“This is where we keep Kylie’s clothes, ” Dusty said, gesturing toward a long wardrobe rack of designer suits and blouses.
Dusty was a fresh-faced twenty-two-year-old, just out of design school, with short purple hair and pierced studs in her nose, eyebrow, and lip. Last season when the head wardrobe consultant for Magnolia Lane quit over a SAG Award snub, Dusty landed the job because her best friend’s ex-boyfriend’s mother played canasta with the producer’s aunt. Hollywood was the original who-you-know town. Thanks to the call to my college roomie, four short days later and I now knew Dusty.
“Kylie plays Tina Rey on the show, ” Dusty continued. “Blake, Ricky, and Deveroux have their stuff over there.” She gestured to the far end of the room, where menswear hung on two rows of clothing racks. “And Mia’s are here.” She ended by pointing to a row of clothes stuck on dry-cleaning hangers and swathed in plastic. “Mia has her own wardrobe person, so you’ll mostly just be making sure the others have the right outfits for their scenes and doing a little damage control. You know how to hand-sew, right?”
I nodded.
“Great!” Dusty said, tucking a purple lock behind her ear. “Any questions?”
Only about a million. The second Dana and I had walked onto the Sunset Studios lot that morning it had been like entering some alternate reality, and I was still trying to get my bearings.
We’d parked my Jeep off-site in the designated parking garage behind the lot, then hoofed it-along with the other cast and crew not quite somebody enough to have their own on-set parking places-to the studio’s gated rear entrance. We’d stood in line with women toting wardrobe bags, and a seemingly endless supply of guys with tool belts and little walkie-talkie headsets while the two-hundred-year-old security guard (give or take a year) in Coke-bottle glasses checked our names against his list. Wonder of wonders, when I got to the front of the line mine was actually there. The guard even gave me a “Good day, Miss Springer” before passing me through the gates onto the sacred grounds of the Sunset Studios.
The best way I could describe the studio lot was to compare it to a life-size dollhouse-every corner dressed within an inch of its life but none of it real. Just beyond the rear entrance lay the Sunset Studios “city, ” which was basically a maze of city streets with hollow buildings made to look like New York, Boston, San Francisco, and, of course, a generic middle-American suburb.
Beyond the “city” were rows of squat warehouses with the names of hit shows painted on the outside. All buzzing with activity. I spied a group of extras and guys in headsets milling around outside stage 3F, where the sign said they shot that new cop drama. Outside stage 4B was a catering truck handing out breakfast burritos, and the guy who’d played Screech digging into a box of morning Krispy Kremes.
I would have loved to do a slow celebrity-gawking tour around the rest of the lot, but since I’d hit the snooze about a dozen times that morning (If God wanted people to be awake at 6:00 a.m., he wouldn’t have invented late-night TV.), we were already running ten minutes behind, so instead we’d hightailed it to stage 6G.
The assistant director (or AD) quickly ushered Dana to a holding room with the other extras. She’d given me a conspiratorial wink as she headed off, which I’d tried not to roll my eyes at. (Okay, fine. I hadn’t tried very hard.) And only thirteen minutes late (but who was counting?), I’d made my way into the wardrobe department, where Dusty was currently filling me in on suburbanite fashion, Hollywood style.
“So, basically the outfits will be hung up here for you ahead of time.” She pointed to a rack along the wall where clothes were clumped together and tagged. “All you have to do is make sure the right person is wearing the right thing for the right scene.”
“That’s it?” And people were going to pay me for this?
Dusty laughed. “It’s harder than it sounds. Getting actors through wardrobe is like herding cats. Especially if they aren’t happy with what we’ve picked out for them. Speaking of which, watch out for Margo. She’s notorious for adding her own accessories.” She did a mock shudder. “Costume stuff and cheap as hell.”
“Margo?”
“She plays Nurse Nan on the show. You know, Ash-ley’s evil twin sister who just escaped the mental institution and is secretly living in Ashley’s attic?”
“Oh, riiiight. Nurse Nan.”
Dusty chuckled again. “You’ll get used to calling them by their real names, don’t worry. In the meantime, how about we go get some coffee and I’ll introduce you around.”
