HOLLYWOODLAND HOLLYWOODLAND an american fairy tale JENNIFER BANASH Impetus Press PO Box 10025 Iowa City, IA 52240 www.impetuspress.com [email protected] Publisher Note: This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. ISBN 0-9776693-0-0 September 2006 Copyright © 2006 Impetus Press. All rights reserved. for my father I’m going to be in the movies if I have to fuck Bela Lugosi to get there. Actresses are a little like race horses. It’s difficult for us when the race is cancelled. This is an attempt at the ultimate motion picture. ••• 2:00 AM, 82 ° She is in her car when it happens, the black roads around Mulholland winding and twisting, unrolling like the soft dark fabric of a magic carpet. Her eyes blur and she squints them repeatedly, leaning forward to see. The needle on the speedometer flies up past eighty, then ninety, the tendons in her right arm straining, muscles burning as she grips the wheel one-handed. Sierra loves to drive more than anything, the feeling of weightlessness, careening through the air, unstoppable. She was fucking unstoppable. She could feel the kid in the seat next to her getting nervous, moving back and forth in his seat, one hand clutching the belt that cut across his skinny frame. His jeans make a harsh scraping sound. The rasp of denim on leather annoys her, and she closes her eyes. “Sierra.” She could hear the panic creeping into the kid’s voice, tight and measured. “Open your eyes. Slow down.” The kid is a roadie and a distraction. This is what you did in Hollywood. You partied. Pills pooled in an unlined palm, champagne sliding down a long pink throat. White powder, the gleam of crushed stars, the shock of adrenaline hitting the brain, eyes widening. And you did not go home alone. Not if you could help it. Especially if you were a girl famous for being sexy, for getting laid. So, she tries to relax, cranks up the stereo and hums along with the music, one hand grazing the wheel with her fingertips, the bass vibrating through the leather seat, her hair moving in the breeze wafting through the open windows, heavy with the scent of white flowers and scorched earth. Spinning hubcaps set the tempo for the music of your broken window. Camera’s on and the cameras click, we open up the lens and can’t stop . As she turns the wheel sharply to the left, negotiating the steep curves which lead up to her house, she does not believe, even for a moment, that she is drunk. Sure, I was buzzed, she’d think later, but I’ve been way more wasted than that and still made it home. The tree rises up through the sky like a mirage, its long branches reaching toward her with sharp, bony arms and scratching fingers. How the hell did that get 1 JENNIFER BANASH HOLLYWOODLAND there—then white light, or is it the white picket fence just beyond? The crash, her head hitting the steering wheel with a surprising amount of force, stars clouding her vision in a flash of exploding whiteness. Shit, that really hurts. The pain in her face is sudden and enormous, the bridge of her nose on fire. And the kid in the set beside her, holding his arm and groaning. “My arm, shit, Sierra, my arm.” White clouds billow up from the crumpled front end of her car. We’re going to disappear in a puff of smoke, she thinks, giggling to herself. Poof! Her laugh rings hollowly in the darkened interior, and when she brings her hands up to her face, her fingers nervously searching the fine bones, they come away wet and red. Her face. Fractured. Ruined. She scrambles for the rearview mirror, her nails catching on cold metal, pulling it sharply down. A sliver of light illuminates her features, dissected in fragments, shards reflected in the narrow strip of glass. Mirror, mirror on the wall, am I most beautiful of all? Her eyes are beginning to blacken, her nose distorted and swollen. Dark liquid, the bloody black of rottenness, of decay, runs from one small, perfectly-shaped nostril. “Queen, thou art lovely still to see, but Snow White will be a thousand times more beautiful than thee.” She pushes against the door with a low moan, terror rising in her throat, throwing her whole body weight, one hundred and seven pounds against the hard metal until it finally gives, creaking open. She tumbles out onto the still-warm pavement, her body hitting the asphalt with a sharp smack. When she picks herself up, the kid is standing on the side of the road cradling his right arm which hangs at an unnatural angle from his body, the shoulder jutting up through his thin gray t-shirt. He leans over, surveying the damage to the fence, which is demolished, and the tree, still standing. His face is pale, ghostly in the moonlight and when he speaks, his voice breaks and she shivers, touching her face lightly with one hand, fingers shaking. 