by Alan Russell
Her shoulders were hunched over, her head down. Graham zoomed in on her face. He liked to take shots of stars when they thought they were unobserved. Those were the true pictures, the unguarded ones. Lanie’s face was drawn and pensive. There was a stillness to it that even the distance and night couldn’t hide. Graham pushed the trigger, hoping for the money shot.
The conditions certainly weren’t optimal. He fiddled with the lens, trying to compensate for the black sweater and even blacker pants she was wearing. Her light hair was pulled back and she was wearing a double strand of pearls. Her makeup had been carefully applied. He wondered if she had come from a set that way or had just put it on.
Graham trained the camera on her eyes. They were the most talked-about peepers this side of Liz Taylor’s. No one could agree on their color, only on their beauty. Like fine gems, the color seemed to change in the light, and had been described as cerulean blue, aquamarine, even lavender. But at the moment, Graham would offer a different description: they were tired eyes.
Lanie reached for the glass. She swallowed the liquor as if it were medicine, then swallowed again. Graham clicked away. In less than a minute she had finished the sizable glass. She took no pleasure in her drinking, just went about getting drunk in as expeditious a manner as possible.
Graham watched the scene unfold in his viewfinder. He had a bad feeling about what he was seeing, but that didn’t stop him from his shooting.
For several minutes Lanie just sat there; then, as if awakened, she bowed her head, brought her hands together, and began to pray. It looked as if tears were falling down her cheeks. Graham doubted whether her tears would come out in the printed photographs, but he did his best to frame her face.
Lanie moved, though, dropping from her chair to take up her prayers on her knees. The table and angle obscured Graham’s view. He raised the tripod over his head and shot blind, depressing the cable and hoping the shots would come out.
She prayed long enough for him to capture dozens of pictures. Then it was back in the chair, and back to the booze. She poured herself another glass, but apparently decided she wanted a mixer.
Some pills.
Graham kept shooting. Maybe she’s just taking vitamins, he thought. It was possible Lanie’s self-destruction only went so far, and that she was replenishing the vitamins lost to the drink. Hollywood was that strange place where narcissism and self-destruction often went hand in hand.
But she was taking an awful lot of vitamins. One after another.
He wondered if it could be some kind of medication. Lots of people who were HIV positive had to take a whole battery of pills every day. But none of them took it with alcohol. Graham thought of Marilyn Monroe.
He thought of his own mother.
Lanie had cleared the house. She had dressed in black. She had offered up her final prayers.
She was killing herself.
Graham flashed back onto a dream that often plagued him. He was back in the tunnel, but this time he stopped the Citroën instead of fleeing. But he didn’t go and try to help the couple. He took pictures of them, oblivious to everything but getting the shot.
Lanie was raising a plastic bag up to her head. She wasn’t taking any chances. Death by asphyxiation was a sure thing.
Graham patted his body for his cell phone and came up empty. Dammit, he’d left the phone in the car. He didn’t hesitate then, just pushed himself off the fence and landed on Lanie’s property. Somewhere there had to be a path up to the deck, but he didn’t see it. With a long lens, you forget how far away your target is. As he ran, he realized the house was at least a hundred yards off. Foliage barred the way. He clawed at the greenery, fighting through trees and plants. The ground was slippery, and made more so by an abundance of snails. With his every step, gastropods were popping like small firecrackers. Twice he lost his footing in the ice plant, but he was up immediately. Seconds counted, and he knew it. Everyone had always commented on how fast he could run, but his speed seemed to have vanished. He felt slow, slothlike, entered in a race he couldn’t win.
Graham finally stumbled upon some steps and followed them forward. The winding path led up to the deck. The screen door wasn’t locked and he threw it open. Lanie’s head was slumped on a dining table. The bag was still wrapped around it.
He grabbed the plastic and yanked upward, pulling out some of Lanie’s hair. She was still breathing, still responding to pain. Her hand reached up and waved as if she were shooing away a mosquito, then dropped back to the table. She opened her eyes, blinked a few times, and tried to focus. Her mouth opened and closed, as if on a trial run of sizing out the words, before she whispered, “Who are you?”
“A friend.” Graham couldn’t see a phone. “What kind of pills did you take, Lanie?”
She mumbled incoherently and started to close her eyes. Graham grabbed the pill bottle. He scanned the prescription and found she had downed a bottle of Xanax.
Lanie was slumped over again. “It’s not bedtime, Lanie,” Graham said, shaking her until her eyes opened. “Where’s your phone?”
Her eyes were closing again. “Kitchen.”
“Walk with me.” Graham tried pulling Lanie to her feet. Her legs were limp. Dead weight. He pulled her along. “Help me, Lanie. We’ve got to get you an ambulance.”
The words had an unexpected effect. Lanie started struggling in his arms. “No ambulance,” she said. “No hospital! No hospital! Not like this. Not like this.”
Lanie started weeping. Her hands were shaking. Miss L apparently preferred death to indignity. Her legs found some reserve of strength, and her heels dug into the carpeting.
“Call doctor.”
“There’s no time for a house call, Lanie.”
“Dr. Burke.”
