Goodnight Sometimes Means Goodbye (Wrong Flight Home, #2)

by Noel J. Hadley

  I let Greenberg have the last word; otherwise we'd be standing out here comparing penis sizes like silly schoolboys for hours. Greenberg cracked the door open to Leah's dressing room and peeled his head through, eyes and cheekbones suddenly scrubbed clean of its unpleasantries, and the entire demeanor of his voice was converted to Hollywood sainthood.

  “Baby-booby!” He said. Yeah, that Hollywood sainthood.

  “Lawrence!” Leah had the lingo down too, and would do perfectly well in Hollywood. That sort of talk was always troubling though, because I never could be completely sure if and when she was being genuine.

  The door to her dressing room closed behind him.

  Muffled voices followed. I couldn't understand a lick of it, but every single syllable seemed pleasant enough. I couldn't blame Leah for the brownie-nosed butt kissing, especially considering that guys like Greenberg practically ran Hollywood. There was no other way around them. The Greenberg's of the world were pimping vampires who needed other people's talent to stoke their own ego. I'd never survive the business, but I wasn't Leah. Leah could and would survive. And more than anything I hoped she'd get the part.

  11

  ONLY THREE MINUTES had passed before the door to Leah's dressing room opened again. I hadn't moved except to practice a few different poses. I liked the one best where I leaned against the wall, letting one leg overpass the other at the ankle, and both arms were crossed. I had watched a New Kids on the Block music video on the plane ride over, Hanging Tough, VH1, and thought Donnie Wahlberg's performance would make for some good inspiration here, a badass but simultaneous carefree look. The fact that I clutched both roses in my teeth was my own last minute improvisation.

  Greenberg closed the door behind him, took one unkindly look at my Hanging Tough demeanor and said, “Are you still out here, retard?”

  I removed both roses. “You do realize that the blue-footed booby is an actual bird that lives off the coasts of Central and South America. Unfortunately, the word booby is likely old Spanish slang for stupid. But the baby-booby's are actually quite adorable, all fluffy and stuff, if that was indeed your intended comparison for Leah.”

  Greenberg stared at me, mouth gaped open and parched, looking particularly unattractive in his pronunciation of anger. Then again, most people are when angry. “Don't dick with me, Chamberlain. That's right. I know who you are. And I know there's an entire army of hungry as hell paparazzi who'd love to bend you over and pleasure themselves in your hide.”

  “That's generally not the way photography works.”

  Greenberg stabbed my chest with his finger. “I've rubbed shoulders with David Zaslav and Bob Iger. I can practically outlaw you in Hollywood. Hell, I can probably ban you from Disneyland.”

  “Bob Iger, impressive. I met Snoop Dogg once. He seemed nice. Well actually, if we're being honest, I only saw him from across the street. I waved at him though. He didn't wave back. But in his defense he probably thought I was waving at somebody else.”

  “I don't want to see you around Miss Isla Elliot again. Do you hear me, bub?” He poked me in the chest again when pronouncing bub.

  “That's Mrs.”

  “What?” He twisted his face into ugly contortions.

  “If you're referring to Leah in the context of her fictional character, the First Lady is a Mrs., not a Miss. I just thought, if you're going to make REPUBLICAN BLUE into a movie, you really should get at least some of the important details right.”

  He slipped me one of his fingers on his return trip down the hall. I didn't count how many knuckles were on either side, but I was pretty sure he erected the middle one (I gave him the benefit of the doubt), and then told me to fork off, only he didn't actually describe an eating utensil.

  “Thanks for the advice,” I said.

  Fork off, Chamberlain. Another finger.

  I let him have the final word, again.

  12

  IT WAS AFTER THE 8PM SHOWING that Lawrence Greenberg turned the corner down the hall again. There was an evolutionary chance that he'd arrived simply to congratulate Leah on her immaculate performance. More than likely it was to woo her into bed. But her performance was immaculate. Had she put on a third show I would have attended that as well. I sat at about the halfway mark this time, row X instead of ZZ, only I was off to the side, which made it abundantly clear that she was indeed staring at me during encore and not at the Hollywood producer. I thought I'd bring that fact up, perhaps as small talk; just to get the conversation rolling, but then didn't, especially considering we'd be comparing penis sizes within seconds if I did.

