The Stand-In

by Deborah Moggach

  ‘Miss Dune?’

  She swung round. The doorman was calling her.

  ‘Shall I tell him you’re on your way up?’

  ‘Er. No thanks.’ She smiled. ‘I want to surprise him.’

  The doorman grinned at her, across the lobby. She stepped into the elevator. Its doors closed behind her.

  How very fast it was! Much faster than Lila’s. Her ears crackled as the brushed-steel box hurled her up into the sky, like a space-ship. Before she could draw breath, the doors opened.

  She stepped into a white corridor. There were five doors, 18A . . . 18B . . . She walked down to the end. 18C.

  She stood outside the door, absolutely still, her head cocked. Was that the sound of a typewriter tapping? There was a roaring in her ears. For a moment she couldn’t hear anything. Then her head cleared, and she pressed the bell.

  Six

  SILENCE. THE TYPEWRITER stopped. Footsteps approached and the door opened.

  Trevor stood there, dressed in a blue bathrobe. He was unshaven, and smoking a cigarette.

  ‘Hi, hon,’ she drawled.

  His face lit up. ‘Lila!’

  He dropped his cigarette on the floor, and squashed it with his foot. He stepped forward, closed the door and put his arms around her.

  ‘Couldn’t keep away, Tee,’ she murmured. ‘My, do I feel horny tonight.’

  He slipped his hand under her coat and kissed her. She tasted his saliva; she smelt his hair. Oh, those forgotten scents!

  His stubble rasped against her skin. She pushed her tongue into his mouth and pressed her body against his. Below the knot of the bathrobe cord she felt the bump of his erection.

  His fingers slid through the opening in her blouse and touched her bare breast. He pulled the coat off her shoulders.

  Suddenly he jerked back. ‘Jesus!’ he yelped.

  He pushed her away, roughly. She stumbled against the doorframe. Revolted, he wiped his lips. She wiped her mouth, too, and smiled at him. She was panting, hard.

  ‘Who the fuck –?’ he started.

  Watching his face, she removed her dark glasses.

  His eyes clouded. Just for a moment he didn’t recognise her. Wasn’t that amazing? He didn’t remember her. Then he stared.

  ‘Jules?’

  He blenched. Trev. He actually went pale.

  ‘What the fuck are you doing?’ he demanded. His voice was so high! He sounded like a schoolgirl.

  ‘Don’t see what you’re making such a fuss about.’ She spoke in her normal voice, low and reasonable. ‘We’re the same underneath, you know. Me and her. Just the same.’

  He backed away from her, into the next room. It smelt of fresh paint. There was a work desk, but the rest of the furniture was draped in dust sheets. A step-ladder stood against the wall.

  She followed him in and nodded towards the window. ‘Nice view,’ she said, conversationally.

  ‘You’re out of your mind,’ he said.

  ‘It’s all trappings,’ she said. ‘All the other stuff. Coats, cars, money, all that shit. Fame and everything. Underneath we’re just the same. Just women. That’s all your fat dick knows about, doesn’t it? That’s the only thing that matters.’

  His nose wrinkled, as if he smelt something rotting. ‘You’re totally round the bend.’

  She smiled. ‘She’s the one who’s round the bend, not me. For starters, she’s a liar. I’ve discovered quite a lot about Lila, recently. She should be locked up.’

  ‘She should?’

  She smiled at him, charmingly. ‘Sorry you’re so disappointed. Once – remember? Once, you wouldn’t have been quite so disgusted. Shame, really.’ She stood beside his desk. It was overflowing with papers.

  Trevor stood beside one of the shrouded armchairs. The dust-sheet was spattered with paint. He fumbled in the pocket of his bathrobe and took out a pack of cigarettes.

  She smiled, taking her time. It all depended on pauses. Every actor has discovered that secret.

  ‘Shame, really,’ she repeated, sliding her hand into her pocket. Feeling the gun, she clicked open the safety catch. In Hedda the gun had been larger, a Colt .44, but the mechanism was similar.

  ‘Sit down,’ he said. ‘Have a cigarette. You’re obviously in a bad way.’

  ‘Shame you’re such a shit, because the day you smarmed yourself into her arms you bought your death warrant.’

  She took out the gun. Trev burst out laughing.

  Finger poised against the trigger, she raised it so that it was pointing in his direction. It was so heavy that it strained her hand.