2 3 JENNIFER BANASH HOLLYWOODLAND It is two in Hollywood. Eighty-two degrees. “Sierra, we’ve gotta get your car up to the house. See if it starts.” She climbs back into the car and sits down gingerly, the back of her legs scraped raw and bloody from her tumble onto the pavement. The smell of spilled gasoline hangs in the air like toxic waste. She holds her breath and turns the key tentatively to the right, imagining the explosion, the car engulfed in flames: burning, twisted steel, the red-orange heat of the fire consuming her. She realizes that she is sweating, her shirt is wet through, the material sodden and stuck to her skin. After three tries the motor catches, coughing and sputtering its way back to life and with a loud rattle, the engine begins to purr. “Thank you, God,” Sierra mumbles under her breath, and then coughs, blood pooling thickly in her mouth. “C’mon, get in already!” She is panicked, annoyed at the kid, at herself, but mostly she is scared. She hunches over the wheel, concentrating on the brief stretch of road leading up to the house and tries to ignore the fear building in her chest, the incessant chatter of voices on the radio, in her head. She realizes that she is moaning, the sound coming from the deep center of her body, her voice strained and stuttering. Uhhhh . Uhh . Uhh . She pushes the remote with a jab of her thumb and runs into the darkness of the garage, which is cool and dry, leaving the kid sitting open-mouthed in the car, cradling his bent arm. She flips on the overhead light and begins searching frantically under piles of boxes, (C’mon c’mon, where is it, where is it?) and bulging plastic bags. When she straightens up, she is sweating. She can feel the blood dripping from the end of her nose, spattering redly on the concrete floor, the faint sound of bones crunching beneath the skin as she reaches up and wipes her face with one hand, dark fluid staining her pale skin. Her face feels swollen, huge and hot, her features impossibly distended. She holds a nine millimeter in her hands, the black steel cold around her curving fingers. She sighs deeply, relief relaxing the muscles in her back, and suddenly she is so tired. She sinks to the dusty, cement floor and puts the gun to her head, hand shaking. She 2 3 JENNIFER BANASH lowers the gun for a moment and cocks it, the sound echoing in the damp, cavernous space, then places it muzzle flat against her temple. Its coolness against her skin is calming, and she concentrates on her breathing, filling her chest deeply with air, then exhaling. Her head begins to feel light. She closes her eyes. Who do you think you are Sharlene Miller? Oh, I’m sorry, Sierra? Crashing your car like that. Spoiled brat. Cinderella, my ass. You’ve got a test shoot with Playboy tomorrow. Face cut up and smashed, nose like Bozo the clown. So attractive, really. Mortgage overdue, credit cards maxed. No one wants to work with you. Fired from Vixen. Too difficult, they say. Bitch-cunt, they say. You can’t get a movie to save your life. Hell, no one even likes you. You Sharlene, not Sierra, the tit job, the curtains of bleached blonde hair, but you. Do you even exist anymore? Whatever happened to Sharlene Miller from Barstow, California? I don’t know, she whimpers. I don’t know who that is anymore. 4 JENNIFER BANASH Coma I She was spinning out through darkness . A series of shadows looming like ghosts cut from strips of black paper, growing before her closed eyes. This is where I undo the spell, she thinks excitedly, her fists clenching the stiff white sheets. And the prince . For there is always a prince, moving through the story like water, his silhouette walking out of the blackness to claim her. The touch of hands on her shoulders, breath in her ear. Sierra, wake up. Don’t leave us. The wind, she thinks with a smile, is picking up. But all at once she is spiraling down through a pocket of light, glittering, more precious than even the diamonds circling her wrists.