Jaine Austen 2 - Last Writes (16 page)

By Jaine Austen
—

…when it suddenly dawned on me that I was sitting in the same seat Quinn had been sitting in when he died. Yikes. I was in a Dead Man’s Chair.

Instinctively, I leaped up. And it was a good thing I did. For at that very moment, a hundred-pound overhead light came crashing down onto the kitchen table. Just inches from where I had been sitting.

Chapter Nineteen

I
don’t know how long I stood there, rigid with fear, staring at the lethal black lump that had landed on Muffy’s kitchen table, gouging it like a meteor from outer space. Finally I managed to open my mouth and scream. Louder than I’ve screamed in my life. Louder, even, than the time I had my first and only bikini wax.

I forced myself to look up into the rafters, but it was too dark to see clearly. For all I knew, someone could have been hiding up there in the shadows of the cat-walks.

At last, one of Miracle’s crackerjack security guards came racing into the soundstage. The guard, whose name tag said “Bobby,” was a kid, barely past the Clearasil years. With a faceful of freckles and an unruly cowlick, he looked like Dennis the Menace in uniform.

“Gosh,” he said, taking in the scene. “What happened?”

“Someone tried to kill me,” I shrieked. “Call the police.”

“Gee, I can’t call the cops, ma’am. Not without authorization.”

“Authorization? What authorization?”

And why was he calling me “ma’am”? Did I look that old?

“From Mr. Donnelly.”

“Who’s Mr. Donnelly?”

“Head of Security.”

“Screw Mr. Donnelly,” I said. “I’m calling the cops myself.”

I was just reaching for my cell phone when a burly guy with a gut the size of a watermelon came puffing onto the stage.

“Hey, Mr. Donnelly,” the kid said. “I was just about to call you.”

“What the hell is going on here?”

“Someone tried to kill me with a klieg light,” I said. “I was sitting at the kitchen table, and the light fell just inches away from where I was sitting. The wires must have been cut.”

Donnelly took out his flashlight and shone it up into the rafters.

“Nobody’s up there.”

“Of course not. Whoever did it wasn’t going to stick around and wait for Security to show up.”

“What makes you think anyone’s trying to kill you, ma’am?”

Why did these idiots keep calling me ma’am? Any minute now, I expected one of them to issue me an AARP card.

Donnelly scratched his greasy head and examined the scrapings trapped in his fingernails.

“Coulda been an accident. These things happen, you know.”

“Just call the police.”

“There’s no need for the police, ma’am. We can do our own internal investigation.”

Aha. Now I understood what was going on. Donnelly didn’t want to call the cops because he didn’t want any more negative publicity for the studio. Well, I didn’t give a flying frisbee about the studio.

“Either you call the cops,” I said. “Or I do.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

I looked up and saw Detective Incorvia walking toward us.

“Detective Incorvia! Thank heavens you’re here. Someone tried to drop a klieg light on my head.”

“I’m glad they missed,” he said. “Now calm down.” He lead me over to Muffy’s living-room sofa. “Can I get you something to drink? Some coffee?” He turned to the Security guys.

“Can one of you get us some coffee?”

“No,” I said. “Get me the scotch.”

“Scotch?”

“In the cookie jar.”

He went to the kitchen and retrieved the scotch from the cookie jar.

“I see Muffy’s been dipping into the sauce again,” he said, smiling, as he handed me the bottle.

I took a healthy swig or three.

“Feeling better?”

I nodded.

“Okay, why don’t you tell me exactly what happened.”

And I did. In a giant rush of a run-on sentence, I told him everything. And I mean everything. I told him about the frog in my briefcase, and Bianca’s hair ornament, about the Evian/gin bottle in Muffy’s drawer, and how not a half hour after I’d been talking with Zach, a klieg light crashed on the kitchen table and almost killed me.

“Wow,” he said, when I finally came up for air. “That’s some story.”

“Don’t you see?” I said. “Everyone knows I’ve been asking questions about Quinn’s murder. Someone obviously wants me to stop.”

By now, a bunch of cops had arrived and were investigating the scene.

“Detective Incorvia!” one of them called from up on the catwalk.

“Yeah?”

“The wire’s been cut.”

“What did I tell you? This was no accident. Somebody wanted to kill me.”

