Chapter 13
THIRTEEN
Oh God, oh God, oh God. Another dead person! I couldn’t believe I was there again… My heart was racing, I’d broken out in a sweat, and I wasn’t entirely sure I was breathing. Around me was chaos. Everyone was talking at once. No one was making sense. Kathleen was wailing.
“This is a disaster,” Donald gasped. “An absolute disaster... I’ll lose everything!”
“Does anyone know first aid?” Louis wanted to know.
“I know some,” Ed said. “Do you think he’s not dead? Could that be possible?”
“Let’s make sure she hasn’t made a mistake,” Louis said.
“Can someone call an ambulance?” Ed called out.
“The phone isn’t working,” I said. “Oh my God, the phone isn’t working!”
Ed gave me a worried look as he and Louis hurried off the stage.
“The phone isn’t working?” Grace said, coming over to me. “You mean the desk phone in the office?”
“Yeah, uh-huh, the line was cut.”
“No one panic,” Donald said. “Everything’s under control.”
“What do you mean everything’s under control?! Nothing’s under control!” Keely screeched. Donald’s attempt at avoiding panic was causing panic. “Oh my God. Oh my God...”
“We have to get help,” Meg said, putting her arm around Keely.
At that point, I noticed Eldridge standing next to me. He whispered, “You’re going to be fine.”
Everything seemed to stop for a moment. He was right. I was going to be fine. I didn’t know Finn. He wasn’t a friend of mine. He was just the dead person in the next room. Things like this happen to everyone. Okay, they happen to me more often, but still?—
“STOP! For God’s sake. Everyone, STOP,” Amber was yelling. She wiped the tears from her face, and with determination said, “It doesn’t matter if the phone works or not. We’re not calling an ambulance. We’re not calling the police.”
“I have to say I agree with Ms. Bright,” Donald said, his voice shaky but basically calm.
“What? Are you both crazy?” I said. “This is exactly the time you call the police. I mean… if we could.”
“It’s not what Finn would have wanted,” Amber said.
“No, it’s definitely not what he’d have wanted,” Donald parroted.
“He’s dead. I don’t think he gets a vote,” Marc said.
“Really Marc?” Meg said. “Now is not the time to be funny.”
“I wasn’t trying to be funny. That was a fact, not a joke.”
“I… I have a plan,” Amber said. “All we have to do is get his body back to his house. There’s a call girl he’s fond of, Arabella. I know she’ll go there, and she can call the police. She can say she woke up next to him after a night of sex and drugs, and discovered him dead.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “Why would you do that?”
“Finn has an image to maintain. There’s no way I’m letting him die of an overdose on a broken-down soundstage recording a show about a bunch of has-beens and never-weres.”
“Now, wait just a minute,” Donald said. “That’s a bit harsh, to say the least.”
Ignoring him, I said, “Dead people don’t have images to maintain. What you’re saying is crazy.”
“Elvis. Marilyn Monroe. James Dean. Their estates make millions. Just because Finn is gone doesn’t mean his career dies with him. It’s important to make the right choice about what happens next.”
Okay, I was wrong. Dead people did have images to maintain.
“If you want our help, you maybe shouldn’t refer to us as has-beens and never-weres,” Keely pointed out.
Ignoring her, Amber turned to Marc and said, “Explain to me why we can’t leave now? What’s wrong with the doors?”
“They’re locked,” Marc said. “Well, jammed. Deliberately.”
“Deliberately? Donald, what’s going on?”
While he hemmed and hawed, I heard Keely saying, “I can’t believe it.”
“I know… He’s dead,” Meg said, threatening another crying jag.
“Actually, I meant I can’t believe that Finn and Kathleen were still seeing each other. Who would have thought?”
Then Donald began answering Amber’s question. “I didn’t want everyone to know this, but we’re not paying for the space. We know the guard, Alan, and he let us in. Then he put doorstops into the door jambs so we couldn’t get out. If the guard at the north gate knew we were here…”
And then, Louis and Ed were back looking very somber. Louis said, “Yeah, he’s definitely dead.”
