“Well … let me tell you what I’m not saying,” Eppstadt replied, his tone silky. “I’m not saying you don’t have a career.”
“Well that’s nice to hear.” Todd said sharply.
“I want to find something we can do together.
“But … ”
“But?”
Eppstadt seemed to be genuinely considering his reply before he spoke. Finally, he said: “You’ve got talent, Todd. And you’ve obviously built a loyal fan-base over the years. What you don’t have is the drawing power you had back in the old days. It’s the same with all of you really expensive boys. Cruise. Costner. Stallone.” He took a moment, then leaned closer to Todd, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “You want the truth? You look weary. I mean, deep down weary.” Todd said nothing. Eppstadt’s observation was like being doused in ice-cold water. “Sorry to be blunt. It’s not like I’m telling you something you don’t already know.”
Todd was staring at his hand, wondering what it would feel like to make a fist and beat it against Eppstadt’s face; over and over and over.
“Of course, you can have these things fixed,” Gary went on chattily. “I know a couple of guys older than you who went to see Bruce Burrows and looked ten years younger when he was finished working on them.”
Still idly contemplating his hand, Todd said: “Who’s Bruce Burrows?”
“Well, in many people’s opinion he’s the best cosmetic surgeon in the country. He’s got an office on Wilshire. Very private. Very expensive. But you can afford it. He does it all. Collagen replacements, lifts, peels, lipo-sculpture … ”
“Who went to see him?”
“Oh, just about everybody. There’s nothing to be ashamed of: it’s a fact of life. At a certain age it’s harder to get the lovehandles to melt. You get laugh-lines, you get frown lines, you get those little grooves around your mouth.”
“I haven’t got grooves around my mouth.”
“Give it time,” Eppstadt said, a touch avuncular now.
“How long does it take?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never had any of it done. If I went in there, I’d never get out again.”
“Too much to fix.”
“I think it’s bad taste to jump on somebody else’s self-deprecation, Todd. But I forgive you. I know it hurts to hear this. The fact is, I don’t have to have my face out there fifty feet high. You do. That’s what they’re paying for.” He pointed at Todd. “That face.”
“If I was to get something done … ” Todd said tentatively, “about the lines, I mean?”
“Yes?”
“Would you make Warrior then?”
He had opened the door to Eppstadt’s favorite word: “Maybe. I don’t know. We’d have to see. But the way I look at it, you haven’t got much to lose getting the work done anyway. You’re a heart-throb. An old-fashioned heart-throb. They want to see you kick the shit out of the bad guy and get the girl. And they want their heart-throb perfect.” He stared at Todd. “You need to be perfect. Burrows can do that for you. He can make you perfect again. Then you get back to being King of the Hill. Which is what you want, I presume.”
Todd admitted it with a little nod, as though it were a private vice.
“Look, I sympathize,” Eppstadt went on, “I’ve seen a lot of people just fold up when they lose their public. They come apart at the seams. You haven’t done that. At least not yet.” He laid a hand on Todd’s arm. “You go have a word with Doctor Burrows. See what he can do for you. Six months. Then we’ll talk again.”
Todd didn’t mention his discussion about Doctor Burrows to Maxine. He didn’t want the decision process muddied by her opinion. This was something he wanted to think through for himself.
Though he didn’t remember having heard of Burrows before, he was perfectly aware he was riving in the cosmetic surgery capitol of the world. Noses were fixed, lips made fuller, crow’s feet erased, ears pinned back, laugh-lines smoothed, guts tucked, butts lifted, breasts enhanced. Just about any piece of the anatomy which gave its owner ego problems could be improved, sometimes out of all recognition. Traditionally of course, it had been women who were the eager and grateful recipients of such handiwork, but that had changed. One of the eighties muscle-men, who’d made a fortune parading a body of superhuman proportions some years before, but had begun to lose it to gravity, had returned to the screen last year looking more pumped than ever, his perfect abdominals and swelling pectorals — even his sculpted calf muscles-surgically implanted. The healing had taken a little while, given the extensiveness of the remodeling. He’d been out of commission for five months — hiding in Tuscany, the gossip went — while he mended. But it had worked. He’d left the screen looking like a beaten-up catcher’s mitt, and come back spanking new.