One
Rosie carried her overnight bag up the stairs and was greeted by the familiar mess of their kitchen. Ben had left the blender on the counter, next to a half-empty box of strawberries and a can of protein powder. Rosie imagined him wearing his Lakers t-shirt, his gray sweats with the barely legible Kenyon logo, sprinting out the door like a bullet.
When they arrived in Los Angeles eight years ago they rolled their eyes at people eating takeout from brown cardboard containers, at the Priuses gliding silently down Santa Monica Boulevard, at the young women walking dogs that were large as horses or small as silver quarters.
“Nobody has a normal dog: a golden retriever or a Labrador,” Rosie observed.
“That’s because we’re in Los Angeles. The city is full of artists, musicians, writers.” Ben held her hand tightly, maneuvering through the crowds on Venice Beach Boardwalk.
“And models, waiters, and pizza delivery boys with college degrees and unpaid student loans,” Rosie replied nervously. She thought about their own newly minted degrees, the loan statements being forwarded to their studio apartment in Venice, the meetings where they had shown their student film and been politely told they had something, but it was rough. “Shine it up and let us take another look.”
Now, two apartments, one surprising success on the indie film circuit later, they owned matching Honda hybrids, belonged to the Save the Ocean Foundation, and shopped exclusively at Whole Foods.
“We’re living the dream.” Ben smiled when Rosie reported updates from their Kenyon classmates. Some worked in big corporations, others collected postgraduate degrees or took over family businesses in Ohio.
The ocean was just yards from their front door and she loved the sound of the waves crashing onto the sand. And she adored the secondhand bookstore that stocked a whole section of Ibsen and Pinter. But the studio executives in their three-piece pin-striped suits made her nervous. They treated you to a three-course lunch and then cut your budget so ruthlessly; Rosie wanted to run home and bury her head in a pillow.
Rosie wiped the kitchen counter and sorted through the mail Ben left on the table. Her mother still sent letters on creamy white stationery, though Rosie usually dashed off an email reply. There were two invitations to movie premieres and a note from Ben: please pick up my tux at the dry cleaner.
What should she wear to the premieres? Now that she held the title of “associate producer” on a studio picture her mildly bohemian wardrobe seemed wrong. She either had to buy vintage Galliano and Audrey Hepburn little black dresses, or brave the saleswomen at Prada and Pucci.
Rosie hauled her overnight bag to the washing machine. The title of “associate producer” puzzled her. She accompanied the location scout on trips to find the perfect settings. She visited factories with the costume designer to choose the right fabrics. She sat in meetings with the studio accountants and publicity team. She didn’t seem to do anything by herself, but no one could do anything without her.
“Relax.” Ben rubbed her temples as they lay in bed at night. He turned Rosie on her stomach and pressed his thumb on the small of her back. Ben knew her body as well as she did. In college, people had said they were mirror images of each other. They wore their wavy brown hair in the same off-the-shoulder style. They both had hazel eyes and freckles on their cheeks. They dressed in unisex t-shirts, often trading clothes. Rosie strolled campus wearing a Bob Marley t-shirt and had to admit she never listened to his music when a Marley buff tried to engage her in conversation.
Now Ben kept his hair in a crew cut and Rosie straightened hers and wore it halfway down her back. Ben dressed in sports shirts and slacks, and Rosie stuffed her side of the closet with cotton dresses. But when they ran on the beach, they shared a similar gait. They ordered the same smoothies from Jamba Juice. They both opened the Sunday New York Times at the same page and read the book reviews from back to front.
“Your job is to organize people and you’re brilliant.” Ben pushed his thumb harder into her spine. Rosie could feel her body melting and goose bumps popped up on her skin.
Ben’s job was easily defined. He was the director. His name was stenciled on the back of his chair, it was ironed onto a t-shirt the cast gave him on the first day of shooting, it was printed on his parking space at the studio lot: BEN FORD, DIRECTOR.
Ben wore the t-shirt for a week straight. He marveled at it over breakfast. “Not assistant director, not second director: director,” he said, chewing a mouthful of eggs. He wore it when he Skyped his best friend in Atlanta. He wore it under his dress shirt when they had dinner at CUT with Erin Braun, their lead actress, and her race car driver boyfriend.
