the one in my imagination, because the foxy one transpired to be about ten times as expensive as the non-foxy model.
‘Get it anyway,’ Emily urged.
‘I shouldn’t,’ I said. ‘I’m not earning.’
‘Tell me about it.’
Then the pair of us went to the beach and whiled away several hours, dissecting all sorts of inconsequential stuff, like what a total gobshite Donna’s Robbie was – we got great mileage out of that one – and how Sinead looked much better since she’d gone blonde the previous year.
‘I’d never have thought it would suit her.’
‘No, me neither. Not with her colouring.’
‘No, not with her colouring.’
‘But she looks great.’
‘She really does.’
‘And if she’d told me what she was planning to do, I’d have tried to talk her out of it.’
‘Me too. I would never have thought it would suit her.’
‘No, me neither. I have to say I really didn’t think it would.’
‘But it’s fantastic. Really natural looking.’
‘Very natural looking…’ And so on. Lovely, no-brainer stuff, where I didn’t have to be clever, or even coherent. Extremely comforting.
But when we got back from the beach, our sleepy, lazy mood changed and we were suddenly encapsulated in a ball of anxiety. The first thing Emily did after she’d opened the door was to skid towards the answering machine, hoping for a message from David Crowe.
‘Well?’ I asked.
‘Nada.’
‘Oh, poor Emily.’
‘It’s too late,’ she said the following morning, as she made us our smoothies. ‘If it was going to happen it would have happened by now.’
‘But your script is brilliant.’
‘It makes no difference.’
Despite having perfectly valid problems of my own, I couldn’t help but be affected by Emily’s hopelessness.
‘Isn’t life very unfair?’
‘Too right. I’m so sorry that all this stuff is going on with me,’ Emily said. ‘I’m sure you could do without it.’
‘Ah, you’re ΟΚ,’ I shrugged.
The thing was – though I’d never have admitted it – that it was almost a relief to be around a big drama that wasn’t mine. Now and again Emily made another half-hearted effort to quiz me up and down about Garv, but I was resistant and she hadn’t the energy to persist.
‘So what would you like to do today?’ Emily asked.
‘Duh!’ I gestured at the window and the dazzling day beyond it. ‘Go to the beach, of course.’
‘I’ll get my bikini,’ she offered, gallantly.
I shook my head. ‘There’s no need. Stay and do some work, you’ll feel better.’
Emily had always been a grafter, and though she claimed she wasn’t making any progress on her new script, I knew how guilty she felt if she didn’t put in the hours. She’d even done some work the previous evening.
Mind you, as well as writing, Emily spent half her life on the phone, hopping from call waiting to call waiting, like a juggler keeping several balls in the air. There was no such thing as a short conversation.
Connie – whom I still hadn’t met – seemed to take up a lot of her time, on account of having drama after drama with flowers, caterers, hairdressers, bridesmaid dresses… It made me queasy to overhear. I didn’t want anyone ever to get married, I wanted the whole world to get divorced – even single people – so that my life wouldn’t feel like such a rare and conspicuous fiasco.
Connie’s most recent wedding disaster related to her honeymoon. In a strange version of life imitating art, the resort she’d picked for her honeymoon had been invaded by disgruntled local militiamen, who’d kidnapped seven of the guests. Connie’s travel agent was refusing to return her deposit, and though Emily hadn’t an ounce of legal knowledge, she was urging Connie to sue. ‘You’ve got rights. Who cares if it wasn’t in the contract? Oh hang on, there’s my call waiting…’
‘I’ll be back later,’ I said, flinging a book into my beach bag.
‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ Emily asked.
‘Yes.’
Well, I wasn’t too bad – I’d been in Los Angeles for three days and not once had I rung Garv. I’d had two really compulsive urges, but luckily they’d both happened when it was the middle of the night in Ireland, so I’d convinced myself not to act on them.
