“I don’t know,” Adam says. “Will it hurt me?”
“Not if you want a five bed/six bath in Malibu.”
Adam doesn’t particularly want a five bed/six bath in Malibu. He doesn’t use half the bedrooms and bathrooms in his home now, and the beach reminds him too much of Florida. Maybe some desert house in Palm Springs or a sprawling ranch in Montana or another place where they have sprawling ranches—anywhere but LA.
“Give it a few days,” Marty says. “They need you more than you need them, so make ’em squirm.”
“Okay, buddy?” Marty is asking, and Adam realizes an acknowledgment is required.
“Sounds good.”
Hanging up, Adam checks the text messages he’d ignored while on the phone. Relief when he sees they’re not from Phoebe.
Cecily: On set, totally sux without u.
Thirty seconds later: Come back—Ron tired of hearing about my shits!!
Then from Ron: She’s not kidding. You MUST guest star soon.
Cecily again: Yes, guest star! SPLEEN, SPLEEN, SPLEEN!!!!
Wistful, Adam types a message for both of them, saying they should have Enchanted Ales on him tonight. Thinks about his non-fishbowl apartment in BC, tries to remember what exactly it was about Vancouver that drove him bonkers. The rain?
He’s missed several e-mails as well: NYU’s Office of Annual Giving looking for another donation; organizers from a charity softball event asking if they can add him to their roster again; fan letters begging him to return to the show—one of them mildly threatening.
And then, because he can’t really put it off any longer, he plays Phoebe’s message from this morning: “Hey, it’s me. So, um, I got a job lined up and I’m coming back to LA in the spring. And I’ve got some other news. So when you get a chance, give me a shout.”
There is absolutely no news Adam wants to hear from Phoebe Fisher.
That’s not really accurate. If it was simply that she was returning, he could be persuaded to hear about that. But since she offered that as a throwaway before advertising the “other news,” he’d wager eons and empires she’s married or getting married, or she and her kid boyfriend are joining the circus to then get married by a clown. None of this is news he wants to hear. As long as she’s happy, he’s happy … well, happy-ish, which frankly seems like an enormous emotional maturity leap for him. But that doesn’t change the fact that his grand experiment of being vulnerable and committing to someone was a spectacular failure.
Still, he knows he needs to call her back, realizes if he’d called her back last year after he’d lashed out and told her he’d slept with Cecily, Phoebe probably wouldn’t even have this news to share.
Slumping on the suede sofa, he wonders if it’s his couch or Phoebe’s. After a decade of living together in one configuration or another, isn’t it all their stuff? He should give it to her. She’ll probably need furniture. If she’d take it, he’d gladly give Phoebe the whole fucking aquarium condo.
He mutes the giant flat-screen TV that’s always on now that he lives alone and, for all intents and purposes, is unemployed. Phoebe is the top person on his phone’s Favorites list, but he manually types in the numbers anyway.
She picks up on the second ring. Her apprehension is palpable, so he shares a story about a recent dinner with his publicist, where Evie convinced him to help poach an A-list actress at the next table and hilarity ensued. Phoebe laughs; Adam laughs.
No one could ever say Anna Zoellner’s bastard son wasn’t good at convincing people he felt things he didn’t.
He lets her tell him about her new gig at Cedars-Sinai starting in June, and about how all the kids at Michigan can’t stop talking about Murder Island. Lets her work up to telling him she’s engaged. Without overplaying his congratulations—she would be able to tell that was fake—he asks polite questions. Lets her tell him “probably July” and “something pretty small, maybe the back room at Rosebud.”
On the television he catches a bizarre image: a plane in the water, shivering people standing in clumps on the wings. Even with all the ships coming to help them, they look so alone and adrift.
And then, when she’s finished all those things she had to say and he had to hear, she speaks his name with infinite tragedy. “Adam.”
In some other world, maybe, this is the time when he makes a play, voices something dramatic and game changing.
“Phoebe,” he starts, but knows that he has to get off the phone before he says more, because anything else he could say would only hurt her, and he has been trying so impossibly hard not to do that anymore.
“I should get going, I need to call Marty. Let’s get dinner when you’re back.”
After hanging up, he actually does call his agent.
