Dreams Are Not Enough

by Jacqueline Briskin

  “Hap?” she asked.

  “Maxim’s brother,” Barry reminded.

  “How could you forget him?” Maxim said. “He’s too large to forget.” He sat back in the wing chair. The jumping orange flames lit his lean face. “Just one minor problem. We don’t have a leading lady.”

  “I’m under contract to Saint-Simon.”

  “I had Magnum’s legal department check,” Maxim said. “Your contract’s only got a few months to run.”

  “A Magnum movie?” she said, aware she sounded inane.

  “You are being dense. Hap’s and my movie. A Harvard Productions film. The distributor’ll probably be Magnum—it so happens I’m acquainted with somebody there.”

  Diller gave an actor’s chuckle.

  “We anticipate a major, major release,” Maxim went on. “You should relate to that. Also, the female star will do more than bare her boobs—not that I’m knocking yours, understand. It’s just you’re ready to move on to more meaningful roles.”

  She cleared her throat. “Does Hap know you’re asking me?”

  “He’s scouting locations.”

  “He doesn’t know then.”

  “I’m the producer. The producer’s task, as you know, is to hire the talent and enable it to function.”

  “Maxim, Saint-Simon’s planning a better role for me.” As far as she knew, a total lie.

  Maxim sipped his brandy. “Is that a no I’m hearing?”

  “Yes, a no.”

  “A definite no, or a maybe no?”

  “A definite no.”

  Maxim tilted his head, holding out his free hand, a gesture that meant, Lady, fine by me if you want to give up the chance of a lifetime.

  Wind howled, redoubling the force of the rain.

  “Listen to that,” Diller said.

  “It’s like a genuine Magnum storm,” Maxim said, megaphoning his hands as if on the set, calling, “Okay you guys, get your rain machines ready!” He lowered his pitch to normal. “I’m not avid about that drive back to Tours.”

  “You’re spending the night here,” Barry said, nodding tipsily. “You’re staying here.”

  Alyssia wanted nothing more than to be rid of Maxim’s acid smile. “Yes,” she said. “I insist—I hope you and Diller don’t mind sharing a bed.”

  “Dill?” Maxim asked.

  “All I can say,” Diller retorted, “is it beats getting killed on that bastard of a road.”

  • • •

  “Did you know about Maxim’s plans?” Alyssia asked as she stepped into the heavy flannel nightgown. “The movie, I mean?”

  Barry was already in the high-legged lit matrimonial. “Before you came down he waxed eloquent about the production—I’d forgotten the flights his wit can take.”

  “Wit?”

  “Oh, he kept up a running commentary about being forced to star Hap’s girl.”

  Hap’s girl? In the years since Beth had reported that Hap’s engagement to Sara Cowles was broken, there had been no mention of any serious entanglement—but certainly Hap must have been involved. Alyssia turned away. “Then she’s an actress?”

  Barry yawned. “That’s the point. She’s not. Her name is Whitney Charles. Of the Charles-Boston bank. She’s tried her hand at commercials. She’s made three of them, all for companies controlled by Charles-Boston.”

  “Think they’ll go with her, then?”

  “How can they? You know how abysmally uncertain the movie business has become. Magnum stockholders would rise up en masse if Uncle Desmond were to commit the gross nepotism of distributing a film his sons made with a star whose sole expertise is vanity commercials. That’s why he wants you. You might not be Bardot, but people have heard your name.”

  “Think I was wrong, turning him down?”

  “Hon, don’t we have a mutual nonintervention pact? You manage your career, I manage mine.”

  She turned out the light and climbed into the big, soft bed, pulling the goosedown quilt high to her ears. Barry rested a hand on her shoulder. A comradely gesture, not a suggestive invitation. They hadn’t had sex in four months. Prior to that the interim had been more like five. This infrequency was never mentioned, it being a source of private shame to both of them. Though she had been approached by Saint-Simon, who buzzed like a stout, whiskered bee amid the distaff side of his ensemble, and by Claude Tissot and some ten others, she put them off with deftly humorous tact that roused no animosity. Among her friends, who were also her co-workers, she was considered to be that American perversity, a faithful wife. She accepted that her archaic fidelity was more closely tied to Hap than to Barry.