  I was still leaning against the wall outside of her dressing room door when he arrived, cramping his style no less with another Donnie Wahlberg inspired pose, same two roses in my teeth. He stopped in front of me and frowned.

  “Aside from being a total asshole, what are you, her sworn protector now or something?”

  I removed both roses from my teeth. “I was standing guard just in case we needed to reenact that scene from The Bodyguard when legions of fans scream for her in the alleyway. I hope you know how to sing Whitney Houston.”

  “Beat it,” he growled.

  “I love that song, but it doesn't feel right for the scene I have in mind.”

  I didn't see Greenberg clench his knuckles, but once he'd decided to take a swing at me his actions were swift and effective. I was cold-cocked in the eye, my left one. I actually saw a streak of black mixed with stars, much like what happens in cartoons, and was instantly drawn to the ground. I cupped five fingers over my socket, mostly to see if everything was still in place. The shock hurt more than the physical pain, and it quickly occurred to me that Donnie Wahlberg's performance in Hanging Tough ended entirely different than this. Maybe the mullet is where he attained his power.

  “I said I wasn't going to tell you again, Chamberlain, which makes everything before that punch a gift of grace.”

  I wiped my eye and stood back up on my feet with no immediate plan to retaliate, maybe even take another punch if I had to. Leah's part in the movie was far more important than my own ego, but I was tired of justifying my existence too. Whatever happened next, I hadn't really thought it through. Both roses fell to the floor in my tumble and my knees had trampled them.

  Hit him, you bozo! I heard Great-Uncle Milhous’s voice.

  “You gonna hit me back, Chamberlain? I've got about a hundred lawyers that say differently. They say, you even think about passing me in the hall and even so much as accidentally rub your ass up on my thigh, your grandchildren will be drowning in legal debt.”

  “What's going on out there?” Leah opened the door to her dressing room, all ready to go in that cute little white dress of hers.

  “If I were you, darling, I'd choose my friends a little more wisely.”

  “Yes. You've given me that spiel before, darling.” Leah wasn't pleased. She looked down at both of my roses, sprawled out on the floor and trampled on, and then caught sight of my eye. It was probably already beginning to bruise. “Did you just hit him?”

  “Hey, honey, I care about your career.”

  “I do too.”

  “Your friend ran into a doorknob or fell off a staircase or something. Guys like this, caught up in murder investigations, are bad for business. Just look at him, he's got signs on both ears advertising SPACE FOR RENT. The paparazzi gets one look at you with this runaway turd and you're getting the wrong sort of press, you hear me? You can't have that on your résumé, or it’s bye-bye career.” He fluttered his fingers when stressing bye-bye.

  Leah gazed at me with that unreadable face of hers. I loved even her unreadable faces, probably because I was so drawn to the mystery behind them. Of course, they simultaneously annoyed me too. Now that's love. We're drawn to the things that often bother us the most.

  “My entire point being, Chamberlain here doesn't much care if you get the part or not. He's not in it for the long haul. But I am. I want you in my movie, honey. I want to make you into a s
tar. Is that too much to ask?”

  “And I want to be in it.”

  “Studios don't generally invest millions of dollars into controversy.”

  Leah kept her eyes on me.

  “I've asked the murder suspect to leave. He's dangerous. And yet he clings to your shadow like a disease. I'd even call the cops, let them in on their little runaway's whereabouts, but the last thing you need is the press getting wind of this. I don't hire leading ladies who associates with dinosaur mobsters either.”

  “Dinosaur mobsters; wasn't that the plot to one of your movies?” I said.

  “Shut up, Joshua.” Leah was serious. I did as she commanded. Leah turned now to Greenberg. “That's not what this is about.”

