A little while ago I told her she should call Mike at Icon and thank him for his trouble.
“Why?” she asked warily.
“For me,” I said.
Her eyes narrowed. “Why don’t you call him, then?”
“Because I’m not the one who wants to fuck him.”
“Caaady…”
“What’s the big deal? If you like him, why don’t you say so?”
“Because it’s tacky.”
“Oh, and those blind dates of yours aren’t.”
She pouted into her magazine for a moment, then looked up again. “You aren’t writing that, are you?”
“Writing what?”
“About me and Mike.”
“What’s to write? Anyway, it’s none of your business.”
She looked down again.
“I can tell he likes you,” I said. “I could tell it that night. If you let him get away, it’s your own fault.”
“Same to you,” she said.
27
SPEAK OF THE DEVIL. JEFF JUST RETURNED WITH ONE OF THE trashier tabloids, fresh from the checkout counter at Ralph’s, the front cover of which is dominated by a stock shot of Jeremy and Mr. Woods and the headline: MR. WOODS KID TARGET OF UGLY GAY SMEAR. Inside, next to a recent picture of Callum, is the news that “fanatical gay activists” have been circulating “vicious rumors” about the homosexuality of the former child star, but that “megabucks superagent Leonard Lord” had “categorically denied” the truth of those rumors. “Callum Duff is all man,” Leonard was quoted as saying.
Jeff saw me grin when I got to that part. “Can you fucking believe that?”
“He’s too smart to say that,” I said.
“I’m sure he didn’t.”
I asked him if he thought Leonard had called the tabloid or vice versa.
“I don’t think they even talked to each other. This was just the safest way to break the story—as an indignant denial. It lets ’em reaffirm the awfulness of being queer and dish the dirt at the same time. And Leonard can’t do shit about it.”
“Why not?”
“What’s he gonna do? Deny that he denied it?”
I asked him what he thought would happen now.
“Oh…the so-called responsible press will feel sorry for Callum and run lots of items about the special girl in his life, whoever the lucky dyke starlet happens to be, and it’ll all be fine, because there are no queers in Hollywood.” He collapsed into the chair with a sigh and peered into the paper sack he’d brought with him. “Can you be arrested for smuggling jelly doughnuts into a cardiac ward?”
I must admit, I hadn’t thought he’d actually bring them. “Be still, my heart.”
“Yeah, exactly,” he said.
“How many?”
“One,” he said, handing it to me. “And take it slow.”
I nibbled away at what I thought to be a reasonable rate. “What else is in there?”
“Well…Big Ed, for one.”
I laughed. “You’re lying.”
He smiled at me. “No.”
“You nasty thing. What else?”
“Just some magazines. How’s the diary going?”
“OK.” Since this seemed as good a time as any, I added: “I need to ask a favor, Jeff.”
“What?”
“Would you deliver it for me? To Philip Blenheim?”
“The diary?”
“Yeah.”
“When?”
“When I’m finished,” I told him pointedly.
Jeff blinked at me for a moment, absorbing the implications of that. “OK,” he said finally.
“You’ll have to transcribe it first. I don’t want him having the only copy.”
He nodded.
“And don’t edit.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
I smiled at him, and he smiled back.
“Is that it?” he asked.
“That’s it.”
“You aren’t planning to…finish it anytime soon, are you?”
I told him I didn’t know.
28
I’VE BECOME EXHIBIT A AROUND HERE. THERE ARE MORE AND more doctors all the time, a Great Wall of clipboards surrounding the bed. Whether this was provoked by my present condition or my lifelong one, I couldn’t begin to tell you. They smile a lot and take notes and leave, often returning with eager reinforcements in a matter of minutes. Everyone has remarked on this, even Mrs. Haywood, the tight-lipped southern lady in the next cubicle, who can barely contain her resentment over all the attention I’ve received. I’ve been gracious about this so far, but I’m on the verge of telling her to fuck herself.
Renee arrived this morning with Mike Gunderson in tow. She finally worked up the nerve to call him, and they had their first quasi date last night—dinner in the hospital cafeteria. She was so pleased with herself. She looked the way a cat looks when it drops an impressive corpse on its owner’s doorstep. Which is not to say our Mike is even slightly inert. He exudes a vigorous midwestern earnestness that Renee interprets as “a great personality.” I’m keeping my fingers crossed.
Last night, while Renee and Mike were at dinner, Jeff came by and dropped a small bomb on me.
“Don’t get mad,” he began.
“What is it?”
“I know what you told me, but…”
“What, Jeff?”
“Neil is outside.”
“Oh, fuck.”
“He left a note on the door. I had to tell him.”
“Left it where? Here?”
“At the house.”
“What did it say?”
“He just wondered where you were. He’s a great guy, Cadence.”
“You’ve talked to him?”
“Some. Yeah.”
Don’t ask me why, but I immediately got paranoid. The very thought of those two guys getting together to discuss me was supremely unnerving. I had no choice but to bully Jeff with sarcasm. “Have you two been bonding or something?”
