by Corey Mesler
“That’s my Buddy. Sorry I can’t be there at the launch party tonight. Gotta court date here. Trying to shake wife number five so I can marry number six.”
Eric didn’t know if this was a joke or not so he tried a tentative laugh, half bark.
“Har har, that’s right, Buddy. You stick with that fine woman of yours.”
“Thank you, Eden, I will.”
Eden Forbes, of course, had never met Sandy.
“Eden Forbes says you’re a fine woman,” Eric said to Sandy, his next phone call.
“Fuck him,” Sandy said.
“Where are you, dear?” Eric said with an ersatz trill.
“I’m writing. I’m at this picturesque, comfortable habitat writing.”
“Ok,” Eric said. “You wanna meet us later—”
Sandy had hung up.
“This is my favorite,” Jimbo said, pulling into a driveway.
Jesus God, Eric thought. Drive me out of this nightmare.
8.
The search for Dan Yumont had begun that morning. Linn Sitler sent out a team of young filmmaker wannabes who hung around her office. They were instructed to scour the city beginning with the hospitals and police stations and then the bars and sleaze joints. Dan Yumont had been arrested twice before for picking up prostitutes. And once for possession of a firearm without a permit. This was common knowledge, mythopoeic tabloid fodder like Britney Spears occasionally forgetting her panties, or Mel Gibson sometimes turning into Adolf Eichmann when he drinks.
One of the young reconnaissance filmmakers was named Bandy Lyle Most. Word around the city, at the local independent film groups and at the Media Co-op at First Congo Church, was that Bandy Most was the most talented filmmaker to come from Memphis since, well, Eric Warberg. This reputation was based on one short film he made while a student at the University of Memphis. It was called Madam Sabat’s Grave. Its status was just aborning. For now, Bandy was working at Black Lodge Video. He was known for his arcane recommendations and for pushing Alain Delon movies on lovely young co-eds who thought they wanted to see Mario Bava films instead.
Another member of the search team, at the other end of the achievement spectrum, was a mad young Turk named Hassle Cooley. Most people assumed that the name Hassle came from his reputation as a pain in the ass, but it was actually his given name and, perhaps, had prefigured its owner’s temperament. Hassle was 27 years old and had hung on the fringes of Memphis’s fringe film groups for years. He seemed to be at every film showing, at every media event, at every art show opening. He was purported to be working on a “mammoth, truth-telling motherfucker of a film,” loosely based on Birth of a Nation. The film was more rumor than full-fledged proposal.
Out into the bright sunshine of Memphis, Tennessee, went our intrepid searchers. They saw much that was of interest, especially in the rent-by-the-hour motels. Hassle Cooley was first on that scene and was trying to claim all the hookers’ stories as grist for his mill alone. One hooker, after only a brief chat with Hassle, was heard to say, “If this fucker wants a pop, it’s double.”
By late afternoon they had all returned to base. No word of Dan Yumont had they heard. The trail began and ended with the airport search of his bags. Dan Yumont, for all intents and purposes, for now, had vanished.
9.
After Eric and crew had seen the house on Audubon, a nice enough spot but horrible for shooting, with low windows and an almost underground feel to it, they were about to split up and go their separate ways. Eric declared he wanted a lie-down before the party that night.
“Eric, you wanna lie down at my house?” Kimberly asked. “It’s quiet there. I won’t bother you at all.”
Eric was tempted. He saw it all complete before him, the opening credits, the establishing shot, the story line as it stretched out like a red thread, and the smashing downfall of the leading man, who ends up disgraced, embarrassed, cursed and alone.
“Thanks, Kim, I need to get back to my headquarters.”
Headquarters? God.
“Ok, Baby,” Kimberly said, placing her hand on his forearm. “You know where to find me.”
This was the same woman who for years wouldn’t return his phone calls or letters.
Once back in his own digs, having dismissed Jimbo with the admonition to pick him up late—not early—for the festivities that evening, Eric wondered at the silence, the stillness of his temporary home.
“Hon,” he called softly.
