Unscripted Joss Byrd (19 page)

Chris turns to me without a glass to raise.

I shrug.

“… to
The Locals
!”

“To
The Locals
!
”
All the adults toast. (All of them, except somebody who isn't here.)

“I'll see you all tomorrow night at the wrap party. Be there. No more weepy speeches, I promise. Just free booze!”

And that's a wrap.

“Pictures, kids!” Jericho's father pulls the cap off his camera and scrambles in front of us. “For Posterity!” he says. I don't know who that is, but she's got a heap of pictures coming her way.

We strike silly poses—me with an ice pack on my head, and the boys, still shirtless, flexing their muscles. Groaning, Tom lowers onto the sand in front of us and freezes in different robot positions. Who would've thought I'd have wrap pictures with him instead of with my own mother? We all swap places. Then we swap places again. How many combinations can there be? In school I learned a way to figure it out using multiplication or by making a chart with each person's initials, but I can't remember how, exactly.

Next, anyone with a phone or a camera steps in and out until everybody gets a chance to be in a picture. (Everybody, except somebody who isn't here and who, now, won't be in any of the wrap pictures.)

We keep trading spots until Tom drops out to refill his champagne glass and I'm left posing with just Chris and Terrance and his wife. Mrs. Rivenbach holds my ice pack and fixes my tangled hair behind my ears. Terrance stretches his arm over Chris until his hand settles on my head. Behind Chris's back, Terrance whispers to me through clenched teeth, “Joss, after this you should go check on your mother.”

Anyone on this beach would think that the four of us are a family—the Rivenbachs from Los Angeles, California, who play tennis wearing diamond jewelry. And Terrance looks like the kind of guy who would've taken me to the lighthouse if he promised to. But that's Hollywood for you. It can make people believe the fakest things.

*   *   *

In room 204, Viva is inside the bathroom, crying and kicking the cabinets. But if she thinks that her boo-hooing will make me forget that she ruined my best day, she's even crazier than she seems.

“Viva?” I call as I pick sand out of my ear.

No answer. Just more crying and slamming.

“We're wrapped. We're all done,” I say coolly. “I caught a wave. You missed it, you know.”

She's sobbing in a gulping way that even she couldn't put on for attention.

“I wiped out real bad,” I say to make her feel guilty. “I hit my head. They put me in an emergency towel.” But the sound of her smacking things around and then crumpling herself onto the floor makes my voice and my anger start to fade. “You should've seen it…”

*   *   *

“I don't want to get out anymore,” I say, staring through the window. Right outside our limo, on the red carpet, there's too much of everything—too many cameras and flashes and bright dresses and ID tags swinging and all the people, so many of them shouting. “It's too busy. And everybody's going to stare at me.”

“Give us a moment, please,” Viva tells our driver. Then she turns to me. “Of course they're going to stare at you. Because you look so grown-up and glamorous and they all loved your movie.”

I don't feel grown-up or glamorous. I feel jittery in my belly and light in my head. “I want to go back to the hotel and just watch it on the TV.” I miss the hotel's cool, white sheets, and thick, quiet walls, and I want the chocolate wafers that Doris sent in a fruit basket.

“But the rest of the cast is waiting for you.” Viva smooths the edge of my gown. “They want to see you dressed up. All you have to do is smile. And if someone asks who you're wearing, you say Betsey Johnson, and then you'll go inside to sit and watch. It'll be fun, you'll see.”

I wrap my fingers around my seat belt. Lights are flashing quicker. Shouts are growing louder. Dresses are turning brighter. I'd like to see my costars and to watch the awards show inside. But how?

“What about this,” my mother says softly. “Do you want to go out there as a character?”

“What do you mean?” I concentrate on the clasps on my silver shoes that are heart-shaped rhinestones.

“Let's make up a girl who wants every person in the world to see her. And you can pretend to be her. Wanna do that?”

I look at her hopefully. “Who should I be?”

“Um … Bebe VanWaterHausen!” She laughs and lifts a hand to me, presenting Bebe.