“Cadence…”
“You have, haven’t you? That’s cute.”
“Piss off.”
“You’ve been reading to each other from Iron John.”
“Do you want your purse?”
He held it in front of me without waiting for an answer, so I took it from him and began fixing my face.
“You know,” he said, sulking, “that shows how little you know about me.”
“How’s that?”
“Iron John is the last thing I’d read. Fags don’t need that Hairy Man shit. We’ve always been tribal.”
“Who cares? How do I look?”
“Even.”
“Even?”
“The lipstick is on the lips, Cadence. What do you want me to say?”
I stuck out my tongue at him.
“I’ll send him in,” he said.
Neil was in his nice gabardine slacks, looking ominously well shaven and dressed. “Hi.”
“Hi.”
“You look good,” he said.
“Better than you expected?”
He shrugged, smiling.
“You heard about…the caper?”
He nodded.
“Pretty nuts, huh?”
Another nod, another smile.
“That’s why I didn’t tell you,” I said.
“I figured.”
“You’re such a pussy.”
“I know.”
“Well, stop it, then,” I said. “It’s not healthy to be that scared.”
Unfinished business hung in the air like ozone after a thunderstorm.
“I plan to tell them about us,” he said.
“Forget it.”
“No. I want to.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know…but it does.” He sat on the edge of the bed and looked around. “I should’ve brought you flowers. These are nice.”
“I’ve got flowers out th
e ass,” I told him. “Or somebody does. I left a bunch back at my dressing room.”
“I’ll bet you did.” He reached over tentatively and stroked the side of my face. “I brought you something else, though.”
“What?”
“Is this a good time?”
“Well, no,” I said, “now that you mention it, but a week from Thursday might work out.”
“I just wondered about disturbing your roommates.”
“What is it, for God’s sake?”
He smiled and stood up. “I’ll get it.”
He left the room and returned sheepishly a moment later with a bulky wooden four-wheeled object that had to be turned on its side before it would fit through the door. I didn’t realize what it was until he rolled it across the floor and I saw two sturdy little steps jutting out from one side.
“My stage,” I said.
“Or pedestal…whichever you prefer.”
“My stage-pedestal.”
“See…” He knelt next to the thing and fiddled with something at the bottom. “I put a little brake down here that stabilizes it once it’s in place….”
“So I don’t slalom into the audience during the big finale.”
He laughed. “Exactly.”
“Good thinking.”
Curiosity, I noticed, had gotten the best of Mrs. Haywood, who was leaning so far out of her bed she looked as if she’d hit the floor any second. “It’s a pedestal,” I yelled.
“For what?” she called back.
“For me.”
“Oh.”
“She hates me,” I told Neil under my breath. “She was the star here until I arrived.”
29
NEIL STAYED AS LONG AS THEY’D LET HIM, THEN TOOK MY pedestal home with him, since the nurses kept tripping over it. I dreamed about it last night, though, dreamed that it was still here, next to the bed, keeping me company while I slept. I woke to the sound of it—or dreamed that I woke—just before dawn, recognizing the whir of those tiny wheels across the linoleum. I opened an eye and waited, perfectly still. The dark plywood mass was next to me, moving slowly toward the foot of the bed like a giant tortoise. Nobody was visible from here, so whoever—or whatever—propelled it was most certainly under the bed.
I sat up. The pedestal stopped in its tracks, playing dead. I almost giggled, since it reminded me of one of those movies where an intruder poses as a statue to keep from being seen. Nobody here but us pedestals. I cocked my head and listened, hearing only a distant, tinny siren and a blubbery snore from another bed, probably Mrs. Haywood’s. It was still dark in the room, but the big windows had begun to turn a pale and pearly blue. I lay still for a while, mimicking sleep, and soon enough the pedestal began to move again. After a moment or two, some part of it (those steps, I presume) struck the leg of the bed with a rude bonk, provoking its hijacker to emit a small, exasperated groan.
I knew who it was before he came out. I caught a whiff of wet loam and wood smoke and stale sweat, with something sharply herbal at the core. It was odd to recognize him from the smell alone, because I’d never used that sense on him before. Like everyone else who claims to know him well, I’ve always been limited to what I could see and hear. The smell was right for him, I realized, and it somehow put me at ease. I stayed calm even when he abandoned his efforts at stealth and climbed onto the pedestal to grin at me.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I asked in a stern whisper.
He pointed to the pedestal, then to the door.
“No way,” I said. “It stays.”
He shook his head.
“I’m calling the nurse.”
This only made him cackle ecstatically. I gazed around to see if he’d woken any of the other patients, but the place was quiet. He climbed down from the pedestal, using those funny little steps of Neil’s, then sprang up onto the bed with enviable agility. I pulled the covers up under my chin and tried to stare him down, getting an eyeful in the process.
