Chapter 10 Griffin #2
There was another thing he liked—the way she couldn’t help but deliver a sly zinger, even when she was panicking.
She had one of those brains that worked fast and never switched off.
He liked people who weren’t afraid to challenge you, even when they were conscious of the potential power imbalance.
And her zingers weren’t belittling—they didn’t come from a place of insecurity, designed to take you down.
They were more about keeping it real, and lord knew he needed people in his life who kept things real.
Not that she was in his life, or would be, beyond this one strange sequence of events.
“My point is,” he said, collecting himself, “there’s merit in the way your parents have chosen to live.”
“There is. But there should be a happy medium, you know? Without going the full off-grid.”
“Isn’t that what you’re living? Reading books, chilling in your apartment, but also out there functioning in the real world?”
“Not sure how well I function, but sure, I guess.”
“You use a computer and cell phone. You’re perfectly capable of intelligent conversation, and you toss in the words ‘hashtag humble brag.’ You hold down a job that requires dealing with the public, with its good and bad. You just kneed a guy in the balls, and then tased the fucker.”
“I did, didn’t I? Honestly though, I’m not sure I’ve found my happy medium. If it were really up to me, I might choose to live permanently in my own little bubble. Vivien and I could have been better prepared for the world with a little more exposure to it.”
“Do you not get lonely?”
“Sometimes,” she said, evidently surprised at the question. “But mostly I like my life.”
“Happy enough.”
“Exactly. Besides, I’d rather be alone than with people who don’t get me—which is most people.”
Hell. She could be reaching into his brain and copy-pasting his thoughts. He spent his days surrounded by people, but he always felt distanced—felt he had to keep his distance. Not with her.
“You start reaching for more,” she continued, “and it only makes what you’ve got seem like less. Better to be grateful for what you have. Same with anything people strive for, I guess—money, power, fame. No offense.”
“None taken.”
They drove on in a comfortable silence. As they reached the freeway, he noticed she was asleep, her face so serene it deserved a halo.
What the hell was he getting himself into?
With the missing sister, for starters, but also with Lana?
Even he couldn’t figure out if his motivation was altruistic or selfish.
He let the fuel gauge fall as low as he dared before turning into a gas station, pulling the baseball cap low. Several cars were hooked up to pumps. To the east, the sky was lightening, etching the mountains in charcoal shadow. He laid a hand on Lana’s cheek and murmured her name.
She inhaled, slowly opening her eyes, and flinched when she saw him.
“Sorry, did I startle you?”
“No. Well, yeah. I’d just kind of forgotten what was happening.” She straightened and stretched, a deep crack sounding from her sternum. “But here you are, Griffin Hart, driving my car.”
“This is not very manly of me, but do you mind pumping the gas? In case someone recognizes me and posts about it, or I get clocked by security cameras.” He pulled out his wallet and took out some cash.
“This one’s on me, since you’re supplying the wheels.
” Predictably, she hesitated. “Look, I don’t want to be that guy who throws his money around like he owns everyone, but it makes sense to spend mine.
I don’t use it for much. Can we please not make it an issue? ”
“Okay, thank you,” she said, getting out. “Look at you, hiding away with your wads of bills. It’s like being on the run with Raskolnikov.”
“With who?” he said, lowering his window as she started to pump.
“Crime and Punishment? My pop culture references tend to fall flat. How about Jason Bourne? I know those books have been made into films—we have the movie tie-in editions at work.”
“Familiar with Jason Bourne. I’m just concerned those goons from the set might be waiting for me to pop up. Maybe buy me sunglasses too?” He handed her more cash.
“You think the security footage might end up online?”
“It’s happened. Plus, there’s a website that does live tracking.”
“Of celebrities?”
“Just me, as far as I know. Where-is-Griffin-Hart-dot-com. If I go to a store, or wherever, there’s usually someone doing a live feed.”
“That’s next level.”
“Started as a joke, I guess. My publicist keeps promising me it’s some kooky internet trend that will pass, but it just seems to snowball.
