Watch Out, Hollywood!: More Confessions of a So-called Middle Child

by Maria T. Lennon

  I play with my glasses. “Because of what happened at school?”

  She nods. “Frankly, we need a new hero. The kind of hero troubled kids can relate to. A flawed hero.”

  “Well, if you want flawed, look no further,” I say to each and every one of them. “As a middle child, I’ve overcome a lot.” I put both hands on the desk and lean over. “Let me tell you, it’s not easy being me.”

  “Well, then let’s see what you can do with being Josie.” Chad points to a wall. He hits a button, and the curtains pull back to reveal a solid glass wall. Inside the room there is a beam and mats.

  “It’s soundproof.” He winks. “We can hear them, but they can’t hear us. Unless I touch this button.”

  I think I’m in love. “May I?” I go to play with the button when the boring old suit interrupts my fun.

  He gets in my face like I’m a little kid. “You know why it’s called Off the Beam?”

  “Yeah, because my character is always trying to push someone off the beam to get on the team, and she’ll use any way she can to do it.” I grin. Just thinking about it makes me happy.

  “That’s correct,” the lady says. “And you’re aware of the whole point of the show?”

  Uh, hello! Of course I know. “That she gets on the beam!” I laugh. “I’m so perfect for this part, you will die when you see me. I was born to play Josie.”

  The old man begins again. He’s got zero fashion sense and even less hair. Not to be rude or anything. “The girl you’d be playing—”

  Yes! The girl I would be playing sounds like it’s a go. This is going so well, I can hardly stand it.

  “She would learn that she can’t get on the team by her underhandedness. That is her character arc. She learns to do things the honest way. That’s what we want kids to take from this.” The lady pauses to make sure I get it. I get it, all right.

  But to be perfectly honest (which of course I can’t be), I think that whole thing is dumb.

  “Do you understand, Charlie?” the woman asks again.

  “Yes, ma’am.” Of course I’m not going to tell her she’s wrong. That she has no clue about her audience. What kid wants a lesson in their show, huh? “Should I show you my routine?” I get up and do a few stretches. “It’s pretty impressive.”

  But Chad tells me to sit. “There’s another person auditioning for the part. You’re next.”

  Whoa, hold on a second. What did he say? I whisper to him, “I thought you said I was their top choice?”

  The lights dim, and we watch the room. I try to calm my nerves by repeating to myself: No way can anyone be as good as me. I go through the reasons:

  • I’m funny.

  • I’m original.

  • I’ve spent my whole life trying to get what I want by any means available.

  • I’ve got a trendsetting fashion sense.

  But then the door to the soundproof room opens. A girl walks in. My stomach drops. It’s Marta.

  Can you believe it? Marta. That’s it. God hates me, hates me. She’s wearing her signature floppy leotard from 1972, and her hair is stuck up in a high beehive. I’m pretty sure she’s got egg stains on her front. They all lean forward and blink. A lot. Like they can’t believe what they’re looking at.

  They slap the table. “She’s perfect!”

  “So real!”

  “So relatable.”

  “Vulnerable yet powerful. I love it.”

  “Hello, Marta.” Chad speaks into the intercom. “We’re all here. Please begin.”

  She nods confidently before hopping up onto the beam. And the second she does, you can tell she’ll be an Olympic athlete one day. I want to look away. Better yet, I want to run away. But I can’t. Even I want to watch her. Marta completes a perfect routine on the beam. It’s downright disgusting. Her arms and legs are so powerful, so light, she floats through the air like she’s flying. And when she lands, I can hear the sharp inhale. They cover their faces like they can’t believe what they just saw. I want to puke.

  Chad hits the button. “Beautiful. Just gorgeous. Thank you, Marta Urloff.” Chad turns to me.

  “Amazing, isn’t she? Incredible?”

  “And you knew it all along.” He shakes his head at me. “You knew, and you lied. I’m not interested in lying clients.”

  “I don’t see it as lying, but as protecting—” I look at all their faces.

  “Nice,” Chad grins.