Their hands were poised on the first rung of success; they just had to climb the ladder. Sometimes it was the best feeling in the world and sometimes it scared her to death.
Rosie separated the whites from the darks and added laundry detergent and fabric softener. Her feet hurt from two days of trekking around horse farms. Her arms were sunburned because Ben hadn’t been there to remind her to reapply suntan lotion. She wanted to stand under the jets of their high-tech shower and climb under cool cotton sheets.
The bedroom was messier than the kitchen. Two days’ worth of t-shirts, running shorts, polos, and slacks lay in a heap on the floor. Ben joked that when they bought a house it would have his and hers walk-in closets. His would be accessed by a special code so Rosie couldn’t pick up his sweatshirts and socks. He liked that she kept the bed perfectly made, heaped with pillows, but he missed the masculine squalor of his dorm room.
Buying a house in the Santa Monica hills was on the wish list they tacked to a bulletin board in the bedroom. After the movie wrapped they had three goals: get married, go to Africa, and buy a house. Sometimes they changed the order.
“We shouldn’t wait for our honeymoon to go to Africa,” Ben pondered aloud, eating waffles in bed on a Sunday morning. “We could get married in Africa, on a wild animal reserve.”
“We could buy a house first,” Rosie offered, sipping fresh-squeezed orange juice. “And get married in our garden, overlooking the Pacific.”
Recently they had a small argument over their wish list. Ben scratched out “house in Santa Monica hills” and replaced it with “house in Beverly Hills.”
“Why would we want to live in Beverly Hills?” Rosie frowned when she saw the new entry.
“Movie people live in Beverly Hills or the Hollywood Hills.” Ben shrugged, taking off his running socks.
“That’s why we like Santa Monica,” Rosie replied. “It has writers and artists and regular families with two kids and SUVs.”
“If we want to get a bigger deal next time, we need to move in the right circles.” Ben sat on the bed and put his arms around her. “Would a house above the Hollywood sign be so bad? With an infinity pool and our own orange grove?”
“I’d settle for an orange tree.” Rosie grinned, closing her eyes and imagining a low modern house with floor-to-ceiling windows.
“I want to give you an orange grove and a rose garden and a fountain filled with goldfish.” Ben pulled her down on the bed.
“I’m not very good with goldfish,” Rosie giggled, feeling his mouth on her breast.
“Then we’ll hire someone to take care of them,” Ben mumbled, his fingers caressing her thighs.
* * *
Ben’s clothes were scattered on the floor and Rosie threw them on the bed. She began separating dry cleaning from laundry, but suddenly she froze. The bed was unmade, the sheets twisted and hanging on the floor. Ben never made the bed. Sometimes Rosie made it while he was still in it. She folded her side and plumped the pillows against the headboard. She hated to come home to an unmade bed; it made her feel as if she hadn’t showered.
She stepped back and studied the sheets closely. Ben’s t-shirt against her cheek smelled of his deodorant. A pit formed in her stomach, opening wider like a chasm.
Ben’s habits were as familiar to her as the inside of her underwear drawer. He screwed on the toothpaste cap so tight she had to run it under hot water to unscrew it. He tore off the cover of magazines and folded the corner of every page. He pulled the sheets around them at night as if he was protecting them in a cocoon. But when they had sex, when he covered Rosie’s chest with his own smooth, compact body, when he opened her legs and plunged into her, he pushed the sheets fiercely off the bed. After, when they were both sweaty and spent and tasting of each other, he wrapped his body around hers and they slept uncovered, all night.
Rosie sat at the edge of the bed, trying to think. Had they had sex before she left? Could she have left Ben in bed, the sheets crumpled on the floor, and slipped off in the morning on her trip?
Her heart hammered in her chest and she blinked to keep the fear from forming into tears. Ben had an early call Tuesday morning. She remembered because it was such a glorious feeling to lie in bed, alone. She felt like she was back in college with a late-morning class, stealing an hour to read Donna Tartt’s The Secret History.
She had made the bed and packed her overnight bag. Ben’s drawer was full of fresh socks and she counted that he had enough clean t-shirts. The towels were stacked neatly in the laundry and the bathroom was filled with fresh, fluffy linens. She even rescued her favorite stuffed animal, Taffy the Penguin, and propped him on Ben’s pillow: to keep him company while she was gone.
