Midnight Movie: A Novel (24 page)

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July 7 12:30 AM
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After Andi’s funeral, Janine had a bit of a breakdown, and I can’t blame her. She unofficially moved in with me—and I say unofficially because she still kept 90 percent of her crap at her apartment. She wouldn’t go back there, though, and whenever she needed stuff, she made me a list, gave me the key, and told me to get to work.

Her parents were awesome. Even though they couldn’t really afford it, they gave her a ton of money so she wouldn’t have to worry about working. They wanted her to spend the summer resting up her body and mind. At one point, Mr. Daltrey called me and gave me a lecture—a nice lecture, but still a lecture—about taking care of his baby. He said, “I know Cranford’s dead, but there are other Cranfords out there. You make sure they stay away from my girl, y’hear?”

I heard.

Austin was still fire central, and Janine didn’t want me leaving the apartment any more than absolutely necessary, so we started having band rehearsals at my place, which pissed off most of our neighbors. But, you know, fuck ’em. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

One night after a rehearsal—and this was the same night that that suicide bomber in Seattle drove into Safeco Field and took out most of the lower deck—Jamal said to me, “You know who you should call? You know who’d probably have some sort of insight on all this crap? Your pal Tobe Hooper.”

I said, “What do you mean ‘all this crap’?”

Theo said, “Dude, shit’s blowing up, and shit’s burning up, and people are getting the shit kicked out of them, and there’s all these people killing themselves, and there’s all that shit online about zombies, and shit ain’t right.”

Jamal said, “And there’s that little matter of your sleepwalking. Remember?”

I said, “Barely.” And that was almost the truth. I’d done a good job of compartmentalizing that little mess. I focused on fixing Janine’s problems, which meant I didn’t have to dwell on my own.

Janine, who’d snuck into the room at some point, said, “I’ll tell you why you should call him. Because all this crap started after they showed that movie of his.”

I said, “You’re blaming suicide bombers on Tobe? Give me a break.”

She ignored me and said, “Like Andi. She started losing it after the Cove.”

I said, “So what? What does
that
have to do with
this
?”

I must’ve sounded kind of harsh, because she threw up her hands and said, “Don’t snap at me, Erick. And I don’t know
what
that has to do with this, and I don’t know
if
that has to do with this, and I don’t know what or if
anything
has
anything
to do with
anything
. I’m just putting it out there. I don’t see you putting anything out there.” She wiped her eyes—I hadn’t noticed she’d started crying until then—then said, “But maybe that’s because you didn’t get beat within an inch of your life and watch your sister go bat-shit crazy.”

I said, “Hey, I had my own problems. Like the nine thirty-three thing—”

She interrupted me: “Which you’ve conveniently neglected to mention for the last month.”

Theo said, “Janine, didn’t that douchebag beat you down after the movie?”

I said, “Jesus, Theo, come on.
Beat her down
?”

Janine said, “No, he’s right, David beat me down. And yes, it was after the movie.” She paused, then said, “Call Tobe Hooper.”

I said, “Why? Tobe Hooper could not care less about me. Who am I?”

Jamal said, “Don’t say that, man. No self-dissing. I bet he’d at least listen. It’s possible he’s holed up in his room, working on a script, not even watching the news.”

I said, “I’m sure he watches the news. I’m sure he knows what’s up. And I’m sure he’d hang up on my ass if I called him, especially if I said that he had anything to do with this.”

Janine said, “Even if he thinks you’re giving him garbage, you should talk to somebody, just to get it off your chest.”

Theo said, “Hells yeah, you should. I’ve had nightmares about that nine thirty-three business, and I told my shrink about it, and I feel way better.”

Jamal said, “You’re seeing a shrink?”

Theo said, “Hells yeah. I’m, like,
totally
mentally healthy now. What, you don’t notice a difference?”

Jamal said, “Yeah, sure, Theo, I
totally
notice a difference. You’re a goddamn
bastion
of mental health.”

I said, “Listen, Tobe Hooper is not my pal. I’m a writer, and he’s a subject, and generally, never the twain shall meet. Besides, even if I felt right about calling him—which I don’t—I don’t have his number.”

Theo said, “Dude, seriously, J’s right. Hooper’s probably sitting in his mansion right now, writing a movie about this shit. He probably thinks about it all fucking day.”

Janine said, “I think about it all fucking day, too. It’s
all
I think about.” She turned to me and said, “Erick, when you’re not in the room with me, I stare at the TV and cry. You’re pretty much the only reason I’m still sane.”

It got really quiet and intense in there, and I actually thought
I
was going to cry, but then Theo said, “You may be keeping her sane, but you’re driving me
in
sane.”

We all laughed, even though it wasn’t particularly funny, but in those days, you took your laughs where you could get them … even if they were shitty laughs.

Janine said to me, “Jamal’s right. You should call Tobe.”

Theo said, “Dude, if you don’t want to call Hooper, you could
totally
talk to my shrink.”

I ignored Theo and said, “I don’t know …”

Janine said, “I
do
know. Call some of your publicist friends, get Tobe’s number, and give him a ring. Or I’ll do it myself.”

I said, “Okay, fine.” Then something dawned on me, and I asked her, “You were at the movie. How come nothing happened to you?”

She said, “I was outside the whole time. I didn’t watch it.”

It was after midnight, and I was lying in bed, sucking down a bottle of some brown, trying to figure out how I could keep the third act of my new script from sucking—which was turning out to be a losing battle—and
ding
fucking
dong
, the doorbell goes off. Now, a postmidnight visitor is weird for anybody, but for me, it was
especially
weird, because my doorbell never even rings during daylight hours, let alone the dead of night. Everybody in Hollywood knows that I don’t dig pop-ins. Hell, the UPS and FedEx dudes are well aware that they should always leave my packages on the porch without ringing the bell and without asking for a signature. And believe you me, they never forget. How could they forget? I mean, it’s amazing what a memory aid my fake little chainsaw can be.