The only answer was the susurrus of the overhead fan.
He headed for the bedroom to lie down in the dark. There he found Sandy, asleep, her mouthed cocked open and drooling. On her chest a sheaf of papers.
Eric tiptoed to the bed. He gently extricated the sheets and took them out to the living room.
Once he was seated and his reading glasses nosed, he read:
—Good.
—Saskia. I’ve just discovered I like to say your name.
—Many people do. It’s an odd name, isn’t it?
—Well, I don’t know any others. Saskia. Where does it come from?
—Company my father works for.
—That’s the name of the company?
—Yes. Art historians.
—A company of art historians? Doing what?
—Providing images—art for—heck, you know, I’m not sure I can explain it.
—That’s ok.
—They license images, Jack.
—Ok.
—Right. What do your parents do, Jack? Are you from here, Jack?
—Born in Niagara Falls, New York. My father worked for E. I. DuPont and was transferred to Memphis when I was five. A sort of Southerner. My accent falls somewhere along the highway between New York and Tennessee. An Ohio accent, maybe.
—And your mom?
—Does your mom work?
—She’s a college professor.
—Huh.
—Why?
—Mine’s a homemaker, through and through. Her generation.
—I think my parents are a little younger than yours.
—Probably. What does your mother teach?
—Russian studies.
—Huh.
—What were we saying—before the waiter—I had something—
—Shiva.
—No—oh, half empty. Are you really that downbeat or are you being ironic? This is the age of irony and sometimes I don’t always get it. Not that I’m dense. It’s—
—No, I wasn’t being ironic. I don’t think. I mean, really, I just think—well, that things are serious, that being serious is a, in a way, positive approach to the world.
—And if you’re a half-full kind of person? You’re not taking things seriously enough?
—To be honest, I’m not really a half-empty kind of guy, either. I don’t think the glass has ever had a damn drop in it. And, well, I’m not judging, mind you.
—Aren’t you? Aren’t you saying that if you are light-hearted you’re not paying attention?
Eric put the pages down. It was good. Sandy was good. He didn’t really have to remind himself of this. She had been at the top of her craft for decades now and he was lucky to have her. But, there was the other thing: the love thing, the sex thing. Wasn’t it always that way? Respect isn’t enough. Amity isn’t even enough. There has to be love and there has to be sex.
Eric placed his glasses on top of the papers. He put his head down, not really expecting to fall asleep sitting up, chin on chest, but he did. He fell fast asleep and immediately slithered into a dream in which he was called up on stage to sing with Booker T. and the MGs and he had neglected to tell everyone that he could not sing. The spotlight hit him—he was expected to sing, because it was all riding on him, because he was in charge, the whole show, the whole enterprise, was resting solely on his ability to sing . . .
He woke up around 6 p.m. His neck hurt like hell. The light was muted, seeping in like syrup under the heavy drapes.
Sandy was in the kitchen making coff
ee.
“Hey, Bunky,” she said, softly. “Coffee and cake? They’ve got some pretty nice chocolate cake in here.”
“Yes, thanks,” Eric said, shaking the cobwebs away. “How long did I sleep?”
“Dunno, don’t know what time you came in.”
“Oh, yeah. Oh. Wait. The pages—they’re wonderful. Just the right touch for Hope’s character. You’ve really nailed it.”
“Thanks, Bunky, My Little Cabbage. Come get some cake.”
Eric struggled out of the recliner. His bones hurt. After he rose he picked up the pages to take them to the kitchen table. Something fell out from between the pages.
Eric groaned as he bent to pick it up. It was a photograph.
“What’s this?”
Sandy looked up from her cake.
“Ricky Lime brought that by. Look at it.”
Eric went back and put his reading glasses on. The photograph was of a city street, a shot down one sidewalk, street with moderate traffic on the right side. There was a sign in the foreground. Central Barbecue.
“So?” Eric said, settling down. He picked up his coffee. “Thanks, Sweet,” he said.
“There’s a ghost in the picture.”