  “I’m not kidding—she and her guardian are totally committed to her future as an Olympian. You said this would take total commitment, remember?”

  “You also lied about yourself.”

  I slam my hand against the table. “Now that’s going too far.”

  “Really?” Chad opens his laptop and quickly types something. A video appears. He taps play. I can hear my voice. Marta’s voice is next. I know exactly what this is and why he’s playing it.

  “Where did you get this?” I ask, but I already know. Greta.

  “You had no idea how to do anything on the beam at all. You got Marta to train you.” Long pause. “In fact,” he continues hammering me, “you lied to me about every single thing.”

  TRUE FACT: Whenever you’re caught in a huge lie, break it into little pieces.

  I work the room, turning on my charm. “I did it because I know I am the best person for the job. Hands down.” I look into each and every set of eyes. “I really studied the script. The part of Josie doesn’t even hang on gymnastics, does it?” I walk around the table. “It hangs on personality. Believability. Am I right, people?”

  They nod. Chad nods.

  I can feel it. They’re coming over to my side. “Marta. She’s great at gymnastics. Yes. But she’s an only child. She’s never had to be underhanded. See what I’m saying?” I can see they’re listening. “And between you and me, she’s got zero sense of humor. That’s why she isn’t right for this. Trust me, I know.”

  The suits turn. “She was very funny on that video.”

  “Because she was with me. Don’t you see?” I shout out. “I’m the funny one. Trust me, she is so not funny.”

  “I laugh just looking at her,” says one old guy.

  “But not in a good way.” I’m fighting for my life here. “And you need total commitment. She has no time. Zero. And then there’s her aunt with the mole, who doesn’t speak English—”

  “Stop. Get out here before you make it any worse.” Chad opens the door and points to the audition room.

  “But I can’t beat that.” I look at him.

  “Oh, I know. I represent her too now, so either way I win.”

  “Great.” I walk out into the hallway. Marta’s aunt is standing outside, wearing her Romanian red-and-white tracksuit and doing some weird gypsy voodoo hand signals at my face. I avoid looking at her for fear I will have nightmares of being attacked by her giant hairy mole.

  Greta spits on the floor. “You are thief.”

  Marta is standing right by the door I’m supposed to go through. I stop in front of her. “I know you hate me, but you’re being played. Watch out.” And then I slip into the audition room. The room is cold and silent. I can’t see the suits and Chad looking at me from the other side. I strip down to my supersparkly leotard. The intercom buzzes.

  “Begin,” Chad says. Is it my imagination, or is he being meaner to me than he was to Marta?

  I look at the beam, massage it, try and make it my friend. I’ll never beat Marta on skill. So I’ll have to beat her on personality.

  “Any time now.” Chad taps.

  I put my hands on the beam, take a deep breath, and lift myself up and over into a straddle. I can feel my heart through my leotard. Keep your cool, Charlie, I tell myself. I lift my leg and stand. You’re halfway there.

  Chad beeps in. “Come on, we don’t have all day now.”

  I stand tall and stretch high. Focus, Charlie, focus. Don’t even think about them. I reach my hands up and find a spot I can focus on. I do a split leap as high
as I can and I land on the beam. I can’t believe it! I’m killing it! I turn, do a little hand thing that looks kinda cool, and make another leap. And then when I’m coming down, my foot slips, my other leg scrapes the side of the beam and I fall flat on my face.

  I slap the mat. “And it was all going so well!” I yell into the room.

  The intercom clicks. “Uh, not really.”

  “Thanks, Chad. Thanks a lot.”

  “Get up, finish it,” he says.

  I push away all thoughts of Marta smiling and get back up on that cruel beam. I raise my hands high, flick my wrists, and do my best gymnast face—like I just had a huge whiff of tuna. Split leaps. I start to run and do the little splits in the air. I’m smiling, get ready to plant my hands for a final cartwheel off the end, when—bam!

  My hand loses its grip and I fall like a giant lump of goo on my side. That’s it. I’m done. I don’t even try to get up. I pound the mat and cry. I even forget anyone’s there until I hear the click of the intercom.

