Hollywood Stuff (2 page)

“Jane, oh, Jane, I feel I know you, may I call you Jane?”

Jane nodded, before she actually spoke.

“And what may I call you?” she finally asked.

“I’m Wren Bixby and you can call me Wren, but everybody out here calls me Bix. “She paused for a breath or for effect or for both and added,” Including my buddy Jeb Gleason, who claims to be your best friend. Is he lying to me again?”

Jane felt all of her loneliness melt and be replaced with something else. She threw
The Long Goodbye
on the couch and curled up in a giant padded rocker and tucked her feet underneath her.

“You’re a friend of Jeb’s?”

“ We worked together years ago and he was the love of my life. Luckily I’ve had almost as many of those as he has, so we’ve remained friends,” said Bix. “Look, I’m just terrible at small talk and dancing around stuff, so do you mind if I get straight to the business of this call, then we can trade Jeb stories?”

“Fine,” said Jane. She immediately responded to this stranger who disliked small talk, since Jane was so bad at it herself. In fact, she hated small talk as much as she hated talking on the phone, so the combination of telephone small talk was something she really wanted to bury. “Shoot,” she said.

“I want to buy your story and turn it into a movie.”

“Which one?” said Jane, looking up at the bookcase.

“The scarecrow murder, to start with. You’ve got a lot more?” asked Bix.

Jane claimed later to have gotten a little hazy after she realized that Wren Bixby was not talking about buying any of her old first editions. Bix explained that she wanted to buy the rights to Jane’s life story…at least to the part that had become public when Jane got into the crime-solving chapter of her life and when she babbled like an idiot on that Chicago television newsmagazine. Apparently Wren had caught the segment on some early morning program in L.A. on a sister station to the Chicago channel that had carried it. That same morning, Bix happened to have breakfast with Jeb Gleason, mentioned the story, Jeb told her that he and Jane had been close friends in college, and since there are no coincidences, according to Bix, she knew she was meant to make a movie of Jane Wheel—PPI, picker, private investigator.

“So how about it?” asked Wren. “The sum we offer for rights is small, and I mean small, but if we move through the pipeline with the project, sign with a major studio, get a good writer, persuade a star to get involved, and the movie gets made, you’ll get more. I mean, we’ll put you on as a consultant or something. I usually give a fancy dog-and-pony show when I’m schmoozing someone for their story, but Jeb says you are strictly a no-bullshit kind of woman.

Jane took a deep breath. “I might need a little bullshit for this one.”

“Fair enough. How about you come out to L.A. for a meeting with us—my partner, Lou, and I have a very small production company, Bix Pix Flix. Don’t judge us on cutesy, we picked it in a moment of weakness. Kind of like people who pick their online screen names in homage to their favorite metal band, then have to give the contact name out during a job interview…you know…yes, I do have that MBA and you contact me at
[email protected]
. Anyhow, BPF will fly you out here…oh, and we want Tim Lowry’s rights, too, but they’re not essential,” said Wren. “You’re the story here, Jane.”

Jane called Charley’s cell and left a message. She knew he’d say to do whatever she wanted on this. This was not the kind of thorny issue that Charley and she would need to sit down and thrash out. Charley would tell her to leave him out of it, Nick would make her sign an oath in blood to portray herself as childless, but basically, this would be her decision. Jane could take it or leave it. And she knew what she would do. She would leave it. She had done enough damage to her own privacy and to those whom she loved in a ten-minute interview. She was a monastic person, one who would be happy to live as a recluse, a hermit…if only the other caves would hold occasional yard sales.

Ay, there was the rub. Jane had to put up with all those other people because people begat stuff, and stuff, for Jane, was what brought people palatably to life. It made others interesting, warm, human. It was what people kept and what they discarded that guided Jane through the confusion of human emotions. But how could Jane go along on her anonymously merry way, scouting junk in alleys and yards, on rummage sale tables and auction house floors, if she was involved in some ego-wrenching nonsense in, for the love of Pete, Hollywood? What would ever make Jane leave her happy home, in the sensible midwestern time zone where you can catch the local news and Letterman and still be asleep by midnight, and head for loopy La-La Land?

