Page 77 of Holiday Star
Lawson’s ex goes berserk trying to find him.
I don’t give a fuck what he, or anyone else, wants to say about me.
“Don’t know. Disappeared like last Christmas when he went to your house. His parents came into town, not a good sign.” He sighs. “They’ve never let him grow up, you know? His parents, his agents, all his handlers. He’s easier to control that way, helpless without them.” His words remind me of when I first met Caleb, how he couldn’t even turn on the washing machine.
“Careful. You almost sound like you care,” I warn.
“Let me tell you a story,” Wayne begins, and as he talks I see why he’s such a good reporter. He has a way of capturing my attention, painting a picture with his words.
“When Caleb was about nineteen or so, I was outside his building waiting for him to come out. My third wife, now ex-wife, was on the phone, bitching at me about how I was missing my son’s baseball game. I was always missing those games back then. Too busy working.”
“Anyway, Caleb comes out and tells me to get lost like usual. I tell him to go screw himself, like I always do, but then I get upset because it’s bugging me, missing my kid’s game. I keep thinking of how my son looked at me that morning. How he didn’t even bother to ask if I’d make the game, something he used to do. It was like he’d given up on me, his workaholic dad.”
“I don’t mention any of this to Caleb, but, somehow, he knows. We’ve been together a long time, like I told you. He asks what’s wrong, and for some stupid reason I have a moment of weakness and tell him.”
“Caleb rolls his eyes and tells me, ‘Okay. Let’s go.’ And I’m like, ‘Go where?’ He says, ‘To your son’s game. I’ll go too so you can watch him and me at the same time.’”
Wayne gets uncomfortable at this point, as if he regrets bringing it up. He rushes to the ending. “We go, and my kid freaking loves it. Tells all his friends, ‘Check out my dad sitting over there with Caleb Lawson. They came to seemeplay.’” Wayne shrugs. “My son still talks about it, all these years later.”
I look at him with fresh eyes, seeing the attachment you must make when you spend so much time together, the way that he and Caleb have, even if most of it is at a distance.
He glares at me. “Don’t go getting all sappy-eyed, sweetheart. There’s no heart of gold under this shirt.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I wave him off, thinking about how his heart may not be gold, but he did just prove that it’s still beating.
“That’s a good story. Sounds like the Caleb I thought I knew.” Sadness tinges my words.
Wayne’s sharp eyes are evaluating me again. “That is Caleb. So is the drunk. So is the jerk. So is the guy who donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to charities last year without telling anyone about it.”
“Exactly!” I throw my hands up. “Isn’t everyone like that? Aren’t we all a million contradictions? Sad one day. Happy the next. Sometimes kind and other times selfish. The only sure thing about us all is our inconsistency. I don’t understand why we expect celebrities to be any different. Why must they be only one person? Never changing. Always frozen in time.”
He shakes his head. “That’s not what people want. It’s too confusing. They want the simple story. Good versus evil. They want the celebrity wearing the white cowboy hat to never put on the black one. Caleb’s been painted as a golden boy. It’s a long way to fall off his pedestal.”
Turns out Wayne is right. I start paying attention to the magazines I used to detest. I watch the entertainment shows on the TV. That picture of Caleb at the bar is everywhere. His sudden disappearance doesn’t help. It makes him seem guilty. No new shiny photos of him to replace that incriminating one. The news anchors repeat over and over, “Caleb Lawson’s representatives decline to comment.”
With Pip sitting next to me on the couch, I call Caleb’s phone again that night and the next and the next.
No answer.
I don’t leave a message.
Instead, I paint.
48
Rehab,” Wayne announces a few days later as I emerge from the hospital after a twelve-hour shift. He hands me a cup of coffee. Starbucks this time. Not the cheap stuff. It must be bad news if he’s bringing me caffeine.
“A facility up in Santa Barbara.” He takes a sip from his own cup.
“Is he okay?” I open my lid a crack and blow on the steaming liquid, watching it swirl under my breath. The drink warms my paint-stained fingers.
“Don’t know. That place is locked up tighter than Fort Knox. It caters to celebrities. Prides itself on keeping things confidential. You wouldn’t believe the strings I had to pull just to confirm he really is in there.”
“Will you publish it? That he’s in rehab.”
Wayne sends me a look, showing he’s disappointed that I even asked. Like I should know better. But when he sees the frown lines in my forehead, he softens and gives me a begrudging, “Sorry, sweetheart.”
He usually says sweetheart sarcastically, like the word was caustic, but today he says it without irony, the gentle way a father would to his daughter.
