by Beth Ain
I take out my compass and stare at it. We are going north, toward my dad. That will cheer me up, too. My mom hands me her phone, open to an e-mail from strawberryscentedcharlotte.
Dear Jules,
Well, so I didn’t get the main part in the play, but I play a very important part, which I think will definitely help me grow as an actress. I have to find something funny to think of because my character is someone who laughs a lot, which is kind of more your thing. How is Emma Saxony? Everyone here says Emma was just the greatest, most popular camper ever and that everyone knew she would be a star. Maybe you can tell her hi from Camp Lackahanna.
Love,
Charlotte
I am disappointed that the e-mail isn’t from Elinor. What if her parents have decided to get back together and they are going to live happily ever after in London? I feel so bad that I don’t want this to happen for Elinor. I mean, I DO want it to happen, but I’m worried that she’ll never come back, and I’ll be left with Stinkytown and third grade to deal with all on my own! I distract myself by writing back to my fruit-flavored former best friend.
Since Emma was kind of horrible to me and since I keep thinking about her asking me if I really wanted to be an actress and what kind and all that, and since she has made making this movie feel kind of awful instead of totally great, well, I want to write to Charlotte that Emma Saxony is a mean idol and not a teen idol. But something about Charlotte’s e-mail sounds kind of sad, so I don’t want to make anything worse for her.
Dear Charlotte,
I’m glad you are in a play and having fun, even if it isn’t the big starring role. I’m hoping I’ll start having fun sometime VERY soon, since nobody told me that filming a movie isn’t quite as much fun as you think. Also, I have to jump into a mud pile tomorrow, so maybe that will make you laugh for your play.
Love,
Jules
After yet another very long ride in the maxi-van, we arrive in a very pretty place with a big mountain and beautiful hotels and lots of people doing outdoor activities. We walk into the lobby dragging all of our pillows and things, and then I just drop it all. I see my dad! I run to him and he picks me up and I don’t ever want to let go. But I have to let go when Big Henry yanks on my legs so hard, he almost pulls off my pants!
“You all are a sight for sore eyes!” my dad says. “Even the crazy lady!” Grandma Gilda jabs my dad in the side and then they hug. We all laugh, and the Lichtensteins go to their room and we go to ours, and Big Henry and I can’t stop talking about everything that’s happened so far. We have a whole afternoon as a regular family on vacation before I have to become a movie actress again.
We are sitting at an outside café eating frites when my mom hands me yet another e-mail from Charlotte — I don’t think they keep people very busy at her camp. I thought she was supposed to be white-water rafting and riding around in golf carts!
Dear Jules,
I think that will make me laugh for the play. It reminds me of your worm swimming pool. Remember when you told me you would save me some mud because it’s good for my face? Well, there you go. It will be like a facial - at a spa! My so-called friends here don’t even believe that you are the same Jules Bloom who is going to be in a movie with Emma Saxony, so do a good job. I can’t wait till they see I was telling the truth.
Love,
Charlotte
I show the e-mail to my mom.
“I think Charlotte has been saying actual nice things about me,” I say.
“Sounds like she was bragging about you,” my mom says.
“I really thought she could only brag about herself,” I say. “Maybe I should tell her about what a jerk Emma Saxony is because maybe that would make her feel better.”
“Do you think that would make Charlotte feel better, or would it make you feel better?” my mom asks.
“Is this like Daddy making me investigate things? That kind of a question?” I ask.
“I am just saying that maybe you could do something that would help Charlotte with her so-called camp friends,” my mom says.
I get an idea right then and there.
We walk around the village, and then Big Henry and I spot the bungee-jumping thing. Kids are flying all around over there. Hank and I make a run for it.
My parents catch up to us and say, “Not right now, guys. You will get to go, just not right now.”
“Why not?” I ask. “Tomorrow we start filming again and there won’t be time.”
“We talked about it with Colby,” my dad says, “and we all think it’s just the littlest bit risky, Jules. Once the movie is finished filming, you can bounce all you want.”
