After All

“All right, let’s do it again,” I tell him. “I’ll follow the script. Promise.”

Madison scoffs beside me. She knows as well as I do that following script hasn’t been my strong suit. That’s a metaphor that can go a million different ways.

Luckily I pull through, summoning as much cheesiness as I can manage to bring Cole Black to the edge of caricature and in another hour it’s time to call it quits.

I say goodbye to the crew and leave the North Vancouver studio in my Audi, a recent purchase. Though I’d saved up a pretty big nest egg while working for most of my twenties, which resulted in my waterfront home, I’d also been especially frugal with my money.

But with the role on Boomerang has come the big bucks and more opportunities, especially in advertising. It wasn’t long ago that doing ads as an actor was frowned upon, unless you were doing them overseas for things like Japanese whisky. Now Matthew McConaughey and his damn drawl and Lincoln car has made it acceptable. Danny DeVito and George Clooney smiling about Nescafe then pushed it into the encouraged department.

So a popular show plus a few ads here and there and I’m finally making money I’m not afraid to spend. Hey, I’ve been the ‘it kid’ and then I’ve faded into obscurity. At thirty-eight, I know more than anyone how quickly everything fades and I’m not just talking this business. It’s life, in general. Over in the blink of an eye.

I’m not sure why my thoughts have taken a turn for the negative but I feel myself being pulled into the liquor store hoping to pick up something for tomorrow morning when Will and Ted come over before the ceremony. It’s an excuse, really, since I have a fully stocked bar but I’ve got it set in my mind. Naturally, being that it’s late and everything in this damn city closes early, it’s closed.

I probably should keep going, get in my car and head over the Second Narrows Bridge towards home. Grab a bottle of rye from the bar cart, put my feet up and relax. Pass out in front of the TV. That sort of thing.

But there’s a fire building through my veins. I don’t get back in the car, instead I walk across the parking lot, past the grocery store and shops that are all closed for the night, right to El Rodeo.

Don’t ask me why it’s called El Rodeo. It doesn’t serve Tex-Mex or any food, nor does it have a western décor. If anything it looks like a nautical joint. But it is a bar and one usually frequented by actors and crew who work at the studios.

Being Friday night, there’s a few people inside, some that I vaguely recognize, but I keep to myself and take a seat at the bar. I try not to do a lot of drinking at this place since there are usually some autograph hounds, gossip bloggers and paparazzi around, plus the drinking and driving laws in British Columbia are very strict and the last thing I need is to be tossed in jail.

But for some reason I find myself pounding back the rye like it’s water and by my fourth one I know I’m taking a cab home. Maybe it’s that I’m feeling increasingly frustrated lately, which reminds me that I probably should schedule another meeting with my therapist, Christine. Or it’s that Will is getting married tomorrow and while I’m happy for my best friend and Jackie, his sweet, pregnant and young bride-to-be, it reminds me that while my career might be moving forward again, my personal life isn’t. It’s as stagnant as ever. One step forward in one direction, two steps back in the other.

Whatever it is, I stay until the bar closes and the bartender calls me a cab. My head is foggy but my heart rate is doing a dance. I still feel this vague frustration and anger even though I don’t know why or what to do with it. The alcohol hasn’t masked it, it’s only encouraged it.

“Hey buddy,” someone says from behind me after I stumble out of the bar and onto the street. The cab isn’t here yet but I’m obviously not alone.

I turn around to see a rotund guy with a paunchy gut staring at me, phone aimed in my direction, a dick-ish smile on his fat face.

“Are you talking to me?” I ask him. I shouldn’t even open my mouth, especially when I’m drunk.

“Look, he thinks he’s the next De Niro,” the man laughs to his phone, obviously recording this exchange.

Take in a deep breath. Don’t engage. The world is full of people waiting to pull you down and that says more about them than about you.

I go over the things that my therapist has taught me.

But right now, none of that matters.

“Are you recording this?” I ask dick face, trying not to slur my words.

“Hey buddy, how does it feel to go from Cruiser McGill to Bruiser NoChill?” he asks snidely.

Bruiser NoChill.

My new nickname.

And I know exactly why he’s saying this. He’s trying to provoke my reputation. Trying to make me say something stupid, something he can capture on his phone and sell to fucking TMZ.

Somehow I manage to corral the instinct to give him what he wants. AKA, put my fist into his nose. Two weeks ago I did that to a bouncer at a bar downtown, probably where the fucking nickname Bruiser NoChill came from. Or maybe it was from the week before when I told a paparazzi who took a photo of me and a young actress leaving her house to go fuck himself and threatened to break his camera.

I’m not really Mr. Popular as of late.

I put my back to him, my fists balling, and wish the damn cab would show up. There’s nowhere else for me to go and this guy is still right fucking here.

“You’re, like, forty, dude,” the guy keeps talking at my back and he’s getting closer. “You really think playing Doctor Death is going to help your career? That was over when you left Degrassi, you Ryan Reynolds wannabe.”

I swear I don’t have anything against Ryan Reynolds.

But those words set off a bomb inside me.

I spin around and almost clock the fucker right in the face.

Lawsuit, lawsuit.

Those words, flashing in my head like a siren, are the only thing that saves me.

Instead, I grab his phone and throw it down to the pavement, then take the heel of my boot and slam it down on the case until I hear the glass crack.

“Holy fuck!” the guy exclaims and then I bring my eyes to his and I know I look drunk and crazy but it’s enough for him to back up while shaking his head. “You broke my phone! You fucking broke my phone!”

“You need a social media break,” I tell him dryly, something that Doctor Death would say.

Fucking hell, what’s wrong with me?

I need to get out of here.

Just then the cab pulls into the parking lot and I wave my arm frantically, jogging towards it.

I get in and give the driver my address. I can’t help but stare out the window at the guy trying to pick up the pieces of his phone.

Sighing, I run a hand through my hair and lean back in my seat as the interior of the cab begins to spin.

What are the chances all of this will go unnoticed?



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