  Barry exuded a vinous yawn and rolled away from her.

  My poor sweetie, she thought, rubbing his leg affectionately with her big toe. His rich relations still intimidate him—that’s why he got loaded.

  She invented excuses for Barry’s drinking. Despite their lackluster sex life and the empty spaces he left in their marriage, her loyalty to him had deepened, and because of this she never considered herself as one of the main reasons he hit the bottle. Despising himself for his failures, he bitterly resented her for her successes.

  Within two minutes his loud, jagged snores competed with the assaulting storm. She lay on her back with her eyes wide open.

  To star in a film, to play something more than a sex kitten, would be a challenge—and tremendous for her career.

  But of course taking the part was unequivocally impossible.

  She couldn’t face Hap.

  She knew that to him her hasty departure without a word of explanation must inevitably have appeared cruelly meretricious and self-serving. Kept in the dark about her motives, he could only conclude that she had chosen a chance to work with Saint-Simon over a life with him.

  Suddenly she saw herself opening the door of a drab, beige motel room, saw Hap waiting for her, his gray eyes warm and intent. With a whimpering moan, she rolled onto her stomach, pressing against the mattress, tightening her vaginal muscles as she rubbed back and forth, a humiliating, unsatisfyingly inconclusive compromise for love.

  She was sickeningly jealous of Whitney Charles of the Charles-Boston Bank.

  • • •

  Sunday morning the wind had lulled, but a light rain still fell. While Alyssia dressed by the little electric heater, hastily skivvying into lined woolen bell-bottoms and two layers of sweaters, Barry crouched in the bed with the feather comforter pulled up around him.

  She asked sympathetically, “Want me to bring you up a raw egg with Worcestershire sauce?” His favorite hangover cure.

  “Thanks, but I’ve got to put in an appearance.”

  He lurched from the bed, drawing his plaid robe around himself. “Once more into the fray,” he said.

  She planted an encouraging kiss on his prickly cheek—his breath smelled sour—and they linked arms as they went down the staircase. Reaching the bottom step, they saw that the library door stood ajar. Maxim was bent over the desk, reading.

  Barry paled. With a wordless growl he careened across the dilapidated stone floor of the hallway. He yanked Maxim from his desk.

  “You don’t go prying into my things,” he panted.

  “What the fuck—” Maxim started.

  Barry shoved at his cousin, who fell backward onto the nineteenth-century arched wooden trunk where various drafts of manuscripts were stored. Maxim, recovering his balance, charged back at Barry, aiming a series of rabbit punches at the stained plaid of his robe. Barry, crying out, slapped at Maxim’s hands. A humorously amateurish scuffle.

  The noise brought Diller from the kitchen. “Jesus,” he said. “What the hell’s up?”

  “Barry never lets anyone see his writing,” Alyssia explained. “Not even me.”

  Alyssia and Diller stood, their breath showing in the cold air, their hands dangling, duelists’ seconds aware that they should stop the clumsy battle but not knowing how.

  Maxim caught Barry a hard blow to the chest, Barry staggered, then rus
hed forward, flailing at Maxim’s tensed face.

  Blood spurted from Maxim’s nose. Barry dropped his hands. “God, Maxim, I didn’t mean that.”

  Maxim struck his final assault at his now undefended opponent, raising his knee upward. Clutching at himself, grunting, Barry bent double.

  Alyssia rushed to her husband’s side, leading him to the desk chair.

  Diller offered Maxim his handkerchief.

  “Thanks,” Maxim panted, stanching the blood. “What the fuck was that all about, Barry old chap?”

  “Ever think of asking before you look?” Barry’s question ended in an embarrassed quaver.

  “In my ignorance I assumed writing is meant to be read,” Maxim said.

  “Not until the final draft.”

  “It’s pretty good.”

  Barry straightened.

  Maxim added slowly, “In fact, pretty damn good.”

  “Well, if nothing else, the battle’s cured my hangover,” Barry said cheerfully. “Had coffee?”

  “I’ll have another cup,” Maxim said. “Barrymore, I never meant to castrate you.”

