by Sarah Ready
“I was in The Red Lantern Returns. Remember? After that I went on to daytime television.” She goes on and talks about her roles, the shows, the movies, the life…I tune her out and think about climbing back in bed so this day can end. Then I realize she’s stopped talking.
“Ah, what?” I ask.
Her upper lip curls. “I have a job offer,” she says, more slowly than before.
I close my eyes and try to clear out the bowling balls that are knocking around my skull preventing me from thinking clearly.
“You’d have to get yourself cleaned up,” she says. She lets her eyes linger on my scraggly beard, my stomach, my boxers. She gives a tight little smile and I have the urge to cover myself. “No booze, either.” Her eyes flick to the row of beer bottles on the kitchen table. Shame prickles over my skin and I itch under the heat.
“All offers go through my agent,” I say. I resist the urge to shift, to hide my shame. “You’re talking summer blockbuster? Or a sequel?”
I’ve been waiting for this moment. For two years now. Maybe I was wrong and the universe is actually giving me a little good karma for once.
“A sequel?” she asks.
“An origin story then,” I say. Those are big now, people love the superhero origin stories. If we do an origin story I won’t have to fly. That’s the hold up, I can’t fly. Every time I think of strapping in and swooping through the air I break out in a cold sweat and can’t breathe.
The blonde shakes her head. “Stoney. I’m not here for a movie. I want to hire you for a birthday party.”
I stare at her, not quite comprehending what she’s saying. “A what?”
“My son’s turning eight. I want to hire you for the entertainment. Dress in your suit. Sign some autographs. Maybe do a few balloon animals.”
The world fades and all I can see is this woman, one who apparently knew me before, asking me to be… “A clown? You want me to be a clown?”
“No,” she says. She puts her manicured nails on my arm and I flinch. “A party entertainer. I’ll pay you. A thousand dollars. It looks like you could the use the help, Stoney.”
I step back. She’s not here to convince me to come back to Hollywood, she’s here to convince me to be a clown.
“Get off my property.”
“A thousand dollars is a good rate. My son loves your movies. Well, not loves, they’re mediocre, but it’s not like we could get Spiderman—”
“Get off my property.”
Her eyebrows go high. “Really? What do you have to be so high and mighty about? Look at you.” She waves her hands at me. “Look at you. Disgusting.”
I don’t need to look at me. I see myself in the mirror every day. I know it’s not pretty.
“Get out of here,” I say.
She spins on her heels and marches to her car. When she pulls out, her tires spin and kick dirt up as she fishtails down the gravel drive.
I slam the door.
My head aches and I want to climb back in bed and sleep away the rest of this day. But my agent called last week and it’s high time I called him back.
I pull out my phone and text him, you up for a call?
In seconds my phone rings. I answer, aaand it’s a video call.
Devon’s face fills the screen, he’s in a silk shirt and sunglasses, the Pacific Ocean’s in the background.
“Liam. Good grief. Is that you? What have you done to yourself?”
I sigh. Yes, I gained twenty pounds. Sure, I don’t have an eight-pack anymore. Yes, I look like crap. I get it.
“Good to see you too, Devon. You called last week?”
“Hmm. Did I? Let me see.” He pulls out another phone and starts tapping through his notes. “Right. Here it is. I have a job offer.”
I fight down the little blip of fear. I can do it. I can jump back in, do the stunts, take the risks, fly.
“Yeah?” I say, and my voice only cracks a little.
“Best offer you’ve had in years. Hemorrhoids.”
“What?”
“Hemorrhoid commercial.”
“They…you…what?”
“Liam. You don’t look so hot. Let me book you for this. Take the week, clean yourself up. You can shoot on the twentieth. A clean twenty thousand, the usual percentages for representation.”
“You want me to do a…“—I can’t say it—“a commercial?”
“Buddy. It’s not what I want. It’s what the people want.”
I’ve heard that line from Devon before, but it was when he was negotiating on my side for a multi-million-dollar movie role.
“I thought…” I clear my throat, start again. “It’s been two years. I’m ready.”
“Buddy. Look at you. You’re not ready.”
