Movie Star By Lizzie Pepper (9 page)

“One Cell believes the opposite. If you look for solutions, you’ll find them everywhere. Pause to ask yourself the most basic questions about who you are and what you want, and answers will manifest.

“You probably know that at the Studio we do group meditations. The Practice actually has three parts: Grounding, Connecting, and Energizing. Grounding is a silent standing meditation. It’s kind of intense. I mean, it’s harder than you think, but you really learn to feel your place on Earth, and you observe the paths your mind follows in the strict absence of external stimulation. The physical practice is a critical element. It really connects your body to your mind in a way that changes how you function in the world. You wouldn’t believe it until you experience it. After that we move into Connecting, which is a guided brain journey. That’s where you learn about the Whole Body Principles in a relaxed state that helps you broaden your perspective—your emotions, needs, desires. Once you see these from a distance, you can think so much more clearly. And the last part is Energizing, where we do poses that are designed to channel all those ideas and revelations from your heart and brain centers to your fingertips.”

Ah yes, those Studio poses. Hollywood lore credited them for lean strength, the toned but slender bodies we all were expected to bring to every role, no matter the character.

“The best part is the 100. Have you heard of it?”

I’d heard of the 100. It was part of the Studio’s cult-y lore. “Is it like group therapy?”

“Sort of,” Meg said, “but it’s a little more direct. You join a Core Group for the Practice, and when it’s your turn, during the Grounding, your leader asks you questions—it’s actually a lot more than 100 questions. Truth comes out—the truths you’ve been keeping from yourself. Once you’ve uprooted your ugliest, hardest, deepest fears and desires, you face life in a completely new way. Post 100, you control your emotions instead of your emotions controlling you.” She touched her bead necklace, the one that resembled Rob’s. “This is a Truth necklace. We all have them. They represent what you learn about yourself in the 100. Does this all sound dopey? I mean, I am fully aware that it’s just some beads on a leather cord.”

“Not at all!” So far I was impressed. It sounded less like a cult than an ambitious self-esteem-building program. No wonder Rob was so unflaggingly confident in acting and in life. “Why does One Cell get such a bad rap?”

“I always wonder that. I’m kind of too inside it to completely understand. But when people get involved in One Cell, they change, body and soul. Sometimes they devote their lives to the Practice or leave toxic people behind. Nobody likes to see their loved ones transform, especially if it means they’re growing apart. Think about a woman who leaves her abusive husband. Of course he’s going to hate the people or organization that gave her the strength to escape. But I really don’t understand why the press goes bananas.”

“Maybe because everything is so secretive?”

Meg laughed. “That’s kind of a catch-22. We get a bad rap for being secretive, but we’ve learned to be private because we’re so constantly misunderstood.”

There was a pause, and Meg asked, “Should we find Rob for you? He’ll be stuck in meetings forever if we don’t rescue him.”

We headed back inside and ran into Rob, walking down the hall
toward us. “There are my girls!” said Rob. He gave me a big hug. “I missed you.”

“I’ve been talking too much,” said Meg. “You know how I get.”

“Watch out, she’s trouble,” Rob said to me, and gave Meg a teasing smile.

“Meg’s been a great host,” I said.

“I knew you two would hit it off,” Rob said. I remember how the old me felt in that moment, thrilled that he knew me so well. He’d picked a friend for me, and he’d gotten it right. Only later would I come to realize how carefully planned it all was.

When I turned my phone back on, there were the texts from Aurora.
how is it? r u alive? pepper? pls confirm you have not signed away yr bank account.

not such a big deal after all
, I wrote.
very hollywood but
no pressure. will call tonight.

okay, b careful!

C
ome on, there must be more. Did they swear you to secrecy?”

“I’m telling you the truth,” I insisted. “It’s nice, but not fancy. They do meditation and offer classes. It’s all sort of self-help stuff, except whatever it is really helped Rob’s acting.”

“What about the Klan robes?”

“Optional.”

“Okay, maybe that’s true,” Aurora said. “But, Pepper, you have to promise me, double-dog-pinkie-swear promise, that you will not shave your head and wear a robe and marry Rob in a mass wedding.”

I could tell Aurora was slightly disappointed that there was nothing scandalous going on behind the walls of One Cell. Aurora was my best friend, but we’d gone in such different directions. During the six years I was working on
American Dream
she’d gone off to college, joined a sorority, and gotten a master’s in social work. Sometimes our friendship seemed to center around her infinite fascination with my comparatively glamorous life. Almost like I was her own personal reality TV show—the more drama, the better.

