"So?" I asked. "I meant what I said before. It's just a fucking leg. Not the end of the world. Most of the guys out there, the grunts and shit, they go into it figuring something will happen. Better you lose a limb than die, you know?"
"Do you ever wish you did something different, though?" she asked. "Took a different path or something?"
"Regret's a waste of time," I said. "Your path is your path, for better or worse. It is what it is. You don't know what's going to happen in life. You've got right now and that's it. Can't change the past, can't predict the future." I paused, realizing what a pompous ass I sounded like. "That's my two cents worth of philosophizing for you. That's about all it's worth, anyway."
River ran her finger across my chest. "Anyone ever tell you you're a wise man, Elias Saint?"
I laughed. "Not one fucking time," I said. "Are you regretting where you are now?"
"Here, with you?" she asked. "No. Being in Hollywood? I don't know."
"When's the last time you were really happy?" I asked.
"Here, now," she answered, without hesitation.
"What about before that?"
River looked thoughtful. "I don't know," she said. "Maybe...when I was a kid, I'd take my sister down to the creek near our house sometimes and we'd wander along the edge, skip rocks, look for frogs. It was nice. We'd stay away from the house for hours, mostly when it wasn't safe to go home."
"How old were you?" I asked.
"Oh God, I don't know," River said. "Maybe eight or something?"
"And that's the last time you remember feeling really happy?"
She shrugged. "I think so...That's kind of pathetic, huh?"
"Yeah, pretty much," I said. "Maybe you ought to do something about that."
"You think you can?" she asked. "Make your own happiness, I mean?"
I shrugged. "I don't know," I said. That was the million dollar fucking question.
"What would you do, if you could?"
"If I could make my own happiness?" I asked. "Fucking bottle that shit and sell it."
River rolled her eyes. "I mean, what would make you happy? What would you do, if you could do anything?"
"Don't laugh," I said.
"Okay."
"I weld shit," I told her.
"Like, metal?"
"Yeah," I said. "Got into it in the Navy. It's a hobby. I don't know what the hell I could do with it, but if I could get paid to do it, that's what I would do."
"What do you weld?"
"I've made all kinds of shit," I said. "Some, when I was deployed. Got pieces of scrap metal and stuff, made furniture, stupid stuff, to make life more comfortable."
"So you'd make furniture, if you could do anything in the world?"
"Yeah," I said. "And, I mean, there's this other idea I have, but it's dumb..."
"Tell me."
I suddenly felt vulnerable, like I was revealing some big part of myself. "A lot of the prosthetics are getting really life-like," I said. "Which is cool and all. But I want to do the opposite. I think they could look more like art pieces or something."
"Like industrial art," she said, nodding.
"Yeah. I have some ideas I've been sketching."
"Can I see?" River sat up.
I nodded toward my bag. "There's a notebook in there," I said. "If you want to look at them. I mean, they're not anything big. I don't even know if they're something that can be done, anyway. Just some things running through my head."
River pulled the notebook from my bag, and joined me, sliding up against me. She opened the notebook, and I held my breath, waiting for her reaction.
She flipped through the pages, looking at my sketches. Finally, she looked at me. "Elias, these are really good. This is a really cool idea," she said. "Actually, I've got this artist friend, Abby, in LA. She knows people who do laser cutting and shit, kind of like the things you've got drawn up."
"It's just something I was thinking about, anyway," I said. "A dream. What would you do, if you weren't an actress?"
"When I was a kid, I wanted to be a teacher."
"What kind?"
"Elementary school," River said. "I like kids. And I'd feel like I was doing something important."
"More than romantic comedies?"
River sighed. "It's stupid, I know."
"Why is it stupid?"
"Because it's ridiculous. I've been given this incredible opportunity millions of people would love to have, and I'm so ungrateful that I want to just throw it away to do something else. It's obnoxious."
"Life's too short to do something you don't want to do."
A rap on the door downstairs interrupted us. I sat up in the bed, and reached for my prosthetic, while River scrambled out of the bed and slipped into a t-shirt and pajama pants.
"Fucking photographers again?" I asked, as River peered out the window.
"A cop," she said, glaring at me. "Probably because of the shot fired earlier."
I was already sliding into my jeans. "Don't look at me," I said. "That was all Cade."
"Like you wouldn't have done the same thing," River said.
"I'd definitely have done the same thing," I said. "But that shot was Cade's."
Downstairs, Jed waited on the front porch. By the time we pulled open the door, Cade and June were already crossing the meadow toward the house.
"River Andrews," Jed said. "I didn't think the name Beth Winters suited you."