Sleeping in Flame (3 page)

Someone said you should never be a housepainter because others all think they know how to do it and, as a result, will always be telling you how to do it better. The same is true with making movies. Some of the things said in the meeting that afternoon were so dumb and off-base that I frequently had to gulp to keep my exasperation down.

Fortunately, Nashorn was very interested in making a movie, and despite Nicholas's strange behavior, our meeting ended with the boss of Nashorn Industries smiling and actually rubbing his hands together.

"This kind of work is what I like. Lay the plans and then get going. I think we can pull something together here, Mr. Sylvian. And Mr. Easterling, you have the right ideas for the screenplay: clever, funny, and sexy. Don't forget those sexy parts though -- that's what makes people like me go to the movies!"

Everyone shook hands, backs were patted, and finally we were out on the street in an adamant winter rain before either of us spoke again.

"'Don't forget the sexy parts!' Nicholas, are we really going to have to work with that dope?"

"He's just an asshole, Walker. Don't worry about him. We'll take his big money and make our own film. Come on, I've got to find a phone. I want to try her one more time before we go to the airport. What time is the flight?"

Page 8

I looked at my watch. "A little under two hours."

We walked some blocks in the rain before spying the ghostly yellow block of a lit phone booth.

While Nicholas called, I stood outside and tried to

shield myself from the mean, icy drops that were coming down like ball bearings.

He reached her and gave me a big thumbs up. But he spoke only a few words before shouting

"He did _what_?" and slamming his hand hard against one of the walls. The booth shook.

With the phone to his ear he looked at me and said, "The fucking guy tried to kill her!"

I didn't know which fucking guy he was talking about, but assumed he meant the man she was living with.

"He killed me" is one of the more overused phrases of our already hyperbolic times. As a result, it has lost most of its punch. People use it to say "killed" in business, in bed, on the golf course.

I've learned not to pay attention when people use it, but the look on Nicholas's face behind the wet glass said there was no fooling around here.

He spoke for a short time into the receiver, looking at me while he mumbled and nodded and tightened his lips repeatedly. Suddenly, he hung up with a bang and came out.

"We've got to meet her at the Käfer. She'll be there in twenty minutes."

The streets were jammed with five o'clock traffic but we found a taxi.

It was a brand-new Mercedes full of that great mystical new-car smell.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

He nodded. "She's been living with a French guy for about a year. Luc something. He thinks he's a director, but the only films he's ever made have been industrial shit about how to work a computer or a storm window. I don't know where she got him, but I never liked him. He's about five feet five, spends most of his time lying around home complaining, and walks around in T-shirts in winter so you'll see his muscles. A real weekend Rambo, you know?

"Anyway, she got smart about two months ago and threw him out of her house. Since then he's been following her everywhere she goes. Stands outside her apartment all night, shows up in every restaurant she goes to, calls her up and threatens her --"

"Threatens her? How?"

"Hey, listen, a couple of days ago he broke into her place and tried to rape her! Tore off her clothes and threatened to stab her with a pair of scissors if she didn't come across. Jesus Christ, she's such a sweet woman.

Wait till you meet her. How could somebody do that? She was able to talk him out of it, but then today he grabbed her on the street and started hitting her in the face. Said _no one_ ever left him. Can you believe it?"

"I can believe it if he's a madman. How did she stop him?"

"Started screaming. Luckily, a couple of cops showed up. He ran away!

_Ran away_. The guy is forty years old and he runs away! But when she went back to her apartment, he called her and said he was going to get her, no matter what she did."

Nicholas patted my knee and shook his head. "A nice man to get involved with, huh?"

The Käfer is a Munich "in" spot of the first order. It is full of people wearing leather, jewels, or very little. During the last part of the cab ride

Nicholas cheered up some, and was smiling again as we went through the door of the restaurant.

It felt as if all the people there were waiting: for their date, for the right moment, for whatever they felt was their due. I have always felt uncomfortable in places like that, places where no one tastes the expensive food or drink because they are too busy watching the door to see who comes in.

