“I’m sorry I missed that. I would’ve liked to hear you really sing.”
“I’m not that good anymore now that I haven’t done it much in years.”
“You were a singer?”
“Sort of. Musicals and choir in high school and a couple of shows in college. Nothing very serious. I never thought to pursue it. I can’t write music and, really, it’s the writing that matters. There are a lot of famous bands with singers who don’t have great voices, but you don’t see too many great singers who can’t write other than those geared for that horrible teeny-bopper marketing machine.”
Will grimaced.
“What? What did I say?” I asked.
“Nothing. It’s just . . . well, you know that I was sort of part of that teeny-bopper marketing machine. Midnight was written with 12-to-17 year-olds in mind. It ended up having broader appeal, but my casting and a lot of the early marketing was meant to appeal to that demographic.”
“Really?” I then felt bad about what I had said. I didn’t mean to insult him.
“Yes. And I can tell you that I didn’t like it at first. I kind of rebelled, I guess you would say.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, just before Midnight 1 was released and for a while afterward, I tried not to be the perfect PG-13 kind of guy. There were a lot of tabloid photos of me with cigarettes in my mouth stumbling out of bars. One of the worst TV tabloids even recorded me at a Hollywood hangout with a group of women.”
While he spoke, I had visions of him acting like a Hollywood bad boy, but couldn’t reconcile that with the man sitting in front of me now.
“It was not good. I know that the production company was a little worried for a while. It was Katherine who finally sat me down and asked me what I thought I was doing. She had been in the business since she was ten and had seen a lot of people get sucked into the fast nightlife in L.A. and spit out. She said she thought I was better than that.
“I knew she was right. It wasn’t like I was really even having any fun. Most of the people I met only wanted to hang out with the star of Midnight. They couldn’t have cared less about me personally.
“I dropped out of the party scene at that point and started reconnecting with friends I had made that were not part of that scene, like Stephen and Colin and the guys at the Rugby Club.”
“I think I really appreciate Katherine now,” I said. Will’s story made me even more anxious to finally meet her.
“I’m glad because, although I think you’re cute when you’re jealous, you really have nothing to be jealous of.”
A slow song came on and Will asked me to dance. With our arms around each other, it was like we were the only two people in the room. He kissed me when the song was over.
“I think it’s starting to clear out in here. You ready to go? I have an idea of something that I want to do before I start getting stalked again.”
We drove up into the Hollywood Hills to a spot on private property with a panoramic view of L.A. We entered a curved driveway with a small one-story house with a partial stone façade. We parked at the end of the curve in the driveway that hung over the hill.
“Are you sure it’s okay we’re here?” I asked as I noticed that there were a few lights on in the house.
“It’s fine. This is a friend’s house and he’s gone, shooting a film in Canada.”
“Would I know who it is?”
“He, Neil, was with us at the concert back in March. He’s a DP – Director of Photography.”
“I think I remember: tall, shorter blond hair, goatee.” Another Brit. Not a surprise.
“Yes, you have a good memory.”
Will then got out of the car and walked around to let me out of the car. It was a relatively warm evening. He put his arms around me and we looked out over the lights of L.A. below. He started to kiss me and, as it got a little more involved, he took me into the back seat of his car to continue.
Chapter Fourteen
I spent most of the weekend finishing packing. The movers were due first thing Monday morning. Will was there to help most of the time although he had a lunch meeting with some producers that were considering him for a film scheduled to shoot just after Midnight 4. My parents were there as well to help on Saturday, but only part of Sunday as they had to drive back to the Bay Area so my father could be at work on Monday morning. Matt remained until he had to leave for his evening flight to San Francisco.
On Monday morning, the moving trucks came. Kelly’s furniture and boxes went in one truck to go to the Bay Area and mine in another to be taken to storage. I had already packed my car with all the things I would need until I returned from Europe in September. It wasn’t much.
Will left early in the morning to meet with his personal trainer. I laughed when he told me that he would spend a good portion of Midnight 4 with his shirt off and that the producers had recommended that he work a little more on his definition. I considered it funny how much thought and effort went into an actor’s appearance. I imagined that it had to be one-hundred times worse for the women. I sighed, thanking God I didn’t have to put up with that kind of scrutiny. At the same time, I considered the fact that Will may have been used to women who spent a lot of time and money on their appearance and wondered whether or not he wished I did. Since there was nothing I could do about it, I tried to put it out of my mind.
Kelly and I went over the apartment with the vacuum, which was the last thing to go into the truck. We had a few cleaning supplies that I was going to take into USC Housing with me and we went over the apartment again to try to ensure that we would get most of our deposit back.
We turned in our keys, and headed out to our tandem space in the underground parking to depart. We gave each other hugs.
“Are you going to be okay?” Kelly asked with concern.
“Yes, of course. Why?” I had no idea what she could possibly mean.
“Well, you know things might change when the spotlight hits Will again in a few weeks. Will was mentioning it the other day and seemed worried.”
“Will is worried about me, not about us. I think that, if we’re careful, it should be fine.”
