Heartland

by Davis Bunn

  Only his target was not on the set at all, but rather off in Sioux Falls, silent and distant.

  On his time off he started teaching those who were interested what it meant to ride the high range. Derek had probably the worst seat on a horse of anybody JayJay had ever come across. But the guy was sure game. Peter too. Even Claire started coming out with them. When she was along, though, she made him practice his lines to the forests and the birds and the clouds. Shouting out the words, yelling himself hoarse, learning what it meant to test his limits. He never got over his embarrassment, but he learned to shove it aside, back with all the other questions he was doing his best to leave up to God.

  He ate his dinners with Peter and Cynthia. Afternoons she came out to the set by limo and either walked the ranch trails or rested in JayJay’s trailer. Soon as they were done, they took off in his truck, the limo driver standing by his empty machine and watching their cloud of dust. They avoided Salton City, where word was out about JayJay Parsons and his upcoming talk. They explored the region, looping through dusty towns and miles of citrus groves and fields of asparagus and artichokes. The twisting highland roads left Cynthia queasy, so where possible they held to the valley floors. They ate when they grew tired of driving. Their talk was of life beyond the set, JayJay asking but never giving much. After he deflected their questions a few times, they stopped enquiring. Too close to him now to pry. Satisfied just to forget for a few hours that there was anything out there called Hollywood.

  Saturday was the longest workday yet, longer even than the studio shoot. They started while sunrise was a faint eastern promise and worked long after night had taken control. The entire day was spent on the streets of Salton City, doing the setup for Monday’s assembly. JayJay worked against a variety of add-ons, actors whose single lines of dialogue were listed in the script under names like “First Developer,” “Second Mexican Farmer,” “Shopkeeper’s Wife.” Everywhere they went, they stopped traffic. The crowds were a problem until Britt hired the Ford salesman named Piston to call for silence before each take. Piston had a hog-caller’s yell that halted traffic on the interstate. The locals minded him far better than they did Kip.

  They had taken over the Main Street Diner as a location center. Deep into a grueling sunset scene, Britt drew JayJay into the diner’s back room. “How are you holding up?”

  JayJay collapsed into a seat, too tired even to complain when the makeup person started dabbing his forehead. “Wore plumb to a nub.”

  “I want you to see something.”

  Derek hit a switch. JayJay groaned. There before him was the same scene Britt had shown him in his suite. Wooden as a plug nickel. JayJay complained, “Why don’t you just take me out back and shoot my sorry hide?”

  “That was then,” Britt said. He waited until Derek gave him the nod, and said, “This is now.”

  Tired as he was, JayJay came forward in his seat. There on the screen was a man he knew and yet didn’t know. A man who wasn’t fumbling through words that didn’t fit inside his mouth. Instead, he saw a local rancher. A man weary and dusty from just another day with too many chores and too few hours. Talking to his neighbors and his friends. Sharing their woes. A man doing his best. Which wasn’t enough to solve the problems they faced. But they faced the problems together. JayJay didn’t need to say the words. It was there on the screen.

  He was one of them.

  When the screen went dark, Britt said, “You see?”

  JayJay had not noticed Peter leaning against the back wall until then. “I wish you could know what it’s like, seeing the images in my head come to life like that.”

  Britt said, “That is acting.”

  The makeup lady whispered, “I’ve got chills.”

  Britt said, “I want to shoot one more scene.”

  JayJay groaned.

  “Hear me out. You’ve come into town, just doing your weekly run.

  You’ve wound up hearing the same story told from five different angles. How the town is worried and hurting and doesn’t have any answers. How good things are dying before they ever get a chance to live.”

  JayJay said nothing.

  “How the old ways are being lost. How people, your people, are adrift and confused. You didn’t ask them to talk with you about their problems. But they’ve sought you out.”

  JayJay sat and stared at the empty screen.

  Britt said, “We can do this another day if you like.”

  JayJay pushed himself from the chair. “I feel like a gunslinger facing down a wolf pack with one bullet left in his shooter.”

