CHAPTER 41

It was bright and early when they rolled up to the gates of Andromeda Studios. R.J. wasn’t feeling particularly bright, but he couldn’t argue with the early part. He hadn’t slept much the night before, thinking about what might happen today, and he hadn’t slept at all the night before that, after his naked visitor had left him.

The encounter with Mary had left him in short temper for the meeting with Janine Wright, but luckily Portillo and Bertelli had been there to sweet-talk her—and to keep R.J.’s temper in check. He felt his bile rising just being in the same room with her.

But in the end she had agreed. Had to, really. There was no other way, and whatever she might say about bad publicity selling tickets, the body count was high enough now, even for her.

“Good morning, John,” Portillo greeted the handsome young actor at the gate.

John flashed him a smile. “Hey, Lieutenant,” he said. He glanced into the car and did a small double take when he saw R.J. “Um, Lieutenant, I’m not supposed to let that guy on the lot.”

“There’s been a change in plans, John,” Portillo told him. “I’m sure it’s all right. They just forgot to update you.”

The young actor still looked doubtful. “I don’t know. It could mean my job.”

Mary leaned over so John could see her. “It’s really okay, Johnny,” she said. “I kind of need him with me for protection.”

“Muh-Mar—Miss Kelley?” the gatekeeper blurted, and to R.J.’s surprise the kid blushed. “Whu-when did…what are you…?”

Mary gave him a sweet smile. “We’re all supposed to be on the set. Mr. Brooks is working for me.”

“I, I…um,” John stammered. He was fire-engine red, and obviously so flustered by Mary that he couldn’t find the floor with his foot.

“Please?” Mary said, and John lurched backward and stumbled for the button that opened the gate.

As the car moved forward onto the lot, R.J. snorted. “I think he likes you, Mary,” he said.

She looked at him coolly. “Some people do,” she said. “I don’t know why you find that so strange.” And she turned away and looked out the window.

Portillo gave R.J. a dark look. “Oh, brother,” R.J. muttered to himself.

Since the incident on the couch two nights ago Mary had been a little distant, which R.J. guessed was only natural. He couldn’t be sure since he’d never turned a woman down before, not when she was naked and in his arms, but he guessed this was how she might be expected to react.

Still, it was certainly putting a crimp in the working relationship. She hadn’t said a word to him since, nothing more complicated than “Yes, no, pass the salt, please.”

But what the hell. They were here, and there was a job to be done. And in a little while it would be over, one way or the other.

Portillo pulled into a parking spot next to a step van that was parked near the soundstage.

R.J. put a hand on Mary’s shoulder and she stepped away from it. He shrugged. “Listen, Mary,” he said. “Just keep your eyes open, and stay close to me.”

“I’ll try,” she said, with a tone of voice that said it would be hard work to stay close to him.

R.J. ignored it. “My guess is, it’s going to be a lot of waiting and maybe nothing happens. He knows we’re waiting for him, but I think he’s got to try, anyway. You’ll be safe, there are twenty cops all over the soundstage, and another dozen studio security guys. And I’ll be right there with you.”

She gave him that tone of voice again. “Oh. Then I guess there’s really nothing to worry about,” she said, and she turned away and went in.

R.J. was beginning to wish he had just said fine, the hell with it, and let her have her way with him on the couch. He swore under his breath and followed her in.

Portillo went to check the perimeters and talk to his men. Mary quickly and pointedly found somebody she knew and went to stand and talk with them, leaving R.J. by himself.

All around the set, everything looked almost exactly the same. To R.J., it looked like the crew were even wearing the same T-shirts. The long row of food tables still stood along the wall, surrounded by casually grazing Teamsters, and the same three or four guys were still hustling at top speed while everyone else stood around in clusters, talking, and sipping coffee.

The set itself was completely different. The walls of the cheap hotel were gone and in their place was a smooth, featureless white screen. It folded around the stage with no visible seams or corners.

Three huge wind machines crouched in an arc around the set. Nosing in between them was the front end of an airplane, what looked like a DC-3. The nose and windshield were there, perched above the soundstage. Behind them was nothing, no tail section, no wings. The airplane was chopped off weirdly in accordance with movie-making logic; if the shot only shows the nose, you don’t need the whole damn plane.

R.J. knew what the set-up meant. From the other machines and technicians standing around, R.J. could see they were all set to re-create the famous scene. Wind, rain, and heartache.

R.J. had seen the original maybe a hundred times. His mother and father facing each other on the runway, the wind and rain whipping around them, the fate of the world hanging in the balance, as they said good-bye. He still couldn’t watch it without getting a lump in his throat, and he wasn’t the only one. It was maybe the most famous movie scene of all time.

And there was the beach boy, standing next to the porn queen, in perfectly re-created costumes, getting ready to shoot that scene again. R.J. could hear the beach boy, repeating one of the lines over and over, in a bad imitation of his father’s famous growl.

R.J. had no problem seeing in his head what they were trying to copy. His mother and father, eaten up by passion and now torn apart by a world gone crazy.

Like any kid he’d seen his dad unshaven and in his underwear, heard the two of them yelling things at each other—he knew they were human beings.

But they were the two perfect star-crossed lovers in this scene, too. And when he thought of them together, he thought of them standing there, holding hands and saying good-bye as the rain whipped at them.

It was his family portrait, damn it. And these half-baked clowns were cutting off the heads and sticking their own faces through the holes, smirking and gawking like two rubes at the fair.

And to make it worse, there was Casey on the other side, talking with the bearded guy who was always racing around with a clipboard.

