by Lee Goldberg
An exotic Chinese city balanced on the craggy precipice between past and future . . . its gleaming towers rising above Victoria Harbor, casting an otherworldly neon glow over a rats-warren of back alleys that haven’t changed in centuries. We PAN DOWN to one of those alleys, through a tangle of neon signs in Chinese letters fighting for space above the streets, until we find a tiny restaurant no tourist has ever visited.
INT. RESTAURANT — NIGHT
It’s smoky, dark, more like a bar than a restaurant. Straker is the only customer. The waitress is EVE CHAN. She is young, unbelievably beautiful, and moves with the grace of a ballet dancer. She brings him an array of exotic dishes—including Drunken Shrimp (a bowl of live shrimp swimming in alcohol) and Dead Alive Fish (a twitching fish that’s deep fried except for the head, so it’s essentially dying on the plate)—and three different red sauces. Straker speaks to her in flawless Cantonese . . . but here’s what we’ll see in the subtitles:
STRAKER
I’ve been looking forward to this. It’s been way too long since I’ve eaten anything that’s still alive.
EVE
I don’t know many white men with a taste for Zui Xia and Ying Yang Yu.
STRAKER
I also like Cap’n Crunch with Crunch Berries.
Straker uses a pair of CHOPSTICKS to catch a squirming shrimp, dip it in red sauce, and put it in his mouth. That’s when THREE TRIAD KILLERS dressed IN BLACK come into the restaurant. They are each carrying nunchucks and exuding pure menace. KILLER #1 stays at the door while the other two approach Straker. Eve moves as far away as she can get. But Straker continues casually eating his plate of squirming shrimp, paying no attention to the killers. The one at the door speaks in English.
KILLER #1
You’ve disrespected the Wo Li Wo triad for the last time, Straker.
STRAKER
I’d like to eat my dinner before it dies. Wait for me outside and you can frighten me when I’m done.
KILLER #1
You will die before your meal does.
STRAKER
You’re going to need more men.
KILLER #1
There are three of us and one of you.
STRAKER
You’re still outnumbered.
Straker flings a dish of HOT SAUCE into the face of KILLER #2, who screams in pain and reaches for his eyes, dropping his nunchuck, which Straker catches. Straker whacks KILLER #2 across the knees with the nunchuck, knocking him to the ground, then sets the weapon on the table. KILLER #3 comes at him, nunchuck flying. Straker ducks and stabs KILLER #3 in the leg with a chopstick. KILLER #3 instinctively grabs for the chopstick, dropping the nunchuck, which Straker catches just as KILLER #2 comes at him again. He whips KILLER #2 in the face with the nunchuck, then whirls around and whips KILLER #3 in the face, too. Straker sets the weapon on the table as both men squirm on the floor. Our hero hasn’t moved from his seat or disturbed his plate. He calmly reaches for a fresh set of chopsticks and looks at KILLER #1, who is stunned.
STRAKER (CONT’D)
Can I finish my dinner now?
KILLER #1
We’ll be back.
STRAKER
I’ll be here, shaking in terror.
Killer #1 walks out. Straker returns to his meal as the two other killers struggle to their feet and stagger out of the place. Eve returns to his side with a fresh bowl of hot sauce. She is TREMBLING. He takes her hand. He speaks to her in Cantonese:
STRAKER (CONT’D)
You don’t need to be afraid.
She answers in English.
EVE
It’s not fear.
STRAKER
Then what is it?
EVE
Desire. I’m yours tonight . . . if you want me.
He smiles.
STRAKER
In that case, I won’t be needing the dessert menu.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Oakwood Apartments, Universal City, California. June 25. 11:00 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time.
What a piece of shit.
Ian Ludlow set the Straker script down on his lap, unable to endure another word, and looked around the pool. Nearly every chaise lounge at the Oakwood Apartments was occupied by someone reading a screenplay just like he’d been doing until only a moment ago.