“It’s been two years. Two. Years. How long can they blacklist me?” I stop when I see the distaste form on Devon’s face.
I catch myself in the camera and I barely recognize the man I see. Pale, deep-lined skin, dark bags under bloodshot eyes, and hollow desperation. I turn away from myself and back to Devon.
“I’m better,” I say firmly. “I’m ready.”
Devon looks down at his watch, then back to me. He’s done, he’s already checked out from the conversation. He used to do the same move with D-list actors he didn’t want to deal with. He’d look at his watch, say he had a meeting, that he’d get back to them later. After they’d left he’d laugh at how pathetic they were to believe him.
“Buddy, I’ve got a meeting. I’ll get back to you later.”
He reaches to hang up. He’s going to hang up on me. I’ve hit bottom. I’ve really, truly hit bottom.
“Don’t bull crap me, Devon. Tell it to me straight. Am I ever going to play Liam Stone again?”
Devon sighs and pulls down his sunglasses. “Okay, buddy. I didn’t want to say. Not today at least.”
Today. June 27. The day I fell thirty feet during filming and broke five vertebrae in my back. I was lucky. I lived.
This god-awful day is the day my career died. And in all other purposes, so did I.
“You’re finished,” says Devon.
“No more Liam Stone films?”
“No more films.”
I look down at myself. The out-of-shape body, the ragged clothes. I knew it already, didn’t I?
I rub a hand over my face and drag it across the stubble. “What about—”
“No.”
“Or—”
“No.”
“I could—”
“No. Buddy. You had two chances. You lost your shit during filming on both of them. Cost millions of dollars. Set back production schedules months. No one will hire you. You’re a liability. No one wants a liability.”
“Not even—”
“No.”
I sit with it, this knowledge that it’s over. I knew it though. I’ve known it for years. It’s just been a slow, gradual, painful slide to the bottom.
“Take the hemorrhoid commercial. You can sustain yourself, make a good living off commercials playing to nostalgia.”
“I don’t need the money. I need…”
“Liam. Buddy. You know what they call you around town?”
I shake my head. I don’t want to know, but I can’t get an objection past the lump in my throat.
“Has-been Stone. Super zero. Crazy Comic Coo-Coo Nut.”
“Alright,” I say. I don’t need to hear more. But he continues.
“There’s a joke that’s been going around. Knock, knock.”
I guess this is the part where I hear how complete and total my fall from Hollywood grace is.
“Who’s there?” I ask. My shoulders bunch, waiting for the blow.
“Liam Stone,” Devon says.
“Liam Stone who?”
He looks me square in the eye and says, “Exactly.”
Devon lets the meaning of the joke sink in. Liam Stone who? Exactly.
I’ve been forgotten. I’m a has-been.
“There’s nothing I can
do?” I ask.
“Buddy. You trashed a movie set. You lost your shit, had some crazy breakdown, and now your name is mud. I can’t fix crazy.”
“I’m not…” I stop.
I see myself through his eyes. The world’s eyes. I look like hell. I live as a hermit. I’m not to be trusted. My shoulders fall. There’s a heavy weight on me that has nothing to do with the calendar date.
“I’ll get back to you about the commercial,” I say.
“That’s my boy,” Devon says. And without a goodbye he hangs up.
I hold the phone, stare at my face still pictured in the camera.
Once, it graced movie screens around the world. Once, it was loved by millions.
Now…
I was like a light bulb. Hollywood plugged me in and while I shone brightly they made millions. But as soon as I dimmed, they took me down, and threw me out. Within five seconds, they had another lightbulb, shining just as brightly as me. I was replaceable. I didn’t realize it while I was shining. But to Hollywood, actors aren’t people, they’re commodities.
I was a commodity.
But even knowing that, I’d still give anything to go back. To shine again. To be loved by millions.
3
Ginny
“Would you pass the potatoes please?” asks Heather.
“Sure,” I say. I lift the antique dish piled with mashed potatoes. Enid always pulls out the heirloom china when Heather and her husband come for Sunday dinner. I hand Heather the dish and she wrinkles her nose.
“How are things?” she asks.
“Good,” I say. I learned years ago that the less said around Heather the better.
