Cliff Falls (The Missing Pieces Edition) Read online

  The man tossed the empty suitcase onto the mattress and opened it.

  Nauseous from the altitude, he sat down momentarily on the side of the bed. His eyes returned to the television.

  “Although an official studio investigation did not link Clay Grant to the fire, he disappeared from the public eye and later from Uncle Sam, reportedly owing the IRS more than four hundred thousand dollars in back taxes.”

  Standing up, the man started packing. He was confident that interest in Clay had not faded in the years since the fire. There was still a market for the former child star and this photographer was betting on it. He tossed his toiletries into the suitcase, along with two towels from the motel bathroom.

  “It seems everyone is looking for this missing star on the run. In this ENZ exclusive, our reporters tracked down Clay’s last hiding place in Beaver Creek, Colorado and spoke with his former landlady.”

  The photographer stopped packing, went to the television and turned up the volume. Crouching down, his attention was glued to the screen. He didn’t intend to be on television, and was surprised the crew had captured him taking pictures in the distance.

  Gripping the remote, Burt Cummings recognized himself in the shot, right in the middle of the reporter and landlady in her terrycloth bathrobe. There he was, camera flashing in the background, like an eager extra attracting more attention than the principal. Show off. Despite an additional twenty pounds, he thought he looked good on television. Not bad for fifty-two. He was quick to ignore the thinning hair and wide forehead that merged into a scalp. At one time he had harbored thoughts of having a career. He would have made a good character actor, “the heavy” in gangster films, he thought. But that was before he decided to go behind the camera.

  Burt had only been a Crewmember a year when he started working for the managers who were trying to buy Clay. He helped convince Clay’s mother to sell him to the team and stood to profit considerably. Yes, he got kickbacks for keeping Clay in line, but the real money was to come later. Sometimes his methods were heavy-handed, but “the brat” was impossible to control, especially as he got older. Burt never did work again. He was blacklisted. The studio blamed him for provoking the kid. After all that sweat equity, he lost his reputation and his promised share of the backend earnings. Merchandise cut. Gone. Production deal. Gone. Personal appearance fee. Gone. Clay! Gone! Gone! Gone! Despite his side deal, he never got a cut of that money. Everything was leveraged and everything was lost. Had Burt known how it would play out, he would have tracked Clay down that night and made him pay on his own.

  Burt pulled out his wallet and removed a tattered photo. It was of Clay, maybe twelve years old. This had always been his secret weapon, his ultimate leverage. Every time he looked at it he was reminded that Clay was vulnerable, weak, nothing like what the world saw. He was stripped of all the adulation, reduced to what Burt saw him as, someone he could control. Burt may have not owned Clay like the managers, but there were other ways of owning a person.

  Standing up quickly, he leaned against the television stand, again feeling the effects from the altitude. He shut his eyes as the reporter continued interviewing the landlady.

  “I didn’t know who he was, but he owes me three months’ rent.”

  “Do you have any indication where he went?” the reporter asked, pressing his microphone up to her face.

  “He owes me three months’ rent!”

  Burt slammed the suitcase shut. He didn’t know where Clay was, but he knew where he could find out. And she was going to tell him. Or else. He left the motel room without bothering to turn off the television.

  “Missing in action and outrunning the IRS. So where is ‘Little Guy Mike’?”

  Chapter Six

  August 16, 2002

  Clay opened his eyes from a perfect night’s sleep. The deep green eyes were the same, but the boy had faded, at least on the outside. He was thirty-three. His face masculine, his cheekbones and jaw defined. His hair, once perpetually dyed black by the powers that be, was now his natural unruly chestnut brown and covered his eyes when he sneezed. He looked so different that on occasion when people would tell him he resembled LGM, he’d just laugh and say, “That fool?”

  Looking different was one way to separate the present from the past; that and making sure he was constantly moving. He always kept his knit hat in his back pocket and a duffel bag packed with a few essentials, just in case.

