CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
All Max did for the next few weeks was work, drink, and sleep. It wasn’t so much sleep as an altered consciousness brought on by too much alcohol but it was mildly regenerative. Enough that he was able to function on some level without curling up in a corner and hiding from the world.
Ironically his pain from Carrie’s betrayal and subsequent departure only served to make his performance in the play deeper and more complex. Every night he received a standing ovation, and later he’d leave the theatre and face a throng of gushing fans who wanted him to sign their programs and get a picture. He did it all with a fake smile as if on autopilot. This was his secret and shame.
So when his mother and father wanted to meet him after a performance and have dinner he desperately tried to come up with a viable pretext. He already had plans with an unopened bottle of whiskey. Max loved his parents very much but comforting him was not their forte. Their own relationship had always been volatile and Max had grown up with slamming doors and shouting matches, then all would return to normal for their friends and family. The cracks in the veneer were never to be seen. In the last several years, Karen and Tim seemed to mellow in their marriage and there wasn’t much fussing and fighting. Strangely, the less the couple worked in the movie business, the less they argued. Maybe now that they were semi-retired there was simply less to get mad about. Or maybe they now weren’t competing with each other to see who could become more famous.
But his mother wasn’t having any of his lame excuses, which was how he ended up sitting across from them in his old friend Albert’s restaurant near the South Bank, eating pasta and checking his watch every five minutes.
Karen dove into her rosemary chicken. “Your performance is a triumph, dear. We’re so proud of you. You’re a shoo-in for awards season.”
He’d been hearing that quite a lot lately when people came close enough that he could speak to them. The wise ones gave him a wide berth.
“Thank you but who knows about the nominations. There are many wonderful performances this year.”
“None as good as yours, son,” Tim said with a shake of his fork. “This is your year.”
This most assuredly was not Max’s year. If it were, he wouldn’t have been divorced and heartbroken all within months of each other. The work, the acting, wasn’t the panacea it had been in the past. When this play was over he might just take off several months or even a year providing he could get out of the contracts he’d already committed to. Alcoholism should scare off the movie studios. He was bound to be a full-blown drunk by the end of the play’s run.
“We’ll see,” Max replied, not wanting to get into an argument with his parents. A headache was beginning to make itself known right behind his eyes, pounding away with tiny hammers.
Albert sidled up to the table and slapped Max on the back. “How’s everything tasting here? Is my staff treating you well?”
“Delicious as always,” Max praised. “My dinner is perfect.”
Karen frowned and lifted up her water goblet. “That waiter hasn’t been by to refill my glass in forever. Can you find him? He seems to have disappeared.”
Snapping his teeth together, Max reined in a nasty response to his mother. Knowing Albert, he wouldn’t allow Max to pay for the meal.
“He was just here, Mother. You said you didn’t want any water.”
Max kept his tone as cool as possible but Karen wasn’t having any of it.
“That was ages ago, and I haven’t seen him since.”
One. Two. Three. Oh hell.
“He’s right there.” Max pointed to the young waiter a few tables away. “He’s been by several times.”
Tim squinted at the server and shook his head. “That’s not him. That’s someone else.”
“It is our waiter,” Max said, his jaw aching and tight.
Albert grinned and made a wave with his hand. “No problem, Mrs. Hayes. I’ll take care of it.” He noticed the empty chair beside Max. “Where’s your pretty girl tonight, my friend? She looked like she was a keeper.”
Just the mention of Carrie even without hearing her name felt like a knife in the heart. Obviously Albert didn’t read the tabloids. “I’m afraid she and I…”
Few people had had the bravery to ask Max that question. He didn’t yet have an answer. He might say that he’d been taken in or he might say that he’d been idiot to let her go. Either or both might be correct.
Nodding his head, Albert signaled to the waiter. “Sorry to hear about that. Here’s your water, Mrs. Hayes. Let me know if there’s anything else we can do.”
Albert drifted over to another table and the server came to refill Karen’s glass. Just the mention of Carrie’s name was enough to set his parents on edge.
