Flavor of the Month

by Olivia Goldsmith

  Well, she reflected, I must have arrived. How else could I be here? She smiled. This unreal scene was her reality. But the reality she was living was becoming more and more unreal. She breathed in the fragrance of night-blooming jasmine, mixed with just the slightest scent of chlorine from the pool. Essence of Hollywood.

  Then, as she watched, a man climbed out of the shrubbery in the darkness. He was short, and almost as dark as the shadows he had hidden in. He looked up at her. “Hi,” he said nonchalantly, and brushed off his crumpled dinner jacket. “I was looking for my wallet,” he explained, and strolled off into the crowd. She shook her head.

  Behind her, two society women began to gossip. They were older matrons, clearly married to Industry heavies. One looked up. “Oh. Oh! Look!” she cried. “It’s Mary Jane.”

  Jahne felt a tug in her stomach. She felt herself almost dissolve, and instantly a film of sweat broke out all over her. God! Were they from New York? How had they…Then another older woman walked up to the group. “Mary Jane Wick, meet my friend Esther Goodbody,” the matron said. Her voice faded.

  Jahne could only hear the buzzing in her ears. She tried to take a deep breath, one that moved all the way down to her solar plexus. She took another wobbling step forward on her very high heels and almost slipped but caught herself just in time. Get a grip, Jahne, she told herself sternly, and then she looked up. There, across the pool, she saw him. He was wearing black and white, like all the men. She could hardly believe her eyes. It had been such a long time since she’d last seen him in New York. “Oh, my God!” she said out loud.

  No, she told herself. She was merely shaken by the women and the mention of her old name. She turned her eyes away, blinked, took a few more deep breaths, and told herself to be calm. Now I’ll look, she said to herself. Now I’ll look, and find I am mistaken. But as she raised her eyes and looked across the tiny lights floating like lotus blossoms in the pool, she knew it was he.

  It was Neil, and he was dressed as a waiter, serving canapés to the party guests.

  Paul Grasso stood with a drink in his hand, moved slightly back and forth from heel to toe, rocking where he stood, and shook his leg. Yahta, yahta, yahta. He hated these fuckin’ Industry soirées. But it was his shot to get to Marty, and he’d managed to corner his prey at last. You would think it would be easier, since Marty was there with Lila Kyle, who looked gorgeous as ever but not one bit grateful. But Paul knew there was no gratitude in this town. Paul thought of the Italian proverb that asked, “Why does she hate me so? I never did anything for her.” Because Lila clearly hated him. She’d gotten the part but never delivered on the casting job she promised him. The job he was desperate for. Anyway, she never took his calls. Now she stood beside Marty, obviously gorgeous and obviously bored.

  “Nice tux,” Marty DiGennaro commented, his sarcasm heavy. Paul ignored him. He needed to pick up some work, but nothing was lower than asking for it here, at a party like this. Still, it wasn’t like he was begging. Hey, he was owed it.

  “So what you been up to? Make it over to Vegas lately?”

  “Nah,” Marty said. “Too busy.”

  “How’s the show going? I haven’t heard.” Paul felt sweat bead his upper lip.

  “Real well.”

  Well, he’d have to do it. “Got any casting trouble? Maybe I could help?”

  “You mean maybe I could help. You looking for work, Paulie?”

  “I wouldn’t mind the casting for this new project,” he admitted, and held his breath. Marty paused. It wasn’t the pause that refreshes. It was the one that ended a friendship and turned it strictly business.

  “Call my office tomorrow,” he said, and Paulie knew he’d cashed in his last chip but that he was back in the game.

  Lila cleared her throat and shifted from one leg to the other. It made her boredom more than apparent. Ara had invited her, since she was his client, but Marty had an invitation for two in his own right. She had refused to come with him, however, and told him she would meet him at the party. Now she was regretting her decision. This was all so dull. And Paul Grasso looked like he wanted to play “I’ve Got a Secret” with her. She’d blow them both off. “I’m going inside,” she told Marty, and without a goodbye or acknowledgment she walked across the deck and through the open French doors to the huge tiled living room. Near the center of the room, a mammoth chair stood, surrounded by a gaggle of morons. Lila did not want to look too interested, but she floated toward them. Lots of power there: Don Simpson and Joel Schumacher. Days of Thunder meets Peter Pan. When would she be the center of attention? she wondered. As she came up to the group, not one of them turned to look at her.