Grateful for a moment to absorb it all, I followed Dusty out of the wardrobe room and down a series of hallways littered with makeup bags, discarded scripts, and lengths of cable. As I picked my way around the land mines, I made a mental note to wear wedges tomorrow. I could just see myself snagging a stiletto on a cable and doing a face-plant in front of Mia Carletto.
Finally the hallways opened up to a larger common area just behind the actual soundstage. In the center of the room sat Craft service-a large folding table laden with chips, cookies, crackers, soda, water, candy, and about a million other fattening, sugar-filled treats that made my mouth water, not the least of which was a large metal carafe of coffee with the Starbucks emblem emblazoned on the side. That was it. I was never leaving.
A mousy-looking girl in an oversize T-shirt and jeans stood behind the table, refilling bowls of Chex Mix. Around the table two guys in tool belts full of tape, wires, pens, and huge walkie-talkies stood munching on handfuls of cookies, while two waif-thin women with sprayed-in-place hair sipped from water bottles.
Dusty pulled me aside confidentially. “That’s Margo there on the left.” She pointed to the older of the two women, a tall brunette in a tailored suit with skin pulled so tightly back from her face that her lips were bulging. Obviously a fresh face-lift, and an aggressive one at that.
“And her?” I asked, gesturing to the other woman. She was slim, with long blonde hair, and there was something vaguely familiar about her.
“That’s Veronika, Mia’s stand-in.”
“Stand-in?” I asked.
“The stand-in runs through the scene for the technical crew, so they can get the lighting right, block out the camera angles, that sort of thing. She’s pretty much the same height, size, and coloring as Mia, and she generally wears the same clothes Mia will be while she’s running through the scenes. In fact, that, ” she said, gesturing to Veronika, “is the identical Armani suit that Mia will be wearing in the scene we’re shooting today.”
No wonder she’d looked familiar. As I took in the light cream-colored pencil skirt and blazer paired with alligator pumps, I was struck by just how much she did look like Mia. They honestly could have been twins.
“So, how long have you been working in production design?” Dusty asked, pouring herself a cup of coffee.
“Oh, well, uh…” Okay, so here’s the thing. I might have exaggerated my résumé just a teeny, tiny bit when I’d spoken with Dusty on the phone last night. In fact, if you wanted to get technical about it, I might have even lied. A little. But it was for a very good cause. There was no way I’d be able to help Ramirez get his old job back just sitting at home watching the daily entertainment report. He needed a man on the inside, so to speak. And I was that man.
Even if it meant fudging the truth a little.
“Well, I’ve been interested in design my whole life, ” I said noncommittally as I grabbed a paper cup.
“Yep.” Dusty nodded. “Me too. I was always the artistic type. When I was fifteen, I got my first piercing.” She gestured to the silver barbell cutting through her heavily lined eyebrow. “My mom just about freaked. She didn’t get my need to express myself, you know?”
“I totally hear you.” Okay, so my need to express myself had come through the use of my mother’s Visa to buy two-hundred-dollar pumps when I was fifteen, but same concept.
“Oh, are you pierced?”
“Me?” I asked, dumping cream into my cup and taking a sip. Heaven. “No. Well, my ears, but that’s it. My vice is shoes. I’m a total pain chicken. I’m really impressed that you have three.”
“Seven.”
I coughed, choking on a mouthful of coffee. “Seven?”
“Yep.” She nodded. “I started with the eyebrow, then nose, lip, belly button, both nipples, and my hood.”
I cocked my head to the side. “Hood?”
“Yeah. You know…down there.” Dusty pointed at the crotch of her jeans.
I think I went about fifteen different shades of red. I sipped at my coffee to cover my embarrassment, cringing at the thought of needles going…down there.
Luckily, though, I didn’t have to come up with a clever reply.
“Uh-oh, ” Dusty said, glancing to the left.
“Uh-oh?”
She gestured to a doorway. “You’re about to meet Hurricane Mia. And it looks like she’s a category four today.”
I turned just as a tall, slim woman strode through the room making double time. Her long blonde curls hung loose at her sides, bouncing up and down furiously as she stomped on two-inch strappy heels across the cement floor. She had on the same cream-colored pencil skirt as Veronika, paired with a white button-down blouse…open far enough that a lacy push-up bra showed beneath, maximizing her D cups. I’d recognize her anywhere. It was Ashley!