I was thinking about that as we made our way across the room to a staircase leading to the bar.

As we were about to start climbing, Nicholas turned to me and said something exciting, but which later turned out to be eerily prophetic.

Page 9

"Walker, now you are going to fall in love with a unique woman." He said no more and moved up the stairs. I followed, curious as hell.

The bar was small and crowded. People were making lots of noise, drowning each other out.

Watching the action and looking for a unique woman, I

lost sight of Nicholas, who had drifted off to the left somewhere. It was very hot in there, and I decided to check my coat at the stand on my right. Moving toward it, I had to go around a high metal table that was there for people who couldn't find space at the bar.

Standing at that table was a very tall woman dressed all in black except for a round red velvet hat that looked like something a bellboy would wear.

The first thing that entered my mind was how wonderful it would be if she were waiting for me.

Her face was cloud white, her eyes dark, large, and memorable.

The funny hat was pushed forward and down tight on her head, but thick eyebrows said she had black or very dark hair. She was smoking an unfiltered cigarette. When her eyes saw me they were indifferent. This woman definitely

_wasn't_ waiting for me. I tried to hold those eyes with mine, but she suddenly saw something over my shoulder that made every feature on her face brighten.

Someone put his hands on my shoulders from behind and 1 felt myself pushed toward her.

"Nicholas!"

"Hello there!"

They embraced and I watched her pull him in with a giant bearhug. So what? _This_ woman was Maris York. Sometimes life hands you a big tip.

"I am so glad to see you."

"Me too, pal. Maris, this is my friend Walker Easterling."

She continued to hold his arm while we shook hands. She gave me a good shake: strong, totally there.

"It's good to meet you, Walker. It was so nice of you to come."

It astounded me how poised and happy she looked. A couple of hours ago she had been attacked, but now she stood there like the unruffled hostess at a diplomatic cocktail party.

"Hey, what's that?" Nicholas pointed to a dark mark below her right ear.

"A souvenir from Luc. I think my jaw is going to be a hell of a sight tomorrow. I'll look like a boxer who lost."

"Wait a minute. Let me get some wine and then we can talk about everything." He walked to the bar. Maris watched him closely. When she turned to me she was crying and smiling at the same time.

"Please excuse me, Walker. I just --" She put a hand to her eyes and brusquely rubbed tears away.

"It's so good to see you two. After Nicholas called this morning I was so happy. Then this stupid thing had to happen." She rubbed her eyes again. "I was really lost today. I thought I was going to drown."

"Are you all right now?"

"I want to be all right, but I'm still pretty bad. I wish we could have met under different conditions."

Nicholas came back with a large bottle of white wine and three glasses.

"So, have the police caught him yet?" He handed her a glass with wine to the top.

"No, and I don't think they will, either. If I know him, he's on his way to France by now. He's been in trouble with the police before. Whenever something bad happens, Luc zips back to Paris. He's got family there. At heart he's a big scaredy-cat."

That did it. That she should call the man (monster?) who'd so recently tried to kill her a

"scaredy-cat" made me love her. Believe me, it was that simple.

The keys that unlock the heart are made of funny materials: a disarming phrase that comes out of
Page 10

the blue, nowhere, a certain sexy walk that sends you reeling, the way someone hums when she is alone. My father said it was the way my mother danced with him.

Nicholas and Maris continued talking while I stared at her and tried to figure out what to do. When I tuned back to their conversation, he was asking what she was going to do.

"Stay with a friend. I want to leave town as soon as possible because I don't know when he'll be back. I don't know where to go yet, so I'll have to figure that out first."

"Do you want some money?"

She reached over and touched his cheek. "No, but thank you for offering.

When I was home I took all of my cash and checks and passport, just in case.

