27
You have three messages.
BEEEP
Dude, it’s Deena. I just got a call that I’m finally going in for f*cking Law and Order this week. Wish me luck! See you in class, kid.
BEEEP
Hello, I’m calling from Dave O’Brien’s office, over at Kevin and Kathy? We’re just calling to let you know the show’s coming back next Tuesday at eight thirty, and your episode will be airing then. We tried calling your agency, but, er—anyway, just calling to let you know.
BEEEP
Hey, babe. Can’t wait to see you tonight. A messenger’s going to drop off the clothes and the passes, and I’m sending the car for you at six thirty, okay? Screening’s at seven, don’t be late.
BEEEP
The minute James got back into town, any doubts I might have had about us evaporated. He was tanned from the sun, proof of his days spent shooting in the desert, and the sight of him made me melt.
I’m confused by his message, though. We’d discussed going to the premiere of his movie together.
“You’re sending a car?” I say when he picks up. “Like, a rental car?”
“No, like a car with a driver. To pick you up.”
“Like a limousine?”
“Well, no. It’ll probably just be a town car. A sedan. Is that okay?”
“Of course! I mean, I’ve never even … But where are you going to be?”
“The cast has to be there early. I’ll meet you at the end of the red carpet.”
I’m curious, but I’m not going to ask how one knows where the beginning or end of a carpet is, red or otherwise. I imagine the beginning to look something like the swirl where Dorothy sets out with Toto to follow the yellow brick road. I picture a welcoming committee of munchkins, and Glinda the Good Witch, who will help me find my way.
“Okay, great,” I tell him, managing to sound more confident than I actually feel.
That afternoon, a messenger arrives with a garment bag I have to sign for. In it are two beautiful cocktail dresses, both with the tags still attached.
“He bought these for you?” Jane asks, impressed.
“Well, I’m only keeping one, but yes.”
“These are like real designers,” she says, running her fingers over the shiny satin.
“Which one’s better, do you think?”
“Well, I’d have to see them on, of course,” she says, tilting her head to one side, as if trying to picture me in them. “At first glance, the black is safer, but the green makes more of a statement.”
After trying each one on a dozen times in front of the bathroom mirror, I decide to wear the green dress with the plunging neckline. I put on my highest heels, beautiful to look at but nearly impossible to walk in, and I enter Jane’s room and pose with my hand on my hip and one foot angled in front of the other, model-style.
“I’ve decided to become a statement person from now on.”
“I’m so proud of you!” Jane squeals.
I put on much more makeup than I normally do, and Jane helps me put my hair up using about a thousand bobby pins. I check my reflection in the mirror from every angle. James will be impressed, I think with pride.
I make a grand entrance, gliding daintily down the circular staircase where Jane and Dan wait, beaming up at me with pride, like I’m going off to prom.
Dan’s face goes red as I get closer and he lets out a long slow whistle. “Wow,” he says in a husky voice, as I reach the bottom stair.
Jane nods her head with the pleased air of an expert. “Gorgeous.”
But then my hair starts to fall in the back, and Jane takes me back into our upstairs bathroom to put another thousand bobby pins in it. I can hear the driver ring our intercom and my heart leaps as I race downstairs, but then I can’t find my lipstick, so I take off my shoes and run back up, where I discover it under the bathroom sink. I tear back down the stairs and hover in the kitchen for a moment, putting my shoes back on and trying to catch my breath.
“Do you have any cash?” Dan asks. “You should tip the driver.”
“Shit! I forgot,” I say, already feeling that I’m slightly miscast in the role of premiere-attending actress. He takes a ten and a twenty out of his wallet and tucks them into my evening bag. There’s something so sweet about seeing his giant hands fumble with the clasp on the small satin bag, the same vintage loan from Jane that I brought to Katie’s wedding, and for a moment I wish I were staying home to watch something with him on the couch instead of going off into the unknown of whatever a “premiere” might be.
