Heartland

by Davis Bunn

  “No sir.” JayJay settled the laptop on his knees and rested both hands on its top. He reckoned he could wait another few minutes and satisfy the old man’s need for conversation. “I can’t say it is.”

  “There you go then. I heard tell you were a believer. After all I’ve witnessed in Hollywood, I figured it for just one more tall tale. But seeing you here, I’m inclined to believe it after all. Which is why I came down here at all, Mr. Junior. The slim chance that this strange thing I’d been hearing was true.”

  “Call me JayJay, sir.”

  “Pour me a glass of water there, JayJay.”

  JayJay had to settle the laptop on the coffee table to do so. He disliked letting go of Peter’s computer. But it was right there where he could keep an eye on it.

  The old man was so arthritic he needed both hands to lift the glass. He drank and settled it back on the table and declared, “I’m dying.”

  The truth was too clear in what JayJay saw to be denied. “I’m sorry to hear that, sir.”

  “I’m ready to go.” Carter Dawes spoke with a blunt calm. “Been ready. Lost my wife five years back and my only child eleven months before then. After that sorry mess, life just lost its flavor. Feel like I’ve woken up most mornings since then, hoping to hear God’s call.”

  JayJay nodded once in response. “I understand you. Yes sir, I truly do.”

  “I didn’t want to make this trip. But I felt God pushing me. Which is a mighty strange thing. On account of how I ain’t had nothing from this studio but grief.” The tone did not change. But the old man began rubbing his knees. Two circular patterns of old aggravation. “I knew why God wanted me to buy this studio. There ain’t never been a time in our nation’s history when we needed moral leadership more than now. Not just in politics. In everything. And the truth is, we’re an entertainment-driven culture. Which means our young folk look to Hollywood for their guidance. And if these folks have a moral compass, they sure keep it well hid.”

  The old man took time out for another unsteady sip. He used the edge of the blanket covering his legs to wipe his mouth. Then he continued, “But the fellow I chose to run this studio didn’t pan out the way I’d hoped.”

  “Martin Allerby,” JayJay said.

  “He was the third try. All of them ran to ways that turned my stomach. At least this one’s made me money. I set a board in place that I hoped was gonna keep him in line. Told him he had to start up a program that would have a Bible-reading hero at its heart. A man of the land. A man who knew how to lead by example. Martin Allerby fought the idea tooth and nail. I told him either he did it or he found another job. So he did. And he made money on that too. But even this hasn’t turned out the way I wanted.”

  JayJay recalled Peter’s earlier conversation with Britt. “Too many tornadoes and not enough moral meat.”

  “There you go.” Dawes thumped a fragile fist on the sofa’s arm. “And that feller they had playing the lead role, he just went from bad to worse. Made a mockery of everything they had on the screen by the way he lived when the lights went off. Then I started hearing rumors. About a new feller they’d brought in. A believer. A man with guts and true grit. A man who walked the talk.”

  Here it came, JayJay reckoned. The feller’s windup was over. The lasso was about to be tossed.

  “Now I done seen you for myself, and I believe the rumors are true. So here’s the deal. I want you to sign on for the long haul. Not just making more pictures. Representing the studio. Giving it a face. Being the man people think of when they hear the name Centurion. Name your price. A seat on the board, a chance to direct, whatever you hanker for. I just want to leave this earth knowing there’s one feller in charge down here who listens to the same higher call as me.”

  The man spoke like a cowboy. Simple and direct. When he was done, he just stopped. No need to fill the empty space. JayJay had to ask, “You ever live on a ranch?”

  “All my born days. Eighty-three years. Born to it, lived it, and I’ll be buried behind the house on the same patch as my wife and family, right back to my great-grandaddy.” He looked away then. “Including my son. And his boy. All we had. Both lost in a traffic accident six years back. What cost me my wife as well, I have no doubt.”

  “I can’t tell you how sorry—”

  “Don’t give me sorry, son. Just say you’ll help me out in the here and now.”

