Page 13 of I Did Something Bad
“Oh?” he asks, caution tinting his voice. “Whatwereyou going to ask?”
“I was going to ask,” I sharpen my tone to reiterate my irritation at his presumptuousness that I’d be so obvious about it. What am I, a novice celebrity gossip blogger? “What madeherdifferent from everyone else? Surely you’ve met thousands of people at thousands of parties. What was the connection there? Was it just that you’re both Myanmar?”
He’s angled his body to face me directly now, but I’m not fazed. I can almost see his brain taking its time crafting the perfect answer, aware that anything and everything he says can be used against him. For a second, I can’t help but feel tired on his behalf, for always having to think three steps ahead before you speak.
Finally, he puts his phone facedown on his lap. “The first time I was ever invited to a big-shot Hollywood party—and this was agesago, probably a decade by now—it was theVanity FairOscars party. I don’t knowhowmy publicist scored me an invite considering I wasn’t even invited to the actual Oscars, but somehow she did. And this was beforeRenegade,beforeCampfireand evenP.S. Forever.” He pauses, and I try to picture what that Tyler Tun must’ve been like, before all the madness and the lights and glamor and award show invitations, let alone the permanent front-row seats. “As you can probably imagine, I was nervous as all fuck that night. I knew I had to socialize and mingle, get people to remember my face and my name, but I was terrified. I walked in, grabbed a drink, and then walked over to a corner and just…stood.”
“You… stood? For how long?”
“It felt like hours, but then I checked my watch and it’d been six minutes. Anyway.” He cracks his neck. “Eventually, just as I’m wondering if maybe I should, I dunno, go get drunk in the bathroom first so that maybe I’ll be a little braver and actually talk to people, May walks over to me and says, ‘Hi, I’m May.’”
“Had you met her before?”
He shakes his head. “Nope. But obviously I knew who she was. My little sister was obsessed with her on the Disney Channel, andKiss Herhad come out just a few months prior, soeveryonewanted to talk to her. At one point, I could see a literal line forming behind her. But she never turned around, and instead she kept talking to me, a nobody who could’ve easily been mistaken for an overdressed server. And then we both found out that we were Myanmar, and that wasn’t the whole or even themainreason we clicked so well, but itwaskinda the final puzzle piece. Half an hour later, and to the horror of her publicist, we ditched the party and got a taxi to a McDonald’s an hour away, and we sat in a corner booth for hours. We demolished six Big Macs and four bags of fries between us.”
I don’t realize that I’m grinning until my cheeks start to ache.“Sounds like a good night,” I say. The way he recounts it, I feel like I somehow lived the memory myself.
He nods, his own grin expanding like he’s right back there, too. “It was one of the best nights of my life. And that’s just who she’s been for me since then. I’m sure you’ve heard about how Hollywood is ruthless and this industry will spit you out once you’re a second past your prime and all that, and unfortunately it’s all true. But I never—” At this point, he turns the other way and looks out the window, and for a second, I’m worried he’s stopping and self-censoring again. But then he says, voice steady like this is the surest thing in the world, “I never have to worry if she won’t stay. Because I know ninety-nine percent of the people who are currently cheering me on will jump ship the moment something goes wrong. But not May. Because she’s the kind of person who excuses herself from a conversation with Madonna to go say hi to the new kid who’s standing all alone in the corner.That’swho she is.”
In the moment, I’m stunned, trying to process this much honesty all at once. It feels like such a raw, earnest story that I can’t even think of any follow-up questions, because the way he’s said it is just perfect.
My bubble of awe is popped, however, when he throws me a sly sideways smile and reminds me exactly what our setup is by adding, in a tone whose smugness is not lost on me, “And you can absolutely quote me on that.”
As we near the vicinity of the park, it’s clear that word has gotten out. The car crawls toward the entrance while what looks like Yangon’s entire female population aged between thirteen and thirty-three (and a few outliers on either end) swarm the area. I know they can’t see inside the tinted windows, but part of me feels tempted to tell Tyler to duck in case, I dunno, a freshly divorced middle-aged auntie tries to push herself through the glass.
We make it past the gates without hitting anyone, but cars aren’t allowed inside the park grounds, not even for Tyler Tun, so we park in the front parking lot, just a few feet of grass and a half-crumbling brick wall separating us from what I can only describe as mayhem wearing shirts plastered with Tyler’s face and holding up signs with messages likeI’D LIKE TO TY YOU UP IN MY BEDandYOU LIGHT A CAMPFIRE IN MY PANTSand a very succinctTYLER LET’S FUCK.
