Part 21 (1/2)

By now, I'd reached the front door. Lewis was still standing there. I think he'd been there the whole time, listening. I was still mad at him for not telling me the truth, but it was hard to blame him. He'd been in an impossible position.

I nodded at him, and he nodded back.

In the hallway behind me, Mr. Brander said, ”Don't you dare open the door! I mean it, if you leave now, you'll regret it!”

I opened the door, and I left, closing the door behind me.

It was after dark by the time I got back to the apartment. As soon as I opened the door, Kevin said, ”What happened?” It was like I could see the groove in the floor where he'd been pacing back and forth.

”It's over,” I said. ”Evan was right. Mr. Brander's crazy.” I briefly told him what I'd learned.

”Oh, man,” Kevin said. ”I'm so sorry.”

”But.”

”But what?”

”Well, you told me so all along. Right? You were right and I was wrong.”

”You think I'm happy I was right?”

”I don't know,” I said. ”Are you?”

”You're not being fair.”

I wasn't being fair. In fact, I was being kind of a d.i.c.k. But I couldn't help it. Los Angeles had been testing the h.e.l.l out of me lately: not just that moment with Otto in his bedroom, and having Daniel try to seduce Kevin and me, but also the traffic, the smog, the noise, all the att.i.tude from other people. I'd pa.s.sed those tests (more or less).

This was different. It was one thing constantly being surrounded by the desperation of other people - of Otto, Gina, Regina, Daniel, Declan McConnell, and even Cole Gordon and Mr. Brander - to feel their dark emotion coating me like crude oil. It was another thing to realize that I'd been just as desperate as they were, even if I hadn't quite known it yet. And it was another thing still to realize that I was right to feel so desperate, that the things I thought were real weren't. I'd joked with Otto that first week that I was going to go barefoot in Los Angeles, but in a way, it had been true. And it wasn't just broken gla.s.s I was walking across. It was something even more painful. Yup, it was broken dreams - everyone else's and my own.

But so what? Bad things happened all the time in this town. I'd told Kevin that Los Angeles was the big-time, and it was, so what the h.e.l.l am I moaning on about? All I can say is at that moment in time, I'd had all the desperation I could take. I said once before that I felt like an inflatable Santa slowly leaking air. Well, now I was completely deflated, an empty vinyl skin lying on the floor. I wasn't sure how I was even able to talk, but I was.

”You have no idea how hard this whole thing has been on me,” I said to Kevin. ”Writing movies is my dream.”

”How hard it's been on you?” Kevin said. ”Did it ever occur to you this has been hard on me too? In case you forgot, I had an actual career before coming to this town. I wasn't just a d.a.m.n interview transcriptionist.”

I had forgotten that. Kevin hadn't talked much about his new job. Maybe it was like how I hadn't wanted to talk about the movie project around him, how I was always worried what he'd think. He probably hadn't wanted to make me feel guilty, since coming to Los Angeles had been my idea in the first place.

Even so, I couldn't seem to stop arguing with him.

”It's not the same thing,” I said. ”That's just your job.”

”And writing movies is some higher calling?” Kevin said. ”Is that it?”

”That's not what I meant. I just meant this is a real disappointment for me, okay? Can you not let me feel bad about this for one single day?”

”Who said you can't feel bad?”

”You've just been expecting it,” I said. ”Right from the very beginning, you thought this movie was never going to happen.”

”And that makes it my fault?”

”It's not your fault. It just doesn't feel very supportive.”

”Supportive? You know how you just mentioned that I have an actual job? Can I point out that I'm the only one here who does?”

It went on like this for a bit, and I still couldn't seem to stop myself from saying things I knew I'd regret, and not saying all the things I knew I should. Why was I taking it out on Kevin? I didn't know, but somehow it was like a scene from a movie, the screenplay locked, and there couldn't be any deviations from the script.

Finally, Kevin said, ”Just tell me one thing.”

”What?” I said, impatient.

”Exactly how much are you willing to sacrifice to make it in this town?”

”What?” I said again.

”If you had to choose between me and making it as a screenwriter, which would you pick?” Now he was the impatient one.

What was I supposed to say? Kevin's question seemed totally unfair.

So I said, ”I can't deal with this right now.”

And then I went to bed.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

I was floating facedown in a swimming pool, completely motionless, dead to the world.

It was the next day, Sunday morning.

I know this is how this story started - with me floating in that pool the same way. But that had actually been pretty different. Back then, I'd been floating in that pool because I'd been so dead-tired from the move to Los Angeles.

Now I really did feel dead.

I'd never felt this way before. All my life, I'd heard people say, ”I feel dead inside,” but I hadn't known what they meant, not really. Now I did. It was different from having a black hole in your stomach or even feeling like a deflated Santa. It was like I didn't feel anything - like I didn't exist, like I wasn't even a person.

Like I was a ghost.

I'd woken that morning to find an email from Fiona. She'd finally gotten back to me: I've read your scripts. I'm afraid I'm not the right agent for you. Good luck. Fiona She hadn't said anything about Mr. Brander, but I figured she'd heard from him. He'd probably sent her an angry email the day before, or maybe made a furious phone call. Now Fiona, who had been stringing me along for months, knew there was absolutely no chance of the deal with Mr. Brander ever going forward, so she was cutting her losses.

I could not believe it. She hadn't even waited until Monday. That's Hollywood efficiency for you.

Kevin and I hadn't slept together the night before, not after our fight. He'd slept on the couch in the front room. That morning, before I could even tell him about that email from Fiona, he told me he was going to stay in Long Beach with his old college roommate for a day or two, that he needed some time to think.

I hadn't stopped him. I knew it had to do with our argument, and the question he'd asked me the night before, about my picking between him and screenwriting. But even if I had started the fight, that hadn't been a fair question, so I still hadn't answered it. Right then, he was up in the apartment packing up his computer, getting ready to go.

That was fine. I needed time to think too, or maybe just to see if I'd ever feel anything again.