Shooting Stars (32 page)

But for now, the tight belt which has been cinching my chest has been loosened a notch. No, this is not how I dreamed of having a family. Nobody dreams of this. But at least, maybe now, I
can
have a family…even if it's not the structure I thought it would be. At thirty-seven, I'm learning that life is often not how I thought it would be.

And for the first time in years, I realize that maybe that's OK.

* * *

Growing up in the '80s meant growing up with the Brat Pack—
Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, St. Elmo's Fire
. So when I read that '80s star Molly Ringwald had moved to L.A., I was ecstatic—I loved Molly Ringwald.

Spurred by a starring role in the TV show
The Secret Life of the American Teenager
, Molly relocated her family from Europe to Venice Beach and rented a modest home a few blocks off Abbot Kinney.

For three Saturdays in a row, I'm on her. It's a commitment: not only is Molly a long drive, but working her also means I have to pass up all the
other celebs who are typically out and about on Saturdays. But I know she's worth it. Magazine editors are around my age, and they'll remember Molly. She'll sell.

In many beach neighborhoods, residents like Molly park in a communal alley behind their houses and can exit on one of two streets enclosing their blocks. So in order to watch both of Molly's exits—along with a potential
walk
out the front door toward the shops and beach—I need to sit in the opposing alley, uncomfortably close to her house. It's convenient to be a woman in these situations: people may find my car a nuisance, but they don't see me as menacing, as they might if a guy parked similarly. I can leave my windows and visors down, even unzip my pants if my skinny jeans are too tight, and no one's going to complain.

The first Saturday, I sit all day long with no signs of life. I don't yet know Molly's car and her garage door is down, so it's impossible to tell if she's home. I try again the next Saturday, and this time I see her. I haven't seen a picture of Molly since her old movies, and I'm pleased to report she's just as I remember she looked as little Samantha in
Sixteen Candles
: precious. She looks sick, though—hunching over as she gets out of her car, coming
home
at around 9:30 a.m. (I must have missed the departure.) She goes inside, not to resurface for the rest of the day. I get a couple of shots, but they aren't particularly becoming so I don't send them in. I want Molly's first experience back in the States to be fabulous, and I won't have the tabloids making fun of her with my help.

Finally, the third Saturday, I get to know my little redhead. And Molly Ringwald, the teenager I so wanted to be, lived up to my dreams. In her back alley drive, Molly comes out with a small video camera, and her husband and daughter come out with a bicycle-built-for-two. Molly laughs as she takes pictures of her family. My smile is bittersweet as I take pictures of a family life I so covet. Then, as if that weren't enough, the three drive to Santa Monica and buy Molly a bike. Hidden behind my tint, I watch and photograph as she test drives bikes in the shop's back parking lot until she finally settles on one—frilly and pink with a basket and horn.

Besides today, I've only ever had one other “I wish I were them” day in my life as a pap—the day I followed Justin Chambers (
Grey's Anatomy
's Dr. Alex Karev) and his wife and their five kids as they adopted a new puppy.

Truthfully, I don't covet the life of celebrities. I don't covet their money, or their fame, or their power. (OK, maybe I covet their clothes.) Really, I want just one thing, and you know what that is. And off the top of my head, I can think of more than a dozen stars who would surely give up all their money, all their fame, and all their power for the exact same thing. We are all just human.

Several weeks and several magazine sales later, I can see a break in the clouds. The Malibu thunderstorm is over, hopefully Frank Opis has “gone away,” and I have a baby plan in the works. Sunshine is still in the distance, but it is bright. And as I reflect back—and ahead—I realize that although life doesn't promise me happiness, in America I'm free to pursue it. And that's big.

I put in an informal resignation with CXN. Since I'm freelance, there's no real resigning, but it's time to go. I feel sure Bartlet is going to be sad to see me leave; I am a top earner for CXN and Bartlet is a businessman. It hurts when all I get is an email: “No problem. Bring your Nextel to the office tomorrow.”