It was funny that I was the one who’d become a celebrity, because Aurora was the star all through high school. Not only did she have the
leads in all the plays, she hosted all the parties and, as a freshman, dated a senior who was objectively the cutest boy in school. I wanted to be her friend, in an idle way, like any ninth-grade girl who saw Aurora’s self-assurance would. She was the kind of girl who wore a ratty colorless sweater one day and the next thing you knew all the girls were showing up in their fathers’ old, stretched-out gray crewnecks. But I knew she’d never notice me: quiet, studious Lizzie Pepper.

Then, the first week of sophomore year, I had an opening. In homeroom I was assigned a seat right next to Alan Mollander. Now, it was no secret that Aurora had an unrelenting crush on Alan Mollander. Here was one subtle clue: She’d written “I love Alan Mollander” on the wall in the girls’ bathroom in pink Sharpie and signed and dated it every month for two years, cute (now-graduated) boyfriend be damned. On the second day of school, when the teacher asked if there were any problems with the seating arrangements, I raised my hand and said that I was having trouble seeing the board. I asked to switch seats with Aurora, whose desk was front and center. This meant that she would now sit next to Alan for the rest of the semester. As we crossed each other in the aisle, carrying our respective piles of books, she mouthed, “Thank you,” and our friendship was born.

From that day Aurora acted as if she’d accrued a debt that could never be repaid. She critiqued my wardrobe; she brought me to all the parties I never even would have known existed; she found me prom dates. (If I’d worn glasses, she’d have been the one to make me get contact lenses.) Above all, she made me try out for my first school play, junior year. If anyone “discovered” me, it was Aurora.

But now our lives were the opposite of what I would have predicted. Aurora, born to be the center of attention, had gone serious and world-saving, working for a nonprofit in Chicago. I had gone . . . Hollywood.

Once we’d exhausted her curiosity about One Cell, I told Aurora that I wanted her to meet Rob when I brought him to Chicago to introduce him to my parents. I assumed she’d be thrilled. After all, Rob Mars was an even bigger deal in her world than he was in mine. Instead, she voiced concern.

“This is getting serious,” Aurora said. “It’s so fast.”

“I know,” I said, “But I’m happy. It’s okay to just go with it so long as I’m happy, right?”

Aurora was uncharacteristically cautious. “Just make sure it isn’t all on his terms,” Aurora said. “He’s older, successful, and used to getting his way. Don’t let him push you around.”

I bristled. “Have I ever let anyone push me around?” Aurora should have been happy for me, and instead she was acting like a parent. It occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, my old friend was jealous.

“Well, I seem to remember that you let me wear your red dress to the prom, even though it was clearly better on you.”

“You’re welcome.” We hung up, promising to talk soon, but I felt the distance even more than usual.

That weekend it was all over
Rounder
: “Lizzie Gets Serious with Her ‘Boy Wonder.’ Rob to Meet Lizzie’s Parents.” I hadn’t told anyone—not a soul besides Aurora—about Rob meeting my parents, but Boy Wonder nailed it: That was what Aurora and I had nicknamed Rob when he and I first started dating.

I called Aurora. “How could you?” I demanded.

“I had nothing to do with it, I swear,” Aurora said.

“Please,
please
be honest with me,” I said. “I know that
Rounder
can be really aggressive and might take you off guard. And things have been crazy. Maybe I’ve been selfish with all this Rob stuff going on. The point is, you can tell me the truth. I’m not even mad.”

“Here’s the truth, although I can’t believe you’re even asking. I never sold information or gossip or anything about you. I didn’t even tell my
mother
you and Rob were dating until it was in the papers, remember?”

“I wish I could believe you,” I said. “I’m going to hang up now.”

Aurora called me back immediately, but I didn’t answer. Her texts came flying:
it wasn’t me. did u tell anyone else? rob? is ur phone tapped? i think they tapped your phone.

We were at breakfast. Rob was reading the paper. He looked up at my phone, which had vibrated right across the table.

“Aurora?” he said.

I nodded.

“You’re not answering?”

“I think she’s leaking stuff to the press.” I handed him my phone, open to
Rounder
.

He shrugged. “Cut her some slack. She’s new to this, and the tabloids can be pretty crafty.”

“I guess so.”

He looked at me for a moment, reading me. “I’ll get you a new phone number. One for Aurora, too, if you like. With security software. Will that make you feel better?”

It would.

That night Aurora called me on my new phone.

