A Star Is Bored

by Byron Lane

“I’m just fucking with you,” Kathi says dryly. “Come in.” She turns casually and walks into the wonderland that is her home, motioning for me to follow. She moves with ease, her comfort and calm at odds with the commanding surroundings. We’re in the definition of a “great room,” with vaulted ceilings and a huge disco ball the size of an oven affixed high overhead. Sunlight from a skylight is hitting the little square mirrors of the ball and sending twisting and twirling bits of pinks and blues and purples all around. The far wall is covered in antique portraits of animals: Someone’s beloved cat. An aristocrat’s precious dog. A bird that looks suspiciously like Sean Penn.

  Kathi turns back to me as I pass through the doorway. “Please wipe your feet,” she says. “The floors are made of endangered trees.”

  I look down and wipe my feet on an absurdly tiny, vintage-looking Mickey Mouse rug resting on an ocean of caramel-colored hardwood flooring that stretches under us in all directions. This is not the kind of wood flooring I’ve ever seen before. These planks are not the kind from Lowe’s or Home Depot. These look like huge, ancient, wide and thick rectangle-cut logs—no doubt from some haunting enchanted forest—which have supported this house and its various occupants over the years, through every earthquake, man-made and not. To my right is a massive roaring fireplace and, above the mantel, the mounted head of a huge hairy moose staring down at us. To my left is a piano covered in photos of Kathi Kannon’s family and friends: Her flipping off a laughing Barbra Streisand. Her smoking with Bruce Willis. Her Lady-and-the-Tramp-ing a hot dog with Tom Hanks.

  Kathi motions around us. “Here we are,” she says, adding, “I think. There’s no actual proof, existentially speaking.”

  Beyond the piano are a few stairs leading up to a dining area. A formal dinner table is another huge hunk of wood, spanning the wide length of the room, another piece of furniture that didn’t come from West Elm. The walls are stucco, painted in faded hues of peach and blue with artistic minimurals here and there: stars, flowers, a guillotine. The accent lighting is neon pink and electric blue.

  In the middle of the room, under the disco ball, directly in front of us, is a bright white Native American–style rug supporting a circle of nine old leather chairs. And that’s where Kathi Kannon turns to face me again. She takes a seat, her legs folding unnaturally beneath her like a thousand-year-old yogi. She squints, taking me in as I sit across from her.

  “How old are you?” Kathi asks.

  “I think it’s illegal to ask that,” I say, regretfully but playfully.

  “Well,” Kathi says. “Brace yourself.”

  I smile. “Everyone says I look young. I’m twenty-nine,” I say. “I guess it’s my Louisiana genes. I’m from just outside of New Orleans.”

  “Interesting,” she says coldly, in a tone that could be intrigue or disgust.

  In the quiet that follows, I let my eyes dart this way and that, searching for something to keep the conversation going. It’s not that there isn’t something curious in the room to ask about, it’s that there’s too much, too many things requiring inquiry, so instead I turn to my arrival on this property, asking her, “Was that you who buzzed me in at the gate?”

  “I don’t know what happened,” she says. “I just wanted the ringing to stop.”

  I clear my throat and instantly fear it’s too loud. I swallow hard. I force an unnatural smile—I’m thinking, How is it possible that I’ve forgotten how to smile?! I try again to brush down the curl on the side of my head. I feel my body heating up, the warmth emerging unreservedly from my forehead, my back, my armpits, all traces of a cool countenance fleeing, oozing from my pores, from my very being.

  Yet Kathi sits perfectly still, her body planted in the chair, her shoulders slightly hunched as if the idea of proper posture escapes her. She observes me without a real tell about how she’s feeling about me, watches me like I’m a television.

  She doesn’t make another move, another comment; she doesn’t budge. This is a woman who must be used to an awkward encounter, familiar with people who want something from her. Maybe she’s used to waiting to be asked for things—a job, an autograph, an ovum. This is a woman with a lifetime of training in inconvenience, observation, assessing. This is a woman who, despite her stature and wit, fame and fortune, forceful and bold motions through life, doesn’t seem to care who takes charge. Maybe she doesn’t really give a shit whether I start talking next or she does, whether this conversation continues or not. Maybe the mystery of what will happen next is what is most amusing to her.

