The Last Dreamer (16 page)

“Just a minute,” he said, slowly, and then she heard him call to his secretary: “Kelly, would you close the door, please?” He returned to the phone.

“Iliana, I’m going to say this once.” He spoke in a restrained voice, which she knew he had to do since he was at work, but she could tell he was seething. “I don’t give a
fuck
about your ticket, I don’t give a
fuck
about your plans, I don’t give a
fuck
about anything, except that you get your
fucking
ass
on that red-eye tonight!”

She felt her face turn red, as the hand that was holding the phone started to shake. Her breathing got loud and shallow. She could tell people in the lobby were looking at her, but she couldn’t hide the emotion she felt. She had been married to Marc for sixteen years, had dated him for a year before that, and had never before heard him talk that way. Not to her, not to anyone. Occasionally he would throw out a “hell” or an “ass,” but he never aimed it directly at her; it was only when he was stuck in traffic or describing something that annoyed him at work. It was one of the things she had always loved about their marriage—that neither one of them ever lost control to that extent.

“Don’t you talk to me like that—”

“Then I’ll talk to you like this,” he said. “Go fuck yourself, is that better? Go fuck yourself, Iliana!” He hung up the phone.

She froze, trembling. A moment later she felt a touch on the small of her back, and jumped.

“Hey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” Jeff said. “I was just wondering, is everything all right?” She looked at him, still shaking. “No, I guess everything’s not all right. What is it?”

“Just some
 . . .”
She looked down and rubbed her forehead with one hand. “Just some resistance.”

“Your editor’s giving you a hard time? Look, don’t let that get to you. You’re the talent, you call the shots. We have a fantastic day ahead. Let’s not let anyone spoil it. Okay?”

She let out a heavy breath. What was done was done. She would have to deal with it later. “Okay,” she said.

They walked to the glass doors, and he pulled one open. He stepped away for her to pass through, and then followed her out.

Chapter 16

Sitting in the blue Pathfinder that Jeff had rented, Iliana remembered a time several years earlier when she and Marc had taken the kids to a mountaintop resort in the Catskills. The day before they were to leave, a massive snowstorm abruptly changed course and headed directly toward the area where they were vacationing. The roads were closing, and guests were told that if they didn’t leave right away, they could be stuck at the hotel for days. Realizing that by leaving they’d be heading into the storm’s path, she and Marc decided to stay and wait the storm out. In the lobby, they watched as other families tensely loaded their cars, and staff members piled into vans to go down the mountain. The whole scene looked like a flight from Armageddon. Later that night, in a largely empty dining room with a skeleton staff, Marc and Iliana ordered champagne, and the four of them had hot fudge sundaes for dessert. A sentence from somewhere, the Bible maybe, kept running through Iliana’s head: Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.

Iliana realized she felt the same way now as she had on that Catskills trip. She regretted getting into such a big and horrible fight with Marc. But the damage was done. Her ticket was changed, and even if she changed it back, she was still going to have to account for her behavior when she got home. So she turned to the window and quietly breathed out through her mouth, trying to calm down. She could fret all day, but what would that get her? Nothing. It made more sense to put the fight out of her mind, embrace the adventure ahead, and deal with consequences later.

“So, where should we start?” Jeff asked as he maneuvered the car out of the hotel driveway.

Iliana shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

“Well, I’d like to show you everything from the old days, but not much is around anymore,” he said. “But I can take you to the areas that were important to me. And maybe, if we talk a bit, maybe I can make you feel what it was like.”

She nodded. It would be great to think about his life for a while.

“And as you may know, when you’re talking about teenage boys and Southern California, all roads head to the beach,” he added. “So, Ms. Fisher, let’s start there.”

They approached the 405, and Jeff merged into the traffic easily, as only someone who had spent a lot of time on Los Angeles freeways could do. The windows of the car were open, and the wind rushed through, wild and invigorating. Iliana repeatedly pushed her hair away from her eyes and behind her ears, only to have it slap against her face again. Gradually, she felt herself letting go of the conversation with Marc, surrendering to the warm wind as it pushed thoughts of him out of her mind.

“Want the A.C.?” Jeff shouted to be heard over the whipping air.

“No, I love the open windows,” she shouted back.

“Okay, suit yourself,” Jeff shouted, sounding amused, as though she never failed to entertain him. “But make sure you can hear me, because I have something important to tell you. I got in touch with Terry. I talked to him on the phone.”

“The Dreamers’ Terry?” she asked.

He nodded. “I found him online. He lives south of San Francisco. I told him about you, and he wants to meet you.”