‘You’re getting a great tan,’ Emily said, sitting cross-legged on the couch and switching on her laptop. ‘Drive safely.’
On the way to my car I saw the New-Agey next-door neighbours, obviously on their way out to work. An incongruous pair: she was African-American, haughty and graceful, with a swan-like neck and elbow-length extensions, whereas he looked like Bill Bryson – bearded, balding, bespectacled and kind of jolly. I gave them a nod. Smiling, they approached and introduced themselves: Charmaine and Mike. They seemed very pleasant and didn’t mention my aura.
As I said goodbye and turned away, I saw one of the neighbours from the other side, returning from buying coffee for himself and his house-mates, if the Starbucks tray he was carrying was any clue.
‘Yο,’ he yelled at me, as he marched along in knee-length cut-offs and a torn vest. Even if Emily hadn’t already told me the lads were all students, I think I could have figured out that this one wasn’t exactly an insurance salesman, judging from his shaved head, many facial piercings and elaborate facial hair. In my few short days in Los Angeles I’d decided that next door could well be a halfway house for Goatees Anonymous. There appeared to be dozens of blokes – although Emily said there were only three – and they all seemed to be afflicted. Some just had wispy, bum-fluff efforts; others, obviously the more hardcore cases like this guy, wore cultivated Fu Manchu mini-beards.
Outside their house sat a long, low, orange car. It looked so clapped out I thought it had been abandoned, but Emily told me it belonged to the boys. It had only cost them two hundred dollars on account of none of the doors opening, so entry and exit was by means of the windows. They called it their Dukes of Hazzardmobile.
‘Hey,’ I replied, climbing into my car.
I drove the shamefully short distance to the beach and parked. The vista ahead of me was as picture-perfect as it always was. The sand, the sun, the waves, the clear, golden light. Pity I was so wretchedly lonely. Worse still – and I was ashamed to admit this – I was unsettled without the routine and structure of a job and, really, I can’t tell you how annoying this was, because I felt like I’d spent most of my working life fantasizing about winning the lotto, jacking in the job and having endless free time to loll around in the sun. Now that I had it, I was afraid of it. Of course, over the years, I’d taken holidays, but this strange, uncharted hiatus wasn’t a holiday. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I knew what it wasn’t.
I noticed that my left ring finger no longer looked so weird –the raw-dough colour was becoming more normal, the sunburn had gone down and the outline was plumping out to fit with th
e rest of the finger. It was like writing in the sand being washed away by the waves.
I spread out my towel and sat in the invisible plastic bubble that kept me cut off from the rest of the world – apart from Rudy, the ice-cream man. He hadn’t shown up the previous day. His day off? I asked.
No, he said. He’d been at an audition.
‘So what’ll it be today?’ he asked.
‘What do you recommend?’ I was keen to prolong the contact.
‘How about a Klondike bar?’
A Klondike bar it was, and away he went.
I watched him slog along the beach, getting smaller and smaller the further he went. Where did he put the ice-creams at night, I wondered. Was there a big place they all lived? Like a bus depot, but for ice-creams? Or did he have to bring them home with him? And if so, was he worried about members of his family eating them? It wouldn’t matter so much if they paid for them, it’d save him trudging along the beach while people threw stones at him. But they probably wouldn’t cough up… I drifted off to sleep.
As far as I was concerned, there was no such thing as too many zeds. I was still sleeping that same dead-person’s sleep as I had been at home – at least I did once the loudest telly in the Western hemisphere was switched off. Being asleep was a blessed release, and waking up was like being delivered into hell. Each morning when reality hit my first thought was one of terror. ‘I can’t believe this has happened. I can’t actually believe I’m here.’ But not long after waking, the horror usually dispersed, just leaving a wispy residue of dread.
When I got back around six-thirty, Emily had fallen asleep on the couch, her laptop on her stomach, and there was a flashing light on the answering machine. One message. Not for me.