  ‘What a totally crappy line!’ he laughed. ‘What’re you out of, some B movie? Where did you learn that shit?’

  He was shaking with laughter. She stared at him. The gun dangled in her hand.

  He walked up to her. ‘Leave the big scenes to the experts,’ he said gently. He took the gun and put it on the desk. Patting her shoulder, he said, ‘Calm down, you poor little bitch.’

  Seven

  THAT DID IT. Something clicked, inside my head. I sat down, heavily, in his office chair. It swivelled from side to side and I tried to steady it with my foot.

  He squatted beside me, on his haunches, and gazed into my face like a doctor. ‘Want a drink? You look as if you need one.’

  He went into the kitchen. Slowly I unknotted the scarf and pulled it off. I was suddenly terribly tired. The wig felt crooked; I hadn’t even fixed it on properly. From the kitchen there was the sighing clunk of a fridge door closing, and the rattle of glasses. I pulled off the wig, stuffed it into the pocket of the coat and unpinned my hair. It felt as stiff as cardboard; I clawed it down around my face with my clumsy, gloved hands. I hadn’t even got a hairbrush.

  I had never felt such a complete idiot in all my life. I dreaded him coming back. From the kitchen came the pop of a cork. How on earth had I even contemplated such a pitiful charade? Why hadn’t somebody stopped me? I must have been out of my mind. For Christ’s sake, I had never even fired a gun, not a real one. I didn’t know how. I wasn’t a murderer, any more than you are. Something about this place seemed to have unhinged me; working in the movies had obviously warped my sanity. How could I have dreamed up such a ludicrous scenario? It was utterly pathetic.

  Sweltering in the coat, I gazed at the shrouded furniture. I wished I could just cover myself over and curl up in the corner. Nobody need ever see me again. My face burned with embarrassment. Trev’s decorator had already painted one wall a deep red. There was a sheen on it, like oil in a puddle.

  He padded in from the kitchen, carrying a bottle of white wine and two glasses. He put them down carefully on the floor. It was covered with dust-sheets, too.

  ‘Could I have a cigarette?’ I asked. ‘Haven’t got anything with me.’ My teeth seemed to be chattering. Ridiculous, when I was so hot.

  ‘Sure.’ He passed me one, and flicked his lighter open. He still had his old favourite: the brass one filled with petrol. He leant towards me and lit my cigarette. ‘Who knows about this?’

  ‘Nobody.’

  ‘Isn’t Lila in on it? It’s not something you cooked up together? A kind of joke?’

  I shook my head. ‘She was asleep.’

  Sitting in the armchair, he stared at me. ‘What?’

  ‘I let myself into her flat. I’ve got a key.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘She didn’t wake up.’

  ‘Hey, hang on.’ He raised his hand. ‘Hang on a sec. You went into her flat, and dressed yourself up in her clothes?’

  I wished he would shut up. Put like that, it sounded so childish.

  He was too amazed to pass me the glass of wine. He just sat there, staring at me. His mouth hung open.

  ‘You were going to come here,’ he asked, ‘and shoot me? Or pretend to shoot me, or something?’

  I shrugged. ‘Perhaps.’

  My God, he was starting to grin!

  ‘Can I have my wine?’ I asked irritably.

  He passed it over
. He was still staring at me wonderingly, half-grinning. ‘I don’t believe this!’ He pinched his arm. ‘I must be dreaming.’

  ‘Why the hell shouldn’t I?’ I tapped my cigarette into his overflowing ashtray. He was trying to work something out. I watched his face.

  After a moment, he looked up. ‘Let me just get this straight. I’m a bit slow. You wanted people to think it was Lila? Is that it.’

  I took a long drink of the wine. Christ, I needed it.

  ‘If you shot me,’ he went on, ‘you’d let her take the blame?’

  I shrugged my shoulders again. ‘Not really.’

  ‘What were you going to do? Go back to her place and wake her up?’

  I shook my head. ‘Change into my clothes and go home.’

  ‘What about if somebody saw you?’

  ‘There’s a side door,’ I said. I tried to sound dignified, but it didn’t come out right. I wished I hadn’t given him the details; they sounded so laborious.

  He buried his face in his hands, rubbed his face hard, and looked up at me. His hair stood up, ruffled. ‘Christ, Jules, I always knew you were odd, but I never realised you were a complete nutter.’