“What, this blur?”
“Uh-huh.”
“So Lime isn’t the best still photographer. I’ll get him replaced. I don’t know where he came from anyway.”
“No, no, look closer. The—ghost—”
“Is—oh, no—is wearing a white cape.”
“Yep.”
“A white, spangled cape and jumpsuit.”
“Yep, that’s the puppy.”
“It’s blurry.”
“Well. He’s been dead for so long.”
10.
The Film Commission sent a limousine to pick up Eric and Sandy. The limousine driver handed Eric a note. It read: DAN YUMONT STILL NOT FOUND.
Eric sighed.
The driver smiled as if he were driving a hearse.
He handed Eric a second note.
Eric studied the messenger. He had that lean and hungry look, the one most often associated, in Eric’s experience, with someone who wants to break into films.
“Thanks,” Eric said, investing the simple word with as much endgame as he could muster.
The second note was from Eden Forbes. Why didn’t he just call Eric’s cell?
It read: DIDN’T WANT TO CALL CELL IN CASE SANDY ANSWERED. I WANT YOU TO ADD MEMPHIS WRITER TO SCRIPT. NEED MORE LOCAL FLAVOR OF WHICH SANDY HAS NIL.
Oh, this was gonna go over well. Eric looked at his paramour. He smiled a tight smile.
“Who’s that one from?” Sandy asked. She was dressed in a gown so low-cut that a fingernail-paring-size slice of aureole was visible on either side.
“No one,” Eric said.
“Hm,” Sandy said. “Is no one female?”
“Now, there’s a question.”
“Hm,” Sandy hmmed. She had already lost interest in the query.
“Why this note passing like we’re in school?” Eric mused out loud. Had he mused it out loud? He thought so, though Sandy moved not.
“Everything all right?” the limousine driver asked.
Eric studied his eyes in the mirror. Even his eyes were lean and hungry.
“Yes, thanks,” Eric said into the mirror.
“My name’s Hassle Cooley,” the driver said into the mirror.
“Hassle. Cooley.”
“Right.”
“Ok. Thanks, Hassle.”
“No hassle,” Hassle Cooley said.
“Ha. That’s funny,” Eric said.
Sandy rolled her heavily made-up eyes.
“I make movies, too,” Hassle Cooley said.
“Ah,” Eric said.
“Maybe later I can tell you about a couple of projects I have in mind.”
“Sure.”
“Really?”
“Yes, why not?” Eric said.
“You won’t be sorry,” Hassle Cooley said.
Eric was always sorry.
11.
The party to celebrate the launch of Memphis Movie was held in a downtown restaurant called the Arcade. The restaurant sat on South Main, across from the Amtrak Station with its gorgeous and frightening architecture. The building adjacent to the station loomed high above the street, gothic and unkempt, its dirty stone like a hanging garden of soot and age.
The Arcade itself, though unpromising from the outside, inside was a bit of a Memphis time machine: quaint and funky, alive with Memphis mojo and serving up the best hummus in the city. Its walls were obscured by a plethora of photographs of Memphis greats: Elvis, Rufus Thomas, B.B. King, Big Star, and a new addition, a lovely dun-tinged photo of the recently deceased Arthur Lee. The restaurant was closed for the movie party and the two shotgun rooms of the place were packed so tight it was impossible to move. In each booth sat at least six people, animated to the point of public disgrace, creating, overall, a din akin to the roar in the Roman Colosseum during a bloodletting.
Eric and Sandy were greeted by loud shouts and incoherent toasts as they entered. At the doorway stood someone from Linn Sitler’s office, a lovely young woman named Mimsy Borogoves. She offered Eric a soft, thin hand, which he took the way a retriever takes a shot dove into its mouth, gently, with only a deeply buried desire to crush it. Was it Eric’s imagination, or did the young beauty hold his hand a little too long, a dangerous half-minute longer than she had held Sandy’s?
They had reserved a place at the head of a long table for Sandy and Eric. When they were seated plates of appetizers were placed before them. Sandy immediately began to eat. Her appetite recently was something to behold.
