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wrong and he told her to get a bowl, quick. He threw up into the bowl and lay back, his heart pounding. His hair felt damp and hot; everything was swirling. Goddamn chili dogs was the last thought he had before he passed out.

CHAPTER 4
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    Holly didn’t even bother with make-up. With her hair towel-dried and pulled straight back, tied with a rubber band, she put on some jeans and a Gold’s Gym sweatshirt. Tonight’s meeting was not an affair to get all done up for. Still, she thought, with a last glance at the mirror, she was lucky—she still looked good: tan, slim, and healthy. Her gray-green eyes looked out over high, carved cheekbones; her nose was straight, and her full lips, when she smiled, showed perfect teeth. Her modeling days were over, but acting was so much more real, more substantial and satisfying.
    She went out to the carport and thumbed the button on the remote device on her keychain. The woop-woop sound from her little BMW convertible told her the alarm was disengaged. Holly loved her car; she loved driving in the warm LA nights, with music blasting and her hair blowing crazily in the wind.
    She drove up to Olympic Boulevard and turned east, then north when she got to La Brea. By the time she got up to Sunset and over to Franklin it was nearly dark; she would be just on time if she could get a parking spot.
    The meeting was in a church annex. Some people filed into a door in the side of the building. When Holly got there a greeter she had never seen told her “Welcome” and shook her hand.
    Inside, about thirty people sat in folding chairs arranged in a circle. At one end of the room was a table covered with books, carefully displayed, and a tray with coffee, cups, and sweetener. She nodded to the several people she knew and took one of the few vacant seats, opposite the side where the table was set up.
    A woman with a notebook on her lap cleared her throat and said, “Greetings, and welcome to the regular Wednesday night meeting of SAVING OUR LIVES.” She was reading from a format, Holly saw; the same format that all the meetings used, with small variations according to each group.
    “My name is Cynthia and I’m here to save my life.”
    “Hi, Cynthia,” the group intoned in unison.
    “Our purpose,” Cynthia continued to read, “is to learn to live free from the injuries of our past and find our potentials as fully expressed human beings. We are here to take charge of our lives, having spent too many years giving our power to other people, or to concepts like money and prestige.” There was more, but Holly stopped listening as she began looking at the other people in the room.
    It seemed to be an affluent group, no down-and-outers, and she was glad of it. Of the thirty in the circle, about twenty were women, ranging from their early twenties to mid-fifties, with a couple of attentive teenagers just to her left. Then there were the men. It seemed odd to her that men would come to hear information like this; to talk about honesty and emotional issues, about trust and fear of abandonment. It struck her as courageous and wimpy at the same time.
    “I will now share for ten minutes and the meeting will open up for discussion.” Cynthia wrapped up the reading from the notebook and cleared her throat again. She looked about forty, very thin and rather smart looking in a gabardine suit.
    “Okay,” she began, “I’m a little nervous. I’ve never spoken in front of a group before. I guess I’ll begin with how I got here.
    “About two years ago my life just seemed to be coming apart. I had been divorced for five years and every man I had dated since turned out to be a bigger jerk than my ex-husband.” She paused. “Or else he was totally boring.” This got a laugh from at least half the room. “My daughter had just gone off to college and my home seemed intolerably empty. I had a decent career in advertising and couldn’t stand going in to work, and nothing seemed to have any meaning for