  He meant it, Alyssia thought, following the men into the warmth of the kitchen.

  • • •

  That morning Barry and Maxim stayed very close, the two exchanging family nostalgia as if to reassure each other that fisticuffs were nothing compared to their tribal past. On Barry’s invitation, Maxim—with Diller—agreed to spend another night.

  Diller volunteered to go into Tours with Alyssia to buy food. Though rain turned the rolling countryside desolate, and the narrow road was slick and difficult, the shopping trip seemed exceptionally short. Diller was excellent company. He had a ruefully gentle way about him, a likable pliability that she associated with certain homosexuals. But that, she decided, was highly unlikely. If Diller were, would Maxim, a highly publicized lady’s man, be touring Europe with him?

  17

  Alyssia, with Juanita next to her in the car, returned to Paris early the following morning for a rehearsal of Le Feu. The session, one long, uninterrupted Gallic argument, lasted until after six that night.

  As Alyssia let herself wearily into the flat, a masculine voice said, “Hi.”

  Maxim lounged in the easy chair, elegantly mod in his Harris tweed jacket and faded jeans.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked sharply.

  “I read my horoscope. It says this evening is for repaying hospitality. We’re having dinner, you and I.”

  “Maxim, I’m too tired to move. Besides, Juanita’s already fixing something for me.” She glanced around for corroboration. But the open doors revealed the emptiness of the bedroom with its pair of narrow, monastic twins as well as the tiny slits of kitchen and bathroom.

  “When I explained we were going out, she decided to take in Sound of Music.”

  Alyssia’s temples throbbed painfully. “What makes you so sure you can control everyone?”

  His narrow, handsome face drained of its usual tension and the newspaper on his lap rustled onto the rug. “Alyssia, you have no idea how humorous that remark is.”

  Pressing two fingers to her aching head, she told herself that in the six workaholic, often homesick years that she’d spent building her career in France, Maxim’s invitation was the first overture made by any Cordiner other than Barry.

  “All right,” she assented. “Give me a few minutes to change.”

  “No sweat. Our reservation at Laperouse isn’t until eight thirty.”

  As she moved to the bedroom, he reached out, patting her derriere. The light caress roused nothing in her, not even mild anger.

  • • •

  Lapérouse spreads through an ancient, charming house. Initially they were seated in the large downstairs salon, but Maxim spoke briefly to the captain and they were led up the highly polished old staircase to a secluded ell overlooking the dark Seine with its brightly lit boats.

  After their orders were taken, Alyssia said, “If this evening’s about the film, the answer is still no.”

  She anticipated a wittily cutting retort, but instead he turned in the banquette to look at her with somber earnestness. “Let me level with you, Alyssia. I need you badly. Both of you.”

  “Both?” she asked in surprise. “Barry, too?”

  “We don’t have a script, only a story line. The novel he’s working on covers roughly the same ground.”

  “It does? He never discusses his work with me,” she admitted. “What’s it about?”

  “A loose, episodic journey. His title’s the same as the original, The Odyssey, ours is Wandering On. His locations are the lushest hostelries in Provence, we move up and down the Oregon and California coastline in a psychedelic bus. Our characters are anti-Vietnam, pro pot, pro sex.”

  “Experimental stuff?”

  “Very powerful stuff. New for American film, yes, but the time’s right. Alyssia, I meant it when I said you’ve grown beyond those dumb, leg-spreading American chicks. You deserve a real role. You are the sixties, the new woman, intelligent, loose, no hangups about sex.”

  Nary a one, unless absolute fidelity to a near-celibate marriage would be considered a hangup.

  A chic, elderly couple was seated at the nearest table. The man glanced at Alyssia, did a double take, then murmured to his Chanel-clad wife, who after a discreet half minute turned to look. Generally Alyssia took innocent pleasure in recognition. In her current mood, the sliding glances vexed her.

  Darting a frown at the offenders, she said in a low voice, “Maxim, I’m sorry. But I have my own reasons for refusing.”

  “What about Barry? Have you ever stopped to consider the kind of life he has? Never earning a cent, living off you?”

  “That,” she retorted, “is our business.”