I know if I act very mad and very frustrated that they will give me the lecture about how I am making a choice to pursue acting, so I don’t act mad. Well, I do, but not whiny mad. Just inside-mad.
We walk around a whole lot longer, and I am tired and bored and all I can do is watch other kids go on the bungee and the luge. And I’m sure Big Henry is pretty mad that all because of me, he can’t go, either.
“Jules,” my mom says to me back in the hotel lobby, “how are you?”
“I’m fine,” I say. This is my plan. I’m fine. Fine, fine, fine.
“It doesn’t seem like you’re fine. It’s been a long week already, and now you are about to shoot a whole bunch of scenes, and I know that Emma isn’t exactly the sweetest, and now we’ve said no to the bungee, and I’m wondering how you’re keeping everything inside so neat and tidy?”
I start to feel shaky in my knees when she says all this, and I just wish she had left me alone. Now I feel like I’m going to explode in the French lobby with all the French-speaking children who I’m completely afraid to talk to since I never learned French the way I planned.
I walk out into the air and I start to cry. My mom follows me, and my dad and the others head up to the rooms.
“I guess I’m a little nervous, but only a LITTLE, and not like I usually am, and I just wanted for once not to be nervous and for everyone to think I could handle something without tripping or throwing up or whatever!” My mom hugs me. “But now I just want to feel normal again. I want to hear English and I want to play with Elinor and maybe I even want to, I don’t know, go to camp or something.” I can’t believe I say this, but it is true.
“That sounds like a lot of stuff to be keeping inside, and it’s all fixable stuff,” she says.
I believe her when she says this, but everything still feels a little bad, especially with all those kids bouncing high up in the air — having real fun, normal fun — right before my eyes.
The only good thing is that when we finally get back to the room, I have an e-mail from Elinor waiting for me.
Dear Jules,
I haven’t wanted to write to you because my wonderful summer has turned not so wonderful. My parents are getting divorced. And on top of that, my dad wasn’t even telling the truth when he said he would be here all the time for me. He’s been working like crazy and my old friends are all at camp, so thank goodness Abby was here for two days and I got to show her around with my mom. And thank goodness I at least get to come back to New York City and to you and even Teddy and maybe a worm swimming pool.
Tell me something that will cheer me up. Is Emma Saxony still being horrible? She just needs Lucy Lamb to show her who’s boss!
Love,
Elinor
I feel so bad that I wished for this. I can’t even answer her right away. I feel bad that I’ve been mad at her, and that I got mad that my dad didn’t come on the road trip with us, and that I got mad that I couldn’t bungee jump. All while Elinor is having the worst summer ever.
I try to sleep because we have to be on set very early in the morning, but I stay awake for too long, thinking about Elinor and Charlotte and how I wish we were all at the school playground, instead of
in three different parts of the world.
The next bunch of days come and go without me even seeing Big Henry or Teddy or even George. I am rehearsing lines, changing outfits, getting made up, trying not to fall asleep sitting there, watching Emma Saxony boss everyone around and watching Rick Hinkley be a real blockbuster hero. He’s my new favorite movie star.
Finally, we wrap it up for the day and we have some free time, so Rick takes Colby and me on a hike to see the mudslide. As it turns out, Lucy Lamb gets Rick and Emma into all kinds of trouble, but she helps Rick figure out that Emma is the bad guy — the guy they are trying to stop. Emma Saxony is the villain, and even though it is Lucy’s fault that Rick goes flying down a mudslide, it is the mudslide and Lucy Lamb that actually save the day, capturing Emma Saxony in mud and stopping her in her tracks.
“You are one great actress, kid,” Rick Hinkley says to me. Colby smiles at this and gives me a little push.
“Thanks,” I say. “This is my first movie.”
“Well, let’s hope you stay you. I don’t really see you turning into a fussy kind of actress anyway.” I think he thinks Emma Saxony is fussy. “You are more of a hockey-player type actress, I think.” I get the feeling that Rick Hinkley and I think alike. I love the idea that I am a hockey-player type actress. I picture myself with black goop under my eyes and a hockey mask, and I am facing off against Emma Saxony.
