Imposter (20 page)

BRIAN WRENCHES THE HANDLE OVER AND
over, but the doors are locked. As if he hasn't even noticed the crazy guy beside us, the driver calmly pulls into traffic.

Brian chases us for a few yards, but gives up as we accelerate. Whatever he's shouting is drowned out by jazz from the car stereo. The music is frenetic and complicated, a perfect soundtrack for my life.

“So where are we heading?” the driver asks.

“Laurel Canyon and Hollywood Boulevard.” I press myself against the backseat, face turned slightly away from the mirror. “Please.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

For twenty minutes, Hollywood spins by, a blur of Christmas lights and New Year's Eve energy. “Which building you want, man?” the driver asks, pulling over.

“I don't know.” I hand him a twenty. “Keep the meter running, okay? I'll be right back.”

I can't see Sabrina. The driver isn't going to wait forever, so I run down the street, peering through gaps in bushes. I'm almost
past an alleyway when I notice a stream of smoke curling up from behind a dumpster.

“Sabrina?”

She peers around it. Slowly, awkwardly, she pulls to a stand. She's wearing jeans and a gray hoodie. Her hair is dragged back in a lank ponytail. She drops her cigarette and stumbles toward me.

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

She leans into me. Presses her face against the nape of my neck. “I thought I heard them following me. Photographers.”

There's no one around.

“Please take me home,” she says.

I walk her to the taxi. It's not especially cold, but as she slides onto the backseat, she's shaking.

“Where we heading now?” asks the driver.

“Pico and Century Park,” says Sabrina. She pulls up her knees and hugs them. Her teeth chatter.

“Can you crank up the heat?” I ask.

The driver turns a dial.

“You're so sweet, Seth.” Sabrina's eyes well with tears. “But it's not about the cold.”

As her meaning becomes clear, it's impossible not to think back to our first meeting at Curt's house—how she seemed so alive, so blissfully in control. I flattered myself that her mood had something to do with me, but it was all about the drugs. I was just a foil, a character that enabled her to play the most alluring version of herself.

Maybe the realization should make me feel sad, but it doesn't.
I can be more than a foil now. I can get her home safely. If Sabrina can't rely on herself anymore, she can count on me.

I shuffle along the seat and let her lean against me. She holds me so tightly that she almost crushes me. She doesn't stop shaking, though.

A quarter hour later, we pull up in a district of apartment buildings. I give the driver another twenty and he tips his head in thanks.

As the taxi pulls away, Sabrina points down the adjacent street. “It's a block that way,” she says. “I wasn't sure if the driver recognized us, so I didn't give the correct address.”

We're nowhere near the beach or the hills. The clean, orderly street of modern apartment buildings seems more suited to go-getting professionals than a young actress. “I didn't picture you living here.”

“It's only a half mile from my agent's office,” she says, like this explains everything. “Ex-agent's office, I mean. Being near him made it smoother when I petitioned for emancipation. The judge liked knowing there was someone close by to watch out for me.”

We stop beside a tower block with smooth concrete walls and chrome accents around the doors. Sabrina buzzes in. The marble-clad lobby is spacious. A water feature against the far wall tinkles therapeutically.

“Ms. Layton?” The doorman's greeting turns into a question at the last moment. He has seen the news too, and knows she's supposed to be in rehab.

“Hi, Neil,” she says, still clinging to me.

He's only mid-twenties, but the wary look he gives me seems almost paternal. It might've annoyed me once, but now it's a relief to know there's someone else looking out for her.

We take the elevator to the ninth floor. She jams her keys into an apartment door and slips inside.

Before she turns the lights on, Sabrina closes every blind.

“I can't help it,” she says. “I feel like they're watching me all the time. Every moment, just looking.”

Yesterday I would've called her paranoid. Now anything seems possible, even on the ninth floor of an apartment building.

“Has Ryder ever been here?” I ask. “Or Brian? Anyone to do with the movie.”

“No. Why?”

“I just wondered.”

The apartment is surprisingly small. The kitchen and living room are joined, bathroom and bedroom partially visible through doors at the end.

“Sorry about the mess,” she says. “Kitchen's clean, though, if you want something to eat. I always keep the kitchen clean.”

As Sabrina goes to her bedroom, I run the kitchen faucet and splash my face. The clock on the microwave reads 10:38.

I wander through the living room, footsteps silent on thick-pile carpet. The walls are covered in framed movie posters—not Sabrina's films either, but classics:
Casablanca, Double Indemnity, Vertigo
. A cream-colored sofa faces a state-of-the-art home theater system.

Sabrina doesn't even look around as I enter her bedroom, just
remains seated on the edge of her double bed, cradling a small prescription pill bottle. She uncaps it carefully, almost reverentially. Then she catches my reflection in a mirror and freezes.

“What are you doing, Sabrina?”

“Nothing.”

It's my cue to leave. To stop asking questions when the answers are all too obvious. She's making it easy for me, really.

Instead I lunge for the bottle and snatch it away.

