Chapter 15
15
OLLIE
It was strange how the mind and body reacted when something cataclysmically shite happened to you.
From when he’d started acting at twelve, until he’d landed the role in The Clansman when he was twenty-five, Ollie had had thousands of rejections, some of them for parts that he’d really wanted. Somewhere along the way, that had given him the ability to compartmentalise disappointment and rejection, to put it in a box and refuse to let it get him down. Before he’d married Sienna, he’d had a few semi-long-term relationships that lasted a few months here and there – even thought he was in love a couple of times. And when the flings ended, usually because he was going off somewhere for work, he’d refused to let it get him down for long.
‘Dust yourself off, son,’ his mum always said, ‘and let’s keep going. You and I can deal with anything life throws at us, because we know the great stuff is on the way.’ She’d drilled that optimism and resilience into him since he was a kid, and it was part of his DNA now. The only time that attitude hadn’t got him through unscathed was when he was fourteen and his grandparents died within months of each other. He hadn’t been close to his grandad – he was a man who preferred the pub to his family and didn’t even try to hide it. But his gran… She’d come to every show, every school concert, every football match, and every Sunday she’d taken him to church in that building he’d visited this morning. Like her daughter, she was also called Moira, and her loss had left a huge hole in his life. He still missed her and he knew his mum did too. Gradually though, with the help of Kara, Drea and Jacinta, they’d both picked themselves back up and got on with living again.
What happened today wasn’t a death, but it was a massive blow and he felt like he should be experiencing some kind of devastation. He kept waiting for it to come. It had been a couple of hours now, and he’d had a few coffees. He’d even found a packet of cigarettes Sienna must have left on a shelf just inside the balcony door, and smoked a couple of them too, which did nothing more than make him feel queasy because he’d quit five years ago and not touched one since. He was surprised by what she’d done. Shocked. Blindsided. But he wasn’t pacing the floor or feeling his heart being ripped from his chest. Was the love already gone? Was this blow failing to crush him because he’d already begun building protection? Deep inside, had he already known the end was coming?
That was going to take a whole lot of soul searching to work out, but in the meantime, he focused on the practical stuff.
He’d spoken to his agent, his manager, his publicist, and told them all he wouldn’t be commenting. What did it say about his life that he’d spoken to the people who handled his career before he’d had a conversation with the woman he’d vowed to spend the rest of his life with?
Not that she could get through to him anyway, because he’d also put his phone on silent, muted all notifications and he hadn’t gone near a social media website since he’d watched the video.
Instead, he’d spent twenty minutes letting the jets of the shower pummel his back (for the second time today), got dressed again, packed his case for Hawaii, pulled a beanie hat low down on his head and now he was leaving the building.
He took the back exit to the gated service area where he’d parked the hire car he’d picked up at the airport when he’d arrived last night. Nothing conspicuous. A basic Audi. The last thing he needed was a flash car drawing attention to him every day. When he’d landed the role in The Clansman , he’d blown his first big cheque on the down payment on a Lamborghini, but he’d realised almost immediately that he was in a constant state of anxiety when he was driving it, because every pothole could cause a blowout, every idiot on the roads could cause a crash and it came with a big arrow above it saying ‘look at me’. After a week, he’d driven it back to the dealership to return it, and then he’d gone to another garage down the road and driven away in the black Ford F150 pick-up truck that he still owned and adored today. It sat next to Sienna’s Porsche Cayenne in their driveway, and she rolled her eyes every time she looked at it.
As he drove out of the back entrance and round onto the street where he could see his main door, he spotted and recognised a couple of press photographers hanging out at the front of the building. He was pretty sure they were just there out of hope and optimism, because no one other than his closest circle knew he was in town. Hopefully he would be gone before the media even knew he’d been here.
There was no ping of an alert from his silenced phone, but the car’s display screen, connected to his phone via Carplay, flashed up a message that he had a voicemail from Kara. He pressed play to listen.
‘Ollie! I’ve just seen the video. Oh God, I’m so sorry. Where are you? I’ll come to you right now. I’ve got you, pal. Call me back.’
He hadn’t even considered not going to Hawaii. Why would he? The only people he wanted to speak to were about to fly with him to London for an overnight stay, before taking a flight tomorrow to Honolulu, via a brief change in San Francisco, so right now there was nowhere else he’d rather be. Everything that had happened deserved more than a rushed phone call, so he texted her to let her know where he’d be.
‘Hey Siri, text Kara.’
The very efficient Siri checked the number with him, then told him to proceed.
I’m on way to airport. Meet me in usual lounge.
Message sent.
Shit, what had happened to them? Both of them going through major relationship dramas at the same time. As far as he could remember, this had never happened before. Kara had been with Josh for what felt like forever, and even before that, one of them had always been in a relationship when the other one was single. At least they would have the time in Hawaii to drink, talk and suss out exactly what they were going to do with the carnage they were both dealing with.