  “You done?” Chad’s coldhearted voice comes in loud and clear.

  “Done. Yeah. I’m done.” I sit up and stare at the beam. How can one piece of wood be so complicated? “I can never beat her, can’t you understand? That’s why I didn’t want her to come!” I yell at them. I scoop up my clothes and leave the room. Marta is still standing in the hall right where I left her.

  Marta laughs at me. “Looks like you’re the one who got played. And you lost.”

  “It’s yours. Have it all.” I storm out, past her nasty aunt and her hairy mole. I’m done.

  Chad and the suits walk out of their room. “Charlie, where do you think you’re going?”

  I march right past him, down the hallway, wearing my leotard and ripped tights, and Converse in hand. “I quit.” I hit the elevator button as many times as I can. “Open!”

  The elevator opens and closes, with me in it.

  The End

  Well, that’s it, people. You may as well stop reading now. It’s all downhill from here, from not being hired by ABC Family to getting dumped by Chad at dumb old WME to being forced into the car from hell to being stared at by eco-freaks as we chug up Laurel Canyon in a broken-down car full of toxic fumes—and I’m not talking about the guy’s wet armpit hair.

  Chad, the Hollywood hypocrite. Marta and her money-grubbing aunt. Wasn’t one shot at the American dream enough? They had to steal mine? I hated them all. In fact, the list of people I hated was way longer than the list of people I didn’t.

  “Drop me here,” I tell the guy when we get to the top of my driveway. He doesn’t argue this time. See, even he thinks I’m a has-been. My legs are stuck to the seat, but I peel them off and crawl out the back door, my clothes in my hands, my hair a wreck. He turns the car around and doesn’t look back.

  That’s the last of it, the end of my hopes and dreams. There’s nothing left for me to do except go and talk to Mr. Houdini himself. I often feel like he hears me, like he understands. I climb on the wall to sit with him. I know he knows what this feels like. I can see it in his eyes. But see, here’s the difference: he was the kind of guy who could get back up no matter what. Not me.

  I’m starving and depressed. Food—food would make me feel better. I make my way along the wall. I tiptoe up to the front of the house and peek in. No one is in the kitchen. Mom and Dad had appointments today. So the coast is clear. I open the fridge to find a brand-new piece of Brie and a new container of tapenade, and I pull the fresh baguette right out of its bakery sleeve. I slip all of it in my shirt, grab a bottle of Pellegrino, and run up the stairs, back to my room. My soul needs healing.

  I call Jai. He’s my soul man. My one and only friend. “Hey, Jai.” I cut a huge slab of Brie and stick it on a piece of bread.

  “Hello, my American friend.” He picks up the laptop and moves through the slum.

  I see a whole lot of people cleaning floors, pushing trash, washing sidewalks. “Hey, what’s going on?”

  “Very big news. 60 Minutes, a very famous American TV news show, is coming to film a wealthy Indian who has built the largest house in the world.”

  I fix my pillows, settle into my bed, and take another wonderful bite. Being home alone is just what the doctor ordered. “So what’s that have to do with the slums?”

  “The house is built in the middle of the slums. Like a giant penthouse shooting straight up sixty floors.” He smiles. “The billionaire has hired untouchables to clean all his waste. The Americans are very interested in this.”

  Untouchable? I stop eating. “What’s an untouchable?”

  “Ah.” Jai shakes his head like there are so many bad things. “In India, it is said to be the lowest form of humanity. These are the people who clean toilets, cremate the dead, remove dead animals from the road, and cut the cords of babies when they are born. They look the same as me, but they are different. Everyone knows who they are, and they are avoided like the Black Death.”

  I repeat in my mind: Everyone knows who they are, and they are avoided like the Black Death.

  That’s it. I, Charlie Cooper, am an untouchable. “So how do they stop being an untouchable?”

  “They accept their fate, just as we all must.” Jai looks behind his back.

  I shove the last bit of Brie into my mouth and wash it down with some Pellegrino. “But how can you do that when your fate sucks?”