It makes sense to go, not only to feel valued and appreciated, which I never have with CXN's management, but also for financial reasons. Because my reputation has grown so much in the last eighteen months—which I didn't fully realize until I started listening to offers—I find I can command 70 percent rather than the standard 60 percent, of picture sales. Doing the math, going from 60 to 70 actually means a 17 percent increase in overall pay. (Simon could never understand how that worked even when I did the fractions for him.)

After positive interviews with International PIX (iPIX) and its American owners, Will and Jimmy, I accept an offer with their agency.

Jimmy tells me later that the head of Just Jared, the largest inside industry blog, congratulated them on my hire: “You scored a coup getting Jennifer.” Finally I comprehend—not conceitedly, just factually—that
in a short time I have become one of the best paparazzi in Los Angeles and by default the world. And it all started less than two years ago when Paris Hilton crossed my path, and I “just knew” that this was what I was supposed to be doing.

* * *

I think if you're a female over the age of twenty and you get pregnant, you can't claim it's “completely unplanned” if you're using no birth control or using only a half-ass birth control method. Conversely, if you're thirty-seven and haven't had a boyfriend for years, it makes perfect sense to think getting knocked up is about as likely as sighting a pink panther.

So when I slept with Bo, a pot-smoking Canadian backpacker who lived in a Hollywood hostel, the ludicrous thought of getting pregnant didn't cross my mind, at least not right off. The morning after, I was concerned only that Bo—who told me immediately
after
sex that he was “probably” a sex addict, that he was into multiple-partnered sex, and that he was looking for an open relationship—might have given me any number of STDs. Fabulous. I sure know how to pick 'em.

I had met Bo at the Starbucks on Western Ave. It had been my ritual this summer to start off my mornings there. Bo asked me out, and one afternoon we went whale watching in Long Beach together. It was fun to hang out with someone who knew so little about Hollywood culture. A couple of times we went “dutch” to dinner.

It was clear right off that Bo had “issues,” as the dating world likes to say, so we probably weren't meant to be together for the long term, but he kissed me on the whale-watching boat, and it felt nice, so I kept seeing him. A few dates later, the kissing turned into groping, and all of a sudden it turned into
way
more than I'd planned for.

I didn't stop it, but I didn't exactly enjoy it. I just lay there thinking,
Ummmm, THIS is what I've been missing out on for the last [insert: very large number of] years?

To make matters worse, when our lackluster lovemaking was over,
he
started to get upset. About what, I do not remember. Never did I want someone gone more than
right then.
But we were in my bed, of course, since he lived in a bunk-bedroom with roommates. After twenty minutes, the longest amount of post-coital cuddling I could muster, I told him he had to go.

The next day I called to ask Bo to get tested, as testing myself right then would have been pointless because one of the worst STDs, AIDS, would take three to six months to show up on my test. I explained awkwardly, “I've never had casual sex. I've only slept with [insert: very small number of] boyfriends in my life…I'm sure you're fine, but I'm just scared.”

The more I asked, the more angry and upset he became. “You don't trust me…You don't like me…What do you think is wrong with me?” Eventually, he hung up on me. Once again, fabulous.

Fortunately, he must have realized I really was just doing this for my own protection, because the day after that, Bo texted to say he would get tested. A few days later, he called. His test results had come back clean. Phew, I was in the clear.

Then, I ovulated. Since I've been considering a sperm donor, my doctor suggested that I monitor my ovulation cycle. For the last three months, I'd been testing my cycle. For the first two I had come up with nothing—no surge in hormones, no release of egg. My period would come, but the stick never changed. Something was wrong.

This month I'd bought four kits—twenty-eight sticks—and peed on one every single day. To my relief, about nine or ten days before my period was due (and four or five days after I'd had sex), the stick began to show a surge in hormones. According to the kit instructions, “the line” still wasn't dark enough to say I was ovulating, but at least it was turning color. Phew, I had some hormones left.