  At the center a tall, dark woman was talking to an equally tall, dark man. He smiled at her. She smiled back. From the corner of her eye, she saw Marty approach.

  “Miss Kyle?” the tall man asked. She nodded. “I’m Sam Shields. And this is April Irons.”

  Lila gave April a big smile. April Irons meant features. First-class features. Marty joined them.

  “Hello, April,” he said, and took Lila’s arm. Lila felt her annoyance build. He didn’t own her. She took her arm back.

  “So, what are you up to, April?”

  “Oh, a new little project. Sam here is directing. Just getting some pointers from Don.”

  “Really?” Marty smiled stiffly. “Got a working title?” he asked idly, obviously bored.

  “It’s called Birth of a Star,” April cooed.

  Neil stood on the back porch, sucking on a cigarette, his hands trembling. Sam Shields. Fucking Sam Shields! Neil had been passing a tray of caviar and had turned to offer some to a small group. He recognized Michael Douglas, Kevin Costner, Richard Gere, Marty DiGennaro, and Crystal Plenum. He served Michelle Pfeiffer, Phoebe Van Gelder, Kirk Kirkorian. And that producer bitch, April Irons. Then the guy in front of him had leaned into the bowl of Beluga, scarfing it up. Neil almost dropped the tray when he saw it was Sam Shields. His first instinct had been to push the fucking bowl of fish eggs into Sam Shields’ face; then he realized he had to get away.

  The humiliation was stinging. It was both a relief and an insult that Sam didn’t even recognize him, hadn’t even looked at who was serving him. All the bastard could see was free four-hundred-dollar fish eggs.

  “I told you. Nose, there are no breaks.” The fat guy again, now standing at the kitchen door, warned him.

  “You’re telling me!” Neil said, flicked his cigarette into the Beluga, and began to walk down the driveway, unclipping his stupid black bow tie.

  “Where you going. Nose? You got a job to do.”

  “Yeah, fat boy, you got that right. But it’s not this one.

  Where the fuck did the caviar go? Sy Ortis thought, looking around the room. Another waiter passed at that moment, and he grabbed him before he got away. But he was only carrying skewered vegetable on a bed of kale. Even in Mexico, we threw that crap out. But he was hungry—nerves always made him eat—so he took four of them. These guys disappear so fast, Sy didn’t want to take a chance on this one’s getting away.

  “I’d like to have ten percent of everyone in this room.”

  Sy looked up from the skewers to find Milton Glick at his elbow. “Yeah, well, you’d have to be a faggot to get it,” he said, indicating with his head Ara standing with a group of young men. Then he looked Milton up and down. “And a hell of a lot prettier than you are.”

  “I’ve already gotten fucked up the ass in this town. I guess it won’t hurt to suck some dick.” Milton shrugged.

  “Who did you come with?” Sy asked.

  “My wife. She’s over there, talking to Mary Jane Wick about some charity ball. Who are you with?”

  Sy shrugged. “Jahne Moore. The client Marty had to find on his own. The client from hell. Because you didn’t get me two Sharleen Smiths.”

  “Nobody is perfect, Sy. Except you, of course.”

  Neil stood at the bottom of the driveway. Now what the fuck do I do, he thoug
ht? I can’t thumb a ride. Not in Holmby Hills. And no money for a cab. There once had been buses in this town, but they must have ended in the tar pits with the hairy mammoths. He turned at the sound of the beeping horn. A car was parked across the road from Ara’s driveway, and a woman was leaning out its window, beckoning to him. He walked over slowly, blessing his luck. He had never been picked up in this town—in any town, for that matter. Maybe his luck was changing for the better.

  The woman stepped out of the car as he approached. She was not pretty, he could see. Shit, she was ugly. And old—well, middle-aged. But what the fuck? He was no Miss America, and was stuck here without transportation.