“Can’t wait to slide down this baby,” he says, looking at the mudslide.
“You don’t have a stunt double?” I ask.
“Not for this. I think it’ll be fun,” he says.
“Do you think I could do it? Without a stunt double, I mean?” I ask.
“Sure! Kids do things like this all the time where I’m from,” he says.
I squint my eyes and try to picture the hill in my neighborhood that leads down from Riverside Drive into Hippo Playground turning into a giant mudslide and all of the children of the Upper West Side sliding down it and into the park.
“Not where I’m from,” I say.
“Rick!” Colby says now. “I don’t know how Jules’s parents will feel about this.”
“Will Emma use her stunt double?” I ask.
“What do you think?” he asks. And then we all laugh.
Dear Elinor,
You will not believe this, but I am going to do the mudslide without a stunt double. Rick Hinkley is doing it himself, too, and I saw the slide and thought it looked like fun, and I told Colby I wanted to do it and then she talked to the director and my parents and a lawyer and they all agreed that it isn’t all that dangerous and that it would actually be a better scene if I do it - there will be close-ups of me going down instead of just shots of my body double, which is what Emma will have. I will do my own stunts because I am a hockey-player type actress. This is what Rick said.
I am very sad that your parents are getting divorced, and I hope I can be a good friend to you the way you always are to me. Picture me sliding through mud to cheer yourself up!
Love,
Jules
The last scene of the movie isn’t filming until tomorrow afternoon because we need blazing-hot sun. So I get to stay up late after dinner and walk around the village and watch Teddy and Big Henry go on luge ride after luge ride while I cheer them on with my dad’s video camera. This is my job since I can’t actually do anything. I am the director.
“Let’s go get in that bungee line,” my dad says now. “All of us.”
I stop walking and look at my parents. “I thought you said I couldn’t do the bungee until after filming,” I say.
“Well, that was before you became a stunt-person,” he says.
“We’re all gonna do it,” my mom says.
“Even George?” I say.
“No way, José,” she says. “I’m just here to laugh at your parents.”
We run through the gate and we all get strapped into our bungees.
“I’m a little nervous,” I say. I say this out loud for the first time all summer.
“Remember when we shouted our summer wishes onto Broadway?” my mom asks.
“Yep.” That feels like a year ago, but it’s only been a couple of weeks.
“Remember my positive affirmations?” Grandma Gilda shouts, as the rest of us get lifted up off the little trampolines.
I smile. This helped a lot with the sitcom. “Yep,” I say.
“Remember the chocolate cake batter flinging all around the kitchen?” my dad asks. I smile and look down at the mountain below me.
“Remember Bat Duck?” Big Henry asks. At this, I crack up.
“Yep.”
The guy pushes me onto the trampoline with so much force I go flying, and I flip in the air and all those butterflies are going crazy. And then I see Big Henry out of the corner of my eye, his little body jumping up and down on the bungee cord.
“Do it for Bat Duck!” he shouts into the Canadian sky.
I look at him. Okay, I think. I will.
And the next day, I do.
I am running as fast as I can toward that mudslide when Rick’s character says, “Lucy, jump!”
I take one look at that mud pit, pretend it is giant bowl of chocolate decaf cake batter, and I jump. I slide down with mud spraying all around me, and I am going fast, but it isn’t a rocky, bumpy ride, because they put plastic under the mud, which you don’t see when you go to the movies, but it’s there! I let out a big, fat, happy scream because it is the best feeling I have ever had, and then we all crash into the mud pool at the end and Rick stands up and says, “We got her!”
Then he puts Emma Saxony in handcuffs, and Emma and her character are miserable and covered in mud. We all say a few more lines to each other, and then I hear, “Cut!”
I jump up and down in the mud and the director says the take was perfect, and he even lets Big Henry jump in the mud pool with us.
Then, the most amazing thing happens. Big Henry swims to me!
“You did it,” he says.
“YOU did it,” I say.
