Celia and I had discussed it and come to the conclusion that we could not move in together. She was less convinced of this than I was, but I was steadfast in my resolve. Even though my career was in the gutter, hers was thriving. I couldn’t let her risk it. Not for me.
My head was on the pillow, but my eyes were wide open when I heard someone pull into the driveway. I looked out the window to see Celia slipping out of a car and waving good night to her driver. She had an Oscar in her hand.
“You look comfortable,” Celia said, once she’d made her way to me in the bedroom.
“Come here,” I said to her.
She’d had a glass or three. I loved her drunk. She was herself but happier, so bubbly I sometimes worried she’d float away.
She took a running start and hopped into the bed. I kissed her.
“I’m so proud of you, darling.”
“I missed you all night,” she said. The Oscar was still in her hand, and I could tell it was heavy; she kept allowing it to tip over onto the mattress. The space for her name was blank.
“I don’t know if I was supposed to take this one,” she said, smiling. “But I didn’t want to give it back.”
“Why aren’t you out celebrating? You should be at the Sunset party.”
“I only wanted to celebrate with you.”
I pulled her closer to me. She kicked off her shoes.
“Nothing means anything without you,” she said. “Everything that isn’t you is a pile of dog shit.”
I tossed my head back and laughed.
“What happened to your tooth?” Celia asked.
“Is it that noticeable?”
Celia shrugged. “I suppose not. I think it’s just that I’ve memorized every inch of you.”
Just a few weeks ago, I had lain naked beside Celia and let her look at me, look at every part of my body. She had told me she wanted to remember every detail. She said it was like studying a Picasso.
“It’s embarrassing,” I told her now.
Celia sat up, intrigued.
“I kissed the television screen,” I said. “When you won. I kissed you on the TV, and I chipped my tooth.”
Celia laughed so hard she cackled. The statuette fell back to the mattress with a thump. And then she rolled over on top of me and put her arms around my neck. “That’s the most lovable thing anyone has ever done since the dawn of man.”
“I suppose I’ll make a dentist appointment first thing tomorrow.”
“I suppose you will.”
I picked up her Oscar. I stared at it. I wanted one myself. And if I had stuck it out with Don a little longer, I could have had one tonight.
She was still in her dress, her heels long gone. Her hair was falling out of the pins. Her lipstick was faded. Her earrings still glistened.
“Have you ever made love to an Oscar winner?” she said.
I’d done something very close with Ari Sullivan, but I didn’t think that was the time to tell her. And anyway, the spirit of the question was if I’d ever experienced a moment like that one. And I absolutely had not.
I kissed her and felt her hands on my face, and then I watched as she stepped out of her dress and into my bed.
*
BOTH OF MY movies flopped. A romance Celia did sold out theaters. Don starred in a hit thriller movie. Ruby Reilly’s reviews for Jokers Wild called her “stunningly perfect” and “positively incomparable.”
I taught myself how to make meat loaf and iron my own slacks.
And then I saw Breathless. I left the theater, went straight home, called Harry Cameron, and said, “I have an idea. I’m going to Paris.”
CELIA WAS SHOOTING A MOVIE on location in Big Bear for three weeks. I knew that going with her wasn’t an option, nor was visiting her on the set. She insisted she would come home every weekend, but it felt too risky.
She was a single girl, after all. I was afraid the prevailing wisdom erred too close to the question What do single girls have to go home to?
So I decided it was the right time to go to France.
Harry had some connections to filmmakers in Paris. He made a few calls on the sly for me.
Some of the producers and directors I met with knew who I was. Some of them were clearly seeing me just as a favor to Harry. And then there was Max Girard, an up-and-coming New Wave director, who had never heard of me before.
“You are une bombe,” he said.
We were sitting in a quiet bar in the Saint-Germain-de-Prés neighborhood of Paris. We huddled in a booth in the back. It was just after dinnertime, and I hadn’t had a chance to eat. Max was drinking a white Bordeaux. I had a glass of claret.
“That sounds like a compliment,” I said, taking a sip.
“I don’t know if I have before met a woman so attractive,” he said, staring at me. His accent was so thick that I found myself leaning in to hear him.
“Thank you.”
“You can act?” he said.
“Better than I look.”
“That cannot be so.”
“It is.”
I saw Max’s wheels start turning. “Are you willing to test for a part?”
I was willing to scrub a toilet for a part. “If the part is great,” I said.
Max smiled. “This part is spectacular. This part is a movie-star part.”
I nodded slowly. You have to restrain every part of your body when you are working hard not to look eager.
“Send me the pages, and we’ll talk,” I said, and then I drank the last of my wine and stood up. “I’m so sorry, Max, but I should go. Have a wonderful evening. Let’s be in touch.”
There was absolutely no way I was going to sit at a bar with a man who hadn’t heard of me and let him think I had all the time in the world.
I could feel his eyes on me as I walked away, but I walked out the door with all the confidence I had—which, despite my current predicament, was quite a lot. And then I went back to my hotel room, put on my pajamas, ordered room service, and turned on the TV.
Before I went to bed, I wrote Celia a letter.
My Dearest CeCe,
Please never forget that the sun rises and sets with your smile. At least to me it does. You’re the only thing on this planet worth worshipping.
All my love,
Edward
I folded it in half and tucked it into an envelope addressed to her. Then I turned out my light and closed my eyes.
Three hours later, I was awakened by the jarring sound of a phone ringing on the table next to me.
I picked it up, irritated and half asleep.
“Bonjour?” I said.
“We can speak your language, Evelyn.” Max’s accented English reverberated through the phone. “I am calling to see if you would be free to be in a movie I am shooting. The week after next.”
“Two weeks from now?”
“Not even, quite. We are shooting six hours from Paris. You will do it?”
“What is the part? How long is the shoot?”
“The movie is called Boute-en-Train. At least, that’s what it is called for now. We shoot for two weeks in Lac d’Annecy. The rest of the shoot you do not need to be there.”
“What does Boute-en-Train mean?” I tried to say it the way he said it, but it came out overprocessed, and I vowed not to try again. Don’t do things you’re not good at.
“It means the life of the party. That is you.”
“A party girl?”
“Like someone who is the heart of life.”
“And my character?”
“She is the kind of woman every man falls in love with. It was originally written for a French woman, but I have just decided tonight that if you will do it, I will fire her.”
“That’s not nice.”