If Only in My Dreams (5 page)

“Just put it on here,” she tells Jesus.

“Don’t you have any scrap paper?”

“Does this look like an office?”

“Got a pen? Or do you want me to use eyeliner?”

She sighs and relinquishes a Sharpie she keeps handy for signing autographs. Which doesn’t happen as often these days as it did when she was on
One Life to Live
. Soap fans are a dedicated breed.

Jesus scribbles something, then hands the card back to her. “Promise me you’ll call Jezibel.”

She sticks it into the shallow lone pocket in her vintage forties’ skirt. “Thanks, but I really don’t think—”

“Um, hello, you need to close your mouth so I can do your lips now.”

“Okay, but just so you know, I don’t need—”

“Ah-ah-ah,” he cautions.

Forced to close her mouth so that he can apply the vintage deep-red lipstick, she contemplates the day that lies ahead.

She still hasn’t found the nerve to break the news of her illness to the powers that be, particularly Denton Wilkens, the director. She will, before the day is out, but she isn’t looking forward to it.

What’s the worst that can happen?

It’s not as though he can recast the Violet role at this stage in filming… can he?

No, but he’s going to have to scramble the production schedule to accommodate her surgical recovery and treatment. As the world’s most notoriously anal-retentive director, he’ll hardly welcome the disruption—particularly on a film this close to his heart, and one he’s wanted to make for years.

Glenhaven Park is Denton’s hometown; he was born there on December 7, 1941.

“The world I came into that day,” he dramatically told the cast at the first read-through, “was a far different world than it had been the day before. I was born the day America’s innocence died.”

Denton can be a little over the top… but not necessarily more so than any other director Clara has ever known.

“Just think,” Jesus muses, expertly giving her the lips of a forties’ film siren, “you’ll be able to channel all this personal angst into your role as Violet. Maybe you’ll win the Oscar.”

“Yeah, posthumously,” she says darkly.

Jesus curses. “You just smudged. Stop talking.”

“Sorry,” she mumbles through a clenched mouth.

“You’re no ventriloquist, honey. But move your lips one more time”—he brandishes the crimson lipstick tube—“and you might just be a clown.”

Sitting mute and motionless, Clara wonders when would be a good time to talk to the director about her illness. Definitely not until she’s finished filming her scene today—the one in which city-girl Violet steps off a train in Glenhaven Park, slips on the icy platform, and literally bumps into her future husband for the first time.

It’ll be difficult enough to muster believable passionate attraction for a man who, she happens to know, has been battling a nasty stomach bug the last few days
and
is having a torrid, clandestine affair with the best boy. She might be a pro, but given her current emotional state, it will be more challenging than usual to separate the closeted actor Michael Marshall from fabled all-American hero Jed Landry.

“All right, you’re all set, Violet,” Jesus proclaims, taking a step back to admire her face. “Off to the hairstylist you go.”

“Thanks, Jesus.” She removes the black vinyl drape and peers out the window of the trailer at the frosty gray dawn, pulling her terry-cloth robe more tightly around her. “You know, it actually looks like it’s going to snow. Wouldn’t that be great?”

“Snow? Great? I’d rather be on a tropical island, shellfish and all, wearing a thong and drinking a piña colada.”

“A thong?” She raises an eyebrow and attempts to block out the mental image of Jesus deJesus in a thong.

“A sarong?”

She makes a face. “I’ll take the snow. And a parka.”

“Oh, come on.” Jesus shudders, looking at the overcast sky. “You wouldn’t kill to be lying on a beach right now?”

“Not in December,” she says, remembering that today is the first of the month. “In December, I want snow. It puts
me into the Christmas spirit. Only twenty-four shopping days left.”

“Fa la la la freaking la,” Jesus replies in a monotone.

She sticks out her tongue at him.

Then, as Jesus warns, “Don’t you go messing up those perfect lips with that slimy tongue!” she realizes that she forgot, for a merry moment, about her plight.

“And anyway,” Jesus adds, “it’s not supposed to snow. It’s supposed to warm up to fifty and rain.”

Fifty degrees and rain?

So much for being in the Christmas spirit, Clara thinks glumly, and steps out into the gray December morning.

