Page 37 of The Duet

“Can I tell you something else?” Dave tugs at his graying beard.

“Shoot.”

“I mean no disrespect to Joan, you, or the other members of The Lady Kings. I’ve been with you a long time and The Kings will always be my number one, but that song you do with young Cleo.” He whistles through his teeth. “Something special happens when you two are up there.”

Even Dave has noticed?

“Yeah. She’s good.” Cleo’s made of the same special stuff Joan was made of.

“Good?” He scoffs. “She’s sensational.”

I can only nod approvingly. What would a guy like Dave, and the rest of the crew, make of me sleeping with Cleo? None of these people are saints and many things happen on tour that might not so easily happen in ordinary life. Dave probably wouldn’t bat an eyelid. But that’s the thing with a tour. Once it’s over, all those shenanigans tend to fade automatically because they don’t hold up in real life.

I can easily see myself sleeping with Cleo in hotel rooms all over the country, but I can’t see her staying over at my house on Laurel Canyon, having breakfast with me in my kitchen, in Joan’s chair. That’s about a hundred bridges too far.

“Hey, Dave, you’re a movie buff, aren’t you?”

He nods. “I just caught the latest Jane Campion movie in a theatre downtown while you were all having dinner.”

I slide the manuscript in his direction. “Would you do me a favor and read this for me? Let me know if it’s any good.”

“Untitled Lana Lynch biopic,” he reads out loud. “Whoa. For real?”

“Yeah. Apparently, Faye Fleming wants to play me.”

“Hm. Yeah, I could see that,” he says, as though he’s seriously considering it. “Who wrote this baby?” He peers at the much smaller letters the writer’s name is typed in. “Charlie something. Oh, yeah. Charlie Cross. It’s going to be super queer, that much I can tell without having read one single page.”

“Am I supposed to know who Charlie Cross is?”

“Uh, didn’t Elisa Fox come to the show in LA? Underground is based on Charlie Cross’s books.”

“Really?” Suddenly, I’m a whole lot more interested in reading the script.

“That huge movie with Faye Fleming and Ida Burton that came out a while ago—when there was all this brouhaha about Faye and Ida coming out as a couple. Charlie Cross co-wrote that.”

At least the screenplay writer is queer. That’s something.

“You had no idea?” Dave asks.

“No, because I have no interest in a movie being made of my life. I’m only fifty-four. What this is…” I tap my finger on the pile of pages in front of me. “Is a movie about Joan dying. That’s what it will all boil down to in the end, and I couldn’t be less interested.”

“Fair enough.” Dave eyes the script. “Do you still want me to read it?”

“Yes. I would like that very much.” There’s plenty of time for me to read it after Dave is done with it. “Thank you. Let’s have another beer.”

“Right on, Lana.”

It’s not as if Joan and I were joined at the hip, despite living and working together, but even sitting here with Dave and the rest of the crew feels odd without her. I know my resistance to reading that screenplay, and even more so to the possibility of having that movie made, is me still resisting Joan’s death—it’s my last-ditch effort against making it even more final somehow, as though she can die more than once.

But it’s my prerogative, and I don’t care what anyone else has to say about that. If someone even dares to make a move on this production without my blessing, I will sue the pants off their arrogant booty. Who does this Charlie Cross think she is, anyway? Writing a screenplay about me without ever having spoken to me? Where does she get her information? It can only be a load of bullshit. I’m sure, if she were still alive, Joan would agree with me wholeheartedly.

It’s well past midnight when I return to my room. There’s no sign of Cleo yet. I could text her, but that’s not the kind of person I am. If she shows up, she shows up. If she doesn’t, too bad for her.

Before I slip into bed with an episode of Underground, I search the internet for a clip of our very last duet. The one before we kissed. I watch it a few times, because it’s hard not to play it again and again and get sucked into the magic of the moment. Until I realize it will be too bad for me as well if Cleo fails to show up in my room tonight.

Chapter 22

Cleo

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