I tried not to go all fan-clubby on her, instead containing my excitement to something between open admiration and just plain staring. I had to admit, Ashley (or Mia, as I supposed I would have to get used to calling her) was much prettier in person. Her eyes were a bright emerald green, her alabaster skin perfect even without the effects of airbrushing, and the body stuffed into that pencil skirt wasn’t an inch over size two. She looked like she either existed on Tic Tacs or had a personal trainer on twenty-four-hour standby. Or maybe both. The only thing marring her perfection was the scowl etched on her face.
Mia strode up to Dusty, bearing down with purpose.
“Dusty!” she barked.
“Yes?” Dusty replied coolly. Though I could tell by the way her hand had tightened around her coffee cup that she was steeling herself for the worst.
“What did I say yesterday about teal?” Mia narrowed her eyes.
Dusty bit at the inside of her cheek, looking like she hadn’t been ready for a pop quiz so early in the morning. “I give up.”
“It makes me look pale!” Mia slammed a hand down on the snack table, making a plate of chocolate-chip cookies jump. “I told you I want to wear peach in the Neighborhood Watch scene. I’m a Spring. Springs wear peach.”
Dusty sucked in a slow breath, obviously keeping her composure with much difficulty. “Margo is wearing peach in that scene. You can’t both wear peach.”
“Screw Margo!” Mia screeched.
I saw Margo’s spine straighten, but she didn’t say anything.
“I am the star of this show, ” Mia went on. “People tune in to see me. Let Margo wear the teal and look like a corpse. I will be shot in peach. Got it?”
Dusty opened her mouth to respond, but Mia cut her off, sticking one manicured finger in Dusty’s face.
“Or it will be your job. You know how easily I could get you sacked? I’m Mia Carletto. And you? You’re expendable.” With that Mia slammed her hand down on the table again so hard the cookies hit the floor. Then she turned and stalked out of the room.
Dusty clenched her jaw, her eyes shooting daggers at Mia’s back. I joined her. Those looked like they’d been really good cookies.
“And that, ” Dusty said, still clenching her jaw, “was Mia.”
“So I gathered. Is she always that friendly?”
“Oh, this was a good day. You should have seen her during sweeps week.”
“Yikes. Remind me to stay on her good side.”
“Impossible. Mia doesn’t have a good side.” Dusty tossed the remains of her cup in the trash can. “Well, apparently I’ve got to go switch out Mia’s outfit for something ‘Springy peach, ’ ” she said, doing air quotes with her fingers. “Think you can start rounding up the others and get them dressed for the first scene?”
“No problem, ” I responded.
Famous last words.
The trouble with actors, I was soon to learn, was that they lived by the “hurry up and wait” credo. Depending on the complexity of a scene, the director might spend an hour setting up the shot for fifteen seconds of dialogue. This left the actors with way too much time on their hands and nothing to fill it. Which, as any kindergarten teacher will tell you, just spells trouble.
The Magnolia Lane cast had me running from one end of the Sunset Studios lot to the other all day long. First it was fetching Blake, aka Ashley Culver’s comatose husband, who was, by the way, not in his trailer but across the lot at the basketball court playing one-on-one with a doc from E.R.
Then I had to find Kylie, who played Tina Rey Holmes, the perky newlywed turned high-class call girl who’d moved in next door to Ashley and had the hots for the single electrician across the street who was being framed by the DA for murdering his ex-girlfriend. If last season’s cliff-hanger was any indication, I suspected Tina Rey would be having an affair with Ashley’s husband when he woke up from that coma. (That is, if Nurse Nan didn’t off him first. God, I loved this show!) Kylie, of course, was nowhere near her trailer either. Instead I finally tracked her down smoking a cigarette near the fake Golden Gate Park in the San Francisco section of the Sunset “city.”
Ricky, who played the show’s hunky gardener and everybody’s favorite boy toy, Chad, was, predictably, not in his trailer either. (See a trend here?) Instead, I tracked him down outside stage 3E, chatting up two of the briefcase girls from Deal or No Deal.
And last, but certainly not least, was Deveroux Strong, the Nordic-looking blond who played the hot electrician-slash-framed murderer, and who, incidentally, all the tabloids suspected was about to come out of the closet any day now. After checking the studio cafeteria, the Craft service table, the basketball courts, and the producer’s office, I finally found Deveroux, wonder of wonders, in his trailer.