Rosie surveyed the bed and a hollow feeling formed in her stomach. The pillows were scrunched and there was an open Rolling Stone on the bedside table. The sheets formed a knotted column like a snake. She pictured a girl with bouncing breasts and tousled hair, arching under Ben’s compact form.
Over the years they had very few fights. Ben was like a sleeping giant. He never raised his voice. He hardly ever disagreed with her. Sometimes he would wrinkle his brow, make her repeat what she said, and then calmly refute her argument.
Ben wanted to drive straight out to Los Angeles after graduation. Rosie thought they should get real jobs and save money before they embarked on their dream. Rosie wanted to call their company “Benny and Rosie Films.” Ben thought they needed something slicker: “Benjamin Rose Productions.”
Once or twice a year, something would set Ben off. Rosie didn’t like a scene, after Ben spent days and nights in the editing suite. Ben favored the Beverly Hills Hotel for their anniversary dinner and Rosie preferred a quiet meal at home. His face would close up and he would throw on his running shoes and burn off his frustration on the pavement.
Even when he darted out the door, saying she didn’t understand how hard he worked, Rosie knew he’d come back. They were best friends, lovers, and partners. They spent all day together on the set, sending telepathic signals. When they were apart, they called each other ten times a day, hugging their phones to their cheeks.
* * *
“Are you sure you want to set the fourth scene on a horse farm?” Rosie had asked the day before, standing in the middle of a paddock. “They’re full of flies and manure. I don’t think Erin is going to find it romantic. Maybe you should have her meet her lover at a lake or on a tennis court?”
“I want a stampede of horses,” Ben said into the phone. Rosie imagined him with one eye squinting into the camera. “I want dirt, open fields, a majestic mountain in the distance.”
“I guess that means you won’t settle for a 7-Eleven on the other side of the stables?” Rosie laughed, walking through caked mud back to her car. “I’ll call you when we get to Long Meadows.”
Even when they couldn’t talk to each other—when Ben holed up with writers and came home late wired on coffee and donuts, when Rosie flew to San Francisco or Dallas to meet investors—she felt like Ben was by her side. She saved up stories of obese oilmen wanting a stake in the movie, of San Francisco socialites demanding their daughter Chloe or Prudence have a small part in exchange for financial backing. When they lay in bed, toes touching, fingers massaging each other’s backs, Rosie knew no one would ever come between them.
But the sheet lay in a heap of beige cotton. It spoke louder than a vague Facebook reference, louder than a magazine gossip column. Ben had had another woman in their bed. He had pushed aside the pillows. He had pulled the woman into the center of the bed. He had made love to her.
Rosie heard the screen door bang shut and the ice maker making a spitting sound. She noticed Ben standing in the hall and watched him strip off his t-shirt and throw it in the direction of the washing machine. He strode towards the bedroom, a glass of orange juice in one hand, and a smile spreading across his face.
“You should have texted me you were home.” Ben put the glass down and planted an orange-juice kiss on her mouth.
“We beat the traffic,” Rosie said grimly. “Made it in record time.”
“You smell like hay and horses.” Ben nuzzled the side of her neck. “Let’s go out for sushi. I want to hear about every horse farm from here to Bakersfield.”
“I was about to jump in the shower.” Rosie pulled her eyes from the crumpled sheet. She looked at Ben: his long nose with a slight bump in the middle, his hazel eyes flecked with yellow, the dimple at the corner of his mouth. She tried to squelch her rising panic, to imagine this was an ordinary evening: shower, dinner, and bed.
“I’ll join you.” Ben casually stripped off his sweats. “I had the executive producer crawling around the set with a calculator. He was tallying how many Starbucks the crew drank during each take. Christ, next he’ll be adding up toilet rolls.”
“The sheets,” Rosie said numbly, pointing to the floor.
“I’m a hopeless case.” Ben grinned. “I meant to make the bed, but I just didn’t have time. I’ll turn over a new leaf when the movie wraps. I’ll serve you breakfast in bed for a month.”