“I’ve been working on it with Daddy to surprise you,” he says.
We all get out of the mud after a while, and I walk over to Emma, who is cleaning mud out of her ears. “Could I get your autograph?” I ask.
“Uh, sure,” she says, kind of laughing. “I didn’t know you were a fan.”
“It’s not for me. It is for my good friend Charlotte, who is at Camp Lackahanna, and she really loves you and her friends don’t believe I’m in a movie with you, so could you write something nice so she can prove it?”
My mom takes my hand now, which is probably why Emma agrees. She gives Emma some paper and a pen.
She signs her name in big teen-idol handwriting and hands me the paper.
“Thanks,” I say. She turns away and then I think of something else I really want to say. “Emma!” She turns back to me. “About what you said in Montreal, I figured out what kind of actress I want to be — a hockey-player type actress,” I say, and I smile a big Lucy Lamb physical-comedy smile.
Then Emma Saxony does something very Jules-like. She shrugs.
I made Emma Saxony shrug!
After a few more days of real vacation, we say good-bye to the Lichtensteins and to Canada. Teddy says he’ll write from science camp, and I’m glad. I’ve gotten used to getting a lot of e-mail from my faraway friends.
We get all the way home to New York City a lot faster by airplane than by maxi-van. And when we get inside our lobby, Joe hands me a piece of turquoise mail. It’s a birthday card from Elinor. She thought I would be here for it, I realize. And then he hands Big Henry a package — from Plattsburgh. “Bat Duck!” Hank says when he opens it. I am so relieved I start laughing hysterically.
“I can’t wait to show everyone at camp how I can swim,” my brother says.
“
And I can’t wait to be there to see it!” I say. We all decided on the plane that I would go to camp for a few weeks, too. My parents think it would help me feel like things were normal again, and I kind of agree.
And then Mom’s phone rings. I think it is going to be Grandma Gilda making sure we got home all right and wanting to tell us about getting back to Florida just in time for a heat wave. But it isn’t.
“It’s Colby,” my mom says to us. Then she picks it up and listens for a while.
“What is it?” I ask.
“You better enjoy ‘normal’ while it lasts,” my mom says. “The sitcom was picked up. It’s going to be a real show on TV — are you ready to be sassy Sylvie for a while?”
“Uh, YES!” I shout. Then I do a little Sylvie dance.
I’m ready for anything.
“Ah! Bloom, Jules,” my new teacher, Mr. Santorini, says, looking at a list he’s holding in his hand. He walks over to me with his hand out. “Very nice to meet you.” When I look at him closely, I realize he looks a little bit like Captain von Trapp in The Sound of Music, if Captain von Trapp would ever wear a Hawaiian shirt, that is. I’m just hoping he doesn’t have a whistle.
I put my hand out and let him shake it. “Hmmm,” he says. “Let’s try that again. This time when I shake, shake back, sailor.” I know what he means about the shake because this is how Colby Kingston, my agent, shakes hands. I just didn’t know it was okay to shake a teacher’s hand this way. I also don’t know why he’s calling me “sailor.”
I grab on and shake firmly this time. I feel like my TV character, Sylvie, would handle all of this better than I am handling it, and I also think that this quirky Mr. Santorini would like Sylvie better than Bloom, Jules — worm-digging Upper West Sider.
On a road trip, I would first and foremost bring my brother, Michael Levine, who would make me spit out Easy Cheese and crackers with his backseat antics, and I would bring my mom, Gail Levine, who is even more entertaining on the road (and also a race car driver in disguise), and my dad, Charles Levine, who is a born explorer and also has mad map skills. I would always bring my adventurous and encouraging husband, Jon Ain, and our backseat drivers, Grace and Elijah. For laughs and support, I wouldn’t mind putting my feet out the window with Rhonda Penn Seidman, Denise Goldman, Amy Flisser, Diana Berrent, Kim Lichtenstein, Denise Benun, Jill Grinberg, and Jenne Abramowitz, who would wear a cowboy hat — making our road trip feel all honky-tonk and, therefore, legit.