I changed my mind about the wedges. I was wearing running shoes to work tomorrow.
The worst thing about it all was that I hadn’t even gotten a chance to talk to Mia. The only thing I’d gathered from the other actors was that they routinely got fan letters, some of which verged on the unbalanced edge. The odd thing about Mia’s were that, unlike the usual fan mail, these letters had started showing up in her trailer. Which meant that the writer had somehow gotten onto the set. I thought of the security guard standing sentinel. It didn’t seem likely he’d let a crazed fan in, which meant that whoever wrote them worked either on the show or at the studios. A somewhat disconcerting thought. And, unfortunately, one that didn’t narrow things down a whole lot. But I dutifully relayed it all to Dana when I met her for lunch in the studio cafeteria.
“Ohmigod, that means someone on the show is threatening her?” Dana asked, shoveling a spoonful of fat-free yogurt into her mouth.
I shrugged. “Not necessarily. The letters could be coming from outside and someone on the set is just delivering them.”
“I think it’s the AD. That guy has totally shifty eyes.” Dana illustrated by wagging her eyeballs back and forth as if she were watching a Ping-Pong match.
“Creepy. So, what did you gather in holding?” I asked, digging into my cheeseburger and fries. Hey, all that running around burned a lot of calories. I needed fuel. Thick, greasy, cheese-covered fuel.
“Well, there are seven regular extras on the show and a few others who filter in and out, ” Dana said, nibbling on a carrot stick. “But I think we can eliminate them from the suspects list. That AD watches us like a hawk.”
“With his shifty eyes?” I couldn’t help adding.
She ignored my sarcasm. “There’s no way an extra could wander off without being noticed. The leads, however, are a different story. They’re all over the set. One of them could easily slip away to Mia’s trailer for a minute without being missed.”
I popped a fry in my mouth. “I wish I knew what the letters said. I mean, at least then we’d have a clue what kind of person we’re looking for.”
“Someone who doesn’t like Mia very much.”
“From what I gather, she’s not exactly popular.”
“Have you had a chance to talk to her yet?”
I shook my head. “No. But I’m on it this afternoon.”
We finished our meal, topping it off with dessert (Dana’s a fat-free bran muffin, mine a chocolate-chip brownie with whipped cream) and promised to meet at the back gate after work, before Dana returned to her holding room under the shifty gaze of the assistant director.
I took the long way around the studio, picking my way through the maze of warehouses until I found myself at the back of stage 6G. Here six portable white trailers were lined up in rows, most of them with their blinds shut tight. The first one bore the name RICKY MONTGOMERY. The next two, a generic TALENT, and the fourth MIA CARLETTO. I paused, squinting up at the windows for any indication of life inside. Nothing.
“Mia?” I called, doing a gentle little tap, tap, tap on the door. Still nothing.
Apparently Mia was still at lunch. But that didn’t mean that her mysterious letters were…
I bit my lip, glancing over both shoulders. I should have walked away. I should have gone back to wardrobe, where Dusty was probably waiting for me. I should have known as I tiptoed up the two metal steps leading to the trailer’s door and gingerly turned the knob that nothing good would come of breaking into a star’s private trailer.
I should have.
But I didn’t.
Instead I slowly opened the door ducked my head inside.
“Hello? Mia?”
The interior of the trailer was a decadent contrast to the stark outside. Red velvet material covered a plush, four-foot sofa along one wall. The blinds were not only shut, but layered with brocade curtains in deep reds and golds. The floor was covered in a thick, plum-colored rug that swallowed up the sound of my heels as I stepped into the room. This was a far cry from the trailer my mother had rented to drive us to the Grand Canyon when I was eight.
To my left was a small hallway, at the end of which I could see a bedroom done in the same dark, opulent colors. To the right was a mini kitchen, complete with stainless-steel appliances and granite countertops. In front of the sofa sat a coffee table, the top littered with scripts, notes, half-empty coffee cups, and a stack of mail.
I raised one eyebrow. Fan mail?
I took a step closer, gingerly flipping one envelope over to see the address. It was hand-written in loopy letters with little hearts dotting the Is. Bingo.
I did another over-the-shoulder, praying Mia took a long lunch, as I quickly sifted through the pile of letters. Three from teenagers asking Mia to their prom, one from a little girl in the hospital, two marriage proposals, and one from a housewife in Milwaukee wanting to know were Mia hired her gardener. Great fuel for my celebrity addiction, but none of them threatening enough to warrant a police presence.
