Dylan Meserve’s mother was long dead from an undiagnosed degenerative neuromuscular disease. His father was a Brooklyn-based alto sax player who’d never wanted a rug rat in the first place and had died of an overdose five years ago.

Michaela and Dylan were gorgeous and young and thin and had come to L.A. for the obvious reason.

By day, he sold shoes at a Foot Locker in Brentwood. She was a lunch waitress at a pseudo-trattoria on the east end of Beverly Hills.

They’d met at the PlayHouse, taking an Inner Drama seminar from Nora Dowd.

The last time anyone had seen them was on a Monday night, just after ten p.m., leaving the acting workshop together. They’d worked their butts off on a scene from Simpatico. Neither really got what Sam Shepard was aiming for but the play had plenty of juicy parts, all that screaming. Nora Dowd had urged them to inject themselves in the scene, smell the horseshit, open themselves up to the pain and the hopelessness.

Both of them felt they’d delivered. Dylan’s Vinnie had been perfectly wild and crazy and dangerous, and Michaela’s Rosie was a classy woman of mystery.

Nora Dowd had seemed okay with the performance, especially Dylan’s contribution.

That frosted Michaela a bit but she wasn’t surprised.

Watching Nora go off on one of those speeches about right brain-left brain. Talking more to herself than to anyone else.

The PlayHouse’s front room was set up like a theater, with a stage and folding chairs. The only time it got used was for seminars.

Lots of seminars, no shortage of students. One of Nora’s alumni, a former exotic dancer named April Lange, had scored a role on a sitcom on the WB. An autographed picture of April used to hang in the entry before someone took it down. Blond, shiny-eyed, vaguely predatory. Michaela used to think: Why her?

Then again, maybe it was a good sign. If it could happen to April, it could happen to anyone.