Not Jeb Gleason. Not anyone who found her through Jeb Gleason, that was for sure.

Jane picked up
The Long Goodbye
and carried it with her to bed. She fell asleep with the book open next to her, content with her decision to call Bix in the morning and explain that she was not interested in any movie project.

Morning came slightly earlier than Jane had planned—announced by a ringing telephone.

“Wake up, babe, wake up. I’ve already booked our flight. We’re going out tonight. I’ll be there in a few hours to help you pack appropriately. Book a haircut and a pedicure. You’ll be wearing sandals. This is going to be a first-class trip.”

Right. Jane picked up her alarm clock and held it an inch in front of her face. 5:00
A.M
. What was that she had asked herself when she decided that she would reject the movie proposal? What would make her leave her happy home? Wrong pronoun. Who would make her leave? Not Jeb Gleason, no.

Tim Lowry. Of course.

“Out of the question,” said Jane. “I’m going back to sleep so that I can forget that you called me at this hour.”

“You are so cute when you’re sleep-deprived. Expect me in two hours.”

One hour and twenty minutes later, Tim Lowry showed up at her door in Evanston wearing Ray.Bans and carrying a vintage Hartmann suitcase. He walked past Jane at the front door, through the house, up the stairs to the master bedroom, and opened her closet.

Shaking his head and clucking, he threw a few blouses and skirts on the bed. He held up a ridiculously expensive flowered chiffon dress that Jane had bought the summer before and looked at his friend, the top of the wire hanger forming a question mark in front of his face.

“I thought Miriam’s daughter’s wedding would be a good time to experiment with a new look,” she said, shrugging.

“How’d that work for you?”

“It didn’t. I wore my old black Lauren,” Jane said.

“As I suspected, Miss I-am-so-comfortable-in-my-rut-I-will-never-leave,” said Tim, tossing the dress onto a chair. Jane served up the excuses—the phoniness of Hollywood, the loss of privacy, her fear of flying—and as Tim swatted away everything, she waved in his face the flyer for the River Grove Rummage Sale that was coming up the next weekend.

“How about this, then? We can’t go off and miss the biggest rummage sale in the Midwest, can we?”

“Darling girl,” Tim said, “one word:
Pasadena.
”

When Jane didn’t respond, Tim practically began dancing around her bedroom.

“If we leave today, we’ll be staying over the weekend, and this is the first weekend of the month. Pasadena City College Flea Market,” said Tim, overenunciating each of the five words. “Not the Rose Bowl, but that’s too big anyway. Time for us to see some West Coast flea, don’t you think? Old film star photos, movie props, posters, good modern furniture, California pottery in its natural habitat…” Tim trailed off and took Jane’s hand in his. “Do you good to get out of the Midwest, honey.” Tim waved his hand around her bedroom, pointing to the pottery vases that lined the top of barrister bookcases under the window. “You’re suffering from too much McCoy. Not enough Bauer.”

Tim stopped for air and looked deep into Jane’s brown eyes.

“Charley and Nick are off working and you will be lonely here anyway, so why not give this a whirl? We don’t have to say yes. We don’t have to sign anything, “Tim said. “It’s not like you to turn down new territory for scavenging, honey.”

Jane took a deep breath and prepared to list all of her fears of traveling and public embarrassment, but none of that came out when she opened her mouth.

“Jeb Gleason,” she said.

Tim shook his head.

“You met him when you came to see me at school. When I lived in that big pink stucco house on the hill? With those two blondes you called the Bobbsey Twins? Jeb was tall, thin, wore the big Panama hat?”

“Jeb Gleason, “said Tim.” Yeah. Right. A lanky Dennis Quaid type, right? So what’s the big deal? An old boyfriend. You’re a grown-up girl now, all married and motherly. What’s the problem?”