  Squinting against the persistent gleam of light coming through the pane-glassed window, Clay smelled seawater from the rugged harbor. “Room with a view” the ad read. It was the only window in the frugal saltbox. Set back, deep within the thick colonial wall, it was more like a porthole. He repositioned his head in the pillow. Hey, it’s a view.

  He had been in Charlestown, Massachusetts three months, almost the whole summer. At least I’m sleeping through the night. For that he was grateful. It always took him this long to settle into a new town. And just when he would start to feel at home, something would happen that would force him to move on.

  He would still be in Beaver Creek, Colorado had that ski instructor not recognized him. Did I have to ask out a former president of my fan club?

  This was always his dilemma: contort yourself to please others or stay true to yourself and be alone. For the past fifteen years, he chose the latter.

  As a result, he had no one to talk to. Really talk to. Writing was his only solace and now he was not even doing that. Words only made him more aware of what he could never change. And the voice that always comforted him, the one that he used to hear on the scaffolding, was now distant and faint. Why bother?

  Nestling his head in the pillow, he cherished these moments in bed, hidden beneath the protective summer blanket, and his feet tucked into the soft cotton sheet secured to the mattress.

  I could spend eternity in here. Okay, so a coffin offers the same benefits.

  Clay felt that burnt leather journal tucked under his mattress. The irony of sleeping atop his buried feelings. He never had the heart to throw it away and still he couldn’t open it. If there were a day to open it, it would be today, his birthday. But he knew better. He couldn’t risk being consumed by the memories.

  Drifting back to sleep, the question every year was the same. Do I really have to sing to myself?

  Every year on his birthday, he did his best not to think about the night of the fire or the days that followed when he found himself in Costa Rica trying to disappear. Most runaways went to Hollywood. Clay ran everywhere else. South America, Thailand, and then Europe, backpacking until the money ran out. It was nearly three years before he realized the studio covered up his involvement in the fire. He couldn’t figure out why until he started seeing his face pop up on billboards and newsstands across Europe. The syndication was growing year by year. It didn’t matter how obscure the town was.

  He was in the Black Forest when he first learned about his troubles with the IRS. Clay didn’t need to read German to know he wasn’t responsible for a tax debt when he never saw a profit. Obviously, this was payback for covering up the fire.

  Every place he went, Little Guy Mike followed. When he saw a child wearing a “Little Guy Mike” Halloween mask during Carnival, he knew it was time to go back. He was homesick and because of the syndication, Little Guy Mike was more popular abroad than it had been in the States. That was five years ago.

  He had been to so many places, but because he kept to himself, each place felt the same.

  Yawning, he peeked at the blurry red numbers on the alarm clock, 5:27 a.m.

  “Crap!”

  Jumping from bed as if an army officer had entered the barracks, Clay stumbled over his duffel bag in the dark. He tumbled backwards onto the knotted pine floor. He seldom landed on his feet, but he did land.

  Flat on his back, Clay stared upward. The low ceiling, like Heaven, always seemed higher from this vantage point. He pulled himself up, which he was also accustomed to doing.

  “I’m getting too old for this.”

  As he rose, he saw her. This had become a morning ritual. Through that porthole of a window, he stared at her. The flapping colorful flags were draped over her elaborate rigging. The crew climbed her three proud masts, lowering her vast sails. Whatever majestic was, she was it. U.S.S. Constitution. Old Ironsides. She made him want to be a better man. That inspiration was hard to come by.

  The heartless clock showed 5:31 a.m. “Crap!”

  ***

  Boston is a walking town, but Clay was running.

  Since the night of the fire, he never had a good feeling about his birthday. And why would he? He always felt something bad was going to happen. Usually it did.

  The North Washington Street Bridge connected Charlestown to the North End, crossing Boston Harbor where it met the Charles River. Sprinting across in record time, his frantic pace conjured up memories of being late to set. An unforgiving crew could make life miserable for a kid. It didn’t matter that Clay was the star. The cold shoulder lasted weeks. It was never his intention to be late. It was just his nature.

