We drove down Robertson Boulevard in Beverly Hills where all the famous people go to get photographed by the paparazzi. B-grade celebs loitered on the streets and spent ridiculous amounts of time looking in store windows, shielding their faces from the cameras and smiling coyly.
Jake gave his car to a valet and we walked into a small coffee shop that was swarming with the young and rich of Beverly Hills. I immediately felt out of place. I pulled my Wayfarers from my bag and tried to act like I was too cool to care what I looked like, but I needn’t have worried because no one gave me a second glance. They were all too concerned with themselves, with their appointment books and cell phones. Jake himself took a call on his cell as we walked in, and held up two fingers to the host who seated us in the middle of the room. The windows were reserved for celebrities, where they could see and be seen. It confirmed for me again why I liked them better dead.
‘No, I can’t have the rewrite with you tomorrow, I’ve had a family emergency,’ Jake said, winking at me. ‘How about next week? Yeah, Monday should be fine. Should we meet at the studio? Okay good buddy, take care.’
He snapped the cell phone shut, took off his baseball cap and let his black curly hair come tumbling out, swishing it around like a shampoo commercial. He picked up the menu and scanned it.
‘You work in the film industry?’ I asked, guessing from his phone conversation.
‘Yes, I do,’ he said, beaming proudly. ‘I’m a screen-writer.’
‘Have you written anything I would know?’
‘Probably not. At the moment I’m mainly a script doctor. Most people don’t realise there’s sometimes twenty or thirty writers on these big movies. Audiences complain about seeing five or six names credited on a screenplay, but they’d have a fit if they knew how many writers were really involved in the crap that’s out there.’
‘What does a script doctor actually do?’
‘We fix things. We all have our areas of specialty. Dialogue, fight scenes, car chases. Mine is sex.’
‘Excuse me?’
Jack smirked. ‘Sex scenes. Where they go in the movie, how they play out, the length, the amount of nudity involved.’
‘Are you serious? You mean, like the hand on the misty window in Titanic?’
‘Can’t take credit for that one. But that was good work. Even I can admit that.’
The waitress came over to take our order. ‘I’ll have an egg-white omelette,’ Jake said, smiling up at her, ‘with mushroom and spinach and a fruit cup on the side. Gotta have my protein.’
The waitress giggled. ‘For you, miss?’
‘Just coffee.’
‘You don’t want to eat?’ Jake asked.
‘I’m not hungry.’
‘Hank’s gonna be fine,’ he said, picking up on my unease. ‘You should really eat something.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You’ll have to excuse her,’ Jake said to the waitress. ‘We’ve had a very traumatic experience today. Our dad is in hospital.’
‘Oh no,’ the waitress said.
‘What?’ I almost shrieked.
‘He was hit by a bus. The 108 out of Echo Park.’
‘How horrible,’ the waitress said, putting her hand on Jake’s shoulder. ‘Will he be okay?’
‘He’s in a coma. They expect him to make a full recovery, but until then my main priority is looking after my little sister here.’
‘You’re so lovely to do that,’ the waitress smiled, and patted me on the head like I was a puppy. ‘You poor little thing. I’m sure your dad will be okay.’
‘Why thanks,’ I grumbled.
‘You’re lucky to have such a nice brother.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘Listen, I really shouldn’t do this, but I’m going to comp your meals today. Don’t worry about paying for anything.’
Jake took her hand. ‘Why thank you so much Ruby,’ he said, looking at her name badge. ‘I’ll have a side order of toast too. Whole wheat. And my sister will have a fruit salad.’
‘You got it sweetheart,’ she said, writing it on her pad and leaving.
‘That wasn’t funny,’ I said.
‘Come on, we got a free meal didn’t we? Anyway, enough of this small talk. Let’s get serious. So, Hilda, what do you do?’
‘I go to high school.’
‘High school, huh?’
‘I’ve nearly finished. One more year to go.’
‘Right, so you’re like, uh, sixteen or something?’
‘Seventeen.’
‘Seventeen. Okay. Do you live around here?’
‘Encino.’
‘Wow. You’re a fair way from home.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘So, I understand you’re part of some cult obsessed with death?’
