‘Honey, really, there’s nothing you can do.’
‘I could call the National Enquirer and tell them what that bastard producer Irving is doing! He’s never liked me, Bill, not since he tried it on and I kneed him in the balls. If my fans knew Gigi was being shelved by the studio, there’d be an outcry!’
Bill stifled a sigh. He’d seen this all before; stars who thought they were indispensable to both the studio and the public. In reality, both were fickle, and Gigi would soon be forgotten as another character caught the audience’s imagination. Besides, Cheska was so difficult, always had been. Up until now, for the sake of the ratings and a percentage of the profits, both he and the studio had been prepared to put up with her mood swings and volatility.
‘Look, Cheska. I’m afraid making a stink about this is going to do no one any good, least of all you. Think about your career. We’ll have to take it on the chin if you want any kind of future in this town.’
‘I just can’t believe this is happening, Bill.’ Cheska rubbed her forehead, dazed with shock. ‘I mean, the show’s still high in the ratings, Gigi is the most popular character . . . I—’ She wrung her hands. ‘Why?’
‘I’ve told you why. I understand how you feel, but we’ll just have to put this behind us and look to the future. There isn’t anything we can do about it.’
Cheska glanced at him, her eyes glinting malevolently. ‘You mean you don’t want me to do anything to hurt your cosy relationship with the studio?’
‘Now, that’s not nice, Cheska. I’ve done my best for you, you know that. I’ve gotten you some great deals in the past few years.’
‘Well, if this is your best, I think maybe the time’s come for a change. I’m calling ICM. You’re fired, Bill. Please leave.’
‘Come on now, Cheska, you don’t mean that. We’re gonna sort this out together and get you something real good.’
‘Don’t give me that baloney, Bill. You’ve got other, bigger fish to fry than me now; in your eyes, I’m a washed-up actress with a bad reputation.’
‘Cheska, don’t talk such shit!’ Bill said.
She stood up. ‘From now on I’ll deal with you through my accountant. Send all cheques to him, as usual. Goodbye, Bill.’
Bill looked at Cheska. Her chin was set at a defiant angle, her eyes were clouded with anger. He’d thought her one of the most beautiful young women he’d ever seen when she’d first walked into his office all those years ago. And she was probably even more lovely now she’d matured. Underneath that exterior, though, she was a real screwy broad, always had been. Paranoid about what people thought of her, believing everyone was out to get her, even when she was riding high. But then, the town was full of insecure women. Cheska was just the cream of the crop. Bill knew he was being let off the hook, and he wasn’t sorry. He decided not to fight on.
‘Okay, Cheska, if this is what you want.’ He sighed, picked up his briefcase and walked towards the door.
‘It is.’
‘If you change your mind, let me know.’
‘I won’t. Goodbye, Bill.’
‘Good luck.’ He nodded at her and left the room.
Cheska waited until she heard the front door close. Then she sank to the floor and began screaming with rage.
39
Eight weeks later Cheska arrived home after her last day at the studio. There’d been champagne and a huge cake on the set afterwards, with the rest of the cast gushing about how much they’d miss her. She’d gritted her teeth and smiled her way through the party, pretending that leaving The Oil Barons was her decision. She realised that Bill had been right, it was the only way to salvage what was left of her pride and her career – even though she knew for certain they were all aware she’d been fired.
Whenever someone had asked her about her next project, Cheska had waved a hand nonchalantly, saying she was going to Europe for a much-needed vacation before she committed herself to anything. The truth was there was nothing in the pipeline. She’d called all the A-grade agents in town – ICM, William Morris and so on – operations that had been desperate to represent her a few years ago. Now, when she phoned, a secretary would take a message, but the agents never rang back.
Cheska asked her maid to bring her a glass of champagne and sank into an armchair in the sitting room. She’d begun to wonder whether she’d made a dreadful mistake when she’d told Bill to take a hike. Should she call him? Ask him to forgive her heat-of-the-moment decision and start scouting around town for suitable roles?