  JayJay stared at the laptop. He could feel the energy more sharply now. Drawing him like a magnet tuned to his mortal flesh. “I can’t, Mr. Dawes. I don’t like telling you no, but I’m set on leaving this place.”

  Dawes did not show regret. Perhaps he had aged beyond that capacity. All he did was go through the painful process of drinking once more from his glass. When he had wiped his mouth and settled back against the pillows, he said, “Had a call from the lawyer feller in Ojai who handles my affairs. There’s been an offer for the studio. All cash. Lock, stock, and barrel. He ain’t said nothing, but I smell a rat. One that likes fancy suits and running things his own way.”

  “Martin Allerby is buying your studio?”

  “I ain’t got no hard proof. Man’s covered his tracks well. But that’s my guess.” He gave JayJay a look steady as a hunter’s aim. “And I’m gonna sell it to him.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  “Can and will, son. Can and will.” The old man leaned forward. “Unless we shake on this.”

  JayJay wanted to rise. Just get up and walk out the door and down the corridor, back to his room, back to where he could open the computer and type in the words and leave this whole sorry mess behind. But a weight had settled upon his heart, pushing him down, filling him with an unutterable knowledge.

  “The fact that you don’t want this chore is all the sign I need,” Dawes told him. “God’s hand is on my being here, and on our talk, and on this offer. I’m asking you with a dying man’s certainty. Accept your calling, son. Take on this duty. Become the man our poor hurting nation needs. One voice for good. One Christian who will stand in the false lights of Hollywood and point out a different path. A path toward the true light.”

  Chapter 53

  Peter was back in the Fresno hospital room seated beside his wife when she opened her eyes. “What time is it?”

  “Just gone midnight.”

  She reached over. “How is Kelly?”

  He pulled his chair up closer and set the pad down on the bed so he could take her hand. “She’s woken up. Spoken with her mom. The doctor says her signs are good.”

  “The babies?”

  “Both sleeping. Like their mom should be.”

  “In a while.” She used her free hand to pick up the pad, which was empty. “Working hard, I see.”

  “I just got here.”

  “That’s no excuse.”

  “Now you’re sounding like Britt.” Peter wanted to add, The simplest conversation with this woman could be turned into a poem of undying love. But the look in her eye said she already knew. So he made do with a kiss. “Can I get you something?”

  “I’m fine. How is everything?”

  Everything being the world of film. “Britt used a conference room downstairs for interviews and planning. When Kelly woke up he left for the hotel. The press are gradually drifting away. They’ve basically gotten bored with the townspeople saying they don’t blame us, they like us, we did our best and fought it with them. And how JayJay saved a half dozen lives.”

  “Where’s JayJay?”

  “Hotel, probably. He left a while ago. Ahn said there was a problem with Kelly’s mom.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  “Couldn’t tell you.”

  She knew him well enough to read the unspoken. “What is it?”

  He hesitated. “Maybe it should wait.”

  “Tell me.”

  So he did. About the conversation he’d had with JayJay while she was in the operating theater. What JayJay had said about how he had come to be here. And what the pastor had told Ja
yJay. Peter finished with, “It was amazing, sitting there and hearing him talk about living through exactly what I had written—”

  “Why haven’t you told me this before now?”

  “I don’t know, hon. I mean, you’re laid up and the babies—”

  “Go to him.”

  The sudden change in her expression caught him totally off guard. “What?”

  Cynthia pushed herself higher in the bed. She winced at the pain. But waved away his hand. An impatient gesture. An urgent signal. “Peter, you’ve got to find him.”

  His writer’s mind went into random sort mode. Finally he settled on, “It’s after midnight and I don’t—”

  “Listen to me.” Cynthia rarely got this way. Where her tension vibrated in her voice and her gestures and her gaze. But when it happened, there was no denying the dynamic urgency. “Peter, you have got to go to him now.”

