Who Killed Jenny Schecter? Ch. 11

"They wanted to change the ending, have her go straight and go back to her boyfriend. That pissed off a lot of people. You go along with it?"

"I'm not sure what you're asking. Did I go along with it? Yes, I went along with it, because that's what the suits wanted. Was it the right decision? No, it was a totally craven, crass, cowardly decision. But that's the business we're in. Craven, crass, cowardly usually wins in Hollywood. Actually, it seems to win most places, if you ask me. That's one reason I want to run a big studio someday. Underneath my cold, heartless, scheming bitch exterior, I have this teensy, tinsey little spark of idealism. I want to kick craven crass cowardly's ass. You can't do that from any place but at the top."

"If you have any soul left when you get there," Lauren said.

"Oh, absolutely, you're correct. Yes, it's a race. How many pieces of your soul do you sell to get there, and how many will you have left at the end, if any. Sure, I'm aware of that."

"What did you think of the production itself?"

"The production? Hah! Clusterfuck. But hey, all movies are clusterfucks, they're controlled chaos. Again, ask Carmen. The good ones manage somehow to come together at the end, in the cutting room. Some are shit, irredeemable, but you don't know it at the time. And there's a few that are just so good, so golden, that no amount of cluster-fucking can ruin them. Somebody once said that in Hollywood, nobody knows anything."

"William Goldman," Carmen said quietly. "He wrote The Princess Bride and Butch Cassidy."

"There ya go," Adele said. "Nobody knows anything. Except maybe Carmen"

* * *

"That was pretty gutsy, asking how she kept her job during the purge," Carmen told Lauren. They were sitting in the studio commissary eating lunch and killing time before their appointment with Aaron at 2 p.m. "You were provoking her."

"Yes," Lauren said. "I wanted to see how she gets angry, if she has a temper. If she blows up."

"Well, you made her angry, but she hardly reacted at all."

"No. And I don't think she killed Jenny. Shane, you've been awfully quiet. Everything okay? What's on your mind?" Lauren asked. She took a bite of her taco. Like the first day Shane had met Carmen, it was Mexican Menu day in the commissary.

"I'm okay," Shane said.

Lauren glanced at Carmen, who shrugged. Lauren was learning how talking to Shane was sometimes harder than pulling teeth. "So, Adele. What's your intuition say?"

"She didn't do it."

"But...?"

"I'd like to send her to the electric chair anyway."

"California doesn't use the electric chair anymore," Lauren said.

"Not my problem," Shane said, making them laugh. "I say, strap her in and turn on the juice."

"Boy, you really don't like her," Carmen said. "I don't think I've ever heard you say something like that about somebody."

Lauren looked at Carmen for a moment, then turned to Shane. "Shane, let me ask you a pretty hard question. Was Jenny really that out-of-control while making that movie?"

Shane pushed her refried beans around on her plate. They could see her working desperately to formulate some kind of answer.

Carmen took a sip of her iced tea, set it down, and said, "If I may, I think I can translate what Shane is not saying. I can read her body language. She's trying hard not to say that yes, Jenny was out of control. She's trying hard not to say that Jenny was in full turbo diva mode. She had become corrupted by money and power and ego. And Shane is feeling guilty, not because she had anything to do with Jenny being that way, but because she was utterly powerless to stop it. Or even slow it down. Or even say anything out loud to Jenny. How am I doing?"

Shane wouldn't look up from her plate.

"Shane says that she now realizes she totally fucked up her relationship with Molly, but that there was a chance to save it, if Jenny hadn't screwed it up by hiding the letter. Shane says she's still furious with Jenny, but because Jenny died only an hour or so after Shane found the letter she never had a chance to process all that anger. So it has been sitting inside her all this time, and it had no place to go. And then when Jenny was murdered, Shane naturally felt awful. She had somehow been -- and here Shane is still searching for the right word, but I think 'manipulated' comes about as close as we can get -- Shane says she had somehow been manipulated into become Jenny's lover, and she still doesn't know how that happened, or even why. She has no idea why she was so weak, and let Jenny push her around and -- not to be too harsh about it -- let Jenny walk all over her. Shane is saying that all her life she's the one who called the shots about her love life and sex life, for good or ill, and that she'd never before been played. But she realizes she was. She's angry about that, too. But then Jenny was murdered, and of course she's been grieving over that, as well all were and are. But Shane says she's been carrying that extra burden none of the rest had, that she was furious with Jenny but has had to bury that anger so deep down."

"Shane says she feels guilty as hell because part of her is glad Jenny is dead. Not because she hated Jenny, because she didn't. But because she was betrayed. And the person who betrayed her and manipulated her and made her feel like shit, and who potentially ruined her relationship with Molly is dead. And Shane is saying that her own pain and confusion over those terrible events is over, and she has her life back, and her own personhood back -- but at a terrible, terrible cost. Shane says she's sorry Jenny was murdered ... but that there's one small, tiny part that's glad, and she feels ashamed she feels this way, and hates like fucking hell to have to talk about it, or have people ask her about it. For a few minutes on March 8 Shane wanted Jenny to die, and then, sure enough, Jenny did. And it's tearing Shane apart. Magical thinking. She wanted Jenny to die, and then she did. So she's thinking it's her fault. That she caused Jenny to be murdered, because she was so angry at her at that moment. And of course, Shane being Shane, she turns all that anger inward, away from Jenny and onto herself. And now she realizes Alice is in jail for a crime she didn't commit, and she knows this to be true because she's the one who murdered Jenny, but just in her mind, as wish fulfillment, and not a true, physical fact. She's guilty of thought-murder. Wish-murder. That's what Shane is saying."

They watched tears streaming down Shane's face. She put her hands over her face and sobs wracked her body. Lauren stood up, pulled Shane to her feet, and held her while she cried and cried. The commissary was emptying out as people went back to work. A few people looked over and then quickly looked away.