The Comeback(79)

I pull my phone out of my bag and look down at it. For some reason my encounter with Emilia is making my chest heavy and tight, and I feel lonelier than I have in a long time. What is wrong with me? I think as I scroll through my contacts and call Nathan.

“Nathan, hi!” I say enthusiastically.

“Hi, sweetie. I’ve actually been meaning to call you.”

“You have?”

“I think John Hamilton is going to offer you this role. He said your screen test blew them all away.”

“Okay,” I say slowly, surprised by the validation I still feel at his words. “So when do we sign?”

“It doesn’t exactly work like that,” Nathan says, sniffing. “He’ll be trying to get you for cheap now, so we’ll have to negotiate. He did seem to like you though. Thinks you’re smart.”

“Who was it that said women and dogs are the only two instances where too much intelligence is a bad thing?”

Nathan snorts. “Probably John Hamilton.”

“So can we meet with him next week? After Christmas?”

“Yes, I’ll get Dana to email him and arrange it.”

“Thank you. I’ve got your support with this . . . comeback, right?” I say needily, hating myself.

“As long as you don’t call it a comeback. Remember, you took one year off, to spend time with your parents.”

“That’s what I told you.”

“You didn’t have to miss the goddamned Golden Globes, Grace,” Nathan says, but his voice isn’t nearly as scathing as it was when we were in his office.

“And there will be at least one topless scene. It might not say it in the script, but you could be topless for the entire one hundred and twenty minutes, if it’s John making those decisions.”

I swallow. “I’m ready for it all.”

“You’re a lucky girl, Grace, if you manage to pull this off,” Nathan says, just before we hang up.

I look down at my phone and flick through my contacts until I reach my sister’s name. Esme has called me three times since I last saw her. My finger hovers over the call button for a moment, but then I just lock the phone instead. I should really check that I don’t have a parking ticket.



* * *



? ? ?

I think I’m going to drive home to Malibu, but somehow I end up on Grand Boulevard, my body making a series of unsolicited turns that bring me right to the doorstep of the glass house. I ring the bell and wave into the security camera. Dylan opens the door, and I didn’t realize how much I missed him until I see him standing there in his navy swim shorts and an old Bob Dylan T-shirt. He looks tanned and his hair is ruffled on one side where he must have been lying on it.

“Have you been sleeping?” I ask, surprised.

“Swimming,” he says, and he’s not even trying to hide how pleased he is to see me. “Come in.”

We sit around the kitchen island, and I remember how much I loved this house, even though nothing in it was ever really mine. It’s less showy than Emilia’s, with ivy tumbling down the kitchen cupboards, and colorful books propped up against every surface. It’s the kind of house where you could believe that someone has actually read the books.

“Did I ever tell you about the pimp and the . . . girl I saw at a launderette downtown years ago?” I ask, before we can start any of the painful small talk that has been our trademark since I’ve been back. I don’t know why the memory came to me, but now that it has, I’m finding it hard to think about anything else.

“I don’t think so.” Dylan shakes his head.

“So, it was the second assassin movie, and we were filming this intense scene where I had to shoot and kill my fellow assassin, my former best friend, but I kept doing it wrong. I was getting tired and restless, and after about thirty takes, Able stood up, furious, and ordered the complete closure of the set for the day. I thought he was going to send me back to the hotel alone, but he drove me to downtown LA instead and pulled up outside this depressing strip of stores. I got out of the car and watched this sweaty, shiny-suited man walk into a launderette with a skinny blond girl who had these bruises all over her arms and legs, and lips covered in scabs like mosquito bites. The man was dropping a pile of old clothes off with the launderette owner, I guess to be altered to fit her, and this girl was trying on these dresses that were five sizes too big for her, like sequined ones with big eighties shoulder pads that hung off her. At some point she caught me staring at her, and all of a sudden she came to life, coiling up and spitting at me through the window like a snake,” I say, shaking my head at the memory of the spit trickling down the window, right where I stood. “Afterward, Able took me to this divey diner next door for a milkshake, and he said, ‘The differences between your life and someone like that are less substantial than you think. Never forget how lucky you are to be where you are,’ and for the first time in a while, I really felt it. On set the next day, I stared my former best friend in the face and thought of the girl as I shot her in the forehead. I nailed it in one take, and the crew gave me a standing ovation when I left.”

I look up, and somehow Dylan is still watching me with interest. I stand up and take a box of water from the fridge because I need a moment to catch my breath more than anything.

“The thing was, this girl was clearly just fucked, like she knew her entire future was going to be sleeping with disgusting creeps in shitty cars and getting to keep like two dollars from whatever she made, and we just left her there, trying on these dresses, and now I can’t understand why I didn’t do anything to help her. I was just so content for the whole exchange to be about me; I actually remember thinking how lucky I was that I’d been able to witness it, but it should never have been about me at all. It was about her—it was her bad luck that she was there.”