I hold back a giggle.

Viva pulls my seat belt away so that she can hold my hands.

“What is Bebe like?” I ask.

“Bebe has a twin sister, but they were separated at birth. And she thinks that if she walks the red carpet, her sister might recognize her and realize they're long-lost twins.” My mother squeezes my fingers and looks me straight in the eyes. “You have to go out there, Bebe. It's your mission. All right?”

Outside, cameras are rolling by on wheels. If the cameras spot me, my twin might be able to see me. “All right.”

“Ready, Bebe?” Viva rubs my arm. “You look absolutely faboo.”

I hug my mother tight. We press together, poofy dress against poofy dress. She smells like salon. “Ready.”

*   *   *

“I'm okay now, though.” I tap the bathroom door. “The medic gave me ice.”

If it were me crying, Viva would say “Don't you dare cry.” But those don't feel like the right words now.

“So, it's party time tomorrow night. I bet there'll be some surprises. Jericho and his dad already rented a snow cone cart for everybody today. Can you believe it? Some wrap gift, huh?”

Leave it to Jericho to show up me and Chris in front of everybody. It must be nice to be able to spend your movie money on gourmet ice.

“The snow cone guy's even wearing a white uniform and a striped paper hat. I didn't get any yet. There's all different flavors. They have coconut. If you want to go, they're probably still there.”

When I knock, she doesn't answer, not even to yell at me to get lost. I don't know what else to do but take out my phone. And I can't think of anyone to call except for Terrance.

WAT SUD I DO? I text. Big deal if he sees my spelling now. I don't care what he thinks anymore.

IS SHE OK?

CRING HARD

SHE'LL BE FINE.

CAN U COM?

I CAN'T. JUST STAY WITH HER.

The shoot is already over, but Terrance is still making me to do his dirty work. His answer—I CAN'T—stabs me in the chest because it isn't true. Terrance Rivenbach can do anything he wants. He just doesn't want to come. He doesn't care about me or my mother.
The Locals
is wrapped for him, and so are we.

“Forget him. He's just a blowtard,” I say to the bathroom door, too softly for my mother to hear. “… We're on the same side again, aren't we, Viva?”

I hear her pulling tissues from the box and blowing her nose.

“We can go for lobster … if you want,” I say. “It's our last chance.”

After a few minutes it's so quiet on the other side that it's scary; Viva is anything but quiet.

“Viva?” I knock louder.
“Mom?”

“I'm fine,” she finally answers, sniffling. “It's just so stressful at the end of a shoot.”

I let out my breath and lean against the door frame.

“You know me,” my mother says. “I'm always worried about what we're gonna do next. I just hate to sit still. The thought of us running out of jobs…” She pulls more tissues and then unrolls toilet paper. “But don't you start getting stressed out, too.”

“I won't,” I lie. I don't know what's worse: filming
The Locals
or not filming
The Locals.
“We could work on dancewear-slash-shapewear. I could help you think of a name. Doris says marketing is all about branding.” I try to sound hopeful.

“Oh, forget it. What's the use?” Viva blurts. “It's a stupid idea. All my ideas are stupid.”

I hope not
all
. I've finished four movies now, haven't I?

“God! I'm such a screwup!” she yells. “When am I going to pull it together? Look at me … what a wreck.”

I touch the door with my fingertips.

“I knew it wasn't forever.” Her voice softens. “But I just … can't I have something good for a little while?
For me?
Is that too much to ask?”

I fill a glass of ice water for my mother and leave it on the bedside table. I also open the laptop on her bed. The screen flashes pictures Viva must've taken of the ritziest, most beautiful houses in Montauk: Lego-like homes with clean, sharp edges, country cottages with worn wood shingles and perfectly clipped hedges all around. These are the kinds of houses with names like Covington Manor or the Beaumont Green. My mother has always wanted a house with a name.