  Traveling along the Freedom Trail, his swift feet followed the red brick line, darting past historical markers. Churches. Meetinghouses. Burial grounds. They told the story of Boston’s and the nation’s struggle for freedom.

  Clay appreciated that liberty was a precious thing and worth fighting for. But he wasn’t interested in retracing his own Freedom Trail, that uneven road that began the night of the fire. As far as he was concerned, the people and events of his past were all best left in the past. He had paid a heavy price for running away and did everything in his power to ensure that it wasn’t in vain.

  With each stride, Clay was always one wrong step away from his face being plastered on every television network around the globe or having another ghost from his past being unearthed. One in particular who was relentlessly cruel.

  Quickening his pace, Clay glanced up to align himself with the Old North Church’s towering steeple. It was a constant beacon to ships entering the harbor. His on-set tutor had made sure he knew the history.

  Sometime before midnight, in 1770-something, Randy Newman…no, Robert Newman climbed the darkened belfry and held high two lanterns. It was a sign from Paul Revere that the British were coming! And by sea, not land. That event ignited the American Revolution. Clay only wished that he had such warnings.

  He’d like to think that God would give him a sign of impending danger but he knew better than to get his hopes up. Been there. Done that. Still something deep in his heart wanted to believe that God was looking out for him.

  He looked at that belfry as he raced by. If warning lanterns were left for Clay on this day, he couldn’t tell as the rapidly emerging sun shined in his eyes and obscured his sight.

  The Italian North End was already awake. Street vendors scattered empty produce crates among the stalls opening for the day. Merchants arranged fresh fish in open containers filled with ice, while grandmothers hung laundry off tenement balconies.

  Racing through the narrow walkways and alleys, Clay darted under a grand banner strung across the street.

  91st Annual Fisherman’s

  Feast & Angel Flight

  August 15th —18th

  Music, Food and Fireworks!

  It had been a summer of feasts and this would be the largest. Clay avoided crowds, reminding himself that a quiet existence would be possible once Labor Day passed. That is, if he still had a job.

  He got paid today. After taking care of a few expenses, he knew he would finally have enough cash to send to his former landlady in Colorado.

  Catching his breath, he arrived at 300 Hanover Street. The brown marquee announced “Mike’s Pastry” in stylized yellow lettering. It was a fixture in the immigrant neighborhood for more than fifty years and attracted regular customers as well as tourists. It had occurred to him that “Little Guy Mike” working at Mike’s Pastry was the equivalent of hiding in plain sight. So far, the strategy had worked.

  Clay went around back and cautiously poked his head in the door. His best bet was to slip in once the manager was out of sight.

  If Santa were Italian, this was what his workshop would look like. Specialty cakes spinning on wheels as bakers added decorations. Trays of macaroons being removed from the stainless steel ovens. Eggs added to dough churning in the industrial mixer. The aroma was invigorating. He loved this place.

  The bakers were loading pastry bags with ricotta cheese. They took a golden cannoli shell in one hand and filled each side before dipping the ends in chocolate chips or pistachios, dusting the top with confectioner’s sugar.

  Clay caught the eye of one of the bakers.

  “Coast is clear,” the baker said. “He’s in the front.”

  Stepping into the kitchen, Clay was careful to avoid Angelo De Spirito, the bakery’s manager. “You guys are the best,” he spoke softly. And they were. In the past three months he had yet to endure the cold shoulder. They didn’t know who he was, but his quirky ways were a welcome distraction, as were his stories of Italy. As Clay was greeted by a host of first generation Italian bakers, he spotted Angelo approaching.

  A baker intercepted Angelo by rolling a six-foot rack of cannoli shells in front of Clay. Another slid an apron over Clay’s head, before the first baker spun the rack around. The guys always looked out for Clay. However, when Clay turned around he was face to face with Angelo.