The snow wasn’t lying on the main road, so putting his foot down, he teetered on the speed limit. Music. That’s what he needed. His phone was already linked up to the car speaker system, so he lined up some Chris Stapleton and drove with the raspy sounds of ‘Fire Away’ filling his head. He pointed the car in the direction of the M8 motorway, which would take him all the way to the airport, about twenty miles outside the city, but only a few miles into the journey, almost unconsciously, he veered off, and ten minutes later he was back in the same street he’d visited earlier.
The teenagers were gone from the corner now, and there were just a couple of elderly blokes shuffling up the street, both insulated from the cold by their flat caps, padded jackets, and judging by the sway of their steps, a few lunchtime whiskies.
He stared at the building he’d toured earlier with Calvin. Was he being crazy even contemplating getting involved with a project like this? He had a dream job that, in filming season, came with an intense schedule, a personal life that just got way more complicated, and he already lived out of a suitcase. Did he really want to add to his workload? His head was giving him a different answer from his heart. Just at that, his phone rang and he knew that the name that flashed up on the car’s display system would come down firmly on the side of the heart.
He flicked the button on the wheel to answer.
‘Hey Mum, how are you doing?’
She didn’t even pause to consider her answer. ‘My blood pressure is rocketing and I’m about ready to track down that wife of yours and give her a piece of my mind. Oh son, I’m so sorry. One of the dancers in the aerial acrobatic group just showed me that video of Sienna that’s doing the rounds and, oh my goodness, it’s a shocker. What’s going on? Are you okay? Aaaargh, I just want to hug you.’
‘Thanks, Mum,’ he said, thinking that her opening outburst summed up his mother in a nutshell. Loving, protective, would fight anyone who crossed people she loved, and not one to keep quiet or ignore a problem if she had something to say. He’d never been so glad that he was going to see her tomorrow in Hawaii. When she first went offshore, she’d call from a payphone in a port whenever she could, but now that the ships had decent Wi-Fi they managed to speak every week. ‘It was a bit of a blindside moment, but to be honest I should have seen it coming. Things haven’t been great for a while now.’
‘I knew that, son. You’ve never been much good at hiding your feelings and acting like nothing’s wrong.’
That made him laugh. ‘Mum, I literally get paid a lot of money to hide my feelings and act like nothing’s wrong. I got a Golden Globe for it last year.’
‘Aye, well, you can’t hide them from me,’ she said. ‘And I’m going to give you a pass on your cheek, given that you’re thirty and you’re an only child. If you desert me, I’m on my own in my old age.’
Her habit of using humour at inappropriate times was yet another of the things he adored about Moira Chiles.
‘That’s very true. You’re lucky I’m devoted to you at the moment, but that could change…’
This was no time for jokes, but he knew that as long as he was firing back barbs and teasing her, the chances of her worrying herself sick would be lowered.
‘Enough of your cheek. Anyway, it’s been a long time since I felt you two were truly happy together. Do you think there’s any hope of getting back on track with Sienna?’
He’d been mulling over that same question all afternoon. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘Okay. Well, I’ll hold off tracking her down until you’re absolutely sure. I’m not sure Jacinta will have the same restraint. I spoke to her earlier and she is ready to take a contract out on Kara’s Josh. What a spineless one he turned out to be.’
Thanks to a dozen instances of missing each other’s calls, Ollie had still to hear the details of what had caused Kara to call off the wedding, but before he could interrogate his mum, there was a deafening sound of a horn in the background.
‘Listen, we’re just coming into dock, so I need to get going. Offloading at Miami always takes ages. One of the croupiers in the casino is giving me a lift up to Orlando in return for a promise to sing Adele songs to him the whole way there. I’m catching a direct flight to Honolulu from there and Seb is picking me up from the airport and taking me to the hotel, so I’ll be there before you. Tell Jacinta to remember to bring me three large bars of Dairy Milk, two packets of shortbread and a couple of boxes of Tunnock’s Teacakes. And hurry up and get there so I can hug you.’
‘I will, Mum. Love you.’
‘Love you back, son. And I promise you… there’s loads of good times ahead for you.’ There it was. The Moira Chiles Pep Talk in Optimism, number 3425.
He hung up feeling a whole lot better than he had five minutes ago. He stared at the building again. His mum would love it. His gran would have approved too. But was he ready to tie himself back to Glasgow again? Was there really not a shred of hope for him and Sienna?
He kicked the car into gear and pondered his indecision all the way to the airport.
When he came off the slip road, he went left at the roundabout, in the opposite direction from the terminal building, and stopped at a layby a few hundred yards from the car hire drop-off point. This was going to be the last time he’d be alone for a while, so much as he had no desire to do it, it made sense to just get an update on the online shitshow his life had become today.
Emails first. All of them predictable. Another round of communications from his manager, his agent and his publicist – hear no evil, see no evil and speak no evil – flooding his inbox with requests for the comments he’d already said he wouldn’t give, suggesting interviews he’d said he wouldn’t do and offering damage-control strategies he’d said he wasn’t interested in. All that spin, smoke and mirrors that came with celebrity life was bullshit to him. He’d rather just get on with living his life and let people think whatever they wanted.