  And so I blather. “These are cool chairs.”

  “Yeah, I like their attitudes,” she replies, awakening from her easy-breezy trance. “I got them from a flea market in Paris and had them shipped over. I feel bad that they’re made out of animal corpses, so I named them after Chinese emperors, and they all seem fine with it. You’re sitting on Qin Shi Huang. How is he on your buttocks?”

  “He’s … nice.”

  She raises her eyebrows again, tilting her head slightly, as if to say, What else?

  “Um. I’m very grateful for the opportunity to meet with you,” I say.

  “Me, too. For the opportunity to meet myself,” she says quickly, like this is her tenth take of this scene. She sucks again on her electronic cigarette, then opens her mouth, letting the vapor float out; no blowing here, no exertion, this is not going to be hard work for her. The mist calmly dissipates like clouds in summer.

  I’m in awe. Kathi Kannon seems brilliant but enigmatic. Pleasant, but her teeth are slightly clenched. There’s a vibe—jesting but tangible—that she doesn’t want to be doing this and doesn’t want to be here and this whole day would be going a lot better if she was just in her bed taking a nap. I feel it as rejection, that familiar friend I’ve known since my earliest days in my lack of childhood playmates, my mother abandoning me with her tragic and early death, my father, who grew colder and colder the more I grew up and, to his horror, didn’t grow out of my more effeminate qualities.

  I struggle to keep it going, this new, semi-electrified life I started living back at Kathi Kannon’s front gate and now want so badly to never end, as if I’m instantly important just by proximity to her. I decide to be bold; perhaps she’s not used to people being frank and forward, perhaps that’s what she’s looking for.

  “Miss Kannon,” I say, trying to exhale away my encroaching stress-related neck pain. “I hear you’re looking for someone who can help you with your writing, and I’ve been a writer for many years now, a journalist, so I’m trained to take down information and to be sure it is precise and accurate and grammatically correct. And I can do that for you, help you with your writing and whatnot, if you want.”

  She coughs, looks away, then back at me. “What?”

  “I’m very responsible, I’m always on time, I’m hyper-organized, and no task is too big or too small.”

  I pause for her praise.

  She says, almost with frustration, “I feel like I’m dreaming and if I could just wake up, I’d be thinner.”

  I continue, “I’m also good with things like organizing and maintaining a calendar. Do you have a scheduling system?”

  “Yeah,” she says, standing and reaching into her pocket, pulling out scraps of paper and reading them. “‘Call Jessica Lange’—done,” she says, tossing it onto the floor. “‘Get erotic birthday cake for Russell Crowe’—done,” she says, and again tosses it aside. She pulls another scrap and reads, “‘Take birth control—’” then gasps, grabbing her stomach, “Oh my GOD!”

  I grip the arms of the Chinese emperor chair and start to stand, to comfort her, to offer her peace, to counter my own confusion at how she can still be on the pill at fifty-six years old. Then she smiles.

  “Acting,” she says, sitting back down with a sigh, but one chair closer to me this time. I take it as a good sign and wonder what to do next. Another eternity passes in silence, and her face again cues me to keep going, get it over with, deliver this breech baby before we al
l die, her of monotony, me of inherent nothingness.

  “You keep your calendar on scraps of paper?” I ask, like a stunned child who just accidentally saw Chuck E. Cheese take off his costume head, revealing an awful rat man.

  Kathi collects the scraps of the calendar papers and stuffs them back in her robe like treasure, glancing at me as if to say, Who doesn’t?

  “Why do you want this job?” she asks.

  “I hate my life,” I say, regretting it instantly, feeling myself blush, my hand uncontrollably going to the curl on the side of my head. My unruly hair, an unhinged reminder that I was prepared for every question about my entire career history—college, experience, references—but I was not prepared for this simple one about my life.

  Kathi lets out a humph. “I relate,” she says, mostly to herself.

  I count this as a tiny victory, so I press on, quick to turn the subject away from my neurotic problems and back to the measurable marks of this employment opportunity. “I was told you want to get serious with your life and career, that you need an assistant to help you be more professional. Do you want that?”

  “I’ll be honest, it doesn’t sound like me. But when I’m bored, I’ll say anything.”