I have to make about three more trips up and down the stairs to retrieve my forgotten powder, change the bra whose strap is showing (“switch it for the black one,” Jane says), and do one last hair-and-makeup check in the mirror. Finally, I say goodbye with a “ta-daa” at the door, and Dan and Jane give me a little applause as a send-off. I walk gingerly down the carpeted stairwell, slightly unsteady in my heels, gripping the banister for support, and find the impressively shiny black town car in front of our building, with a driver standing beside an open door that’s waiting just for me. I pause on our stoop, looking east and west, hoping a neighbor might see, but there’s only an older man walking a small dog way off down the block, and I enter the car without an audience.
The driver’s name is Benny, and he asks what radio station I’d like to hear.
“Anything’s okay. Whatever you like.”
He turns to a station playing an old Carpenters song, and for about ten minutes I just stare out the window, enjoying the music and the quiet and the cool feel of the soft black leather seats. I’m going to my first premiere. I feel pretty and confident, as if I’m Diane Keaton or Meryl Streep, attending the opening of one of their own films, surrounded by friends and well-wishers. Someday, maybe …
The car glides along gently, so different from the rattle of the back of a cab. After a while, I notice an ashtray in the armrest of my seat, and a box of Kleenex, and some individually wrapped red and white peppermints in the middle console.
“Is it okay if I smoke, Benny?”
“Of course, madam.”
It’s then that I realize the evening bag I’ve been gripping tightly in my lap isn’t my evening bag at all, but my brown leather Filofax. I must have grabbed it instead of my purse.
“Oh!”
I must have put the evening bag down on the table by the front door as I was saying my goodbyes, and in my rush to leave, picked up the Filofax instead.
“If you’re out of cigarettes, madam, I can offer you one.”
“Yes, please, I—I forgot them,” I say, trying to swallow the panic that is trying to rise in the back of my throat.
Benny hands me a menthol cigarette from a crumpled pack he produces from his inside jacket pocket, and expertly holds a lighter for me over his shoulder without taking his eyes off the road. I crack the window and exhale deeply.
I don’t have my powder.
I don’t have my lipstick.
I don’t have my house keys.
I don’t have any money.
I don’t have the passes that say I’m invited to the screening.
It also occurs to me that I’m not sure how I’m getting home. I suppose James and I will go back to his place, but what if I can’t find him at the theater? Suddenly our plan seems so flimsy, and without my purse I feel totally unarmed to face the night.
“Benny, do you … are you taking me home as well?”
“No, Madam, I’ll only be taking you to the event.”
“Oh,” I say, my voice very small.
It’s too late to turn back now. We’ve already crossed over the Brooklyn Bridge, and James said not to be late. I’ll just have to find him when I get there. I press my lips together lightly. It feels like there’s plenty of lipstick still on them, but I’ll have to be careful not to accidentally wipe it off. I try to hold my lips apart a bit, which makes them feel dry. My head is pounding now, from nerves and the menthol cigarette and all the bobby pins.
The premiere is at the Ziegfeld on 54th Street, where I’ve been once before with Jane to see a re-release of Funny Girl. But as we turn onto 54th Street from Sixth Avenue, I hardly recognize it. Even though it’s nighttime, the face of the movie theater is so bright it looks like the sun is beating down on it, but it’s hard to tell where all the light is coming from. There’s a crowd spilling off the sidewalk in front of the theater and a line of people across the street waving and taking pictures. A police car and two news vans are blocking traffic, and a policeman with a whistle is waving cars toward the next block.
“This is as far as I can go, I’m afraid, madam. You’ll be all right from here?”
“Yes—I’m—I’ll be fine.” But my voice sounds tinny and faraway.
Benny pulls the car to the curb and steps outside, and for a moment I’m confused and a little hopeful—maybe he’s going to park the car and walk me in? But then I see he’s just coming around to open my door for me. I wobble unsteadily to my feet.
“Thank you so much, Benny. I forgot my—I don’t have any …”
But Benny waves my apology away with a smile and a nod.
“Please, madam, enjoy your evening.”
I totter to the sidewalk as the town car glides away. I’ve gone only a few feet, but already Benny and the dark comfort of the car seem part of an evening long ago that’s now been swallowed up into the night. I try to walk as gracefully as I can, although my shoes make me feel like I’m walking on tiptoe. I keep my head down and I aim for what I hope is the entrance.
