Fade to Black (18 page)

“Thanks a lot.”

“Where you headed?” the driver asked, starting off.

“Venice, near the pier,” Eric said, admiring the upholstery and interior of the car. “This is beautiful. Is this an Auburn?”

“Yeah, thanks,” the driver said, pride dripping through his seeming indifference.

The car’s body was waxed and polished to a near-mirror finish which reflected the towering palms and Maigret blue sky overhead.

“What year?” Eric asked, trying to keep up the conversation. He wanted distraction, some company to take his mind off the other things.

“Thirty-four,” the driver said, not in a talkative mood.

“Great,” Eric said admiringly. He noticed a pile of film scripts heaped on the seat beside him and did a doubletake of the driver. He looked vaguely familiar.

“Are all these scripts yours?” he asked, trying to keep his enthusiasm under control.

“Yeah,” the driver said. “I used to be an actor. Now I’m producing.”

Eric looked out at the passing scenery, imitating the driver’s aplomb. They were driving through Beverly Hills. The roadside looked like someone had planted money in fertile soil during the rainy season.

“I’m in the film business, too,” Eric said offhandedly.

“Really?” the driver said, reaching into his coat pocket and pulling out a joint. He lit it with the dashboard lighter and took a puff before passing it to Eric.

Eric inhaled the smoke deeply, holding it in as long as he could. Just what I needed, he thought. He passed the joint back to the driver, then leaned back into the soft contour of the bucket seat. This was how it was supposed to be; the life.

“I have this idea for a movie,” Eric blurted, now making no pretense at hiding his excitement. “You wouldn’t be interested, would you?”

The driver smiled. “Sure. Maybe I can help you.”

Eric picked up one of the scripts and noticed the name stamped on the opening page, below that of the screenwriter.

Be cool, he told himself. Play it like a pro.

“You are
the
Gary Bially, aren’t you?”

Bially nodded humbly. “Yeah.”

“You, ah, produced
The Big Rip-off,
right?” Eric said, trying to impress.

“Yep,” Bially answered. “I do four pictures a year.”

He gave Eric the rest of the joint and told him to keep it.

Eric smoked it down to a roach, waiting for Bially to ask him about his idea. They continued down the street, flanked by more high-priced automobiles, all gleaming beneath the setting sun like salmon gliding upstream to their spawning grounds.

“Listen,” Eric finally said. “This idea . . . for my movie?”

Bially nodded for him to go on.

“It’s a . . . sort of like an early fifties Sam Fuller piece, you know . . . kinda . . . this story about these two crooks, and they break out of jail and they join up with this, uh, carnival of convicts.”

Bially raised an eyebrow. “What’s it called?”

“Alabama and the Forty Thieves,”
Eric said, reciting the title like the punchline to the joke of the century.

An imperceptible smile tugged at the corners of Bially’s lips. “That’s not bad, kid,” he said, “tell me more.”

“Well, I thought maybe we could do it in black and white, you know, and get Peter Bogdonavich to do it, and . . .” Eric went on telling Bially his conception of his envisioned masterpiece while the producer turned down Lincoln and headed into Venice. Bially listened patiently, asking an occasional question Eric figured was his way of testing him to make sure he was legitimate. Eric told him all about Tony Alabama, the Cagney role, the female lead. He even recited samples of the dialogue and explained some of the shooting angles he’d worked out.

As he dropped Eric off a few blocks from his home, Bially told him, “You have to come to my next screening.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, call me at the studio.”

Eric was beside himself with joy, dropping his reserve.

“Oh, Jesus!” he exclaimed. “Thanks!”

“Yeah,” Bially deadpanned. “Don’t mention it.”

“Thanks a lot!” Eric repeated, letting himself out of the Auburn and bounding up to the curb. “I’ll call you.”

“Good.”

“Thank you.”

“Right.”

Bially grinned as he drove off.

“Bye!” Eric shouted after him before turning and racing madcap down the block and up the steps to his house.

“Aunt Stella!” he howled with delight as he burst into the living room. “It’s our lucky day!”

The sight of the empty wheelchair sliced through his high and the euphoria. He paused in the doorway, then walked over to the fireplace and stroked the urn on the mantle. Dust came off on his fingertip.