A man’s voice, speaking in that laid-back, Californian, singsong way, like this call wasn’t a matter of life and death. ‘Yeah, hey Emily. This is David. Crowe. Your hardworking agent.’ He got particularly sing-song at that bit. ‘I just got a call from Mort Russell at Hothouse. He’s read your script and he’s veeeeery excited.’ Another little tune. ‘Call me.’
‘Emily! Wake up!’ I tugged her by the arm and tried to pull her up. ‘Wake up, you have to listen to this!’
Her face blank and dazed, I played the message again. Then she was off that couch and on that phone so fast…
‘Who’s Hothouse?’ I asked. ‘Are they good?’
‘I think they’re part of Tower,’ she mumbled, punching numbers. ‘Don’t have left for the day, oh still be there, please, Emily O’Keeffe calling for David Crowe.’
She was put straight through.
‘Yeah,’ she said and nodded. ‘Yes… Right.’ Another nod. ‘OΚ… When?… OK. Bye.’
Slowly she put down the phone. Even more slowly she let her body slide down the wall until she was on the floor. Everything in her actions screamed catastrophe. She turned a strained face to me. ‘You know what?’
‘What?’
‘They want me to pitch it to them.’
It took me a moment. ‘But that’s good!’
‘I know. I know. I KNOW.’
Then she wept as I’ve never seen another human being weep. Torrents. Buckets. Convulsions. ‘Thank God,’ she bawled into her hands. ‘ThankGodthankGodthankGodthankGod…’
‘You artistic types,’ I said, indulgently.
‘I have to talk to Troy.’ She was suddenly urgent.
A quick phone call – at least it was quick by her standards, a mere twenty minutes or so – then it was all hands on deck. Hair and make-up and dresses and heels; we were meeting Troy at Bar Marmont at eight-thirty. Apparently Troy was a director and he would advise Emily on Mort Russell, Hothouse, pitching and self-esteem, among other things.
‘Is he married?’ I asked, as I asked about everyone.
This sent Emily into fits of laughter. ‘Troy? Yeah, Troy is married all right. To his work. But other than that he’s single. Single, single. Single, single, single. The most single person you’ve ever met.’
‘What films has he made?’ I asked, as we sped along the 405.
‘None that you’d have heard of.’
‘Is he no good then?’
‘He’s brilliant. But he works in the independent sector. He’s too uncompromising to survive in the studio system – at least at the moment. He’s waiting for his reputation to be good enough so he gets total artistic control on a big-budget blockbuster.’
‘God, would you look at them!’ We’d passed a gym with floor-to-ceiling glass windows, so that everyone on the treadmills was visible to the whole world. Not only would I hate to have passing motorists witness my red, sweaty shame, but it was eight-thirty on a Friday night! Had they no bars to go to?
‘Loads of gyms do that window thing,’ Emily said. ‘There’s always the chance that Steven Spielberg might be passing.’
Bar Marmont was dark and gothic and very un-LA. Plaster serpents snaked up the walls and even the mirrors reflected back gloom.
‘There he is.’ Emily marched over to a man sitting on his own. After they had greeted each other very excitedly, she introduced me to him.
‘Hi,’ he said shyly.
‘Hi.’ I was staring at him. I knew I was, and all I could do was wonder, What makes a man beautiful?
I knew there were certain conventions. Big jawlines, prominent cheekbones, long, thick eyelashes. Everyone likes a good set of gleaming white choppers, while soulful puppydog eyes do it for some people (although I’m not one of them). And noses? No. Noses are meant to take a back seat. Everyone thinks it’s just better if they keep out of the way.
However, sometimes a person breaks all the rules, and they still end up being devastating. Troy’s long face was dominated by his nose. His mouth was a straight, underscored line which gave nothing away. But the light bounced from his olive skin and his dark hair was shorn GI short. His eyes were, perhaps, hazel-coloured. A sidelong glance across the room, as he looked across at the bar, and a greenishness blazed.