  “Again late,” the stout manager reprimanded. “Everyone else 4:30. You 6:10!”

  Clay nodded in agreement. He knew silence was his best bet.

  “If the feast didn’t start tonight!”

  Clay continued to nod.

  “Get to work!”

  Smiling, Clay got to work, moving the rack filled with cannoli. As soon as Angelo turned his back, he sneaked one. Tasted as good as it looked. Not a bad breakfast. Happy Birthday to me.

  Wiping the cream from his mouth, his heart allowed him to say something unexpected, “Nothing is going to spoil this day.”

  Just as the words rolled off his lips, a furious Angelo stepped in front of him.

  Chapter Seven

  The North End readied for the feast. People assembled carnival games. Policemen sectioned off streets. Workers erected a stage in the square. Volunteers on ladders attached green, white and red decorations to the lampposts.

  At Mike’s Pastry a line stretched out the door despite the hot and humid August weather. Among those toward the back of the line was a stocky man with a Minolta slung over his shoulder. Excitement raced through his body. Casing his surroundings, Burt attempted to blend in with everyone else in line, while still trying to keep everyone at a distance. Patience was not one of his virtues. But if the address was right, he wasn’t about to blow the element of surprise. Some might call Burt a stalker, but he knew he had every right to make Clay pay. And he had played out this moment in his head a million times before.

  Inside, the bakery was packed, bustling with a mixture of tourists and locals pressing up against the enormous glass case overflowing with authentic Italian pastry. Everything in this place was the real thing. Pistachio macaroons. Almond biscotti. Chocolate Florentines. Lemon rings. Rainbow cookies. Apricot bows. Napoleons. Fig squares. Tiramisu.

  “Two pounds of the white cherry macaroons!” one lady shouted, pointing to the glass case. “And a Lobster tail! With chocolate cream!”

  The activity was chaotic. Numbers were yelled out as workers anxiously filled boxes, before wrapping them with white-and-blue string.

  In the kitchen, the bakers intensified the pace, attempting to keep up with the demand. But Clay was out back, assigned to a “special project” in the alley.

  Clay unloaded bags of flour from the delivery truck, stopping momentarily to wipe the sweat from his forehead. The heat was oppressive, and he was obviously not happy.

  “Next time, on time,” Angelo gloated.

  Clay offered a tortured stare, convinced Angelo was a studio boss in a former life. He hurled another bag off the truck.

  As soon as Angelo returned to the kitchen, Bella, the manager’s ten-year-old daughter, appeared from behind the delivery truck. Bella wore jean shorts and a pink Red Sox jersey. Her naturally curly hair framed a cherub face that lit up when she smiled. So much personality in such a little body, Bella was exactly the type of kid sitcoms were built around. Clay was grateful a Hollywood scout hadn’t discovered her yet, but he knew with the feast starting tonight that it just might be a matter of time.

  “This will cool you off,” Bella said. She held two Italian ices, one in each hand.

  “Lemon?” Clay shouted from the truck.

  “Of course!”

  Clay leaped off the truck overjoyed. Lemon was his favorite. Stumbling as he made his landing, he regained his balance just in time to avoid falling to the ground.

  Exhaling, Bella handed him his Italian ice.

  “You really are an angel,” Clay said. Wiping his brow, he held the cold cup against his face. “I can see why they picked you over all the other girls.”

  “But I don’t want to be the angel!” Bella said, brushing her curly locks from her face.

  “Why?”

  “The girl who’s the angel has to hang from that!” Bella pointed to a rope and pulley across the street. It was three stories up, higher than the banner announcing the feast. “That’s high!”

  Wouldn’t catch me up there, Clay thought to himself.

  “And with all those people staring at me, I won’t be able to remember the prayer!”

  Squeezing the last of his ice from the white paper cup, he realized that Bella hadn’t touched hers.

  “They keep saying I’m lucky. Lucky! But I don’t want to do it!” She sat down discouraged, handing Clay her ice.