Sometimes I wonder how the hell I would have managed if Dr. Lemon hadn’t done me that favor.  Maybe I would have turned to dealing, or worse.  Maybe right now there’s another kid sitting in a library somewhere reading about acid-eating microbes in South American caves as his empty belly rumbles.  Dr. Lemon died of pancreatic cancer about a year after that fateful meeting.  I hope someday I’m able to pay it forward, the chance that he gave me.

Miles pass and my mind never strays from Ren for very long.  I’m not awfully creative and for the life of me I can’t imagine how things are going to go when we’re face to face.  I keep myself occupied with the radio so I don’t have to think about what the hell we’ll say to each other when I drive into Atlantis.

“So Ren, what’s up?  Been a few years, haha.  You look hot.  Sometimes I think I hate you.  And sometimes I think the opposite.” 

I’m starting to wonder if maybe this wasn’t such a good idea, showing up like this.  I could have tracked down Ren a long time ago to figure out whether we could wade through the mess of our past.  But it would have been harder for her to find me, if she’d even tried.  Maybe she had tried and then gave up.

Gary’s oily assurances that the family has no idea I’m part of the production schedule may or may not be bullshit.  I don’t give a damn about the rest of the Savage clan; Ren’s sullen brothers or her airhead sisters.  I know August has been dead for years and Lita can go eat glass for all I fucking care.

Once I told the girl I loved that she’d never have to see me again.  That’s a promise I should have broken a long time ago.

CHAPTER TEN

REN

I remember reading something once about how in olden times royalty would always be surrounded by people.  They had all these well-dressed clingers – usually minor nobility - hanging around at all hours to help them dress, to hand them spit glasses, to inspect their piss, to claw wax out of their ears, whatever.

Even though no one has tossed me a chamber pot when I sit up in bed the first morning of filming, I have the feeling I’m opening my eyes inside of a fishbowl.

It gets worse when I open the door.

“Shit!”

The shriek erupts from my mouth when I nearly collide with a prowling cameraman.

It’s the handsome dark-haired one one I’d seen yesterday.   He doesn’t say sorry.  He doesn’t say anything.  He just trains his lens on my wild hair and puffy face.

I cross my arms over the old t-shirt I’d worn to bed and disappear into the bathroom for a while.  At least there are no cameras creeping around the bathroom.  Well, none that I can see anyway.  I decided not to think about that.   I have some trouble attaching my microphone and finally just stuff it inside my bra, winding the cord beneath my shirt and attaching the box piece to the waistband of my jeans.

When I finally emerge, the cameraman is gone and I find my sister Ava in the kitchen scooping some hideous orange goo out of a jar and feeding it to her son.  Rash is crouched in a corner with a camera balanced on one shoulder.  He looks like he was painted there. I wonder if his knees hurt.

“Hey,” says Ava with bright cheer as Alden spits out a blob of orange.  I can’t say I blame the kid.  I’d spit it out too.

There’s a large country kitchen table in the middle of the room that I don’t remember seeing before.  Spence used to have a folding table and one metal chair.    It’s probably a prop, procured by Vogel Productions.  Brigitte had told me that Spence had gotten rid of a lot of the furniture ages ago. Gary’s team must have arranged a little bit of interior renovation.

I pour myself a cup of coffee, sit on the rustic bench that fits neatly with the rustic table in the rustically repainted kitchen while Brigitte prances around the clearing in front of the kitchen window amid a cloud of feathers.  I gulp down some black coffee.  I never sweeten my coffee.

“What the hell is Bree doing?”

Ava wipes her son’s mouth.  “Feeding the chickens.”

“I don’t remember seeing any chickens yesterday.”

“They weren’t here yesterday.  A truck arrived this morning with some chickens and a premade coop.”

“Ah, another prop.”  I’m starting to sound downright bitchy.

There’s a low whistle from the corner.  I turn and face the source of the noise.

“What’s that?  You calling a dog, Rash?  I haven’t seen any around.  Unless one arrived with the chickens.

“Ren,” Ava whispers.  “You’re not supposed to talk to the crew.”

“Then maybe they shouldn’t whistle at us.”

“It was supposed to be a subtle hint.”  Rash has lowered the camera and fiddles with one of the dials.  The cameras are actually smaller than I expected.  I wish this would make them seem less appalling but it doesn’t.   “I was just reminding you to stay on track.  Any mention of Gary or the show and certainly any direct conversation with the crew will need to be edited out.”

Edited out.  Of course.  Reality television, what an absurd contradiction.

“Sorry,” I grumble. “I know I’m supposed to pretend this is real life.”

“It is real life,” argues Ava as she lifts Alden out of the high chair.  The little boy lays his head on his mother’s shoulder and gives me a winning smile, squeezing my heart in a little spasm.  For his sake, I’ve got to keep up appearances.

“You’ll get used to it,” Rash promises.  He removes a white square of cloth from his back pocket, rubs it across the camera lens and resettles it on his shoulder.  “Hey Ren, the others have already given their fifteen minutes in the Blue Room.  You want to get this out of the way now?”

The Blue Room is an appendage to the original house.  It juts out of the back like a square hump and spoils the sensible footprint of Russ Savage’s architectural design.  It had been Lita’s project, a lavish guest bathroom that August tiredly agreed to build and never finished because there was no money.  Now it’s been refashioned into a confessional booth of sorts, with sea-colored walls and neutral Pottery Barn furniture to lounge on while pouring out the contents of your heart.  Of course you understand before you start talking that everything you say will be appropriately modified for the show’s needs.

“Why the hell not?”  I grumble.

“Camera’s all set up in there.  Just switch it on when you’re ready and answer the questions as best you can.”

“What questions?”

Rash or Cate Camp or someone on the Born Savages payroll must have explained it to me already.  Nevertheless, Rash patiently explains again.  Every week there will be a different list of questions that we are supposed to address during our Blue Room interview.  We may choose a crew member to be present for prompts or we can sit there and monologue it all the way.  For the life of me I cannot picture my brothers engaging in long winded monologues but apparently everyone’s finished their weekly interview except me.

Suddenly I’m eager to get this first hurdle over with so I spill out the rest of my coffee, plant a kiss on my little nephew’s forehead and head down the hall.  Before I go I wave out the window to Bree.  She doesn’t see me.  She’s trying to gracefully wrench her heel out of the mud while a chicken pecks at her lime green toenails.

The Blue Room smells, strongly, oppressively, of freesia.   One quick glance around and I see the culprits; a cluster of of those benign jelly-like air fresheners that gradually dry up and wither into a hard crust.  It’s an unpleasant odor to me because it reminds me of Lita.  Her signature scent was an expensive freesia-based perfume and she always wore too goddamn much of it.    I grab the air fresheners in a hug and and chuck them out the door into the hallway before settling into a wide papasan chair.  I feel like I’m sitting in a cereal bowl.