In the heart of formerly-countryside, now-suburban Glenhaven Park is a town green that looks like something out of
It’s a Wonderful Life
. Especially today, thanks to the Oscar-winning art director’s holiday magic.

Store windows are artificially frosted, and some, like the five-and-dime, display packets of holiday cards, compartmented boxes of metallic ornaments, and bags filled with fancy ribbon candy. Every lamppost is wrapped in shiny silver garland. Nostalgic strings of wide-spaced, bright-colored bulbs line the gingerbread eaves above most front porches; flocked trees decked with bubble lights and tinsel stand in picture windows; door wreaths abound.

As long as you don’t look at the vast condo community sprawled on a hillside above the Congregational church and overlooking the town, you might actually believe you’ve stepped back in time.

A wide, grassy strip runs the length of the town, encompassing three blocks. A brick path meanders among trees and
shrubs, wrought-iron benches, and tall posts that appear to hold gaslights.

On either side of the green, Victorian-era homes and businesses that line the sidewalks have been stripped of anything post-WWII. Flags with fifty stars have been replaced with flags bearing forty-eight. In place of SUVs and foreign sports cars are vintage roadsters parked in driveways and diagonally along the curbs. The Internet café has been transformed into a telegraph office; the trendy clothing boutique now advertises
STYLISH WOMEN’S HATS
and
MODERN SLACKS
.

A half mile up the commuter railroad tracks, an authentic diesel locomotive—painted a cheery red—has been positioned. It’s ready to steam into town towing old-fashioned domed, corrugated railroad cars, and to dispatch Clara and several extras on the platform to block the first scene.

Clad in platform shoes with high wedge heels, a trim-fitting gray wool skirt suit, black wool coat, and brimmed black velvet hat, Clara boards the train with a crowd of period-costumed extras.

She’s struck, as she was during rehearsals, by the dated rotating mohair seats and ornate lighting fixtures. What a far cry from the modern commuter railroad she takes out to her father’s place in Jersey.

“It smells like smoke in here,” one of the extras comments, fanning the stale air.

It
does
smell like smoke.

Repulsed, Clara clasps her wrist against her nostrils to inhale instead the potent fragrance of the essential oil she dabbed all over herself this morning. A blend of lavender and geranium, the concoction is, quite suitably, called Calming.

God knows Clara can use as much of that as she can get these days.

The scent was wholeheartedly recommended yesterday by Luna, the aromatherapist at her mother’s favorite health store. Clara stopped in on a whim to load up on organic produce, herbal supplements, books on holistic medicine… as much supposedly healing merchandise as she could carry.

“Do you think this was once a smoking car?” one of the extras asks.

“They were all once smoking cars, dude,” somebody replies.

Cigarettes. Why did you have to smoke all those cigarettes when you were younger?

Cancer. You have cancer
.

Her thoughts catapulted back to her diagnosis, Clara can’t help but wonder if things might be different now if she hadn’t.

You can’t second-guess everything you ever did
, she reminds herself.
What good is that now?

What is, is
.

Nothing to do but accept this. Accept it, and fight it
.

“Clara?” someone prods impatiently, and she realizes that nearly everyone is in their places now.

Everyone but the bit actor playing the conductor—and the leading lady.

Fighting the overwhelming urge to scratch the itchy spot where the rough woolen collar brushes her bare neck, Clara takes her designated spot standing beside the door. She’s supposed to be the first passenger off the train.

Her character, a disillusioned office worker, is eager to reach her small-town destination and begin her new elementary school teaching position at the redbrick schoolhouse.

Little does Violet know that she’s about to be swept off her feet by the so-called swooniest fella in town.

“Here you go, Clara.” With a grunt, Lisa, the prop mistress, sets an authentic 1941 Samsonite Streamlite suitcase on the floor at her feet.

“It looks heavy. It
is
heavy,” Clara exclaims, lifting it slightly to test the weight. “What’s in this thing? Sandbags?”

“I stuck a bunch of outfits from wardrobe inside. Stuff we decided not to use. You can go through it after the shoot and keep what you want.”

“Are you kidding? I can’t wait to get back into real clothes when this shoot is over. I don’t know how women back then dealt with being this dressed up every day—and can I ask why this suit doesn’t have more than one pocket?”