  Britt actually smiled. “That is exactly what I intend to capture.”

  When they were back outside, Britt continued with his instructions. “You don’t want this new concern they’re shoving at you. You wish the townspeople would just go away. But you’ve known these folks and this town all your life. They have come to you because you’re one of them. They see in you what you don’t want to see yourself.”

  JayJay stood in the center of Main Street. Traffic was diverted to roads on either side. Derek was to his right, next to the camera on the dolly, a little vehicle with rubber wheels and a collapsible carriage that could move soundlessly from ground level to four stories high. Carpenters had laid out a carpeted lane of wooden planks hooked together that would smooth the dolly’s progress and keep the camera from jiggling as it tracked JayJay’s walk down the road.

  A second camera was next to JayJay, armed with a close-up lens long as a Winchester barrel. Derek checked through the camera viewfinder, then used his walkie-talkie to communicate with the electricians manning the lights. There must have been a couple hundred people packed behind the rope barriers, filling the sidewalks, forming a human half-moon behind them. But they were so quiet JayJay could hear the electricians thumping on the lights with their little rubber mallets, readjusting the aim.

  Britt said, “You are going to do the toughest thing an actor ever faces. You are going to communicate the tumult and the confusion and the fear. And you are going to do so without ever opening your mouth.”

  There were a couple of police officers on crowd-control duty. But they had nothing to do. Children stood at the front of the crowd, but they were as quiet and still as their parents. Somewhere in the distance a bird chirped. Derek’s walkie-talkie crackled. A carpenter whacked a final hook of Derek’s carpeted lane into place.

  “You are going to walk down this road. Up ahead is your enemy.” Britt’s gesture took in the dark and empty street. “It’s not just the night, though, is it.”

  “No.”

  “Don’t tell me, JayJay. This isn’t about telling. Show me you understand. Show me you see the enemy there inside yourself. Attacking now at your weakest. When you’re not just tired. You’re terrified. You’re afraid of failing. Afraid of letting these people down. Afraid they’ll see you for what you know you are.”

  “Afraid of all the mysteries,” JayJay muttered.

  This time Britt did not contradict. “These people believe you are the one to help them. The one with answers. But you know all the faults you carry. All the mysteries. All the doubts and questions without answers. They think you are real. But you know better.”

  JayJay nodded slowly. Oh yes. He knew.

  Britt let him study the empty road ahead. Giving him enough time to get so totally locked into the moment that all the people vanished. And the lights and the cameras. Until it all focused down to the choice.

  “What are you going to do, JayJay? What decision are you going to make?”

  JayJay did not look at him. It wasn’t about Britt anymore. Or the night. It was just him.

  “All right. Now go out there and show me what you’ve decided to do, and who you are going to be. For these people, and for yourself.”

  Sunday was just another working day for about half the crew. They were busy turning a derelict dance hall into a civic center, their gift to the community in lieu of actually paying the extras—an idea hammered out b
etween the mayor and Britt. At dawn JayJay held an abbreviated prayer time for those who were on duty—the set designers, carpenters, electricians, and camera crew. Cynthia was there, Peter was absent. Kelly was still away. For once, JayJay welcomed yesterday’s residual fatigue. Being so tired made it easier to face having lost a good woman before the connection ever took hold.

  He went back to his room and dozed for a couple more hours, then accompanied Cynthia to church. It was a modern facility built with a hometown flavor—stone walls, redwood beams, painted Mexican tiles for decorative artwork. JayJay sort of floated through the service, there but far away. Still coming to terms with the previous day—and what lay ahead. The next afternoon he was scheduled to address the town.

  Peter and the mayor found him after the service was over. Miller wore his customary grin. “How’s your new ride?”

  “Makes getting out of bed worthwhile,” JayJay said.

  “Had a bunch of folks come by, asking me why that actor feller is out tooling around town in my boy’s truck.”