  “Yes it is. Sacrifice comes with the job.”

  “I've sacrificed everything.”

  “Apparently not. Do you want the part or don't you?”

  “Leah, maybe I should leave,” I said, trying not to touch my eye.

  “Shut up, Joshua. Lawrence, I want that part, and you know damn well I'm right for it. Let's talk about it. I'll have my agent give you a ring.”

  “I didn't come all the way out here to be steamrolled by this guy.” Greenberg pointed his fat thumb at me.

  “You can have my talent, but you sure as hell can't have my body. Not anymore.”

  “If you're gonna pull out a sexual harassment card, think again. That cock sucking session was off the clock, baby.”

  “Don't be disgusting.”

  “And if you're looking to file a complaint, get in line. I'll answer each one of you after I'm finished with the other line-up of a gazillion girls eager for fifteen minutes of stardom, and willing to do anything for it.”

  “I'm sure your wife would be thrilled, not knowing what diseases you're always dipping your cock in. Thank God I required a condom.”

  “Hey, she doesn't have any complaints, living that plush life of hers in our Beverly Hills mansion. And besides, whatever we did the other night was consensual. But keep this in mind; my movie is getting made with or without its Broadway sweetheart.”

  “I'd normally say the size of one's hanging meat doesn't matter, but you're shrimp-dick just didn't cut it for me. I was well aware of the fact that you stuck your pinky finger up there, just to make it seem larger. And just so you know, I faked the whole thing.”

  “I could tell. It was the worst acting I've ever seen since...”

  “Your last movie?”

  “Buzz off, bitch.” He flung the back door open and disappeared in a hurry. It slammed shut behind him.

  Leah just stood there staring at the door, like a deer before headlights, totally stunned at the prospect of what had just gone down. A crowd of stagehands were gathered, including several other cast members, who had given up any hint at discretion and stood now in the hall, fully exposed to the drama and watching.

  She said: “Why do I get the feeling that I just lost the part of my career defining role?”

  “I'm very sorry, Leah. I told you I'd leave. I'm not worth this, and neither is losing that part. Call him up. You should make this right with him.”

  “I'm not a whore, Joshua.”

  “I didn't say you were a....”

  “I'm not a whore,” she cut me off, “At least, not anymore.”

  13

  FINDING ICE FOR MY EYE and paper towels to wrap it in was all Leah could do not to cry. Even after several cubes were secured in place she held the floodgates of emotion in (so long as I'd know her she somehow had the capacity to suppress them until they could be released in waves of passionate surrender and furry on stage), and in about ten minutes we were standing outside staring up at her larger than life portrait. It hung over 42nd Street, with the letters REPUBLICAN BLUE in bold print, and a series of lights elevated the intricacies of her face into angelic features as the eleven o’clock hour waved goodbye to the tenth. The streets had emptied considerably as we stood there craning our necks up at the billboard. Leah wore a hoodie as an extra measure of secrecy, and if anybody recognized her (she received a few courteous hello’s now and then) they mostly paid no attention to the irony. That was New York for you.

  “This is going to sound ridiculous,” she finally said, “but thank you.”

  “You're welcome?” I kept the ice pack over my left eye.

  “For saving me from that creep, just like Uncle Jack and his prostitutes.”

  “That's not a very accurate comparison.”

  “It's more than you probably care to know.”

  “All I managed to do was get you fired from your movie.”

  “You saved me from another miserable night in bed with him.” She turned to face me now, even removing the ice pack from my eye. The way she closed in on it for a closer look, touching the bruised skin with a single fingertip was rather intimate. “Just like Saint George and the dragon. And Lawrence sure can pack a punch. Your eye already is beginning to swell.”

  “There's probably some internal bleeding, which means it will be purple and black in the morning. I don't think he fractured anything.”

  “Didn't your other great-uncle teach you to box or something?”

  “Milhous? He did, though I can't say I'm very good at it.”

  “All the same, why didn't you hit him back?”

  “Because I was trying not to get you fired. It was your career. I wanted you to make the next decision.”

