But all his adrenaline came to a halt when he realized a terrible flaw in his plan. What if Susan didn’t read Yes? What if this was all for nothing? He’d just have to cross his fingers, or pull another crazy stunt. But wasn’t starring in a play called Marionettes crazy enough?
CHAPTER 21
“What the hell?” Patrick shouted at his client for the first time. It felt strangely satisfying, but it didn’t compensate for the real sensation of fear he felt as well. Either he was losing Bobby or or... He couldn’t think about “or”. He hadn’t had an experience like this before. He couldn’t compare it to anything else.
His partner had warned him the night before to take it easy with Bobby. “Try to reason with him. Talk to him. Don’t lose your cool.” Yeah, right! That was easy for Anthony to say. He didn’t have to deal with unpredictable actors. Patrick worked his butt off getting the best he could for his clients, cutting the best deals, on the phone, at lunches, never ending lunches! And now Bobby was doing this. Broadway? Why did he have to hear about it from Yes? Why did Jerry Cross get access to this news before he did?
“Don’t shout,” Bobby was sitting on his oversized sofa trying to think about Susan when he got the call. He wasn’t surprised Patrick had phoned him, but he was a little surprised at how upset he sounded.
“What do you want from me?” Patrick grieved through the line. He felt like a broken man. No other client had ever made him feel this vulnerable or this dependant. How had he lost control of Bobby?
Bobby rubbed his forehead. “I want that gig with the Marionettes. You saw the script. You even gave it to me.”
“I gave it to you because I owed the producer a favor. I didn’t expect you to accept it. Theatre is a diversion from movies; it’s also a lot of hard work. It’s a commitment, Bobby, you can’t just walk out after a week because you have a movie to film.”
“We’ll see about what I can and can’t do, Patrick. I want the part. It’s the lead role, right?” Bobby wasn’t so sure now. He’d only glanced through the script. Maybe there was a smaller part he’d missed that they’d intended for him.
“You can have the lead role, of course.” Patrick scratched his head in an agitated way he only ever reserved for slow waiters and loud children. “But maybe a smaller, honorary role would be better. You could just make a star appearance and you wouldn’t have to commit so much of your time. You could still start Money Run in the planned timeframe.”
In theory, it was what he should do, but he couldn’t quite see himself in a walk-on-walk-off role. It would be the lead or nothing. “I want the lead. Why are you insinuating that I can’t handle commitment?”
Patrick sighed again. “Is your mom back from Paris yet?”
“No.”
“Okay, look, I’ll check with Marionettes and see when they begin.” There was a pause. “Bobby, has this theatre thing got anything to do with that girl from the movie script you were telling me about? Have you found her?”
Bobby didn’t quite know how to answer. He longed in a strange deranged way to tell Patrick all about the dreams. “I’m finding her,” he said instead.
“Well, I hope it all works out for you.”
“Thanks.” Bobby felt the conversation was concluding a monumental change in his life. He was moving to New York City, but Patrick made it seem as if Bobby was never coming back. It scared him. Was this move going to be permanent? Is that what Patrick foresaw? Bobby respected people with experience, even if he didn’t like what they had to say, or he didn’t like them personally. Patrick had had a lot of experience in the careers of actors. Was this really the end? Was he making a terrible mistake?
Bobby hung up on Patrick and studied Yes magazine again. The article was good. Jerry had used one of his better promotional shots and he looked confident and handsome. The conversation flowed smoothly as well. Jerry had made New York sound exciting, his decision to move there for love, romantic and positive. There was nothing wrong with the article. In fact, it was the best one to come out this year. Bobby should be pleased. And he was.
He just wasn’t experienced with moving. He had been in contact with a broker named Emily Zark, and had been assured that she could find him exactly what he was looking for. The only trouble was, not even Bobby knew what he was looking for. And it scared him more than he was willing to admit.
“Who is she? That girl in the article.”
“Susan?” Bobby felt his heart pound in his chest. He’d done it. He’d found a way back to the island once again. Bobby felt a mixture of triumph and relief. She was still in his life.