Thankfully, there does seem to be a “front” of the red carpet, in the form of a velvet rope and a girl wearing a black cocktail dress and a tight ponytail, holding a clipboard in one hand and a walkie-talkie in the other. I look around, hoping to see James, but I can’t spot him anywhere. I hang back for a moment and watch the girl as she waves a few people in without checking their names. Maybe she won’t check mine either. I decide I’ll try to walk past her as if I don’t see her. I try to look confident and in a rush, but my attempt at walking briskly backfires as my left heel snags on the carpet, and I trip and practically fall into her clipboard.
“Oooph,” she says, pushing me back upright.
“Excuse me,” I say, smoothing the front of my dress and trying to look nonchalant.
“Can I help you?”
“Sorry. Yes. I’m, uh, a guest here? Tonight?”
“Okaaaay,” she says, looking me up and down. “Can I see your credentials?”
“I don’t have—that is—I had them, but I forgot them at home.” She sighs, as if that’s exactly what she expected me to say.
“Well, who are you with?”
“James Franklin?” I say, hopefully.
“James Franklin, the actor?” she says, narrowing her eyes doubtfully.
“I’m—yes.”
“Like, as, his date?” she says, frowning, looking me up and down.
“Yes, I’m with him—yes.”
“But he’s in there already,” she says.
“I know. He told me—I’m meeting him.”
“You’re meeting him?”
I’m tired of everything I say to this girl being repeated incredulously, but even to me my story sounds weak. Why didn’t we go together? Why am I here by myself, feeling like I’m trying to crash a party to which I wasn’t invited?
“Yes, I’m supposed to be meeting him.”
She’s still eyeing me skeptically. “We-elll, what’s your name?” she says.
“Franny, uh, Frances Banks.”
As she searches her clipboard, I’m jostled by a couple I can’t fully see, but even out of the corner of my eye can tell are shiny and happy, and look like they belong.
“Hi, Taylor!” cries the happy voice of the shiny girl.
Taylor with the ponytail looks up from her clipboard, and her face goes from cloudy to bright, as though she just found out she was picked for the cheerleading squad. “Hiyeee! Ohmahgosh!” she gushes. “Hi, Penny! You look so beautiful.”
I know it’s her before I even turn my head, but there’s a small hope in my heart that I’m wrong, that it isn’t Penelope Schlotzsky—now Penny De Palma—who’s sparkling behind me, who’s looking so beautiful, that it isn’t Penny who’s going to see that I’m not being allowed into the party she’s breezing into, but as I turn, it isn’t Penny I recognize first, it’s her dress.
Penny De Palma and I are wearing the same dress.
Her jaw drops and she blinks quickly, as though she’s trying to get a piece of dust out of her eye. But then, a beat later, her face rearranges itself into a smile, and she holds her head high and straight.
“Franny!” she says warmly. “We’re twins! You look wonderful!”
I realize my mouth is still hanging open, and I snap it shut and attempt a recovery of my own. “Thanks! Uh, so do you.”
And she really does. The dress fits her better, and her long, straight blond hair shines in glowing contrast to the bright green silk. My hand goes to the back of my head, where I can feel the lumps of bobby pins, and I can only hope that none of them are sticking out at the moment.
“You guys know each other?” Taylor says, baffled.
“Hello, Frances, lovely to see you again,” says Joe Melville, who seems to emerge out of nowhere.
I hadn’t even focused on who Penny’s escort was, since he turned for a moment to talk to someone else, and now I’m sure I’ve flushed beet red, because my whole body feels hot. It couldn’t possibly be any worse. I’ll be turned away at the door, not just in front of Penny De Palma, but in front of my former agent, too.
“Oh, hello, Joe.” I sound like I’m reading a children’s book out loud. Is the crow slow in the snow? I’m tempted to continue, but Joe has seen someone else he knows and has already turned his back to me.
“Who are you here with?” Penny asks, looking around for my invisible date.
“I’m—well—James was supposed to meet me and I forgot my passes because I grabbed my Filofax instead of my purse, and I’m sorry I’m wearing the same thing as you, and I’m thinking I might just go home.”
I’m expecting a look of pity, an embarrassed smile, a polite brush-off. But Penny De Palma grabs my hand in hers and looks me straight in the eye.
“Nonsense,” she says. “You’re with me.”
