by Vendela Vida
“This is a lot to take in,” you say. “So I’d have to pack all my things up, leave this hotel, go through the whole check-in hassle?” You widen your eyes, as if all this would surely overwhelm you—you must make them believe you are a woman of leisure for whom all of this moving and working will be an unfamiliar hardship.
The practical secretary takes the bait. “We’d have someone come grab your bags. And they’d just bring them to Ivy’s old room. Which would be cleaned up of course. No check-in, nothing. The hotel’s been very good to us. They leave us all alone.”
No check-in, you think. This is a relief on a dozen levels.
“You’re probably wondering how many days your services will be required before you can go back home, or wherever your next destination is,” says the practical woman.
It has not occurred to you to wonder about this. “Yes, of course,” you say.
“Filming is scheduled for three more weeks,” the tattooed man says.
“Some nights go very late, but you will get two days off a week,” the practical woman adds.
“Three weeks,” you repeat absentmindedly.
They stare at you. You are their last hope. You know you should up the price, but you have nothing; you’re not in a position to barter.
“That works for my schedule,” you say, as though you have a schedule.
“Great,” says the tattooed man. He is elated.
“Now, let’s make sure you two meet and that she feels she can work with you,” says the pale practical secretary. She glances at her phone; she scrolls. “Oh, wow. Something just changed. She could meet you in twenty minutes in the tenth-floor lounge.”
“The tenth-floor lounge?” you say.
“It’s on the tenth floor,” she says. “It’s private,” she adds, and rises. She’s short in her practical heels.
You stand, still wrapped in your towel. You wipe your moist palm on the towel before shaking hands with each of them.
You go into the dressing room, and lie down on the massage table, facing the ceiling. You are happy for the time to think.
You needed to stop using Sabine Alyse’s name and credit card. This job allows you to do that.
You needed to get out of this hotel, which was going to be difficult without identification. This job satisfies that.
And you will be paid.
You roll off the massage table. To secure the job you should try to make yourself resemble the famous actress in whatever way possible. You noticed the previous stand-in, the one you will be replacing, the one you saw crying—why was she crying?—dressed in jeans and a blouse and heels. You realize she must have been shorter than the famous actress, so she needed heels to replicate the famous actress’s height; you need anything without a heel.
You select metallic sandals from your suitcase (you packed them in case you ended up in the desert, or on a beach), jeans you didn’t think you’d be wearing in Morocco, and a black cotton blouse. You’ve noticed the famous American actress often wears black. She was in edgy independent movies when she started her film career, and she seems to want to remind the public of that fact.
You dress and then stand in front of the mirror to apply the makeup you bought at the Casablanca beauty store. Your skin. If only the marks were small pits that together could form a star. That might be interesting, even. You would settle for that. Instead: there’s a reason that for most of your life you’ve run and swam. There’s a reason why you finally arrived at diving as your competitive sport. With diving your face was virtually unseen. It was all about the shape your body made in the distance as you dropped from a high board and disappeared deep into the water. By the time you came up for air, the judges had determined their score. It had nothing to do with your face.
When you are finished dressing you look in the mirror. First to make sure your clothes look right, then a second time to make sure you appear sane. The third time to see how much you resemble her. You pull your hair back in a ponytail, so there’s less of it, and because you saw Ivy wearing her hair in that style. She wore her hair pulled back so the wig could easily go on and off.
You practice saying your niece’s name twice in front of the mirror. “Reeves Conway. Reeves Conway.” Then you use it in a sentence. “Hello, I’m Reeves Conway.”
It suits you. More than your own name does.
You stash your suitcase under the massage table because you don’t know where else to put it. You take a towel from a stack and drape it over the suitcase.
You exit the dressing room and wait for the elevator. When it arrives, you step inside and press ten.
The elevator doors open and the lounge is in front of you. With low couches and an enormous TV and international newspapers set out, it’s a miniature version of the lounge on the first floor. But the only person in the lounge is a bartender. He stands before a bar lined with large backlit bottles and oranges in vases.
The bartender greets you in English and in French. You ask for a glass of sparkling water, and sit down on one of the plush sofas and wait. You worry you look too desperate, sitting there facing the elevator doors, as though waiting to pounce the moment they open and the famous actress emerges. You move to another couch.
The bartender brings you a tall narrow glass of sparkling water and it tastes so refreshing you already know you want another one. This is how it is in these countries—the glasses are so small and you are always thirsty. At the home you shared with your husband your cups were bowls, but your thirst was never satisfied.
The elevator doors haven’t opened but now the famous American actress is in the lounge. She must be staying on this floor, you realize. Suddenly she is before you. She is radiant, as though she has swallowed a light, a sun, and is glowing from within. She’s small-boned, tiny. Her eyes are the green of damp moss; her hair darker than it’s been in other films. The fringe of bangs is new—you assume it’s been styled this way for this shoot. Her cheeks are wide and her nose narrow. You have to work to not stare.