“For what? Your iPod?”

“Nope, it won’t fit. I keep that right here.” She grins and lifts her jacket, showing Lisa the slim device tucked into her waistband. The skirt fits loosely, and she can’t seem to get used to the fact that it’s a size twelve—which, as the wardrobe mistress has repeatedly reminded her, is the equivalent to a modern four, her usual size.

“Hey!” Lisa protests. “You can’t carry one of those in the scene. This is supposed to be 1941, remember?”

“Shh! Nobody knows it’s here. And I’ll take it out when we shoot later. It comes in handy in this endless blocking.”

“What if it falls out of your skirt?”

“It won’t.”

“It might. Hand it over.”

“Oh, relax, I’ll just pop it in here.” Clara opens her large black leather clutch purse and drops it in. “There. Nobody will ever know it’s there.”

“
You
will. It might interfere with your authenticity.”

“Nah, I’m a pro, and anyway, we’re not shooting yet.” Clara sighs and scratches the back of her neck again. “God, I would kill to be wearing a sweatshirt and jeans.”

“And here I thought you were a glamour-queen actress,” Lisa says dryly. “So much for the Hollywood illusion.”

“Yeah, but I look like one today, right?” Clara asks with a grin, reaching up to pat her head beneath the trim hat. The hairstylist tamed her brunette mane into a controlled pompadour high above her forehead, with sleek waves falling to her shoulders.

Her smile fades as she remembers that it won’t be long before her hair is falling to the ground in clumps.

“Places, everyone!”

At last the train is ready to steam toward Glenhaven Park for the first run-through.

Clara clutches her purse in one hand and grabs a pole with the other in anticipation of the train’s movement. Time to conjure an expectant, exhilarated feeling.

You’re going off to start a new life.
…

The train starts chugging. It quickly picks up speed.

“How can you ride facing backward?” asks an extra seated nearby. “Doesn’t it make you feel sick?”

Clara merely shakes her head, trying to focus on her character’s motivation.

It’s 1941… you’re Violet… off to start a new life.
…

“Hey, did you drop this?” somebody asks, and hands her something from the floor.

She looks down to see the photo business card she had tucked into her shallow pocket earlier. Jesus had used it to scribble his life coach’s phone number… which she has every intention of throwing away.

But there’s no place to toss it now, so she opens the purse and tucks it in.

Nearly losing her balance as the train rounds a bend, she holds on tighter to the pole, wondering if they should be going this fast. Positioning her too-tight vintage platform shoes farther apart to keep her balance, she glances at the landscape flying past the window.

Get into character. Come on. You’re an actress
.

Yes, an actress with a hell of a lot more on her mind this morning than work. But there will be plenty of time to brood later.

The train hurtles forward toward Glenhaven Park, and Clara stares at the back wall of the car, convincing herself that she’s Violet. Violet, living her uncomplicated 1941 life, embarking on a new adventure in a brand-new place.

Any second now, you’re going to meet the man of your dreams.
…

Yes, and he’s going to go off to war and die.

But Violet doesn’t know that now.

Violet is all hope and anticipation.

Lucky, lucky Violet. Healthy. Happy. About to make a fresh start.

What I wouldn’t give to be in her shoes for real
, Clara thinks wistfully.
Not forever
.

Just for now
.

Just for the happy stuff… like not having cancer and falling in love with Jed Landry
.

“I don’t know… maybe I like the blue one better after all. What do you think, Jed?”

Mustering every shred of his threadbare patience, he pretends to study the woolen muffler Mrs. Robertson is ostensibly about to purchase for her son—after a good twenty minutes’ deliberation, with Jed as a reluctant participant and model.

“The red looks more Christmasy.” He points at the muffler in her hand. “Definitely the red.”

There’s a moment of silence as she contemplates that. A train whistle sounds in the distance. Jed can hear the 9:33 chugging away from the station across the green, and fervently wishes he were on it.

“But Theodore will be wearing the scarf for the rest of the winter,” Mrs. Robertson protests, thrusting the scarf away. “He won’t even open it until Christmas morning. Maybe I should—”