Photographic (40 page)

He leaned forward as she said this, eyes darting between her mouth and her eyes. “Wow.”

She nodded.

“Thank you. That makes me feel incredible.”

“It’s the truth. No one can take what you have away. Humility is important. But so is knowing your ability. I’m in a position to know it better than anyone. You light up the room. You light up the whole damn house when you’re in it.”

“Except when I’m in a funk.”

“Okay, exception noted. Big exception.” She smiled.

“You know what? You’re the one who turns it on. It’s you. It’s been hard without you.”

“We can still burn the midnight oil, baby.” They got up to kiss, to exasperated sounds by Tam, standing by the window. She started running loops through the kitchen.

The return to the U.S. couldn’t be anything but traumatic to Jane’s now acute social sensibility. It was back to the cover of magazines and tabloids. Their homecoming was news. The interview on British TV had come out in American press articles, as she knew from the phone conversations with her mother and Hank. Those articles were different than they might have been. Ian had done the unexpected, cheating them out of their delight in burrowing for cover-ups, their speculation and gleeful theorizing about secret love affairs. He admitted it. They had some facts to grapple with, instead of just rumors. It didn’t stop them from having their field day, but it made them play in a different court, one grounded in some kind of reality. That much the interview had done for them.

It led to a different kind of article. Ian was the abject hero, muddied by his fall from grace. Would his wife want him back? Would his public? The speculation ran both ways. Although Jane’s flight to London was well-documented and could now be directly linked to his
Odysseus
antics, they knew he was with her now. That pointed to forgiveness. But would it last? How was he getting back in her good graces? Paparazzi spies abroad or at home hadn’t detected any jewelry purchases or expensive outlays of funds for gifts or such reparation yet, so it remained a tabloid mystery. Hopes were high he would give another interview on this side of the Atlantic to clear up just such lingering questions.

Now that Jane paid some attention to the press, it was as if she’d been inoculated with a little bit of the bug, a touch of the dead germ of media contagion, and while she was better protected against its subterfuges, she could also never again be the pure unsullied soul she’d been, in her chaste tower. Now she had the taste, the hunger to know more. And with the knowledge of what was written about them, more particularly about Ian, came the desire to stifle the misinformation, exaggeration, and even the plain truth disseminated about him through new articles every day. Now that he publicly admitted to the act, they dug for more salacious information about him, and raked over his past history. His past was never as questionable as it was made to sound now, and it was like little daggers to her heart to read some of the retellings of Ian’s honest life the way it could be told from a particular slant. Why couldn’t she stop reading about it all? She told herself she would, soon. 

The NC-17 problem did not go away. The studio’s worst nightmare was a big budget picture released as an NC-17. Such a release limited the number of theaters that would show it to such an extent that the grosses would be severely affected. The greatest sin in their bottom line oriented industry. Tor’s vision, on the other hand, was being expressed in a way that was true to his nature: European, sexual, provocative, artistic. The studio perspective was directed toward the practical, commercial, and short-term. Ian did not realize at first that he was at the center of the tug-o-war between the two factions.

A couple of days after their arrival back home, Ian was on his computer when Tor messaged him. 

Tor69: these bastards driving me nuts

Eire13: stan?

Tor69: interfering with the creative process etc 

Eire13: signed contract

Tor69: want to handcuff artist, make schlock

Eire13: indie movie better for you

Tor69: why can’t I get my bloody picture way I want it shown in theaters everywhere? if not afraid of honest sexuality why hypocrisy?

Eire13: things are changing, making the picture you want to make anyway, aren’t you?

Tor69: ya, but they give me so much trouble you wouldn’t believe they think it’s going to roll nc-17 if I keep cut way I want it (still rough cut they’re so damn anxious already predicting this) and will cut profits up to 30 or 40 percent.

Eire13: got to concern you as well.