No, she decided. Her pride had taken a big enough battering and she couldn’t go crawling back to him now. The only thing she could do was to set her sights a little lower, go for an up-and-coming agent who would be glad to add a big name like her to their list.
But was a second-rate agent worse than no agent at all? Probably.
‘Shit!’ Cheska closed a hand over her temples. She had a bad headache coming on.
The maid brought her the champagne and she took a large gulp, not caring if it made her headache worse.
And, of course, there was her financial problem. She was broke – in fact, worse than broke. She owed tens of thousands of dollars. Yesterday, she’d gone to Saks to buy a dress for her last-night party and her credit card had been refused. The assistant had rung through and returned to tell her that she was over her limit. So Cheska had written out a cheque which she knew would almost certainly bounce and walked out, red-cheeked and fuming. When she got home she’d called her accountant and asked him to send the next cheque he received from Bill direct to her, bypassing the bank. It would be for over twenty thousand dollars, which should see her through the next few weeks, if she was careful.
Cheska let out a wail of despair. She’d worked solidly from the age of four, and what did she have to show for it? A house that would have to be sold to pay off her debts and a wardrobe full of designer outfits that she now had no occasion to wear. Her friends in the business, so happy to accept her hospitality in the past, had deserted her in droves during the past few weeks.
She knew why: she was on her way down – they smelt it on her like cheap perfume. There was no room in their lives for a failure. It might brush off on them.
Cheska spent the rest of the night getting very drunk and awoke the following morning on the sofa, still fully clothed.
The following week was almost intolerable.
She cancelled her masseuse, her workout coach and her hairdresser. She fired the maid and her security company, knowing she couldn’t afford to pay them at the end of the month. Her nails became chipped, her hair hung lank around her face and she stopped getting dressed in the morning.
Her financial problems, and the boredom, were bad enough, but those dreaded feelings, the ones she’d hoped and prayed had left her forever, were starting to bubble to the surface. Her dreams became overcrowded once more, and she woke up sweating and shaking.
Then a few days ago, she’d started hearing that familiar voice, the one that had made her do those terrible things. She hadn’t heard it since she’d left England, nearly eighteen years ago. And other voices had joined in too. They weren’t telling her about other people this time, they were telling her about herself.
You’re a failure, aren’t you, Cheska? . . . A silly, no-talent little girl . . . you’ll never work again . . . nobody wants you any more, nobody loves you . . .
Cheska would move from room to room, trying to leave the voices behind, but they always came with her, never giving her a moment’s peace.
She tried banging her forehead with her fist to try and make them go away. She answered them back, shouting as loudly as they did, but the voices wouldn’t stop . . . just wouldn’t stop.
In desperation, she’d called the doctor a couple of days ago for some strong tranquillisers, but they did nothing to calm her or stop the voices.
Cheska knew she was going off the rails. She needed help, but she didn’t know where to turn. If she told her doctor about the voices, he’d lock her aw
ay in a funny farm, like those other doctors had when she was pregnant.
After two weeks of living hell Cheska looked in the mirror one morning and saw that she was no longer there.
‘No! No! Please!’
She sank to the floor. She was invisible again. Maybe she was dead already . . . she’d dreamed it often enough. What was reality? She didn’t know any more. Her head was bursting, the voices drumming away, laughing at her.
She ran maniacally around the house, putting sheets over the mirrors that were too heavy to move and turning the rest around to face the walls. Then she sat down on the sitting-room floor, trying to still her breathing.
Cheska knew she could go on no longer. The voices were right when they told her she had no future.
‘Somebody help me, help me, help me!’ There’s no one to help you, Cheska . . . no one. Nobody loves you, no one wants you . . .
‘Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!’ Cheska began banging her head rhythmically against the wall, but still her tormentors continued.
A short while later, she sat up. There was no alternative. The peace she craved could only be achieved one way.