“Ben!” she yelled as he headed for the bathroom.
“What’s up?” He turned around, crossing his arms over his naked chest.
“You had a woman in our bed,” Rosie said. Her teeth were chattering, a chill ran up her spine.
“What are you talking about?” Ben replied guardedly. He flicked an imaginary hair from his forehead.
“The sheets were at the edge of the bed. You had sex with a woman in our bed.”
“Rosie, you’re crazy.” Ben stood beside her. There were beads of sweat on his shoulders.
“When we have sex you kick the sheets off the bed,” Rosie said in a strangled voice, her eyes brimming with tears.
“I had a nightmare.” Ben shrugged, a smile playing on his lips. “Something to do with Erin getting a cold sore as big as a pizza. I must have kicked them off during the night. I’ll help you make the bed.” He reached down and grabbed a side of the sheet.
“Ben!” Rosie screeched. “We’ve slept together for ten years. We’ve shared a single bed, a bunk bed, that king bed at the hotel in Sundance. You never kick the sheets unless we have sex. Tell me who she is or I’m leaving.”
“Let’s go to Johnny Rockets and share a burger and a shake. I’ll explain everything if you just give me a chance.”
“I want to know her name.”
Ben dropped his hands to his sides. He sat on the bed, drumming his fingers on the mattress. He looked up at Rosie, his eyes bright and clear.
“Mary Beth Chase.”
“Mary Beth Chase the producer? Mary Beth Chase the Hollywood vixen who wears La Perla in public and has her own bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Mary Beth Chase who is at least ten years older than you and has had more boy toys than other women have handbags?”
“She’s none of those things.” Ben kept his eyes on the floor. “She went to Wesleyan. She’s whip smart and she’s had five blockbusters in a row. People don’t like women with balls, they just want to cut them down.”
“And you want to screw them!” Rosie stormed. She paced the bedroom like a wounded lion. She couldn’t look at Ben. She couldn’t look at their matching chests of drawers, at the framed poster of their movie, at the picture of them taken at Sundance, arms around Robert Redford.
“She’s been plying me with dinner and drinks for weeks. I didn’t want to tell you till things were finalized, but the studio wanted to bring her in as executive producer. She knows how to steamroll a movie. Her productions bring in bigger numbers than anyone’s besides Jerry Bruckheimer’s.”
“You went to bed to close a deal!” Rosie exploded. “Is this the Playboy Mansion? Are you Hugh Hefner?”
“You don’t know how sorry I am. It just sort of happened. She wanted to see a clip of our indie. I brought her home to get the DVD. You were away. We sort of moved from the sofa to the bedroom.”
“Stop!” Rosie screamed. “You threw away ten years of our lives so your movie could make a few more zeros.”
“Rosie, I’ve loved you since we were juniors at Kenyon. I couldn’t have made it through Senior Seminar without you.” Ben ran his hands nervously through his hair. “When we moved to LA, I thought about running home every night for a year. But I’d look at you in bed, and even asleep you had confidence in me.”
“Don’t!” Rosie yelled. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She felt like she was swimming underwater and someone had removed her snorkel.
“We’ve grown apart,” Ben said slowly. “I feel like I’m not running fast enough because I’m waiting for you to catch up. You don’t want a mega successful movie; you don’t want a Beverly Hills estate. You cringed when I wanted to check out Maseratis.”
“You lied to me, and when you got caught you said it didn’t mean anything.” She turned on him. “Now you think we’re growing apart. Which is it?” she demanded. “Because I want the truth.”
“I don’t know what I want,” Ben said lamely. “You’re always the one who figures out what we want, but that doesn’t seem to be working anymore.”
“I want us,” Rosie whispered. She was going to throw up or pass out: crumple into a heap on the sheets.
“I’ll tell you what I do know.” Ben was like a windup toy that suddenly sprang to life. “I want this movie to be the biggest thing since Mission: Impossible. I want to make a sequel every year and have houses in the Hamptons and Hawaii. You might see that as selling out but I see it as seizing an opportunity.”
“I’m not against those things.” Rosie’s words came out between sobs. “We always said we’d be the next Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson. We’d show Hollywood we were made of Teflon.”
“I think we should take a break.” He looked at Rosie.
