Shooting for the Stars Read Online Free Page B

stopped to sign a few autographs as she walked up the red carpet that was used for the stars’ arrivals.
    The screen went dark for a second, and then Laura Marlowe’s face came on it again. It looked like the same scene outside the Academy Awards. But everything was different. Her dress. Her hairdo. And, most of all, the expression on her face. She didn’t look happy or excited anymore. There was a woman with her this time. A man too, who looked a lot older than her. There were fans again clamoring for her autograph, but she walked right past them without a glance. The bottom of the screen said: Academy Awards Ceremony—1985 .
    â€œWhat a difference a year makes, huh?” Abbie said.
    We were sitting in a video-screening room next to her office. Abbie clicked on a remote and froze the picture at that second shot of her going into the Oscars in early 1985.
    â€œShe looks miserable,” I said.
    â€œYes, she does.”
    â€œWhy? She’s got it all. She’s rich, she’s famous, and she’s beautiful.”
    â€œLet’s just say there was a lot of things going on in Laura Marlowe’s life before she died.”
    I looked at the screen again. “Who’s the woman with her?”
    â€œHer mother.”
    â€œShe brought her mother to the Oscars?”
    â€œThe mother created her. Changed the kid’s name, signed her up for acting lessons, sent her out on auditions. She pushed her daughter into show business for years before she finally became a star. The mother is the reason she was there with Hollywood’s elite that night.”
    â€œWhat about the father?”
    â€œLong gone.”
    â€œDead?”
    â€œNo, just gone. For most of her life anyway. He walked out on the family when Laura was very little. She hardly knew him. But then he showed up again when she became famous. That’s him in the picture walking behind her. Probably trying to cut himself in on a piece of the action.”
    Abbie clicked the remote, and a different picture of Laura Marlowe appeared on the screen.
    She was coming out of a plain-looking building and getting into a car. The mother was there again. So was another man who I didn’t recognize. Laura Marlowe didn’t look beautiful or glamorous now. She was dressed in what appeared to be a hospital gown, she wasn’t wearing any makeup, and she seemed to have troublewalking. The mother and the man in the picture were each holding on to one of her arms. There was no cheering crowd this time, just the three of them.
    â€œWhat’s this?” I asked.
    â€œA hospital in California. She was apparently in rehab there. A TV news crew shot this after staking out the place for a few days. It never became public though. Today the Internet and TMZ would have a field day with it. It would go viral. ‘Glamorous movie star fights substance abuse.’ ”
    The bottom of the screen said June 21, 1985. Only a few weeks before she was murdered. I remembered reading in the clips that she’d been hospitalized during the filming of her final movie. They’d cleaned her up in rehab, sent her back to finish the film—and then she died. There was no happy ending to this story.
    â€œWhat was her substance of choice?”
    â€œYou name it.”
    â€œWho’s the guy with her?”
    â€œHer husband.”
    â€œEdward Holloway.”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    â€œWhat was that marriage all about?”
    â€œWell, he loved her.”
    â€œDid she love him back?”
    â€œFrankly, I don’t think she loved anybody at this point.”
    Abbie shut off the video, and the screen went blank.
    â€œThis is all very interesting,” I said. “But here we are thirty years later, and what does any of it have to do with anything? More specifically, what does it have to do with me?”
    â€œCan we talk off-the-record?” Abbie asked.
    â€œMeaning you want me to agree not to print anything