Eric eschewed the food and looked up and down the main table. Here were the chief ingredients for Memphis Movie. The actors; the cinematographer, Rica Sash, whom Eric had never worked with but was excited to get the chance, Rica having just the previous year shot the new Roman Polanski film, for which he had received an Oscar nomination; Ricky Lime, looking worried and smug simultaneously; much of the crew; and in the chair marked for Eden Forbes sat a round little man with eyes like a tax accountant’s. Eric made a mental note to avoid him.
Eric ad-libbed a little speech. It was a short conglom of fervent words. Five minutes after he sat down he couldn’t remember what he’d said. Had he said anything worthwhile? Anything new? Did it matter?
Sandy was asked if she wanted to add anything, after being introduced as “Eric’s wife and writing partner.” She waved a half-eaten chicken wing in the air, signaling that she would rather not speak. A small phobia of Sandy’s, the getting up in front of crowds. Eric hated it too, but it never frightened him. He had about him a bit of the ham.
Later, in the crush of the crowd, Ricky Lime pressed up against Eric and breathed heavily into his ear.
“Did you see the picture I sent over?”
Eric nodded.
“What do you think?” Ricky fairly shouted.
“Can we talk later? It’s hot as hell in here.”
“I have more. Nearly 50 percent of the shots have some kind of—of anomalous image in them.”
Eric nodded. He wasn’t sure if he was agreeing to anything. He just wanted to get out of there.
“Some younger, some older,” Ricky was saying now. Had Eric missed part of it? “When can we get together? I also think I’m being followed.”
Eric nodded one last time. As soon as he could he would have Lime fired and replaced with—anybody.
Eric greeted most of the cast at least briefly. Kimberly Winks seemed to spend most of the evening in tight conversation with Ike Bana. Eric could only imagine what delicious ambition was being generated between them. At least he was spared Kim for the night. Many of the actors were expressing overly ardent worry about Dan Yumont. Eric was all calm reassurance. He felt, actually, something less than calm about it. A small qualm, would be how he would put it.
At the end of the evening, he pulled Hope Davis outside. They st
ood on the sidewalk under the neon and Eric felt a bit less harried outside in the relative quiet.
“So, how do you like Memphis?” Eric was suddenly a high school nerd looking for a date.
“What I’ve seen is charming.” Hope Davis spoke in her Hope Davis voice. Eric’s heart fell through his body like a cake dropped from a second-story window.
“It can be. Charming, that is.”
“Yes, you grew up here, right?”
“I did. If I grew up.”
Hope Davis laughed a warm and polite laugh and placed her hand on Eric’s bicep.
“Now I think I’m ready to crash for the night,” Hope Davis said.
“Is your room nice? Did they do right by you?”
“Oh, yes. The Peabody. The view of the river is quite—quite hypnotizing.”
“Sleep well,” Eric said.
Sleep well. Shit.
Where was Sandy? Did it matter whether he waited for her or not? How far had they gone down that road?
Eric could see the maniac limo driver across the street grinning like an ambitious Moonie.
Just as he was about to start for the car a hand arrested him by grabbing the back of his shirt. It was a disconcerting, though oddly sensuous feeling.
Eric turned and was staring into the exquisite face of Mimsy Borogoves. She had pale skin with a natural rose blush to her cheeks and eyes the color of luminous fish scales. Her hair was a soft brown nest.
“You don’t remember me,” she said.
“I—I don’t.”
“When you came back in . . . uh, 2000, to give a workshop at the U of M.”
“I—”
“There’s no reason you should remember me. You must have talked to hundreds of people that night. You said something that night, a joke that flopped, that I have remembered ever since. Some hotshot young actor challenged you concerning Memphis’s theater history, something about you not supporting local actors enough. And—do you remember this?—the young Turk made a reference to the Memphis State production of Hair, how groundbreaking it was and—”
“I don’t—”
“The punch line, anyway, was, ‘You, sir, are no Keith Kennedy.’”