  He gets up again and walks. The slums have great wireless. “I’m sorry, Charlie, but I must make myself scarce before the television cameras come. There’s still the matter of the Russian mob hunting me down.”

  “Fine, just go,” I say angrily. Guess he doesn’t want to talk to an untouchable either. I curl into a ball and search through Google images for the best untouchable outfit ever.

  And then I guess I passed out.

  Toss This in the Trash: I Am No Role Model

  I wake up to Pen yelling at the top of her lungs, “Charlie!”

  Next I feel her hands on me, shaking me in a not-so-nice way. “Wake up!”

  I’m totally dazed, still half dreaming. It was all so clear. I was in India, dressed in tons of silk robes, covered in jewels and cremating Lillian on a massive funeral pyre, over the great Ganges River, and I was surprisingly at peace.

  “Charlie, you have to see this.” Pen grabs her computer, types something into Google. Up pops my audition, which of course was videotaped and leaked by Marta’s ungrateful aunt. “It’s gone viral.”

  I read the numbers on the bottom of the video. Eighty thousand views. It’s only been three hours. What the heck?

  TRUE FACT: We love to watch our heroes crash and burn.

  I fall back on my bed of crumbs and Brie. “Is there no dignity left?”

  “Soon you’ll have more views than Psy.” Pen plays the video of my total breakdown, analyzing every move. “What the heck happened?”

  My eyes fell on the paused image of me lying on the beam. “I was ambushed.”

  “So Lillian sent Marta over there?” Pen replays it for the third time.

  I watch as I fall and cry, fall and cry, over and over again. They fast-forwarded it and then rewound it so it looks like I just keep falling and crying. They’ve put on the sound of a baby crying at a high pitch, also playing it backward and forward. Nice touch.

  “So what does Lillian get?” Pen looks at me. “That’s the question.”

  She hits play on the YouTube video again. I slap the computer shut. “How about my total humiliation?”

  The door swings open. Dad pokes his head in. “Charlie?”

  I plaster a fake smile on. “Hey, Dad.”

  Dad doesn’t know. “So, so, how’d it go today, Charlie? Tell me everything.”

  Felix screams from downstairs, “No one gets the computer!!!” even though no one is near the computer.

  Mom comes running into our room. “Hey, baby, did you get it?”

  I wish I could hide under my blanket.

  “Charlie?” Mom’s voice is suddenly s
ad. “Are you okay?”

  I take a deep breath. “Well—”

  “Marta got it.” Pen cuts me off.

  “Marta?” Mom looks all perplexed. “I thought she didn’t want it.”

  “She changed her mind” is all I want to say on the subject.

  Mom nods like it’s no big deal when it’s the biggest deal of my entire life. “We should have them over to celebrate, make up for the lie you told—”

  “Mom!” I cut her off. Dad stares at me with that horrible look that basically says I know what you’ve done. I haven’t had the time to tell Dad yet. And I want to be the one to tell him. I don’t want him to think I’m a liar, because if there’s one thing Dad can’t stand, it’s a liar. Pen turns her back to us and opens a book. She pretends to read, but the tension in the room is louder than any noise could ever be.

  Mom takes one look at me and says, “Well, tell him yourself.”

  Suddenly it’s so quiet. Dad looks at us and smiles like the last one in on a secret.

  “Tell me what?”

  And me, I start to sweat. I just can’t take one more person hating me right now. I’m not going to lie, it’s been pretty rough. I have no one.

  “Well?” Dad’s waiting.

  “Um.” I’m thinking of a way to put it.

  I’m struggling, when all of a sudden Pen cuts in. “Yeah, so maybe Charlie kept the audition quiet.” Pen gets up and points right at me like she’s my lawyer. “But you know what Charlie did in return?”

  Dad looks right at me.

  “Charlie”—Pen gets between us—“got Marta into the JOs. Got Pickler to pay for her flight and her registration.”

  I am warm with gratitude.

  “That’s nice.” Dad plays with a string dangling from his shorts. “But . . .” He rips the thread and pushes Pen’s chair so there’s nothing between him and me. “It doesn’t change the fact that you were underhanded.”