  “Oh, absolutely. Barry explained that never your twain careers shall meet. But I say bull to that. You owe him, Alyssia, you owe him. Minus you, he’d be a lawyer, pulling down large fees, at peace with Aunt Clara and Uncle Tim—”

  “You do realize you’re being obnoxious?” Alyssia snapped. After a few beats she said quietly, “Barry wouldn’t do it anyway. You know how often he’s called movie writers whores.”

  “That’s what all the virgins say. It comes from fear—fear of not being asked, fear of being rotten at the job. Believe this, Alyssia. He’d leap through flaming hoops to script Wandering On.”

  “Then why not let him at least do a treatment?”

  The first course had arrived. Maxim watched the ceremonial serving of their turbotin braise aux échalotes.

  When they were alone again, Alyssia said, “He’s a completely dedicated writer.”

  Maxim took a bite. “This is topnotch.”

  “Give him a chance.”

  Maxim continued savoring the food as if she hadn’t spoken. “Taste it. There’s an herb I can’t quite identify.”

  “Is this your way of saying the film’s a package deal? If I’m not in it, you won’t use Barry? Is that what you’re telling me?”

  “I’m telling you to eat your turbotin before it’s stony cold.”

  • • •

  As usual on Friday, Saint-Simon broke the rehearsal at one. Alyssia and Juanita loaded the Citroën, halting in Belleville-sur-Loire for fresh baked baguettes.

  As they entered the house, they shared a glance of astonishment. Behind the library door, typewriter keys clattered furiously.

  “There’s something I haven’t heard for a while,” Juanita said.

  The typing continued, its crescendo unabated until the dinner hour. When Barry emerged his eyes were bloodshot, his face slack with fatigue, but he grabbed the wine bottle from the kitchen shelf, capering over to Alyssia, enfolding her in an exuberant bear hug.

  “Hon, you are about to have the plum role of your career!”

  She pulled away, gaping at him. Juanita, stirring the spinach bisque, watched impassively.

  “You don’t know?” Barry asked.

  Alyssia shook her he
ad.

  “Didn’t Maxim tell you? I was positive he said he’d already cleared it with you. . . . Or did I say I’d do it? The way I’ve been an adjunct to the typewriter, I can’t remember my own name.” Another hug. “I know you’re nervous about tackling Hollywood and a proper starring role, but believe me, you’re ready.”

  “Saint-Simon—”

  “You’ll have time to finish Le Feu. And he’s not a pettifogger, he won’t hold you to the few extra months of your contract. I’ve never interfered before, hon, but you can’t turn this down.”

  Alyssia sighed. “Barry, you truly want to do the script?”

  “This film’s exactly the boost you need in your career,” he said loudly. “So much so that I’ve agreed to do the outline gratis.”

  “I’m doing this for you!” Barry shouted.

  “Soup’s ready,” Juanita called from the stove.

  • • •

  “You turd,” Alyssia said. “You unspeakable turd.”

  “One day,” Maxim retorted, “you’ll be on your knees thanking me.”

  It was the following afternoon. He had arrived alone at the château around eleven in the morning, closeting himself with Barry. The heavy library door muffled their outbursts of anger.

  • • •

  “You got him to do it without pay!”

  “Writing on spec is routine for a novice.”

  “And if I refuse to take the part, you’ll reject his outline?”

  “I’d have to.”

  “He could turn in a treatment that’s the best since Gone With the Wind, and you’d still reject it?”

  “What choice would I have?”

  “Don’t you care that you’ll destroy him?”

  “Alyssia, you’re in the business, I shouldn’t need to spell this out for you. Without you we won’t get any studio to release Wandering On, so there won’t be any film. Barry’s destruction isn’t up to me. It’s up to you.”

  • • •

  The rest of the week Maxim stayed at the château to help Barry pare down his overblown treatment. The cousins argued day, night and over meals. At Le Nègre, the two-star restaurant in Tours, the cousins disagreed about a scene so virulently that they were asked to leave. By Friday they had an outline, and late that afternoon, Maxim departed. Barry celebrated with a vintage Beaujolais. The following morning Alyssia gave her husband a raw egg with Worcestershire sauce, and he retired to the library to begin work on the actual script.