“So why come back now?” I asked. “Aside from the fact that your friends were sitting here with their lives on hold worrying themselves sick about you.”
Jack smiled sheepishly. “It was just so fucking cold, man.” Everybody laughed. “Next time I go out to commune with nature, I’ll be better dressed for it.”
“Where’d you get the shirt?” Lindsey asked him.
“I don’t remember,” Jack said, frowning. “Where is it?”
“I threw it out,” Alison said. “It stank.”
“I don’t know. I must have found it in the woods.”
“You know you lost your wallet?” I asked him.
“I didn’t lose it,” he said. “I threw it into a stream. I didn’t want to be tempted to go into town and buy drugs. Wait, how do you know about that?”
I told him about how his wallet had been found, and how we’d all become suspects in his kidnapping and possible murder. “Jesus!” he said, breathing out slowly. “I don’t know what to say. It didn’t occur to me that it would be found.”
“I’m just curious,” I said, annoyed in spite of myself. “What did you think we’d all be doing here while you were gone?”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean, did you think we’d all just go home and give up on you? Did you think we would all quit our jobs and just stay here until you resurfaced?”
“Ben,” Alison said, trying to cut me off.
“No,” I said, surprising myself with the force of my resentment. “I want to know. Did it occur to you we might be worried? Did you even think about us?”
Jack looked up at me, his gaze unswerving. “No, I guess I didn’t, Ben, and I’m truly sorry about that, because you’re all pretty much my only real friends. I was just zoned out, you know? I was in another world, and I guess I just figured you’d be here when I got back.”
“And here we are,” I grumbled, my anger dissipating in the face of his honesty.
“I knew I could count on you,” he said with a grin.
“Fuck you.”
“I love you, man.” He stood up and came over to hug me.
“No, fuck you,” I said, putting up my hands.
“I love you, Ben.”
“Fuck you,” I said again but by then I was laughing and he was hugging me and I realized that I was really, truly, glad he was back and that he was okay.
“So,” Alison said, interrupting our horseplay. “Do you think it worked?”
“What?”
“Your trip. Your time up there. Do you think you’ve kicked the habit?”
“I don’t know,” Jack said. “I certainly don’t feel any craving for coke, not like I used to.”
“Well,” Chuck said, “medically speaking, it’s out of your bloodstream by now.”
“I know,” Jack said. “I feel like I somehow purified myself. Like it’s no longer a part of my life.”
“Could it really be that simple?” Lindsey asked.
“There was nothing simple about it,” Jack said good-naturedly. “You go try and live in the woods for three days.”
“So,” Alison said, stretching her arms over her shoulders. “What happens now?”
“Now,” Jack said, “I think I ought to see about getting my job back.”
I remembered the time I’d asked Jack about the future and he’d said, “This is the future.” It was ironic, I thought, that his philosophy of living in the moment and not getting bogged down with worries of the future was actually the cornerstone of most addiction recovery programs. One day at a time, wasn’t that what they said? I felt an irrational surge of optimism at the notion that Jack’s own nature might actually serve him well in his struggle to stay sober. Then again, it could be a load of crap and Jack could be high again in a week.
We spent the rest of the morning watching with fascination as Jack pulled together the scattered strands of his career. His first call was to Luther Cain, whom he awakened at home. Despite being accustomed to Jack’s fame, watching him dial an Oscarwinning director’s home phone number from memory was still impressive. Their conversation was surprisingly brief, but Jack explained that Cain was not a “phone guy” and would be immediately flying by private jet into Monticello, along with Craig Schiller, one of the producers of Blue Angel II, and they would drive down to meet with him in person. “He needs to see for himself what the story is,” Jack explained matter-of-factly, as if it were no big deal that one of Hollywood’s biggest names would be dropping by the Schollings’s place. I guess it wasn’t so outrageous when you considered that one of Hollywood’s other biggest names was making phone calls from the living room couch in shorts and a Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt. But still, it was pretty cool.
The plan, devised with Alison’s help, was that Jack would forgo his twelve-million-dollar salary and work for scale, allowing Cain to reimburse the insurance company for the lost days so that no one was out any money except for Jack. It was Alison’s hope that by establishing a position of goodwill with the insurance company, they wouldn’t refuse him coverage on future projects. Jack was confident that if he could get Cain in his corner it would give him the credibility and the muscle to salvage his career.
“You know Cain’s already brought a lawsuit against you,” I reminded Jack.
“That’s just business,” he said. “It’s no big deal.”
I had to admit that there was something intoxicating about living in a world where million-dollar lawsuits were tossed casually aside, and severe grievances were resolved with a quick phone call. I could see how, after living in that world for a while, you tended to take a light view of consequences. No damage was too great to be undone by the big business of entertainment. I knew that was a simplification, but not by much.
Jack was already signed to two other projects after the Blue Angel sequel, and even though he was itching to speak to the producers of those films, he decided that the prudent thing to do was to first arrive at an agreement with Luther Cain. “Then I’ll be dealing from a position of strength,” he said.