“I’m going to go say a quick hi,” Tyler says to Tun (“Nice name!” he’d also joked), his PA who greeted us at the car.
“Oh, no, I don’t think—” The poor kid, who is probably no older than twenty-one and for whom this is clearly the most important job he’s had to date, tries to say. (I don’t think you should go into the throng of screeching women, at least one of whom is waving a Sharpie and starting to remove her shirtwas probably what he was going for.)
“Just five minutes, promise,” Tyler says, clapping Tun on one shoulder.
As soon as he rounds the car and starts walking toward the crowd, it’s like an invisible hand turns the sound dial up to a thousand. Tun and I exchange looks that say,You’re seeing this, too, right?And then, when three different bras are flung over the wall,Do you think he’ll make it out alive?
But he does, and once Tyler is ushered away, the guards get to dispersing the crowd. I don’t know how they do it, but in less than half an hour, I can’t spot a single fan outside the gates. I imagine the threat of legal action and/or (worse), confiscation of phones, was used more than once.
Speaking of phones, absolutely no recording of any kind is allowed, which means I have to do things old-school. I scribble down as many notes as I can while mumbling a quick “Hi!” to everyone Tyler is (and consequently I am) introduced to as we make our wayaround. As I predicted, he’s polite beyond belief, saying yes to every single photo and autograph request from whoever asks, even the park janitorial staff. But every time he gets a break from introductions, I can tell he’s looking for something. Or someone.
Another thing I learn about Tyler: he prefers having his hair and makeup done in his private trailer so he can run lines with someone if he needs to; so that’s whereIsit and scrawl furiously while he, script in hand, alternates between quietly running lines by himself and conversing with his stylists. Finally, Tun knocks and pops his head in. “Ready?” he asks. When Tyler nods, he says into his headset, “Tyler’s heading for set.”
“You excited?” he asks me as he holds the door open.
“Actually, yeah,” I say, smiling. The converging realizations that I’m about to watch the first few scenes of the new Tyler Tun movie and that I’m covering it forVoguestart to sink in, and every nerve in my body begins to thrum with nervous electricity.
We’ve only advanced a couple of feet, though, when a voice calls out, “Who let the riffraff in here?! Security!”
Tyler, his small hair and makeup army, and I all swivel to see May Diamond—the chicest bodyguard I’ve ever seen (fictional or not) in her black skinny jeans, cropped gray mock-neck top, hair in a low ponytail—full-on sprinting in our direction, a giant grin on her own perfectly made-up face.
Before I can react, Tyler takes one large step forward, open arms locking tight as soon as May’s body launches into his. “Hi, asshole,” he says into her ear.
It’s one of those moments that almost feels too intimate for an outsider to witness, especially in such a public setting. For a split second, I’m tempted to put my notebook away and pretend I never saw this. But then I remember what Clarissa had said about how maybe this is the lead-up to the reveal of a secret relationship between Mayand Tyler, and, coupled with his vague answer earlier about why he chosethismovie, I inconspicuously jot down my notes so I can revisit this moment later. How their eyes glint with something familiar, like ships spotting the warm beacon of the lighthouse. How, in spite of the raucous mob running and yelling into headsets around us, you can see their bodies relax, palpably feel them shift things around to welcome each other into their space. I think of how comfortable he’d looked earlier when he was talking about May, and I thought I’d gotten it at the time, but now Ireallyget it.
And out of nowhere, a memory: Thidar and Nay letting themselves into my house at 6A.M.the morning after Ben had packed a suitcase and walked out, three iced lattes and five boxes of tissues in hand, dressed in pajamas because they’d known that we weren’t going to get out of bed that day, crawling under the covers on either side of me and holding me while I cried and cried like it was the end of the world. Because that day, that was exactly what it’d felt like, and if I had to face the end of the world, then there was no one else I wanted by my side.
I’m thankfully yanked out of my own brain by May’s voice saying, “Hi! I’m May!” with her arm already stretched out.
“H-hi,” I stammer as I take her hand, a small inner voice unable to stop itself from quietly squealing,Holy shit, you’re touching May Diamond. “I’m Khin.”