Cheska walked slowly to her bedroom and took out the bottle from her bedside drawer. She sat on the floor and gazed at the innocuous-looking yellow spheres peering at her from behind their glazed brown plastic screen. She wondered how many she’d have to take to make sure. She twisted the top and shook one of the pills into her palm.
The voices assailed her ears once more, but this time she laughed.
‘I can stop you!’ she cried triumphantly. ‘It’s easy, it’s so easy . . .’
She put the pill to her lips, and her tongue tasted its burning, chalky texture. Taking a glass of water from the bedside table, she swallowed it. Tipping out three more, she looked up to the heavens, where she was sure Jonny was waiting for her.
‘Can I come to you now, please? I don’t want to go down there with them. If I say sorry and that I believe in God, will they let me?’
For once, there was silence in her head. No one answered and a single tear rolled down her cheek.
‘I’m sorry, Mummy, so sorry. I didn’t mean it, really.’
And what about Ava? You abandoned your daughter . . . Who can forgive you for that?
The voices were back again. ‘Please! Please!’ she begged them. She knocked back the pills in her palm and was about to tip out more when there was another noise . . . a bell chiming, as if at the gates of hell.
The chimes reverberated around her head. ‘Stop! Stop! Please stop!’ The noise was vaguely familiar, and gradually she realised it wasn’t hell beckoning her in but the bell at the front gates. Somehow, she managed to walk into the hall, then sank to her knees.
‘Go away, go away! Please!’ she screamed.
‘Cheska, it’s me. Uncle David!’
Cheska looked up at the video screen. David? It couldn’t be him. He lived in England. It was the voices again. They were trying to trick her.
‘Cheska, please, let me in!’
She stood up and peered at his face on the screen, just to make sure. Older, heavier, with grey hair receding at the temples, but still with the same twinkling eyes.
‘Okay, okay.’ Cheska walked unsteadily down the hall to switch the alarm system off, then pressed the buzzer to let David in through the gates.
David did his best to hide his shock when Cheska opened the front door. Her hair was lank and greasy, her eyes glassy, with large black smudges beneath them. Her pupils darted from side to side, giving her the appearance of a hunted animal. In the centre of her forehead was a huge black bruise. A dirty sweatshirt hung from her thin shoulders and her once shapely legs looked like two sticks. She was swaying in front of him, as though she was drunk.
‘Cheska, how lovely to see you.’ He leant forward to kiss her and smelt an unwashed odour.
‘Oh, David, David, I—’ Her blue eyes looked up at him in anguish, then she burst into tears and sank to the floor once more.
He watched as she sat there, rocking herself backwards and forwards, and knelt down to comfort her, but she screamed when he tried to touch her. Then he noticed the pill bottle clutched in her fist.
‘That’s it, I’m calling a doctor.’
She looked up at him. ‘No! I . . . I’ll be fine, really.’
‘Cheska, look at you. You’re not fine at all.’ He wrenched the bottle from her grasp and looked at the label. ‘How many of these have you taken?’
‘Only three or four.’
‘Do you absolutely swear?’
‘I swear, David.’
‘Right. Let’s get you up off the floor.’ He swiftly pocketed the pill bottle then helped her to her feet. She managed to make it into the sitting room, collapsing onto the sofa and holding out her arms to him.
‘Please, come and hold me. Uncle David, just hold me.’
David did as she asked, and she buried her face in his lap. She lay there silently for a while, then stared up at him, studying his face. She lifted a hand and traced his eyes, nose and mouth.
‘Are you real?’
He chuckled. ‘Well, I should hope so! Why do you ask that?’
‘Oh, because I’ve imagined so many things over the past few days. People, places . . .’ A smile suddenly lit up her face. ‘If you are real, then I’m so glad you’re here.’
With that, Cheska closed her eyes and promptly fell asleep.