It’s like it’s on the tourist map now—the walk of fame, the Hollywood sign, Rodeo Drive, Universal Studios, Where-is-Griffin-Hart-dot-com. Like Celebrity Pokémon.”
She hung up the pump. “Wow, your life.”
“This is why I can’t do normal things—drink at a bar, shop, date.
” Her head lurched a little on the word “date,” in a why-are-you-telling-me-this way.
And yeah, it was out of context, and more a reminder to himself than a warning to her.
“I’m very aware that I’m a joke, a meme, a character. Not quite human.”
“Oh, you’re definitely very human,” she called back as she headed in to pay.
He wasn’t sure how to take that. Weird that being called human was both a compliment and an insult.
He watched her through the glass storefront.
No one stared. No one whispered and nudged their friend.
No one took a photo. Dance like no one’s watching, they said.
But what if someone was always watching?
Lana was probably right when she said he “retracted.” Ironically, the only time he felt able to relax and be himself was when he was on camera, pretending to be someone else. Only then did he let himself feel something, sit in those feelings, let them fill him, use them.
You’re taking on too many roles, his dad said, often.
You’ll get overexposed. Not to mention, there’s more to life than work.
You gotta be more choosy. But the more Griffin could fill long days being someone else—four a.m. starts and late finishes, or night shoots from dusk to dawn, day in, day out, year in, year out—the less he needed to be this bizarre artificial construct that was Griffin Hart.
And the greatest irony? All these people thought they knew Griffin Hart, and even he didn’t know who Griffin Hart was. He got the feeling the Griffin Hart that Lana saw was someone else again.
When Lana returned, she offered to drive, and he gladly accepted.
He drifted in and out of sleep, his mind shimmering along the boundary between a reality in which lights passed on the freeway and the CD skipped, and a dreamland where Lana leaned over him and kissed him.
Eventually, he came to fully, with sun on his face and Lana leaning over him, her hair falling like a curtain.
“I was just going to pull this around.” She flipped his visor to the side window. “To get the sun out of your eyes.”
It didn’t work—the sun was too low—but he appreciated the thought.
They were parked at Will Rogers Beach, under a pale blue sky.
The cap had fallen off the back of his head and he quickly pulled it on, though no one seemed to be watching.
He yanked the tag off the sunglasses and slipped them on.
People liked to peer into limos or black SUVs in case there was someone famous behind the tinted windows, but a little Honda with clear glass?
What high-profile person would ride in that?
Maybe he should get one. He inhaled. “Damn, I smell hot food.”
She pulled a paper bag from the back. “I got us breakfast burritos from a drive-through. You paid, I’m afraid. Turns out I left my wallet in my backpack. There was money left over from the gas.”
“All good.”
They sat in the car eating, as if this were a regular day. A regular moment with a regular girl in a truly regular car.
Lana’s phone trilled and she silenced it. “My alarm. I usually work Saturdays.”
Which was a reminder that nothing about this was regular, for either of them. She should be waking up in her studio, he in the pool house, and they should never have met.
She leaned over him and grabbed a receipt from the door pocket—the one she’d written the detective’s number on. “I think it’s a decent-enough hour to call,” she said, dialing. The detective didn’t answer, so she left her name and number.
“Lana Fleming,” Griffin said after she hung up. “You sound like a 1950s screen siren. Vivien Fleming, too.”
“Named after long-dead relatives. But I’m aware of the irony, given my parents’ thoughts about films, and the fact I’m as far from a movie star as it’s possible to get. Except right now, when I’m as close to a movie star as I’m ever likely to get. So there’s that.”
As they finished their burritos, a phone beeped.
They looked at each other expectantly. “Oh, hell.” Lana lunged for a pocket in her cargos.
“Vivien’s phone. I forgot to check it when we got into cell coverage.
” She brought out the pink phone and unlocked it.
“A text from the production company, a few overdue bills, a bunch of missed calls over the last month—mostly from me or the production company, but some random numbers too. Some called multiple times. But then, she’s cleared her contacts.
For all I know, it could be her hairdresser. ”
“We could call the numbers? See who answers?”