I froze. ‘Did Hank say that?’
‘Something like it.’
‘I don’t belong to a cult. It’s more like an informal online community.’
‘Obsessed with death.’
‘I guess. How do you know all of this?’
‘So you’re not a member of the Children of God?’ he said, ignoring the question. ‘You’re not trying to convert Hank into some weird Jonestown-type deal?’
‘Of course not. I don’t even believe in God.’
‘Interesting. So you told Hank his apartment was haunted?’
‘No. I didn’t say his apartment was haunted, I just told him someone died there.’
‘But now he obviously thinks it is. He thinks this actor guy, Bernie or whatever his name was, pushed him over.’
‘I didn’t mean for him to get scared,’ I said, guilt growing in my stomach like a baby alien. ‘I didn’t know he’d take it that way.’
‘Well, the dude’s pretty messed up about it. Next thing he’ll be calling for an exorcism or asking for the Ghostbusters.’
‘Like I said, I never told him the place was haunted. Are you saying this is all my fault?’
Jake sat back. ‘Far from it. I just want to get to know you. I get the feeling we’ll be seeing each other around. We can’t pretend we’re strangers.’
The waitress came back with our food. I picked at the fruit salad with a fork while Jake wolfed his meal down. A piece of egg caught on the corner of his lip and made me feel a little sick. There was something off about Jake, something not quite right in the way he had appeared out of nowhere, an extra who seemed to have suddenly burst forth as a major player. The egg dropped from his lip back onto the plate and he scooped it up with a forkful of mushrooms.
‘So how old are you?’ I asked.
Jake swallowed. ‘Twenty-five.’
‘And how did you become a screenwriter? Did you go to college?’
‘I did, but I dropped out. I’m more your “loner” writerly type.’
Something flashed in my mind: the first day Benji and I went to Hank’s apartment, the figure in the apartment below Hank’s hunched over a desk, music blaring.
‘So, this “death” thing you’re involved with—’
‘It’s not a “thing”. I just like visiting places where people have died.’
‘Sounds kinda sick.’
‘It’s no sicker than this,’ I said, looking around the restaurant at all the Beverly Hills housewives and their super-skinny daughters. ‘Half these people are walking corpses as it is. Botox has killed their skin cells.’
‘You crack me up, Hilda. You’re like Mae West, or Ethel Merman. One of those larger-than-life, wise-crackin’ vaudeville types.’
I didn’t like the way he said my name, implying more familiarity than we had with each other. It felt too slick. ‘So I’m the funny fat chick?’ I shot back.
Jake put his fork down. ‘Man, everything’s an inquisition with you.’
‘You’ve got to be kidding me. You’re the one asking a hundred questions like this is a Playboy interview.’
‘I am?’ He looked down at his food and thought for a moment, and I visualised the cogs turning in his head. ‘Sorry, I get a bit over excited and don’t realise I’m asking so many questions. I guess it’s the writer in me.’
‘No, I’m sorry,’ I apologised, slumping into the table. ‘I’m just worried about Hank.’
‘He’s a strong guy. Stronger than you know. He can take care of himself.’
‘He doesn’t have to. He has me.’
‘He’s got me too. You and me, we’re quite the good Samaritans, huh?’
Something about the way he said it made me think of the cat in the dumpster. You’re such good kids, the woman had said. ‘I’m not trying to be a good Samaritan,’ I said. ‘Hank’s my friend.’
‘I didn’t say he wasn’t. Why are you so defensive? Man, I’d forgotten how moody teenagers can be.’
I picked up my bag and stood. Jake wiped his face with his napkin and stood as well.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Home.’
‘Oh come on, we’re just having a conversation.’
‘Look, Jake, I’m really tired. Maybe we can talk some other time.’
He wiped his fingers with his napkin. ‘At least let me drive you.’
‘I’ll get a cab. Thanks.’
I walked outside. He didn’t come after me, and I hadn’t expected him to. Out on Robertson Boulevard the sun was bright, too bright. The photographers turned in my direction to see if I was anyone, saw that I wasn’t, and skulked off towards another restaurant.