“I want to do the sequels.”
“You’re sure?” Marty asks. “An hour ago you were pretty on the fence.”
“Yeah, I know. I got a craving for lamb.”
12 i guess i knew that
“I fucking hate you,” Evie Saperstein says as a greeting. Walking onto the patio of Chateau Marmont, she gives Phoebe’s cheek a kiss. “Six months after having a kid and you look like a Victoria’s Secret model.”
Phoebe thanks her, but the truth is, she hasn’t lost the last fifteen pounds of baby weight and is astonished, after years of starving herself and sticking her finger down her throat in the name of her “acting” career, how little she actually cares.
“Must be how you hang on to that hot young husband,” Evie says. This is likely meant as a compliment, so Phoebe just smiles.
Calling Evie “Ms. Saperstein,” a pert hostess leads them to a table in the shade next to scantily clad blond starlets Phoebe doesn’t recognize. She never knows anyone anymore, and it seems bizarre that that used to be such an enormous part of her world. Actually, everything about her previous life in Los Angeles has felt alien in the year and a half she’s been back.
As they are unfurling napkins, a waiter dips over, asks if “Ms. Saperstein” would like her usual—a crab BLT not on the menu—and Phoebe orders the chopped salad. Between counseling at Cedars-Sinai, running her group sessions in the evening, hacking out a few hours a day when her schedule meshes with Cole’s, and making sure Cassie is fed, changed, and napped, Phoebe hasn’t seen Evie for months, and there is much updating: the married tech billionaire Evie’s sleeping with; how Cassie is starting to be more fun and less bloblike; and potential work crossovers—meeting some of Evie’s clients might be nice for Phoebe’s patients, or as Evie describes them, “some of your sad people.”
Dishes cleared.
Phones checked.
Dessert discussed but ultimately not ordered.
Then Phoebe does the thing she tries never to do. The thing she knows puts Evie in an uncomfortable position.
“Is he okay?” she asks. There’s no need to specify the “he” is Adam.
“I take it you caught his meltdown on Howard Stern?” Evie shakes her head.
“Part of it.”
Her friend Melissa (who may or may not have slept with Adam a million years ago) had e-mailed her assuming she’d heard the show, the subject line, Your Boy’s Hysterical. And when Phoebe found the Web link for the broadcast, Adam had been extremely witty as he bashed Murder Island 3 and its director while Stern and guest David Arquette goaded him on. It was also incredibly unprofessional. After so many years of Adam diligently doing everything asked of him—committing to inanely written scenes, shaving his head and waxing his chest, Comic-Con panels and DVD commentaries when bigger actors couldn’t be bothered—to hear him trash a project was shocking.
“Minerva and I have been cleaning that up all week,” Evie says, and explains that Howard and Adam met at a charity softball event and Adam had stopped by the show without Evie’s sanction. “Honestly, in a few days everyone will forget about it. Even New Line acknowledges the film was a shit box.”
“That’s good, I guess,” Phoebe says.
“So you guys
really don’t talk at all anymore?”
Since coming back, Phoebe has seen Adam one time. Because he’d told her to call, she’d left him messages when she and Cole moved into the little Craftsman bungalow in Los Feliz. An assistant she’d never met called to set something up (and offered to ship over anything Phoebe wanted from the condo—actually, to sell her the place for a “very fair price” that Phoebe suspected would have been significantly below market). Adam had canceled thrice; then he’d been in New Zealand filming. Finally they’d gotten lunch at Tavern. Looking too thin and vaguely stoned, he’d spent the majority of the meal fiddling with his phone, flirting with the waitress, and declaring everything “tight.” On the drive home, Phoebe had to pull over to puke up steak salad and green-olive bread. Two days later she found out she was pregnant, but she’s still not entirely convinced the vomiting was morning-sickness-related. Her wedding invitations had already gone out at that point; Adam sent his regrets and a check for too much money. She never cashed it. Though she didn’t send him a birth announcement, an even bigger check arrived in a generic card when she had Cassie six months later.
“I’m sorry, E,” Phoebe apologizes. “It’s not fair for me to ask about him.”
“It’s not that.” Evie shrugs. “It’s just sorta sad.”
