Chapter Four #3
“Yeah, well,” Clark stares into the amber liquid in his glass and sighs, “It’s been a long time coming.
We decided before we moved out to Colorado, believe it or not.
Thought maybe a change of scenery would give us another chance.
But her and the kids hate it. We were gonna wait until after the holidays, for her kids, but she called me this week and told me she wants to sign the papers as soon as I get back.
Now we have to get the PR together and have the kids sorted to leave again all while not fucking them up. ”
Jeremy nods, listening before asking carefully as if he hadn’t read a few tabloids, “River and Ocean are from her previous marriage, with that other actor, right?”
“Yeah, Travis Monroe. But I’m not in much better shape. I was fresh out of my second marriage when I did Hotter Summer with Laurelai,” Clark openly reflects.
“You two fell in love on set?”
Clark smirks, “‘Love’ isn’t quite the word, but yeah. We started seeing each other while filming that.”
“Huh.”
“What?”
Jeremy shrugs, unable to meet Clark’s eye, “I always thought her performance was flat in that movie. No chemistry between you two.”
“You’ve seen it?” Clark grins, voice lilted.
Jeremy readjusts in his seat, clearing his throat, “Didn’t everybody?”
Clark drinks more, squinting his eyes as he leans forward and asks, “What other movies have you seen of mine?”
Being cornered out of nowhere, Jeremy sweats as he’s caught off guard. Shrugging, he navigates out of telling the truth by offering, “Crude Nights is my favorite.”
“Woah. Deep cut,” Clark chuckles, sitting back and absorbing that answer, “That was, like, my first real movie.”
“You really sent it in that one.”
Clark touches his chest, offended, “Are you saying I don’t always?”
“It’s different,” Jeremy shrugs.
“Hm,” Clark thinks, sipping on his cigar and whiskey in each hand. He looks off and admits, “I got to have a lot of creative freedom over my characters back then.”
“What about the character that you’re doing for this movie? Ferdinand.”
Clark sighs deeply, “Reverse Tarzan, huh?”
Jeremy scrunches his brow.
“I can’t stop thinking of that,” Clark shakes his head, “This is more of the same. You won’t believe how many movies I turn down that are just remakes and sequels of bygone franchises. I thought this one was different, a love felt romance with action! But no. It’s fuckin’ reverse Tarzan.”
“That’s not entirely true,” Jeremy attempts to salvage some optimism, this gloomy version of Clark making him inexplicably sad, “Tarzan was never on horseback.”
Clark smiles, then chuckles before laughing heartily. He roughly clanks his glass against Jeremy’s and says, “You know what? You’re right! And this isn’t a Disney production, I’m getting down and dirty in this!”
“To reverse Tarzan with horses and sex,” Jeremy raises his glass once more.
Clark can get behind that, hitting his glass hard against Jeremy’s again before slamming it down on the table and then up to his mouth.
Jeremy’s amused by the eccentric movements, laughing and patting his pocket for his case of cigarettes.
Getting out a stogie, he turns to Clark and asks, “Do you have a light?”
Handing him a zippo, Jeremy balks, “Hey! This is mine.”
“Didn’t you give it to me?” Clark smiles.
“Uh, no. I didn’t,” Jeremy says matter of factly, lighting his cigarette and putting the zippo on the table.
“Well, I’ve been taking care of it, haven’t I?” Clark asks, blowing smoke up to the dusk sky.
“That’s not the point.”
“Oh, this is the whole hermit crab fiasco all over again,” Clark rolls his eyes, bringing up an instance in the second grade where Jeremy got a pet hermit crab as a souvenir from the lake and gave it to Clark but then wanted to take it back.
“That’s completely different,” Jeremy points out, “That was a case of you using your powers of persuasion for evil.”
“Or, is it a case of you being gullible?”
They go back and forth, talking about their childhood as if the memories are sailing away, dwindling on the horizon.
The sun sinks below the ocean and the patio lights kick on as they continue picking at the food, smoking, and drinking.
They polish off one handle of whiskey, Clark convincing the drunken Jeremy to come inside for another.
“Oh! I wanted to show you something!” Clark slurs, stumbling into the main room. He goes over to a grand piano at the back of the room, leaning against it and clasping his hands together to plead, “Please, will you play something for me?”
Jeremy sips at his refreshed drink, just tipsy enough to feel tempted. He warns Clark though, “I don’t know, I’m pretty rusty.”
