by Anne Girard
Energized by the swim, she smoothed her wet hair back from her face, then propped her elbows up onto the edge of the pool. Chuck, relaxing in his khaki shorts and white polo shirt, smiled down at her.
“How would you like to go to the pictures tonight after supper? Lights of New York is playing over at Grauman’s.”
“Oh, could we, Chuck? That’s an actual talkie!”
“Your wish is my command,” he said and made a gallant half bow from his waist.
“I love Grauman’s. Mommie and I went there to see Lon Chaney in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. It’s beautiful inside. That was the same night I saw Miss Pola Negri.”
She came out of the pool and he wrapped her in the towel, then closed his arms around her.
After she dressed, they went to a cute little malt shop on Sunset Boulevard and sat in a red leather booth along the windows. Harlean loved the bustling city view.
She had changed into a conservative gray skirt, a short-sleeved rose-colored angora sweater, white socks and sneakers. He never liked the way men stared at her, even with her face freshly scrubbed, free of cosmetics, and her short blond hair brushed back from her face, yet they did anyway. She was as aware of their attention as he was, and she could feel Chuck bristle each time.
“Mommie always says it’s just my hair that makes them look since there aren’t many gals with my particular shade.”
“More likely, it’s the face and body that goes with it,” he said, but he wasn’t smiling.
She didn’t like Chuck to feel jealous, but having been a bookish tomboy not so very long ago, secretly she reveled in the sensation she had when men acknowledged her. Mother had always been the beauty of the family, tall and shapely, with a dignified air. It had been difficult growing up in the shadow of what had seemed to her like a very bright light. But things were changing. She wasn’t in that shadow at the moment. The sunshine belonged to her. Being back in an exciting city like Hollywood was only the beginning of a transformation that she could actually feel. It was exciting just to contemplate growing into her own version of womanhood here, and the things that might mean for her life with Chuck. She wished she could tell him about it, but she wouldn’t dare. At least not yet.
* * *
The theater was packed since this first full-length talkie was the hottest ticket in town and people sat chattering excitedly and then cheering as the house lights were lowered. Harlean loved not having to read the dialogue and she found the new style of film, hearing what she was seeing, entirely captivating.
After it was over, and the audience had applauded, Harlean and Chuck walked outside beneath the bright theater lights and into the cool evening air. There were more handprints and signatures here now than when she was last here. It was exhilarating even to contemplate that stars like Mary Pickford, her husband, Douglas Fairbanks, Tom Mix and Harold Lloyd, true Hollywood royalty, had stood in these very spots and pressed their hands and shoes into wet cement to the cheers of adoring crowds.
She found Clara Bow’s square and stood in those footprints for her mother’s sake. She shivered at the feeling of being so close to the impression of someone so famous. She would tell her mother all about it when she phoned her on Sunday. Teenage fantasy spurred her on, and her heart beat very fast as she wondered what it must be like to be so adored by legions of fans, or to step before a camera knowing your hairstyle, your outfits and even your lipstick shade, would be copied around the world.
“Here’s Pola Negri, doll!” Chuck called out. Then he held up his hands as if he were holding out a microphone. “Say a few words to your fans, Miss Negri,” he playfully bid her.
Harlean smiled, then lowered her head and lifted her eyes as she’d seen the exotic actress do in the magazines. Then, with just a touch of embarrassment, she read what Negri had written in the cement.
“‘Dear Sid, I love your theater. April 1928...’ Oh, gosh, Chuck, she just did these! That’s so exciting to think!”
“What is your favorite thing about being such a big star, Miss Negri, adored everywhere?”
Chuck’s prompting made her giggle.
“Going to bed with my interviewers, most definitely.”
“Why, you vamp.” He smiled.
“How would you like to be my next conquest...what’s your name again?” she asked, innocently batting her eyes and thoroughly enjoying the sudden silly role playing.
“McGrew’s the name, Chuck McGrew. But I’ve got to warn you, I’ve got a very jealous wife.”
“Is that so?”
“Oh, absolutely,” he said with a devilish grin as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder. “But what she doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”
“If I’m a vamp, you, sir, sure are a cad.”
“Admit it, that’s your favorite thing about me.”
“Not my absolute favorite thing,” she returned, happily playing along as they walked out onto Hollywood Boulevard toward their car.
“Time to get you to bed, doll.”
“I thought you’d never ask,” she teased. He held the door and she climbed into the shiny green roadster.
“I’ve got a surprise for you.”
“For Miss Negri, or your wife?”
“Why don’t you surprise me on that score?”
“A cad and a rake,” she said as he slid onto the seat beside her and started the great rumbling engine.
Chapter Two
The next morning, Harlean couldn’t help but feel excited when Chuck told her the surprise he had in store was waiting for her here in Beverly Hills. She hadn’t seen much of this exclusive new residential area on her last trip to California, so that made the prospect even more enticing. It was still a relatively new neighborhood, one ornamented by curving lanes, vast stone or brick estates, a variety of charming Spanish-style bungalows and Tudor cottages—along with some still-empty wide, deep lots. Emerald lawns and rows of tall palm trees bordered lush parks and bridle trails. It was a true sanctuary from the bustling city nearby, and a world away from Kansas City.
