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"He doesn't care," Julian says. "Why are you asking that?"

"Because he cared when it was me," I say. "He still hasn't cooled off. I mean, I don't know why." I pause. "Trent has his own ... proclivities."Advertisement

"I think that was something else."

"What's ... something else?"

"That Blair still likes you."

When Julian speaks again his voice becomes more urgent. "Look, they have a family. They have children. They've made it work. I should have never gone there but ... I never thought I would hurt her." He stops. "I mean, you're the one who always hurt her the most." He pauses before adding, "You're the one who always did."

"Yeah," I say. "This time she didn't talk to me for almost two years."

"My situation was more ... I don't know, typical. Something you'd expect," Julian says. "The girl I met was a lot younger and ... " This seems to remind Julian of something. "How did the casting sessions go this morning?"

"How did you know there were casting sessions this morning?"

Julian mentions a friend of his who had auditioned.

"Why do you know twenty-one-year-old actors?" I ask.

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"Because I live here," he says. "And he's not twenty-one."

We're standing next to Julian's Audi in the parking lot off of Fairfax. I'm going back to Culver City when he vaguely mentions a meeting, and I realize I haven't asked him anything about his life, but then I don't really care one way or another. I'm about to leave when suddenly I ask him, "What the f**k happened to Rip Millar?"

At the mention of the name Julian's face becomes too calm.

"I don't know," he says. "Why are you asking me?"

"Because he looks freakish," I say. "I actually got scared."

"What are you talking about?"

"He's a horror movie," I say. "I thought he was going to start drooling."

"I heard he inherited a lot of money. His grandparents." Julian pauses. "Real estate investments. He's opening a club in Hollywood ... " An annoyance I never detected in Julian announces itself. And then Julian casually tells me a story he heard about this secret cult that encouraged members to starve themselves to death - some kind of torture kick, a how far can you take it? kind of thing - and that Rip Millar was somehow indirectly connected to them.

"Rip said something about how I'd met a friend of his," I murmur.

"Did he say a name?"

"I didn't ask," I say. "I didn't want to know who it was."

I notice Julian's hand trembling as he runs it lightly over his hair.

"Hey, don't tell Blair we met, okay?" I finally say.

Julian looks at me strangely. "I don't talk to Blair anymore."

I sigh. "Julian, she told me she heard that you and I were at the Polo Lounge the other night."

Julian's expression is so completely innocent that I believe him when he says, "I haven't talked to Blair since June." Julian is totally relaxed. His eyes don't waver. "I haven't had any contact with her for over six months, Clay." He reacts to the expression on my face. "I didn't tell her we were at the Polo Lounge the other night."

On a break and I'm listening to a message Laurie left on my cell phone ("If you're not speaking to me at least tell me why ... "), then I delete it midway. The rooms of the casting complex surround a pool, and the rooms are filled with the boys and girls auditioning for the three remaining roles. Sudden interest from a rising young actor whose most recent movie "caused a stir in Toronto" has taken one of the available roles off the table, the part of Kevin Spacey's son. Only one boy out of the dozens seen yesterday has met the team's approval for the other male role. Jon, the director, keeps complaining about the girls. Since The Listeners is set in the mid-eighties, he's having problems with their bodies. "I don't know what's happening," he says. "These girls are disappearing."

"What do you mean?" the producer asks.

"Too thin. The fake tits don't help."

Jason, the casting director, says, "Well, they do help. But I get it."

"I have no idea what you're complaining about," the producer deadpans.

"It all seems so unwholesome," the director says. "And it's not period, Mark."

Talk turns to the actress who passed out while walking to her car after her audition yesterday - stress, malnutrition - and then to the young actor under consideration for Jeff Bridges's son. "What about Clifton?" the director says. Jason tries to move the director's focus to other actors, but the director keeps insisting. pqdm.com