Next, his texts. A rake of contacts from journalists asking for his thoughts, lots of ‘I’m here for you’ sympathy texts from dozens of acquaintances, offers of a chat from several friends and castmates, and yet another reminder from Drea that he had to be at the airport by four o’clock. He scrolled through them all and decided there was nothing that required immediate action, especially as he had no desire whatsoever to discuss his wife’s indiscretions or the state of his marriage.
Okay, job done.
He’d just released the handbrake when another notification alerted him to an incoming video call. Sienna. Of course, she’d have landed now. Probably already in the terminal building at LAX. He considered ignoring her, but he knew she would just keep calling. Sienna Montgomery wasn’t someone who let things go if she didn’t get her own way.
Reluctantly, he accepted the FaceTime call. Her face came immediately into focus. In the background, he could see what looked like a lounge area, with strip lights on the ceiling. He recognised it immediately. LAX had a whole ecosystem and team for dealing with celebrities. They were brought in through a different entrance, and chaperoned through a series of corridors and rooms that had no public access. When he flew with the cast of The Clansman , they were ushered through to the lounge that Sienna was standing in now, to relax there pre-boarding. If they were landing, they were met off the plane and taken through that same area to shield them from the public gaze. He rarely used that service when he flew alone, preferring to travel with glasses on, a hat pulled down, and as little fuss as possible, but a certain female who was on his screen right now took it for granted. She’d been going through LAX that way, with her famous parents and grandparents, all her life, so although she no longer had that star status, she had enough influence to send a text and get swift passage to the VIP lounge.
His wife was one of those stunning natural beauties, but right now, she wasn’t giving her best look. Her eyes were even more bloodshot than they’d been earlier, there were mascara stains under her bottom lashes, her hair was dishevelled and her skin blotchy. He couldn’t remember a time when she had looked like this, not even after a two-hour workout with her thousand dollar an hour personal trainer.
‘Ollie, I’m so sorry,’ she said again, and he wondered what approach she was going to go with now. Repentant? Explanatory? Self-justification? Would she be mortified? Or would she stick true to form in her life and go on the offensive when she felt attacked?
‘Is this when you say again that it wasn’t what it looked like?’ he asked her, but there was no challenge in his voice, just sadness and disappointment, which seemed to light the blue touchpaper.
‘Oh piss off, Ollie. Is that how we’re playing this?’ Yep, cue a very definite lean into a ‘fight fire with fire’ position. ‘What do you expect? At least he’s there for me. When was the last time you came rushing to my side? Or helped me through any kind of shit? You won’t even come back to LA when I need you.’
‘Last time I checked I wasn’t snogging the face off someone I wasn’t married to though.’ Low blow, but it felt justified.
Her perfect bone structure twisted into a snarl. ‘You sure about that?’
Okay. So that’s how this was being played. He wasn’t rising to it.
‘I’m sure.’
‘Maybe you just didn’t get caught. You honestly want me to believe there’s nothing between you and your eternal side piece?’
This was exhausting. He knew exactly who she was talking about, but he wasn’t getting into this with her again.
‘You’ve put Kara before me since the first day we met,’ she went on.
He’d heard this so many times. It was the same argument she’d recycled every time she was angry, insecure, or she’d messed up and was trying to deflect blame. Like right now.
‘And you’re doing it again. I’m asking you to come home and you’re going with her instead. No wonder I did something stupid. You can’t fucking blame me.’
He was over the manipulation. ‘So it’s my fault you’ve got a thing going with Van? Tell me something, Sienna – was it just today? Or the last week? The last six months?’
He saw her jaw tighten and her eyes dart to the side, and he knew whatever was going to come out of her mouth next was a lie.
‘Today.’
It wasn’t. He should be angry. Furious. He should be raging about the injustice of this, the betrayal of everything they’d promised to each other. Yet, he still felt nothing but tired of the whole thing. Maybe she had a point. Perhaps his calmness was a sign that he was already checked out.
‘And I know it was stupid, but I was just feeling so shit when you said you weren’t coming home.’ The emotional pendulum had swung back to self-pity, but only on the way to petulance and emotional blackmail.
‘So that’s it? When you don’t get what you want, you just hit up another guy?’
For a second, he thought she was going to throw her phone at the wall. Instead, her eyes narrowed, and her cheeks reddened.
‘You really don’t care, do you?’ she hissed.
He said nothing. He did care. He loved her. They’d had a brilliant few years at the start of their marriage and he hated that he’d hurt her, even unintentionally, by not doing as she asked. But this wasn’t serving either of them anymore and it was becoming pretty clear that they both knew it.
His silence was making her escalate and veer right back into the attack zone.
‘You used me and my name to get a bit of fame, then you think you can just toss me to one side and treat me like shit? Last chance, Ollie. Forget your precious Kara and come back to LA tonight or we’re done.’