* * *
There’s a partially downloaded e-mail on Sharon’s iPhone from Evie at the Saperstein Group, but the spinning white wheel indicates the echoy lower level of the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center is a network dead zone. Searching the costume-clad Fan-Con attendees, she finds her photographer from The Enquiring Sun shooting what must be his five thousandth picture of women dressed in Princess Leia’s Return of the Jedi metal bikini. Signaling she’s stepping out, Sharon weaves through tables of vendors selling old comic books and action figures, and heads out the door, shivers in the late January air as the message loads.
Ms. Gallaher—
We’d like to thank you for your interest in our client, but Mr. Zoellner is doing limited press at this time. He will be making an appearance at the “Thirty Years of E&E” Convention in Detroit next week, if you would like to include that in The Enquiring Sun.
Thank you again for your interest,
Evie Saperstein
Painful flare of disappointment as Sharon wanders back to the bustling convention floor. She hadn’t really expected Adam Zoellner’s rep to offer him up to the least respected of the three NYC dailies, but she’d hoped … a lot, more than was probably healthy. Maybe hoped that somehow the interview would take place not on the phone, but over coffee, hoped that she might have made Adam Zoellner smile, that he might touch her hand.
She’d gotten the media alert about the E&E convention in Ed Munn’s hometown weeks ago, but her editors had been lukewarm about the anniversary story to begin with. There is absolutely no way they’ll send her to Detroit.
Back in the exhibition hall, her photographer has moved on from nearly naked slave Leias to a pale girl, very possibly underage, in a teeny tiny Sailor Moon costume. Shoving down her gloom, Sharon is heading over to make sure Nick got the photo release form signed when a tall redheaded guy in a vintage Eons & Empires T-shirt puts his hand on Sailor Moon’s shoulder and asks, “Nat, what’s going on?”
Shifting her phone and notebooks into one hand, Sharon fishes a business card from her purse and explains that she and Nick are with the paper and would obviously never run photos without getting consent from a guardian.
“I’m not sure it’s mine to give.” The redheaded man softens, says Sailor Moon is his sister. Then, looking at the girl, “I’m thinking Maura wouldn’t be on board with this.”
“It does seem highly unlikely.” Sailor Moon shrugs, straightens her blond wig, and goes off to talk to guys in Star Trek: The Next Generation uniforms. Nick starts snapping a lady in Wonder Woman’s strapless bathing suit.
“Sorry about that.” The redheaded brother smiles at Sharon.
“I’m the one who should be apologizing.” Sharon wonders if the curious way he’s looking at her means he’s going to ask her out. Mentally she prepares her patented rejection.
“So, I don’t mean this like a pickup line,” he says, “but you look really familiar. Have we met?”
No one ever recognizes her author photo (more because so few people bought The Atheist in the Foxhole than any inherent flaw of the picture), but sometimes The Enquiring Sun runs her head shot when they post her stories online. She mentions this, and he shakes his head.
“Sorry, I’m a Daily News guy.”
He glances at the card she handed him. “Gallaher, only one G.” Trace of recognition crosses his eyes like water moving under ice. “I remember now, it was Thanksgiving, like, ten years ago, in Chicago. I dated Phoebe Fisher for a while, and you were there with her bro…”
Then it all comes crashing back: talking too much about the election; how proud Chase had been to introduce her to his family; feeling short and ugly next to his model sister. And this guy—Owen, no, Oliver—Chase had been so excited to see him (though apparently no one had been expecting him). The guy had stayed for breakfast, and everyone joked about how Chase had tagged along on his and Phoebe’s first date. “He’s a really good dude,” Chase had told Sharon repeatedly. “So much better than those assholes Phoebe dates now.”
Sharon feels her heart kick-start, sweat dripping down her spine to the waistband of her tights, and that odd sensation that the floor of the Javits Center might open up and suck her down to the molten center of the Earth’s core—something she hasn’t felt since she finished her book.
“Oh.” She actually drops her notebooks and press badge, her phone. “Right. Thanksgiving, Bush v. Gore and all of that stuff…” Talking too much when she’s nervous again.
She bends down to pick everything up, and of course Oliver follows. He’s a really good dude.
