Who Stole the Funny? : A Novel of Hollywood by Robby Benson Read Free Book Online Page A

muttered. “I’ve gotta turn him into an asshole. That’s what he needs. He needs a good old-fashioned asshole lesson.” He was trying to get Natasha to
    laugh. Even smile.
    Jeremy was their number one priority. J.T. knew he had to go
    back into the caves. His Directors Guild insurance had run out and this job meant an opportunity to renew the insurance so that Jeremy could get the best health care possible. It was a no-brainer.
    Natasha and J.T. sat at the kitchen table for two hours. Barely a word was spoken. After that they sat on the end of Jeremy’s bed, watching him sleep. Barely a word was spoken. After that, J.T.
    packed a suitcase in preparation for three weeks in Los Angeles.
    Barely a word was spoken. They kissed.
    “Darling, reach out . Call Asher,” she said.
    Before daybreak, J.T. drove two and a half hours to the nearest airport that had an early Monday morning flight to Los Angeles. If 4 2
    W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?
    he could get on the 6 a.m. flight, he’d be in Los Angeles by 9 a.m.
    That would put him sitting at the production meeting in the San Fernando Valley by ten (if he was lucky), ready to steer the boat , keep the train on the tracks, and, most important, protect the foul lines and make sure the ball stayed in play.
    The Red-eye
    J.T. could never sleep or watch a film on airplanes. He couldn’t figure out why anyone would want to watch a movie when they
    could look out their window and see planet Earth from thirty-
    five thousand feet in the sky. The stars, the moon. What’s wrong with people? he thought, watching them pay five dollars for a set of crappy headphones.
    J.T. sat in the coach section, the studio’s budget not stretching to business class, according to his trusty agent, Dick Beaglebum.
    At least he had a row to himself. Red-eyes from Johnson City, Tennessee, didn’t exactly tend to be fully booked. He could get up and pace if he needed to, and J.T. frequently needed to.
    He had no script to go over—there hadn’t been time to send
    it. He kept thinking about the turn of events that had brought him to this point, to getting back on a plane to the place he’d sworn to leave behind forever.
    Jeremy had been seven when they left Hollywood. Less than
    a year later, he’d collapsed one day, and when he woke up, he was in the hospital with a peritoneal dialysis catheter snaking from his abdomen and his father massaging his feet and staring at him with one eye closed.
    J.T. couldn’t help it. He had a habit of viewing the world with one eye closed, as if filming the moment . The exact provenance of 4 4
    W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?
    this quirk had been debated at many family Thanksgivings, but
    the truth was that seeing the world in 35 millimeter was J.T.’s secret way of keeping disturbing realities at bay. He no longer knew if this had started only after he became a director, or if he’d taken to directing because a part of his soul responded to distancing himself through a lens.
    J.T. panned to Natasha as she wiped Jeremy’s clammy fore-
    head with a cool blue washcloth. The Bakers had been briefed by doctors, nurses, and therapists about what life would now be like.
    They were only beginning to come to grips with the understand-
    ing that young Jeremy had a very serious illness, and that the treatments would greatly alter their lives from then on.
    Jeremy was staring at a sitcom on the TV above his head. The
    laugh track was bugging the hell out of his parents. J.T. looked around for the remote. “Jeremy, would you like me to turn off this god-awful tripe?”
    “If you’d directed it, it would be funny,” Jeremy said, his throat still painfully dry.
    While other fathers and sons talked sports, Jeremy and his dad
    would spend hours talking about “the Funny”—the noun, not the
    adjective. At seven, he understood the quad split. The kid just . . .
    had it.
    “Wow. Um, thanks,” J.T. looked away, embarrassed. “Maybe
    you should rest now.” He found