Eight days after Bo and I had sex, I went in for a pre-scheduled OB-GYN visit and told my doctor of my ovulation woes. “Oh, you have a short luteal phase,” she explained, and I wondered why she didn't mention that possibility before. I had no idea what a luteal phase was, so looked it up when I got home. The second half of a woman's cycle, after ovulation, is
the luteal phase, and if that time period is too short (the average length is fourteen days), then an embryo may have difficulty implanting. A luteal phase under ten days will generally not support pregnancy. The doctor also said, “We'll need to do several more tests before we try insemination, and may need to supplement with hormones.” Fabulous, again.

* * *

Day 23. When they inseminate you, or if you're trying to “get pregnant fast” (by reading
Get Pregnant Fast
books), you wait till you ovulate and then have sex/squirt sperm. It seems that once your egg is loose—and she lives for two days—then the sperm, who live for up to three, have the best chance of swimming to meet her. Nobody seems to mention that having sex, letting the sperm swim aimlessly around in there, and
then
releasing the egg, also might work.

Cursed with an extremely short cycle (apparently a luteal phase issue), I get my period every twenty-three to twenty-five days. Today is Day 23 from my last period, and I did not get my period this morning. Not necessarily alarming, but JoDeane did tell me yesterday that her Internet research produced some articles saying that sperm live for up to two or three days
or more.

Now it seems that although it's
very
unlikely I'm pregnant (I'm
sure
I ovulated four to five days after sex with Bo, and not before), it's not impossible.

* * *

Day 24. Today, instead of my period, I receive a letter from the LAPD. Signed by a “Detective Gonzalez,” it asks me to call a number because the detective wants “to talk.” It only gives a reference number and does not specify what the topic is. Bartlet (who I still talk to most every day) says it is obviously about the bite I gave Frank weeks ago, and if I ignore it, it will go away: “The LAPD have much bigger battles to fight than ones between two paparazzi,” he says.

Not getting my period on Day 24 isn't completely unusual. Still, I don't “feel” like I'm about to get my period. Today, I feel nothing, except for an odd sense of…something.

Are you there, God? It's me, Jennifer. Where is my period?

* * *

Day 25. My period did not come this morning, and all of a sudden I have a strange sense “down there.” I didn't think you could feel if you were pregnant, at least not this soon.

Around one, Claudia Nextels me. She knew I'd slept with Bo, and rumors were obviously spreading that there was an off chance I was pregnant. “Buy a pregnancy test and meet me on Robertson.”

“I'm not officially late till tomorrow. I'll do it then.”

“I'm gonna come get you, and we'll go to Rite Aid together if you won't go yourself.”

“Fine,” I say, mildly irritated. I'm not ready to deal with “results”—good or bad. Especially since, in this case, I don't even know what
good
or
bad
would be.

An hour later, after a stop at the drugstore, I arrive before Claudia at Cuvée on Robertson. I order my usual turkey and Gouda sandwich and sit down to wait. When she walks in, she shuffles me immediately toward the restroom. Right then, her Nextel goes off. It's J.R. with a Lindsay tip.

“Damn. I gotta go.”

“No problem.”

“You can do this without me.”

“Right.”

She rolls her eyes. “You wanna come?” she says, offering to share the Lohan tip.

“For sure, no. I wanna sit right here and eat. I'll call you later.”

As I eat lunch, a tornado swirls through my head:
Besides eleven days ago, it has been [insert: a ridiculous number of] years since I've had sex. Bo and I slept together only once. He'd have to have had super-sperm for
one to have survived till I ovulated. Besides, he's a heavy pot smoker—and marijuana kills them. How many could have been viable? I was starting to like BMG8865 and his curls.

Regardless, I know I'm pregnant. I can feel it. Still, I don't take the test.

After lunch, Claudia hooks me up with the massive Lindsay follow, the one I didn't want to join in the first place. About five minutes later, we both lose it, quite intentionally.

“I'm done with the day,” I beep. “Going home. Gonna happy hour with the girls.”

“I'm ringing you first thing in the morning,” Claudia responds before signing off.