“Thank you, lady,” she said. “I love my spy phone.”

“Now nothing we say will leak to the press,” I said, and I didn’t have to say anything more. I didn’t really want or need to know the truth. I just wanted to trust my friend again.

Then Aurora told me about some crazy date she’d gone on, where it turned out the guy worked as a professional escort, without benefits. She was weighing the pros and cons, trying to figure out if that was a deal breaker, and soon she had me laughing so hard I was crying. Classic Aurora.

There were no further security issues. I didn’t know if Aurora had learned her lesson or if it was the new phones, but, for a while at least, I forgot to worry.

Rob and I spent most of August in Malibu, living the dream, as Aurora liked to say. Travel would descend upon us soon. We both had movies to promote in autumn, which meant doing press and premieres on different schedules in different locations. His was an international release, so we’d be apart for at least a month. In the meantime, we settled into what was a normal life for us. Every morning his trainer came and they worked out together in the gym above the garage. (Apparently the Studio couldn’t take full credit for Rob’s godly physique.) Afterward, it was my turn with the trainer. We alternated between Pilates and grueling cardio workouts. Exercise bored the crap out of me, but it was part of the job.

By the time we finished working out, the phone calls from our people were coming in. Agents, managers, lawyers, publicists. Rob was shooting multiple ads, TV and print, for a brand of scotch, international media distribution only. He never drank scotch, but (as he liked to say) for ten million dollars, he
looooved
scotch. I was developing an all-natural cosmetics line and co-launching an Elizabeth Pepper–branded workout line with Target. In the late afternoons we both had mani-pedis, or haircuts and colors, or waxing, or laser treatments to erase whatever imperfections were threatening to present themselves. I’d always had facials, but now I was systematically removing freckles and unwanted hair from my entire body.

A couple times a week we went to the Studio. Rob had frequent meetings—he was involved in the Studio’s plan to expand the Practice beyond California by building a new studio in the heart of Manhattan—so I’d arrange to have lunch with Meg at the same time. Then Meg started coming over to the house to help me coordinate my life with Rob’s, and
pretty soon it became clear that she could manage me better than I could manage myself, so Meg became my assistant, although we never called it that. It was more like she was my very resourceful friend. Who got paid. When she was paid, how much, and by whom weren’t things I had to worry about.

In late August Rob and I went to the tenth-anniversary rerelease of
An Average Man.
I remembered seeing that movie in high school, with Aurora, and not quite understanding why all our parents thought it was such a big deal. But now, to watch the movie at its star’s side made me feel like a queen. The line between Rob and the protagonist he played in the film, Joe Ferris, blurred. That was my boyfriend up there, transforming from ordinary Joe to Captain Joe, world leader of the future.

Being in that theater, I knew how Kathleen Scott felt, encouraging her explorer husband, Sir Robert, to embark on the Antarctic expedition on which he would perish in a blizzard. She wasn’t thinking about the dangers of that frozen world. She was imagining his homecoming, the heroic return, and what their reunion would be like. What made watching
An Average Man
so hot was knowing that later, at home, Rob would be all mine. I would lie next to the real man behind the hero—the mortal man, who in spite of his bravery still needed me more than anything else.

Little by little, as in any relationship, Rob and I chipped away at each other’s mysteries. His movie star veneer faded. Aside from when I was actually watching him onscreen and that shiver of unreality came when some facial expression reminded me of Henry in
Great and True
, our relationship had nothing to do with who he was in the outside world. I watched him fixate on my five-times-magnifying mirror, discovering for the first time his own unruly eyebrows. I found out that his famously distinguished salt-and-pepper hair required three hours with a colorist once a month. I saw him freak out like a schoolgirl when, closing our bedroom curtains, he discovered a bat. I learned that he could only read
scripts aloud, and needed to take a break every page or so to check his e-mail, refill his water bottle, and stare out the window. I figured out that whenever he was being asked questions he didn’t want to answer, his manner stayed perfectly even but the muscles in his neck contracted in a tic that made him look momentarily like a hungry fish. And yes, world, Rob Mars’s farts stank.

But in some ways I felt like I still didn’t truly know my boyfriend. The Rob Mars gloss was layered thick, and I was always poking at him, trying to get him to admit being bored or lazy or in a bad mood. Didn’t he ever feel conflicted or guilty about the eternal sunshine of our days? Did I never annoy him, not even when I picked at my pedicure as we watched movies? And there was one particularly vexing mystery that didn’t diminish: the locked door in the gym.