Susan marched off. She was getting into the habit of doing that. Temperamental. “It’s you!” he shouted.
Susan stopped, but she didn’t turn around. Bobby ran up to where she stood and put his arms around her, hugging her body close to his. “It’s you,” he whispered in her ear. “It’s you,” he said again, kissing her jaw and her neck. “It’s always been you.” He planted butterfly kisses all over her pale shoulders, her mouth, oh God, the smell of her body. How he longed for her. Of course he would act in Marionettes for her. He’d give up anything and take up anything if it meant being with her. She was his perfect match. Somehow, for some reason, she was the one.
Susan bent her head towards his kisses, turning her body to his, covering his mouth with her own, kissing him back with the same passion he felt for her. Oh how he longed to throw her down onto the sand and make love to her again. But he knew that he couldn’t waste this opportunity. He pushed her gently away from him to inspect her T-shirt. It said, “Bobby”. He grinned.
“What’s wrong? Why did you stop?”
Bobby used all his will power not to kiss her again. He knew that if he did, they would make love and he would wake up on his sofa, no closer to finding her than before. “Susan, do you want to sit somewhere and talk?”
“I—I guess. Over there?” she pointed to a large rock under a single coconut tree.
“Great, come on.” He took her by the hand and led her over to the spot. They both sat, and Susan stared at him expectantly. It was all too bizarre. “How do you know about what’s going on with me? Are you reading the papers?” he blurted.
Susan dug the sand with her big toe and didn’t answer him immediately. “I hear about you,” she said.
“Really? How?”
“Maggie tells me.”
“Who’s Maggie?”
“My sister.”
“I didn’t know you had a sister.”
“Why should you?”
“I don’t know. I’m just interested in you. I don’t have any brothers or sisters.”
“I know. I only have Maggie.”
“Is she older than you?”
But Susan fidgeted. “I don’t want to talk about Maggie. Have you thought about how to get off this island? Do you have a plan?” She wasn’t quite angry, but her mood was definitely less upbeat.
“I do have a plan, as a matter of fact.” And he did. “What we need is a knife; a big strong one for cutting bark off trees to make twine. I saw it in a movie once.”
“But we don’t have a knife, Bobby.”
“I know, but I thought we’d walk the island in case we found one.” Bobby’s tactic was that if it was Susan’s dream, and he was pretty certain that it was, she could imagine anything she wanted to. If she wanted to find a knife, she could find one. He would leave it up to her.
Susan dug the sand some more with her toe and bit her bottom lip. Bobby thought she looked adorable. He would have much preferred the lovemaking to the island walking, but he’d have to stick with his plan if he was to somehow connect with Susan, or find her, or help her, or all of the above.
“All right,” she reluctantly decided. “Let’s go.”
In a way it would be interesting, he reasoned. He’d finally see the rest of the island.
They left the beach and started across a rocky terrain that sloped upwards. There were some clusters of cactus, but the ground was mostly soli
d rock along the coast.
As they climbed higher, the inky sea below seemed to crash harder against the forever steepening cliffs.
“Don’t fall,” Bobby joked, but Susan had a determined look on her face. Bobby wondered if she was concentrating on the knife or on how the island should look. He knew for sure it wasn’t his dream, because he would have made the landscape resemble those atolls you see in travel magazines. It would be flat, beautiful, and there’d be plenty of knives lying around.
On and on they walked, with Susan constantly scouring the ground with her eyes. The landscape didn’t change much as they made their way around and back down to the beach again. From what Bobby could tell, the island was quite small.
There was the one beach with its coconut forest nearby, and beyond that lay a rocky terrain littered with sprawling cactuses, tumbleweeds, and here and there an unusual tree resembling the African Baobab.
Birds swarmed the “Baobabs”, roosting heavily in their bare braches. Bobby couldn’t quite make out what species they were, but he did see some Pelicans, although he felt certain that Pelicans didn’t nest in trees and wouldn’t be so far inshore either. Yep, it was definitely her dream. She was most certainly a city girl.