  “Are you bored right now?” I ask.

  Kathi apologetically nods, yes.

  Despite my efforts, I can feel my body sinking with disappointment, failure.

  She says, “But don’t worry, it’s not you, it’s me. Or maybe it’s us—it’s too soon to tell. Maybe it’s because we’re not sitting on Emperor Yi.” She nods to a leather chair across from us. We stare at it, as if he’s about to talk. She looks at me. “Come on. I’ll show you around.”

  Kathi Kannon stands, her legs unwinding beneath her. She turns and takes off to the right and I think I can hear the sound of her eye roll. I don’t know if she’s giving me a tour because she’s warming to me or if she’s apathetic and trying to pass the time as quickly as possible.

  She motions to the room where we’re standing. “This is the living room, as opposed to the dying room. I named it Mateo’s room. That’s Mateo the Moose up there.” She points to the moose head above the fireplace. “I saw him in a hotel in Bulgaria and I just felt so bad for him and figured I’d try to give him a happy life. He’s been here for so long. He once saw Jack Nicholson nude.” She looks at me to gauge my reaction. Shock, of course. And fascination. She’s pleased. Kathi turns to Mateo the Moose again. “My life’s greatest mission is to find the back half of him and put it on the other side of the wall in the other room. Come see.”

  Kathi walks, and I follow, into the adjoining room, a bit deeper into her mansion, her world. The room is painted entirely red, like a womb, and is filled with boats—paintings, statuettes, drink coasters. Clusters of fragile model ships sit crammed, poised precariously, on the mantel above what I have now counted as the second raging fireplace. On the floor, there’s an ocean of throw pillows large and small, patterned and solid colors, shapes like lips and flowers. I wonder why Kathi needs so many cushions—perhaps for when she has friends over for talking, reading, orgies.

  In the corner is a bar, where Kathi Kannon, film icon, takes a glass from a shelf, grinds it into an ice bucket until the glass is full, and pours a Coke Zero on top, fizz and bubbles nearly spilling out in a close call that she doesn’t even register. “Want one?” she asks.

  I can’t tell if she’s being kind or if this is an order.

  “Well, do you? I don’t offer to serve people every day. This isn’t Apple-tart.”

  “Applebee’s?” I ask.

  “Whatever the fuck,” she says, taking a gulp of her soda like a kid drinking chocolate milk.

  “No, thanks,” I say. “I can’t believe you make your own drinks.”

  “Who else is gonna do it? I have a few people on staff around here, but they’re mostly just ambience. Sure you don’t want one?” Kathi smirks, like she knows something. Like she’s known all along what I want, one of many things she gleaned instantly upon meeting me, probably upon meeting anyone—she knows them. Maybe it’s a natural, brilliant gift. Maybe it’s because she’s met so many people in her life, she can zero in on you like a laser. She’s met every personality type, seen every quirk. And she’s pegged me: Twitchy, uptight, wounded. And thirsty.

  “Okay, sure,” I say, “I’ll take a Coke Zero.” I’m thinking, Why not—just another bit of texture to add to this weird experience. I’m thinking, I’ll write about this in my suicide note after I leave, after she rejects me.

  “The most important part of the assistant job is…” Kathi starts, pausing to hand me my Coke Zero.

  I chime in, “Keeping you organized, updating and backing up all of your phones and computers, helping you write every single day?”

  “Keeping my e-cigarettes charged,” Kathi says.

  I say, “Right.”

  I say, “Got it.”

  I say, “That’s the job.”

  She asks, “Have you ever had one?”

  I ask, “A job?”

  She says, “An e-cigarette.” And as quickly as the question exits her mouth, the e-cigarette is headed toward me, Kathi Kannon holding it out to me, offering me a puff. I stare, hesitating a moment, a moment too long. She sighs and rolls her eyes, bringing the cigarette back to her, down to her shirt, wiping the mouthpiece off, and handing it to me again. “There,” she says. “No more cooties.”

  I wince in shame. “Oh, no. It’s not that. It’s just, I don’t smoke or do drugs or have fun,” I blabber, betraying the reason for my hesitation, which was simply: I never smoked one of these. What if I make a fool of myself? What if I cough? What if I spit up on her?!