“You see,” Chuck said to him. “You can handle your career. You don’t need that fucking guy.”
“It’s not that simple,” Jack said with a frown. “There are contracts. Agreements. There’s history there.”
“A history of drug abuse and exploitation,” Alison said sharply.
“The guy owns a piece of me for the next few years,” Jack said, shrugging his shoulders.
The next item of business was an exclusive interview with Sally Hughes. Chuck had extracted a promise of secrecy from her the night before, after considerable negotiation and flirtation, by guaranteeing that she would be the one to break the story in a one-on-one interview. Sally originally wanted to do the interview live via satellite feed, but after consulting with her bosses decided to videotape it so that it could be edited into a cleaner segment. Chuck went outside and ushered Sally and her crew through the media throng, past Deputy Dan and the police barricades and into the house. The competing journalists reacted in a panic of shouted questions and demands, furious at being scooped. Sally now had replacement cameramen, two of them, who’d driven through the night to be here for what she’d called in as an exclusive with the alleged kidnappers of Jack Shaw. If they were surprised to see Jack himself actually sitting there waiting for them, they were professional enough to contain themselves. A sound guy and a makeup person were there as well, and they got to work setting up klieg lights and umbrellas to mute them, moving the furniture, and basically turning the living room into a mini-studio. Chuck introduced Sally to Jack, and Sally did her best not to seem too impressed or excited, and failed sensationally. This was clearly the biggest interview of her career. Jack went upstairs for a quick shower, and the camera guys put Chuck on the seat next to Sally to do some lighting tests. Chuck flirted with Sally the whole time, posing and leaning in to whisper to her while they shot her from different angles. She made faces at us, but she didn’t seem to really mind. If anything,
his clowning around seemed to calm her down.
Jack returned about twenty minutes later, looking clean and composed in black jeans and a denim shirt he’d taken from my suitcase. While the makeup guy worked on him, Jack chatted amicably with Sally, listening attentively as she mapped out her plans for the interview and offering a few suggestions of his own, which she hastily scribbled down.
The rest of us retreated to the back of the living room, well behind the cameras, and the interview began. “You’ve been missing now for almost seven days,” Sally said, after a short preamble. “Where have you been?”
Jack smiled and said, “First of all, I’ve only been missing for three days. Up until three days ago, I was staying with my friends.”
“Staying here in this house?”
“That’s right.”
“But you told no one.”
“I chose not to alert the media, if that’s what you mean.”
Watching Jack under the lights and in front of the camera was really something. There was nothing about him you could point to that was different, but his smile seemed that much more radiant, his demeanor that much more commanding. It wasn’t that something changed in him when he was in front of the cameras, but rather he became something that was always in him, lying just beneath the surface. It was this intangible, indescribable quality that Jack brought to the screen, but seeing it in person from ten feet behind the camera was a remarkable experience.
We had discussed whether or not Jack should publicly admit that he’d been taking cocaine, or just claim the ever-popular addiction to painkillers like so many other celebrities did. We’d come to the conclusion that there had been too many public displays for plausible deniability. “Better to just come clean and move past it,” Jack said. “The industry isn’t known for its long memory, you know? Besides, there’s already a protocol to the whole rehab thing that the studios and press have to come to expect. Misbehavior, confession, and most of all, contrition. As long as you play the part, they’ll give you your shot at redemption. If you improvise, you can bring down a whole world of shit on yourself.”
I don’t know how calculated Jack’s performance was, but he pulled it off beautifully. He was quietly confident without seeming brash, and while he was apologetic he didn’t ask for sympathy. He was a slightly subdued, wiser Jack Shaw who was now ready to make amends and pick up his career where he’d left off, with a new commitment and a clear perspective. I hoped that was really the truth, and not just Jack getting into character, and I wondered if, for someone like Jack, there was actually a difference.
“Many speculated that your disappearance was drug-related. Is there any truth to that?”
“Drugs were part of it. But it was more than that. I was having some troubles that needed to be worked out. Unfortunately, my schedule didn’t allow me the time I needed, so I was forced to take some unscheduled time.”
“Were you addicted to drugs?” Sally persisted.
“I was using cocaine,” Jack said simply.
“And now you’re not?”
“I will never take cocaine again.”
“Can you tell us by what means you conquered such a powerful addiction in only a few days?” Sally asked.
“I wouldn’t say I conquered it,” Jack said, looking introspectively at his hands. “I would say I got the drug out of my system, got rid of the immediate craving for it, and, with the help of my friends, established a strong foundation for keeping myself sober.”
“You mentioned your friends,” Sally said, leaning forward like Barbara Walters. “Is there any truth to the rumors that your friends actually had to kidnap you?”
Jack laughed. “I hadn’t heard that one,” he said. “Is that really what they’re saying?” He delivered this line with the same easy tone he’d used when he declared that he wouldn’t do coke again. He lied so effortlessly that for an instant even I believed him. With a jolt of dismay, I realized that I was no longer capable of distinguishing the truth from the lies when Jack spoke.