  Peter had exited the elevator and walked past the nurses’ station, heading for the parking lot when a voice said, “You sure you want to go out the front?”

  He turned to face Ahn. “I thought the press had given up and blown away.”

  “All but the die-hards.” Ahn stepped closer and tightened his gaze, as though seeking to probe beneath the surface. He stated flatly, “Something’s the matter.”

  “I don’t know if it is or not.” Peter waved vaguely at the floors overhead. “But Cynthia’s got it in her head . . .”

  “Is it JayJay?”

  It would be far too easy to dismiss Ahn as just another unfinished kid. “How did you know?”

  “Man, you weren’t there. That lady, she just vaporized him.”

  “Who, the mother?”

  “I played like a potted palm and Mrs. Channing still blistered me. When she was done, JayJay took off. Said he was going back to the hotel. Man, I’m worried. I tried to tell Britt, but his world has tightened down to editing scenes with Derek and Rhoda. Getting ready in case Martin tries to say we lost it.”

  Peter liked the way he said it. We. Even the agents were claiming a place on the runaway bus. “I think . . .”

  He stopped at the sight of Kip scurrying down the hall. “Did you hear what happened to JayJay?”

  “Hear?” Ahn snorted. “I was there.”

  “Bad?”

  “I’d rather go fight another fire.”

  Peter said, “Cynthia thinks JayJay needs us.”

  Kip hesitated before asking, “Is it true what Britt was saying, about you guys praying for me?”

  “Every day,” Peter confirmed. “JayJay’s idea.”

  Ahn was already headed for the rear exit. “We can talk on the way. Let’s go.”

  Chapter 54

  Kelly clambered out of the dark, driven from slumber’s embrace by a driving, urgent need. One she could not name until she was close to the surface again.

  Like the first time, awareness came back to her in stages. Her first conscious connection was her chest rising and falling in steady rhythm. So steady, in fact, she was not surprised to next feel the tube in her nose, pushing oxygen into her lungs. A fact that had escaped her entirely the first time she’d reappeared. Then came the astringent hospital smells, and the beeping, and the sound of a voice saying, “I believe she’s coming around.”

  Kelly’s mother gripped her hand. Kelly knew it was her mom, the way she took hold, it was an energy thing as much as the touch itself. Edith Channing said, “Hello, darling. I’m right here. Everything is going to be fine.”

  The doctor bent over her and gave a professional smile. “Can you hear me, Ms. Channing? Just nod your head if you can. Excellent. Your throat has suffered some burns, and it will be quite difficult for you to speak for a while. And to swallow.”

  Her mother fitted a tiny sliver of ice between her lips. “Suck on that, dear. It will help the thirst.”

  Kelly lay very still, gathering herself. Then she swiveled her head. Locking gazes with her mother. Pouring everything she had into the look. All that could not be said. All that needed to be understood. The pure, unadulterated urgency of what had to be done.

  Edith Channing’s bedside manner disappeared. She might not have caught every component of her daughter’s message. But what she saw caused the older woman to drop her eyes momentarily.

  Kelly knew the doctor was saying something. And she needed to pay attention. But that would have to wait. Right now there was space for just one thing. She waited until her mother finally lifted her gaze again. Then she spoke. The three words were so painful they seemed drenched in acid. Her voice was unrecognizable. She had to take a shallow breath after each word. But she got them out.

  “Call. Him. Now.”

  Chapter 55

  As soon as Peter entered JayJay’s hotel room, he knew. It might as well have been written across the sky in Hollywood-size script. Peter’s laptop lay open on the coffee table in front of JayJay’s chair. The screen was blank. JayJay’s hands lay limp on the chair arms. JayJay did not look over when they entered. He just sat there staring at the empty screen.

  Peter walked over and sat down on the sofa next to JayJay. “You can’t do this.”

  JayJay did not look over. Or give any sign he heard Peter at all.