“It sure looks that way.”

And suddenly I was terrified. I liked it a lot better when it could have been an accident.

Chapter Twenty

D
etective Incorvia walked me to my car.

“Are you sure you’ll be all right? I can have an officer drive you home.”

“I’ll be okay,” I said, not meaning it. My heart was still bouncing around in my chest like a Ping-Pong ball. I could picture the headlines:
Freelance writer has heart attack on freeway. Medic who drags her mangled body out from behind the wheel says: “Never have I seen such ratty underwear.”

“Jaine? Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine.”

I was just opening the door to my Corolla when I thought to ask: “By the way, Detective, what were you doing here tonight?”

“I came to interview an employee. One of the cleaning crew.” He took out his pad and consulted it. “Crista Alvarez. Apparently she saw someone sneak into the prop room a few minutes before the show started taping. At first Ms. Alvarez didn’t want to get mixed up with the police. But then her husband convinced her to call us.”

“My gosh. Who was it? Who did she see sneaking in to the prop room?”

“You’re not going to like this,” he said with a sigh.

“Why? Who was it?”

“Your friend Kandi.”

“What the hell were you doing in the prop room?”

Kandi and I were in the living room of her high-tech, high-rise Westwood condo, where the living is easy and the rents are astronomical. I’d found her sprawled out on her spotless white sofa, watching a tape of
Miracle on 34
^th
Street
, the treacly Natalie Wood movie about a kid who doesn’t believe in Santa Claus.

“You know how many times I’ve seen this movie in the past week?” Kandi said. “Fifteen times.”

“Fifteen?”

Kandi nodded. “It’s so soothingly bland. It calms me down.”

“Well,” I said, pressing the mute button on the remote, “it’s time to return to the Land of the Anxious. I repeat: What the hell were you doing in the prop room? Apparently a cleaning lady saw you sneaking in there before the show started.”

Kandi sighed. “Getting closure.”

She popped the cork on a bottle of wine. “Want some?”

I shook my head. Something told me I’d need to keep a clear head for this story.

“A couple of weeks ago we did a show called ‘Spiffy Biff.’ All about what happens when Uncle Biff meets a woman and tries to impress her by acting suave and debonair. In the show, Biff tries to be worldly and takes up smoking a pipe. After the show wrapped, I took the pipe from the prop room. I know it’s insane, but I wanted it because it had touched Quinn’s lips. I was so crazy in love with the guy. You know how that is.”

Sad to say, I didn’t.

“Of course, after I found out he’d been screwing around on me, I was furious. The last thing I wanted to look at was that damn pipe. Dr. Mellman told me to get rid of it. He said it would give me closure. So I brought it back to the prop room. I slipped in while Mr. Goldman was telling his knock-knock joke.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was ashamed. I felt like such an idiot, stealing something because my lover’s lips had touched it. Have you ever heard of anything so stupid?”

Actually I had. One of The Blob’s proudest possessions was a laminated paper cocktail napkin that he swore Heather Locklear had used to blot her lipstick.

“So I guess Incorvia is convinced I’m the killer, huh?”

“No, not at all,” I said, without much conviction.

“Oh, God, Jaine,” Kandi said, slugging down some wine. “You’ve got to find the real killer.”

I’d been planning to tell her about my near brush with death, but now I didn’t have the heart to do it. She had enough to worry about.

I turned the sound back up on the television and kissed her on the forehead.

“Try to get some sleep, sweetie. I’m sure everything will work out.”

She nodded numbly, and I walked out the door,
Miracle on 34
^th
Street
droning softly in the background.

Poor Kandi. Not even Santa Claus could bail her out of this mess.

By the time I got back to my apartment, my terror—which had temporarily abated with the news of Kandi’s prop room adventures—was back in full bloom. Someone had tried to kill me. Whoever it was might try again. And again. Until they finally got it right. A thought which sent me scurrying to my medicine cabinet in search of tranquilizers.

I rummaged through yellowing bottles of aspirin and ancient moisturizers I’d bought while under the influence of a Clinique saleswoman/hypnotist. Finally I found what I was looking for: A bottle of Valium, left over from my divorce from The Blob. I save it for specially horrific occasions. (Like the time I saw myself in a three-way mirror in a pair of bicycle shorts.)

