“No, it’s fine. I’m fine. I just want to…”
She shakily opened the door and fled. She needed to get to Griffin. Because somehow a Hollywood superstar had become her go-to guy.
Chapter 17
Griffin
Griffin had planned to make it quick. Pop into Mr. Ross’s room—he’d never been “Franklin,” not to Griffin—pay some strained respects, offer his sympathies to the family, leave.
But when he arrived, no one was there but the old director himself, though Griffin wouldn’t have recognized him without his name on the door. He was half the size of the man Griffin remembered. He was asleep, or perhaps unconscious, his head little more than a skull with some skin loosely applied, his toothless mouth open in a slack O, his every breath a raspy groan—inandout. This was the tyrant who’d made a year of Griffin’s childhood hell?
The visitor chairs sat empty, as did a cluster of vases. There was one thinking-of-you card. Griffin idly picked it up. It was from a performers’ benevolent fund. Not even signed.
Griffin’s phone beeped. His first thought was Lana, and his reaction was warm relief. But no, he hadn’t given her his number. It was his mom:The gray lady is not who you think. Do not trust her.He frowned. His mother often communicated in code, wary of messages being intercepted, but this one was lost on him.
The door opened, and a nurse walked in, wheeling a little cart. She saw him and halted. “Oh, I didn’t realize someone was here. I’ll come back.”
“It’s fine.” He put the card down. The room was too empty, too quiet. A tomb already.
“I’m Ophelia, one of the nurses. I just need to chart some vitals.” She unrolled a blood pressure cuff. “Were you close to Mr. Ross?”
“He directed me in my first film.”
“Of course! You were amazing in that. You got an Oscar nomination, didn’t you?”
“Right.” His one and only.
“I remember that,” she said, wrapping the cuff around the director’s pale, flaccid arm. “What were you—ten, eleven?”
“Nine.”
“Gosh. Well, I’m glad someone’s come to see him. A reporter tried to get in once, claiming to be his granddaughter.”
“He doesn’t have grandchildren. His son died in a plane crash years ago.”
“We know. That’s why it didn’t work—for the reporter.”
“Are you saying no one’s visited?”
“Not in the couple of weeks he’s been here, and he’s declining fast.” She dropped to a whisper. “But then he did have a reputation for being something of an…”
“Asshole,” Griffin muttered.
“I didn’t want to say it,” she said, fitting an oxygen monitor to his finger.
“Sorry.”
In Griffin’s memory, Mr. Ross was a giant. Giant frame, giant voice, giant personality. For years after filming wrapped, his face had haunted Griffin from the black and white prints in his grandparents’ gallery. An unnaturally white smile against an unnaturally dark tan. Parties. Drinks. Women. The guy hadn’tsat at home watching movie marathons and still he ended up alone.
Are you lonely? Lana had asked Griffin. He hadn’t known how to answer, but this …thiswas lonely.
“Sadly not unusual, for someone of his age,” Ophelia said as she worked. “When you don’t have family and outlive your peers… But he left his mark, which is more than you can say for most of us. He launched your career, so that’s something, isn’t it? There are all sorts of ways we leave the world, and I’ve witnessed a lot of them. This one doesn’t seem so bad. Live large, then sleep till you die—and who doesn’t like a good, solid sleep?” She returned the cuff and oxygen monitor to her cart and checked a bag of fluid clipped to a pole. “Can I get you a coffee—if you want to sit a while?”
“No, I’m good. I just wanted to say goodbye, and I’ve done that, so…”
Griffin needed to leave—fast. He followed the nurse into the hallway. The ward was quiet, though all the other patients had at least one visitor—holding their hands, silently reading magazines, hugging other family members. He recognized the name of an agent who’d once been big. Only one other room, next to the nurse’s station, was empty of visitors. The door was closed, but through the small window he could make out the outline of a body under the bedding. The name outside the door said “Unknown.”
“You have a John Doe?” he said to the nurse. “Here?”