“Now what do you think of this fine street?” Chuck asked her. “It’s called Linden Drive.”
“Very posh,” she said, as they pulled over in front of a white stucco house with a terra-cotta roof. There was a small palm tree in the front yard and two bird of paradise plants framing the door. “Why are we stopping?”
“Because we’re home. God, I hope you like it. If you don’t, I’m in big trouble since I put a hefty down payment on the place, sight-unseen, a few weeks ago.”
Her mouth fell open.
“You did what?”
“Married people need a proper home, doll. I wanted to give you that as a wedding gift. Since you liked it so much out here near Hollywood, it just seemed a good place for us to officially start our new life. The real estate agent told me this is one of the best streets in the area. Lots of stylish young couples, and movie types, are buying here right now.”
In her mind, movie stars were like royalty. She and her mother had excitedly combed through all of the Hollywood magazines every month for as long as she could remember. They had read and knew every word of gossip about their exciting lives and careers. Like her mother, Harlean, too, had placed those glamorous icons on pedestals they could see but never quite reach. The prospect of actually living here among them was too spectacular to fully fathom.
He shoved his hands nervously into his trouser pockets. “So, do you like the place?”
“It’s adorable on the outside, Chuck, but can I see the rest of it?”
Of course she would love it, but this was all so sudden. It was hard to know what to think, or even how to react, to his cascading generosity. Most new husbands bought their brides flowers or jewelry, not pretty houses in Beverly Hills. It seemed as if there was nothing he would not do to make her happy.
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br /> As they stood facing the house, he took the key from a pocket in his trousers. “Here, take it. It’s yours.”
“The key or the house?”
“Both. And all of my heart, too.”
She kissed his cheek, and then he led her up the brick walkway. After he opened the front door, Chuck scooped her up and whisked her across the threshold.
Harlean found the house too charming for words. After he put her down, she first took in the beamed living room with a fireplace inset with indigo tiles. It was bright and sunny, and smelled new, like oil soap and fresh paint. Her heart was racing.
Next, they went into the dining room and on to the kitchen overlooking the back of the house. There was no furniture in the place yet, except in the bedroom, where a mattress was made up on the floor with pillows and a patchwork quilt. At the foot of the bed, Chuck had somehow placed a carved satinwood table that had belonged to his mother. A huge crystal vase sat on top, brimming with white orchids. They had always been Harlean’s favorite flower for how delicate they appeared, but how hardy they were if tended to properly. Her hand went to her lips as she stifled a gasp of surprise.
“It’s all just so perfect,” she said in a whisper.
“Are you sure you like it?”
“Of course! I can’t believe you did all of this for me.”
“Who else is there, doll? You’re everything to me, so you’d better get used to your husband spoiling the daylights out of you.”
Harlean melted against him, then twined her arms around his neck and kissed him tenderly. Passion was never very far off after a kiss between them. “Touch has a memory. O say, love, say.” The words of John Keats threaded themselves back through her mind. She had loved that poem since the first time she had read it and feeling Chuck’s touch often brought it back to her.
“I’ll never get tired of the way you taste,” he murmured as their kiss deepened, and he pulled her more tightly against him. “I really am the luckiest man alive.”
“What do you say we christen the place?” she asked.
“Right now?”
“Why not? I don’t know how you did all of this without me finding out, and on top of everything you made sure we’d have a bed.”
“I’m discovering there’s not a lot money can’t buy.”
“I’m not sure if you’re more handsome or more resourceful.”
“As long as we christen this new bed right now, I don’t care which one of those gets first place,” he said in a low voice thickened by lust.
Afterward, Chuck fetched a hotel picnic basket from the trunk of the car and spread a red-and-white-checkered tablecloth on the living room floor in front of the fireplace. They feasted on ham sandwiches, a cluster of purple grapes and a wedge of cheese. Chuck had brought along a bottle of Champagne from his father’s secret wine cellar in Chicago. Harlean flinched with surprise as the cork popped and he filled two teacups with the bubbly French nectar to celebrate the occasion. He stretched out, propped his head on an elbow and gazed over at her as she sat cross-legged in her bathrobe.
“A penny for your thoughts,” he bid her.
“I just never thought life could be this good. If this is a dream, I never want to wake up. That’s exactly what I’m thinking.”
“Are you sure it’s enough?”
“A husband I love and a home? Why wouldn’t it be?”
“There must be something more. When you were a little girl, what did you want to be when you grew up?”
“Happy,” she said truthfully. “That was it. And I am.”
Harlean waited a moment to let that settle on him then, as it did, she watched his eyebrows knit together as his expression became a frown. “You don’t want to be an actress or anything, since we’re out here in Hollywood, do you?”
She could tell that the prospect was unsettling to him. They both knew that it was a difficult, demanding and largely disappointing dream for those determined to pursue it.