I was about to concede that my snooping was just…well, snooping, when I spotted one more envelope, partially shoved under last week’s copy of Variety. I picked it up.
The outside was a plain number ten, like the kind my phone bills came in. It was addressed to Mia Carletto, care of Sunset Studios, though I noticed it was missing a postmark. My heart sped up. Hand-delivered? There was no return address, and the top had already been neatly slit open.
With my pulse picking up to marathon speed, I gingerly slipped my fingers inside and pulled out the note.
Again, nothing special about the stationery: plain white paper, typed note. Could have come from any computer. It started, Dear Mia, but those were about the only repeatable words on the page. This guy seriously needed his mouth washed out with Ivory. He seemed to have a thing for the F-word, coupled with the B-word, with a few references to female genitalia thrown in for color.
But as vulgar as the letter was, it was the last paragraph that made a chill run up my spine.
I’ve been watching you. I’ve been waiting for you. I’m going to kill you.
Irrationally I looked to the closed blinds, as if Mr. Potty Mouth might be watching me right now. Of course, I didn’t see anyone, but that didn’t slow the adrenaline shooting through my limbs. Suddenly Mia’s trailer was the last place I wanted to be. I quickly shoved the letter back in the envelope and stuck it under the Variety. I did a hasty survey of the room to make sure it looked the same as when I’d entered, but really, I all I wanted to do was get out of there. Now!
I grabbed the handle of the door and quickly twisted it open. If I hadn’t been in such instinctive fight-or-flight mode I might have had the presence of mind to peek outside first. As it was I plowed headlong out the door.
And ran smack into something.
“Unh.”
It was something solid. Stiff.
I looked up.
Something pissed off.
I gulped down the fresh shot of adrenaline sitting in my throat like a lump and did a little one-finger wave. “Uh…hi, ” I squeaked out, doing a great Minnie Mouse impression.
Two dark espresso eyes narrowed at me. A stubble-covered jaw tightened into a hard line.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Ramirez ground out through clenched teeth.
I moved my mouth up and down, but no sound came out. I cleared my throat and sucked in a big breath. Which did nothing to help me because it smelled like Ramirez and just sent my circuits reeling again in a whole new direction.
“I…I…”
His eyes narrowed into fine slits. “Yes?”
“I’m working?” I said. Only it came out more of a question.
“How the hell did you get on the set?” He glanced behind me as if looking for security rushing to catch up to the blonde who’d broken in.
“I was on the list.” Okay, I’ll admit I just liked saying that. I mean, how often does one get on that kind of list? “I’m working here. On the set. I’m the new wardrobe assistant.”
Those eyes narrowed again, so far that I wasn’t even sure he could see out of them. “New wardrobe assistant?”
I nodded, doing another dry gulp. I was ninety-nine percent sure that Ramirez was like an M &M: hard coating on the outside, but kind of sweet and soft inside. But as I stood there, his dark, intent face hovering over mine, that white scar running menacingly across his eyebrow, and his black tattoo peeking out of his sleeve (not to mention the fact that I knew he always carried a loaded gun somewhere on his person), I was a little intimated. Okay, fine. I was a lot intimidated. I pitied the criminal who had to come up against that face across an interrogation table. They’d crack like a cheap Naugahyde bar stool.
Which, of course, was exactly what I did.
“See, here’s the thing: I thought that maybe if I was on the set I could help you with this whole stalker dealie. I mean, people tell their stylist things they never tell anyone else. And I totally know Magnolia Lane. I mean, like megafan know it. And Dana decided we should go undercover, and then we’d find the stalker, and you could go back to homicide and wouldn’t have to spend your days babysitting a bunch of flawless actors. Speaking of which, I’ve heard that Mia is a bit of a pill, so you might not want to get too involved with her. I mean, not that you’re involved. I mean, you wouldn’t be, and I’m totally not jealous at all because I know how that turned out last time, and I’m so not going there again, and I know that even if I was, you wouldn’t. You know?”
Ramirez took a deep breath. And I could see him mentally debating the merits of throwing me over his shoulder and bodily carrying me off the studio lot.
Instead, he gritted his teeth, that vein in his neck pulsing double-time. “I told you to stay out of this. To stay away from me. What part of that was so hard to understand?”