The people with vaguely recognizable faces were actors, put up in a furnished apartment by one of the nearby movie studios while guest-starring on a TV show or playing a small part in a film. The rest of the good-looking people were aspiring actors, striking poses with their perfect bodies to attract any nearby directors or producers, who were the comparatively unattractive people, the ones with the pale, flabby bodies and roving eyes.
And then there was Ian.
“It can’t be that bad,” a woman said.
The remark came from a chaise lounge a few feet to Ian’s left, where a twentysomething unnatural blonde in a string bikini was pretending to read a script. Her performance would have been more convincing if her script wasn’t from a TV series that had been canceled two years ago.
“What can’t be?” Ian asked.
“The script you’re reading.”
“Why do you assume it’s bad?”
“The expression on your face,” the blonde said. “You look like you just gave a hobbit a hand job. See, you’re making that face again.”
“You painted a vivid picture,” Ian said.
“It’s one of the visualization techniques I use to summon my emotions in a scene. Now you know my secrets and can be an actor, too.”
“What makes you think that I’m not an actor?”
Ian knew it was the T-shirt and board shorts that he was wearing to hide his never-been-to-a-gym-since-high-school, it’s-so-great-that-McDonald’s-is-finally-serving-breakfast-all-day, damn-it-the-dry-cleaner-has-shrunk-another-one-of-my-polo-shirts body that gave him away. But he didn’t know what else to say. If he were writing this scene instead of living it, he’d have no problem coming up with a witty one-liner.
She smiled. “You strike me as a behind-the-camera type.”
“Guilty as charged.”
“Are you a director?”
“Nope,” he said.
“Producer?”
“Nope.”
“Writer?” She said it warily and moved ever so slightly away from him, as if he might be contagious. That was because writers didn’t have the power to hire anybody. In fact, writers were interchangeable and frequently discarded. The seven writing credits on the cover page of his Straker script were proof of that.
“Yes and no.” He pointed to the line on the title page that read Based on the novel by Ian Ludlow. “I wrote the book that this script is based on, though they’ve made some big changes that I’m not wild about.”
Now she looked like the one who’d given a hand job to a hobbit. “You’re a writer?”
“A New York Times bestselling author.”
“How nice for you,” she said, deeply unimpressed. And with that she went back to pretending to read her script.
Ian wasn’t surprised. He was used to the rejection. He’d heard that it was impossible for a healthy, single man not to get laid every night while living at the Oakwood. It was a big reason why he’d moved here nearly a year ago while waiting for his Malibu house, blown up in a gas explosion, to be rebuilt. But at least he could take some pride in achieving the impossible.
Ian got up, tucked the script under his arm, and headed back to his apartment to face the blank screen. He had a book to write. Reading the Straker script had been a pathetic attempt at procrastination.
He was nearly at his door when he was jolted to a stop by an unexpected sight. There was a homeless woman sitting on his doorstep and leaning against an enormous backpack, the kind that people carried to trek through Yosemite and not the concrete canyons of Los Angeles. It wasn’t until the woman looked up at him that he realized it was Margo French.
“You didn’t have a chance with that actress,”
she said.
“You saw that?” Ian asked as he approached her.
“I wish I could unsee it. It was cringe inducing. I’d have better luck with her than you.”
“I don’t think she’s gay.”
“You never know. From what I’ve heard, it’s very trendy now for actresses to be ‘sexually fluid.’”
Ian stood a few feet away from her so he wouldn’t be looking down at her like a judgmental parent. “Did you hike all the way down here from Seattle to find out?”
“I took the bus and hiked from the Greyhound station in North Hollywood.”
Ian was shocked by the news. Nobody walks in LA.
“That’s ten miles away! You should have called me to pick you up or taken an Uber.”
“I don’t have your number and I can’t afford an Uber,” she said. “I spent my last dollar on the bus fare. Are you going to let me in?”
“Yes, of course, come in.” Ian held his hand out to her, helped her to her feet, and then unlocked his door, opening it wide so she and her backpack could pass in front of him.
