Cliff Falls (The Missing Pieces Edition) Read online

  Without his mom, Clay learned that the managers created a business framework that trapped him and enriched themselves: a production company, merchandise deals, personal appearance fees, a corrupt legal team... And, worse, everything was court approved. As he discovered, Family Law was clear: “parents of a working child are entitled to its custody, income and service. Children are cattle”. And Burt’s job was to be the cattle rancher, to ensure their cash cow went moo on cue.

  Now Clay was one good judge away from being freed, and the thought filled him with enough hope to try to reconcile with his mom, something he had vowed never to do. But he needed to see her again. Looking into her eyes, he would know: was she tricked or did she do it for the money. And he wanted to believe she was manipulated. Maybe he was being foolish, but that was the power of hope. Despite suffocating from the events around him, this new hope strengthened Clay and put a light back in his eyes. It helped him keep a connection with himself, something only writing in his journal had done. But unlike his journal, this hope told him he had a future, a life beyond all this. This hope even allowed him to stand before the man who had controlled his very breath, to finally stand before his tormentor and not cower. With eyes locked on Burt, Clay couldn’t wait for the moment Burt found out the truth. Everything Burt built his life on was about to come to an end.

  “One day you’ll look and I’ll be gone,” Clay said quietly but loud enough for Burt to hear.

  “You always say that. Where do you think you’re going to go? You’re the most famous person in the world,” Burt shot back. “Remember, we’ve got a table set up for you to sign the new product line before we go to the next mall.”

  “Next mall? I’m not staying!” Clay thought of his mom. He was promised the day off. It would have been his first in five weeks. He spent the last few months touring packed stadiums with that preacher and anti-drug campaign to help bolster his image after the tabloids photographed him smoking a joint. In their eyes, protecting his image was clearly more important than any reality he lived with. Now he just had to get through this event and get to the airport in time to pick up his mom. He kept picturing her waiting, thinking he didn’t show up.

  “Oh, you’re staying. You’re signing every last doll, game, and toy in that warehouse!” Burt spotted and then reached for the hat on top of a box. “Put on the hat.”

  “I’m not wearing—”

  Burt grabbed his arm, and shoved the hat on Clay. “Do I need to glue this to your head? No funny business. When you get out there, hit your mark. These kids came to see ‘Little Guy Mike’ not you!”

  Burt let go of his arm.

  Clay put his journal back in his pocket, reminding himself that nothing was going to spoil this day. Not even Burt. He took a deep breath, transformed into “Little Guy Mike” and prepared to step onto the stage.

  “Oh, by the way, your mom called. She’s not coming.”

  Clay stopped in his tracks, wondering if he heard Burt correctly. “You’re lying.”

  “Some excuse about feeling out of place,” Burt said. “Stupid boy. You didn’t really think she was going to show, did you?”

  Caught between Burt and the crowd, Clay was totally dejected. He couldn’t believe he had gotten his hopes up. Was nothing ever going to change?

  “See, you can relax now,” Burt said. “You don’t have to be anywhere but here.”

  The Little Guy Mike theme song started to play as the crowd roared. The mall erupted in song. Everyone could feel the love. Everyone but Clay.

  One dream short from touching the sky.

  Then along came one lit-tle guy.

  Now the impossible is just around the bend.

  Thanks to our new lit-tle friend.

  He’s our guy—aye, aye, aye—lit-tle guy.

  He’s our guy—aye, aye, aye—lit-tle guy. Little Guy Mike!

  “You son of a bitch!” Clay caught Burt’s eye. “You did this.”

  “Burbank, California! Help me welcome ‘Little Guy Mike’!” The announcer’s voice boomed across the audience. You could feel the mall shake from the excitement.

  As usual, there was no time for what Clay was feeling. On cue, he once again transformed himself. Stepping out onto the platform to a cheering crowd, his face was in character. His happy persona was all that held back everything he was feeling inside. But the hurt was stronger.

  Defiant, Clay removed his signature baseball hat. The audience roared as he waved it back and forth. Some parents on the second floor looked as if they were prepared to jump. People always wanted a piece of him. They could have it. He tossed it into the crowd, creating pandemonium as the people fought over the hat.

  He glanced back at Burt.

  This wasn’t over.

  As Clay walked off the stage, a callous hand grabbed his arm and shook him violently, pinning him up against the wall, his head slamming against the brick. Clay caught his breath in fear, tightening his gut, his shoulder throbbing where it had been dislocated before.

  “Not my shoulder!” Clay pleaded.

  “What are you going to do, call your lawyer?”

  Clay’s eyes widened.

  “Yes, the bosses know all about your little filing! Are you stupid? They’ve been planning for this day for years. They won’t let their cash cow walk away without a fight!” Twisting his arm tighter, Burt shook it. Clay let out a scream but the cheers from the crowd drowned it out. “The judge will stand by the decision! Everything was court approved and the bosses have plenty of lawyers to make sure it stays that way!” Burt leaned in. “People would kill to have these opportunities. When are you going to grow up? Even your mom doesn’t want to be here!”