“We work together every day,” Rosie replied frantically. She was like a woman in a magic show, sliced down the middle. Half of her felt physically sick; she never wanted Ben to touch her again. The other half saw Ben walk out the door; watched his wide smile and his hazel eyes and his freckles disappear, and thought her heart was breaking.
“The studio would buy out your contract,” Ben said slowly, as if he was figuring it out while he talked. “Maybe you could do theater. You’ve always loved Ibsen and Pinter.”
“You’re planning my life for me! I’m associate producer,” Rosie sputtered.
“They gave you that title because they wanted me.” Ben shrugged. “We were a package deal. I’ll move out. You can take your time figuring out what you want to do.”
“You sound like you’re reading a script,” Rosie yelled, pounding her fists on the bed. “Did Mary Beth Chase hire a writer for you? Are you going to use this for the big breakup scene in the movie?”
“Rosie, let’s not make it worse. We both need time to cool off. I’ll go spend the night at the studio.”
“You mean you’ll drive to Mary Beth’s bungalow!” Rosie was like a rocket breaking apart. She grabbed her overnight bag and pulled open her chest of drawers. She jammed in underwear, bras, t-shirts, shorts, socks, and leotards. She went to the closet and yanked out a bunch of cotton dresses. She gathered her makeup bag, the paperback books on her bedside table, and the slippers she kept under the bed.
“Where are you going?” Ben followed her through the hall into the kitchen.
“I’ll post it on my Facebook status.” Rosie dragged the bag down the stairs and flung it into the hatchback. She saw Ben in the rearview mirror. He was standing at the door in his boxers. She slowed down, thinking he’d run after her. He’d pound on the window and beg her forgiveness. He got caught up in the craziness; he’d do anything to win her back. Rosie idled the car at the red light and watched Ben pick up the newspaper from the porch and walk inside.
It was one block to the beach and she parked near the sand. The last surfers straggled in from the waves and a boy threw a tennis ball to his dog. She saw a young couple strolling hand in hand and all she wanted was to be walking along the shore with Ben and talking about their day.
The couple wore matching UCSB sweatshirts and denim cutoffs. He had an earring in one ear and she had a tattoo on her ankle. Their faces were so close together they walked like a monster in a fairy tale: two heads bobbing on top of one body. Rosie remembered when she and Ben used to bump into things; they were so deep in conversation they didn’t notice where they were going.
* * *
They met on the lawn outside the dining hall. It was early fall; only the second week of classes, and the air was humid and thundery. Rosie lay under a tree, eating a peach and reading Mary McCarthy’s The Group. She was feeling lost back on campus. Her best friend had transferred to Oberlin and her sophomore boyfriend hooked up with his high school sweetheart.
“Let me guess, you’re enrolled in one of those lit classes where you’ve never heard of the authors and the books are so boring you can’t stay awake.” Ben sat on the lawn next to her. He looked vaguely familiar, as if she’d seen him at the back of a lecture hall. He had wavy brown hair and carried a backpack crammed with notebooks.
“Mary McCarthy is one of the best writers of the twentieth century.” Rosie looked up. “Unless you’re intimidated by female intelligence.”
“I wouldn’t have lasted two years at Kenyon if I was intimidated by intelligent women.” Ben grinned.
Rosie liked his smile; it made his eyes crinkle at the corners.
“They grow like weeds around here. I’m Ben Ford, we were in a film seminar last semester.”
“Rosie Keller.” Rosie shook his hand formally.
“Are you a film major too?”
“Theater,” Rosie replied.
“You should switch,” Ben said decisively. “Do you want to influence three hundred people in one badly heated space with terrible coffee and overpriced sweets, or millions of viewers all over the world?”
“Last movie I saw, the popcorn cost six dollars and the coffee tasted like turpentine.”
“Movies transport you to another place. You can be in Egypt, on a canal in Venice, at the Great Wall of China, just by watching the screen.”
“I’ve read Chekhov, Ibsen, Pinter.” Rosie ticked the names off on her fingers. “I’ve never read a great screenwriter.”
“But have you seen The Godfather, Apocalypse Now, Midnight Rider, The Sting?” Ben leaned close. He smelled of sweat and ink.