That was the doctor’s name on the pill prescription.
“Please.”
Graham paused for a moment. This was one of the movie’s power players. She wasn’t the kind of person to say “please.” Lanie needed immediate attention. She should have thought about her star image before trying to commit suicide.
“Please.”
It was time for his deaf act. The louder the cries, the harder his hearing. But instead Graham asked, “What’s his first name?”
“Arnold.”
“Here’s the deal: If I see you falling asleep I swear I’ll call for an ambulance. And the only thing that’s going to beat that ambulance to the hospital is a bunch of photographers. If you promise not to sleep, I’ll call Dr. Burke.”
“Promise.”
“Keep your eyes open, Lanie. That’s it.”
Graham grabbed the phone. He punched in information and got Dr. Arnold Burke’s number. His service answered on the fourth ring.
“This is an emergency,” Graham said. “I’m calling on behalf of Lanie Byrne. She needs to talk to Dr. Burke immediately.”
“What’s your number, sir?”
“What’s your telephone number, Lanie?”
It took another prod, and several seconds, before Lanie answered. The numbers were uttered in painfully slow fashion. Graham translated them, then added, “This is an emergency.”
He hung up and waited. “You’re not going to sleep, are you, Lanie?”
Sluggishly: “No.”
“Because I’ll call that ambulance.”
The threat got her more alert and vocal. “No.”
The phone rang. It had been less than a minute since Graham had hung up on the service, but Dr. Burke was already calling back. Star treatment.
“I’m with Lanie, Doctor. She’s swallowed a thirty-day supply of Xanax and chased them with cognac. She doesn’t want me to call an ambulance, and she doesn’t want to go to a hospital.”
It was the doctor’s turn to agonize over the decision. “When did she take the pills?”
“Within the last ten
minutes.”
“What are her vital signs? Is she conscious? Is she talking and making sense?”
“She’s still conscious, Doc, but she’s already acting like a zombie.”
“Don’t let her sleep. Keep her talking. If she starts vomiting, make sure her mouth and nasal passages are kept clear. Do you know CPR?”
“Yeah. Some. It’s been years, though—”
“My office is on Stuart Ranch Road. That’s off Civic Center Way. Do you know where that is?”
“Yes, but—”
“I’ll meet you there.”
The doctor offered one final word of medical advice: “Hurry.”
CHAPTER
TWELVE
“Where are your car keys, Lanie?”
A small, bothered shake of the head. “Not sure.”
“Where do you think they might be?”
Her shoulders raised themselves up about a millimeter approximating a shrug.
Graham gathered her up, got Lanie to her feet. Mostly supporting her with his arm, they did their version of the three-legged race up two flights of stairs and into a cavernous five-car garage. Four of the spaces were occupied. Graham lowered Lanie to the ground, propping her against the garage door. She was beginning to lose muscle control. He ran from vehicle to vehicle, starting with the Lexus LS 600h, then moving on to the Infiniti Q50, the Tesla Model S, then the Range Rover. No keys. His last chance was the Jaguar XK coupe.
The fob was on the front seat.
Graham ran back and collected Lanie, then hit the garage door opener. He lifted her in his arms, then tossed her into the backseat. She barely noticed.
The driver’s seat was uncomfortably close to the wheel. Graham patted with his hand, searching for the electronic controls to the seat. He found the switch and punched both his seat and the car into reverse at the same time. Smoke rose from the wheels. He accelerated up the long driveway and was already going sixty when the gate loomed in his headlights. He slowed, expecting it to open automatically, then had to slam on the brakes. Even with its antilock brakes, the Jaguar came to a shaking stop just before the gate. Graham gave a quick look to the backseat. Though she had been tossed around, Lanie was all but oblivious.
Graham patted around the Jag, looking for a control to the gate. He knew there were typically three ways to open such a gate: by transmitter, by swiping a keycard, or by punching in a keypad number. He came up empty on the transmitter and keycard. The only thing in the glove compartment was a copy of a rental agreement from Celestial Motors.
“Shit.” Graham looked around for the keypad and found it on a post in the driveway leading up to the gate.
“Lanie.” He raised his voice: “Lanie!”
Her eyes remained closed, and her answer sounded tentative. “Yes?”
“I need to know the code for the gate.”
“Gate?”
“The driveway gate.”
“Control’s on the visor.”
Graham checked. It wasn’t there. “Not here, Lanie,” he yelled, but she wasn’t listening. Her head had dropped to her shoulder. Graham reached back and started patting her on the cheek. The pats escalated to slaps before she became aware enough to try and push his hand away.
“Stop it.”
“What’s the gate code?”
She strained to remember, shook her head.
“Think!” Graham commanded.
“X,” she said.
“X what?”
“X.” She motioned with her hand from upper left down to right. “One, then nine, then . . .” She gave up with words, but not gestures, this time going from upper right down to left. “Then three and . . . and . . . that bottom X.”
Graham looked at the keypad and understood. Or he thought he did. He hit one and nine, then three and seven.
The gate began to open.
Graham charged through the gap, leaving no more than a quarter inch to spare between the car and the gate. He rocketed up the hill to the main road, opening the windows. The cold air swirled through the car.