“I finally made it,” he said defensively, staring at the urn. “I just met this producer, and he liked my idea for the movie and he’s going to do it and we’re going to be rich and we’re not going to have to worry about a thing.”

The room was silent, but Eric heard voices.

Aunt Stella.

“All I’m worried about is your inconsideration,” the voice said, mincingly. “I’ve waited all day while you’ve been out in the streets making a fool of yourself. Your stories are garbage!”

Eric shrank back from the voice, his face turning morose.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered feebly. “I’m sorry, Aunt Stella.”

“That’s not enough!” the voice said, building in intensity. Eric closed his eyes in pain, raised his hands to stroke his temples. But the voice went on. “Your pipe dreams will get you nowhere. Straighten up your act! I’m ashamed of you! Stop acting like a child!”

Eric recoiled from the fireplace, clutching hard at the sides of his head. He moaned painfully, “I finally made it, Ma . . . It hurts . . . It hurts bad, Maw . . .” He fell to his knees and bent over in agony. Tears came to his eyes.

Like Cody Jarrett. Whenever the headaches came, Ma Jarrett was there to stroke his head and make them go away. Where was his mother? Why wouldn’t someone come and stop the pain?

CHAPTER •
23

He looked to Marilyn for help.

His Marilyn.

Setting up his projector, Eric spent the next ten hours in his room, immersed in his favorite Monroe films.
Niagara, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, How to Marry a Millionaire, The Seven-Year Itch, The Prince and the Showgirl.
It was a chronological sampling of her in her prime, and Eric imagined himself playing opposite her, courting her with charm and wit, sharing her embrace, taking her away offscreen into a world all their own.

He fell asleep before her introduction in
Some Like It Hot
and was awakened by the sound of slapping film once the first reel had played through.

It was past dawn.

He set his alarm and slept for another hour before getting up and preparing for work. While he waited for his frozen waffles to heat up in the toaster, he straggled outside and down the steps to pick up yesterday’s mail.

Amidst the film magazines and junk flyers was an envelope from his aunt’s insurance company. Eric groaned apprehensively as he opened it.

There was a memo on the company’s stationery, but Eric ignored it, staring instead at the check attached to it.

The check was made out to him, for twenty thousand dollars.

“Mornin’ there, Horatio,” Eric cried out cheerfully as he passed through the gates on his way to work.

Horace looked at him uncertainly.

“What are you on, Binford?”

“I am . . . on time,” Eric said, reaching his hand out and deftly stroking Horace’s chin. “You realize, Horatio, that your wife would let you spend more time between her legs if you shaved now and then. Rough on the thighs like that, you know.”

“Hey, nobody talks about my wife like that!” Horace bellowed, taking a step after Eric as he walked into the back lot.

Eric turned back to Horace and winked. “Fair enough, Horatio. It’ll be just between you and me.”

“And knock off the Horatio shit!”

Eric whistled to himself as he strolled past the work stations, fending off the usual barrage of jibes and insults with a wit that left his co-workers wondering.

Reporting into Mr. Berger’s office, Eric clicked his heels and stood at attention, snapping off a perfunctory salute.

“Gofer Binford at your command, sir!”

Mr. Berger leaned back in his chair and looked up at Eric disdainfully.

“Boot camp, huh? Now, that isn’t a bad idea,” he said calmly. “Only thing is I don’t have a stockade to throw you into. Goddamn you, Binford, we’re two weeks from inventory and my accountant says he’s just turned up four month’s worth of shipping invoices you messed up from the word ‘go’!”

“Sorry to hear that, sir!” Eric said, still a green recruit. “It won’t happen again, sir!”

“Binford, your eyes are fucking bloodshot You have some drugs before you came to work? Some of that marijuana?”

“No, sir! Had a long night, sir! How about you, sir! How’s the bum ticker, sir!”

“Well, you’re going to have a long day, too! Now cut it out with the Gomer Pyle routine and listen to me.” Mr. Berger leaned forward over the desk. “As of today, you’re off receiving and back to strictly, delivery.”

Eric stood at ease.

Mr. Berger took a cardboard box off the desk and set it on the counter before Eric.

“Now,” he continued, “get these over to Blow Up and be back here in an hour.”

“Okay, Mr. Berger,” Eric said, smiling.