  Kathi continues holding the e-cig toward me. “You can’t turn me down. I taught Jamie Lee Curtis how to give a blowjob.”

  I nod as if to say, It all makes sense now, and I take the e-cigarette from her fingers. She watches me, a slightly devious smile in her eyes. I feel like the kid I always wanted to be—the kid getting initiated into the group of cool guys, the kid who’s hip enough that he faces peer pressure, pressure to actually fit in versus the actual story of my life, the opposite of peer pressure, never pressured to fit in, always pressured to keep out.

  I put the e-cigarette to my lips. I suck in. I imagine myself looking so, so cool. I nod and bob like I’m listening to reggae in my head; I imagine I look like the guy from Grease, until I start coughing uncontrollably.

  The headline will read: LAME.

  The headline will read: AMATEUR.

  The headline will read: FAILURE.

  “What’s in this?” I ask.

  “Water vapor and meth,” she says.

  My eyes widen.

  “Just kidding,” she says. “I haven’t made meth in years.”

  “Acting?” I ask.

  “Sure,” she says with a shrug, taking back her e-cigarette. “I honestly don’t know what’s in it. But whatever it is, it has to be better than real cigarettes, right? Or drugs.” She locks eyes with me when she says “drugs.”

  Drugs. She mentions them so casually and so quickly upon meeting me. I’m thinking of her story, her life as an addict since age thirteen, the topic or subtext of every interview and magazine article about her. I’m thinking of the promise I made to myself: I won’t be an enabler, not of a drug habit, not of any bad habits. If I get this job, I promise myself, I’ll protect her. If.

  “You’re a little odd,” she says.

  “Yes, ma’am. Thank you,” I respond, like it’s a reflex, a politeness reflex.

  “Please don’t call me ma’am.”

  “Sorry. It’s my father’s fault,” I say, spitting out the word father. I’m thinking of my dad screaming at me as a kid: ALWAYS SAY “THANK YOU”! ALWAYS SAY “YES, MA’AM”! ALWAYS SAY “NO, MA’AM”! YOU UNDERSTAND ME? MY ROOF, MY RULES! His grating, gravelly, masculine voice is still screaming at me, in my head, all these years later, even while not under his roof, even while not under his rule, even while her
e, auditioning for a new role in Hollywood’s royal court.

  “Come on,” Kathi says, marching onward, toward, yes, a third blazing fireplace.

  I follow her through another living room to the backyard, which is like a showroom for folk art, with trees that have their trunks painted in different colors, mannequins fully dressed and posed in unspeakable acts with one another, and a flower bed in which the soil has been topped with glistening chunks of colorful broken glass—pale greens and blues. There’s a trickling water fountain, flashing lights twinkling in random sequence along the roofline, and a fire pit emblazoned with the phrase BURN, FUCKER.

  Little dollhouses line the side of a steep hill that borders her property, tiny lights are on inside tiny houses for what could very well be lucky, magical tiny people who get to live there, as if it’s an entire universe in itself, a universe within a universe within a universe. She stops in front of the fountain at the center of the patio.

  “I made this one night when I was bored. I smashed a bunch of plates and then had this idea to incorporate the broken pieces into cement as a fountain.”

  The water trickles, trickles, trickles.

  “Oh. It’s very interesting,” I say.

  “It leaks. We did something wrong and have to refill it constantly, but isn’t that just a great metaphor for life.”

  “Like, life is garbage?” I ask, instantly exposed. I’ve let my guard down and perhaps spoken too much truth again, revealed too much about me. Kathi stares at me.

  “No, like life is art,” she says in a near huff, as if scolding someone who lacks understanding of basic language.

  “Right, right,” I say, blushing, sweating, back to being underdog.

  Kathi turns slowly and starts to walk away. I follow. I can tell she’s thinking hard—maybe about me. “My attorney told me there are a bunch of questions I’m not supposed to ask you, so I’d like to go ahead and get those out of the way,” she says.

  I cringe but manage, “Sure.”

  “Are you gay, married, impotent? Did your parents love you? When did you lose your virginity? Are you right-handed? Do you ever want to harm yourself or others? Do you have any fake limbs? Answer in any order you like.”