Tor69: fuck, I’m already rich man I make film I want to make. first nc-17 film everyone wants to see has to see and change fucking stigma forever. how about that? will show hypocritical ingrates what real effort by great talent can do

Eire13: least you go forward with firm grasp of your limitations.

Tor69: as americans say, bite me

Eire13: leave that to the press.

Tor69: too busy sniffing around dead corpse of your reputation. ha ha

Eire13: ha

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

J
ANE
AND
T
AM
were out for the afternoon, at a party for one of Tam’s friends. Their absence provided an opportunity for a téte-a-téte, arranged by Ian. 

He hadn’t believed Beezer for a second, about Marta being the source for the scandal. If Angus were capable of living a double life all these years, playing a subterfuge on everyone who trusted him, he was as easily capable of selling the story and blaming Marta for it. Beezer had been the one on location. Marta had been upfront. Beezer was conniving.

They lazed about the kitchen in the afternoon sun, Marta and Ian. An unlikely reunion. She’d been happy enough to be flown in at his suggestion. Marta had something Ian wanted. Time at home had given Ian and Jane the chance to fill in some of the blanks during the past few months. One of these was the fate of the pictures of Tam and Jane from the day of Marta’s accident. Jane thought Marta had kept some. 

Then there were other photos, ones it was harder for Jane to tell Ian about. The day she’d been another person: wild, wounded, and angry, and Marta all too present with her camera. Jane told Ian she didn’t know what the photos were exactly, she’d been too undone at the time, but Marta had left with camera intact when she threw her out. 

Without even seeing them, Ian knew he didn’t want them published. Not for his sake, but for Jane’s. Jane had described to him what she could remember of that day. When she told him what she’d been wearing, one thing he knew for sure. The dress was transparent. The only other time she had worn it had been after they were first married, to a charity auction, and she had a sheer long slip underneath. If Jane were an actress, the situation would be different. In many photo shoots, an actress nearly nude was
de rigueur
. It only upped resale value, negotiations, the ante for their careers.

The pictures of a non-famous wife of a celebrity, on the other hand, normally wouldn’t make a ripple on the waters, but now the case was different. The scandal was full-bore, making everything concerning the Reillys fresh fodder. Secondly, Ian sensed Marta had a personal stake in exposing Jane, or bringing her to the public’s attention, that he didn’t wholly understand, despite his guess at her feelings for him. He sensed a bond between them, but couldn’t trace its origin or meaning. He entertained the idea that Marta wanted to make Jane famous. A better word might be infamous. For what end he couldn’t fathom, other than to show him up as a cad, with Jane, the innocent wife, a foil or a dupe. 

He was rather anxious to see the pictures himself. They sounded unusual, from what Jane had dropped about that day. He had told her he was going to get the pictures back. He didn’t announce his speculations about Marta’s feelings.

Marta and Ian sat drinking coffee, the preliminaries before the first bout Marta didn’t even know was coming, Ian thought about his wife on film. Jane had a face that drew him in, invited him to examine it, understand its planes and angles. To look at pictures of her was to discover the eccentricities that made it work as a whole, beyond the stark bone structure, the deep-set eyes, dark silver glimmers shining out of stone. 

When they met, once he saw her work, eyes wide and unprotected as she did his makeup, revealing herself to him unconsciously, he fell for her in one stroke. He studied and longed to touch those hard planes and valleys of her face, the slopes of her body. She reminded him of home. 

He put his cup back in its saucer, the heat from the sip he’d taken warming him inside.

Marta lolled back in her chair, tipping it dangerously. “So we’re all friends, when I can do something for you.” She thought he had called her for an interview, though he hadn’t said a word regarding what it was really about. She hoped for much more than an interview.

Ian’s grave, still face. She searched it, memorized it. He looked at her, and seemingly through her, until she scrunched her head into her shoulders a bit. 

“It’s not like that.”

“What is it like?”

“I do like you, Marta.”

She huffed and looked away, her neck flushing.

“It’s true. I’ve become quite fond of you, for some inexplicable reason.”