“Right, right, right,” she says. Her hands bumping his as she hastily collects her things. “Gennifer made French toast.”
Even as it’s happening, Sharon can see Oliver registering his mistake. This traveler from another universe trying to make it better with some mix of words: “sorry,” “so young,” and “tragedy.”
“Well, it was a really long time ago.” She’s already moving away from him. “Anyway, thanks for all your help. And don’t worry, I’ll make sure none of those photos of your sister run.”
Then she’s hurrying through the tables and dressed-up fans toward the door, bumping into a man in full Batman armor and knocking a vintage Spider-Man lunchbox off a table.
Behind her someone, probably Oliver who used to date Phoebe Fisher, is calling, “Wait,” but she keeps up her pace until she’s out the door and in the cold January air off the Hudson.
* * *
“You’re positive we don’t know each other?” The coal-haired girl—Nikki or Nancy or was it something like Rachel—is leaning so close Adam wonders if she’s stable on her bar stool. In the dim light, it’s impossible to tell her age, somewhere between eighteen and thirty—younger than him, anyway.
“Pretty sure.” Adam smiles, unconsciously turns so she’s facing his good side, thinks about adding some line about how he’d remember having met someone as captivating as her but decides against it; if the girl’s been in LA more than a week, she’ll know it’s crap.
“Jacqui Holland’s party in Santa Monica?” She points at him, her mock accusatory finger a centimeter from his chest. “You brought a Pomeranian?”
“Nope, don’t know any Jacquis, and I don’t have a dog—Pomeranians are dogs, right?”
“Are you sure?” Nikki-Nancy-Rachel drawls. “You look familiar.”
“I don’t know,” Adam says, as if it’s only now occurring to him. “I’m an actor.” From behind the counter, the bartender rolls his eyes conspiratorially.
“Someone I would know?” asks the girl.
Honestly, Adam didn’t come here to pick up an aspiring actress/unemployed waitress, he didn’t. He came b
ecause the place is mellow and almost always empty before ten, because he couldn’t spend anymore time lamenting that god-awful Murder Island 3 is still in theaters and worrying that no director will ever work with him again because he publicly admitted the film was god-awful. More time not reading scripts (always sci-fi, always the villain) that his manager had sent over. Not thinking about what he’s going to say at next week’s “Thirty Years of Eons & Empires” celebration in Detroit or why, after two years of trying to disassociate himself from Captain Rowen, he let Cecily convince him to appear with her at the convention in the first place.
But …
Nikki-Nancy-Rachel is cute, and if they go to his place, she’ll likely continue to be a distraction. He goes for the endgame.
“I was on a show for a while,” he says.
Wait for it …
Still waiting.
A sound editor might insert chirping crickets.
The bartender hums the Eons & Empires theme song, from the movie, not the series, but it’s enough.
“You’re Captain Rowen!” The girl is back in her own space, nervous, almost reverent. “My … my brothers watched it growing up.” (Clearly putting her in the closer-to-eighteen-than-thirty camp.) “Ohmygod, I didn’t recognize you with hair.”
Now Adam is the one behind the wheel, telling her he’s got wine at his place just down Wilshire. She probably has a car somewhere, but he doesn’t factor that into the equation.
Ten minutes later they’re in the Winston Tower, where Adam’s opening a bottle of Barolo and Nikki-Nancy-Rachel is nervously looking around. Handing her a glass, he clinks it to his own in a toast.
“It’s good,” she pronounces, though she cringes at the taste; he should have opened a merlot or something sweeter. “Your apartment’s really awesome.”
Pretty standard reaction.
He hadn’t bought a house in Malibu (or Palm Springs or Montana) with the Murder Island series money. Looking at property (even paying someone to look for him) had seemed a lot of work. So he’d hired Marty’s decorator wife while he was out of the country and told her to make the place look completely different. Terri Minerva had gutted the space, knocked out walls, installed recessed lighting into new granite floors, and replaced everything homey he and Phoebe had picked out with derelict metals and smoked glass, dark wood, and darker stone. The place oozes sex, but all the furniture is distractingly uncomfortable, and sometimes he’s actively frightened of the artwork.
In Some Other World, Maybe: A Novel Page 27