“Oh,” said Iliana. “I’d like to meet him, too.” It was true, she wanted to meet Terry, to see what he looked like and hear about his life. But not now. Not too soon. She wanted to be alone with Jeff. He made her feel good about herself, and she didn’t want to share him just yet. The thought made her uncomfortable, as she knew it wasn’t appropriate to feel that way. But she pushed it out of her mind, just as she had pushed worries about Marc out of her mind as well. She was tired of judging herself. She would judge herself later.

They turned off the highway and onto a flat two-lane road. Their decreased speed made the wind in the car less frantic.

“Oh God, I love California,” Iliana said.

“Yeah? Do you get here often?”

“A few times,” she said. “Mostly to San Francisco. But my favorite time was when I came here to LA with my college roommate right after we graduated. It was so exciting, being on our own, going wherever we wanted. Heading out to the clubs at night to go dancing. Never knowing what might happen or who we might meet. Whether we might run into a movie star. Whether that was the night we might fall in love.” She looked down. She knew she shouldn’t be talking about personal things like this, just like she knew it that day at lunch. And yet, it felt so natural. His plan to show her what his past was like made her nostalgic for her own.

He looked at her. “And there’s not as much freedom now?”

She smiled. “Marriage changes things, doesn’t it?”

He nodded. “Well, it was different for me. My life was never that free when I was young, because of the show. But I know what you mean. Marriage can be a real downer after a while. Both sides start off happy, but then somebody gets miserable, and instead of trying to get happy again, that person just tries to bring the other one down, too.”

Iliana looked ahead through the windshield, thinking about what Jeff had said. Had she been trying to make Marc miserable because she was? Or had he been trying to do that to her? Were they past the point where they could ever both be happy together? She looked at Jeff’s profile as he drove. No doubt he was thinking about his own marriage. She remembered her meeting with him in Mount Kisco, how his mood had changed when Catherine appeared. And here he was, looking so happy to see her at the hotel, so pleased to show her the California he remembered.

Thinking about how glad he seemed, she started to worry that maybe his expectations of her were too high. It was hard to know what exactly was on his mind. He was taking her to old Dreamers venues as a way of giving her information for a book. She had told him plainly that she couldn’t guarantee she could get a book published, but did he accept that? Or had he convinced himself that she was too good to be turned down?

“Jeff, you know this book thing is not so easy, don’t you?” she said. “I mean, I’m really going to try, but the publishing business is rocky right now, and—”

“Hey, here we go!” Jeff said, swerving way over to the right. “Almost missed the turnoff!”

The air became moist and began smelling like the ocean. Jeff made a few quick turns off the main road and finally pulled into a small parking lot, where a tan, muscular man sitting on a lawn chair beneath a clip-on umbrella took his twenty-dollar bill. He parked the car and they walked uphill along a narrow street, at the top of which was a long, concrete promenade. Ahead were some concrete steps that led toward the ocean, flanked by sand that looked like light-brown sugar. Iliana could see a line of surfers skimming the rolling waves, while sunbathers—families, pairs of women, groups of teenagers—lounged on vibrantly colored beach towels and under striped umbrellas.

Jeff turned and started to walk along the promenade, and Iliana followed him, the beach to their left and fanciful surf shops, poster galleries, and bars on their right. It was a busy place. Women and men in high-tech gear and expensive sneakers ran past, some with dogs by their sides, while bicyclists weaved among mothers with strollers and attractive couples in bathing suits holding hands. Some young men in dress shirts and slacks walked slowly and aimlessly, as though they dreaded going back to the office, while others with ponytails displayed beaded jewelry for sale on square bridge tables. Iliana noticed a homeless woman in an overcoat, sitting on a folding chair, her cart with all her belongings next to her.

Jeff was looking down, his hands in his jeans pocket.

“What is it?” she asked.

“You know, there used to be hundreds of people right here behind police barricades, just trying to get a glimpse of us,” he said. “Crying and screaming, calling our names. All they wanted was to be noticed. All I had to do was wink or wave in their direction, and they acted like I gave them the moon. God, what a time that was.”

He shook his head and began walking again, and she followed alongside. They strolled in silence, listening to the ocean, watching the people. He looked so sad that she felt sorry for him. It was as though the show had been canceled yesterday and not years and years ago.

Eventually they came to a restaurant, with an awning-covered stone patio that held several wrought iron tables and chairs. “Hey, are you hungry?” Jeff asked. “How about some lunch?”

They ordered two glasses of wine and a couple of upscale sandwiches, and Iliana rested her chin on one hand. The area brought a host of fond memories to Jeff’s mind, and he entertained her with them, one after another. He recalled the afternoon that he and Terry had to swim into the ocean for a scene. “They took us out beyond the waves in a motorboat,” he said. “But what we didn’t know was that Terry couldn’t swim! He never told us. Anyway, he’s flailing around, and it takes us twenty minutes to realize that he’s not kidding around, he’s drowning! The guy starred in, like, a million commercials that took place on the beach—suntan lotion, potato chips, Coca-Cola—but he hates the water! I had to jump in and rescue him!” He laughed out loud, as she wrinkled her nose and shook her head.