40
After a while, David gently moved Cheska’s head onto the sofa and left her to sleep. He went into the kitchen, noting the filthy surfaces littered with used glasses and cups. Taking the bottle of pills from his pocket, he flushed the contents down the waste-disposal unit. He had little doubt what Cheska had been about to do, and thanked the fates that he’d decided to stop as he drove past her house on his way to stay with an old actor friend further up the hill.
He’d been working in Hollywood on and off over the past few years and had called in on Cheska occasionally for a drink, believing that, in spite of her abandonment of Ava, it was important to maintain some form of contact. But he had always found her company difficult to endure. There had normally been a man hanging around somewhere in the house and he doubted he’d had more than a few minutes alone with her over all his visits. He was aware that this was almost certainly done on purpose; no one in Hollywood knew that Cheska had a child and he was sure the last thing she wanted was him talking about Ava. She’d known he wouldn’t in front of strangers.
He had dutifully written to tell her that her mother had woken up from the coma soon after Cheska had left England, and had tried to keep her informed of Greta’s progress over the years. But every time he’d seen her, Cheska had been singularly uninterested in talking about Greta. When David brought the subject up, it was a one-way conversation, with him offering short platitudes such as ‘Your mother sends her love’ – which was a lie, anyway, as Greta didn’t even remember Cheska.
Whenever he visited he’d always leave her house feeling horribly depressed, as it was obvious Cheska’s past in England no longer existed for her. As it didn’t exist for Greta. It saddened and frustrated him, but his mother always said, ‘Let sleeping dogs lie,’ and, eventually, that was what he’d done.
David washed up a cup and made himself some tea, going over the situation in his mind. He had little or no idea what had driven Cheska to attempt suicide. He’d presumed that everything was going wonderfully for her.
He’d been in Hollywood for the past month shooting a cameo part in a big movie. Filming had ended yesterday and he was on his way home to England. Temporarily, at least. After attending his mother’s eighty-fifth birthday party, he was going on a long-delayed ‘gap year’, as the teenagers these days called it. He was sixty-one years old, and his career – both here in the USA and in England – had reached the point where he felt he could take time off and return if he wished. He’d earned it, and knew if he didn’t do it now, he might be too frail in the future to attempt it.
He smiled at the thought of her: her petite but shapely figure and her dark hair, swept up in a chignon, her brown eyes shining with warmth and intelligence. He’d liked her the first time he’d met her. It had been at a dinner party given by an old friend from his Oxford days. As a single man, he was usually seated next to a spare female on these occasions, most of whom left him cold. But Victoria, or Tor, as she liked to be called, was different. He had thought originally that she was in her mid-forties – though he found out later she was over fifty – and she had told him her husband had died ten years earlier and she had never felt the need to remarry. She was an Oxford don, specialising in ancient Chinese history, and her husband had been a classical scholar. Tor had spent her life closeted in the world of academia.
David had driven home thinking that such a cultured, well-read woman would have little or no interest in a light entertainer like him. Granted, he too had received an excellent formal education, but he’d lived in a very different world ever since.
However, a week after their first meeting, he received a note from her inviting him to Oxford for a recital he’d expressed interest in. He’d booked into a local hotel, wondering how he’d mix with Tor’s intellectual friends. And he’d had a very enjoyable evening.
Later that night, over a quiet supper, Tor had chided him for his modesty. ‘You entertain people, David. It’s a great gift, far greater than writing a thesis on Confucius. Making people laugh and feel happy for a few seconds is a wonderful talent. Apart from that, you were at Oxford once, too. And this evening you held your own perfectly well with my friends.’
They had begun to see each other regularly and, eventually, he’d asked her if she’d like to go away with him for a weekend. He had taken her to Marchmont, where LJ had warmed to her instantly. Although, mused David, given his mother’s thinly disguised frustration at his enduring devotion to Greta – ‘For goodness’ sakes, darling, she doesn’t even remember who you are!’ was her constant mantra – he was hardly surprised at her relief that at last he had a ‘lady-friend’, as she’d delicately put it.
The Angel Tree Page 34