“If you say so. Talk to you when I get into the City.” Kelly was moving with two friends of hers into the top floor of a Victorian row house in the Pacific Heights area of San Francisco.
Kelly got into her car, backed out of the tandem space, and waved behind her after running over the sensor that opened the garage gate.
I waved, climbed into my car, and headed out to USC to pick up my new keys and move into my one-bedroom furnished apartment that would be my temporary home until the Bar Exam.
That very night was my first Bar review class from 6-to-10 p.m. on the Westside. My new roommate, Carrie, and I went to dinner beforehand and drove to class together as was our planned routine for the next two months. Carrie and I had registered for the Bar review live lectures as opposed to the DVD classes. We figured that we were more likely to stay awake that way.
Carrie was younger than almost all of us in my law school class as she had graduated from high school at sixteen, college at twenty, and was therefore only twenty-three years-old. She seemed even younger than that. Carrie was waif-like and a little shorter than me, and had shaggy dark brown hair, very pale skin with no freckles, and deep blue eyes. It was quite clear that her ancestors had been Irish.
It was not immediately obvious how intelligent Carrie was as she mostly acted like a goofball. Notwithstanding, Carrie had a photographic memory and graduated third in my class. That was really saying something since number one in our class was a middle-aged woman who had been a high-level vice president at a large national bank and was aiming at a second high-powered career, and number two was a professor who had become a professional student at USC, compiling as many different degrees as he could.
Carrie was kind of quirky, which gave her a lot of her charm. She was an avid tabloid reader, the sleazier the tabloid, the better. She planned
on sleeping in a sleeping bag on top of her bed fully-dressed every night. Sheets, comforters and nightgowns were not her thing. It must have been an interesting adjustment for her boyfriend, Jeff, ten years her senior.
The first Bar review instructor was the Constitutional Law professor from USC. Carrie had been one of his researchers and I had him for several classes over the course of my tenure at USC. Consequently, we, along with others in the class from USC, felt comfortable heckling him every once in a while. This made the class a little more entertaining as he was so earnest and would turn bright red when we did so. We wondered if it would show up on the DVD for the other classes or whether they would edit out those parts.
After class, we drove to the Royalist because I wanted Carrie to get to know Will a little better since she was bound to see him quite a bit over the summer. She had met him briefly at graduation and at the party afterward, but neither provided much of an opportunity for them to talk.
It was a Monday night at the Royalist so it wasn’t very crowded. However, it was a little busier than usual in that it was getting to be the start of summer when people went out a little more often during the week.
Prepared for our outing, I dressed up a little in a grey and black knit skirt and black fitted top with a low-cut neckline that Will had seemed to appreciate in the past. Carrie dressed very casually as she always did in fairly unisex attire of non-designer blue jeans and an olive-green Henley shirt, that showed off how tiny she was.
Carrie and I made it to the Royalist by about ten-thirty to find Will, Stephen, Kate, Colin and Gemma waiting at one of the low tables adjacent to the darts section on the left-hand side of the pub. As we joined Will and his friends, I was having trouble remembering my life without Will. Had it only been two months since Will and I met here? Although it seemed natural, it was scary to think how serious we had become so fast.
I sat down in the wooden chair that Will had moved very close to his own, so close in fact, that my left side was flush against him when I sat down. He put his arm around me. Carrie sat on the other side of me, next to Colin.
After introductions, the ordering of drinks, and some casual conversation about Carrie’s and my summer plans to study for the Bar together, I informed Will of Carrie’s addiction to tabloids.
“I have to tell you, Will, that Carrie is an avid tabloid reader. She has piles in our room. She even reads the ones that talk about alien abductions.”
Will blushed, likely worried about what she might have read.
“All the stories are one-hundred percent true, of course,” Carrie said teasingly. “I’ve been reading about you for years. It was all I could do to keep from warning Shannon about you.” She winked at him.
He blushed even more. “I wouldn’t believe everything you read,” he said quietly, still embarrassed.
I was certain he was wondering what she could have read. All I could think was, “Was it really that bad?” and then I couldn’t stop myself from saying it out loud.
“No, just from reading that stuff, I would never have pictured you two together. I would have thought Shannon would be a little too straight and narrow for you,” she said as she faced Will, baiting him.
I was sure there must have been some concern reflected in my face.
“She’s actually perfect for me. I was having a hard time adjusting for a while and a lot of that stuff was way overblown or made up anyway.”
“I’m just winding you up,” Carrie said, with a broad smile, and winked. “It’s what I do. Besides, Shannon has told me about you and how well you treat her so I believe you.”
Will looked relieved, but that changed when he looked at me. I probably didn’t look too happy.
“What?” he asked in my ear as he tried to read my expression.
“Nothing. I’m fine,” I replied in his ear, not wanting Carrie to hear.
Colin grabbed Carrie’s attention, no doubt as a result of having seen Will’s and my unhappy faces.
“Obviously, it’s not nothing,” Will said openly now that Carrie wasn’t listening to us.