  ‘I’m not!’

  He sighed, and shook his head. ‘Know something? This is the saddest thing I’ve ever heard. You ought to go and see somebody. Honest.’

  ‘It’s not sad!’

  He tapped his ash on to the dust-sheet. ‘They warned me about you.’

  ‘Who did?’

  ‘Martin. Reece. They said you were bonkers.’

  ‘What the hell do you mean?’

  ‘Come on!’ he said. ‘You’ve always been strange.’

  ‘I’m not!’

  ‘Why do you think you didn’t have any friends?’

  ‘I did! I have!’

  ‘People didn’t like you,’ he said.

  ‘They did!’ I shouted.

  ‘They always said there was something funny about you, but I didn’t listen.’

  ‘That’s not true!’

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ he said. ‘I blame it on your old man. You were always going on about him. How he was so cold, and all. How he didn’t love you.’

  I stubbed my cigarette out, viciously. I was suffocatingly hot but I didn’t want to take off the coat. It seemed too intimate a gesture. I reached down for the bottle and tried to pour myself some more wine. It sloshed out, flooding the glass. I wiped my gloved hand on the coat and replaced the bottle on the floor. Look! Perfectly steadily.

  There was a silence. Down in the street, a car hooted. We sat there. I looked at his hairy ankles. They were still tanned by the sun. Long ago, I had run my fingers over every inch of his body. It seemed inconceivable, now.

  ‘I know you’re upset,’ he said. ‘I don’t blame you. Honest. I know I’ve behaved like a rat.’

  ‘Why did you do it, then?’ I asked.

  ‘Look. I’ll try and explain.’ He gazed helplessly around the room, and then he began. ‘When I met you I was dead impressed,’ he said. He spoke in a reflective voice I had never heard before. ‘I’d never met any birds like you. You had this terrific confidence – you didn’t know you had it, nobody with an education knows they have it, they just take it for granted. Bleeding middle classes.’ He looked up. His unshaven face looked sad; thoughtful, even. ‘You had this Coutts cheque book. I’d never even heard of blooming Coutts. You went to the theatre and stuff. Remember when you talked about Pirandello and I thought you meant tyres? Christ, I felt a wally. You didn’t notice all that because people don’t. Not people like you. And when we went to see your mother it was all latticed windows and Harvey Nichols and funny stories about the cleaning lady.’

  ‘My mother’s a fool.’

  ‘To tell the truth, I was pissed-off. I thought about my Mum, what she’d been through. But know something? I was kind of envious.’

  ‘My father thought she was a fool too.’ I paused, running my finger down the side of the typewriter. It was plated with nickel or something; there was an embossed pattern on it. ‘They both screwed my brother up,’ I said.

  ‘I loved old, solid things,’ said Trev. ‘Real quality. I loved polishing the furniture in Look Back in Ongar.’

  ‘But it was hideous!’

  Smoke dimmed the room. There was a long silence. Then I heard him drawing breath, to speak.

  ‘For the first few months,’ he said, ‘it was fine.’

  ‘Just fine?’

  ‘You were brainy. You knew things. You introduced me to people. I was dead chuffed. They went on about magical realism, not about how many pints they could put back.’ He poured himself out some more wine, emptying the bottle. ‘You being older, it was like having an education all over again. But a real one this time. That’s how I was able to start writing. It’s you that did it.’

  ‘I’m so glad.’

  ‘No, really. I mean it. Straight up.’ He sipped his wine. ‘It took a bit of time before I realised something was missing.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Who was that bloke in The Wizard of Oz?’ he asked. ‘The one without a heart?’

  ‘The tin man,’ I said flatly. I drained my glass. ‘Got any more to drink?’

  He got up and went into the kitchen. I heard the click of a cupboard door.

  I must go! I told myself urgently. I must get out! But I couldn’t move. He came back into the room, holding a bottle of scotch.

  ‘Run out of wine,’ he said.

  ‘Rich old you?’

  ‘I’m trying to cut down on the booze.’

  ‘What the hell do you mean?’ I demanded. ‘Something was missing?’

  He poured some whisky into my wine glass. I remembered, with a stab, how he used to slosh drink into any available container – mugs, teacups – when we were together.

  ‘It’s not your fault,’ he said. ‘I blame it on your Dad.’

  ‘Blame what?’

  ‘That you can’t feel anything.’