Lanie didn’t like the draft. Her nose and mouth wrinkled up, and she raised a hand to ward off the wind from her face. “Cold,” she complained.
“It’s your wake-up call, Lanie. You can’t go to sleep. You promised me, remember?”
“Who are you?”
“Your guardian angel.”
Since returning to Los Angeles, Graham had driven quite conservatively—at least compared to his former habits. Paris had had that much of a residual effect on him. But now he was flooring it, pushing the Jaguar down a grade at almost eighty miles per hour where the speed limit was posted at thirty-five. The Jaguar’s headlights were on high beams, and with the darkness of the canyon around him, it almost felt as if he were outrunning his lights.
Suddenly there were glowing eyes in his beams. Graham braked and swerved at the same time.
“Shit!” he said, fighting the wheel.
The thump was immediately followed by the bump of the front right tire, then the back right tire. Graham had control by then, and eased up on the brakes. Stupid, he thought. He had almost gotten them killed. First he’d taken out a Lady, and now he had almost done away with the Queen of the Screen. And all for the sake of a—
“What was that?”
He glanced back in the rearview mirror. Lanie was sitting up and looking surprisingly alert. The cold air had her trembling and hugging herself.
“A possum. I tried to miss it, but I didn’t.”
Lanie started shivering all the more. Graham raised the front windows some. He checked his rearview mirror again. Though Lanie’s eyes were open, they were unblinking, and she wasn’t moving. He was afraid she had fallen asleep with her eyes open.
“How are you doing back there?”
There was an annoyed blink to show she had heard. He apparently had interrupted her catatonic state.
“I’ll probably need your help to find the doctor’s office, so you’re going to have to stay alert.”
No response.
“You want to show me some sign that you’re still alive?”
Her pride momentarily reasserted itself. She weakly raised her right hand just high enough for him to see, and flipped him off. For once, he was glad to be on the receiving end of the bird.
He barreled down Malibu Canyon Road, passing two cars on the narrow two-lane road. Horns blared behind him. Ahead, Graham could see the Naked Pink Lady Tunnel. It wasn’t a long tunnel, but Graham’s palms still began to sweat. Tunnels had brought him nothing but bad luck. He found himself holding his breath as he entered into the darkness. He was afraid his fear was all too noticeable, and snuck a look at Lanie. She wasn’t paying any attention to him, or anything. Her eyes were closed. No, more than closed. They were shut tight as if she too was afraid. He wondered if she was claustrophobic.
Graham mentally counted their way through to the end of the tunnel. Only eight seconds. Once past it, Graham heaved a sigh of relief, but the relief was only momentary. He had to grab hard at the wheel when the ride suddenly got bumpy.
“What was that?” Lanie’s eyes were open again.
“I drove over some stones. Probably from the recent rain.”
Lanie started shaking again. It wasn’t that cold, Graham thought.
Graham continued down the hill. When he saw Pepperdine University’s cross in the distance, he knew they were getting close to their turn.
“We’re almost there,” he announced to Lanie, but she said nothing. He glanced back and saw that she was slumped on the seat.
“Lanie!” he shouted. “Lanie!”
She didn’t stir.
Graham kept his left hand on the wheel and reached back with his right. He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward him. Her face, one of the most recognizable faces in the world, was cold. He re
ached up along her chin and felt for a pulse. Nothing.
He didn’t know whether to pull to the side of the road and try to remember CPR, or drive like hell the last mile to the doctor’s office. His right foot responded for him, pushing the accelerator to the floor.
And then he felt something under her chin, a flutter that repeated itself. She still had a pulse.
“Remember your promise to me, Lanie. You were supposed to be my company during this ride. You were supposed to talk to me. Are you listening? You can’t die. Hold on, Lanie. Just hold on.”
CHAPTER
THIRTEEN
Graham had this sinking feeling in his stomach. It felt like Paris all over again. If Lanie died this whole affair would blow up in his face. Hollywood would want a scapegoat, and he fit the bill to a T. His having tried to help wouldn’t matter. The star machine would crucify him.
This is payback, he thought. This is karma doing its boomerang act.
He shot along Civic Center Way, and then turned on Stuart Ranch, looking right and left for the doctor’s office. He took a look back at Lanie, and what he saw made him drive faster.
From a distance, he saw a man waiting at the curb with a wheelchair. Dr. Burke, he presumed. Graham screeched up to the curb. His hopes that the doctor would grab Lanie and forget about him didn’t pan out. Burke impatiently motioned for Graham to come and help get Lanie into the wheelchair.
The doctor didn’t waste any of his bedside manner on Graham. He was tall and thin, and had white, wavy hair that was set off by his black, bushy eyebrows. His face was a map of wrinkles and frown lines, the kind of face that advertised concern. Looking at Lanie, the frown lines got that much deeper.
He checked Lanie’s eyes with a penlight. “Did she vomit?”
“No.”
“Any seizures?”
“No—”
Dr. Burke waved off any more words and felt for a pulse. “When did she last speak?”
“Two, maybe three minutes ago—”