Her husband, Mayor Joel Wilson, chuckles and stretches back in his chair. “That’s good. Real good. I was worried we’d have to find you a job somewhere.”
I smile, which probably looks more like a wolverine gritting its teeth. I’m still working as a personal trainer and fitness instructor, the same job I’ve been at for the past three years. As Joel knows.
“Can’t have welfare cases in the family,” Joel says to the rest of the table.
“She’s not family,” says Finick. He’s Heather’s much younger brother, and her ward since their parents passed last year.
“Thankfully,” says Redge, Heather’s son. “Wilsons aren’t losers.” He’s a little older than Bean. He has the bullet-shaped head of his dad and the personality of his mom.
“We went to see Liam Stone,” says Bean. She bounces in her seat and a few peas roll off her plate.
“Tsk, Beatrice,” says Enid. “Don’t interrupt.”
“Sorry, Grandma. But can you believe it? We went to Liam Stone’s headquarters. It was so cool, and we’re going to go back soon, and he’ll train me to be a superhero and I can’t wait.”
Enid cuts me a sharp look. I didn’t meet her until after George died. George and I married a month after we met, and he died two weeks later. I met his family, including his mom Enid, at the funeral home.
When she saw me for the first time, she looked me over, and said, ‘I wish he’d let you die.’
I agreed with her. George and I were fighting, some stupid early marriage spat that didn’t mean anything. He was driving and I yelled something and he missed a curve in the road. We rolled, went into the water and…I couldn’t get out. He’d swum to the surface. He’d made it out. But my seatbelt wouldn’t come loose. I clawed at it. I fought. I was frantic. I knew I was going to die. It was done.
Drowning, it’s the scariest thing in the world, the most terrifying…until you stop struggling. Then, it’s almost pleasant. That’s what terrifies me, going back to that time, and remembering the moment where it was peaceful, where nothing scared me anymore, and whether I lived or died didn’t matter.
But George came back. Before I lost consciousness I saw him. The light from the surface surrounded him, he swam to me, his arms pushed through the water, he was so vital, so determined and alive. Then, I ran out of air. I lost sight of him, I lost…
I woke up in the hospital. And he was gone.
He didn’t make it. Going back in for me, going back, something happened, he was cut, he was hurt, he bled out. He bled out on the grass while I was unconscious next to him. And, what…what could I say to his mother, the woman I’d never met who blamed me for his death? What could I say? Nothing, except me too. I wished that too. Until I realized I was pregnant with Bean and then I knew that I had to live and do everything I could to protect her and keep her safe and happy and alive. For him.
But.
I’ve failed at that too. And my promise to George to always take care of Bean, to keep her safe. I can’t keep it, because life had other plans. Didn’t it?
I stick my fork into the pot roast on my plate and saw at it with my knife. Slowly I tune back into the conversation. Bean’s telling them about Liam Stone’s trailer and her theory that there’s a top secret base underneath the rusted out single-wide.
Grandma Enid sends a pointed glare my way. She doesn’t approve of Bean’s superhero obsession. At all.
Grandpa Clark sits at the head of the table. He flips through a magazine for World War II models. Heather whispers something in Joel’s ear and he grunts his approval. Redge makes food art with his mash potatoes and peas. And Finick plays a handheld video game in his lap under the table. Nobody’s paying attention.
Except… “This is not an appropriate activity for Beatrice,” hisses Enid. “Stop filling her head with this trash.”
“It’s not trash,” says Finick. He drops his game on the table. He’s grown nearly four inches in the past few months and his voice has deepened. He uses the new depth to inject scorn into the statement. “If Bean wants to be a superhero, let her.”
“Superheroes aren’t real,” says Enid.
Bean gasps.
“They’re not. Only babies think they are,” says Redge. He sticks his tongue out at Bean. “Mom was going to get Liam Stone for my birthday party, but she says he’s a drunk now and not fit to be around decent people.”
Bean hits her hands on the table and springs up. “Take it back.”
“No way,” says Redge. “Superheroes aren’t real.”
“Shut it, you little troglodyte,” says Finick.
“Apologize, Fin, right now,” says Heather.
“No. You aren’t my mom.”