  “I hope you’ll excuse me for saying this. But your son needs a serious reality check, letting that truck go.”

  “That ain’t no newsbreak.” He pulled JayJay to one side. “I got a favor to ask.”

  Peter said, “I thought you wanted me to handle this.”

  “Yeah, I was gonna play the plucked chicken, but then I saw his face light up when I asked about his new toy. And I figured I was good for one more request.”

  “Name it,” JayJay agreed.

  “We’re starting a Habitat for Humanity drive. The aim is to build two hundred houses by year’s end. Biggest welfare project this town’s seen since the Depression days. We just got to get those migrant kids into places with proper floors and running water. Those plastic hovels are nothing but a stain on our Christian walk, and that’s the truth.”

  “You’ll be speaking about this tomorrow,” Peter reminded him. “It’s in your speech.”

  Miller went on, “Sacramento and the federal government are paying two-thirds of the total. The rest is coming through local volunteer work and donations. Today’s the official kickoff.”

  “I heard the pastor mention something about it.”

  “Yeah, they’re playing it up all over town. We been promised TV coverage, papers from as far away as Oakland.”

  JayJay finally caught their drift. He asked Peter, “Does Britt know about this?”

  “Not yet. Miller called me early this morning out of the blue.”

  “Just popped up in the middle of the night,” Miller agreed. “Like a mushroom in a manure pile.”

  Cynthia said, “You might want to reconsider your comparison there.”

  “What I’m trying to say is, we want you to come out and cut the ribbon on this new building project. Say a few words.”

  Peter said, “I’ve written something you might want to use.”

  JayJay said, “Derek’s out there right now, isn’t he? Getting his stuff in everybody’s way. Turning this into a regular three-ring circus.”

  “Ain’t no flies on this cowboy,” Miller confirmed. “What do you say, hoss?”

  “The only way I’ll do this thing is if I really work. I’m not gonna have people saying I showed up to use a pair of silver scissors and then disappeared.”

  Miller actually laughed. “Pardner, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  Monday morning JayJay started off in a fog. He had slept poorly, chased all night by the previous afternoon’s images. Cutting the ribbon and saying his few lines had gone well enough for Britt to close after just three takes. But instead of letting him work alongside the others, Britt had come up with the idea of them taking a drive through the shanty camp. Bean Town, the locals called it. Sombrero Flats. Tacoville. The names were like blisters on JayJay’s brain. The road was a dusty rutted track that crawled through a stretch of pure misery. They took Miller’s SUV. Britt had JayJay squint out the open window, scorched not by the sun or the grit so much as the little faces he passed. Britt preceded them in a flatbed with Derek clinging to the back, filming as they went. All night JayJay’s brain replayed the trip like he was watching those kids on his own personal theater screen. A nightmare of dust and desolation.

  Four cups of coffee, a plate of scrambled eggs, and a rambling prayer for the kids and their parents left JayJay feeling like he just might make it through what would no doubt be a major day. He drove Peter and Cynthia straight from the prayer meeting to the ranch. The two bearded giants and Derek and a lighting guy and a pair of set carpenters filled the truck bed. When he pulled into the parking area and found Britt there waiting for him, JayJay said, “I feel like finding me a nice spot away from this racket and sleeping until oh-dark-thirty.”

  Britt just turned around and said, “All of you, inside.”

  The cabin’s interior was undergoing serious renovation. Britt had proclaimed he liked the atmosphere that was building on location enough to shoot the interior scenes here as well. But this morning it was tools down, and an assembly of maybe two dozen people formed a half-circle in front of a podium. JayJay halted midway through the front door and said, “Uh-uh. No way.”

  “Just listen to me a second.”

  “Why don’t you just paint a target on my belly and give ’em all a load of darts?”

  “That’s an idea. Derek, make a note. JayJay, front and center.”

  JayJay looked at the hold Britt had on his forearm. “What exactly did I do to get you this riled?”