  “Hi,” she called out as he approached. “Working the party?” she asked, nodding toward Ara’s house.

  “Yeah. I should say, was. I just quit.”

  “I’ll give you a hundred bucks for your waiter’s outfit,” she said.

  Neil didn’t answer for a moment. I should have known. “A crasher, huh? I guess people would do anything to be seen at Ara’s party. A hundred, huh?” he asked. “John Ritter would give me a thousand.”

  I shrugged. Yes, it was me, Laura Richie. And Laura Richie has stooped to lower than this to get a hot flash. For you, gentle Reader. All for you. “Maybe you should be talking to John Ritter, then. “

  “And what am I supposed to wear home? Your dress?”

  I opened the back door of the car and reached in. I came out with a pair of black trousers. “I have the pants; all I need is your shirt and jacket. And tie. I’ll let you have my leather bomber jacket along with the hundred. That should get you home.”

  “Throw in twenty bucks more for a cab and it’s all yours,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt and pulling it out of his pants.

  24

  “Did you get that tape?” Sam Shields asked as they sat down on the bed. He was exhausted from the strain of Ara’s party, and the idea of athletic sex with April was not, at the moment, number one on his hit parade. He began to unbutton his shirt as April stripped her own blouse off. “Could you get the 3/4 tape?” he repeated.

  “Of course. Why?” she asked.

  “I’d like to take a look at it,” he said, and reached across the bed for the remote control and clicked on the TV.

  He guessed they were celebrating the deal they had just made: he agreed to the drafting of a new script for Birth of a Star and to directing it. He’d get half a million bucks—twice what he’d gotten for Jack and Jill—if the picture actually went into Production. He could hardly believe it.

  “Sam, what are you doing?” April asked, making no attempt to mask the irritation in her voice. “Turn the fucking television off. Now is not the time.”

  “I know, I know,” Sam said, trying to calm her. “But now that I’ve seen Lila Kyle, I just want to see the show for a minute. Everyone is talking about the thing. Where’s the tape?”

  “In my briefcase, over there.” It hadn’t been easy to smuggle out a copy of Three for the Road, not even for April Irons. Marty DiGennaro was running a closed set and didn’t want a knockoff of his stuff to appear the same season his show debuted. But in the end she’d managed.

  She watched as Sam crossed the room, naked except that his cute buns were encased in those cute blue boxer shorts. He crouched, retrieved the tape, and popped it into the VCR. His eyes were glued to the screen, watching the opening credits. “I just want to see what Marty DiGennaro can do.”

  After the great critical reception of Jack and Jill, April was ready to move ahead with Sam on another picture. And Sam was glad April had made the offer; since he hadn’t written anything else in the last two years, it might be what he needed.

  April was certainly what he needed. After all, she was powerful. She’d never mentioned Crystal and seemed not at all bitter over his affair with the actress. After all, Sam figured the performance he had gotten out of Crystal had sweetened April’s bottom line. So now they were talking preproduction. Costs, casting, above the line, below the line, the whole ball of wax. This was a big one. April was going to trust him.

  Now he looked up. April had left the room.

  “Wait. Where did you go?” Sam called out to her. “Come on back. I want you to see something…a genius at work.”

  “That would be a nice change,” she snapped from the doorway, but her curiosity was piqued. Know your enemies better than your friends, her father used to tell her. And she hated Marty DiGennaro. She hoped the show died like a dog. There’d already been so much buzz: new techniques, feuds on the set, enormous budgets. Maybe it would bring that self-important little prick down. Might as well see what all the talk is about, she decided. She sat down on a far corner of the bed.

  He patted the place by his side. “Come on, it’s business,” he said in a coaxing voice.

  April leaned back against Sam’s chest and took a deep breath. She had taken out her contacts, expecting to get right into bed with Sam and now she couldn’t see the screen too well. But that was all right, she thought. It’s only TV. They watched in silence for a few minutes; then April sat up and leaned forward, squinting. This was not your usual Sunday-night television fare. But, then, she thought, how could it be, with Marty DiGennaro behind it? He was a prick, but he was a talented prick. This was good. More like the big screen than television. But different from both.

