Charming the Beast by Beau Lake

Author:Beau Lake
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: 4 Horsemen Publications, Inc.
Published: 2022-01-28T05:37:24+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

(Otto)

I find myself watching Flora Wright, searching for any sign of what Paul inadvertently caught on camera. When she delivers her lines, I stare at her teeth, expecting to see a sharp canine or saw-toothed incisor. Except, they are all perfectly square and straight, made luminously white by peroxide baked in at 150 degrees.

I encourage her to gesticulate with her hands even in scenes that don’t warrant it, wanting to compare the length of her ring and middle fingers. Both hands are perfectly standard, the nails oval shaped.

All I see is an unsure twenty-something girl, her talent smoldering beneath the surface. There’s no monster there. Perhaps Paul was right, and the stretch of her jaw on film was simply a ghost in the machine.

It should be a relief. But Robert Taneca’s words continue to beleaguer me despite my every attempt to shut them out. Shoot them first. If you wait, it’ll be too late.

The one thing I can’t do is look into her eyes. When I have to speak to her, I look anywhere else: her mouth, her hands, the empty air above her right shoulder, her downy earlobe decorated with a gold button earring. I fear that if I see a hint of incandescence, I’ll be forced to take action for the greater good. Right between the fucking eyes.

“Mr. Lang?” Stan Chesterfield trots after me as I climb the stairs to my closet-sized office. He’s still holding his paper pad in his fist, his pencil tucked inside the coil binding. “Can I get a few minutes of your time?” he huffs.

I stop midway up the metal stairwell, turning to look down at the red-faced reporter. There’s a sheen of sweat on his high brow and jowly cheeks. He’s either not used to the California heat, or he’s well on his way to a heart attack.

Either is bad news for me. If he dies on my set, it’ll be the opening line of every movie review. “Lang’s latest feature is to die for!” Or “The two-hour runtime will make you wish you were dead!” If he isn’t a California native, Daily Variety sent a reporter who originally hailed from some podunk gazette in Wichita, or worse, The New York Times. In 1944, the Times published an article about me called “Creep, Charlatan, or Clever?: The Man Behind Crazed.”

“I’m a very busy man,” I reply testily.

“The studio—” Stan coughs wetly into his fist, and his face turns purple and wrinkly like an overripe beetroot. “They promised an exclusive with you.”

Ah, Metro-Goldwyn-Fucking-Mayer, forever the thorn in my side! First, they saddle me with Dominic Valentine, and now they are promising quotes to shit-stirrers and mudslingers. “Fine,” I grumble. “Come on up.” I take the remaining stairs two at a time and stride purposefully into my office midway down the catwalk.

Since returning from the lakeside set, my office has become a catchment for the detritus of my rapidly unraveling life. I’ve been spending most of my time holed up in here, and it shows.

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