“Doesn’t look like there are any thrown away knives on this island,” Bobby stated.
“Well, you never know.” Susan’s head was bent, still searching the ground. Bobby hoped it meant she would eventually find a knife after all.
And low and behold, from the beach below there came a glimmer on the sand. “Did you see that?” Susan asked excitedly.
“Come on!” Bobby grabbed her hand, and they both ran awkwardly back down to the seashore, having walked the entire perimeter of the island in less than thirty minutes.
“I saw it there,” Susan shouted. She ran ahead of Bobby and scanned the sand. Dropping to her knees, and she started digging with a newfound determination.
“What is it?” Bobby asked.
“It looks like a knife, but it’s stuck.”
“Be careful. You don’t want to cut yourself here,”—in this place! Because on his list of things he couldn’t do, doctor was one of them.
CHAPTER 22
“I’ve almost got it.” Susan grunted. Bobby realized that she was digging a ditch around the knife to loosen the sand.
“Mr. Anderson?”
“NO! NO! NO! NO!” He did not want this. Why? Why had he woken up? He opened his eyes to the blurred vision of his housekeeper.
“I’m so sorry!” Rosa cried. She hadn’t meant to disturb him, but he’d been sitting with a blank expression on his face, eyes closed, for thirty minutes already. She was worried about him and had gently shaken his shoulder.
“What did you do?” Bobby shouted at her. “Why did you wake me?”
Rosa burst into tears and ran from the room. Bobby could not afford to lose Rosa. She was his one and only link to food, clean sheets, and some sort of sanity; but damn it, she’d woken him!
Bobby groped to pull himself off the sofa, the phone still in his hand from his ended conversation with Patrick. He threw it carelessly down so that it bounced off a cushion and landed with a worrisome clank on the hard marble floor.
He felt dizzy. “Rosa!” he called. “Rosa!” Hurry, before she packs and leaves you for good, you idiot. He’d never made her cry before.
He ran down the flight of stairs to her room and caught up to her as she tried to close her bedroom door. “I’m sorry Rosa. I shouldn’t shout. You didn’t know.”
“Know what, Mr. Bobby? You look dead!”
“I did? I’m sorry, really sorry. But I was… I was sort of… meditating. I was meditating, and it’s really hard to do, and, and you interrupted. But it’s okay.” Rosa looked as if she was about to start crying again. “It’s really okay. I’m not mad.”
“No?”
“No. I promise. I’m not mad.”
Rosa sniffed, and put a more dignified look on her face.
“Just don’t do it again. But I’m not mad.” Bobby made an about turn and headed back to the living room. It was mid morning and he wondered if now would be a good time to contact Emily and start planning his trip for real. No more talk. It was time for action.
He would have to take Rosa with him, of course. He would need a bedroom for her. And should Lester go as well? He supposed so. Lester could be useful. Bobby didn’t want to seem as if he couldn’t afford a butler, and what would Lester do back in L.A. all by himself anyway? What about Tillie? She might want to visit once she was back from Paris. He would need a guest room for her, he supposed.
Suddenly, it seemed far more complicated than he’d envisioned. Maybe he shouldn’t bring anyone else, just jump on a train with a backpack and a credit card and see where life took him. Unfortunately, he couldn’t just jump on a train. He’d be bogged down for autographs and get unintentionally harassed. He would have to hire a private jet or go Business on a domestic flight. He knew he’d opt for the jet. No one he knew went on commercial flights if they could help it, and he certainly could help it.
Bobby took one last look at his dream of travelling solo, sitting inconspicuously by a window, credit card tucked into the back pocket of his battered jeans, lost in thought as the train sped by town after town, racing him to his destination.
But that was a different Bobby. The Bobby in the dream could take a train. He could sit next to Susan, laughing about something someone they both knew had said. They could hold hands, he squeezing her fingers every so often to gently remind her that he was thinking of her. She squeezing back.
