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She skimmed right over his lame attempt at humor. “You’re going even farther back in time, eh?”

“Right.”

“Who else is in it?”

“Great cast. We’ve got Tor Torsten directing, first of all. Delaney Corts is Circe, Bond Andersson is Telemachus, we have Vaughn Santineau, Martin Ramp. All the ingredients are there so we’ll hope for the best.”

“And when’s that coming out?”

“Early next year, I think.”

“Time for a break. When we’re back we’ll discuss how Ian balances films with home life, plus more about his new film,
Lunacy
.”

Babe got her makeup touched up. They touched him up, too. Someone fussed at his hair. The audience started a chant. 

“ee-AN---ee-AN---ee-AN” He got up, unhooked his lavaliere, and walked to the front of the stage to crouch down and shake hands with people. Screaming ensued. The aura coming from the audience no longer felt overpowering and unfamiliar. Instead, this close, he could feel their affectionate interest and curiosity. He studied each new face with a curiosity of his own. What had brought her here today? It was an audience overwhelmingly filled with women. Instead of continuing to bend over he hopped down off the stage. A happy, “Ahhh…” emanated from the group where he landed. A few people reached out impulsively and touched him on the arms and back, but then they drew back as if remembering their manners. One woman on the verge of tears asked him for a hug, which he gave. This set off a flurry of requests for hugs, with a reason given why each recipient needed one: “It’s my birthday,” “I just broke up with my boyfriend,” until one woman said, “I want a hug ’cause I want a hug, honey!” He was aware of large men looming in the periphery and the distant sound of Babe’s voice calling him back, a voice trying to wake him from a dream. Guards stood on either side and created a path back, through the pile-up that formed around him. Babe called his name again, silvery laughter in her voice, and he vaulted back onto the stage to hoots and hollers from the crowd, who clapped even more, and somehow more sincerely, after this gesture of good faith. 

He got clipped in and sat down with a warmer feeling than before. He hadn’t planned on sharing to quite such a degree, but still, it felt good to be liked for something. His work, or an idea of who he was. Even that. Yes, it could be a misconception, but if a part of him showed through when he acted, maybe the people here saw it and it touched them, and that was why they gave him some small part of their time and attention.

Babe was explaining the next part of the movie, the time travel element. They gave away so much in these interviews. So much for plot twists.

“Let’s look at this next clip.”

The clip was of a chase, Capassis running through the woods to a stream he splashes along, while behind him a small pack of wolves trots at a distance along the scent, easily keeping up yet never closing the gap. Then he stops, exhausted, turns, and faces the wolves, which halt and look at him, until he falls backwards into the stream. (Applause.)

“And that was filmed…?”

“We were lucky enough to get permission to film some of it on Isle Royale.” 

“The film has time travel, amazing scenery. There’s someone else on the island, isn’t there?” Babe asked. 

“Yes. It’s lucky that it’s Rebecca Wendell.”

“That is lucky, isn’t it? You’re a lucky man.” They laughed together. She glanced at her cue cards. “She plays researcher Kendra Barton, who helps Roderick uncover the truth about what’s happening to him. To move to another area of your life, Ian. Your personal life. You don’t talk about it a whole lot. Is that part of your plan? Keep what’s personal, private?”

“Not exactly. I haven’t talked about it a great deal because I’d rather do my job and talk about the films I’m working on and what they’re about, when I’m here to promote them.”

Babe gave him a look at the end of his answer. Her lips came together in a pursing, considering moue, and she made a tisking sound. She went on.

“Ian has a lovely wife and daughter. They keep their life private, and we’ll respect that, but I think he’ll excuse us for asking a few little questions. So how do you keep things good at home when you have to be away working so much?”

“Um, I’m not saying it’s easy. It’s not. I’m away more than I’d like to be. I’d like to slow it down a little. That’s something I may need to do, just so I have the chance to spend more time at home.”

“So they don’t travel with you.”

“No, we have a nice place at home, and our daughter goes to school, so they need to be there.”

“So how do you and your wife stay connected?”

“We talk on the phone when I’m away. And we savor the time we do have together. It helps to know the reasons why we’re doing what we’re doing. But I think there will be a change down the road.”

“So you’re saying you’re going to do fewer movies?”