My turn to narrow my eyes. “Listen, pal, didn’t you hear what I just said? I’m doing this for you.”
Both eyebrows headed north this time. “For me? Don’t you think you’ve done enough for me lately?”
“I said I was sorry about that.”
“And yet here you are. Doing it again.”
“I’m here to help.”
“I don’t need your help.”
“You know, you don’t seem all that happy to see me.”
“Happy? Happy!” Ramirez clenched his jaw, and I could tell he was thinking a really bad word. “You don’t ever listen, do you?”
“Look, you just do your job, and I’ll do mine.”
“Fine!”
“Fine!”
He leaned in so close that I could feel his coffee-scented breath on my cheek. “Just stay the hell out of my way.”
I ground my teeth together. But, to my credit, I didn’t even shoot back a smart remark. Mostly because I couldn’t think of one. The heat of his body so close to mine suddenly chased every logical thought right out of my head. Instead, all I could think of was the last time our bodies had been this close. And, if that vein bulging in his neck was any indication, how very long it could be until we were this close again. Without meaning to, I inhaled deeply. Fabric softener and woodsy aftershave. I felt my stomach flutter.
Damn traitorous body.
Ramirez stepped around me and stalked into Mia’s trailer, back straight, jaw clenched so tightly he’d need a crowbar to pry that sucker open.
I had a bad feeling that unless I repaired the damage I’d done with Ramirez quickly, there might not be anything left to repair.
I spent the rest of the afternoon washing, pressing, and patching clothes, in between running back to wardrobe for Dusty’s last-minute changes. The woman may be pierced in some weird places, but I was beginning to think she was a saint. Despite the outrageous requests from the actors (like Margo’s insistence that she wear a three-inch, rhinestone-studded brooch over her scrubs in the hospital scene), Dusty managed not only to make sure everyone was fully clothed for each scene, but to keep some semblance of peace on the set as well. Even when it came to Mia. Who, I realized as the day wore on, just didn’t want to do anything. Ever. For anyone. I found myself wishing it were Ashley in the coma instead of her husband. By the time Stein-man, the director, yelled the longed-for, “It’s a wrap, ” it was growing dark outside and I was beyond beat.
I picked up my bag and dragged my tired self through the Sunset city and out the back gates, barely managing to drop Dana off at home and climb the steps to my apartment before collapsing fully clothed onto my futon.
And dreaming of getting up at 6:00 a.m. to do it all over again.
Isn’t Hollywood glamorous?
Somehow I pulled my tired body out of bed at the crack of dawn and by 7:37 (only seven minutes late today-I was improving!) I made my way through security and onto the lot. Solo today. We were scheduled to shoot a bedroom scene between Ashley and Chad, so obviously no extras were needed. Though Dana assured me she was booked for the following two days and would be “back on the case.” (Ever get the feeling your life has become a Charlie’s Angels episode?)
After blindly stumbling through New York, Boston, and San Francisco (all the while wishing I’d gone for the venti latte instead of the tall), I came to a screeching halt outside stage 6G.
A crowd was gathering around Mia’s trailer. And not the good kind of crowd, where someone has just been nominated for an Emmy and we’re all celebrating with early-morning champagne instead of lattes. This was a hushed, speaking-in-whispers, pointing, and doing that “can’t look away from the car wreck” kind of crowd. I jockeyed myself into position to get a look at what they were all staring at. Only, since I’m just five-one-and-a-half, my chances of seeing anything were slim to nil.
I spotted Kylie standing a couple of feet away.
“Kylie!” I called her name as I approached.
She jumped as if I’d startled her. “Oh, hi. Wardrobe, right?”
I nodded. “What’s going on?” I asked, gesturing to the crowd, which I could swear was growing by the second.
Kylie grimaced, rolling her lips inward and stuffing her hands into her pockets. “You haven’t heard? It was all over the morning news.”
I shook my head. The only report I’d tuned in to had been traffic between Evanescence songs on Star 98.7.
Kylie frowned again, scrunching up her ski-jump nose. “It’s Veronika, ” she said. “Mia’s stand-in.”
“What about her? Is she okay?” I asked, craning to see again.
Kylie bit her lip, her voice cracking. “No, she’s not. Maddie, she’s dead.”