“Why weren’t you watching her?” Martin demanded. “This isn’t my fault.”
Miranda launched herself at Martin, grabbed her, and slammed her against a wall. “I want you to do two things,” she said to the cowering Martin. “First, shut the hell up. Second. I want you to get on the phone, call 911, and get an ambulance here, now. Do it, or I swear to you, I’ll rip out your fucking heart. Do it. Now.”
She let Martin go. Martin goggled at her for a second, then grabbed the phone and called 911. Miranda got back down on the floor and kept up the mouth-to-mouth for another ten minutes, until the paramedics arrived and pulled her off.
What we didn’t know is what happened between the time Miranda left and when she came back. The most logical sequence of events has Michelle, claustrophobic, getting up from the chair in a blind panic, accidentally running into the shelves, being knocked unconscious from the falling debris, and then suffocating when the latex covered her nostrils. It was the scenario that the Pomona police, in examining the scene and questioning both Miranda and Judy Martin, latched onto and were going forward with.
There was one small problem. Miranda said that she didn’t recall seeing the breathing straws around Michelle when she was giving her mouth-to-mouth. This might mean nothing, of course: when you’re busily trying to save someone’s life, you’re not going to take the time to notice all the minutiae around you. But it might also mean that the breathing straws came out earlier. And that opened up other possibilities.
For Miranda, who had to be physically restrained by the paramedics from killing Judy Martin, the answer was simple: Martin’s slipshod preparation had allowed the breathing straws to fall out. Michelle, frantic, reached for them, got up to get help, collided with the shelves, and got brained. I also thought Miranda may have suspected Martin of pulling the straws herself, as misplaced revenge against her estranged husband’s favorite actress, but that was a little far-fetched for me.
My own suspicions were also far-fetched, but not nearly enough for my own comfort: I thought that Michelle, in her depressed state, might have pulled the straws herself, in a melodramatic and not-too-well-thought-out suicide attempt. Either she expected Miranda to come back and panicked when Miranda didn’t arrive on cue, or she was sincere, and halfway through realized that suffocation was a nasty way to go. Either way, that’s when she got up out of the chair.
And that’s when I think her autosuggestion kicked in, knocking her out just in time to crash into the shelves. The only good thing I could possibly see out of this scenario was that she was already out of it when she was hit by the can of latex. She would have felt no pain.
No matter how you sliced it, however, Michelle was lying in a hospital bed, respirator down her throat.
I arrived over an hour after Miranda called; when I announced on the set that I had to take Joshua with me, I had to deal with both threats and begging on the part of the crew. I told them if they could do the scene in exactly five minutes, I would wait. In the meantime, I called Carl’s office and told Marcella to have him call me as soon as possible. After that, there was no one else to call; Michelle had been an only child, and both her parents were dead. She wasn’t married. As far as I knew, I was the person on the planet closest to her. At that moment, that struck me as the saddest thing I’d ever heard.
Joshua pegged the scene in one take, and immediately bounded towards my Honda; we screeched off without a good-bye and raced to the 210, got to the 10 by way of the 605, and then sat in evening rush hour traffic for forty-five minutes. Carl called; I filled him in on the situation, and he said he’d make some phone calls. I had no idea what that meant, but it made me feel better. I eventually got off the 10 and made it to the Pomona Valley Hospital on surface streets, quicker than if I had stayed on the freeway.
I understood the power of Carl’s phone calls when I saw a man in a suit looking for me in the emergency area.
“Tom Stein?” he said.
“Yes,” I said.
“I’m Mike Mizuhara,” he said, extending his hand. I shook it. “Chief of staff for Pomona Valley.”
“Where is Michelle?” I asked.
“She’s in ICU right now; I’ll take you to her immediately. But we have to do something with your dog,” he pointed to Joshua.
“What? Oh. I’m sorry,” I said. “I almost forgot he was with me.”
“No problem,” Mizuhara said. “Why don’t we take him to my office? He can wait there.” We headed toward his office.
