An Accidental Affair (22 page)

When I was empty, I collapsed next to Ted Evans’s wife the same way that Johnny Handsome had collapsed next to mine. Anger rose. Then the timer on Patrice’s watch went off.

She said, “If that was Misty banging on your door, I hope she got an earful.”

Within seconds, Patrice was dressed. I went and flushed the condom, then came back and pulled my clothing on, my eyes on my front door, listening for an intruder.

Her cellular rang and she looked at the caller ID. She rejected the call.

Her cellular rang again and again. Two more times she rejected his call.

Her husband kept calling. I didn’t know if he was calling from the other side of the complex or right outside my door. I told her to wait a moment and I went back to my bedroom and grabbed a jacket. Then I followed her fast pace to the front door and undid my locks.

I slowly pulled my door open, hoped that it didn’t sing on its hinges.

A couple of neighbors were in the hallway. Patrice stayed sequestered inside my apartment until I told her that the hallway was empty from end to end.

I wiped sweat away from my eyes and said, “No one is out there.”

“Wonder who that was. Doors don’t knock themselves.”

“My guess would be that it was Ted.”

“Ted would still be there. With one of his guns, maybe two, one in each of his hands.”

“This has been fun. But it might be time to stop.”

“We can’t stop.”

“Why not?”

“Because I have hundreds of Post-its.”

“Patrice.”

“Check your car, if you have one. If I were a woman at your door I would’ve left to go fuck up your car. That’s what I would do. You’d come out and I would’ve taken keys to your paint job. Or I’d be out there busting out your car windows. Then I’d throw bags of shit inside.”

“Guess it’s a good thing that you don’t know if I have a car.”

Her cellular rang again and Patrice took off running back toward her apartment.

I said, “Run, Forrest. Run.”

That was when I let the jacket fall from my arm. Underneath was my loaded .38.

Gun hidden, I rushed my anxiety by tenants and jogged downstairs to the parking lot.

The Apartments was a U-shaped monstrosity, my parking spot far away, at the bottom of its ugliness, my apartment located on the left side of that U toward the middle facing the 605. My car was there, covered. I used a generic car cover much too large for the vehicle. My Maybach hadn’t been battered. I knew that, but I checked anyway. If it had been assaulted, the remote would’ve sent me a warning. The remote would tell me when anyone came near.

Then arrived a moment that I hadn’t adumbrated.

A luxury vehicle crept down the side of the series of worn, three-story stucco buildings. Bentley Continental Supersport. It stopped and its V12 engine purred like an animal primed to attack. Scowling, I stood facing a coupé that cost close to three hundred thousand dollars. This was the dramatic entrance of a celestial being. It was the return of Regina Baptiste.

The Bentley purred. Regina Baptiste shifted inside the car, but the Bentley didn’t creep any closer. She sat, parked, and waited. Like she was waiting for time to reverse itself.

I saw her and I saw that film of her and Johnny Handsome inside of my mind.

Again I heard the applause.

While images resurrected anger, she raised her cellular and motioned at me.

Jaw tight, heart galloping, sweat growing on my neck and brow, I nodded.

Seconds later, my cellular rang.

Regina Baptiste faced me and called me from her hands free as she pulled at her hair. She had dialed my fucking number and that felt like burglary inside my peace of mind.

Her music was on. Janis Ian’s song “At Seventeen.” It was the song that she played when she was at her lowest, a song that took her back to when she was Regina
Baptist
, a brown-eyed girl in hand-me-downs who had dreams of coming to Hollywood and becoming a star.

She rubbed the bridge of her nose and, in a broken voice, whispered, “I love you.”

“Regina Baptiste. If you did, it would be in your actions.”

“Baby, James. I disappointed you. I know that I did. I let you down.”

“You did.”

“I don’t know what to say. I miss you. I need you. I can’t handle this crucifixion, this perpetual character assassination. This shit is driving me crazy. I want to slit my wrists.”

“Thought you had fled to parts of Europe with your publicist.”

“The paparazzi was either following me or waiting on me everywhere I went.”