She stepped in and took stock of the place. The only furnishings that weren’t bland rental pieces from what could have been called “the American Motel Collection” were two white dry-erase boards, propped up on chairs and covered with handwritten plot points for Ian’s next Straker novel. The kitchen table was cluttered with cereal boxes and bags of potato chips.
“Geez, this is depressing,” Margo said. “And I say that as someone who is homeless.”
“You aren’t really homeless.”
“Yes, I am. I’m carrying my home on my back,” she said, shrugging off her heavy backpack onto the floor.
He stared at the backpack, trying to make sense of what she was saying. “How can that be? The last time I saw you in Seattle, you told me you’d given up being a book escort and dog walker and that you were writing songs and performing.”
“I lied. I can’t write songs. I can’t hold a job.”
“Why not?”
She shifted her gaze, looking anywhere but at him. Her gaze fell on the cereal boxes on the table and she began browsing through them like books.
“Because I’m terrified all the time. The fear paralyzes me. Nobody understands what I’m going through and I can’t explain it to them. I’ve used up my savings and lost my apartment.” Margo stopped sorting through the boxes and looked at him. “I need a place to live.”
“You want to live with me?” he asked, incredulous.
“I’ve got nowhere else to go.”
“How about back to your parents in Walla Walla?”
“They haven’t accepted that I’m gay. Do you really expect them to understand I have PTSD from being chased by the assassins who crashed a plane into Waikiki? They’d have me committed.”
She had a point, but staying with him wouldn’t solve her problems and would only create them for him.
“You need professional help,” he said.
“Maybe I do. But who can I talk to who is going to believe my story? You’re the only one who knows the truth.” She looked right into his eyes this time and he saw her anger. “Because it’s all your fault.”
“That’s not fair. I was a victim. I thought I was helping our country, not domestic terrorists. They tried to kill me, remember? They blew up my house with me in it. If anyone should be crippled with terror, it’s me.”
“Do you expect me to feel sorry for you? You got another book out of it and a million bucks. What did I get?”
He got a $250,000 advance but he wasn’t foolish enough to correct her because she’d made her point. She got nothing. Was a check what she was really after? If so, he’d gladly write her one.
“Do you want money?”
“No, you idiot. I want a place to stay where I can feel safe,” she said, and her anger seemed to lose its wind. “At least until I can get my shit together. You’re lucky. You had Clint Straker to help you.”
“He’s a fictional character.”
“He might as well have been your shrink. You were able to work out all your anxieties through your writing. You could make it seem like that woman we killed, like the people who tried to kill us, was all make-believe instead of something that happened to us, that scarred us.”
“That’s true,” Ian said, and it wasn’t the first time Straker had saved him from emotional pain or anxiety. But he didn’t see how Straker could help her. Reading a book wouldn’t be as therapeutic as writing one.
“I need to be with someone who understands what I’m feeling,” she said. “Unfortunately for both of us, that’s you, the least sensitive man on earth.”
He’d have to be Straker for her. He knew he’d make a poor substitute.
“Well, when you put it that way, I’d be a schmuck to say no. Make yourself at home.”
“Thank you,” Margo said, opened a bag of Doritos, and took out a handful of chips. She offered the bag to Ian, and he declined with a wave of his hand. “I’ve got a question for you and I want an honest answer.”
“Okay.”
“The last time I saw you, the director of the CIA offered you a job. Did you take it?”
Ian laughed. “Do I look like a spy to you? I’d rather write about action heroes than try to be one. It’s much less dangerous.”
She gestured with a chip to the script under his arm. “Are you back in the screenwriting business?”
“I didn’t write this. Pinnacle Pictures is making a movie out of Death Benefits. They’re calling it Straker. Damon Matthews is the star.”
Margo ate a few chips, then said, “He’s five feet tall and fifty years old.”
“He’s five foot five and forty-nine years old.”
“But Clint Straker is six feet tall and thirty. Matthews is totally wrong for the part.”