  Burt backed off as a stagehand walked by.

  Clay jerked backwards, nursing his shoulder. His eyes filled with hatred.

  “Now get to the table! And then get ready for the next mall!”

  “No,” Clay said defiantly, catching his breath.

  With eyes full of rage, Burt turned back, his stocky shadow covering Clay. “What did you say to me?”

  Chapter Three

  By the time Clay made it back to the studio, it was already night. He told the stagehand to drop him off just outside the gate. Shoulder throbbing, he wanted to walk the last few blocks. All he felt was disgust and shame. Passing through the gate, he made his way to his trailer to change. The lot was empty. His birthday was almost over.

  He closed his eyes and all he saw was Burt.

  “I hate that man. I hate everyone. Why didn’t I just leave?”

  Clay had stayed. And signed every doll, game and toy. He took pictures with every kid and every parent who stood in line. And worse yet, he smiled. Like that face plastered on that Halloween mask and on all those toys. Despite everything he was feeling, he smiled. And it made him hate himself. Burt’s voice echoed in his head.

  “You didn’t really think she was going to show, did you?”

  Fighting off tears, Clay reached under the dash of a nearby studio tram and hotwired it—the igniting of the engine fueling his anger, keeping his tears at bay.

  “You’re signing every last doll, game and toy in that warehouse!”

  He sped out of the parking lot, heading straight for the warehouse where they stored the new merchandise, backing up the tram at the receiving dock.

  Once inside, he reached for a rope from the warehouse floor and tore open a box marked “LGM Figures”, grabbed a “Little Guy Mike” doll and made a knot around its neck.

  “Looks just like you.”

  His hurt was stronger than the pain in his shoulder. Box by box Clay filled the tram, determined to have his say. Determined to silence Burt’s voice.

  “When you get out there, hit your mark. These kids came to see ‘Little Guy Mike’ not you!”

  Overflowing with Little Guy Mike merchandise, Clay pulled the tram out of the parking lot and raced down the historic back lot. Winding through the façade-lined streets, he accelerated past the timber-framed structures, the famed sets from television and motion pictures. It was as if the façades were calling out to him, pleading for him to turn back. But he wouldn’t listen. Finally, the tram stopped, a LGM doll with a noose around its neck dangling from the rear view mirror.

  Stepping off the tram, Clay gathered as much as he could carry and approached the Little Guy Mike set. Season after season, this façade was the symbol of the typical American home life. The happy existence the show perpetuated, but something that he never knew.

  The house itself was idyllic, but hollow. The white clapboard sparkled like freshly polished teeth. Empty pillars only appeared to support the stylized arch made of plywood and rubber. The yard was well manicured, though closer inspection revealed plastic flowers and trees propped up by wooden braces.

  Over the years, the exterior had been painted many times, its red shutters and foam clapboard well maintained. But the inside remained the same—like him, a dusty dumping ground of empty paint cans and discarded props. It was messy and murky, a place not created for the camera.

  With arms filled, he carried the contents through the bright red door with polished brass knocker, to the outside patch of dirt on the other side of the façade. Back and forth he went, tirelessly piling item upon item. As much as he tried he was still unable to discern Burt’s voice from his own.

  “No one cares what you have to say. Why should you?”

  The tram nearly emptied, Clay reached for the last box, a “Little Guy Mike” Halloween costume, the cardboard perimeter decorated with playful images of the character. He stared at the plastic mask suffocating beneath the thin layer of cellophane. Taking it out, Clay held it up against the night sky, the moonlight illuminating its cutout eyes.

  “Looks just like you.”

  The contoured face with rouge cheeks was anything but natural; the forced expression of a mischievous child was haunting. He hated this mask.

  Clay placed the plastic mask face up, on top of the great mound of Little Guy Mike merchandise. Then he struck a match.

  The smiling mask slowly melted as the flames spread. Toxic fumes filled the air.

  Clay’s youthful face basked in the orange glow of the blaze, his green eyes staring blankly into the fire. He reached into his back pocket and retrieved his journal. Maybe he should let that burn too? He held it over the flames, the smell of burnt leather as the spine singed.

  “No one cares what you have to say. Why should you?”

  It was hopeless. His voice couldn’t silence Burt’s voice. He was done. He had nothing left to say, which was why he was surprised when the words came:

  …scared children—all of us—dealing with adult things—wondering if we are that strong. And everyone wants us to be someone or something else.

  Consumed with this truth, he pulled his hand back. Clutching the journal, he ascended the scaffolding of the façade, climbing above the melting tower of products and silvery streams of smoke.

  Clay settled into his usual spot.

  Chapter Four

  Perched above the studio backlot, above the hanging cables and darkened floodlights, Clay scribbled away under the star-filled sky as his pathetic fire died out below. His acid-washed jeans and faded U2 T-shirt under a nylon jacket were his only shield from the night wind. But he didn’t care.

