Epilogue
Jackie
D oes she win, Charlie?” Benny asked. “You know. You know if she does. You had your vision.”
“Benny,” Charlie said, laughing. “I’m not going to tell you.”
“Come on,” Benny implored. “It’s the Golden Globes . Just tell us if she wins it.”
Charlie shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.” Her face was impossible to read.
“Leave her alone,” I said. Benny snapped a picture.
I hadn’t seen her without her camera in hand all day.
She wanted to document every moment. “My girls are here with me and they’re happy.
I get to act every day and do what I love.
I was nominated for a Golden Globe. I’ve already won, Benny girl. I’m the luckiest woman in the world.”
I smiled so big my makeup artist had to stop working on my eyes for a moment.
“Sorry,” I told her. “I’m just so happy.”
Clara only smiled back. “It’s a big deal,” she said. “I’m doing waterproof mascara. I have a feeling you’ll be crying a lot tonight.”
I laughed. “Thank you.”
There was a group of us gathered at Quinn Canyon while the “glam squad” that my managers had arranged did their magic on me.
I was having a pedicure, a manicure, a blowout and updo, my makeup applied, and I could hear my stylist, Audrey, steaming the gown we’d borrowed from the collection of old Hollywood glamour, which fit the character I was nominated for portraying in Starlet .
The dress was from the 1950s, as was all the styling around it.
My hair was being set in large waves, and Clara was applying the perfect red lipstick for my skin tone.
This moment had been in the works for months, but also, for my entire life.
The press around Starlet had surprised everyone, except for maybe Charlie, who had a calm sense of knowing about everything these days.
For years, I’d worried I had been too old to break into Hollywood, and then too stubborn to realize maybe my time had passed.
But, something had kept me going. Something told me it was going to work out.
That faith, even when I stumbled, just never faltered.
The public had embraced my role as Ingrid Curtis in a way that not a single Hollywood executive had expected, though.
Starlet was a bare-bones production with a tiny budget that was not projected to be a hit.
In fact, nobody in the industry really understood why it had been green-lit in the first place.
It went against all of Hollywood’s conventions.
The story of a washed-up star who was no longer young and in-demand?
A starring role given to an actress with hardly any notable credits to her name who was fifty-five years old?
Everyone expected it to fail.
We called it the “tax write-off” for the streaming service that distributed it.
But I gave it everything. I became Ingrid Curtis and inhabited that role as if my life depended on it.
Every single person on the set of Starlet came ready to work.
We were the underdogs and all we wanted to do was make eight episodes of something we were proud of.
There’s a power in having no expectations, no pressure.
There’s power in having everyone count you out.
There’s a shared collective moment when you look around and go, “Nobody has faith in us, except for us.”
By the end of those eight episodes, we were a family.
When the first season dropped six months ago, the cast and crew and I celebrated, expecting nothing. But by the next week, it had become the most streamed series of the year. It took off like a rocket. I knew it was brilliant and I had always known I had it in me.
Since then, it had been one big whirlwind. Forty years to my overnight-success moment.
The streamer threw money at us, demanded more episodes, and when it was nominated for eight Golden Globes, the pitch of Starlet ’s success went from high to hysteria.
I couldn’t walk down the street without being stopped.
My agents couldn’t keep up with the onslaught of scripts sent my way, talk shows that wanted me as their guest, magazines asking for interviews and cover stories.
Jackie Quinn was a superstar.
It only took four decades for the world to finally notice.
Charlie came up behind me when the hairdresser stepped away to let my curls set and she hugged my shoulders. “I’m so proud of you,” she said. “Win or lose, it doesn’t matter. You’re inspiring so many people, including me.”
“I love you,” I said. “How’s the restaurant?”
“It’s amazing,” Alex said, appearing from the kitchen with a smile on his face.
Of course, I already knew The Perfect Bite was doing incredibly well.
It had become a destination spot up in Montecito.
They’d made it through their first year and were booked up for the next six months.
Alex’s incredible cooking and passion and Charlie’s bread-making skills and business acumen were a killer combination.
“We’re having the time of our lives,” Charlie said, and the way she looked up at Alex made me so happy I thought my heart might just beat itself right out of my chest. It was a look of total devotion.
But before they opened The Perfect Bite, they’d spent a year traveling all over the world on the cheap, staying in hostels and Airbnbs.
I hadn’t even known Charlie had wanderlust. They met me in Cannes when I was shooting some scenes for Starlet and we ate mussels and fries in the sunshine.
I’d never seen Charlie so free, unburdened, and happy.