Clark grabs Jeremy’s arm and pulls him over, sitting him down at the piano bench and coercing him, “Come on! I don’t care if you play Chopsticks.”
Lifting the key cover, Jeremy laughs and shakes his head. He can’t believe he’s about to do this, not having any solid practice in years. Dabbling with some of the keys, he thinks of a song he can play and says, “Okay. But I’m telling you now, I don’t know any popular music.”
“What’s this?” Clark giggles over the rim of his glass, drinking more and eyeing Jeremy’s fingers as they start to lightly touch at some of the keys. He presses them gently, building the base of a song.
“Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, Opus forty-three,” Jeremy tells him, “Sergei Rachmaninoff.”
The romantic piano chords fall together nicely, Jeremy playing smoother than he could have hoped.
Perhaps the liquor had lubricated his musical sensibilities.
He really gets into it, Clark watching him closely as the song crescendoes to a loud volume and then dwindles to a twinkling few piano keys.
As the song comes to rest, Jeremy’s fingers relax and he moves them away.
Looking up, Clark is staring plainly at him.
Blinking, he sets down his drink and starts clapping. Jeremy bows his head, “Thank you.”
“I can’t believe you’re a cowboy,” Clark smiles. His voice is gentle as he asks, “Play something else?”
Jeremy plays some Beethoven and Liszt, Clark leaning against the piano and listening to every chord.
He drinks half of another bottle of whiskey just listening to Jeremy play.
He gets so drunk that he begins demanding Rolling Stones songs, Jeremy laughing at Clark’s slurred words.
The actor starts singing some of the lyrics to “Beast of Burden” as he makes his way to the couch.
He lays down and his hand drops his glass on the ground as he dozes off to sleep.
Not caring about the mess, Jeremy finishes his drink before getting up from the piano and turning to leave.
Before he does, he glances back at Clark’s relaxed form.
Feeling cheesy, Jeremy stumbles to Clark’s side, takes a blanket, and lays it over his sleeping body. Time to go, Jeremy’s body won’t budge.
Gazing over Clark’s restful countenance, Jeremy feels a wave of sadness at looking upon his gorgeous and relaxed face.
His dread comes from the intense longing he has for Clark, wanting more than anything to believe that tonight meant something.
Jeremy felt like a confidant of sorts, at the very least, but he wanted more.
His crush was getting out of hand, Jeremy forcing himself to leave the penthouse and retreat back to his room before he wakes Clark up to do something drastic.
The maid staff had respected the “do not disturb” sign hanging from his doorhandle and hadn’t come to his room, the whole suite dark and bed messy.
Dizzy, melancholy, and drunk, Jeremy kicks off his shoes and tumbles his way to the sliding glass door.
The late night air immediately cools Jeremy down, staggering to the railing and slumping his weight against it as he gulps in the ocean breeze.
He leans far over, head held high as his eyes adjust to the darkness and he can make out the blackened waves below.
There’s a wave that breaks hard against the moonlight that catches Jeremy’s eye as sea foam sprays into the air.
He squints into the night and watches as another wave swells and a surfer breaks into his view, dropping into the wave and riding it as it rolls over in on itself.
The surfer rides the wave out, smoothly laying back down on the board as the tide subsides.
But then he’s turning around, paddling his arms like mad into the water and being carried up to another wave to surf.
The skill is extraordinary, Jeremy mesmerized as he watches the midnight surfer cut into the water under the stars and moon with precision and flare.
The show is a good distraction for Jeremy, only thinking of the fearlessness that must go into riding a black wave.
His mind drifts away from him, lulled by the steady crashing of the waves breaking.
Tempted to text Clark on Sunday, Jeremy turns off his phone and naps the day away instead.
The room service he orders is good albeit expensive, although he’s sure he can afford it right now, and the television in his room is eighty inches.
He watches some of his favorite movies, a little embarrassed that a couple of them star Clark Radison.
Keeping the sliding door open, the ocean in the distance harmonizes with the film dialogue.
By the time the first stars are twinkling in the sky, Jeremy is waking up at the end of his fifth movie.
He turns on his phone to check the call sheet, immediately affronted with notifications he’d missed in his isolation.
Searching for one number in particular, there is no further activity from his message thread with Clark.
Tossing the cell aside, he collapses on his bed and drifts back to sleep.