“Now, why would I want to go and do that? I saw how frustrating it was for my mother—the endless auditions and all those doors slammed in her face. That kind of rejection is for fools. No, thank you.”
Harlean may have inherited that stubborn streak from her mother, and an absolute iron will for getting things she wanted, but better to savor her books, her new home and her marriage, and to enjoy the glitter and glamour of Hollywood from a distance.
* * *
Late in the afternoon two days later, a group of their neighbors organized a party to welcome them. The neighborhood was comprised of a wealthy young society crowd. Fit, tan men wearing monogrammed oxford shirts, linen trousers and bow ties bantered with each other as they carried bottles of bootleg gin up Chuck and Harlean’s walkway. Beside them, their pretty wives and girlfriends wore a confectionary-colored array of cashmere sweaters and ropes of pearls. Each came bearing a casserole, a cake or martini glasses.
As the sun began to set behind the bristling palm trees outside, twenty people crowded into the living room, which was decorated so far with only a sofa, two folding chairs and a flea-market side table. Chuck whispered to her that he’d heard them talking, and two of the girls were heiresses, and one was the daughter of a studio boss.
Harlean herself had been raised in an upper-class group in Missouri and after her mother had remarried, she was educated at a posh private school outside of Chicago. But these people were a cut above that. There was a carefree air that surrounded them, and it was instantly intimidating. Harlean had a feeling that this party was actually designed more to size them up than welcome them.
Just when she was starting to think that this might’ve been a mistake, she saw someone she recognized. The mood lightened instantly as an old friend of hers came up the walkway carrying a bouquet of daisies. She wore a pretty floral dress cinched at the waist and a similar rope of pearls to the other girls.
“Rosalie McCray?” Harlean shrieked with surprise at the pretty, petite girl with the chestnut curls suddenly standing before her. “Gosh, what are you doing here? I remember you told us you lived near Hollywood, but I never imagined!”
“Who else do you think organized this little party?”
The girls embraced and Harlean took the flowers from her. “I wrote to your address in Chicago as soon as we all left the cruise, just like I promised I would,” Rosalie explained. Her accent was sugary sweet, and pure Texas.
“I suppose you didn’t receive it before you came out here? Anyway, Ivor heard that the two of you had moved in right down the street from us so we had to be the first to welcome you to our little corner of heaven.”
Chuck and Harlean had met Rosalie and her husband, Ivor, on their honeymoon cruise through the Panama Canal in January, and the two couples had quickly become friends. Rosalie and Harlean found they had a great deal in common since both of them had been teenage brides with rich young husbands.
“Good to see you again, Rosie,” Chuck said after he’d pressed a breezy kiss onto Rosalie’s cheek. “Like a toddy, kids?”
Chuck had solemnly promised Harlean just that afternoon that he was only going to drink a little today while they entertained their neighbors, but she could tell that he had already knocked back a couple of stiff ones. His voice always grew just a little louder when he was drinking. Knowing that he used alcohol to bolster his confidence, she could see that he felt well out of his league with these people, trust fund or not. Secretly, his drinking frightened her because she suspected his reason for it was deeper than just wanting confidence. She believed, probably subconsciously, it was to keep from confronting his grief over the death of his parents, but for now she tried to put her mind on happier thoughts.
“Gosh, I’m happy to see you,” Harlean exclaimed once Chuck had wandered off.
Rosalie glanced around the crowded bungalow. “Chuck sure got you a
swell place here, honey. You know, last month Miss Clara Bow herself moved into the neighborhood, just a couple of blocks from here,” she said in a gossipy tone.
“No! My mother would die of envy!” Harlean squealed, and then they both giggled. “Think she’d mind if we popped over for a cup of sugar?”
“So, how have things been between the two of you since the cruise?”
Rosalie asked the question so suddenly that Harlean was thrown off guard.
“Things are great,” she answered, and she knew that it had been too quickly.
Harlean’s friendship with Rosalie had been cemented when Chuck had gotten so drunk one night that he had passed out at the dinner table and had to be carried to his stateroom by two waiters. Rosalie had helped her outside as she’d wept, and the two had spent the rest of that evening up on deck watching the stars and talking about their childhoods.
She hated having to make excuses for Chuck but she couldn’t bear to have anyone think poorly of him.
“Honestly, he’s doing great now that we’re here. That one night with you guys was just a fluke. We’d had that quarrel after he’d had too much to drink. That’s all it was.”
Rosalie followed Harlean’s gaze across the room to Chuck. At the moment, he was telling an animated story with great gesticulations.
“Of course that was it, honey. They’re all like that once in a while. So what do you say to lunch tomorrow, just the two of us girls? I’ll show you around town.”
“Gosh, that’d be great.”
“Can we take your car? Ivor has to take ours for an early tee off time with a few of the boys.”
“Sure, but do you suppose Chuck can tag along to the golf course? I’m not sure what else he’d do around here all day while I’m gone.”
She didn’t want to say that she was nervous he’d sit alone and drink.