Breach of Promise Read Free Page A

money is good, the work steady. But it’s like the minor leagues of media. I never wanted to be on a soap, just in films or a solid TV series.
    My unspoken plans were for me to get into feature films, starring roles, and Paula to follow along afterward. Maybe make her big splash in one of my own movies.
    Call it male pride. Ego soufflé. That’s the way it was. Paula could sense it, too, on the drive home. She gets quiet when she’s upset, and a little line forms in the flesh between her eyebrows. I call it the John Gruden line, after the Tampa Bay football coach whose sneer is now legendary among followers of the game.
Maddie, happy in her car seat in the back of the Accord, looking at a picture book, ignored us.
“When’s it supposed to start?” I asked.
“I don’t know any of that yet.” Paula looked straight ahead. “Phyl will fill me in.”
“Phyl you in? I get it.”
Paula did not see the humor. Neither did I. I had done standup comedy for a while, on open mike nights, and I knew when a joke was lame. That was lame.
“Troncatti,” I said.
“What’s Troncatti?” Maddie asked from the rear.
“An Italian pasta,” I said. “You make it with Alfredo sauce.”
“Daddy’s joking, honey.” Paula turned around, protecting her child from the bad jokes of the driver. “Antonio Troncatti is a famous moviemaker. Mommy’s going to be in his movie.”
“With sauce?” my daughter said.
“Good call!” I slapped the steering wheel. “Alfredo sauce and pretentious dialogue.”
Paula spun around to look at me. “What are you doing?”
“What?”
“Why are you putting him down like that?”
“I’m just joking.”
“It’s not funny.”
Maddie said, “Not funny, Daddy.”
“Look at your book,” I told Maddie. “Mommy and Daddy are talking.”
“Talk, talk, talk,” Maddie said.
We drove in silence along Ventura. It was crowded tonight, and I hit every red light. Each one was like a little slap in the face.
Finally, I said, “Look, I’m sorry. All right? I want you to succeed. I really do. This is great news. I just feel, I don’t know—”
“Jealous?”
“Honest? A little.”
Paula put her hand on my arm. Her hand was hot. “Mark, you’re a great actor. I really think that. I think you should be getting your break soon. I want it to happen for you. I know it will.”
Back at the apartment I waited until Maddie was asleep before stirring up some hot chocolate for Paula and me. I took it to her with a big swirl of whipped cream on the top. She was watching a movie in the living room— All About Eve , one of her all-time favorites. She smiled as she took it and gave me the first sip.
“You know, I like being a man,” I said.
“And why is that?”
“Because when I retain water, it’s in a canteen.”
“Oh please.”
“And a phone conversation takes thirty seconds, max.”
“Very funny.”
“But the thing I like most about it?”
She looked at me.
“I get to be married to you.”
Two weeks later I had a knock-down-drag-out with Paula. She had officially signed on to do the film with Troncatti. There was still a part of me that hoped something would go wrong. Film cancelled. Change of mind on the casting. Selfish, I know, but I couldn’t help feeling it.
When the contract was signed, the reality was like a refrigerator dropping on my foot. Paula was going to be doing interviews, preproduction promotion, media stuff. She had a hundred other things to do trying to get ready to go. One night in the apartment, she asked me to help her go over her list, see if she’d forgotten anything.
“Yeah,” I said. “Maddie.”
She gave me her signature roll of the eyeballs, which only ticked me off.
“I mean it,” I said. “You’re going to be in Europe for what? Four months?”
“Give or take,” she said.
“And when are you going to see your daughter?”
“Mark,” she said, pulling off her glasses—they were blackframed and she never wore them in public, but when she pulled them off she