The Cutting Room by Laurence Klavan

Author:Laurence Klavan
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780345472083
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2004-02-03T05:00:00+00:00

Annie stopped off at her place to put on something somber. She loaned me a black jacket that I suspected, from its high quality, had once been worn by Ben. Weirdly enough, it fit me perfectly.

Annie lived in a one-room apartment below Sunset Plaza, near the Viper Room and other hip haunts. There was a tall pile of cassettes stacked near her TV. Though they were turned away, I knew that every one of them starred Ben.

I thought about children taught by a woman so affected by a lousy actor who had seduced her once. Then I thought about a man who would manipulate her to avenge an actress who had once seduced him. Was I more ruthless now that I was seeking the Ambersons for Erendira? Things had gotten complicated.

Annie had a simpler question.

“How does this look?” she said, emerging from the bathroom.

The elegant black dress showed off her grown-up, real-world beauty. It was so flattering, in fact, that I didn’t wonder about her motive for wearing it. She wanted to put her indifference on display for Ben’s survivors.

She also wanted me to button up the back of it.

“Your fingers are so cold,” she said, with pleasure, as I did.

I felt a flicker of arousal as I blended Annie’s buttons with their holes, and she knew it. Annie was trying to prove to me definitively that she had moved on. I decided to let her.

Annie turned around, at the same time that I turned her. Her mouth met mine. And the dress, just fastened, began to come undone.

As we started to make love, maybe we were only playing roles. I was Ben Williams for her; she was Erendira for me. We were stand-ins for stars, and it was one more one-night stand.

But by the end, we had emerged as ourselves again, bit players, perhaps, but in more dignified roles. Annie even called me by my own name.

These were heady times for a trivial man.

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