  “I made the right one.” She sighed passively, turning her attention again to the billboard with her picture on it. “It’s hard to believe, in twenty-four hours all of this will be over. They’ll be swapping it out for an image of my replacement first thing Monday morning.”

  “I thought this is what you wanted.”

  “It is, I guess. You can only play a part so long, but…”

  “I'm sure offers will come pouring in.”

  Just across the street Sean Puffy Combs was lit up with thousands of lights and practically the size of a building. Below P. Diddy I spied the man I'd recently been calling Frank Sinatra. He was leaning against a lamppost, eyes far more distracted by the tourist trap that was Time Square than his waning interest in me. The fact that he had followed me to Jersey and back, and mostly that I'd known about it, was well established by this point. From here on out discretion would be overkill.

  “George Lee Andrews has played the exact same part in Phantom of the Opera now for twenty years. Monsieur André. That’s somewhere close to nine thousand performances, a Broadway record, and he’s outlived something like nine or ten phantoms. Can you imagine that?”

  “Sure. If it’s what he loves.”

  “You know what I hate?” She dipped five fingers into her hoodie and massaged the back of her neck.

  “Jehovah’s Witnesses knocking at your door?”

  “Auditions.”

  “If it’s anything like that movie audition....”

  “Pimps run the world, Joshua. In your line of work, if you don't like somebody you can pick up your camera bag and move on. With seven billion people in the world, that's a lot of bridges to burn. For me, the world of entertainment is small and rather self-contained. Piss off someone well-connected like Lawrence, then I don't have so many options.”

  “I'm a believer that your talent should do all the talking, not the people you sell your soul to.”

  “If only the world spun that way.”

  “I won't frown on you if you go back to him and do whatever it was that occupied your attention when I arrived. You did what you had to. It was your way of surviving a cruel and heartless world.”

  Leah locked her arm in mine and started a steady stroll towards the 1, 2, 3 Subway station. A train whisked under our feet as we walked over a grate, and our thighs occasionally touched. “They’ll probably hire Scarlett Johansson to play Isla. I hear she's an amazing singer.”

  I said: “She’s too young to play the president’s wife.”

  “So am I.”

  “It wouldn’t be a REPUBLICAN BL
UE movie without you.”

  “Phantom got along fine without Michael Crawford, and The Sound of Music survived the absence of Mary Martin. In fact, her successor immortalized the part.”

  “Julie Andrews?”

  “The one and only.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about your legacy tonight.”

  “No matter, it wouldn’t be my last week in BLUE without you. I’m glad you could be here, even if my associates do beat you up. I hope you won't hate me for that last part.”

  “Thanks for inviting me to the beating.”

  “Sorry I’ve been such a bitch.”

  “We’re not going down that road again. Despite what you may think, you passed my audition.”

  “Oh, good,” Leah sighed sarcastically. “And I didn’t even have to get on my knees and play Monica Lewinsky under your desk.”

  “Greenberg may be right though. Doesn’t it bother you, the controversy it would cause if I was recognized standing next to you?”

  “That’s another road that doesn’t need trampled. And besides, there's a presidential election on the horizon, not to mention the Beijing Olympics. Alex's deeds will be forgotten in a week. And you’ll live on. The press has lactated the tits out of this thing.”

  “There will be plenty of fresh milk if we're caught together.”

  “Joshua, you had no part in it. You said so.”

  “I don’t want you to get bad press.”

  “I don’t want you too either.”

  “Leah, there's something I haven't told you. I....” I tried not to flench my eyes in the direction of Sinatra, but the issue needed addressed. “Since arriving in New York, I've sort of been followed.”

  Leah looked stunned. “Who?”

  “I'm not sure. But I had a little run-in with the mob before flying out here. The Mancini family holds me partly responsible for what happened, I think. That, or there's something else going down, something bigger than what anybody knows. Either way this man, and whomever he's associated with, isn't through with me. A couple of police detectives back home won’t be either, and neither will the press.”