“Thank you for confirming that,” Donald said. “I think we should all?—”
“I told you he was dead,” Amber said, crossly. “Look, Donald, isn’t there a way to contact the guard?”
“He’s coming to let us out at seven.”
“What about the giant door? The one they use to load things in?” I asked.
“It needs a key,” Ed said. “The guard has it.”
“We just need to remain calm,” Donald said. “I think we should all take a break. It might be a good idea to move breakfast up. In about an hour we should move forward with the shoot.”
“What?” Keely said. “Is that a joke? We’re just going to finish filming?”
“For Finn. We’ll do it as a memorial.”
“I think that’s disgusting,” Meg said.
Donald ignored her. “We don’t have enough footage yet. We should try again with Marc. Given the circumstances, I’ve decided to allow you greater latitude. What do you say, Marc?”
“Uh… gee thanks,” Marc said, sarcastically.
“We’re talking about recording a song rather than the dance number… And then Wendy and I need to tape our remembrances. So, yes, there’s quite a lot to do still. But I think a break is called for.”
“Finn died,” Grace said. “I don’t think we should continue. And we’re certainly not going to sing .”
“I’m sure he’d want the show to go on.”
“I wouldn’t,” Keely said. “I’d want you all to be emotionally destroyed. Not that you would be…”
“I would be upset if you died,” Meg said.
“Me too,” Grace said.
“Okay, you don’t have to…” Keely said. “My point was maybe the show shouldn’t go on.”
“Look, we can’t go anywhere until seven o’clock. That’s nearly four hours. You might as well finish the shoot,” Amber said.
“And then what?” Grace asked. “We help you to the car with Finn’s body?”
“No, no, no. As soon as I can get outside, I’ll call Finn’s driver. He’ll help me with Finn’s body. None of you have to do anything.”
“Except keep our mouths shut,” Ricky said.
“Speaking of which... I have NDAs with me that I’ll be asking you each to sign.”
“What’s an NDA?” Meg asked.
“It’s a nondisclosure agreement,” I explained. I had to sign one to get the software Pinx Video runs on. Not that I actually understood the software well enough to give away any secrets. “An NDA means you won’t say anything about the things that happened here tonight.”
“But what if the police ask us questions?” Keely wanted to know.
“You can’t say anything. Even if the police ask questions,” Amber said. “Which they won’t. So there’s nothing to worry about.”
“This might be a good time to mention that Amber has agreed to forgo Finn’s salary if it’s distributed among the rest of the cast members,” Donald said. “You’ll all be getting triple what you were promised. And… you’ll be getting it before you leave, as soon as you sign the release form.”
“And the NDA,” Amber said. “You get the check after you sign both documents.”
Louis came over and said to me, “Let’s get breakfast going. These people need a distraction.” He headed back to the craft room, while I lingered for a moment as Eldridge began removing the candy and some of the sweeter items.
“I should have asked before… You’re okay, aren’t you?”
“Me? Yeah, I’m fine. I mean, we’re trapped in here with a dead guy. That’s a new experience.”
“Great,” I said before I walked away. I guess that was the way to look at all of this. It was a new experience. That’s all. I could deal with that. This was new; I’d never dealt with it before. It didn’t even remind me—okay, it did remind me of lots of other times I was in close proximity to a corpse. I tried not to think of it that way.
In the craft room, I asked Louis, “How exactly are you going to make omelets?”
“I have a propane burner.” Then he added, “Everything’s all bagged up and ready to go out. I really just wanted to talk to you. What do you think is going on?”
“I don’t know. I don’t have a lot of experience with hard drugs or, well, any drugs really.”
“It’s too bad Leon’s not here.”
“What is there to know, though?” I asked. “He was high. Or at least, he looked high.”
“But how fast would an overdose cause death? Does it happen right away, or does it take a while? And are there things that would look like an overdose but weren’t?”
I shrugged, clueless. “We don’t know when he shot up. Or even if he shot up. I think there are other ways to take heroin.”
“Did he seem high when he got here?”