“It’s just what Carrie said about not seeing us together. You could have anyone you want. Look at that woman over there staring at you and those two over there,” I said as I nodded in the direction of the women. “I dislike feeling insecure intensely, and seem to feel that way quite often these days.”
“Don’t. I said that you were perfect for me and I meant it. Anyway, you think I don’t feel that way too?”
“Why would you?”
“Right. I keep forgetting how clueless you are. Let’s both try to put our jealousy aside for now. Just remember it goes both ways.”
“I’ll try.”
Will perked up after that and we all had a very good time. Carrie, silly as always, was the source of much amusement. Her goofiness was the perfect foil for the English wit of Will and his friends.
Carrie later returned to USC alone and Will drove me back to his place, planning on dropping me back at my place before a meeting in the morning. Stephen, Colin and their girlfriends drove home separately.
On the way home, I noticed a change in Will’s mood. He wasn’t his usual talkative self.
“What’s wrong? You’re being quiet.”
“Nothing. It’s just that I’m sometimes afraid that, if you have to deal with me as a movie star, you won’t like me anymore.”
I never ceased to be amazed that he was insecure about my feelings for him.
I rolled my eyes as I said, “I don’t just like you. I love you. I told you that I don’t care about that stuff.”
“You may change your mind. It hasn’t really affected you much yet. The promotional tour starts on Wednesday. The madness begins then.”
“What do you mean ‘madness’?”
“Screaming girls, people following me around, losing complete control over my schedule. I won’t be able to see you much for a while, and then the tabloid articles will follow, many of them making stuff up about me. It won’t be pleasant.”
“I’m telling you it doesn’t matter. Nothing will change the way I feel about you.”
We pulled up into the garage and the door closed behind the car. Before we got out of the car, he said quietly, but a little forlorn, “I hope so.”
Chapter Fifteen
I decided to treat studying for the Bar like a job. I started around nine in the morning after coming home from Will’s. Carrie and I sat together with our laptops and extra-long Bar review books at the dining table just to the side of our small living room, furnished in basic brown furniture. We had a big pile of highlighter pens in front of us in multiple colors. I don’t know if the highlighters made a whole lot of difference as I seemed to highlight almost every word as I read.
We goofed around a little at first. It was hard to readjust to studying again.
I took a shower at lunchtime to take a break from studying and ate my microwaved lunch in front of Carrie’s miniscule TV. She liked cartoons, child that she was, so we watched cartoons.
We then studied some more until about 4 p.m. when we left to pick up some fast-food for dinner on our way to class.
Upon exiting class into the postage stamp-sized parking lot, I found Will waiting for me. My classmates stared as I rushed up to him to give him a big kiss. He grabbed my book bag and my overnight bag and walked me to his car parked a few blocks away. We entered his house and I found that we were completely alone.
“Where are Colin and Stephen?” I asked.
“Working. Night shoots. Anyway, I wanted to be completely alone with you since I can’t count on when we’ll be able to be together for a while.”
Will put my bags down in the dining room and led me to the patio that was all lit up with tiny lights. Soft music was playing. It was still warm outside, cooler than it had been during the day, but not unpleasant. The usual late-Spring fog didn’t look like it was coming in this evening.
“Wow. It’s beautiful out here.”
“The benefit of h
aving a lighting expert as a roommate.”
He lit candles on the table up on the deck. He went inside to grab a bottle of wine and two wine glasses and returned to the patio, to find me staring out into the darkness.
“You look sad,” he said as he held his hands holding the full wineglasses to each side so he could lean forward and kiss me.
I grabbed one of the glasses and took a sip.
“I am. I don’t like not seeing you for a whole day, much less what probably will be weeks.”
“I promise that, if I can get away to see you, I will. I just don’t want you to get caught up in the storm, particularly when you have to concentrate on studying for the Bar. My schedule is ugly. I’ve got a syndicated radio show tomorrow morning, the L.A. premiere tomorrow night, a chat show Thursday morning, another in the afternoon, and a nighttime talk show on Thursday evening.
“Then I take a red eye to New York to make it to a chat show Friday morning, a late night show Friday evening, some newspaper and pre-tapings of radio interviews during the day on Saturday, and the premiere there Saturday night. I fly to Chicago on Sunday for another chat show there on Monday.
“If the plans remain firm, I fly home Monday night and leave almost immediately for the British and European premieres, interviews and talk shows the following week. I go from there to Sydney and Tokyo for the final round. So that’s three weeks, assuming I can’t find a break to see you.
“I won’t even get to see my parents when I’m in England other than at the London premiere itself, and that’s if I can pull myself away from the publicists, press and fans long enough to say ‘hello.’”
“Your parents are going? Don’t you worry that the press will invade their privacy as well?” I asked sounding hurt that they could be included in this and not me.
“It’s not the same. The press is far more interested in my love-life than my family. My parents and sisters are pretty much left alone other than a few pictures at premieres now and again.”
I was certain I still looked sad. In fact, I wanted to cry, but worked hard to hold back the tears.
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