chapter 2
CHRIS
Jesus goddamn motherf*cking Christ.
She’s stirring a cup of coffee over and over, and I can’t see her face. Eventually, after what feels like a lifetime of waiting, she looks up just for a moment. Muscle memory takes over and before I even know what I’m doing, I’m crossing the room. Instinctively, I need to be closer to her, to drink in her presence, so long absent. Only her blue eyes, seemingly made of ice, and the memory of her voice saying the word “wife” stop me in mid-stride.
Of course. I should have made the connection. How many times did I listen to her tell stories about the amazing Ben Ellison, who came off as a combination of Jesus Christ and the Dalai Lama and Mother Teresa? Apparently, her amazing Ben Ellison was the same person who had taken the literary world by storm with his book series the year before.
I had blown through all three books in a week while I had a short break from shooting my latest movie in Thailand.
I was less than three pages in to the first book when, unable to wait a moment longer, I tore myself away to call Jeff. I wanted the script more than I’d wanted anything in a very, very long time.
It had been five years since I wanted anything that much. Five long, lonely years.
Damn it.
“I don’t care what it costs,” I told Jeff. “Get it for me. I want all of them. All three books. I’m going to make a fortune.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. It’s not coming f*cking cheap,” he retorted. “Those f*cking books are everywhere.”
Jeff wasn’t cheap either, so I had full confidence in the fact that the trilogy was going to be mine. I expected a rant or a rave about the a*shole agent or a competing studio, but he had merely called back the next day at the exact same moment as a brown envelope was delivered to the door of my hotel suite.
“There’s a screenplay and it’s f*cking good.”
He didn’t say anything else. And he was right. It was f*cking good. Usually, scripts made from books were crap, filled with rambling speeches and all of the lame parts and none of the good ones. This one was pitch-perfect and even more nuanced, layered, than the book had been. I was only ten pages in before I picked up the phone again.
“If it’s not locked down tomorrow, I’m ditching this set and coming to New York and I’m not leaving until we have it.”
Jeff had hemmed and hawed about impossible literati, but he got the meeting. Since that call, I had thought of nothing but how I was going to convince Mr. Ellison that I was the right person to make his movie. During the whole last week of shooting the stupid buddy comedy, another piece of trash in a long line of pieces of trash, I ran through my arguments in my head. This script? It was going to be my Mona Lisa. I wanted to see the writer in the flesh, to look into his eyes to tell him that I could make this movie, that I understood this character down to his very bones.
Of course, I hadn’t realized that I had already met Ben Ellison, and that there was little I could say that would convince him that I was the right person to make his movie. I look around for him, but he isn’t here. No, he did me one better, sending his wife instead. That label catches my tongue and twists it, causing me to cough a few times. A blond intern rushes over with a glass of water and I take a long gulp. Damn it. I wish the glass contained something stronger.
The other people in the room, half of whom I’ve never met before, are looking back and forth between Hallie and me, but thankfully, Jeff makes an asinine comment and everyone’s attention is at least temporarily diverted. As I settle back into one of the plush leather seats, I glance at her again. She’s twirling the little stick in her coffee back and forth, but her hands are shaking and her brow is furrowed when she glances back up. It takes a minute before I see that the ice in her eyes has melted into a desperate plea, meant for me. She doesn’t want me to say that we know each other, I realize suddenly. Part of me wants nothing more than to cross the room in two steps to demand answers to a thousand questions, but that wouldn’t help either of us now.
Fine, Hallie. We’ll play it your way.
“Chris Jensen,” I say, not taking my eyes from her. The effort of trying to make myself sound detached almost kills me.
She relaxes visibly and nods. “Hallie Caldwell Ellison.”
The sound of the last name cuts deeper than a blade.
The tension in the room is palpable, and Jeff hurries to cut through it. He’s never been a fan of silence. But then again, Hallie isn’t normally, either.
“Chris is planning to play the lead.”
Hallie chuckles, but it sounds nothing like her laughter. Her cadence is all wrong, clipped and serious and harsh.
“Of course he is.”
I need to get out of here.
“I, um, I…” Now, I’m the one who sounds nothing like myself. I look at her, the way I used to, for strength. But even though she’s looking at me dead in the eye, there’s nothing for me in her face. “I just came in case we needed a closer, you know to deal the deal, but I just heard the news, so I guess that’s it…”
People are saying things to me, but I don’t hear any of it. I need to look at her, to stare, to inspect her face for any sign that she’s still the person I couldn’t imagine life without. The person who still occupies the first and last thought in my head every single morning and night. As people break into smaller conversations and lawyers start shuffling papers, I lean back in my seat and sneak a glance in her direction. She’s seemingly absorbed in a conversation with the woman in the red dress, but I do notice that the woman is doing most of the talking.
I had imagined her at 25, at 40, at 60, at 100, but in all of those musings, she had been laughing and happy in my arms. This Hallie is neither laughing nor happy.
Technically, she’s gotten more beautiful, I suppose. As she moves to speak with Jeff, I realize that the years have given her a kind of unconscious grace that’s normally associated with ballet dancers. There’s no chance that she’s going to fall off the edges of any balconies now. The flip flops are gone, replaced by a pair of black stilettos that make her legs look impossibly long. Her hair still defies any description of color, chestnut reds and autumn browns all mixed up together, but it’s pulled back from her face and highlights the fact that her cheekbones are standing out in sharp relief against the flawless, too pale skin. She’s lost weight that she couldn’t afford to lose in the first place, and it gives her an ethereal appearance, like she could just disappear into thin air. There’s no trace of the girl next door that I once met on a balcony overlooking Central Park. Even the most seasoned account reps, who deal with famous and impossibly beautiful actresses on a regular basis, are taking an extra moment to stare.
Despite all of that, looking at her fills me with an incredible sense of loss. Everything that made her Hallie, her laughing eyes and animation and warmth and joy, is gone. Even her eyes, ostensibly unchanged by the passage of time, are still the same shocking shade of blue, but they’re impenetrable, frosted over with a thick layer of ice.
I had been able to pretend, for all of these years, that she hadn’t grown up, that she was still out there somewhere. I even managed to make myself believe that maybe when I’d gotten my shit together, I could find her. But even though she’s sitting right in front of me, I haven’t found her at all. This woman bears only a slight resemblance to the girl I remember.
My Hallie.
She doesn’t belong to you, I remind myself.
And the fault for that was entirely mine.
Before I can make a move to steal her away from the table, she shoots the woman in the red suit a murderous look and the pair of them stand up and start shaking hands with various people around the table.
“Thank you, boys,” red suit says, giving Jeff a wicked little grin. “I think we got everything that we came for. I look forward to this. Certainly. I’m sure you’ll be in touch?”
Jeff looks gleeful. “Now that the preliminary is signed, we’ll work on the full contract. Chris generally rules over these things with an iron fist, so we’ll probably have to go another couple of rounds before we lock down the details. But the deal’s done. Finito.”
“We’re very happy to hear that.” She crosses the room to shake my hand briskly, pulling Hallie behind her. “Mr. Jensen. A pleasure.”
Hallie’s arms are firmly glued to her sides.
“Mrs. Ellison.”
“Mr. Jensen.”
I reach for her hand and she hesitates for a moment before offering it to me.
My fingers brush against hers, and the shock runs through me.
Lightning. Still. After all of these years.
I glance at her face to see whether she feels it, but she’s already out the door.
Jesus goddamn motherf*cking Christ.