“I think you’re well rid of that girl,” Max’s mother sniffed. “She knew nothing about acting or the business. What you need is someone who understands your creative side. Someone who can be supportive of your career.”
Max knew exactly what his mother was talking about. She’d said it before in more vague terms but she wasn’t fooling anyone.
“What you mean is that I should be with a woman who can help my career.”
Shifting in his chair, Tim coughed. “That’s not what we’re saying, son. What I think your mother means is that someone outside of the business cannot possibly understand the time and dedication this career takes.”
Quirking a brow in question, Max took a hefty gulp of his wine. “Is that what you meant, Mum? That everyone outside of the industry is too stupid to learn about the movie business and too selfish to allow me to be an actor?”
“No,” his mother exclaimed. “Not at all. We just…want to see you with someone that is your equal. Not a glorified assistant. If they can help your career, all the better. There’s nothing wrong with using one’s connections to get roles. If your father and I hadn’t done that you would have grown up in a one-room cold water flat.”
Nothing wrong with it. Perhaps his parents were right. Carrie had only been using the time-honored Hollywood tradition of “who you knew”. It didn’t make her a horrible person. In fact, some might argue it made her smart.
“First of all,” he began, thoroughly fed up with their prattle about creatives and everyone else. He’d heard if before and he was tired of it. “Carrie has a Masters in Business Administration from a prestigious American university. She heads up Paige’s entire business and directs a staff. Her title is Chief Operating Officer, not Chief Gopher. She is a brilliant and savvy businesswoman, something she should be incredibly proud of. As for understanding my career, that was never an issue between us. She was supportive and always eager to learn about the business. Carrie Johnson is a wonderful woman and much too good for me. I was an idiot to let her go.”
Max hadn’t planned on the last two statements but he’d been on a roll and they’d come tumbling out. But they were true. He shouldn’t have pushed her out of his life. He should have held on for dear life. It was just a stupid little part in a movie. If he truly loved her – and he did – he ought to be fighting tooth and nail to give her what she wanted. Isn’t that what he’d told Nate almost a year ago?
Never take a woman’s dreams. Make them happen for her instead. He hadn’t followed his own advice.
“I’m sure she’s very accomplished,” Tim said, holding up his hands in surrender. “But when you’re gone for months on location is she going to understand? When rumors go around about you and your female co-star will she get upset? I think these are important questions.”
Max leaned forward, his palms flat on the table. He wanted to be sure his parents heard him clearly. “You mean how understanding you were when Mum went to Rome for six weeks to make that movie with that handsome Italian actor? Like that? Because I don’t think the two of spoke a civil word to one another for months.”
Karen gasped and raised the napkin to her mouth as if to hide. “You don’t know anything about that, Max.”
“I don’t? I heard you yelling at each other for weeks before you left and then the ominous silence and passive-aggressive bullshit when you returned. ‘Max, tell your father it’s time for dinner’ when he was sitting three feet away from you. Then Dad flirting with every female between here and Suffolk to make you jealous. I’ll say this for Carrie. If she was pissed at me she’d just tell me, we’d argue, and then settle it. Like adults.”
Karen suddenly found the tablecloth fascinating. “You weren’t meant to hear any of those arguments.”
“But I did. Now we’re going to have a nice dinner, but first I need you to understand that I will date and fall in love with whomever I choose. Next time I bring a girl to meet you I expect you to be nice and polite. You’re actors. Pretend.”
Silence fell over the table and Max dug back into his meal. His parents might be a pain but they’d helped him frame his issues.
He still loved Carrie.
He wanted Carrie back.
He didn’t care about the movie part anymore. Being without her was torture.
In fact, Max had a movie coming up as well. There might be a tiny part in it for Carrie. As soon as he returned home from dinner he’d pull out the script and give it a re-read. He’d prove to her that he could be supportive of her dreams. Then they could have a second chance.
There was only one small problem with that plan. She hated him, and he only had himself to blame.