This particular story takes me back to around four years ago when my brother, Will, and drove up to Milwaukee, Wisconsin (as if there was another Milwaukee) for a wedding. Will was in the wedding, I was just along for the ride (with an invitation to the wedding of course; I’m not that rude). However, the story I’m about to tell you in no way has anything to do with Milwaukee, but rather, the little town we stopped at on the way back home, a little town called Chicago.

We planned early on that we would spend a good part of a day checking out some of the sites in Chicago. After all, we were two bachelors with no family or any other pressing need to return to the real world (although I did have class the following morning). We saw the Sears Tower, Lake Michigan, Chicago River, etc. But the real treat that I kept hyping for the previous weeks was that we had to eat some deep dish pizza. Will, who likes good food, was keen on the idea, so I had no real problem talking him into it.

It was bitterly cold in the Windy City, but we were brave explorers looking for a place to chow down on this fabled deep dish. Will and I were not very fortuitous for the first half hour or so. We walked down several different streets and blocks, and after all this, our morale was getting a bit low. However, our luck would soon change. For in the distance, I beheld orange and white cones!

Now usually orange and white cones are for construction, and are symbols of boundaries and off limits. I thought at first that there was a new skyscraper going up, but looked around and saw no cranes of any sort. Then we heard a sound, something resembling a large fan. We looked, and that is exactly what it was, and it was blowing any unseemly debris, snow, etc. off the street to make it look perfect. Interesting, I thought, but this was all mere distraction as far as I was concerned; I wanted deep dish.

It was then I saw this man talking with a walkie talkie giving orders and seemingly in charge. He looks like a man who knows the lay of the land. Perhaps he knows where there’s some sort of deep dish pizza restaurant, was what I assumed. I looked at Will to see what he was thinking; he was busy staring at the Sears Tower. It would be up to me to engage this man in conversation.

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Yeah, whaddaya want?”

“My brother and I are looking for a place that serves deep dish. Do you know where one is?”

“Man, this is Chicago; there’s hundreds of places like that.”

“Where’s the closest one, smartass?” I didn’t say the last word, but I felt like it.

“I dunno. I think there may be on down two blocks south.”

“South? Good, it may be warmer that way.” He didn’t laugh at my attempt in humor.

Kind of mundane dialogue so far, right? Well, it started to become more interesting. My brother had the gumption to ask, “So, what’s with all the cones and the large fan?”

“We’re shooting a movie here, kid!” was the man’s response. That explained the walkie talkie. He was a production coordinator of sorts.

“Really?” I asked, “What movie?”

To protect the innocence, I am omitting the name of the movie. Not so much to keep the movie anonymous, but to keep the lead actor so; this will come into play later, I assure you. Basically, the next line of dialogue is the guy telling us the name of the movie and the lead actor who starred in it

“Wow, cool. I’ve seen several of his movies. Is he around here?”

“No, he’s probably smart and staying out of the cold.”

And with that the man got a call on his walkie talkie, which prompted him to go about his business. Will and I just shrugged our shoulders, and started walking south, toward our destination.

It just so happened that we passed by several trailers on our way to the restaurant. Minding our own business and taking in the sights made us susceptible to perhaps one of the biggest surprises in my life. Out of the blue (the trailer was literally the color blue), a man stepped out of the trailer. The man was the aforementioned lead actor of the movie that was being shot. Will elbowed me in the ribs, and asked me if that was who he thought it was. Before I could answer, the lead actor came up to us, took off his sunglasses, and said, “Hey, you look like a couple of guys looking for some deep dish!” We nodded in shock. What was hard to determine was what was more shocking: the fact that he was talking to us, or the fact that he was talking to us like a couple of twelve year olds. I said “Yeah. Are you…”

His response was quick. “Let’s go. The craft and services food suck today. I know a good place down the street.” So now the duo became a trio: Will, the lead actor who you would know if I said his name, and me. So we walked, and as sure as the lead actor and the production coordinator said, there was a deep dish restaurant.

During the course of the meal. The expected happened; people came to get autographs from this man, we got service right away (I had no idea they could make two deep dish pizzas in under ten minutes; and the quality was no less than it should have been.), and the manager wanted his picture taken with the lead actor. Will and I were just having a ball. This lead actor was hilarious, and the stories he told; it would fill up material for this blog for a whole month.

However, all the good things must come to an end; the unexpected happened as well. The lead actor was making sure that Will and I were treated more royally than he was, giving us larger slices and making sure the waiter gave us special attention. He also kept calling me “Bud”, and Will “Junior”; Will and I just assumed he was one of those guys that give nicknames to everyone. But one thing stood out above any other abnormality. The lead actor kept mentioning our Mom. Saying phrases like, “So how’s your mom?”, and “You guys make sure you treat your Mom right.” I wasn’t that suspicious at first, but after the sixth time he mentioned her, Will and I looked at each other, and I asked, “Excuse me, but can I ask you a question?”

“Sure, go ahead,” was his response.

“Why do you keep bringing up our Mom? I mean, I’m flattered that you seem to care about our Mom like this, but why do you keep mentioning her?”

“Wait…what? You mean, you’re Mom didn’t tell you?”

“Tell us what?”

“Oh, God, this is exactly what I wanted to avoid. Oh, man. Alright, guys, you’re old enough to take this I think. What did your Mom tell you exactly?”

Will and I were speechless. The lead actor continued.

“I see. Well…oh, man, this is tougher than I thought it was going to be. I was really hoping she would have told you ahead of time. Where do I start?”