“I am a Hitchcock fan,” Rosie conceded.
“He’s my idol.” Ben’s eyes sparkled. Rosie thought they resembled a kaleidoscope. “Which one is your favorite?”
“I’m half in love with Cary Grant,” Rosie replied, folding the page of her book and placing it in her lap.
“Come with me.” Ben grabbed her hand and pulled her up. He ran across the lawn, his backpack bouncing against his shoulder.
“Theater is two-dimensional,” he continued as if they were paused in the middle of a discussion. “You’re always wondering when the house lights are going to come on or whether it’s still raining outside. Movies are like a magic carpet. The big screen takes you wherever you want to go.”
They stopped outside a small building with no windows. Ben extracted a set of keys from his pocket and opened the door.
“Wait here,” he instructed.
Rosie watched storm clouds gather in the distance. There was a faint rumbling of thunder. She wondered how she had never been to this corner of campus, and how she had not noticed this boy who was all frenetic energy and flashing hazel eyes.
Ben opened the door and drew her inside. They were in a small dark room with a screen on one wall. Rosie smelled garlic and butter, and there was a brown Indian blanket spread on the floor.
“Your magic carpet.” Ben invited her to sit down. “Your gourmet snacks.” He pointed to the bowl of freshly popped popcorn.
The screen went black and flickered onto the opening credits of To Catch a Thief. Rosie saw Cary Grant flirt with Grace Kelly. She watched them zip up the hills of Monte Carlo in a tiny yellow car. She felt the glittering Mediterranean as if she was bobbing in a motorboat.
Rosie ate a handful of popcorn, feeling Ben’s shoulder rub against hers. She could see the outline of his knees, his hands with long smooth fingers.
After To Catch a Thief, Ben put on North by Northwest and An Affair to Remember. Rosie forgot that it was dinnertime in the dining hall. She didn’t hear the heavy raindrops falling outside. Ben took her hand and placed it in his lap.
“I see your point.” Rosie grinned when the credits rolled and Ben flicked on the lights. He moved closer so their knees were touching.
“When I get out of here I’m going to drive straight to Los Angeles. I’m going to pound on Steven Spielberg’s door and beg to sweep the cutting room floor.”
“I don’t think they have cutting rooms anymore.”
“I’m not going to let anything distract me. I’d rather eat SPAM for a year than do anything other than make a movie.”
“I don’t think anyone eats SPAM either. Maybe canned tuna, or tofu and sprouts.”
“I’m going to make the best damn film since Titanic, and it’s going to play in every movie theater in America.”
“I’ll go see it.” Rosie nodded, feeling his hand pressing hers.
Ben stopped. He looked at Rosie closely. He pushed his hair behind his ears and kissed her slowly on the mouth. He pulled back, studying her eyes, her nose, and her cheekbones. He leaned forward and kissed her again, putting his arms around her and scooping her up as if she were a doll.
“There’s one thing movies can’t make you forget,” he said, tracing her lips with his thumb. “That you’re sitting next to the most beautiful girl in the world.”
* * *
The last ten years had passed so quickly, Rosie thought as she watched a familiar tall blond figure walk towards her on the sand. She wore a pantsuit with padded shoulders and a man’s button-down shirt. Her hair was cut bluntly at her shoulders and her mouth was smeared with bright red lipstick.
“I’ve been combing the beach from Santa Monica to Venice.” The woman sat down on the sand. “I was about to give up and grab a burger.”
“How did you find me?” Rosie squinted through the tears. She sat hunched over, hugging her knees while her best friend rubbed her back fondly.
“I tried to call you but you’ve been out of range for two days. Then Ben called and told me you disappeared. I figured I better play lifeguard and rescue you.”
“Ben called you,” Rosie repeated, trying to stop shaking.
“He sounded worried about you, something to do with sheets and dirty laundry. He wasn’t making sense.”
“He made perfect sense when he told me we’ve grown apart and he was leaving. I beat him to it,” Rosie sobbed.
“Neither of you is making sense and I’m starving. Let’s go to World Foods and stuff our faces with tofu burgers. I never feel guilty there, even when I order fries.”
“I’m not hungry.” Rosie shook her head. She felt like her body was rooted in the sand.