  It was not unusual for him to return after dark, ascend the rusty scaffolding, and sometimes after a long wait find refuge in the unexpected words that came to him, but this night was different. He didn’t have to wait for the words to come; they arrived on their own. They poured out. Out of his being. Out of his heart. Out of his pen, howling like the intensifying Santa Ana winds that swept against his face, that ruffled his dyed black hair.

  With ink-stained fingers, he wrote it all down. Every word. Just as he heard it, he wrote it down.

  “…scared children—all of us—dealing with adult things—wondering if we are that strong. And everyone wants us to be someone or something else.”

  Tears streaming down his face, Clay was somehow comforted as he listened. This voice was different from Burt’s and it connected him with his own.

  “The voice knows how I feel. It always does. How it feels to be bullied. How it feels when people use you, when they think they own you! How it feels when your every screw-up is captured on camera or in print. How it feels when there’s a self out there being marketed that isn’t you!

  “I tell myself that I don’t care about anyone or anything, but I do care. I hate that. Why can’t I shut that part of myself down?”

  Leaning back against the crude pipes that supported the structure, his legs dangled off the plywood ledge. This was the backside of the façade, the ugly side. His refuge. Burt—that asshole—was right. Clay didn’t have anywhere to go. All this fame and the only spot where he could find an ounce of peace was behind this façade. He steadied the flapping pages in his journal as he wrote. He wrote about every fear, every expectation, what his life was really like, as the one phrase repeated in his spirit.

  …scared children—all of us—dealing with adult things—wondering if we are that strong. And everyone wants us to be someone or something else.

  His green eyes glanced up from the page and looked below. The smoldering fire was nearly out. What did I do? Waves of embarrassment and shame overwhelmed him. He thought about the parents on the second floor of the mall who almost jumped when he tossed the hat into the crowd.

  “The world envies me, but I would trade shoes in a heartbeat with any of the kids outside the gate. Growing up on the lot, I could see them in the park across the street playing with their parents and I wished my days were as ordinary as that. I’ve never known the difference between a normal childhood and this.”

  He closed his eyes and the image of his mother came to him. Was I ever just a kid?

  “My earliest memories are of going on auditions with you, working commercials and print ads after winning that contest in our hometown. I’m still waiting for my pinchable cheeks to lean out. It was fun back then and we would always go for ice cream afterwards. That was the last time I felt normal.”

  Gripping the pen, Clay knew he was always trying to get back to that place of feeling normal.

  “Since I was 12, you haven’t been in the picture, except for when the show was on hiatus or during a few visits throughout the year. Who does that?

  “I will never forgive you for leaving me with them. Never!!!”

  Clay’s tears dripped onto the page, smudging the ink. He had believed that things would get better; that things would change even though everything around him told him differently. He only gave his mom another chance after she promised that she would be there for him.

  “I’m an idiot. I can’t believe that after how much you hurt me, I was looking forward to you showing up! You’d think I’d be over all this. But I just feel the same!

  “I’m sick of this life! I’m sick of all the things I have to care about! The audience. The ratings. The advertisers. Studio executives. My image. Everyone else’s feelings! Everyone else’s expectations! Screw them all!!! I don’t want to care about anyone else but me!!! Besides, they’re never happy.

  “All I know is that I have this desire to have control, to get it all back. All those pieces of myself that were sold, rented, stolen, or squashed. To take back every false perception of who they say I am. Dear God. Just for a day I want the inside and the outside to be the same.”

  Lost in his thoughts, Clay barely noticed that the night wind had become more pronounced, like the words streaming out of his soul. The Santa Ana was invigorating, and like all things that made him feel alive, it was also dangerous. A danger he didn’t realize until it was too late, until the reignited embers filled the air and dusted the pages of his journal.

  The gale-force winds shook the structure, his leather journal slipping from his grasp and falling into the blaze. Gripping the jagged beams as he climbed down the scaffolding, he removed his jacket and beat it hopelessly against the emboldened flames. But they continued to mount, crawling up the side of the façade, rising like shameful prayers finally released.

  Spotting his journal, Clay wrapped his hand in his jacket and reached into the flames to retrieve it.

  He froze for what seemed an eternity as he realized that the fire was out of control. Smoke surrounded him, engulfing the scaffolding and dimming the star-filled sky. After making his way through the front door, Clay turned back, his glossy eyes taking one last look at the show’s set. The façade was rapidly turning black, the entire structure was on fire, and worse, it was spreading.

  As the backlot burned, he made his choice. Clenching his journal, Clay Grant ran into the night and disappeared into the thick smoke.

  Chapter Five

  Fifteen years after the fire

  May 6, 2002

  “Sometimes a picture is worth more than a thousand words,” the photographer thought. He removed the extended lens from his Minolta. Placing it securely in the camera bag, he glanced briefly across the room at Entertainment Now airing on the Colorado motel television set. It was the weekend edition hosted by Kat Stone.

  “Fifteen years on the run. He was America’s guy as the star of the 80’s sitcom hit Little Guy Mike, about the antics of a lovable orphan. Then he vanished the same night a mysterious fire burned down the studio’s historic backlot. Whatever happened to Clay Grant?”