Not So Model Home - By David James Page 0,52
from Taiwan asked me to marry him, come back to Taiwan, and live like a Tai Tai—a privileged lady of means who spends her time lunching and indulging herself while the husband works himself to death to support the Tai Tai. It sounded like a good plan to me. He said he made over $4 million last year (I asked him, “In U.S. dollars?!”), not including bonuses, and I didn’t doubt it when I said good-bye to him at a Mercedes SLS that must have set him back hundreds of thousands of dollars. Believe me, being underwater and in debt with four nonperforming condos, a mortgage on my main house, and credit cards maxed out, I gave this proposal a lot of thought. A lot. But in the end, I turned the guy down. After all, I didn’t speak Mandarin, was repulsed by the idea of raw clams (soaked in any sauce), and felt I would get stir-crazy living on such a small island. Of course, I could fly over to Hong Kong to go shopping or Macao for gambling, but Taiwan was just too uncertain to me. What I was sure of was that my constant barhopping to give my ego a boost was really kicking my ass and body when it all came down to it. I looked in the mirror, and I was looking haggard, worn-out, and old. If it’s true that television cameras put ten pounds on you, I feared what it did when it came to years.
CHAPTER 22
Here, Let Me Help You Tie Your Tie
Another day of shooting. There were still weeks and weeks of shooting to go. It was exhausting, starting at the crack of dawn and working until late in the evening at times. I had a newfound appreciation for television stars.
As usual, we were sitting in Iffy Central, Ian’s cavernous living room where the bulk of the scenes from the show were filmed. We were made up, meticulously but casually dressed, and ready to go. With one small change in the scene to be shot. Darryn’s presence on the show had caused all the others to “lose their edge,” as Jeremy stated. With the exception of the welcomed debacle of the memorial luncheon the day before, Jeremy was getting pissed off that the drama was ebbing out of the show. He needed more drama, more catfighting, he stressed. He wanted to keep the ratings on their rocket trajectory.
“Jeremy,” David stated. “You want us to be dramatic, but we end up suffering for it since Aurora is grading us on our behavior. This is putting us between a rock and a hard place.”
“The only hard place you have been lately has been Ian’s bedroom,” Gilles snapped.
“There!” Jeremy exclaimed. “That’s the toxic behavior I remember. I want more of that—just wittier lines than that. Okay, guys, let’s get started.”
The cameramen got into position and started. Lights, action, attitude!
“David,” Ian started. Could you go upstairs and see what’s keeping Aleksei?”
“Ian!” he complained. “Every time I go to fetch someone, they end up dead. I’m not doing this again,” he said, putting down his Diet Coke on a priceless end table without a coaster. He got up and plodded upstairs like he had a 1,000-pound weight on his shoulders.
The moment this observation slipped from David’s mouth, you could see that everyone was thinking the same thing: something bad has happened to Aleksei. You saw the concerned faces shooting glances at each other to see if they were thinking the same thing. You saw hands tapping on chair armrests. A nervous cough or two.
“It’s weird. I haven’t seen Aleksei all morning,” Drake mentioned. “I at least get treated to hearing him vomiting before he goes to bed at night, then in the morning after he has a yogurt, coffee, and a cigarette.”
“Breakfast of Champions,” I added. It was a good line, but it had none of the zing of some of my earlier precision strikes. I was getting tired. My lines were getting tired, too, I feared.
Presently, David came back downstairs and flopped himself on the couch, picking up his Diet Coke and fashion magazine.
“Well?” Drake asked.
“Well what?” David replied, clearly not understanding that the mood had shifted tectonically in his absence.
“What did you find out?” Drake asked.
“Oh, there’s a loose tile in the hallway outside my room. I nearly tripped on it for the second time. Ian, could you get Drake to get that fixed? Someone’s going to get really hurt on that tile.”
Drake leaned forward