DINNER IN L.A. - Chapter 3

DINNER IN L.A.

a short story in three chapters

Chapter 3

The helicopters made a wide sweep over PCH and the ocean, then back over our hillside. Had they come to check out my rooftop body? Effie did say the police would be here “any minute.” Was a dangerous criminal on the loose… a new hillside strangler? Did the strangler murder the man in the Hawaiian shirt? We bandied these thoughts around until Jim noticed that, except for some police cars, PCH was void of traffic. We all looked down on the empty highway, then saw a stream of headlights in the distance. As the lights got closer, we realized that this was just another high (or low) speed chase. We decided to go into the house so we could continue our scintillating conversation without having to scream over the incessant chopper engine noise.

We gathered in the living room, as Susan brought out a sinfully rich chocolate cake from the latest trendy bakery. I don’t do desserts (the only food vice I don’t have) so I plopped down on the sofa facing the view that was unobstructed by a wall of windows and sipped my wine. The helicopters continued to circle and when they were over the ocean, total blackness behind them, they appeared to be eye level, giving me the sensation that I was hovering in a plane. I wondered what would happen if someone in one of the helicopters discovered my body and alerted the others. Would they try to land on the roof, ruining a possible crime scene, or would they tape it for the 11:00 news? Probably both--- this is L.A., after all.

We endured the muffled noise for another ten minutes before the helicopters left, presumably because the high (or low) speed chase was over. We didn’t bother to turn on the TV. After watching O. J. in his white Bronco all those years ago, the chases just seem redundant now, though local news never seems to tire of them as they try to recreate that O. J. drama. They don’t seem to get the fact that we watched that chase because it was O. J. Duh!

Back outside I grabbed another piece of now-cold pizza and was surprised that the rock music was no longer blasting from below. We were all laughing as Carol told us about her latest ad campaign for a “feminine hygiene” product that was using the slogan “A Rose By Any Other Name,” when we heard a gun shot. Automatically, we hit the deck (a practiced reflex in L.A.), but after lying on cold flagstone for a few minutes our southern California comfort trumped our fear, so we got up. Ben brazenly looked over the edge of the terrace and began to laugh. We rushed over to see what was so funny and saw that a movie screen had been added to one end of the faux Neutra house’s cement terrace. Bridge chairs were arranged in rows in front of it and the catered party guests were watching an old black and white gangster movie. Bogie appeared on screen, drew a gun and fired, the shot reverberating off the hillside. I half expected to see my rooftop body get up and return fire. But he continued to lay motionless and alone.

It had been a few hours since I first called 911 and I was getting angry. Why hadn’t the police come to investigate? Where was the CSI team or medical examiner? Didn’t anyone but me care about Mr. Hawaiian Shirt?

I again took out my cell and dialed 911, ready to give whomever a piece of my mind. Effie was still on duty. She was silent as I vented my frustration for a full minute. Finally, she cut me off.

“Look lady, yours is not the only dead body in L.A.”

That said it all. I hung up and grabbed another piece of pizza. This time I tried the arugula and pine nuts.



The End.

DINNER IN L.A. - a short story in three chapters

Chapter 1

I wasn’t looking forward to dinner. I didn’t want to drive to Malibu. I didn’t want to be social. But, Ben wanted to go. He was writing a new TV show and Susan, his executive producer, was hosting with her husband, Jim, a successful production designer. Pizza! Normally, I love pizza and I like Susan and her husband well enough, but I was cranky. I had recently been hired to write for a freshman sitcom called “Women in Jail” (not a topic that instantly springs to mind as a situation comedy) but, before my contract was even entered into a computer, surprise, surprise… the show was cancelled. Job security--- not a show biz perk.

So, not more than two hours after receiving this career-crushing news, we were going to an impromptu dinner with people who were gainfully employed. Who needed that?! Ben wasn’t trying to be insensitive. He truly thought that being with some friends, eating my favorite food and drinking some good California merlot would take my mind off my disappointment. Ha! We’d been married nearly ten years and it still bewildered me that he knew so little about my emotional vicissitudes. How could he not know that I wanted to wallow in my misery for at least 24 hours?

When we arrived and walked out to the beautiful flagstone terrace, I was surprised to see another couple standing by the bar. Now, not only did I have to put on a happy face for two people I knew, I’d have to smile and talk to two people I didn’t know and didn’t want to know. At least not tonight. They’d ask us what we did. We would tell them we’re writers. Ben would regale them with stories from the latest show he was working on, but when they asked me what I was working on, what would be my gracious and witty reply? Nothing?

The new couple was dressed in black, the uniform of wealthy west side L.A. The guy had on black trousers and a black polo shirt… she a black mini-skirt, black tee and black Jimmy Choo sandals. Ben at least blended in, with his black linen shirt and faded jeans (always appropriate in L.A.). With my faded jeans I’d worn a white linen shirt. I was wearing strappy leopard sandals, however, which gave my “ensemble” a throw-away Melrose Avenue “cred.” But being unemployed, which breeds insecurity (an L.A. malady), I mourned my lack of black.

Jim offered me a glass of merlot and I took a big gulp as Susan introduced us to Bob and Carol, friends from Susan’s Boston PBS days. A documentary producer, Bob had happily “sold out” to work in reality television, producing such shows as “Fantasy Family” and “Kids Take Over.” Carol worked in advertising. After the initial greeting and shaking of hands came the inevitable--- Bob asked me what I did. I told him I was a television writer.

“Really,” he replied. “What are you working on?”

I took another big gulp of wine. “I’m in development,” I answered… a euphemism for nothing.

Bob laughed. “Me, too. I’m developing my golf game.”

I decided the evening might be salvaged and sipped my wine with ladylike flourish.

Susan and Jim’s house sat on a cliff with a spectacular view of the ocean. And, if you looked down their sloping hillside property, you could see the Pacific Coast Highway and the rooftops of houses lower on the hill.

Ben and Susan were in the midst of some anecdote I’d heard a dozen times, so I grabbed a handful of chips (my second favorite food group) and walked over to the edge of the terrace. The sun was setting and the sky was filled with shocking pink clouds along the ocean horizon. Cars were rushing up and down PCH and I wondered if any of the drivers noticed the vivid sunset, or whether they were too busy talking on their cell phones. Directly below, black-clad guests at a catered party mingled around a lap pool in the middle of a drab cement patio attached to a sprawling 60’s “modern” house. Tall, skinny Cyprus trees surrounded the industrial-style terrace. I hate those trees… too thin, like most of L.A.

As if to coordinate with the house, 60’s rock music drifted upward as a few of the partygoers danced around the uninviting pool (though how the women managed in ridiculously skinny four inch heels was a mystery). I tried to imagine the owners of such an ugly house… definitely entertainment lawyers (who else would buy an over-priced Motel 6), when my eyes drifted to the neighboring rooftop of the faux-Neutra designed monstrosity. There, lying on his back, spread eagle in the middle of the roof was a man in jeans and a Hawaiian shirt. He wasn’t moving. I watched for a few minutes, but still no movement, so I called for everyone to come quickly, there was a dead body below. Why I said “quickly,” I haven’t a clue.  If the man was dead, he certainly wasn’t going anywhere in the immediate future.

To be continued…