I opened the bottle and popped a pill in my mouth. I felt it working right away. The fact that I’d washed it down with a glass of chardonnay didn’t hurt. I was feeling a lot calmer as I ran around the apartment checking the locks on my doors and windows.

Prozac, sensing how distressed I was and how much I needed her comforting presence, decided to take a nap.

“How can you sleep at a time like this?” I wailed. “Someone tried to kill me today.”

She opened a baleful eye and shot me a look that said,
This never would have happened if you’d stayed home where you belong taking care of Me-Me-Me
.

Then she rolled over and went back to sleep, totally ignoring me. Much like The Blob used to do after sex.

I crept into bed with my chardonnay and a hot-water bottle and turned on the TV. Maybe, like Kandi, I could find a calming movie to watch. I zapped around, with no luck.

Why is it that whenever you’re in desperate need of a good movie, all you ever find are those stultifyingly boring 50’s gladiator flicks? Where actors like Tony Curtis and Ernest Borgnine run around in togas saying stuff like, “Caspius hath declareth war on the armies of Andronicus and Moronicus!”

I zapped my way past the gladiators, a monster movie, and the Three Stooges. I was about to give up and watch C-SPAN (always an effective sleep inducer) when I came across an old made-for-TV thriller about a psychopathic little boy who kills anyone who gets in his way. It was a shameless ripoff of
The Bad Seed
. Normally I would have zapped past. But there was something about this movie that made me stop: The little boy. I recognized him right away. It was Zach Levy-Taylor, the twelve-year-old version.

I’d know that bad acting anywhere.

There he was on my TV screen, killing his enemies at the slightest provocation. And you’ll never guess what he killed them with: rat poison. That’s right. The very same stuff that killed Quinn.

Suddenly Zach zoomed to the top of my suspect list. Was Quinn’s murder a case of life imitating art? Had Zach bumped off his real-life enemy with the same poison he’d used to kill his fictional ones? Had he remembered his long-ago role and reenacted it on the
Muffy ’n Me
soundstage?

It all made sense to me. The kid had no imagination. I could easily picture him using an old script as a blueprint for murder.

And how did I know that Zach actually left the soundstage after our little chat tonight? Maybe he sneaked back in and climbed onto the catwalk while I was busy snooping in Muffy’s bedroom. He knew I was investigating the murder. Maybe he was afraid of what I’d discover and decided to put an end to my questions with a lethal overhead light.

A million possibilities (all of them ghastly) buzzed in my brain. By now, I was utterly wired. No way could I relax. I tried C-SPAN and hot milk and reciting all of Elizabeth Taylor’s husbands in alphabetical order. But nothing worked. Sleep was out of the question. I tossed and turned, and tossed some more.

It wasn’t until about four A.M. when Prozac jumped in bed and curled up against my tummy that I was finally able to doze off.

I woke up the next morning bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. I’d left the TV on all night, and now an impossibly chirpy trio of pretty people with poufy hair were giggling their way through the morning news.

If you ask me, it should be a federal offense to be chirpy before nine A.M.

“And now,” said a gorgeous Asian woman with poufy black hair, “let’s hear the latest Tinseltown News from entertainment reporter Jim Freeman.”

The camera cut to a cherubic guy with poufy red hair.

“Hey, kids!” the poufy redhead said. “Have I got news for you! More mayhem on the set of Miracle Studios’
Muffy ’n Me
. If you remember, last week cast member Quinn Kirkland was poisoned on stage while shooting an episode of the teen laffer. Now, less than a week later, the Morning News has learned that freelance writer Jaine Austen barely escaped death when a klieg light fell just inches from her head. Word on the street is—it was no accident. Which is why folks are now referring to
Muffy ’n Me
as
Murder ’n Me
.”

His sidekicks chuckled appreciatively.

“With so much bad press, don’t be surprised if this Saturday sitcom winds up in Cancellation City.”

He then passed the baton to a poufy-haired weather guy, who said, “Jane Austen? Isn’t she already dead?”

Gales of laughter from his fellow yuckmeisters. What a class act. Edward R. Murrow was probably rolling over in his grave. And I wasn’t all that amused, either.