“Has the press arrived yet?” I asked. I had been surprised not to see any reporters in the emergency room; news of these sorts of things usually got around quickly.
“No press so far,” Mizuhara said. “The paramedics didn’t know who it was because she had a whole bunch of stuff … latex? … all over her face when she came in. The doctors working on her either didn’t recognize her or didn’t care who she was when they got all of it off her. Then I got a call from Carl about it. We’ve got her registered under Jane Doe at the moment. She arrived just after a shift change. The next shift change is at 2 a.m. With any luck, we should be able to keep this quiet until morning. By that time, our press folks will be ready. Carl also wanted me to let you know he’s on his way himself as soon as he can. He’s asked us to clear a space for his helicopter in our parking lot.”
“Carl is amazing,” I said.
“Sure is,” Mizuhara said. “But then, I owe him one. He gave my son a job at Century Pictures just before he left. Now my son is vice-president in charge of development. I never thought he’d ever get a job. Carl can use me any time. Here’s the office,” he opened the door.
I walked Joshua inside; Joshua gave me a significant look that I knew meant that he had something to say to me. I asked Mizuhara to give me a minute to reassure my dog and then bent down.
“What?” I said.
“Try to get me in to see Michelle at some point,” Joshua said. “I can scan her if you want. Find out what really happened, at least.”
“Thanks, Joshua,” I said, and got up to go.
“Will he be okay in there?” Mizuhara asked.
“Sure,” I said. “Don’t worry. He’s house-trained. Let’s go see Michelle.”
Michelle was on the third floor, in a private room in ICU. Miranda was waiting in the hallway; she rushed to me when she saw me coming.
“Oh, Tom,” she said. “I’m so sorry. This is my fault. I’m sorry.”
“Shhh,” I said. “It’s not anyone’s fault. It’s alright.”
“Actually, Miss Escalon saved her life,” Mizuhara said. “From what I understand, her mouth-to-mouth kept Miss Beck alive until the paramedics got there.”
“Hear that?” I said, to Miranda. “You’re a lifesaver for sure. I think that deserves another raise, don’t you?”
Miranda gave a little laugh and then started crying again. I hugged her.
I spent a few minutes with Miranda, getting her version of events, and then went with Mizuhara to see Michelle. She was the only patient in a semi-private room with three beds. Her head was bandaged; the sounds in the room were of a heart monitor and the sound of a respirator inflating and deflating. It was a terrible thing.
The door opened and a tall man in a lab coat came through.
“Tom, this is Dr. Paul Adams,” Mizuhara said. “He’s the one that worked on Michelle.”
We shook hands. “How is she?” I asked.
“She’s not good,” Adams said. “We don’t know how long she was without oxygen, but we think she went right up to the limit—five or six minutes. Her heart activity is fine, but we haven’t been able to get her to breathe on her own. Her brain activity is very low; I think it’s very likely she’s probably suffered some permanent brain damage. She’s in a comatose state now. I think we can expect her to come out of it at some point, and then we can judge the extent of her brain injuries.”
“‘At some point,’” I said. “What does that mean?”
“Hard to say,” Ada
ms said. “She could come out of it later today, or it could be weeks. It just depends. The concussion she got,” he pointed to the bandage, “doesn’t help any, although it’s actually the least of her problems; it was fairly superficial. In and of itself, it would have knocked her out, but she would have come out of it with nothing more than a bump and maybe some stitches. It was the lack of oxygen to the brain that’s the real problem. If you don’t mind me asking, what the hell was she doing with latex all over her face?”
“They were making a mask of her face for a movie,” I said.
“So that’s how they do it,” Adams said. “Well, I’m no expert on these things, but I think they might want to find another way to do it from here on out. That mask of hers just about killed her.”
“Dr. Adams,” I said. “This may be offensive, but I hope you won’t be going to the press with any of this.”