Heather’s lips pinch and I catch a vein pulsing in her temple.
“Come here, Bean,” I whisper. I motion for her to climb in my lap. I wrap my arms around her and snuggle her close. “Don’t worry about it, baby,” I say. “Heroes are real.” I kiss her on her head.
“Course they are,” says Finick. He shoots a glare at Heather. “Anybody can be a hero. You just have to be willing to do something selfless.”
Grandma Enid drops her silverware and pushes her plate away. “The only thing selflessness does, Finick O’Connor, is get you dead.”
All the noise at the table stops. Everyone stares at Enid’s tight face and the deep lines around her permanently pinched lips.
Then Grandpa Clark jerks his chair back. It scrapes loudly against the wood floor. “That’s enough,” he says in a loud voice. He takes a deep breath of air and looks around at Mayor Wilson’s shocked face. Heather’s distaste. Redge’s gloating sneer. Finick’s defiance. Bean in my lap. And his wife Enid and her tight, pursed mouth.
“That’s enough”—he clears his throat—“pot roast for a good while. Anyone for pie? Enid made pecan.”
He walks from the dining room to the kitchen. The door swings shut after him.
“Is Grandpa Clark alright?” asks Bean.
I rub my knuckles against her head. “Course he is. Right as rain.”
“He just wants you to be a princess, not a superhero,” says Enid. But there’s no fire in her voice, only a hollow fatigue.
“Don’t want to be a princess, Grandma.”
“How about you kids go in to the living room and watch some cartoons,” says Enid.
“We’ll bring pie in a few minutes.”
Bean slips off my lap, and she, Redge, and Finick head to couch. The house is small, it’s a single-story Cape Cod, built in the 1950s. It has two bedrooms, a kitchen, a living room, and one bathroom. The carpet is avocado green, the walls are wood-paneled, and every surface is cluttered with Grandpa Clark’s military battle model kits and Grandma Enid’s porcelain figurines. Sometimes I try to imagine George growing up here, but I can’t. There’s not much of him in the clutter. His childhood bedroom has long since been converted into Grandpa Clark’s miniature model building workshop and Grandma Enid gave all of George’s possessions to charity. There’s nothing here of him.
It used to make me sad, but now it’s just how it is. I grew up out west and never saw the house looking different anyway.
Bean and I live in the garage. It was a two stall. Grandpa Clark converted it to a studio apartment when Bean was diagnosed and I realized my salary didn’t cover all Bean’s medical expenses, as well as a place to live. Not to mention food, childcare, car insurance, gas, utilities, clothing, phone bills, the list goes on. I didn’t have the money. Enid and Clark were kind enough to offer us a place to live. I can never thank them enough. Without their support…I don’t know how I would’ve survived.
Heather clears her throat and turns to me. “Seriously, Genevieve. I want to warn you. I knew Liam Stone when we acted together.” She rubs her blonde hair between her fingers and smiles. She likes to mention all the actors she’s run across. “He was a bad apple before, and he’s a rotten apple now.”
“More like pickled,” says Joel, and he laughs.
Enid sniffs. “I wish you wouldn’t get Beatrice’s hopes up. False hope does more damage than no hope.”
I take the cloth napkin out of my lap and set it on the table. The starched fabric scratches against my fingers. “Thanks for your concern,” I say.
“Hardheaded,” mutters Enid.
Heather reaches over and pats her arm. Enid sends her a warm smile. I wait for Enid to tell Heather that “she’s the daughter of her heart,” but she doesn’t say anything. It’s no secret in town that Heather and George dated for five years, and had only been broken up for a few weeks before I entered the picture. Enid had dreamed for years of Heather becoming her daughter-in-law. They’re two peas in a pod. I’m not from here though, so I didn’t know. In the short time I knew him, George never mentioned he had a hopeful bride back in Southern Ohio. Since George’s death, Enid and Heather have remained as close as mother and daughter. Sunday dinners, birthdays, holidays…even though George and Heather didn’t marry, she’s a fixture in his parents’ life. She’s the daughter of Enid’s heart. And now Joel is Enid’s adopted son-in-law, Finick and Redge her adopted grandchildren.