  “Sam, hand me my glasses. They’re in the drawer of the night table,” she said, not taking her eyes off the monitor.

  She watched carefully. He’d used every trick in the book, but all in new ways and to great effect. He had the wiggle and the jiggle, but the women were tough, liberated, almost androgynous. He had nostalgia, but his cuts and fades and smears, his matching shots, were startlingly different. Better, hotter, newer than MTV.

  And maybe, just maybe, there was a lead here for Birth of a Star.

  “What do you think of the redhead?” Sam asked, reading her mind. “We saw her at the party.”

  April watched the girl. There was the angle that her mother, Theresa O’Donnell, had starred in the last reincarnation of Birth of a Star. That would be good for some free publicity. She was gorgeous, and sly, but…Anyway, April didn’t want this film to look like nothing more than a shlocky parlor trick, a shtick remake. No.

  “Too obvious. And the blonde is doing a Vanna White impersonation.”

  Sam kept staring at the screen. “Yeah, but watch the other one. The dark one.”

  April did. The girl was undeniably beautiful, but she had something else. Her voice, her movements were so…natural. The girl could act.

  “Not bad,” she admitted.

  “We need a new face for the part.”

  “Well, she’s a possibility.”

  They fast-forwarded through much of it. It was fascinating. The show ended, credits rolled. She looked over at Sam, his hard-on obvious through the sheet. “Is that for her or for me?” she asked him.

  “For you,” he said, reaching out and cupping her left breast in his hand. “But let’s audition her.”

  “Sam, it’s unlikely we can afford to use a television star, even if we yoke her with Michael McLain the way I want to do. We need a movie person.”

  “Yeah, so get me Kikki Mansard. She’s hot. Or how about Julia Roberts.”

  “Come on. The Hermit of Hollywood? Unavailable, and her people insist on a big position. I don’t give six percent of the gross to anyone. Bear that in mind, Sam: I don’t give head, I don’t give percentage of gross, and I don’t give final cut.”

  She had signed him for a hundred thousand for a first draft and one set of revisions against four hundred thousand if they went into principal photography with him directing. He’d come cheap—his pussy agent had folded when April threatened to walk away. Sam didn’t know she’d had another quarter of a million she was willing to throw below the line for it. Well, she told herself, she’d use the money to fix up a nice trailer for Michael McLain. It would come in handy.

  “Please can I have final cut?” he as
ked in a wheedling voice. They had been arguing about it for days.

  “Since Heaven’s Gate, no director gets final cut.”

  “Woody Allen gets final cut.”

  She raised an eyebrow and looked at him. “To paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen: ‘You, Sam, are no Woody Allen.’”

  “But I give better head.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” she told him. “Now, what else? Or can we just call it a deal and go fuck?”

  “I shouldn’t mix business with pleasure,” he said, grinning at her now.

  “You shouldn’t, but you do. Just don’t right now.” She reached out for his crotch with one hand and flicked off the TV with the other.

  25

  Since seeing Neil at Ara’s party, Jahne had been searching for him. Discreetly, of course. She began by calling Directory Assistance, but they had no listing. Then she looked him up in the white pages. When they yielded no listing, she stopped at the L.A. Central Library and looked for Morellis in last year’s L.A. phone book, and in Orange County and all the surrounding areas for the last two years. There was nothing. Could he have an unlisted number? Or, worse, did he have no number at all? An out-of-work actor without a phone number was an ex-actor. Had Neil given up?

  Next Jahne began calling answering services, trying to leave a message for Neil Morelli. But each night, as she worked her way through a dozen or so of the hundreds listed, she felt her hopes fade. It was tiring, depressing, to come up empty again and again.

  She missed Neil, and she worried about him. But what would she do if she found him, she wondered. Would she reveal herself? She didn’t think she could. Not yet. But maybe she could help him indirectly: send him some money, or ask Marty to use him in a small role on 3/4.