She glanced back at him, unable to move for a moment in time, watching the revelation of his easy smile, and she started to laugh. Tears squeezed out of the squeezed-up corners of her eyes as she let out great chest-shaking cries. His eyebrows drew together a bit in concern, but he smiled more widely at her, and she didn’t forget to wipe her eyes, because she loved his smile so, and he joined her in her laughter, but with a head-shaking amazement.

When she had calmed down, with only the occasional hiccup, she said, “I can smell you.”

He frowned and lifted one arm to check. 

“You’ve had sex today, haven’t you?” She wiped her eyes, looking at him.

He studied his right boot. “Yeah.” Expression open, his eyes met hers, searching. 

She looked down then. “I thought so.” Her voice neutral.
I’m like a scientist
, she thought.

“I am married, Marta.”

“Things going well in that department, are they? I suppose they must be.”

“We’re doing better.”

“I suppose the sex helps.” She couldn’t stop herself.

“It does.” He said it in the calm way he had. “That it does.”

There was a tension in the air between them, unacknowledged but felt. She wondered if she dared speak of it. Why didn’t he say something, do something? Either act or take the final shot, put the dumb beast out of its misery. “You’re so fucking honest. That’s your downfall. You know that, don’t you?” She watched him lean back in his chair, as she had in hers.

He used his deadly weapon, the one that did things to her, that could make her cry, make her say things, want to throw herself on the floor and beg. He looked into her eyes, knowing her, and he smiled just a little, a smile for her, no one else. She could feel there were only the two of them, and everything else was a lie. Because he made dreams true. 

“There isn’t much of summer left.” His raspy voice was soothing. “Where’d it go?”

This was no special assignation. Not even an interview. It’s telepathy, she thought, and laughed again, a few more tears trickling out. When the following silence had added its leaden weights to a pack heavier than she could bear, she said:

“It’s been a pleasure knowing you, Ian.” It took all the strength she had. “Even for such a short time. I won’t forget you.” She sniffed, tried to disguise it as allergies.

“Thank you.” He cocked his head. “You’ve taught me quite a lot, Marta.”

She thought he might smile, but he didn’t.

“It would be nice if we could see each other again.” Her accent fell into the cadence of her early youth. There was that connection between them, too, a U.K. childhood. Now she clung to any link, holding to a bit of flotsam as the ship sailed out of sight.

“You never know. Things do have a way of coming back around.”

“Would you recognize me, if we did meet, in some public place?” She held one hand over her eyes, blinking at the table.

“I’m not so fickle as that, luv. You might have learned that from Jane.”

“I have the photos.” The last bit of business between them. She took out a manilla envelope. Memory cards, every existing print, the whole shebang, it was all inside. She’d deleted her hard drive copies. For once, she’d played it straight. “In here are the ones I kept back from Jane when we did the interview. They’re very innocent. Just Jane and Tam playing. Would have brought me a pretty packet, but there you are. When I like someone.” She stopped. “Then the others.” She hesitated. “I hate to give them up. They’re quite something. Some of the best stuff I’ve done. Who’d have thought it would’ve been in someone’s bathroom, no lighting, and a reluctant subject. But they’re just so…I don’t know. I guess you’ll see for yourself.”

“How did you know what I wanted?” 

“Even millionaires don’t send private planes for the likes of me without a very good reason. I got three A-levels; just ask my Mum. It could only be the pictures. I’m being straight with you, Ian. Just so you know, there’s not a single other paparazzi in the business who wouldn’t keep his own set on hard drive, flash drive, somewhere, for his own protection or future aggrandizement. So you do have something to thank me for.” 

“I do thank you, Marta. Truly.” 

He held out his hand to her and she clasped it. She held it and looked at their hands on the table, and she said, “It’s all been worth it, to meet a man like you.” 

He squeezed her hand and withdrew his. She left hers resting on the table. After an silent moment, she said, “The only thing I might ask is maybe sometime…”