Jane shrugged. “I don’t know. I didn’t even know I was going to say that. It just hit me that if we go to L.A. and he’s a friend of this Bix woman, I’ll have to see him and it’s been so many years. He didn’t show up for my wedding. Remember? He called Marty’s during the reception and a waiter called me to the phone?”

“Sorry, hon, I was drinking tequila and acting out my own little drama with Bill,” said Tim. “I think that might have been our third-to-last breakup. The one before the one that finally took.”

“He didn’t say anything when I got on the phone. Just held it to the stereo so I could hear what he was listening to….”

“Which was?”

“I don’t remember. Really, I don’t. But it made me cry a little.”

Jane moved over to her dressing table and leaned into the mirror until her nose nearly touched the glass. “I thought it might be nice to stay twenty-one in someone’s eyes.”

Tim came over to stand behind Jane. Reaching over her shoulder, he placed his finger on the mirror, right beside her left eye. “See those fine lines there, baby? That’s from the smile Nick put on your face when he was born. When you look at him, even now, your whole face just gives in and gives it up for him.” Tim touched her lips reflected in the mirror. “And see, there’s just a hint of softness around the mouth here? That’s from whispering to Charley every night. And kissing. And being kissed. That’ll do it, too. I mean, if you kiss someone like you mean it. And I’ve seen you and Charley, honey. You both mean it.”

Tim moved his right hand from her reflection and pointed in the mirror to her throat. “Look at that neck. Still long and graceful, yes, but hmm…” He ran a finger down the side of the mirror along her neck. “Yes, maybe the skin here is a touch less taut. And why would that be? Because you’ve lived some of your life and you’ve laughed and cried and been busy singing your story to the world.

“Janie,” Tim said, straightening up and placing his hands on her shoulders. “You aren’t a pretty little twenty-one-year-old coed. You are a beautiful grown-up woman who has lived life deeply. If Jeb thought you were something back then, he will be blown away by the way you look now.”

Jane smiled and put her hand over Tim’s.

“You do have all your own teeth, right?” asked Tim.

“Okay, okay, I know. It’s silly.”

“And you wear the same size jeans?”

“Okay, I’m done talking about this. I’ll go because you want to go and we’ll find a flea market and take pictures of each other at the Chinese Theatre, but I am not signing away my rights for some ridiculous movie.”

“Agreed,” said Tim. “That would be a terrible idea.”

Jane went into the spare room to get out a suitcase and Tim quickly looked over the makeup table. He gathered up Jane’s pathetically small supply of paints and powders and slipped them into a worn makeup bag. “She’s going to need every one of these,” he said softly, shaking his head. “Should have been moisturizing,” he added, giving his own firm chin an appreciative pat.

By noon, Jane had finally managed to pack a suitcase whose contents met with Tim’s approval. He then drove her to a day spa in Chicago where he knew a friend of a friend. Jane was manicured and pedicured and, in his best while-we’re-here-what-the-heck style, Tim convinced her to get her hair cut.

Jane had been letting it grow out from a very short experimental phase where she told people she was re-creating a kind of brunette Mia Farrow pixie. Her short hair directly coincided with her temporary separation from Charley, and Jane knew that her style choice had less to do with Mia’s character on the sixties television show
Peyton Place
than her own feelings of guilt. She had to become shorn and penitent. Charley had finally convinced her that although she could pull it off—he admitted she had fine cheekbones—he would love to run his fingers through her hair, her long hair, once more.

“I promised Charley,” she said, holding up her hand in a stop-sign position when the stylist approached with the scissors.

“He will approve, sweetie,” said Tim, and nodded at Buzz, the stylist. “Just a cleanup, right?”

“Absolutely.”

Jane had to admit, when she was all done, staring at herself in the mirror, Tim might have been right. Her fine brown hair, stretching to almost shoulder-skimming, had looked tired, accentuated her drawn face. Now, with soft layers, slightly spiky on the ends, her whole face lightened. Her brown eyes were bigger, her smile brighter. Jane’s hands were smooth and her nails, red ovals, elongated her fingers. She kept staring at herself, waving her hands next to her head, smiling. Inside Charley’s argyle socks, which she preferred to her own, Jane wiggled her deliciously painted apple-red toes. Although she had begun the ordeal feeling like the Cowardly Lion being groomed for Oz, she wasn’t at all displeased with the result. And her new look did confer courage.