“I’ll bet they were.”

“Like I was the Duchess of Cambridge. Only they were shouting horrible things at me.”

“You love cameras and press. And all press is good press, right?”

“Everyone has turned so mean. I can’t handle this. This is too much for me.”

I paused. “You’re okay?”

“You know I’m not okay. Do you care? Do you even care how I am, James?”

“Put the pity party on pause and put on your big girl panties.”

“I’ve fucked everything up that I have worked for.”

“Including this marriage.”

“Are we over, James? I need to know if we’re over.”

“How did you find me?”

“Your Maybach has Lo Jack. I called them and they told me where all the cars are parked. Everything else is home, and you’re not home, so I followed the missing car.”

“Smart woman. But Montana women are the best of the best.”

“What is this place? Why has your car been here for over two weeks?”

“Right now this foreign country is my safe haven.”

“Are you staying with someone here?”

“Does it matter? You vanished on me, Regina Baptiste. Just like you did the first time. Just like you did when you left my home and were going back to Bobby Holland. That night the press came after
you and you left me hanging. I should’ve known how things would be then.”

“I’m going to get out. Is that okay?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because I said so. The moment you get out, do you see all of those nosey fucks over your head? They’re looking at your shiny Bentley, wondering who is inside. Wondering who is dumb enough to drive a Bentley that cost more than they make in five years into a dump like this.”

“I’m getting out. Talking like this is stupid.”

“Regina, please, think about your press, as usual. The moment you get out of that Bentley, everyone will start taking photos and video and before you can get to me so I can curse you out and choke you to death, they will be posting you on every site, and everyone from here to small villages in Nairobi will know where you are within the next ten seconds.”

“I’m trapped inside this car.”

“It’s not like you’re in a room at a Motel 6. Not as large, but it has fewer roaches.”

“I’m this close to you and I can’t hold you in my arms.”

“Have you talked to the rest of your family?”

“They hate me. My parents are ashamed. They told me not to come to Montana. The newspapers and reporters are in front of their home. They can’t leave either. They’re trapped.”

“Welcome to infamy. Fame is just the interregnum between being unknown by many and unloved by most. What where you thinking, Regina?”

“Please, James. Help me. I can’t think. I can barely breathe. Tell me what to do.”

“First, you contact H. G. Wells and get his Time Machine.”

“I’m serious, dammit. Damn you, James. Tell me what I should do.”

Her faltering voice weakened me and my savage heart struggled to pound with the civilized beat of love. I looked up at the windows. So much profanity and clamor was overhead. Noise pollution, air pollution, and ground pollution set the backdrop for our emotional moment.

Regina asked, “What are you doing parked in this disgusting place?”

“I’m here degrading myself by having meaningless sex with strangers to fill a void.”

“You have a mistress?”

“Of course.”

“Don’t joke like that.”

“Do you hear a laugh track? No, you’re used to applause at the end of your sex scenes.”

“Please. Don’t do this to me. After that message you left me, the way you talked to me, the threats you made, the things that you said, trust me, it took everything to reach out to you.”

“Where did you go first? Let me guess. You ran to your publicist.”

“I’m sorry. I wanted it fixed. I wanted it shut down before you found out.”

“You wanted to cover up what you had done.”

“You dislike me. You really dislike me.”

“What happened on set?”

In the softest, frailest voice, she whispered, “Come get in the car with me.”

“No. Talk to me first.”

“Why can’t you get inside the car? We can leave here, drive around, and talk. We can go down to Long Beach and park by the Aquarium, or park on a side street in Bixby Knolls.”

“I don’t want to be responsible for what I might do. So what happened?”

“I was having problems with the scene. Working with Johnny
was horrible. I hate him. You know that. I fucking hate him. I had complained about working with him for weeks. That’s why they wanted to do that love scene last. They had hoped that our chemistry would be better. The new scene was important. After everything else was done, they wanted me relaxed.”

“That scene was not in the script I delivered. It wasn’t fucking important.”

“What was I to do? Alan Smithee wanted that scene. You know he gets what he wants.”