Maybe knowing she was going to be okay freed me a little, too.
When you have a child so stressed out, who thinks they need to carry the world on their shoulders, all you ever want to do is try to unburden them.
When they returned from traveling, Charlie got into therapy. She was doing so much better, but she had a lot to work through. I did, too, of course, and so I started seeing my own therapist. Then Benny followed. Triple Quinn was not perfect, but we were trying.
A year after Charlie’s accident, Benny had, indeed, like Charlie predicted, gone on tour with Ravi.
He’d been opening for a big artist across the world and Benny’s pictures had revolutionized tour photography, and people to this day still give partial credit to Benny for Ravi’s skyrocket to success.
She was now one of the most in demand photographers in the business, going on tour with some of the biggest names in music.
Benny and Ravi had a whirlwind romance that ended in horrific heartbreak for Benny—it caught her so off guard, but Charlie was there to catch her.
She knew what it felt like to be destroyed by love, and she brought Benny back from the brink.
While Charlie was in that coma, I questioned everything.
It was a dark night of the soul moment for me.
I was certain I would quit acting, that I’d been stupid to pursue it for so long when it obviously hadn’t wanted me back.
Benny had told me about that text message from Ravi and she wanted to turn it down, wanted to take the safe route.
We both sat in our personal hells, battling demons, wondering if Charlie had been right all along, that we’d been delusional, chasing impossible dreams.
But when Charlie came out of that coma, her steadfast faith in all of us, including herself, was so intoxicating we all got bolder.
I would have turned Starlet down if it weren’t for Charlie telling me to take it.
My agents cautioned me against the role, told me that nobody was betting on it, that it might kill my career before it even took off to be associated with a catastrophic flop.
I insisted on signing the contract against their advice.
And Ravi’s label didn’t want to hire Benny.
She had to plead her case, bet on herself, show up to the profession she didn’t even know she was qualified for yet.
Charlie had pulled off miraculous things for us all. She had no idea how much we respected and loved her, and when Benny and I finally got to receive the full force of her love and faith, it was like a fire erupting in flames. We needed her.
In the end, Charlie made Benny and me better, not because she made us more cautious, but because she made us more well-rounded.
She helped with every detail of my deals, organized my life, kept me on top of my finances, took my flighty sense of self and grounded it.
The only way Benny could have received the offer to photograph Ravi was because Charlie had coached her on the interview, organized a load of agencies for Benny to approach, put together a killer portfolio, helped Benny with her schedules, and given her confidence that met up alongside luck and opportunity.
Charlie’s pragmatism never left her, and we were all better for it. She softened while Benny and I became sharper. And Charlie allowed herself to concede to uncertainty, to let go of control, to let go of everything that had been weighing her down.
Ultimately, we all let go of our extreme positions and discovered middle ground, contributing our gifts and allowing help where we needed it.
Benny brought her levity and hopefulness.
Charlie brought her levelheadedness and to-do lists.
And I brought the permission to dream as big as we all wanted, the faith that everything works out the way it should.
(Alex, of course, brought the food and somehow became the only person who could wrangle the Quinn women back into being allies, whenever we drifted.)
We all got better because of each other.
We needed each other. We helped each other.
That was the magic of Triple Quinn. That was the little family I built from nothing but hope and a steadfast belief that love was the antidote to all of life’s ills.
That, cliché as it is, love could truly conquer all.
Growing up, I never received the beauty of unconditional love.
It was my promise to myself that if I were ever given the chance to bear children, they’d know love so fierce it would be undeniable.
I would be the type of mother I never had, build the type of family I always wanted, break generational cycles, and live and love with total abandon.
Finally, I felt confident enough to say I had done that. I’d really done it.
A couple hours later, I walked the red carpet with Charlie and Benny at my sides, all three of us dressed in gowns, amazed at where life had dropped us.
But the truth was, the joy wasn’t new for me; even when I was rejected relentlessly as an actress, I had never felt lacking.
Nothing had ever been able to steal my happiness for long.
The ceremony began and I genuinely didn’t care if I won or lost the award.
But, I have to tell you, when my name was called as the winner, I pulled my girls into a hug, strode up the stairs proudly, and accepted with so much gratitude I thought I may actually faint from the weight of all my blessings.
I held the golden statue in my hands, tears of joy streaming down my cheeks and said, “This is for my girls, my Triple Quinn. This was always for you. I love you both more than words could ever express. You inspire me every day. It’s the highest honor to be your mom. Thank you for choosing me.”
Charlie coming back to us that day in the hospital was the happiest day of my life.
But this one—this was a very close second.
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