“Hi,” she says.
Just like that. Hi.
You stand up, and as you do so, you hit your knee on the glass coffee table. You act as though you didn’t.
You shake her hand and you say your name is Reeves and she says her name, which, momentarily, strikes you as funny. There are few people in the world who don’t know her name.
Her bodyguards are close—one is already standing by the bartender, the other by the elevator. They are so stealthy they appear suddenly, like magicians in a trick. One is Latino and the other pale with red hair. They don’t look at you head-on, but out of the corners of their eyes, they are watching you. The famous American actress doesn’t acknowledge they’re there. You assume they have been with her for years.
She flops down on the couch, elegantly. You have seen her image a million times and still this is new. You understand, instantaneously, what it is to have presence. You can’t keep your eyes off her features—so much smaller than you would have expected—and her skin, so much smoother than any skin you’ve seen. She doesn’t have a single indentation on her face, except for a dimple below her left cheek when she smiles her endearingly lopsided smile. Her dimple is famous. You wonder if she’s had it insured.
“Where are you from?” she asks.
“Florida originally, but then I went to New York, and now I’m in Florida.”
“I love New York,” she says.
“What about you?” you ask, though you know she lives in L.A.
“L.A.,” she says.
You nod as though this is new information you’re taking in.
“I’m so fucking exhausted,” she says.
“Late night of work?” Now you’re talking. The two of you are just talking.
“Yeah, we went until one A.M. And then I come home and this fucking possessive boyfriend of mine wants to argue.”
You know who the boyfriend is, of course. You wonder if she should be telling you this.
“I’m sorry,” you say. �
��That’s the worst.”
“It is, right? Are you involved with anyone right now?” she asks.
“Um, no,” you say, taken off guard. “I’m the opposite.”
“Bad breakup?” she asks. She pulls her legs up onto the couch and leans into you. She looks like an actress in a movie who’s acting interested. You can’t separate how genuine her interest is, or how much she’s playing the part of someone who’s interested. It occurs to you that maybe she can’t tell the difference either. Maybe for her the line is very thin.
“My husband and I are splitting up,” you tell her. “I decided to leave him.”
“How long ago?” she asks.
“Two months ago . . . or so. I’ve lost track.” You know it’s been exactly nine weeks.
“Are you definitely divorcing?”
“Yes,” you say. “I’ve filed the papers. There’s no way we’ll ever . . .”—you search for the polite word—“reconcile.”
“Wow,” she says. “That’s so impressive that you’re leaving him.”
“I hadn’t exactly thought of it that way,” you say. “‘Excruciating’ is the word that comes to mind.” Even that word does not come close to describing the intensity of pain you feel.
She crosses her legs in the other direction. She leans in again to ask her next question: “Did you have kids together?”
“Together” is a haunting word. You did little together.
“No,” you say, knowing she’ll say that’s a relief.
“Well, that’s a relief.”
You nod, and think for a moment of your sister’s baby. Reeves.
“You’re getting divorced, you’re surviving. It’s part of your story now,” the famous American actress says.
“I guess so,” you say. You don’t volunteer that on most days you don’t feel like you’re surviving. “I wish I didn’t feel so fucking angry at him. What he did makes me feel like I failed at something enormous. In the minds of people who knew us—and even people who didn’t—I failed. It’s horrific and humiliating on so many levels.”
“Humiliating? No. If I were getting divorced, I’d go around saying, ‘Hey, guess what, I’m only in my twenties but I’m getting divorced! And I’m alive. Take that, motherfuckers.’”
You are reminded that you have read about her filthy mouth.
“Take that, motherfuckers,” you mutter, under your breath.
She laughs. It’s a genuine laugh. And a terrible one. It’s a cackle. You don’t think you’ve ever heard it in her films. You would have noticed.
“Think of it this way, Reeves,” she says. “Everyone’s scared of getting divorced but you’re doing it. You’re getting it out of the way and now you can move on with your life.”
“I can move on with my life,” you repeat.
“I might get married just so I can get divorced and get it over with,” she says.
You laugh, instinctively, genuinely. The famous American actress is much more interesting than you thought she’d be.
“You have a point,” you say.
“If I were you I’d get married again as fast as possible so that I could get divorced a second time.”
She looks over your shoulder, and stares at something. You turn to follow her gaze. She’s staring at the bartender, who’s Moroccan, maybe twenty-five. He’s polishing a glass that already looks polished and is placing it back on the shelf.
“He’s pretty cute,” she says.
“Not bad,” you agree. “You think he’d marry me?”
“Totally,” she says. “Can I throw a lingerie bridal shower for you? I fucking live for lingerie. And cotton grandma panties. Depends on the day.”
The pale practical secretary enters the room, and sees you laughing and the famous American actress cackling. You wonder if the pale practical secretary has grown accustomed to the actress’s terrible laugh. You wonder if it’s ever possible to grow accustomed to it.