Great, R.J. thought. Now the picture is complete. Mom, Dad, and Casey. Three people who have yanked on my strings more than any others.

And standing next to Casey, looking bored and mean at the same time like a dozing rattle snake, was Janine Wright.

R.J. just looked. He felt like his guts had just gone twelve rounds with Mike Tyson.

Janine Wright had agreed to loiter on the set for a day and act as bait. Not because she really gave a damn, but she knew it was publicity, and she knew that for every clip she placed on the evening news she sold thousands of tickets to the movie.

So there she was, surrounded by a clump of photographers, looking around for somebody to disembowel and eat. And just maybe, somewhere nearby, somebody was looking at her the same way.

R.J. turned away and headed for the food table. A large silver coffee urn stood on one end. He went over and grabbed a cup. There was no point in trying to talk to Casey. And there was nothing for him to do except wait. So he sipped the coffee and did that, trying to keep an eye on Mary and not on the horrible mockery on the soundstage.

Six cups of coffee and two apples later he was still standing, waiting, and watching. R.J. felt like he would slosh if he moved. But his feet and his back were aching from just standing. And in spite of trying not to watch what was going on out on the soundstage he’d seen and heard enough to make him feel queasy.

So he talked himself into a short walk around the outside of the soundstage. Just to stretch for five minutes, check around, see if maybe Kelley was hiding behind an old piece of scenery or something. And mostly to get away from all of it before he bit a camera.

He stepped over to where Mary Kelley and a young guy in a salad bowl haircut were talking about something with an unlikely name that might have been a band from what they were saying.

“Excuse me,” R J. said. Mary turned cool blue eyes on him.

“Yes?” she said, the way you might talk to the gardener when your mouth was full of cucumber sandwich and petits fours.

“I’d like to step outside for a couple of minutes,” R.J. said.

“Oh, please feel totally free,” Mary replied. The bad haircut snickered.

“Thanks,” R.J. said, and grabbed her by the arm just above the elbow.

“Hey!” Mary said as R.J. yanked her toward the door.

“Hey, yourself, your highness,” he said. “I’m trying to keep an eye on you, and since you graciously granted me permission to leave the room, you’re leaving the room with me.”

“But I was just—”

“You were just being a pain in the ass. I understand. It’s not a big deal, I have to work with pains in the ass every day. And you’re too nice to be any good at it.”

“Damn it, R.J.—” She tried to yank her arm away, but he held on tight.

“Damn it yourself. Listen, Mary, I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. But people get their feelings hurt every day. It’s part of what life is about. So get over it. You don’t want me to call you ‘kid’ anymore, so stop acting like one.”

She was quiet for a minute. At least she stopped struggling until they got close to the door. Then she sighed. “I guess it was—you know. Kind of funny.”

“Only if it had happened to two other people,” R.J. said. He let go of her elbow and turned to face her. “I said I was sorry. I mean that. You walked right into me when I was trying to figure out where I am with somebody else.”

“Bad timing,” she said. “The story of my life.”

“Bad timing,” R.J. agreed.

A guy dressed like a giant smirking blue lizard pushed past them behind Mary’s back. The poor yutz was pushing a dolly with a couple of metal tanks on it. A fistful of balloons was draped over the handlebar.

R.J. shook his head. “Look at that if you want funny.”

Mary turned and looked at the lizard’s back. “Oh, God, not him. More publicity.”

The Big Blue Lizard was one of the most famous characters on the tube right now. All over the country there were guys making a hard buck at kid’s parties with the suit. This one obviously made balloon animals, too, with his tanks of helium.

R.J. almost chuckled. “This is probably the schmuck’s biggest gig ever,” he said.

“Maybe. But he’s likely to get mugged here.”

“What do you mean?”

She shrugged. “The rights to the character are owned by another studio. So somebody is probably having a joke at Mother’s expense.”

“The less funny she thinks it is, the better I like it,” R.J. said, and they went out the door together.

Outside it was warm, the sun was shining, and R.J. supposed that birds were singing somewhere. Not on the Andromeda Studios lot. Not with Janine Wright on the set. The birds wouldn’t dare.

They walked one time around the building, taking about fifteen minutes to do it, stretching, breathing deeply. It was a large building, a converted airplane hangar. Henry Portillo had stationed men at all the key points. They were dressed in jeans or overalls.

“Oh, my God,” Mary giggled.

“What?”

“Those guys are trying so hard not to look like cops, you know what?”

“Yeah. It makes them look like cops.”

They had a small laugh together, and most of the tension from their awkward encounter in the night was gone.

After a few more minutes R.J. had walked the kinks out of his back and neck.

“You ready to go back inside?” he asked Mary.

She sighed. “Yes. I guess so. I just—”

R.J. waited for her to finish the sentence. She didn’t for a minute. Then she sighed again and squared her shoulders. “Mother hasn’t even said hello to me. You know. Not that it matters, but—”

“But it matters.”

“Yeah.”

R.J. put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ve been there, Mary. But everybody loved my mother, and I couldn’t even complain.”

She smiled a little. It wasn’t much, but it was better than a sigh. “You’ve had it rough, Brooks.”

“You too, Kelley.”

“Okay,” she said. “Let’s go back in and watch the Teamsters eat doughnuts.”

The first thing R.J. noticed when they came back inside was how quiet it was inside. They must be shooting already, R.J. thought, and he peeked around to the set.

Between them and the soundstage were maybe fifteen people. And beyond them he could see another dozen and maybe fifteen more by the food tables.

And all of them were stretched out motionless on the floor.