“Then we were shooting a night scene on the beach, and during a break, Terry takes one of the script girls into the dunes,” he said. “Well, the rest of us run up behind them and steal his clothes. So we’re about to start shooting again and the director calls for Terry and we’re all hysterical. Finally Terry shows up wearing nothing, just covering himself with a rock!”

As he leaned back and laughed out loud again, two women approached the table. They were a little older than Iliana, and both very slim, with spaghetti-strap tops and flat, strappy sandals. But while their outfits were youthful, their complexions gave away their age. Both had the plastic look of too much work having been done.

“Excuse me, but weren’t you on TV?” the first woman asked, as the other woman clasped her hands together under her chin.

“Yes, I was,” Jeff said, standing up. “Hi, ladies. I’m Jeff Downs.” He shook hands with them, holding each woman’s hand a moment longer than Iliana thought was appropriate.

“Oh my God, I knew you were. Didn’t I tell you?” the first woman asked her friend, who gave a few quick stamps of her feet and clenched her fists as she giggled. “I loved
Guitar Dreams
when I was a teenager,” the first woman continued. “I know it’s a cliché, but I was definitely your biggest fan.”

“Can we trouble you for your autograph?” her friend asked.

“No trouble at all,” Jeff said grandly, as though he hoped other diners would look up and recognize him, too. Iliana felt a little embarrassed for him, because he looked like an overacting guest star on an old sitcom, and all that was missing was a canned laugh track. The women handed him a few paper napkins bearing the logo of the restaurant, and he wrote, but not before glancing pointedly at Iliana’s bag and murmuring, “Don’t you want to take this down?” She figured he was making a joke but quickly realized he wasn’t, so she reached into her bag for a notebook and pen. Still, it was hard to believe he was serious. Two women give him napkins to sign, and he wants her to take
notes
?

“So you really loved the show, huh?” Jeff asked, turning back to the two women.

“Oh my God, yes,” the first woman said. “Your show, your music. It felt like forever, waiting a whole week for the next episode.”

“And which episode was your favorite?”

“I loved them all, but mostly the ones about you and the girl who wanted the lead in the high school show
 . . .”

Iliana listened to the exchange, waiting for Jeff to introduce her. One of her favorite fantasies had always been of being with Jeff, meeting his friends, hearing him proudly tell them who she was. But he never did. Instead he just handed her their cell phones, so she could take pictures of the three of them. Finally the women thanked him for being so nice. He took their hands again, first one woman’s and then the other’s, looking directly in their eyes as he did so. It was the same way he had taken Iliana’s hand when he said good-bye that first day in his showroom.

He sat down with a sigh, appreciatively watching the two women from the back as they grasped each other and giggled and shook their heads. Then he pointed to her notebook. “Did you get it all down?” he asked.

Looking at him, his eyebrows raised and his eyes wide, she was reminded of Matthew on the day of his very first orchestra concert, when he saw that she was just taking her phone. “Don’t you want to bring the good camera?” he asked. She nodded and hurried to the hall closet where the electronic equipment was, to prove to him that of course he deserved the good camera. Of course he was that important. Jeff, she saw, was asking for that same reassurance. And yet Jeff was a grown man. He shouldn’t be acting like a ten-year-old boy.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “I got it.”

He looked at the two women leaving the restaurant, then turned back to her. “So you were really a fan?” he asked. She nodded. He leaned his elbows on the table. “Tell me what that was like,” he said.

“What it was like to be in love with you?” she asked, an edge in her voice. It was an insanely narcissistic question.

“No, I don’t mean it that way,” he said. “I just want to know. We were always being swarmed by millions of girls, and I was always wondering why they were there. What they were thinking. Because if I had understood
 . . .
then maybe I could have prepared myself for when they all left.”

It was actually an interesting question. She perched her chin on her hand and thought for a moment. “You helped me get through middle school,” she answered.

“I did? How?”

Iliana continued, rediscovering things about herself as she relayed them to him. “When I got to sixth grade, my best friend began hanging with a rich and popular crowd of girls, and I was
 . . .
dumped. I was nothing but a follower. I followed her and her new friends because I had nowhere else to go. None of them noticed me. None of them cared if I was there or if I wasn’t.

“But you cared. In some crazy way through the television screen, I thought that. I felt like there was so much inside of me that nobody ever saw. But I thought that you would see it. I thought if you met me, you would want to be with me. You would think I was special.” She stopped, realizing that she was talking not just about the long-ago past, but about the recent past, too.