“Then you can watch me eat, and you can tell me what’s going on with Hollywood’s most adorable couple,” Angelica said and walked towards the parking lot.
* * *
“Ben slept with Mary Beth Chase, in our bed, while I was scouting locations.” Rosie sat opposite Angelica in a booth at World Foods. Angelica was almost half a foot taller than Rosie. She had naturally blond hair that she sometimes dyed red or even black. Angelica was a chameleon. Even her eyes, a watery pale blue, seemed to change color depending on what she was wearing.
They met on the set of Ben’s indie film. Ben was looking for a girl to play the role of a sophisticated young socialite. “Picture her as a modern Cornelia Guest,” he explained to Rosie. “I want to cast somebody authentic. I’m sick of these actresses with hair the color of mayonnaise and breasts made of plastic. I want a real socialite: I want her to roll her r’s and walk like she’s balancing a dictionary on her head.”
Ben and Rosie started hanging out at gallery openings in West LA. They lounged poolside at the Beverly Hills Hotel and snuck into the Polo Lounge. Ben spotted Angelica in a booth at Spago’s. She was sipping champagne and rolling spaghetti into a ball on her spoon.
“That’s the girl!” he said excitedly. “Look how she holds her fork.”
“Her hair looks like she stuck it in a microwave.” Rosie frowned. “I thought you wanted a sleek blonde with an elegant chignon.”
Ben introduced himself as the producer of the film that would launch her career. Over German chocolate cake and a bottle of Veuve Clicquot, they learned that Angelica came from a wealthy Santa Barbara family. Her hair was actually straight and blond. Angelica believed in method acting and was auditioning for the movie version of Hair. “I want to show the director a white girl can groove,” Angelica explained, licking chocolate from her fork.
Ben convinced her to take the role in his film instead, and Angelica and Rosie became fast friends. They both had schoolgirl crushes on Zac Efron and Leonardo DiCaprio. They both loved Mexican food; they both knew the lines of every song by Beyoncé.
* * *
“That doesn’t sound like Ben.” Angelica ate a handful of fries. “He’s the last honest man in LA.”
“He said I’m holding him back, that I don’t want the big successful movie career.” Rosie sniffled, stabbing a green salad. “I do want it. I love taking the bus tour of Beverly Hills. I adore beautiful rooms and green lawns and blue swimming pools. I saw Remains of the Day three times.”
“I’m not buying his excuse.” Angelica shook her blunt pageboy. “He saw a piece of flesh on his couch and he had to have her. Men see themselves in terms of the size of their penises. The more successful they become, the bigger they think their penises are. It’s like looking in a fun-house mirror. When they think their dicks are enormous they have to use them.”
Rosie shuddered, picturing Ben undressing another woman. “Why the shoulder pads? I didn’t know they were shooting a movie version of Dynasty.”
“I’m channeling Katharine Hepburn!” Angelica exclaimed. “I got the role of Tracy Lord in the remake of The Philadelphia Story.”
“Wow!” Rosie gulped her glass of water. “You’re going to be fantastic. It’ll be the movie of the year.”
“They cast Dirk Graham in Cary Grant’s role. Can you imagine me working with Dirk Graham? I wonder if he really went to Cambridge or if he practiced that accent with his acting coach. I could run my hands through his hair all day.”
“You better not tell Matthew.” Rosie frowned.
“Only on the set, when the director calls action.” Angelica piled her burger with spinach and bean sprouts. “But a girl can dream. Matthew has been working seven days a week. I’m living with a ghost.”
“He started a new job.” Rosie pushed her plate away. “At least your boyfriend isn’t replacing you with his boss.”
“That’s because Matthew’s boss is a two-hundred-pound Lebanese who eats falafel at his desk. Matthew comes home smelling of cumin.”
Rosie recoiled. She had seen pictures of Mary Beth Chase in Variety and W. She was six feet of curves and hair extensions. Her cheekbones were finely chiseled, and her lips were the color of cherries.
“We need to talk about you.” Angelica dabbed soy sauce on her burger. “What do you want to do?”
“I know what I don’t want.” Rosie was having trouble swallowing. “I don’t want to find a new job, I don’t want to move, and I don’t want Ben to have screwed another woman.”