“Am I late?” she asks, looking at her watch. She answers her own question. “You two were both early.” She looks distressed.
She sits down on a chair between the two couches where you and the famous American actress are seated.
“Would you like something to drink?” she asks the actress.
“A small coffee,” she says, and the practical secretary waves the bartender over and orders two coffees.
“Are you feeling better than you were this morning?” the practical secretary asks. She is at least twenty years older than the famous American actress, and it’s somewhat disconcerting to see her catering to someone so much younger than herself.
“Still exhausted.” The actress looks at you and offers an explanation. “That fucking boyfriend.”
The practical secretary shoots the actress an admonishing look.
“What?” the famous American actress says. “I already told her all about it.”
The practical secretary’s face tightens.
“I trust her,” the famous American actress says.
“Thanks,” you say, because it does seem like a compliment.
“You’re welcome,” says the actress, and laughs her strange laugh.
You smile because you’re afraid if you don’t your face will express your alarm at her terrible laugh. In return, she smiles her big, notorious smile and you feel like you’re in one of her movies. Whenever she smiles like that on-screen, the person she is smiling at is instantly charmed.
The pale practical secretary clears her throat. “Did either of you want to talk to her?” the practical secretary asks, looking at the bodyguards.
You had almost forgotten about them. Now you understand how the famous American actress can act as though they don’t exist.
The bodyguards lock eyes with each other and appear unsure, but then the one with the red hair says: “Yes.”
The pale practical secretary and the famous actress move to one side of the couch and the secretary pulls out a schedule she wants to run by the actress.
For a moment you’re alone. But then the bodyguard with the red hair comes over and sits across from you. He’s not a large man; he wears a puffy brown leather jacket and you’re sure he wears it to give him more heft. The other bodyguard keeps watch on the elevator doors, on the bartender, on you.
The red-haired bodyguard stares at your naked left hand and asks if you’re married.
You tell him you’re getting divorced.
He asks about the man who you’re divorcing and you tell him that he’s still in Florida, that you’re the one who moved out.
“No pets?” he says, revealing he’s heard the conversation about kids; why else would he jump to the topic of pets?
“I used to have a turtle,” you tell him. “But I had to feed it a salad every day for lunch. It was a lot of food preparation.”
He nods. “I’m studying turtles right now. Galápagos and Darwin and evolution.”
“You’re a Darwin fan,” you say.
“Oh, I wouldn’t go that far,” he says, as though you really have pushed a boundary. “People assume Darwin was right about evolution being gradual, but I’m intrigued by radical speciation.” He looks away but has you in the corners of his eyes.
“What’s that?” you say, not because you’re necessarily interested, but because you want to do well at this interview and you believe that this entails having a conversation that makes this man feel intriguing.
“It’s also known as punctuated equilibrium,” he says. “Does that sound familiar?”
It doesn’t. “Maybe,” you say. “Can you remind me?”
He sits up straighter on the couch, like he’s being interviewed for a documentary. “There are these periods in evolution when species are in stasis because there’s no need for change. But then, usually because of a change in their environment, they have to adapt rapidly. That’s how new species come about.”
“What kind of environmental change?” you ask. As a twin, you’ve always been interested in nature versus nurture. Also,
if you keep him talking about this he won’t ask about you.
“I’m glad you asked. I’ll give you an example,” he says, and then pauses, as though deciding which one to give. “Say there’s a species of birds—there are these beautiful ones I’m interested in right now. They’re tropical-looking in color, their wings have orange, white, and blue in them. Anyway, they existed for thousands of years, and took shelter in a particular kind of tree. I can’t remember the name of the tree right now,” he says, and his hand makes a fist.
“That’s okay,” you say. “Go on.”
“So the tree where they build their nests and lay their eggs gets suddenly infected by this bacteria. And the trees start to die. So what do the birds do then?”
You realize he’s posing this question to you.
“Find another tree?” you offer.
He points at you, as though he’s been lecturing a class and you’re the pupil who called out the right answer.
“But what if these new trees are taller and the birds need to be able to fly higher up to lay their eggs. Then what happens?” he says.
You open your mouth but realize that this time he doesn’t want you to answer.
“They have to adapt,” he continues. “They have to have greater wing strength. The birds that don’t have it die off, and the others adapt and the species selects to have greater wingspans so they can reach this tree and lay their eggs and have their babies.” He looks out the window of the Regency’s tenth-floor lounge, as though he might see one of these orange-blue birds flying by.
You follow his gaze, and look out at the smoggy, birdless sky.
“Extreme circumstances require radical change. If you want to survive at least.”
“Fascinating,” you say.
The bodyguard stands up.
“Did I fail the interview?” you ask.
“Not at all,” he says. “I know people. I can tell you’re a forthright person, Reeves.” You don’t know if you want to laugh or cry at this statement, but given that this appears to be the end of the interview, you simply nod.