He seemed several centuries older in real life. What made him so authentic was not so much those familiar Earth-blue eyes as the specks of crud encrusted in their corners. I could see liver spots at this distance, and the genuine crepiness of the skin on his neck. When he smiled, I saw a broken tooth, yellow as antique scrimshaw; when he turned his head for a moment, I glimpsed a blackhead in the folds of his pointy ear. Every new imperfection just made him more like the real thing.
I remember thinking: This is incredible. What will Philip come up with next?
He just sat there for a moment, legs crossed, hands folded in his lap, letting me take him in.
“You’re early,” I said.
He widened his eyes and shrugged, then dug into the pocket of his tattered tweed trousers and produced a tarnished gold watch—obviously broken—which he consulted with grave ceremony, tapping its face and nodding, as if it explained everything.
THE DIRECTOR’S LETTER
Dear Di,
Gee, it was terrific to see you at the tribute last week. You and Roger both looked great, and it was good to hear the new screenplay is coming along so well. Tell Marty he’s a fool if he doesn’t shoot the third act as written.
The enclosed notebooks are sent to you in strictest confidence for reasons you’ll understand as soon as you read them. They’re the diaries of Cady Roth, the dwarf we hired for the additional movement sequences in Mr. Woods. Remember? They were delivered to me, at her instruction, by one Jeff Kassabian, who turned up here several days ago in a T-shirt that depicted Clark Kent and Dick Tracy kissing each other. (All will be explained in the manuscript.) Cady’s very ill—in a coma at a hospital in the Valley—if she hasn’t already passed away.
Bear with me. I’m sending you this because I value your opinion more than any other and because your own brilliant mythology looms large in the story that (I hope) you’re about to read. I could be way off the deep end here, but I think this material could be the basis for an important film. That may surprise you when you read it, since I’m cast as kind of a heavy, but I’m sure you’ll understand my excitement over the chance to reflect ironically on the ramifications of my own work—of our work. This could be a “small film” that would stand as a wise and elegant companion piece to a mainstream classic without detracting from it in any way. No director in my memory has ever done this, so I’d like to be the first to try. Of course, certain elements of the story would have to be altered for legal and dramatic purposes, but the central idea is extremely appealing to me. See what you think, anyway. Look at this as raw material and go from there. You’re obviously the only one to write the movie.
Lucy would want me to send you her love.
Philip
THE SCREENWRITER’S REPLY
Dear Philip,
I actually woke this morning thinking about those diaries, so I guess it’s time I told you I think you’re onto something big. The idea of this tiny, ambitious, infuriating, lovable woman who is both enslaved and ennobled by an icon of popular culture is one that seems completely fresh to me. At the same time, it’s old-fashioned and highly moral in the best sort of Dickensian way. There is, as well, a liberal feminist subtext that suits me to a T, as you no doubt recognized when you sent it to me.
I presume you’ll want to fictionalize the story, so we’re dealing more in terms of a modern parable than a docudrama. This would give us the freedom to play and explore our themes more fully without the attendant legal hassles. (It’s fascinating to consider what Mr. Woods might become in this new version. An interplanetary creature? A troll who lives under a bridge?) In any event, the fact that you’re holding a mirror to your own life’s work, much as Fellini did in 8 1/2, won’t be lost on anyone in the critical establishment.
The trick will be to keep our heroine fully human, to position the audience at her level, on her side through it all, without resorting heavily to low-level camera angles. (Not that you would, my love.) I hardly need tell you that such an off-the-wall character, particularly a centr
al one, has to be set amid familiar and reassuring points of reference, so that the audience will accept her into their hearts with the same matter-of-factness with which Jeremy accepted Mr. Woods. To this end, here are a few thoughts:
How wed are we to Cady’s romantic life? The sex scenes made me extremely uncomfortable, and I can assure you I won’t be the only woman who’ll feel that way, however priggish that makes me sound. It seems to me the real relationship in the diaries is between Cady and Renee, two women held hostage by their own bodies for entirely different reasons. That’s where the crux of the drama lies, that’s what we should build on. If I were God here, the central romantic relationship would be between Renee and Neil. I felt there was potential for that all along, and I would find it far more intriguing (and moving, ultimately) if Cady were acting as a sort of witty mediator between the full-sized lovers. We don’t want to know who she fucks. We really don’t.
The interracial component is interesting but risky, only because it could make the film issue-heavy and dissipate its ultimate effectiveness. There’s a fine line, I believe, between breaking ground and digging a pit. We have enough obstacles as it is. Besides, if Renee is to be our love interest, I doubt seriously she’d end up with a black boyfriend; it just doesn’t fit the character, airhead Valley Girl that she is. We already know that she sees herself as Melanie Griffith, so why not go with that and find her a Don Johnson? Or a Richard Gere? Or a Jeff Bridges? He could still be Cady’s accompanist, and we’d avoid the potentially offensive stereotype of the black piano player. Or maybe the boyfriend could be that technician. What do you think?