“Give it back,” she shrieks.

“I'm calling the center.”

Fury morphs into derisive laughter. “You can go home now. You've done your good deed for the day.”

“I'm not going anywhere.”

“I wasn't asking.”

“Are you going to make me?” I wave the bottle. “You going to call the police?”

She flails at the bottle, consumed by something much stronger than anger. When she can't reach it, she hits me. Each blow stings, but I don't fight back and I don't give in. A few seconds later, breathless and bright red, she crumples on the bed, sobbing.

I tell myself it's drugs doing this to her, not me. But so what? She looks like a trapped animal, instincts screaming that worse is still to come. And I hold everything that she wants in my right hand. Her world—at least, the part of it she cares about the most—can be confined to a plastic bottle a couple inches tall.

I stuff it in my blazer pocket and sit down beside her. I don't know whether to hug her, or simply to leave her alone. I don't know if she's spent, or if she'll summon a second wind.

I don't know her at all.

But she called me. Not Kris. Not Genevieve. Not her parents, or her ex-agent.

Me.

“I think you called because you knew what'd happen when you got home.” I let the words hang there for a moment, a cautious opening. “I think you wanted me here so I could stop you.”

The sound of her crying grows quieter, but she won't look at me. Maybe she knows on some deep level that I'm not the problem here. Or perhaps she just doesn't want me to see how much she loathes me—that whatever she was thinking when she made the call earlier, now she'd like nothing more than for me to get the hell out of her apartment and let her take whatever she wants.

She reaches under her ruffled pillow and pulls out a long cotton T-shirt. There's a faded image of Kermit the Frog on the front. She straightens it out on her lap and sits there, staring at Kermit.

The phone in my pocket rings, a tone I don't recognize. The cracked screen identifies Annaleigh as the caller. I step out of the bedroom and pull the door closed behind me.

“I'm sorry, Annaleigh,” I whisper. “I'm just about to leave.”

Silence. The microwave clock reads 10:44.

“I just want to make sure she's safe,” I explain.

More silence, only this time there's breathing too—heavy, ominous.

Finally, a voice. But it's not Annaleigh's. “You're a tricky little fucker, aren't you, Seth?”

BRIAN'S VOICE CARRIES CLEAR OVER THE
line, taunting me. “You really screwed up.”

“Where's Annaleigh?”

“Waiting for her date. Know where he is?”

“Like I'd tell you.”

I check that Sabrina's bedroom door is still closed, and sit on the kitchen floor, back to the cupboards, legs out in front of me. I can't afford to be overheard.

“Annaleigh didn't want to give me this number,” mutters Brian. “But I was persuasive. She finally told me she'd given you her old phone. Said something about your battery flaking out. I've got your phone right here and it seems the battery's just fine. Want to tell me what you're up to?”

“No.”

“Hmm. That's too bad. Funny thing is, I figured I knew where you'd gone. Especially after your visit to Maggie this evening.”

He lets the words sink in. There's no mistaking what this news means, but I can't believe it. When I looked Maggie in the eyes just a few hours ago, she was telling me the truth. I would've bet anything on it.
Did
bet everything on it.

“I've got to tell you, Seth—I don't think you're Maggie's favorite person anymore. Not after you led us right to her apartment. Which reminds me, thanks for taking that photo of the license plate. We've been following the green Mazda since this morning. And, well . . . that guy's been following you, of course.” Brian chuckles. “But don't worry, one visit from me and Maggie realized she's safer on Team Brian. She won't be needing that tell-all interview from you, either.”

I want to throw up.

“Yeah, she told me all about your plan. So when you disappeared this evening, I figured I'd head out too—beat you to the punch. But do you know who came waltzing through the office door just now? I'll give you a clue: It wasn't you.” He laughs, loud and humorless. “You and Gant are quite the operation.”

“Where is he?”

“Right here. And now I've got a difficult decision. Call the police and draw unwanted attention to our project, or let him go.”

“Sounds like you don't have a choice at all.”

“Oh, but I do. He was caught breaking and entering.”

“He has a key.”

“Which Maggie gave to
you,
not him. A small point, but our lawyer says it's significant.”

I ball my hand into a fist and punch the ground. “You really think anyone would believe he was breaking in?”

“Absolutely. He was having second thoughts about his role in the movie. Figured he'd delete all our footage. He was probably planning to destroy our hardware too. The irony is that his own father signed him up for all this, and we've got a waiver
to prove it.” He whistles. “Such a sick, twisted family you are.”

“Let him go, Brian!”

A door closes behind me. I peer around the cabinets to see if Sabrina has joined me, but the living room is empty.

“You'd better calm down,” he says. “I get to decide how this plays out, not you. Maybe I'll tell Ryder to film Gant getting arrested. It'd be a perfect climax to the parental neglect subplot—Dad abandons sons in hotel room; younger son turns to crime. Audiences love that shit.”

I close my eyes. “What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to get back to Annaleigh.”

“Why? You're just going to break us up. Even if you don't, her parents will.”