I'm not going back to that apartment. I'll call my friend Heidi and have her move my things to a warehouse, or something. Wherever Luc is, he won't leave me alone anymore. I didn't tell you a lot of the things that have happened. I

used to think he was just angry and hurt, but he's really crazy, Nicholas."

"Why don't we take you with us to Vienna?"

_I_ said that.

Both of them looked at me with the same expression: Huh?

Nicholas drank some wine, then looked at his watch. "He's absolutely right. Let's go, Maris.

We've got forty-five minutes."

She put a hand to her mouth. Oh! The moment before she spoke was ten years long. What the hell would I do if she said no? What would the night be like back in Vienna without her? She looked from Nicholas to me, to Nicholas again.

"I think I want to do that."

"Then do it. Let's go."

Her coat was short and black and made of some kind of satiny material. I watched her pull it around her shoulders as we got ready to go. She turned and looked at me.

"Is this crazy? Should I do it?"

"I guess it's no crazier than anything else today, you know? Does Luc know you're friends with Nicholas?"

"Oh yes, but he'd never expect me to go to Vienna on the spur of the moment like this. It's not my style; I'm not usually very spontaneous."

'Then you're all set."

She took a deep breath and nodded, more to herself than to me. "Yes, you're right. Thank you."

Nicholas took her arm and started for the stairs. I followed, wondering what part God or fate or luck played in this script. There was still a fear around my heart that she would suddenly stop and say she couldn't possibly go.

Maybe without thinking I walked behind them on purpose, to catch her if she began to fall back into uncertainty, or ran up hard against the wall of risk she was facing.

A few weeks later I asked Maris what she was thinking that night as we walked out of the restaurant. She gave a strange answer.

"I was thinking about a woman I know who entered contests. For years she clipped coupons and filled out forms, did all those things you do to enter contests. A real fan. Well, one day she won.

Won first prize. It was a three-day trip across Colorado in a hot air balloon. Gourmet picnics, see the mountains from up high, the works. Nice, huh? The day she was to go up, she had to meet the balloon in a big field somewhere that bordered a national forest. When she arrived, there were all kinds of cameramen and TV reporters there to record the festivities. She loved that because she's kind of a ham.

So now the prize was even better than she'd hoped. How many times does that happen in life?

First, she'd won the contest, then she was going to be on the six o'clock news. Everything was
Page 11

_wunderbar_.

"There were four people in the balloon, and once they were all on board, the thing took off. The television cameras were rolling, everyone was shouting good-bye and waving, the pilot had broken out a bottle of champagne. . . .

Then the balloon caught on fire. Don't ask me how. The whole thing just went right up, _swoosh_! They were about two hundred feet in the air. No, that's too much, but they were very high, according to her. The balloon started disintegrating and dropping pieces of burning canvas on them.

"My friend and two of the other people panicked and jumped right over the side. Those other two were killed as soon as they hit the ground, but by some miracle my friend hit a tree and was slowed or deflected. She didn't die, but she spent the next three years in a hospital and walks with two canes now."

"God, what a story. But what does it have to do with the night we met?"

"That night I was wondering if flying off to Vienna so spontaneously was going to be like my friend jumping from the balloon."

"From the frying pan into the fire?"

"No, because the fire was all around me. Luc had burned that day to the ground. I thought that even if I came down and hit like an egg in Vienna, it'd be better than going down in slow mad flames."

We drove to the Munich airport in her old red car. It was as Nicholas had described -- a mess.

The ashtrays were packed, the back seat sported a big rip, books were scattered everywhere. I spent most of the trip trying to read the titles by passing streetlight. I wondered if she was a slob, but I was so happy about what was going on that I didn't care. Nicholas asked her to turn on the radio, but she said it had been broken the week before. He leaned over the backseat and winked at me.

"Hey, _Kleine_, how come you never bought a nice car? You make enough money. This thing looks like something out of _Mad Max_."

While shifting gears, she gave him a poke in the ribs. "That's not very nice. What am I supposed to do, be like you and buy a Porsche? An M.L.C.?"