It wasn’t until we were making the invitation list for our wedding that I discovered Jay Levinthal was Ben’s sworn enemy. Which pretty much explained everything.
* * *
? ? ?
Leo is drinking amber liquid from one of my glasses on the porch swing when I pull into the driveway with my kids after school. Two of the eighteen-wheelers are gone so there’s room to park in front of my house. Arthur walks straight past him without saying hello. Bernadette plops down next to him and offers her dimple.
“You smell like my dad.” She means it as a compliment and has confirmed my suspicion that it’s scotch in that glass. Ben’s, I’m guessing. I nearly lost my mind when he spent eighty-six dollars on that stupid bottle. I was glad when he forgot to take it with him, but I’m maybe more glad to see Leo drinking it unceremoniously from a juice glass. Ben would be so pissed.
“Lucky me,” he says, raising his glass in a toast. He doesn’t strike me as particularly drunk, more as a person who stays mildly buzzed all day.
“I like this spot,” he says.
“Me too. The sun rises here,” Bernadette confides.
“Right here?”
“Yep.”
“Wow.”
“If you stay, you can see it tomorrow.”
“Happens every day?”
“I think so.” The two of them look out over the trees, and I have the odd sensation that I’m the third wheel here.
“So, is everything wrapping up back there?” I ask.
“I think. They’re reviewing just to see if there’s anything we need to reshoot. I’ll be back in civilization by bedtime.”
Trigger alert: That’s the kind of thing Ben might have said. He’d belittle the life I’d chosen and worked so hard to build like it was less than. At the corner of arrogance and cluelessness, you find the worst kind of person. I suddenly can’t wait to have this guy off my porch, out of my space, and away from my family.
“Well, enjoy that. Come on, Bernie, let’s get going with the homework.”
* * *
? ? ?
By five o’clock I have a chicken roasting in the oven and a bottle of sauvignon blanc in the fridge. Per our contract, they have to be out of here by six or they have to pay me for a third day. All I need to do is say my gracious good-byes and watch them leave. It was fun to play Hollywood for two days, but now I know that two days maxes me out. We need to get back on track, three people operating as a well-oiled machine. I need to start writing something new. Arthur needs to start learning his lines. Bernadette needs to get the stars out of her eyes. Plus, the tires on my lawn are making me twitch.
I relax thinking about the simplicity of writing for TRC. I’ll get back to that tomorrow. I’ll write a low-stakes romance with the happiest possible ending, with dogs and adorable children, chance meetings and homemade desserts. And I’ll do it at no personal cost. This last thing was just some kind of silent scream.
At five-thirty I go outside, as if my “thanks for comings” will remind them all to leave. My kids insist on coming with me. We walk hand in hand to the tea house and see two cameramen carrying lighting equipment away. “All wrapped up,” one of them tells us.
Inside, Weezie is pulling the linens off the daybed. “Hey, guys, we’ll be out of your hair shortly.” She replaces them with my faded sunflower sheets, the ones that were inadequate for Hollywood, and just like that the tea house is mine again. The stone floor is too clean and the fire is raging too aggressively, but it’s close enough.
We all make our way out front and say our good-byes. Naomi stops to give me a hug. “This film really wore me out. But I get it. And I hope other people do too. It’s important what you wrote.” Bernadette just about faints.
I look up at Naomi because for some reason she’s changed into three-inch heels for the drive back to the city. “That feels really good to hear, thank you.”
She changes her voice for my kids, higher and louder. “Bye, cuties!” They say good-bye in their most grown-up voices, in self-defense.
Martin thanks me. He wants to know if he can come back to the tea house for a press event. I say no, and he laughs. We’re on even footing. Weezie’s corralling everyone into their vehicles as Leo steps out of his trailer to give a wave. So freakin’ rude, I think. He’s been trespassing in my house and drinking my booze for two days, you’d think he could walk twenty feet and say good-bye.
Arthur and I give him a wave just as Bernadette is running over to give him a hug. Either the fact of it or the force of it takes Leo by surprise, and he hugs her back. They exchange a few words, and he touches her dimple. He climbs back into the trailer.