“No one really interacted with him until he was in front of the camera. That’s when his manager discovered he was high. Maybe she was faking that? Maybe she… Wait, do you think Finn didn’t overdose? We were talking before about how hard it would have been for him to shoot up without his manager knowing about it.”
“She could be lying,” Louis said. “She has a lot to gain by lying. Do you think she gave him drugs?”
“I brought them some pop. After he puked. When I walked into the room, she was putting something into her purse.”
“I noticed that purse when we checked on him. Big, big purse. It could carry almost anything.”
The way he was looking at me made me say, “Oh no. No. I’m not doing that.”
“Doing what?”
“I’m not going down to Finn’s dressing room to look into Amber’s purse.”
“Well, that’s your idea, not mine. I have to say it’s not a bad one though.”
“No.”
“If she did give him drugs… Well, that would be a crime—wouldn’t it?”
“Which I would want nothing to do with.”
“Okay, not a problem.”
He picked up a TJ’s bag with the burner in a box, a small frying pan, a metal bowl and four dozen eggs. In his other hand, he grabbed a second bag with omelet fillings: sliced ham, crumbled bacon, onions, spinach, tomatoes, avocado, mushrooms, salsa … and who knows what else.
As he left the room, I said, “No,” to his back. “Not gonna do it.”
“Don’t take too long doing what you’re not going to do. I could use a hand.”
For a moment I was angry. Louis assumed I was going to go down to the Zola Emery dressing room and look into Amber’s bag. Actually, he knew I would. And I wouldn’t be angry, except that I knew I would too. I wanted to talk myself out of it, but that wasn’t going to work. I was going to do it. Finally, I told myself I should just do it and get it over with.
I hurried down the hallway to the last dressing room. After a quick tap, I opened the door and walked in. The room was empty. Well, not exactly empty . Finn’s body was still laid out on the couch. He hadn’t even been covered up. Not that I saw a blanket anywhere, but someone could have laid his pants over him.
Why wasn’t he wearing pants? Had he puked on them? They were hanging on the back of a chair in front of the makeup table. I stepped over and very carefully inspected them. Fearing the worst, I held my breath. But… they looked clean. He hadn’t puked on them. So why did he take them off?
The leather bag sat on the makeup table. I went over and opened it up. Right on top was a syringe. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. She had given him drugs. I picked up the syringe, it was plastic with black lines marking the dosage. The needle was still in it. I leaned over to look for the rest of the things you’d need to give someone heroin—the spoon, the baggie, the lighter… But there wasn’t enough time.
Behind me, I heard footsteps outside the door. I jumped away from the bag and, as quietly as possible, stepped into the bathroom. I heard the door open and someone come into the dressing room.
I was trapped. I couldn’t believe I’d let this happen. What if whoever this was decided they needed to pee? There was definitely no place for me to hide in the tiny bathroom.
“You son of a bitch,” Amber said on the other side of the door. “How could you do this to me?”
Her? She gave him drugs? How could she do it to him ? I mean, she probably thought it was part of her job, but still—she’d given him a fatal dose of drugs! That had to be a least a little bit illegal.
“Just when we were getting you back on track. The buzz on Running Toward Justice is amazing. There’s talk of awards, Golden Globes, Oscars. And now you’re… oh, oh my God…” She actually giggled. “Now you’ll definitely win. You won’t be here to enjoy it… but I will. I’ll enjoy it. I’ll be overseeing your estate. And funeral. It has to be amazing. Huge. An event. Everyone needs to be there. Everyone. I need to get started. Oh my God there’s so much to do.”
There was a short pause before she said, “God damn it, no bars. Isn’t there… I wonder…”
And then the door to the dressing room opened and closed. She was gone. I started breathing again, not realizing I’d stopped. After a long, fretful minute, I stepped out of the bathroom and into the dressing room. Trying not to look at Finn, I noticed that the bag was no longer on the dressing table. Obviously, I wouldn’t be able to finish searching it. I peeked out into the hallway. When I saw the coast was clear, I left. Just seconds later I was back in the craft room. Alone.
That’s when I looked down and realized I was still holding the syringe in my hand.