Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Why was he suddenly revealing his deep, dark secrets? Erin was a friend, but she was here as a reporter, not a confidante. He shook his head. She was the exact opposite of a confidante. She was doing a profile on him for the paper that everyone in town read cover to cover.
Erin must have sensed his inner conflict, because softly, she asked, “Did social services never get involved? Did no one see what was going on?”
He laughed, a short, humorless bark. “I was probably more scared of social services than I was of some of the creeps who hung out with my mom. Besides, she needed me. By the time I was seven, I was talking grocers out of food past its expiry date and just about managed to feed us both. Mostly it was milk and cereal. I learned to cut out the bad bits from bruised fruit and vegetables. I got lunch at school, so there was that. And I loved school. I loved learning.”
He stopped again. What was he doing? No one knew how he had developed the gift of the gab by sweet-talking greengrocers out of their overripe bananas. He had a sudden flash of himself as a kid, skinny and scrappy and so darned hungry—not just for food, but for life. For living! If his mom had taught him anything, it was that he didn’t want to end up like her. Wasting away.
Erin stayed silent, but it was a comfortable silence, one that told him he was safe here, with her.
He took a breath. “I would steal money out of my mom’s purse when she was passed out, otherwise everything went on her habits. She wasn’t a bad woman, my mom. She tried. That was what was so hard. In her way, she loved me. But her addictions were stronger than any love she had.”
He paused, shocked by the stab of pain he felt at the memory. He hadn’t let himself think so much about his mom in years.
“It sounds like you had to grow up very fast,” Erin said, her voice still soft and full of understanding.
He had to stop spilling his guts and get this interview back on track and answer Erin’s original question. “By the time I was fourteen, I knew I had to get a job. I went around the fancy parts of LA to every shop and restaurant, anywhere that might hire a scrappy kid, and one place, a real nice place, had a sign in the window for a dishwasher. I marched in there and said, ‘I’ll be the best dishwasher you’ve ever seen.’ I sold them so hard I made it sound like it would be a crime if they didn’t hire me on the spot. So that’s exactly what they did. At first it was just an after-school job, but as I got older, I started working evenings, too. I began to understand that the diners were industry people. I recognized a few of them from TV and movies, but I quickly learned that the power people weren’t the pretty faces on the screen, they were the producers. I worked so hard that when the owners said they wanted to promote me to full-time dishwasher, I said yes, but only if they would train me to be a waiter. Because waiters got tips, and even better, they overheard the gossip that was going on at the tables. I dropped out of high school without giving it much thought.” He stopped again, trying to keep himself on track. He had a question to answer. “So by the time I was eighteen, I was waiting tables and charming Hollywood big shots. I made the fattest tips of all the staff. It meant my mom and I could live in a nicer apartment and eat decent food. But Mom was pretty far gone by then.” An unfamiliar lump caught in his throat. It had been so long since he’d thought about the end of his poor, messed-up mom’s life. “She died of an overdose before I turned nineteen.”
“I’m so sorry,” Erin said softly.
He nodded, took a sip of coffee and gave himself a moment. “But the one thing we always had was a TV, and sometimes if she was feeling good, she’d take me out to the movies and we’d sneak in without paying and live in a fantasy world for a few hours. It was my favorite time we spent together. I fell in love with movies and TV when I was a little kid with no hope. They showed me what life could be like. So by the time I was waiting tables, eavesdropping on the Hollywood bigwigs, I already knew the kind of life I wanted.
“A lot of people I worked with were actors, screenwriters, budding producers, and directors, waiting tables or tending bar until they got their big break. I got pally with a few of them, one in particular. He was about my age, already a crazy handsome guy, which I was never going to be, and we shared a similar work ethic. Unlike some of the others, he knew he wasn’t going to get his big break because somebody liked his pretty face. He took acting lessons and went to every audition. He was one of the most focused guys I’d ever met. One day we were playing pool after our shift and he told me about this great part that he knew he was born to play. I agreed that he was perfect for it. But they wouldn’t see him without an agent. We were both moaning about how unfair it was for people that weren’t already established, and then I had one of those lightbulb moments. I threw down my pool cue and almost knocked the poor guy out as I yelled, ‘How hard is it to be an agent?’