“You’re right, it is offensive,” Adams said. “But I understand your concern. The staff that worked with me all understand that it’s more important for Miss Beck to recover than it is to be shown on Inside Edition with a tube down her throat.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“Of course,” Adams said, and looked back at Michelle. “Don’t expect too much from her over the next couple of days,” he said. “But if you can, talk to her. Let her hear familiar voices. That helps as often as not. If she has any family, you should contact them and see if they can come as well.”
“I’m afraid she has no family,” I said. “Although she has a dog. Would it be okay to bring him in to see her?”
“I’d really rather not,” Adams said. “It’s a question of hygiene. Also of state law. Unless it’s a guide dog, of course.” We shook hands again and he departed.
“I have to join Dr. Adams,” Mizuhara said. “Carl should be arriving any minute now and we want to be there to meet him.” We shook hands as well, and he left.
I stayed in the room, staring at Michelle. Miranda was in the hall, feeling guilty about Michelle’s situation, but if anyone had to shoulder the blame, I felt it should be me. If I had gone with her rather than Miranda, this might not have happened. Michelle and I would be on our way to Mondo Chicken, her to sulk in her oriental chicken salad, and me doing my best to cheer her up. It occurred to me that if no one was closer to Michelle than me, than the reverse was also probably true as well. I couldn’t think of anyone I was closer to than her. Except possibly Miranda, who I had managed to drag into this mess as well.
I sighed to myself, and rested my head back against the wall. I had really managed to screw this one up.
After a few minutes, there was a knock on the door. Miranda poked her head through. “Carl is here,” she said.
I went out to see Carl, Mizuhara and Adams chatting about something or other. Carl turned to me when he saw me. “Tom,” he said, shaking my shoulder. “I’m terribly sorry. But you did right to call me. Mike and I go back a ways.”
“So I heard,” I said. “Los Angeles really is a small town.”
“Yes it is,” Carl said. “Tom, Mike and I were trying to decide what we should do next. My first inclination is to move Michelle closer, perhaps to Cedars, but Mike and Dr. Adams think she’s best off here.”
“If it’s a question of the quality of care …” Dr. Adams began.
“No, not at all,” Carl said. “But in the next twenty-four hours you’re going to be dealing with things you’ve never had to deal with before. Photographers posing as maintenance workers and nurses. Fan vigils. Reporters trying to interview everyone down to the cafeteria staff. It’s a mess.”
“We’ve managed to keep the lid on it so far,” Mizuhara said. “And I think Dr. Adams will agree with me when I say that the best thing for the patient is continuity of care. Additionally, I’m not comfortable with moving her now. She’s stable at the moment but she’s certainly not out of the woods.”
“We’d probably cause more of a commotion moving her than just keeping her here, anyway,” Adams said.
“Tom?” Carl said. “What do you want to do?”
“I don’t think I’m really qualified to answer that,” I said.
All three of them stared at me for a minute. I suddenly became very uncomfortable.
“What?” I asked.
“You don’t know, do you?” Carl said.
“Know what?” I said, looking at Carl, then Adams, and then Mizuhara.
“Tom, we had her insurance send over her information,” Mizuhara said. “Discreetly, of course; I handled the request myself. Most people have someone listed who has the right to make medical decisions for them if they are unable to make the decisions themselves. Usually it’s a relative or spouse or a longtime companion.”
“Sure,” I said. I’d filled out insurance forms in my own time; if anything ever happened to me, my mother would have to decide whether to unplug me or not.
“Well, Miss Beck doesn’t have any of those,” Mizuhara said.
“All right,” I said. “So?”
“Tom,” Carl said. “The person who Michelle authorized to make medical decisions for her is you.”
I found a chair and sat down.
“You really didn’t know?” Adams asked.
I shook my head. “No. No, I didn’t.”
“I’m sorry,” Adams said. “It’s a hard job to have.”
“Tom,” Carl said, again. “What do you want to do?”
I covered my face with my hands and just sat there for a few minutes, awash in guilt and grief. I felt my actions had put Michelle here to begin with; now I was being asked to make decisions that could affect the rest of her life. I was going to need a really good cry when this was all over.
But not right now. I put my hands down in my lap.
“We’ll keep her here,” I said.