She takes my Filofax from under my arm and thrusts it against Joe Melville’s chest.
“Hold this,” she says to him, and she pulls me past Joe and Taylor and several others who are hovering nearby, hoping for a glimpse of someone they recognize.
There’s a line of photographers on the curb facing the theater. Some must be standing on some sort of risers or bleachers, because they’re impossibly tall and staggered like a stadium audience. I hang back, letting Penny strike a pose in front of them. Flashbulbs start to go off like huge white fireworks exploding in the sky.
“Penny! Penny! Penny! Penny! Penny! Penny!”
They yell as if she’s miles away, shouting her name over and over, frantic and demanding. To me they seem almost angry, as if her pose is not what they came to see, isn’t meeting their high expectations. But Penny just smiles and giggles and waves as if they’re all old friends and they’re blowing her kisses instead of screaming hysterically. She looks back at me and waves for me to join her, and when I shake my head, she reaches out and grabs my hand.
“C’mon!”
“Penny, no, wait—I don’t know how to—”
“Angle your body so you aren’t flat to the cameras,” she says, cupping her hand around my ear so I can hear her over the crowd. “Put one foot slightly in front of the other. Follow me! Matching dresses might land us on Page 6!”
And she pulls me beside her into an empty space opposite the wall of popping flashbulbs, where a giant poster for the movie is set up on an easel. She puts her hand on her hip and gestures for me to do the same, so we’re like dancers in a chorus line.
“Look, you guys,” she calls out, tossing her hair over one shoulder. “My friend and I decided to wear the same dress tonight! Aren’t we just mad?”
I try not to squint against all the flashbulbs, and I’m trying my best to keep smiling, but my mouth is starting to shake and my knees are wobbling. Penelope pulls me along tirelessly, past the photographers and down the line of interviewers, happily telling each one the story of why we’re wearing the same dress, even expanding it as she explains how we cooked up this wacky prank and how much fun we had getting dressed together.
“My friend here, Franny, and I, we’re just crazy!” she tells the reporter from Entertainment! Entertainment! “We love daring each other to do crazy things!”
“Are you having fun?” she asks, as she shepherds me through the crowd to another interview.
“I’m—I guess so.” I’m thankful to be helped by her, but the truth is I don’t think I am having fun. “I had no idea you—you’re really famous now.”
“Oh, that?” she dismisses my comment with a breezy wave. “They yell like that for everyone. Some publicity person tells them my name. They have no idea who I am or if I’m anybody at all. They yell like that and take everyone’s picture, in case.”
Penny doesn’t seem to care, but I’m embarrassed to have misinterpreted yet another element of this baffling world.
The volume of the crowd increases, and behind me I can hear the photographers screaming, “Arturo, Arturo, Arturo!” I turn around, and there he is, Arturo DeNucci, two feet in front of us. Without any hesitation, Penelope pushes through the crowd surrounding him and sticks out her hand.
“Arturo, I wanted to introduce myself. I’m Penny De Palma. I’m a huge fan of your work.”
Arturo DeNucci seems amused by this, and looks her up and down while still holding on to her hand.
“Penny …?”
“De Palma,” she says. “Like the director.”
“You’re Italian?” he asks, looking skeptical.
“No, sir,” she says, proudly. “I’m from Tampa!”
Later, as Penny talks to another reporter, I’m bumped by an aggressive-looking man in a suit.
“I’m sorry,” he says, exasperated, looking over my shoulder at Penny. “Maybe you can—I have Annelise Carson here, and she’s supposed to be next to talk to E!E!, but Brad Jacobsen’s people keep jumping in front of us.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, though I’m not sure if this has something to do with me.
“Well, can you—is Penny almost done, or …?”
“Uh, yes, I think so.”
“Well, but, so—wait—you’re with her, right? I mean, I saw you walking her down the line.”
“Um, I’m with her, I guess, yes.”
“Sorry, I’m sure we’ve met before, but I’m blanking—you’re her—publicist, right? Or, no, wait—manager?” He’s smiling at me, tensely, and I know his smile will fade when he realizes I can’t help him, that I don’t know any of the people whose names he just said, that I’m the last person who has any power here.
“No, I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m no one.”