  ‘That’s not true!’ I yelled. ‘What the hell do you know?’

  ‘It’s like, you’ve spent all this time developing your mind and you’ve forgotten all about your heart. About how to be a human being.’

  ‘What’s this? Some kind of lecture?’

  ‘It’s what happens to intellectuals,’ he said. ‘You’ve got no spontaneity. That’s what’s so creepy. Like tonight. You’ve planned it all so carefully, it’s kind of sick. Lila’d just storm in here and blow my brains out.’

  I looked at him. ‘Would she?’ I sipped the whisky. It spread through my veins, burning; it spread to my fingertips. ‘Would she?’ I paused. ‘You don’t know me at all,’ I said.

  ‘It’s, like, you’re looking at yourself in a mirror all the time, you’re watching yourself. It’s like you’re permanently masturbating.’

  ‘Don’t be disgusting!’

  ‘Everything’s a performance for yourself,’ he said. ‘Even when we were screwing it was like you’d learnt it in your bleeding drama class –’

  ‘That’s not true!’ I yelled.

  ‘I knew you’d put it about in the past, you told me enough times. Knee-trembles in bus shelters, all the grisly details. Like you were trying to prove something. You’ve always been such a blooming show-off. But why hadn’t you had any real relationships?’

  ‘I had!’ I shouted.

  ‘Martin put it better. I remember, we were sitting in the First Aid van, and he said you’d never be a really good actress because you weren’t connected to your feelings.’

  ‘I am!’ I yelled. ‘What’s this, then? Aren’t these feelings?’

  ‘Oh, you’re technically OK, everybody’s agreed about that. But your acting is a sort of wank. A sort of look-at-me. Why do you think you never got any good parts?’

  ‘That’s not true!’

  ‘Jules, you’re thirty-eight!’

  Actually I was thirty-nine. He had forgotten my latest birthday.

  My head reeled. He lit another cig
arette. I longed for one, but I wasn’t going to demean myself by asking.

  ‘The camera doesn’t lie,’ he said. ‘I’ve learnt that, these last few months. I’ve learnt a lot of things. It sees the truth. That’s why Lila’s made it and you haven’t.’ He paused. ‘It’s nothing to do with luck or looks. Nothing you can try and analyse. It’s to do with feelings. With being true to herself.’

  ‘Talk about wanking! Who taught you to rabbit on like this, ghastly soft-brained American psychobabble? Lila?’

  ‘You’re incredibly superior about her. Her movies, everything. Ever asked yourself why?’

  I didn’t reply. He inspected his cigarette. I watched him, hunched in his blue bathrobe.

  ‘I’m just trying to explain,’ he said. ‘Why I did what I did.’ He lifted his head and looked up. Not at me; through me. When he spoke, his voice was soft. ‘When we met, it was incredibly strong. The most physically strong sensation I’ve ever had.’

  My heart lurched. ‘Was it?’ I thought he was talking about me.

  ‘It was lust, really. For years I’d lusted after her.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Lila. Lots of others too, of course. Kim what’ shername. Basinger. Who wouldn’t? That’s the point of them. I even used to pretend, sometimes, in the dark –’

  ‘You said you didn’t!’

  ‘But the minute we met, in the pub, I knew I’d – like, found the person I’d been searching for all my life. Like, the other me. I’d heard about it but I’d never thought it would happen to me. We’re very similar, see. We’re sort of, like, related. Oh I can’t explain it.’

  I sat there, motionless, on the swivel chair. His face looked dreamy and composed.

  ‘I thought she didn’t feel the same way. How could she? She was famous. What’d she see in a berk like me? She was older than me, she’d had two husbands. All that. But then she called me, soon after she got back to New York. We started talking on the phone, for hours . . .’

  His voice went on. It was low, now, as if he were talking to himself. I suddenly realised that he was looking through me just like the directors I had worked with, who were only concerned with the lighting. I was simply a shape in a chair.

  ‘She isn’t clever like you. She’s neurotic and insecure. I know all that. She has lots of faults but it doesn’t matter. It’s not like a balance sheet. I mean, I could make a long list of your qualities but it doesn’t really make any difference, does it? Not really.’ He talked about me as if I were something lying on the floor, an old pullover or something, that he had forgotten to put away in the cupboard. ‘She’s loveable, that’s what’s so special about her. She’s herself. It’s kind of difficult to explain.’