“I’m a lifesaver not a genie.” Angelica squeezed Rosie’s hand. “I can’t make Ben’s penis disappear.”
“Maybe the studio doesn’t want me,” Rosie choked, the tears starting again. “Ben’s the brilliant director, I’m just someone who can organize people.”
“I wish you could stay with us, but we couldn’t fit an extra plant into our place,” Angelica said. “My mother keeps sending me checks but I keep sending them back.”
“Half the actors in town get money from their parents.” Rosie shrugged.
“If I accept their money, I’ll get lazy.” Angelica shook her head. “I won’t get any roles, and I’ll be living in my parents’ guest cottage. My mother is smart as a fox.”
“Your mother is wonderful.” Rosie remembered driving with Ben to their estate in Montecito last Thanksgiving. Angelica’s father was a famous record producer so Rosie had expected a mansion with miles of marble and glass. She pictured a movie theater with padded walls, a black granite kitchen, and rock stars wandering around in tight leather pants.
They drove up a long gravel drive and entered through wrought iron gates. The house was made of stone and covered in ivy. It had elegant bay windows, a peaked roof, and lawns that rolled down to a private lake.
Ben had whistled as he pulled up to the stone entry. He leaned close and whispered to Rosie, “This would be a great place to film a remake of Rebecca.”
Rosie recalled the front hallway with its dark wood floors covered with oriental rugs. The walls were painted ivory and hung with framed photographs of Angelica and her brother, Sam. The living room looked like it belonged in an English hunting lodge. A stone fireplace took up one wall. Sofas were covered in floral chintz and brown velvet. Two Irish setters lay by the fireplace, lifting their heads when Rosie entered the room.
“Your house is beautiful,” Rosie said to Angelica’s mother, a statuesque woman with Angelica’s Roman nose and white-blond hair.
“I expect it could use updating.” Estelle shrugged. “It’s been in the family for years. I’m afraid if I renovate, I’ll dislodge the ghost of my grandfather. I’m positive he lives in the library; I hear him opening the brandy at night.”
“I’ve never been in a house with ghosts.” Rosie patted the Irish setter.
“Every house has a story.” Estelle smiled. “But you can’t learn all its secrets on the first visit. You’ll have to come back.”
* * *
“My mother is special,” Angelica agreed. “But since I’m her only child in the same time zone, she calls me every day. I have an idea!” She gripped Rosie’s hand tightly. “You can live in her guest cottage for the summer.”
“In Montecito?” Rosie wiped her eyes. “I can’t just run away.”
“It would be perfect. Maybe when the movie wraps Ben will come to his senses. He’s put you through hell, you need to pamper yourself. And you’ll do me a favor. Once I get a paycheck for The Philadelphia Story, my mother will realize I’m serious about acting. In the meantime you can talk to her about her roses and feed the ducks in the lake. You deserve so much better, Rosie. Montecito is the ideal place to recharge.”
“It’s so removed.” Rosie hesitated, thinking of the ninety miles of Pacific Coast Highway that separated Santa Barbara from Santa Monica. She wouldn’t casually bump into Ben at Starbucks or run into him at Sprinkles.
“Ben needs to realize what he’s missing. He’ll wake up with Mary Beth’s hair extensions on his pillow and wish he was lying next to you.”
“I can’t just quit the picture.” Rosie shook her head.
“Take a leave of absence for personal reasons. It’s written into every contract.” She looked at Rosie and her eyes were dark. “He’s an asshole and he doesn’t deserve you.”
Rosie picked up her phone. She wanted to call Ben and ask his advice. For the last ten years, if she couldn’t decide between the butternut squash soup and the black bean chili she called Ben. If she wasn’t sure whether to record Homeland or Scandal, she called Ben. But she couldn’t call him. The Ben who made blueberry waffles on Sundays, the Ben who knew exactly how to touch her, the Ben who could whistle Frank Sinatra and knew every song by Muse had been replaced by a guy who screwed other women. A guy whose vision of the future included blockbuster movies, palatial homes, but not her. She put the phone down and set her mouth in a firm, straight line. “Call your mother.”
Copyright © 2018 by Anita Hughes
