Eva followed June into the decoration-strewn living room, not knowing what else to do.
At the dry bar, June opened a decanter of whisky and poured a healthy amount into a tumbler. She tipped her head back, swallowed, and then poured more. She took the glass in one hand, and with the other she massaged her back as she made her way to the sofa and sat down.
“It’s true what you heard me tell Max just now,” June said.“About Elwood feeling like the accident only just happened.” She took another sip of her drink and then leaned back against the couch. Her gaze landed on the half-decorated tree in front of her.
Eva moved to the sofa and sat down next to her. “What happened in that accident?”
June took a deep breath before speaking again. “Elwood was dating the woman who was in the car with him that night. Her name was Ruthie. I think they might have been in love with each other. Anyway. Ruthie didn’t survive and she left behind two little boys whose father had been killed five years earlier at Pearl Harbor.”
“Oh my! That’s so sad.”
“It was awful. El felt like he made those children orphans. He told me he’d been driving too fast and he’d had drinks before he got behind the wheel. He blamed himself for killing that young woman. It’s guilt and regret that kept him chained to this house all these years. And neither of those two things left any room for him to feel anything else. That’s the sad, honest truth.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“When Frank and I moved in here to care for Elwood we both tried, for years, to convince him it was an accident. That’s all it was. But he wouldn’t listen to us. And then Frank died, and he wouldn’t listen to me.”
“How sad.”
“As sad as it gets,” June said, turning her gaze to the photo of her, Frank, and Elwood on her wedding day. Her eyes were glassy, shining with ache.
For several long seconds, neither one said anything.
“Would you like me to finish with the Christmas decorations?” Eva finally said.
June didn’t answer right away.
“No,” she said, several seconds later. “No, I don’t.” She tippedher glass back into her mouth, emptying it, and set the tumbler on the coffee table. “You can finish with that later. Or tomorrow. I don’t care. Let’s go up to Elwood’s office and see about your typing skills.”
“Now?”
“Yes, now.”
“You can make it to the second floor all right?”
“Well, I’m not going to race you, that’s for sure, but, yes, I think I can manage.”
They started for the staircase.
“Elwood won’t mind my using his typewriter, will he?” Eva asked, curious to know how June would answer.
“I can assure you without hesitation that he won’t.”
Her tone was so final and definitive that Eva felt her eyes widen.
“It’s been a very long time since Elwood has been able to write anything well,” June continued. “And even longer since he’s sat down at the typewriter or even stepped inside his office. I’ve been writing his scripts for years.”
10
Melanie stood at the picture window in the front room and watched as a man in a convertible pulled up to the Blankenship house.
He got out of the car and she recognized him. He’d been at June and Elwood’s before, though it had been a while. Max Somebody. Elwood’s agent.
The man strode purposefully toward the Blankenships’ front door.
For a long moment she wished she were sitting on the passenger side of that shiny red car with its top down, waiting for him to complete his business at the house and come back out to his car. He’d then be on his way back to Sunset Boulevard. Or maybe Beverly Hills. It didn’t really matter. She’d want that passenger seat if Max Somebody was headed next to Skid Row, so hungry was Melanie for a break from the tedium of her exile.
She hadn’t been back to Los Angeles since Carson had brought her to this house. Irving and Walt—and Carson, too, for that matter—had all advised her it was wise not to be seen in public,especially back in Hollywood. She didn’t need the press hounding her or asking her questions and then printing things about her that weren’t true and that she hadn’t said, and she certainly didn’t want to make it easy to be served a summons by coming back to LA.
