“You fucked me.”
“Twice. A long time ago. I wouldn’t do it today.”
“Well just for the record neither would I.”
Maxine looked at him coldly. “That’s it. I’ve said what I needed to say.”
She went to the door. Todd called after her. “Why do it to me now? Why wait till I’m so fucking tired I can hardly think straight!” His voice continued to get louder, creeping up word on word, syllable on syllable. “And then screw me up like this?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll find somebody else to look after you. I’ll train them. You’ll be taken good care of. It’s not like I’m walking out on you.”
“Yes you are.”
He turned to look at her, finally. The blood had rushed to the surface of his half-mended face. It was grotesquely red.
“You think I’m finished, so you’re leaving me to be crucified by every piece of shit journalist in the fucking country.”
Maxine ignored the outburst, and picked up what she was saying. “I’ll find somebody to take over, who’ll protect you better than I can. Because I’m just as tired as you are, Todd. Then I’m going to have one last party down at the beach-house, and get the hell out of this city before it kills me.”
“Well I’m not going to let you go.”
“Oh, now don’t start threatening — ”
“I’m not starting anything. I’m just reminding you. We’ve got a contract. I’m not going to allow you to make a fortune out of me and then just walk away when things get difficult. You owe me.”
“I what?”
“Whatever’s on the contract. Another two years.”
“I can’t do it. I won’t do it.”
“Then I’ll sue your ass, for every fucking cent you earned off me.”
“You can try.”
“And I’ll win.”
“Like I said, you can try. If you want all our dirty washing dragged out for everyone to see, then do it. I guarantee you’ll come out looking worse than I will. I’ve covered for you so many times, Todd.”
“And you signed a confidentiality agreement. If you break it, I’ll sue you for breaking that, too.”
“Who cares? Nobody gives a rat’s ass about me. I’m just a professional parasite. You’re the movie star. You’re the all-American boy. The one with the reputation to lose.” She paused. Then murmured, almost ruminatively: “The tales I could tell … ”
“I can tell just as many.”
“There’s nothing anyone can call me that I haven’t been called a hundred times. I know everyone says I’m a cunt. That’s what they say right? ‘How can you work with that fucking cunt?’ If I have to hear it in a courtroom one more time, I can take that, as long as when it’s all over I don’t have to hear your whining and complaining any more.”
“Okay,” Todd said. “If that’s the way you want to play it.”
Maxine headed for the door. “For your information,” she said, “I could go down to LAX right now, and I could fill a limo with kids who have ten times your talent. They’re all coming here, looking to be the next Tom Cruise, the next Leonardo DiCaprio, the next Todd Pickett. Pretty boys with tight asses and nice abs who’ll end up, most of’em, selling their tight asses on Santa Monica Boulevard. The lucky ones’ll end up waiters.”
“If I wanted to, I could make any one of them a moviestar. Maybe not a star like you. But then again maybe bigger. Right face, right time, right movie. Some of it’s luck, some of it’s salesmanship. The point is, I sold you, Todd. I told people you were going to be huge, and I said it so often that it became the truth. And you were so sweet back then. So … natural. You were the boy next door, and yes — for your information — I was a little in love with you, like everyone else. But it didn’t last long. You changed. I changed. We both got rich. We both got greedy.” She put her hand to her mouth, and gently passed her fingers over her lips. “But you know what, Todd? Neither of us was ever happy. Am I right? You were never happy, even when you had everything you’d every dreamed of wanting.”