The slideshow stops when I wake the DVD. I skip to Viva's favorite scene in
Paper Moon
and press play. The character Trixie Delight is saying how hard it is to keep a man. “I don't know why, but somehow I just don't manage to hold on real long … So, if you wait it out a little, it'll be over, you know?”

I understand now that while I've been busting myself to play the director's sister, my mother has been working just as hard, maybe even harder, to play the director's girlfriend for as long as she could. I never knew before tonight that Viva knows exactly what it is to be an actor. Come Monday, we're both without a set to go to.

Even though the sun hasn't set yet, the day is over for my mother and me. So I pull my hungry, sunburned, sandy, and knotty-haired self into bed. As I change into my pajamas under my covers, I knock my mother's
Vogue
magazine—the one with a model with cherry-red lips and a very tight bun—off the bed. I hate
Vogue
magazine all of a sudden; it's filled with Mrs. Rivenbachs posing in vineyards, wearing designer gowns, and holding genuine LV bags (not the imitations my mother buys off the street in Manhattan).

Who cares if bags or gowns or diamonds are real when people are fakes?

When I hear Viva turn the doorknob, I pull the sheets over myself and press the sore spot on my head to feel the hurt. I'm so ashamed that I ever wished away Viva's high heels and makeup. Terrance might have twinkly eyes, but they only hide how sneaky he is inside. My mother, who chases palm trees and daydreams about mansions, is who she is. And whatever comes and goes for us, I always get by because I am who I am—a dirt driveway kid who keeps shaking off the dust.

Now that I think about it, our apartment complex in Tyrone has a name; it's on the brick sign at the main entryway—Shangri La. That means imaginary paradise. I heard it in a song, once.

 

19

I don't know if Chris and Jericho are letting me lead or if I actually am the fastest paddler, but I'm way ahead of them as we're heading out to sea. An extra-long night's sleep did me a lot of good. I can't decide which I like more, the sound of paddling or the feel of it—the whooshing and gliding, plunging and lapping.

The water is cold and extra rough today; it's splashing mini waves at us from every direction. But we're going to ride it—just the boys and me—at one of the local spots far away from where we've been filming. No instructor. No safety divers. No camera. Just us.

“Good spot!” Chris yells, as I settle over a calm patch. “Turn there!”

I dip my left toe into the water and paddle on my right side to spin around. And that's when I see it! Way over on my right, at an angle that must be too sharp to see from the shore, finally, there it is—Montauk Lighthouse with its light flashing and a broad brown band around the middle just like on all the postcards and the souvenir plates and the T-shirts and the nightlights in the shops in town! I open my mouth to say something to the boys, but then I stop myself. I've earned the lighthouse. I don't want to share my thoughts with anyone.

“Whoa, nice view!” Jericho raises his arms. “Hellooo, Montauk!”

“Decadent,” says Chris.

In my head I count,
One, two, three, four, wink. One, two, three, four, wink …

Every five seconds, the lighthouse winks at me.

I sit up on my board. Then I close my left eye and hold my hand open underneath the lighthouse to make it look as if it's sitting right here in my palm. Curling my fingers, I close the lighthouse inside my fist.

There. Mine now
.

Who needs Terrance when I've got myself a view like this? And in any case, most things look better from far away than they do up close.

“Joss! Look alive!” Jericho yells.

“Behind you!” Chris says. “Take this wave! It's perfect!”

I drop to my belly and paddle, paddle, paddle as if it's the last thing I'll ever do. I feel the swell, pop up onto my feet, and plant my stance. The boys cheer behind me as I rush over the water and through the air. The lighthouse is standing tall and proud like a standing ovation.

*   *   *

Two things … two things … acting and surfing … I'm good at two things …
I tell myself all the way back to the Beachcomber.

I see my reflection in car windows as I walk through the parking lot. I actually look cool—like a real surfer girl. I've got water in my ears and sand in my crotch to prove it. I could pass for a local any day.

Even though the knot on my head is sore, I'm determined to balance this board on my head all the way up the stairs and all the way through my door. It's my last chance to show Viva that I'm an actor
and
a surfer.
Two things!