They went on for another ten minutes, Jack dishing the bullshit and Sally eating it up, until Jack started to look tired and distracted. Sally sensed she was losing his attention and brought the interview to a close. The cameramen went outside to shoot some filler of the mountains and the house, and Jack lay back on the couch with a tired smile. “When will it hit?” he asked Sally.
“We’ll edit it in the van,” Sally said, flushed with excitement. “It will probably take about a half hour, then I’ll go live with a quick update and introduce the segment.”
“The other guys out there are going to go nuts,” Lindsey said from the window.
“I know,” Sally said, unable to conceal her pleasure. “They’ll be storming the house.” She turned to Jack. “Remember, you agreed not to talk to any other networks until after the late news tonight.”
Jack lifted his head and looked at her. “Once was enough,” he said. “No offense.”
“None taken.”
Sally got up, shook Jack’s hand and took herself and her now irrepressible smile to her van to work on her story. I sat down beside Jack, who was sipping at a Coke thoughtfully. He looked exhausted. “So,” I said. “Was that acting, or was that really you?”
“That was really me acting,” Jack said.
“What do you mean?”
“The really great actors not only convince the audience,” Jack quoted, standing up and stretching. “They also have to convince themselves.” He smiled at me.
“Profound,” I said.
“And maybe just a bit pathetic,” he said, putting down the soda can and heading for the stairs. “But believe it or not, it actually works.”
“It must be tough,” I said sincerely. “Having no clear line between your reality and your bullshit.”
“There’s a line,” Jack said. “It just moves around a lot.”
“How do you deal with it?”
Jack said “Drugs.” We both laughed.
“Jesus, I’m wiped,” Jack said, turning at the banister. “I’m going to catch a few z’s.”
“Don’t you want to see yourself on TV?”
“Nah,” Jack said, yawning as he started up the stairs. “I hate that guy.”
Don said he couldn’t stick around to meet Jack, who was still napping when he came to say good-bye. He didn’t even take off his suit jacket. “I’m heading back to Manhattan,” he told me, handing his business cards to Chuck and me. “Give me a call when you get back, we’ll get a few drinks, play some ball, whatever.” It struck me that he really liked us, and that maybe he didn’t have too many friends in his line of work. I tried to remember the last friend I’d made as an adult, not counting some of the people at Esquire, and couldn’t. At thirty, friends are pretty much like bone mass. Whatever you’ve managed to store up until now starts to diminish and is rarely replaced. I told Don I’d be in touch, and I meant it. He shook my hand and Chuck’s and gave Lindsey and Alison quick hugs, saying how glad he was that everything worked out. I thought that assessment might be premature, but it was nice of him to say. Alison walked him to the door and he stopped for a moment and looked at her, clearly wanting to say something more to her, something specific. His behavior confirmed my earlier suspicion that he had more than a passing interest in her. He hesitated, opened his mouth, and then closed it again. “I’ll see you,” he said.
“Thanks for everything,” Alison said.
He waved it off. “I’ll call you in a little while, okay?” he said, not making eye contact. “See how everything turned out.”
“Okay.”
“All right then,” he said, and stepped out of the house.
“I think he likes you,” Lindsey said to Alison.
“He’s just a nice guy, that’s all,” Alison replied, closing the front door.
“What, a nice guy can’t like you?” Lindsey persisted.
“Leave me alone.”
“He really is a nice guy,” I said, not to bug Alison but just be
cause I was thinking it.
Chuck said, “I wonder if he’s ever, you know, killed anyone.”
Sally Hughes’s interview with Jack hit the airwaves at about one o’clock and we amused ourselves by monitoring the various networks as the news spread. Within ten minutes of the story breaking, all the other networks were interrupting their programming with live reports from the correspondents outside the house, as if they’d uncovered the news by being there, as opposed to seeing it on television like everyone else. After all the live reports went out, we noticed a change in the behavior of the news people outside. They began moving all over the place with their cameras, climbing up on top of their vans finding any possible vantage point from which to aim their cameras at the house, all in the hopes of getting a shot of Jack. They were undoubtedly catching hell from their bosses for his having made it safely past them into the house, and now the pressure was on them to deliver something. Some of the photographers were even climbing the trees.
By the time Jack awoke two hours later, Fox had aired snippets of the interview twice more, and a crowd of fans easily twice the size of last night’s vigil had begun descending on the scene. Sullivan wasn’t equipped to control the crowd and called in the state police, who arrived in a commotion of sirens and lights and began erecting more prominent barricades. When the crowd continued to swell, they were forced to close off the road, and within a few minutes the road had become a large pedestrian mall. Jack peeked out under the shades for a second, careful to hide his face from view, and whistled softly. “Word sure gets around in these small towns.”
“It helps to have the networks camped out on your doorstep,” I said.
Plan B: A Novel Page 29