“Damon is the number one box office action star on earth,” Ian said. “That makes him totally right for it.”
“Damon? You’re on a first-name basis with him now?”
“We’ve never met. I’ll be meeting him for the first time next week in Hong Kong, where they’re shooting the movie.”
“But the book is set in Texas,” she said. “A drug cartel takes over a Texas border town and Straker goes in and saves them like a one-man Magnificent Seven.
He was flattered that she’d read it. “Most of the financing for the movie is coming from China so they’ve moved a third of the action there and cast a Chinese actress as the romantic lead. So now Straker is taking on a triad that’s holding a Hong Kong neighborhood in a grip of terror.”
Margo ate some more chips. “A movie crafted to fit a financial deal rather than tell a good story doesn’t sound like a recipe for success to me.”
“It’s not,” Ian said. “The script is horrible.”
“Then why are you going there?”
“My publisher is sending me first-class to Hong Kong just to shoot some publicity shots of me with Matthews on the set. It will help sell books when the movie comes out and to capitalize on all that publicity, I’m setting my next Straker novel in Hong Kong. I’m going to use the trip, on their dime, to research my plot.” He pointed to the dry-erase boards covered with his scrawl.
“Smart move,” she said.
“Come to think of it, you picked the right time to show up.”
“I did?”
“You can house-sit while I’m away,” Ian said.
“Hell no,” she said, wiping her hands on her jeans. “I’m going with you.”
“Hell no, you’re not. You said you needed a place to live. Now you have it.”
“I can’t stay here alone,” she said.
“You’ll be fine.”
“You didn’t listen to a word I said. I can’t be alone.” She took a deep breath and looked away from him for a moment. When she looked back, there were tears in her eyes. “I need you, someone I trust who knows what I went through, more than I need a roof over my head. You have no idea how hard it is for me to say that.�
�
Actually, he did, and in that moment, he felt enormous affection for her. He had the sudden desire to hug her and tell her everything would be all right. But he fought the urge. He was afraid she might knee him in the groin if he attempted it.
She wiped her tears away, studied the dry-erase boards for a moment, then looked back at Ian. “I can help you. Talk me through your plot and I’ll do the research. I’ll find the locations and the experts you need to meet to make your story work. That way, when you aren’t doing your PR shit, you won’t waste any time figuring out where to go or what to do. I’ll have done it for you.”
He liked that idea a lot. The one thing he really missed from his TV days, besides the free lunches, was having an assistant to do his research and manage his schedule so he could be free to write. He’d thought about hiring one when he became a writer but he didn’t want a stranger in his house and he didn’t think he’d have enough work for an assistant to do. But in this situation, it made perfect sense. And maybe by the time they got back to LA, she’d be cured and would go straight back to Seattle.
“You have a deal,” he said.
CHAPTER SIX
The White House, Washington, DC. June 26. 1:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.
The president of the United States was enduring his weekly lunch in his private dining room with Vice President Willard Penny, who had just returned with food poisoning from a “friendship tour” of South America.
Penny nursed a 7-Up while the president dined on salmon that he’d caught himself fly-fishing in Missouri over the weekend. Seeing his vice president slurping his 7-Up reminded the president of their months together on the campaign trail and how Penny guzzled Diet Coke all day long. The carbonated soft drink made Penny so flatulent that they lived under the constant danger that he’d release a monster fart on stage, a nightmare that came true during the vice-presidential debates and nearly sank their campaign.
The president had sent Penny on the friendship tour of South America to meet with leaders from government and the business community “to reaffirm the president’s commitment to deepening bilateral trade and investment ties with the region and continue the administration’s support of security cooperation, business engagement, agriculture, and infrastructure development.” The truth was the president wanted the pompous gasbag as far away from him as possible. But now the president needed the VP back in DC to cast a tie-breaking vote on an appropriations bill and, in two weeks, to be the warm body in succession while he went to Paris to attend the G8 summit.