Now if I could just figure the rest of it out.
CHAPTER Fifteen
The leak, of course, was as impossible to track as it was inevitable to occur. Sometime after the 2 a.m. shift change, one of the janitors or nurses or doctors hit the phones, waking up friends and relatives because, after all, how often does the hottest female star in the United States come into your hospital in a coma? At 3:35 in the morning, one of these friends or relatives called KOST-FM and requested to hear “Your Eyes Tell Me,” the hit theme song from Summertime Blues, because she heard Michelle Beck had died. After the song played, another listener called in to say no, she wasn’t dead, but she was in a coma, and she had heard that Michelle’s corneas were slated to be given to Marlee Matlin, who was, after all, deaf.
KOST happened to be the favorite morning radio station of Curt McLachlan, KABC’s morning news director, who was, at 3:35, getting into his car to head to work. The first thing he did was switch off “Your Eyes Tell Me,” because it was, by any objective standard, the single worst pop song of the decade. The second thing he did was get on the car phone with his counterpart at Good Morning America, which, at 6:37 Eastern Time, was just a few minutes away from air. GMA’s news director screamed at the video morgue to pull up clips of Michelle, and at some poor, groggy intern, nineteen years old and two days into her stint of slave labor, to ready a blurb for the hosts to announce on the air. Once McLachlan got off the phone with Good Morning America, he called his own assignment editor out of a sound sleep and told him to get working on a package. He flipped on the radio just in time to hear about the corneas going to Marlee Matlin. This prompted another round of phone calls.
News of Michelle’s death and/or coma hit the airwaves at 7:03 Eastern, 4:03 Pacific. The folks at GMA had the presence of mind to stress that the report was from unconfirmed “radio sources.” It hardly mattered. Newspaper and magazine entertainment editors up and down the Eastern seaboard of the United States leapt from their breakfasts and called reporters at home, hollering their demand for verification. It was the biggest potential young star death since Heath Ledger slept his life away.
My phone first rang at 4:13 a.m. It was the gossip columnis
t from the New York Daily News, looking for verification. I hung up on her and disconnected my phone. Less than a minute later, my cell phone rang. I turned it off and then realized my other cell phone was lost in the woods where Joshua had left it. I reconnected my home phone, which immediately started ringing; I picked up the receiver, dropped it back in the cradle, and then picked up again almost instantly, before it had a chance to ring again. I called Miranda, apologized to her for waking her up, and told her to meet me in the office. Then I called Carl, who, as it happened, was already up and on the phone.
“I have The New York Times on call-waiting, Tom,” he said. “They said they couldn’t reach you directly.”
“I disconnected my phone,” I said. My own call-waiting was going off like mad, making the phone sound like a Geiger counter.
“Good man,” Carl said. “These guys are nothing but a pain in the ass. I’m fending them off for now. What do you want to do?”
“I was going to ask you that same question,” I said.
“Right now, we don’t do anything,” Carl said. “I’ve got to call Mike and make sure they’re ready for the onslaught—it’s going to hit earlier than we expected. You’ll need to make a statement, though; let’s schedule it for noon and have no comments from anyone until then. Are you planning to go into the office right now?”
“I was, yes,” I said.
“Don’t. The fact that you’re in the office at four-thirty in the morning will only verify the situation. Get in at your usual time. And be ready for the reporters. See you at eight, Tom,” Carl said, and then hung up, presumably to yell at the reporter that had the temerity to wake him up at home. I called Miranda as she was getting out the door; she sounded grateful for the reprieve.
At Pomona Valley, Carl’s promised onslaught had already begun. The hospital switchboard was lighting up with calls from reporters who were calling every Los Angeles–area hospital trying to find the one that was treating Michelle. This was followed by calls from fans looking for the same thing. These in turn were followed by both fans and reporters who had found out that Pomona Valley was in fact the hospital they wanted; the reporters were invoking the First Amendment, and the fans their right to know about their favorite star. These were followed by fans and reporters posing as family members. As Michelle had no living family, this didn’t get them very far.