“You're such a disappointment, Seth. Ryder really thought you'd see the bigger picture, embrace the idea of a new kind of movie. Me, I just figured you'd be smart enough to realize that fifty grand and fame were a pretty good start for a kid in Hollywood. But all you do is whine.” He sighs. “You're not even here fighting for Annaleigh. The way I see it, we won't have to break you two up at all. If she's got any sense, she'll dump you herself.”

“Maybe she will.”

“Or maybe you'll get back here and be your charming self, and we'll forget about this unfortunate situation with Gant.”

“You swear it?”

“Yes. Do
you
?”

I pause, but it's mostly for effect. We both know what I'm going to say. “Yeah.”

“Good boy.” There's a delay, and a faint murmuring as if he's
covered the mouthpiece and is giving instructions to someone. Then he's back. “Get your ass here now, you hear me? If you're not around at midnight, we're going to have a real falling-out, you and me.”

I hang up. I'm relieved that Annaleigh kept Sabrina out of this, but I wish she hadn't told Brian about us switching phones. Never mind that he can't track me or eavesdrop. If he has this number, he'll probably find a way to locate me. I turn the phone off and slip it inside my trouser pocket.

I return to an empty bedroom. “Sabrina?”

“I'm in the bathroom. Changing.” Her voice comes from behind another door. “How's Annaleigh? She must be waiting for you.”

“Yeah.”

“You should go, then. Thanks for helping me.”

Her tone is all wrong—too conciliatory.

I scan the room. Her clothes lie strewn across the bed. The Kermit T-shirt is gone. “You've already changed.”

A hesitation. “I'm peeing.”

I try the handle, but it's locked. I run around and try the other bathroom door, the one from the living room. That's locked too.

“Open the door, Sabrina.”

“I'm on the toilet.”

“Open the door!”

She opens it. “What's the matter?” She flushes the toilet. Turns on the faucet.

I watch her in the mirror. She has undone the ponytail so that hair drapes across her face. She stares at her hands, lathering soap quickly, rhythmically.

“Look at me, Sabrina.” More lathering. “Please.”

She rinses her hands, shoves the faucet off, and glares at me. “Happy now?”

She opens the medicine cabinet above the sink as if she's looking for something. But she just wants an object between us, something to stop me from watching her.

“What did you take?”

“Nothing.” She sorts through the cosmetics in the cabinet, fingers skipping from vial to compact. But she doesn't need makeup. She doesn't need anything at all anymore. “You should go. Annaleigh's waiting.”

I try to close the cabinet door, but she bats my hand away.

“I said go!” She spins around, face flushed, eyelids twitching.

“I'm calling the center.”

“Go ahead. They can't make me go back.”

I feel lost. It seems crazy now, but when I found Sabrina behind the dumpster I cast myself in the flattering role of knight in shining armor. But she's shattered the illusion, and returned me to my rightful place in the audience. I'm a spectator, nothing more.

“Please, Sabrina. Just . . .
please
.” The last word comes out quiet and tired. I don't know what to ask for anymore. I just want something different for her.

We stare at each other. For several seconds she doesn't move, or make excuses. She simply lets me witness the version of Sabrina Layton that no one is supposed to see: high on drugs, dirty hair, no makeup.

I'm the one who looks away first.

“You're sweet, Seth, but you can be really boring.” She runs
her fingers along the neck of my shirt. “I should've called Kris.”

Adrenaline courses through me. “But you didn't. Because he would've known you'd go looking for drugs. Wouldn't have left you alone for a moment. Wouldn't have been so . . .”
Easy,
I want to say. But the word in my mind is Kris's:
naive.

There's no use in calling the rehab center. They won't come for her. Even if they do, the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. Sabrina isn't ready for that. Her other relationships may have disintegrated, but not this one. This she values above everything.

It's not difficult to walk out of her apartment. Gant and Annaleigh need me, and Sabrina wants me gone. But as I press the call button for the elevator and pace back and forth along the gray industrial carpet, I still wish I could do more. If only there was someone I could call. Someone who cares for Sabrina as much as I do. Someone like . . . Kris.

I take out the phone, but his number isn't on it. So I ride the elevator to the lobby and approach the doorman. He's reading a thick book, like he doesn't anticipate having much to do, even on New Year's Eve.

“Do you have Kris Ellis's number?” I ask. “I want to call him.”

His expression hardens. “You better not bring him here.”

“Why not?”

The guy snaps his book shut. “Ms. Layton was absolutely clear. If he tries to get in, we're to stop him. Call the police, if necessary.”

His words silence me. Is this why Kris was having Sabrina tailed? Because she wouldn't see him anymore?

So many clues, yet the picture is as hazy as before. Sabrina was determined to get high, so why call me at all? Why not hail a cab and come home alone? Unless there's another reason she wanted someone to watch her. Someone to protect her from—
what?
What could be more destructive than the pills scattered about her apartment?

That's when it hits me. There's something far more destructive than getting high.

And far more permanent.