two things. First, was the Los Angeles River, which he could see to his left and right, which meant that he was over it and that the street he was on was actually a bridge. He’d been so lost in his thoughts, he hadn’t even realized he was walking on a bridge. But he considered his alternative. The banks of the river were nearly vertical slabs of concrete. If he didn’t take one of the streets over it, he’d have had to back-track all the way to Balboa Park near the Sepulveda Dam, scale the dry river bed, then come back this direction. He probably would have chosen this route anyway.
That’s what he thought, and tried to tell himself, in the split second between his first distraction, and the second one, which made the first all the more horrifying:
The aftershock.
The center of the overpass collapsed, turning both ends into immense, concrete slides. Marty rolled and tumbled, along with a dozen other people, two cars, and one motorcycle, down towards the concrete river bed below.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
T he valley?” Marty couldn’t understand what Beth was thinking. She might as well have suggested they move to Fresno. “Why would you want to move there?”
“Because you can get twice the house for the money,” Beth replied.
“That’s because no one wants to live there.”
“Michael Jackson lives in Encino.”
“I rest my case.”
They were renting a house in Westwood, two blocks south of Wilshire Boulevard, for $2200-a-month. The neighborhood didn’t have the cachet it once did, but when Marty walked the dog he still bumped into character actors, up-and-coming directors, and C-list screenwriters, and that was nice.
“Marty, for what it costs to buy an old, two-bedroom fixer-upper in Santa Monica we can go to the valley and get a new, four-bedroom Mediterranean mansion with a swimming pool and a huge yard in a gated community,” she said. “And, best of all, we won’t have to send our children to private school.”
“We don’t have any children.”
“We will,” she said. “That should be the criteria for choosing where we live, not whether it’s a hip place.”
“The valley has no character. It’s just shopping centers and freeways and tract homes. It will be like living in one of those rest stops on the interstate,” Marty argued. “What’s wrong with the Hollywood Hills or one of the canyons, off Coldwater, for instance? Or how about the Palisades, Hancock Park, or Brentwood?”
“Forget about the hills and canyons. I don’t want to be living on the edge of a cliff when the next quake comes. Besides, those houses have no yards at all and are on narrow, steep streets. Hancock Park, the Palisades, and Brentwood cost too much for too little, and we’d still have to send our kids to private school at $12,000-a- year-per-child,” Beth said. “I also want to know our children can play in the front yard and be safe, and in a gated community, you’ve got some measure of security.”
“So, in other words, you want to live in a country club prison out in the boonies,” Marty replied. “If we’re going to do time, let’s at least try to embezzle some money or rob a bank first, so we’ve actually earned the punishment.”
“I want the most for our money and the safest possible neighborhood for our family,” Beth said firmly. “You want a place you can brag about over lunch at Le Guerre, so when agents messenger you scripts at home for a weekend read they’ll be impressed by the zip code. Jesus, Marty, where are your priorities?”
He looked at Beth’s face. Her eyes were blazing with anger and stubborn determination. She was already a mother-bear protecting her cubs, and she didn’t even have any yet.
How could Marty argue against getting more for their money, the best schools for their kids, and security for his family? He couldn’t. She knew it and so did he. It was an infuriating position for him to be in.
Who cares that the valley was numbingly dull, choked with smog, and one evolutionary step above a vast trailer park? No matter what he said in opposition, he’d come off like an asshole.
Beth was always doing this to him, framing an argument in just the right way so he got trapped every time. Either that, or he was a genuine asshole, and he didn’t like that possibility.
Okay, so he did care what people thought about his zip code. What’s so bad about that? After all, part of being a husband and father was being a good provider, and the wrong address, the wrong car, the wrong clothes, or the wrong table at a restaurant could have a severe impact on his industry credibility and, eventually, his advancement prospects and salary. And, by extension, the lifestyle he could provide his loved ones.
Image was the only thing that mattered in his business and yes, damn it, what other people thought about where he lived was important. But he couldn’t admit that now, not when she had fiscal and parental responsibility on her side.
So he gave up.
It was just a house, and he was at the network most of the time anyway, which was why they could afford to buy a place. He’d just have to stay late on Fridays, that’s all, and refuse to allow anything to be messengered to his home. He’d say his home was sacrosanct. The idea suddenly appealed to him. A rule like that would make him look even more powerful.
Yeah, he thought, I’m an asshole and pretty successful at it, too.
Marty sighed heavily and smiled in that lovable way he knew she liked. “Does this mean I have to trade my Lexus in for a Volvo wagon?”
She smiled back. “Not yet.”
He put his arms around her and pulled her close. “Have you ever seen Chinatown?”
“All I remember is that Jack Nicholson gets his nose cut and slaps Faye Dunaway around until she admits she’s his mother and his sister or something like that.”
“Then we better go rent it,” he turned her around and led her to the front door. “If we’re going to live in the valley, you’d better know its secrets.”
5:13 p.m. Wednesday
There was water in the Los Angeles River after all, and it was warm.
That was the first sensation Marty became aware of, the next was the intense pain radiating from his right side. Every breath brought a new stab of agony. He guessed broken ribs, because he’d suffered that before, falling off a dirt bike when he was eighteen, and it didn’t hurt this bad. That was two only two broken ribs, maybe all his ribs were broken this time. He was barely aware of his scorched back. He’d traded up to this new torture, which was so strong, it demanded all his attention, blotting out the discomfort of his other injuries.
The instinctive part of his brain was doing a quick systems check, his synapses firing back responses from all over his body, reports filtering up through his consciousness. He tried to wiggle his toes and flex his fingers and was relieved that he could and without feeling any new pain. At least he wasn’t paralyzed. A visual inspection was required now and he was afraid of what he would see.
Marty opened his eyes and saw blue sky and half of the Wilbur overpass sloping down towards him, tiny pebbles of asphalt rolling down its cracked surface and spilling onto him.
He slowly lifted his head so he could see his body, knowing it was probably a mistake, that he’d widen the hairline fracture in his neck and paralyze himself for life, but he couldn’t resist. Marty had to know what was causing his pain.
His neck didn’t break, but what he saw made him gasp in shock. There were three inches of bloody rebar poking through his side. The warm wetness he was feeling wasn’t water, it was blood. He was stuck on a piece of exposed iron from the snapped support pillar.
If that was true, then why wasn’t he feeling the hard, jagged surface of the mortar under his back? Whatever he was lying on was soft and squishy.
Marty looked over his right shoulder. The blood he was soaked with was only partly his own. He was on the