“From the beginning…” Will said. I looked at him, and he just shrugged, as if he wanted to see where this was going. I have to admit, I was curious myself.

“Right. Well, you’re mother and I met in New Orleans twenty-four years ago…”

I was astonished. “Wow! Mom never told us she met you. Did she ever tell you that, Will?”

Will shook his head; he was as astonished as I was.

This only exacerbated the lead actor’s uneasiness. “Oh, boy. Well, we did. Mardi Gras to be exact. Anyway, I was a young man who was at the beginning of his acting career; a nobody really. But your mother was beautiful.”

Will and I were seriously engaged. I had never known Mom to go to Mardi Gras; it must have been right before she met Dad. The lead actor still spoke.

“We met, we talked, spent a great night walking around the French Quarter. Anyway, she had a room at the Place “de” Arms hotel in the Quarter…”

“Oh, yeah, I heard Mom talk about that place, Will interjected, it’s her favorite hotel.”

“I bet it is,” said the lead actor, almost to himself. This comment made me a little disconcerted. My feelings didn’t stop the lead actor from rambling on.

“Anyways, your Mom invited me to stay with her for the night. And well…”

The realization of what he was saying smacked me upside and down. “You mean to say that you slept with our mother?!”

“Yes! Look I know it’s tough, but I have to continue. After that night, which I never forgot by the way, your mother and I went our separate ways, and we didn’t hear from each other until three years later, when she called and told me that I had to come and be a father for her twins, because, well, I was the natural father.”

“Are you saying…” Will asked with a ghastly look on his face. The lead actor nodded, then continued.

“I told her that I would do the best I could, but I had a career to think about. I had just had my first serious role. You know the movie Can’t say the title without giving the actor away. Sorry.?” Will and I nodded. “Yeah, it was around that time. Your mother told me that I had to give all or nothing, and, regrettably, I chose the latter.”

Will was the voice of reason, it seemed. “But Guinn’s older than me. You may be Guinn’s father, sure, but you’re not mine.” But the lead actor was undaunted by this.

“That’s what you’ve been told you’re whole life, but…you’re twins. Not identical twins, but twins all the same. Has anyone ever told you that you two look alike?” It was true; they had quite often. Our dumbfounded silence was all the answer the lead actor needed.

Will and I were just in shock. Complete and utter shock. The lead actor respected our silence; he had to be just as speechless as we were. I tried to be considerate of his needs, but I didn’t quite know how I felt. I had a maelstrom of emotions, but the most I had was my anger at Mom for sleeping with this guy, behind Dad’s back; some random guy that she met at Mardi Gras! I was about to pick up my cell phone to call her when another realization hit me.

Mardi Gras was in February. If mom was impregnated by the lead actor, she would have had me in the fall. My birthday was in April; unless that was a lie, too…but my birthday is on all my records. Surely those couldn’t be forged. I decided to press into the matter just a little more before conceding that I had just now met my father.

“But my birthday is in April. How could my Mom had conceived in February and then had me in April?”

“I don’t know what to say, Bud and Junior, but the facts are facts. I guess you don’t know you’re real birthday, either.”

Will, deciding to join me, demanded, “Why do you keep calling Guinn “Bud” and me “Junior”? Why? This whole thing is abrupt, and, no offense, but it’s kind of annoying that you don’t call us by our real names.”

“But your names are Bud and Junior, right?”

“No, my name’s Will and this is Guinn.”

“That can’t be right.”

“Well, it is.”

“But you’re mother specifically said that you’re names were Bud and Junior.”

Will and I gave quizzical looks at each other, wondering why Mom would do that. Something wasn’t right about all this. The lead actor had the same feeling, which prompted him to ask, “What are your last names?”

“Davis,” Will and I said in unison.

The lead actor’s eyes widened. “You mean to tell me that your names are not Bud and Junior Hillibrew?”

“No…” was all I could muster.

The lead actor’s shoulders slumped and he looked around frantically. He then quickly jumped up and put on his coat, and explained, “Excuse me, gentlemen, there seems to have been a mistake.” He threw down a hundred dollar bill. “That’s for the deep dish and your troubles. All that stuff I said about being your pop; forget it, I’m not him. I wish you two a long and happy life.” He began to rush off. Will hollered after him, “Thanks for buying the pizza.”

The lead actor stopped, turned around, and walked back to the table. He said, “No problem. And by the way, Guinn and Will, was it? If you ever make a peep about this to anyone, not only will deny everything, but I’ll also sue your asses into the next decade. See ya around.” And with that he left with no intention of coming back.

The lead actor never saw us again, but I’ve seen him plenty of times since then. In different movies. Here I am. I had a chance lunch with a famous actor, but I can’t tell anyone about it because of the consequences of doing so (I took him at his word about the lawsuit; I wouldn’t want people knowing that I fathered illegitimate children, too.).

As for the rest of the story, Will and I couldn’t possibly eat the whole pizza without the lead actor, so we took some in a doggy bag, and drove back to Jackson. Will ate the rest of it on the way. Several things happened. We got pulled over for a speeding ticket. We sang along with songs on the radio. When we got home, my brother threw up from the leftover pizza. He hates deep dish to this day. I know this last paragraph seemed a bit anticlimactic, but isn’t that a lot like life. Each exciting moment is surrounded by dull, mundane moments. We connect the dots, so to speak. In between those moments we do many things; we go cross country for weddings, we father illegitimate children, we get speeding tickets. So the next time you have a special moment, I encourage you to cherish it, because they are special indeed.