Chapter 52 Ryan

CHAPTER 52 RYAN

2011

Los Angeles

Over the years, People has twice printed that I was engaged—“a source close to the couple said”—and that “the couple” planned on keeping the wedding intimate. In fact, me and the named person weren’t even dating. Blame for those stories can’t fall entirely on the magazine, though, since mostly they were planted by my team, or his team, or a PR firm. And yet, there was always a part of me that was disappointed when I saw those items in print. I was hoping the journalist would do better.

There’s this thing I once read about called the Gell-Mann Amnesia Effect. It’s basically how when you read something on which you’re an expert, you’re keenly aware of the errors in reporting and understanding. But then you turn the page and assume veracity on another topic you’re less familiar with. The fucked-up thing about this effect, for me, was realizing I’m not even an expert on myself. Imagine me reading some tidbit in a magazine then calling Janie to vent, only to have her tell me the rhyme and reason behind its placement and me feeling woozy at how blurry the line is between real me and fake me. Such a thing has an eroding effect on one’s sense of self.

Dating fellow actors, of which I’ve done plenty, is satisfying only if you like getting lost inside a house of mirrors.

I was doing about two movies a year then, across genres, though I felt most comfortable playing gritty characters like Persephone, desperate to prove themselves. Janie persuaded me to do a couple rom-coms— “to show your range,” she said—but I hated filming those. Every scene was about me looking tasty for the camera.

One morning when I was home between movie shoots, I called Janie. I asked her to meet me at the Los Feliz house. I waited for her in the backyard, walking the tiled edge of the pool. Eight steps long, three steps wide. I had watched Cass do it many afternoons. “It calms me,” she said when I asked why she was essentially walking in a circle.

But she was right. It was like a form of meditation.

In the years since, I’d spent hours pacing this backyard, wondering if I possessed the courage for what I was finally about to do. Janie was still on the phone when she arrived. She gave me a little wave, held up a finger. I continued walking the edge of the pool. Head down, mind churning. Would I be making my life harder or easier? I couldn’t say.

“All yours,” Janie said. I paused. I was on the far side of the pool.

“I think it’s time,” I said. “I’m coming out.”

Janie raised her eyebrows, held them like that.

“Call Vanity Fair ,” I continued. “I know who I want reporting it.”