“Hello, Bix, good to meet you,” Jane said, practicing. “And Jeb, how wonderful to see you again.”

“Smile with your eyes, babe, and take the voice register down a notch. You can’t miss with throaty,” said Tim, taking her wallet and removing her credit card and handing it to the severe-looking blonde dressed entirely in black at the front desk.

The girl in black, whose red-shellacked lips barely moved, asked something which Jane heard as, “Could I ask what she thinks she’s doing?”

“Naturally,” said Tim, taking the bill and writing something with a flourish.

“Oh,” said Jane, the translation of Lacquer Lips’s remark hitting her. “Would you like to add a gratuity?”

“Yes,” said Tim, taking Jane’s arm and guiding her through the door that the receptionist had run out from behind the counter to open for them, “and you liked adding a big fat one.”

By six o’clock, Jane and Tim were buckling themselves into first-class recliners and sipping Grey Goose with bleu-cheese-stuffed olives.

“How did you manage first class?” asked Jane. “Bix Pix Flix didn’t spring for this.”

“How do you know that?” asked Tim, holding up two fingers to the flight attendant to signal that they were ready for more. “They might be dying to sign us and want to wine and dine us royally.”

“I know to you I’m a poor antique-picking partner who needs you to make all important decisions in my life, but you forget that I’m also a detective. I have my ways of finding out about people and their companies,” said Jane, removing an olive from a toothpick and popping it into her mouth.

“You got some kind of spy network thing going now?” said Tim, digging into his briefcase.

“I Googled Wren Bixby. And the company. And her partner, Lou. They had one minor success about six years ago when they got the rights to that hot novel that stayed on the bestseller list for a million weeks. They didn’t get to make the picture, but they made money when they sold the option. A few other interesting-sounding projects in the works and no outstanding red flags—I mean, they didn’t get their start in porno or anything—but there was nothing that suggested that they had money to fly people out to L.A. first class.”

“So you think I upgraded with my Visa miles? Nope. You might be a good little Googler, but I went a step further. I have a whole L.A. network of out-of-work soap actors who are friends of friends of friends and I called around. Bix Pix Flix has a development deal with a major studio. My source told me that if a producer wants life rights, a producer should cough up some royal treatment. Sooo…” Tim said, in his best bedtime storytelling voice, “when Bix called me to coax you into a yes, I told her that I thought you and I deserved a nice trip together. First class was understood. Look, I know you’re a homebody at heart, but with Charley doing all this globe-trotting and now Nick going along with him, I thought you might need a little reminder of what the world looks like outside of Chicago and the suburbs and Kankakee, and besides…”

The rest of the flight was boarding and Jane heard a dog barking. Could one of those passengers have a small dog in one of their carriers? She smiled, thinking of Rita in a giant duffel bag beside her. No way her dog would stand for becoming a travel accessory. Rita was happy at home, with her buddy and second-best friend, Officer Miles, acting as dog-sitter.

“Janie,” said Tim, snapping his fingers in front of her face, “that’s you barking.”

Reaching into her bag, Jane found her cell phone, apparently set on
Singing dog
instead of ring. Since Nick was gone, Jane glared at Tim, who shrugged.

“Who do you think taught Nick how to do it?”

Jane, trying to quiet the barking as quickly as possible since it was clearly not a first-class cellular ring, flipped up the phone.

“Yeah?”

Jane sighed. The electronic barking was stilled for the time being, but her mother growled louder into the phone.

“Yeah? What’s this about you going to California with that damn Tim?”

“I’m on the plane, Mom, I have to turn off my cell phone,” said Jane.

The flight attendant, bringing them their second round, shook her head. “No worries, we’re fifteen minutes from takeoff, so—”

Jane shook her head furiously at the woman.