“Something funny about all of this?” Berger wondered aloud. “Let me tell you something else. I don’t hand pink slips out around here, but I’m putting you on warning. Starting tomorrow, I’m going to be out for a month having this bum ticker, as you call it, put back in order. Edwards will be running shop while I’m gone, and if I get any bad word on you when I come back, you’re out, got it?”

“Yes, Mr. Berger,” Eric said, taking the box, adding, “Sir.”

Blow Up was a photography studio located on the ground floor of a newly constructed office building in the Hollywood Hills behind Mann’s Chinese theatre. The studio was the only suite completed, but a work crew was on the job touching up the brick façade and laying in the walls for future offices on the upper floors and across the way.

Eric parked the Vespa near the front door, waving to the workers as he opened the back carrier and took out the delivery box. Berger had most of his photography work done at Blow Up, and Eric usually made two or three trips here a week.

“Eric, down here!”

Eric stopped on his way inside and looked down to the end of the building, where a tall, thin black man in a paratrooper’s jumpsuit stood next to a dumpy, middle-aged woman with a clipboard. They were pointing at barren flowerbeds and planters surrounding the building, exchanging suggestions about landscaping.

Eric walked back with the box, which the black man took gratefully, opening it and sorting through its contents. He smiled and clucked his tongue.

“That Berger. Always trying to sweep a little extra work in under the rug.” The photographer looked down at Eric. “He
does
realize I won’t be able to get to this ’til Tuesday, doesn’t he?”

Eric nodded, “Yeah.”

The black man set down the box and stretched his arms, yawning, “Do you realize it’s been over a year since I’ve had two days off in a row, much less a four-day weekend? I tell you, Eric, I am going to waste my time with a passion. A passion!”

“Good deal,” Eric said. “Where you going?”

“Minneapolis,” the black man said, adding. “Family.”

“Oh,” Eric said, nodding his head. “Say, is that anywhere near Sunrise?”

The photographer frowned. “Sunrise? Never heard of it Why? You know someone from there?”

“Yeah. Richard Widmark.”

The black man laughed, “Close friend of yours, is he?”

“As a matter of fact, he is,” Eric asserted. “I see him a couple of times a month.”

“On what channel?”

The woman finally interrupted, “Excuse me, gents, but I have a few more clients to get to still, so if you don’t mind—”

“Sorry, Lucille,” the black man said to her solicitously, “I’ll be right with you.” He looked at Eric. “Tell Berger I wish him good luck on the operation and that he better get his ass back on the job as soon as possible. I’m not looking forward to working with that Andrews cat. Berger’s a kitten compared to that racist prick!”

“Have a good time off,” Eric said, backing away and heading back to his bike. “See you next week, okay?”

The photographer gave him a thumbs up and then directed his attention back to the landscaper.

His errand finished, Eric rode back down into Hollywood, stopping at his bank, located close to the plant so that he could always cash his payroll checks during lunch breaks.

Today, however, he had slightly higher stakes in mind. He left the bank carrying twenty thousand dollars in an inch-thick stack of bills.

The things it would buy.

Eric considered the possibilities, jumping up onto the window ledge in front of the bank, a twisted smile on his face, his enigmatic eyes covered by his mirrored sunglasses. He clumsily folded a fifty-dollar bill into a paper airplane and sent it off on a short-term flight to the sidewalk.

He was near La Brea and Fountain, so when he got back on the Vespa, he headed back north to Hollywood Boulevard, the perfect place to begin his odyssey. Work could wait.

First he needed a camera. The boulevard was crammed with photo shops ready to accommodate the needs of tourists who thought maybe the area would look more glamorous through a viewfinder.

Eric, oddly, had never owned a camera. He knew from commercials that the Polaroid peddled by James Garner was best suited to his needs, so he bought one at the first store he came to, along with enough film to last him the day.

Mann’s Chinese theatre, the boulevard’s main attraction, was just down the block. The open courtyard, cloistered in the arms of an Oriental façade, swarmed with tourists snapping off photos of the imprints and autographs screen stars had left in the cement flagstones. Marilyn Monroe was represented by hand and spiked-heel prints, adjacent to a square similarly imprinted by Jane Russell. The two squares were joined by the title of the film that paired them,
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.