  Britt led him up to the podium. “Look down at your feet, JayJay. Four yellow marks. Each with a number. One, two, three, four. Same as on your talk. See where I’ve labeled the script? Big blue numbers. Even a cowboy like you can see numbers that big.”

  “You’re enjoying this.”

  “Just listen to me. Tonight you’re going to stand in front of as many locals as that hall can hold. How many people did we figure on, Derek?”

  “Eleven hundred, maybe twelve if they stand in the loft.”

  “Twelve hundred people. Coughing, hacking, kids crying. It’s going to be hot and stinky. They’re going to be there for a party. The cameras will play this serious. But you’ve never worked with extras. I have. And I’m telling you, when you hit the big climax, some joker in the second row is going to be drilling in his nose like he’s looking for oil. A small-town rebel will scratch himself and yawn ’til his jaws pop. Three teenage girls on the front row will have a giggle fit and do their best to distract you. We’re going to shoot maybe ten takes. They’ll be squirming like worms in rayon and hiking boots.”

  “I’m glad you’re telling me all this,” JayJay snapped back. “Seeing as how I wasn’t the tiniest bit worried about it before now.”

  Britt said, “What we’re going to do here is work you. These people have been ordered to get up and go have a cup of coffee and a doughnut and a stretch in the kitchen over there. And then saunter back in here and sit down. Lean against the walls. Do whatever they want, long as they don’t make noise.”

  “They’re gonna hate me.”

  “Not a chance. I’m paying them for this. Work has stopped on the set so you can get used to giving emotion to an audience that doesn’t much care what you’ve got to say. Derek is going to light it. We might even film a couple of takes, in case we have to splice in a word or erase somebody’s belch. Which means your little audition is costing the studio somewhere in the neighborhood of six thousand dollars an hour. Do you get my drift, JayJay? Tonight’s scene is pivotal. Right, Peter?”

  From the back wall, the scriptwriter confirmed, “You’ll be declaring who you are. To the town and the audience.”

  JayJay had the sense to understand Britt wasn’t talking just to him. He had set this up so that the audience would hear and understand the stakes. JayJay studied the director. The weary stains beneath Britt’s eyes grew deeper with every passing day. He wore an old Air Jamaica T-shirt and baggy khakis, boat shoes and no socks. A man far too busy and weighed
down to care what came up first in his pile of clean clothes.

  Britt said, “In theater parlance it’s called the star’s soliloquy, JayJay. We’ll be moving into act two and hopefully taking the audience with us. All because of what you’ve got to say.”

  Chapter 32

  The word Martin Allerby liked best to describe the Hollywood spots was seasonal. Being Hollywood, he was not referring to a period measured in months. After all, when it came to weather Southern California had only two real seasons—rain and smaze. No, by “seasonal” Allerby meant that either a player was powerful enough to hit the right spot at the right time, or they joined the cattle call of wannabes.

  The Polo Lounge at the rear of the Beverly Hills Hotel was a perfect case in point. Since the extensive renovations of several years back, the place had resumed its position as the premier watering hole for behind-the-camera players. Writers, producers, studio execs, directors, senior agents, they owned this spot.

  But the allure lasted only from twelve thirty to two. Ninety minutes. Which, given the nature of the game they were all playing, held an ironic ring.

  During the lunch rush, tables were allotted according to power. The darker booths along the wall leading from the bar to the main restaurant were restricted to serious power. Allerby had spotted three other greenlight guys when he arrived. But Allerby was showing up as they were leaving. Which meant his booth had remained empty during the entire lunch crush. The vacuum had drawn gazes from all over the hotel. To have the power to book a booth, and know the maître d’ would hold it until whenever, that was some serious juice.

  His two guests arrived fifteen minutes after he had slid into the booth, long enough for Allerby to greet those he cared to notice, order, and return a couple of calls. Milo Keplar showed up first. The studio’s director of sales knew Allerby well enough not to question his timing. Then Leo Gish arrived. Before the man arrived at the booth, Martin knew his plan was playing out exactly as desired.