up who can pull the kind of attention your boy can!”
“Nobody else has talked to you about the flickers?” Ash added.
“The flickers have not been such a big deal for us,” Papa shot back. “Please geh weg (go away). We’re not interested in you or your movie business.” Papa grabbed my arm and we started to march down the pier toward Ocean Avenue. I felt embarrassed. I towered over Papa, yet he was treating me like a child.
As I felt Papa tug me along, I wanted to stay and hear what those two had to say. Wow, the movies, I thought. Why was Papa so harsh? After all, they hadn’t done anything so bad.
I turned around to see Myers and Ash looking at each other in amazement. It turns out that Los Angeles was full of people who were constantly scouting for new and unique talent to help their movies stand out from all the rest that rolled out of Hollywood. The town was full of actors who would have given their eyeteeth for such an opportunity.
Like cheetahs who’ve gotten a scent of prey, they ran after us. I heard their footsteps just behind us. Papa and I stopped. He turned around to face our pursuers, his face red.
“Please, Mr. Erlich . . . hear what we have to say. It’s a great opportunity for this bocher (young boy) and your family. All we ask is fifteen minutes,” Ash pleaded.
That was a one-in-a-million chance. At that instant I didn’t stop to think about the downside, about how scary it would be to leave my family in El Paso, to move to Los Angeles alone and to work in pictures. Somewhere deep inside I didn’t feel frightened. I just felt desperate. I understand that sometimes fate uses desperation to make itself heard. For the first time in my short life I had the opportunity to reach for the brass ring. When would somebody like me ever get a chance like that again? No matter what Papa thought, I couldn’t let it pass me by.
“I think we should listen to what they have to say,” I said.
Papa turned to look at me. We were both surprised at my audacity. You see, in those days, neither of us was accustomed to me speaking up like that. Asserting myself would be a lifelong challenge.
Papa must have seen the determination in my eyes. He looked away and grumbled a word or two in Yiddish and stared out over the railing on the pier to the ocean. He looked as if he were waiting for something or someone, perhaps a tramp steamer from Shanghai that carried a mysterious passenger who would tell him how to resolve his ambivalence about what to do next.
“Okay, okay, but just fifteen minutes is all.” Papa finally agreed.
To this day I don’t know why Papa changed his mind. Maybe it was his destiny, too. I felt relieved. Ash and Meyers looked like they just received a stay of execution from a firing squad. Papa looked like he was still ready to pull the trigger.
The four of us ducked into The Crab Catcher, a seedy restaurant at the end of the pier. The first thing I noticed when we entered that place was the smell of stale beer and the two drunken sailors at the bar, their heads pillowed on their arms.
An apron-clad waitress with curly blonde hair and very red lips led us across the sawdust-covered floor to a small table in the back. From the moment we sat down with the well-dressed cheetahs I sensed Papa’s impatience. Three of us ordered cherry pie and coffee; Papa just waived his hand curtly: “Nothing for me.”
For about five minutes no one said a thing. After Papa’s initial outburst, Ash and Meyers seemed to be cautious, politely avoiding any semblance of a hard sell. They just sat there and looked at us as they ate their pie.
I looked up at the thick, black fishing net and white buoys that hung from the roof of the darkened restaurant serving as ersatz maritime décor. When Papa took out his Hamilton pocket watch to check the time, I saw myself as a huge swordfish, frantically thrashing about in that net.
What Meyers and Ash didn’t know was that when Papa said we only had fifteen minutes, he meant business. Now there were only ten minutes to go. Soon Papa would say time was up. Hurry up you schmendriks, I thought. Finally, Ash put down his fork and wiped his lips with the napkin.
“Mr. Erlich, we would like to offer your son a contract to try him out working as an actor in pictures at Century Comedies. We can make him a star. Someone like your boy would be perfect for—”
“Huh?!” my exhale was punctuated by a question mark and shock. The whole thing felt unreal, like a dream.
“Whoa, whoa!” Papa almost yelled, as if he were still in the Russian Cavalry. For a moment I imagined him atop a runaway horse that had his ear shot off, sawing at the reins, and trying to stop his stampeding mount.
I felt sick. I felt I was about to cry. I put my hand over my face. He’s going to ruin it. He’s going to ruin it. I don’t know what it is yet, but he’s going to ruin it, I thought. Patience was a virtue I had yet to learn. Suddenly, I confronted the loss of a destiny I hadn’t even known I had just a half hour before.
“My son’s not an actor, much less a professional actor,” Papa argued.
I stopped myself from slamming my hands down on the table. I felt wild. “Papa don’t you remember, I’ve had a year of drama at El Paso High?” I pleaded.
“Don’t worry about that,” said Meyers. “We can teach him to act. He’ll make a good living. Anyway it’s only for one picture. If you or Jake is unhappy after we finish shooting, then you can stop. But if he likes it—and you like it—this could be the beginning of something big.”
“What do you have to lose?” asked Ash.
“Yeah, Papa, what do we have to lose?” I added for emphasis.
Papa held up his hands. My father could be stubborn, especially if he felt forced into something. But I couldn’t hold myself back. I experienced a unique feeling I’d never had; certainty about what I wanted to do. That kind of certainty would be in short supply when it came to making my decision about staying or leaving the circus.
After a minute, Papa looked at me and then at the two men. He looked down at his folded hands on the gingham tablecloth. Then, as though it weighed fifty pounds, he slowly lifted his head.
“This is a ganza (big) decision. I need to think about it and talk to the Missus. I will contact you within the week.” Papa abruptly stood up and extended his hand.
Myers and Ash looked uncomfortable. After all, they were so close to closing the deal. I bet it was unnatural for them, but they must have sensed the need to go slow with someone like Papa.
At that moment I was elated, flying, but I bit my lower lip almost until it bled. That forced me to come back down to the real world. I reminded myself that Mama would be more difficult to convince than Papa.
On the taxi ride back to our hotel I couldn’t believe what was happening to me. I was so anxious my head spun. I could barely think, let alone listen to Papa speak.
“I don’t know, Jakey. The movies . . . such a big city . . . what about school? We’ll have to call Mama.”
I took a deep breath as he spoke. I whiffed the scent of something sweet yet distant, like the aroma of the first tiny honeysuckle blossom in the desert in late winter. You can’t see it, yet you’re sure it’s there. You might say that for the first time since I was seven, I smelled hope.
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