The phone rang and Bobby fished it off the floor. “Yes?” He knew it could only be a small number of people who called this number.
“You got the part.” It was Patrick, not sounding too enthusiastic. Actually he sounded just like a boy who’d been forced to give up his favorite toy.
“That’s great.” Bobby tried to appear more upbeat about the whole thing than he felt. He really did want to go to New York City and find Susan, but he wasn’t so sure about the theatre part of his plan. He wanted to at least believe that Patrick would be there for him, but it all sounded so final. “Thanks Patrick.”
“Just remember who loves you,” Patrick said like a recording, and hung up.
As Bobby placed the phone in its receiver, it rang again. “Patrick?”
“Your mother. How are you son?”
“Mom! Hey, so glad you called. How’s France?”
“It’s wonderful, you know that. But what’s this business I’m hearing about you?”
“Me? What have you heard about me?”
“Only what Patrick’s told me, and don’t go putting him down now. He had every right to call me.”
Bobby was dumbfounded for a second. Patrick had called his mother? Was that even legal?”
Tillie used the silence to jump in with her next point. “When were you going to tell me about moving?”
“When you came back, of course.” Bobby found his voice at last, but he didn’t know how much good it would do him. Of course he should have told his mother before he told the world.
“Humph!” his mother grunted. “You’re looking for this girl.”
Bobby gulped. “She’s real,” was all he could say.
“Look, Bobby, if you want to find her, that’s fine, but Patrick is worried about you. Do you really want to go into theatre? You know you’re better at movies. You don’t have to rehearse so much, and it could make you look bad, as if you’re desperate.”
“That’s crazy!” Bobby seethed with anger. How dare anyone make accusations about him like that? How dare his mother critique his work? Hadn’t he bought her a villa? Wasn’t he entitled to do what he wanted to now? Why couldn’t people just leave him alone and trust him to learn a few extra lines?
“I can do theatre just fine, and everyone knows I’m not desperate. I’m the one turning down movie offers. I could have a hundred jobs now if I wanted to. And it’s only for three months, or so,
anyway.”
There was silence on the other end, and Bobby felt bad as well as tired. He just wanted to suck on a Rum and Coke and wait for Mr. Judge’s call. He hoped it would be good news. But if Judge had good news, he would call him before seven, so if he waited until seven, there would be no good news, and in effect, he would be waiting for nothing. But he still felt like sucking on a Rum and Coke.
“All right,” his mother sighed reluctantly. “I’m not going to sensor you. We can talk some more when I get back in just a couple more weeks. Do you want me to go to New York with you?”
Bobby thought about it. Did he want his mother? It would be nice for her to explore the city, and they could eat out together, and if he ever did find Susan he could introduce them both. Yes, he did want his mother, but the last time he checked he was successful at twenty-four, and he hadn’t got there by dining with his mom. Tillie would have to wait until he was more settled. “It’s all right, I’m going to go check it out and get an apartment first and you can visit when I’m settled. Do you mind?”
Tillie sighed. She would have loved an excuse to stay away from the villa, but she wouldn’t impose on her son. Life as a single, overworked, underpaid mother had taught her how to bare something as simple as a lonely house. She could wait. She just hoped there would be some grandchildren at the end of this tunnel.
***
It took Bobby less than a week to pack up his household. Rosa was fine about moving. She had a cousin living in East Harlem whom she hadn’t seen in seven years, and she was very much looking forward to their reunion. But of course, Rosa would not be living in East Harlem. She would be with Bobby, and Bobby had decided on The Dakota; which, although not so far from East Harlem by countable distance, was located in the Upper West Side, and was thus a far way away indeed.
Actually, The Dakota probably existed in a parallel universe to everything else, and the only reason Bobby had managed to cross over at all was because a friend of a friend of Emily’s who “loved Bobby Anderson to distraction” was more than willing to grant Bobby a favor.
In Your Dreams Bobby Anderson Page 10