“I want to do projects I really care about. If that means fewer, so be it.”

“You’re in your prime years as an actor. That’s a big decision.”

“It’s true, but my daughter’s only six once, and my wife is my first wife, and I want her to be my only wife. You know?”

Jane opened the door of the flat, back from a trip to the British Museum marked by photographers who lurked on the street, trailed behind, nipped into the Underground after them. They were ignored but persistent, careless of her occasional sharp looks, focused only on the pictures they might cadge for their trouble. Her mind was in a tumult over such attention, running along the lines of,
Why me? I’m nothing to them. Is it Tam? She’s a small child, why do they care—after the first few pictures what does it matter. They know what she looks like. What do they expect to see?
Her mind took a darker turn.
Is that it? Are they watching for something—for me to do something wrong?
This dubious path had unpleasant byways.
They’re looking for a clue, a reason why I'm here. They want to write about what might be breaking us up.
 

Her need to get away, to find out the truth for herself, had bred even more questions and theories in the press. They lay in wait for her to do something newsworthy. From her previous life of relative simplicity and seclusion, sequestered from the popular culture that existed in that parallel universe, somewhere close to her husband’s world, not quite of it but feeding off it and even perhaps necessary to it, she felt herself being absorbed into that thin anemic plane of the tabloids, by the self-exposure she’d involuntarily made herself vulnerable to in her London life. 

Her interest was piqued by the reports on Tam and herself in London. Since that first startling notice of the pictures and article in the
Stargazer
, now her appetite was whetted and she wanted to know more. What was being said, who was saying it, how close to the truth they were, and in particular what they were saying about Ian. She kept her mind away from her former self’s judgment of the tabloid-reading masses. 

REILLY MARRIAGE ON ROCKS, SAY CLOSE FRIENDS

The Reilly marriage is suffering from Ian’s long absences due to his filming schedule, say close friends of the couple. His frequent location shoots coupled with rumors of romance with beautiful co-stars have clearly been enough to chase wife Jane Reilly to London Town; far from the family home located in the wee village of Kittrie in the midwestern farm country of the United States. Could this be the death knell for their seven-year marriage? Time will tell as we spot Jane and daughter cavorting about town, sans Ian. Could Delaney Corts, currently lying low in Los Angeles, be the true cause? A spokesperson for Corts says Reilly and Corts are “just friends,” but it’s hard to interpret that phrase these days in Hollywood-ese.

IAN REILLY’S WIFE: COHABITING WITH NEW MAN?

Ian Reilly’s wife Jane, recently vacationing in London with daughter Tamsin, is residing locally at a Notting Hill flat, also occupied by an unidentified middle-aged man: a balding, oft-suspendered gentleman who is a far cry from the glamorous husband she left behind. Could this be the real reason for the Reilly’s separation? She and the mystery man haven’t appeared together in public; instead leaving and entering the flat at different times, an apparent attempt to keep the relationship under wraps. She may feel turnabout is fair play, as her husband has been accused of playing around on the set of his latest film,
Odysseus
, with gorgeous American co-star, Delaney Corts.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

O
N
A
FAIR
wind, he crossed the ocean back to them. Returning from the park, she opened the door, walked down the short straight hall and was drawn to look around the corner, where she saw him. He was sitting on the ivory chair, his dark skin and hair vivid against it, as if he were superimposed against the sky, smiling in the split second before Tam burst in the room. Tam ran in, stood in the middle of the room, like a pointer zoning in on the bird, stock still before she unfroze and tumbled forward into his arms. 

“Oof. How’s my girl?” He hugged her and she started talking, as if she’d been saving everything to tell, all about the flat and the park and their lives. The men with the cameras who followed them. She sat on his knee very straight and told him her life. He listened, tucking her hair behind her ear. She mentioned Mr. Beezer who had visited for two days—he raised his eyebrows as she told about him. He looked across the room at Jane, where she had sunk into the opposite couch.

“How are you?” In his words there was so much more than the words themselves, a world of worry and concern and love. She shook her head.

That evening, Tam tucked in bed, when it was just the two of them, the mood was more like that to be found in the arena of a Roman colosseum than a Notting Hill sitting room.

Jane paced back and forth the length of the room, while he sat exhausted on the couch. The room was close to darkness, their bodies shadows, the draperies pulled wide by Jane, who by her actions seemed to feel claustrophobic.