  “Look. I know I’m guilty as anybody of doubting you. When you first showed up, I, well, I mistrusted you. Ask Derek. He’ll tell you. I questioned everything about you.” The stress and the tension were so tight Peter felt his consciousness compressed down to this one instant. He had heard this was how it was when somebody tried to talk a suicide off the ledge. Which, in truth, was exactly what he was doing. “And I kept doubting. Right to the evening when you came to my hotel room. What am I saying. This hotel room. I was so messed up. Cynthia was sick and I was here and I felt so totally helpless. So scared. I’d been given the chance of a lifetime and the timing was so totally awful. All I wanted was to just go ahead and fail, which I knew I probably would, so I could get back to where I belonged. Beside my wife.”

  Ahn crossed the room. And Kip. The two of them didn’t sit down. Instead they settled against the window. And stared at JayJay like he was a member of the recently bereaved.

  Peter went on, “Then you stopped by my room. And what you gave me was hope. You were on my side. You cared about my problems. You prayed . . .”

  He stopped. He wanted to keep going. But just then his throat was not letting out enough air to shape the words.

  Ahn asked softly, “I don’t know what he’s talking about. But if you leave, you have to answer me this. What am I supposed to tell Minh?”

  JayJay winced at the name.

  “Leave?” Kip almost shrieked the word. “You can’t leave! Not now!” JayJay looked over and squinted. Like he couldn’t place the little man.

  “Do you have any idea what you’ve done for me?” Kip’s arms started their frantic dance. Like he was back on the set. Only the emotion was real this time, along with the driving urgency in his voice. “I’m the little shrimp on the set. The guy everybody laughs at behind his back. The guy they like to mimic. The guy everybody is paid to hate. Okay. If that’s how they want it, fine. I’ll show them. I’ll be worse than they think. I’ll become a legend.”

  He might have scored a swipe at his eyes on that last swing, Peter couldn’t be sure, Kip’s arms were milling so fast. “And then you show up. And you are nice to me. Even when I don’t deserve it. Even when I’m vicious. What do you do but arrive on the set and you apologize. And then you take me out with you on a location shoot and you talk to me like I’m human. And then, what do I hear?” The AD’s chin was trembling so hard he had to clench his teeth to get the words out. “That you’ve got half the crew praying for me. Not once. But every day. Nobody has ever . . .”

  By the time the AD had reached the point where he couldn’t continue, Peter was back in control. “You’re more than an actor on the set, JayJay. You’re leading this location crew in a direction they’ve never taken before. This is one of the laws of Hollywood, how the stars a
nd the director set the tone for the shoot. Not what goes on film. What happens in reality. The prayer group, the harmony, the friendship, the way the town feels about us, this is real.”

  “Let’s talk about real.” This from Ahn. “Let’s talk about the people like my grandmother, who almost wept when JayJay Parsons didn’t live up to her ideal. And now, she’s got her hero back. Can you really walk away from that? Can you?”

  The silence extended out to where time stopped mattering. Dawn became a pale wash upon the window. Birdsong rose from the courtyard garden. Finally JayJay said, “I been sitting here for hours. Staring at this screen. I turned it on twice, then shut it off. Trying to figure out what I was going to write.”

  Ahn started to ask something. Peter raised his hand. Not now.

  “Was I gonna make it all go back to how it was before? If I did that, how was I gonna live with what’s happened over here? I couldn’t. Not unless I wrote in a memory loss. And I could. Just slip in a couple of sentences, right?” JayJay looked at Peter now. “Turn the clock back and make like none of this ever happened. Not the people or the film or Kelly . . .”

  It was JayJay’s turn to struggle for control. “But I couldn’t do that. How could I be sure I wouldn’t turn back the clock on everything that happened here? What if, what if I wrote me out and wrote everybody back to how it was before? No prayer time, no renewal of Heartland, no win in the fight against Allerby. I tried to tell myself that it didn’t matter, not with me leaving and all.”