“From what I saw, there was no problem. Unless you consider the fact that only half of Hollywood and all of the goddamn world saw Johnny Handsome riding you bareback a problem.”

“I’ve been freaking out. I’m losing my mind. I don’t know how it got so out of control.”

“You fucked up my script.”

“What’s more important? Me or that script? Nobody cares about the script anymore.”

“Were drugs involved?”

“No. You know I’m clean. You know that.”

“Speak up. Be a woman and answer.”

She sighed and her voice weakened, “I’m clean, James.”

“Were drugs involved?”

“No. None were involved.”

“Last time asking.”

She took a deep breath. “Some.”

“You just went from none to some.”

“I was stressed.”

“Everyone alive is stressed. And right now, as you’re parked in the Village of Stressed-out, you’re looking at their king. Well, maybe not king. More like court jester.”

“So much pressure was on me to finish that picture.”

“Some. Define some.”

“Things became…for me…tense…so much stress…I broke and did a line.”

“You did a line.”

“I was encouraged. To do what I had to do to save the show. To make it happen.”

“Keep the blame where it belongs.”

“It…it came unexpectedly…I freaked out…and I broke down.”

“Where did you get it?”

“It’s not important.”

“Where did the cocaine come from? Who supplied you with the drugs on set?”

“I was in Johnny Bergs’s trailer. And somebody brought the drugs.”

“Johnny fucking Bergs.”

“Yeah.”

I said, “His fucking name is going to be in my obituary and on my damn tombstone.”

“It will probably be on mine too. Over mine in larger letters and brighter lights.”

“Let me get this right. You were lounging inside Johnny Bergs’s bed on wheels.”

“Not alone. Never alone. A few of us were in there.”

“What others?”

“Just others.”

“You’ve been clean for two years.”

She whispered, “The moment before, James. No matter what happens, there is always a moment before. Nothing happens suddenly. Nothing. Even the unexpected has a moment before. You’re a writer. You know that. I’m an actress. I know that. We create based on the moment before. What happens next is always driven by the moment before. A building blows up. But there was gas left on and fire left on. We see car accidents being set up. The moment before. Every scene
that I step into, I must know my moment before. When an actress doesn’t know her moment before, she’s not prepared, she’s vulnerable, and everything that comes after is fucked and won’t make sense to the audience. It’s out of context. This entire scandal, this shit that’s pulling me down, it’s all out of context. Every scene that you write, you have to know the moment before. Even in life, when we don’t know that there is a moment before, there is a moment before. Even for the ignorant, there is a moment before. They just don’t know it.”

“What’s all this rambling about the moment before?”

“The moment before I did the coke…there was a moment before, James.”

“The moments after you did the coke are what matters. When they put the coke out in front of you like it was a buffet at an anti-Betty Ford clinic, you had choices. To watch, coach, join in, or walk the fuck away. What did you do, Regina? Which choice did you make?”

“I did that one line. Regretfully. I haven’t touched the shit but once in two years.”

“I worked with you. I chartered a private plane and took you to rehab under the radar. I spent twenty thousand a month to sneak you into the Crossroads Center. And when you didn’t like it there, I put you on another private jet and sent you to The Sanctuary in Australia. I did it away from the press. I fucking protected you. I’ve protected you since I met you. I got you clean before anyone knew that you were on coke. Bobby Holland got you on coke. I got you off.”

“Fuck Bobby Holland. I don’t ever want to hear his name again.”

“I married you.”

“I asked you to marry me, James. I asked you because I loved you. I came to you with the prenuptial. I wanted nothing from you. Just your love. That’s all I wanted. That’s what I need from you right now. I need your love. If I have that, then I can get through this.”

“I did more for you than Bobby Holland ever did and I have asked
you for nothing in return. First you fuck Johnny, then you hang me out to dry, leave me with no warning, just book a flight then vanish into thin air; no calls, not one text.”

“That wasn’t me, James. That wasn’t me in that film.”

“What do you mean that it wasn’t you?”

“That was Sasha.”

“Who the fuck is Sasha?”