4
It’s a Sign
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 7
The view from the thirty-firstfloor of my building is dizzying. It’s the first thing that hits you as you enter the apartment: it’s on the corner of the building so more than half the room is sheer glass, floor-to-ceiling, suspended more than three hundred feet above bustling Downtown LA. Up here we’re slightly higher than the Statue of Liberty. Or so Miguel, the Ellis Building’s porter, tells me as he lays my bags down with a smile. George never liked heights, he would have been nervous up here but he would have tried to hide it. Luckily, I’m not scared of heights; I’m not sure how much sleep I’d be getting up here if I were. But the view is nothing short of mesmerizing.
Beyond pristine glass Los Angeles stretches out, from up here a world in miniature, its sprawling smog and heat haze spellbinding if somehow not quite real. From the crisp cool of my luxury accommodation, I can make out LA proper for the first time in all its monstrous glory.
An arid industrial hub strung together by highways, thick clogged arteries pumping out to the vast studio lots along the horizon and their sticky-tarred multistory parking garages. Closer inland the low makeshift wooden skyline intermittently gives way to the odd gleaming glass tower like mine, while out toward the hills glittering crystalline pools sparkle in the sunshine in random configurations like scattered jewels. It’s beautiful in its way. But then it would be nothing without the story that comes with it. It would be just another California city without the borrowed magic of those that pass through. Then as if on cue, I see it, hazy on the far horizon, emblazoned on the lush green rise of the Hollywood Hills, instantly recognizable. Nine white letters writ forty-five feet high. The whitewashed sign that launched a thousand ships and the rocks they ran aground on. The siren song.
“It used to light up, you know?” Miguel chirps following my gaze. Weirdly, I had read a bit about the Hollywood sign in the in-flight magazine on the journey over. I know that originally it was just an advertising banner for a housing development called Hollywoodland, but I didn’t know about the lights.
“Really?” I ask and try to imagine the two-story-high letters glowing out across the city.
Miguel nods energetically as he struggles to retract the extendable handle on my suitcase.
“Yeah, it was completely covered in lights, over four thousand twenty-watt bulbs, it used to light up the hills in the 1920s. Used to flash, pulse, you know, like a heartbeat.HOLLY—WOOD—LAND.” He puffs, finally releasing the bag’s temperamental handle, narrowly avoiding trapping a finger.
“You’re an actor, right?” he asks cheerfully as he offers me my new apartment keycard.
“I am.”
Miguel nods sagely. “Yeah, me too, you know. I’ve been acting for, maybe, about ten years now.” The porter’s eyes sparkle as they stare out through the glass to the white letters in the distance, then he turns back to me with a quick grin. “You know the story about the actress and the sign, right?” he asks breezily.
“No, I don’t think so.” I try to recall any industry gossip I might have heard recently but my mounting jet lag stops me from fully investing. “What was it? Which actress?”
“Oh no, it’s just an old story. From the ’20s. This theater actress. She jumped off the sign. It’s such a tragic story. Every now and then I think of her when I see it, you know.”
“Oh God,” I say looking out at the sign once more. The height from the letters to the sloping hills beneath seems monstrous even from this distance. “That’s awful.”
“Yeah, she came to LA to do a small part in a movie and after that movie they called her in for this huge lead role. You know, a really big part. So she screen-tested and everyone was sure she’d get it but then there was a disagreement between the producers and they went with this otherunknownactress instead and thatunknown actressturned out to be Katharine Hepburn! That role was Katharine Hepburn’s big break instead of this girl’s. Then the studio canceled her contract a few days later. So she jumped.”
I shake my head, unable to think of a more appropriate response to Miguel’s tale. “Wow, okay.”
“Yeah, I know. But the real kicker? The thing that gets me every time? Three days after they found her body in the ravine a telegram arrives at her place from the studio. Turns out the contract canceling had been an administrative error! And they want her to come back in for another huge part. They wanted her to test for another lead role.” Miguel shakes his head and then a thought suddenly occurs to him. “Actually, ha, she was British too. Like you!” He grins innocently.
Thanks, Miguel.
—
After Miguel leaves I tryto shake off his creepy story as I wander the state-of-the-art apartment. I take it all in hungrily, the muted Scandinavian design, the low wool-upholstered furniture, a security video entry monitor in the hallway, discreet wall-mounted plasma screens in all the rooms, oversized coffee-table books. This apartment must be costing someone an absolute fortune. Why on earth they are putting me up here, I do not know. I wheel my case into the larger of the two bedrooms and dig my mobile out from my handbag.
I feel my insides squirm as I remember I’m supposed to start posting things on Instagram during this trip. Hashtag-gifted. Oh bloody hell. After years of holding out, I really thought I’d gotten away with not getting dragged into the Insta-bubble. But I guess there really is no such thing as a free lunch. I’ll have to double-check with Cynthia if an iPhone apartment photo shoot is somehow part of my accommodation deal. It’s starting to look like my new social media account might be doing all the heavy lifting this trip. I try not to think of Naomi’s account; I will not check her grid again, not today. I feel the loneliness beginning to seep back in and I briskly head back into the kitchen.
On the countertop I find a package of essentials: filter coffee, snacks, and a fruit basket with a note from my new American agent Michael.
Welcome to Los Angeles, Mia! Looking forward to meeting you in person tomorrow. M Spector.
Next to his gift is a bottle of Perrier-Jouët champagne, another note attached to its dewy glass, from the producers ofEyre:
Congratulations on the “top-secret” award news!! You absolute star! You’re a winner to us already. Thanks for all your continued hard work x
A warm feeling spreads through me at the reminder of my good news as it wakes up and stretches inside me.
I send a quick message to my friend Souki who I know is in LA right now too. I do not mention George. After all, I can tell her if I see her. But I’m not ready to let my thoughts go back to him right now. The point of coming here was to move on. I need to keep things light, easy.
I haven’t spoken to Souki in months—another quirk of the job—but she’s exactly the kind of person I should be hanging out with right now. Fun, exciting, and not at all hard work. We basically lived together for three months while we filmed an indie horror movie on location in Bulgaria two years ago. The people you work with tend to become an instant family on acting jobs. You’re thrown into close quarters in strange new countries, which means high-stress bond-forming relationships happen fast. There’s only so many hotel dinners you can share in a row without the polite veneer of professionalism slipping into comfortable familial frankness. Souki and I had a blast—on a job that wasn’t. Though we may drop in and out of each other’s lives, our bond is eternal.