‘You girls like a drink?’ he asked softly.
‘Sure,’ Emily said. ‘White wine.’
‘Maggie?’ And the eyes were on me. More khaki than hazel.
‘Something.’
‘You want to narrow it down for me some?’ A little upward curve of his mouth.
‘Aaah. Something frosty. With alcohol.’
‘Something frosty with alcohol. You got it.’ He smiled. Oh, and there we are. Gleaming white choppers, all present and correct.
I watched him crossing the room. He wasn’t very tall, but there was a careless grace to his movements, as if he wasn’t terribly interested in himself.
‘Y’OK?’ Emily asked.
‘Er, yes.’
She rummaged in her handbag, smiling a private smile.
Then he was back. ‘Frozen margarita, Maggie. The best in town. So what brings you to LA?’
‘Just… ‘I hated this question, just hated it. Then I knew what to say! ‘Just taking some down time.’
No one looked at me funny. No one burst out laughing. Looked like I’d managed to use the new slang successfully.
Then it was debriefing time. According to Troy, Mort Russell was ‘Insane, but not in a bad way… Not always in a bad way,’ he amended.
‘And he’s really EXCITED about my script,’ Emily twinkled.
‘I love your work,’ Troy crooned at her. ‘I troooly love your work. I want to have sex with your work I love it so much.’
‘I love your work,’ Emily said. ‘I’m getting all hot just thinking about it… That’s the way they go on,’ she explained to me. ‘Mort Russell probably hasn’t even read my script.’
‘They just drop a love bomb on you,’ Troy said. ‘Two days later they won’t even take your calls.’ Not that that was going to happen to Emily, he insisted.
‘So what do you know about Hothouse?’ Emily asked.
‘They’ve good people and a lot of energy. You know they made The American Way?’
‘Was that them?�
�� Emily looked alarmed. ‘That wasn’t so great.’
‘Yeah, but only because they kept firing the directors.’
‘You know Glass Flowers?’ Emily went off on a tangent. ‘I heard they had sixteen writers on it.’
‘True. And it shows. Whatja think of Sand in Your Eyes?’
‘Not as bad as Obeying Orders. Like, I managed not to walk out!’
While I sipped my frozen margarita, Emily and Troy batted high-speed banter about movies they’d seen recently. Mostly they dissed them, but now and again they poured praise.
‘Great cinematography.’
‘Really tight script.’
After a while, I got the rules. If I’d heard of the movie, they didn’t tend to like it, but if it sounded obscure, preferably foreign, then it got praised.
‘So pitch me your movie, Emily,’ Troy said.
‘OK. I’m thinking Thelma and Louise meets Steel Magnolias meets The Thomas Crown Affair meets Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,’ she said in a rush. ‘Only joking. I haven’t had time to work on it yet.’
‘We have until Wednesday,’ Troy said. ‘But you know? You’ll be great. You,’ he pointed at her, ‘are Good in a Room.’
‘Good in a Room?’ I asked.
‘It’s what they say,’ Troy said, ‘about someone who’s got the art of the pitch. Emily tells a great story, she’s Good in a Room. Another frosty drink with alcohol?’
‘It’s my turn.’
Three drinks later, Troy looked at his watch. ‘I gotta take off. Early start.’
‘Breakfast roller-blading date?’ Emily asked.
‘Seven a.m. spinning class,’ he replied, and they both laughed.
‘They all do that as well,’ Troy said to me. ‘It’s kind of a macho thing, having your personal trainer come by before sun-up.’
Out we went to the valet station and handed over our tickets. I must have been a little bit tipsy, because I couldn’t stop going on about how great the whole notion of valet parking was. I told everyone – Emily, Troy, the valet man, the couple waiting next to us – and they all seemed slightly amused. I saw nothing amusing about being a crap parker and scraping cars against pillars in multi-storey car parks. Although I didn’t do that in every car, just in…