Ian knew he had one chance. He gathered his energy, depleted by months of filming, months of being alone, years of isolation of the heart; more deeply still by other scars of loneliness and loss. This evening, seeing just the outline of Jane’s body, he thought for the first time how her form was reminiscent of his mother’s.

“Jane, I’m so terribly sorry. I know what I did was wrong. Now that I’ve been alone and had a chance to be outside that crazy world, I can see things for how they are."

He spoke to the wounded creature in her, and in himself. “Penelope." 

She looked out the window.

“What errors I have made, and yet what wonders I have seen. Too many tales to tell in one evening, though I will try to tell you every one, every night, until you feel you’ve been there with me, as you were with me in my heart. It was you who brought me back from the madness of this journey. You were the guiding star, my compass point: no matter where you are, or where you go, that’s where I go to find my home.” 

She stood in the window for some time, until she turned to face him. “Actors.” 

He had a sense of impending doom.

“Liars for money. Are you doing it for free now?”

 She stepped up close to him, gazing at him with dispassionate eyes, a look he hadn’t seen, and now found the most difficult to bear of all. 

“Did one lead to the other? Did fantasy creep into reality until you convinced yourself the line didn’t matter?” She turned away, arms folded. 

He saw the faint outline of her back, as she looked out the tall living room windows into the darkness, looking at something in her mind he couldn’t see, but could imagine. 

She continued, in a different voice. He had to struggle to hear her. 

“It seems…it seems so often our wishes become needs before we notice it. When before the wish was the brass ring we never dreamed of grasping. That’s been my life with you.” She made a noise, from deep in her belly, a low sound, a humorless laugh. 

“Oh, dear. How I’ve paid these last weeks—years—for my romantic delusions. Living in an ice palace that’s melted away beneath my feet. The thaw’s set in, you see. It was a cold place, you know, but solid. I was so sure. I thought I could secure it myself, I suppose, brick by bloody freezing brick.” She held her elbows in her opposite hands, rocking forward and back. He watched her head fall, and she turned, crossing to the couch, to seat herself next to him. In the dimness he could see, up close, her face was hard and immovable, a mask. She turned, searched blinking for him. “I do love you. I can’t help it. I’ve thought and thought what I should do, but there it is. I can’t throw away the love I have for you.” Now tears smudged the mascara she wore, something new, leaving black trails down her cheeks. “It’s the biggest, deepest feeling I’ve ever had for anyone.” She chuckled, smearing the tears from her cheeks. “Then Tam came along.” 

They both smiled, though not at each other.

“It’s not just love. It’s the life we once had, those first few years when we were happy. I think we were happy. Those are the two reasons I’m here with you right now. Why I opened the door and let you in.”

After a lengthy silence. “Thank you.” He felt afraid to say more, as if he’d startle her off, like a wild bird. “Thank you.” 

They sat together for a time. “What you said before. I believe you believe it. But you have hurt me in a way that doesn’t heal in a matter of hours or days or weeks. There’s a hole in my heart where the trust between us used to be. I don’t know what it will take to fill it, or if it can be filled.”

 “We’ll have to see.” His voice was barely a voice at all: his declaration and her response having drained him, lines etched between his nose and mouth.

Jane’s lips were mobile, tightening and relaxing. “It could be goodbye.”

“Please no.” 

She let herself be enfolded, almost crushed. He didn’t want to see her face. Her expressions gave him no satisfaction. All he wanted was the assurance of her physical presence. He could do whatever it took to make it right. As long as he wasn’t banished and she didn’t want to disappear, he could win her again. Even his wife couldn’t be immune to the greatest of his charms, should he choose to exert them. And he did choose. He’d been a fool. For Jane, best to be…he felt a sinking drop-off in his stomach. Could he win her back? Acting wasn’t the thing. It was feeling and being real. It was exposure. He clutched her tighter and it wasn’t until he heard her cry out that he realized he was hugging her too hard. Releasing her, he pulled back, breathing hard, and they looked at each other. She had one hand over a place on her shoulder. Her controlled mask was gone. Instead he saw shock and embarrassed confusion. Her face was red and malleable, the tear stains like warpaint, in vertical stripes and great dark smudges beneath her eyes.