Lorrie Moore - Like Life

“Fuck you,” said Deli. And she walked away, in a sinuous hobble, up to the corner to stand.

Harry went upstairs to his apartment and slowly opened the door to his bathroom. He reached for the switches to the light and fan and turned them on in a single, dramatic flick.

The tub. The miso soup was gone, but in its stead was a dark brown sludge, a foot deep, sulfurous and bubbled. “Oh, my God,” said Harry. It was a plague. First suds. Then vegetables. Then darkness. He would get typhus or liver death. There would be frogs.

He left another message on his landlord’s machine, then he phoned Breckie and left one on hers: “I have half the Hudson River backed up into my tub. Sea gulls are circling the building. You are a doctor. Does this mean I could get a sad and fatal ailment?” He had Maria Callas singing in the background; he always did now whenever he phoned Breckie and left messages. “Also, I want to know how seriously involved you are with this guy. Because I’m making plans, Breck. I am.”

On Thursday, Glen Scarp called and Harry said yes. Yes, yes, yes.

They met that Monday for drinks at the hotel where Scarp was staying. It was on East Fifty-seventh Street and had a long vaulted entrance, dreamy and mirrored, like Versailles, or a wizard’s castle. Scarp was waiting for Harry at the end of the corridor, sitting on a velveteen bench. Harry knew it was Scarp by his look of inventory and indifference for everyone who came down the passageway until he got to Harry. Then he looked bemused. Harry proceeded painfully slow, in a worn-shoed lope, toward the bench. Velveteen spread to either side of Scarp, like hips.

“Hello,” said Harry.

Scarp was a short man and stood quickly, aggressively, to greet a tall. “Harry? Glen Scarp. Good to meet you at last.” He was not that much older than Harry, and took Harry’s hand and shook it gingerly between both of his. This was California ginger, Hollywood ginger. This was the limp of flirtation, the lightness of promise. Harry knew this, of course, but knew this only in the way everyone did, which was knew it sort of.

Scarp was wearing a diamond broach, a sparkly broccoli on his lapel, and Harry almost said, “Nice pin,” but stopped himself. “Well, good to meet you, too,” said Harry. “My whole life these days feels conducted on the phone. It’s great to finally see the person behind the voice.” This was not true, of course, and the lie of it trickled icily down his back.

“Let’s have a drink in here, shall we?” Scarp motioned toward the cocktail lounge, which was all ficus trees and chrome and suffused in a bluish light.

“After you,” said Harry, which was how he liked to do things.

“Fabulous,” said Scarp, who marched confidently in ahead of Harry, so that Harry got to see the back of Scarp’s hair: long, sprayed, and waved as a waterfall.

“I want to tell you again first of all how much I admire your work,” said Scarp when they were seated and after they had ordered and Scarp had had a chance to push his sleeves up a bit and glance quickly down at his broach, a quick check.

“I admire yours as well,” said Harry. In reality he had never seen Scarp’s TV series and had actually heard negative things about it. Supposedly it was about young professionals, and there were a lot of blenders and babies. But this, here, now, was not reality. This was reality’s back room. It was called dealing. The key, Harry knew, once you got done with the flattery, was to be charming and quick. That is what these people liked: a good, quick story, a snappy line, a confessional anecdote with polish and perhaps a relative in it. Then they would talk money with you. They would talk ten, fifteen thousand an episode, but that was only starters. Sometimes there was more to be had than that. But Harry was after only a single episode. In and out, like a cold bath. That was all he wanted. In and out. A single episode couldn’t hurt his soul, not really. His play would have to sit for a while, but when he returned to it, like a soldier home to his wife, he would be a wealthy man. He would move. He would move somewhere with fresh air, somewhere where Breckie lived.

“Thanks,” said Scarp. “So what have you been working on lately? You had the under-thirty prize thing — what was that — three years ago?”

“Three? What year is it now?”

“Eighty-eight.”

“Eighty-eight,” repeated Harry. “Well, the prize thing was actually then four years ago.”

“Not under thirty anymore, I’ll bet.” Scarp smiled, studying Harry’s eyes.

“Nope,” said Harry, glancing away. “Not for a while.”

“So what have you been doing?”

It was like talking to the playwriting police. You needed alibis. “I’ve been lying in my apartment,” said Harry, “eating bonbons and going, ‘What year is this?’ ”

“Right.” Scarp laughed inscrutably. He picked up his drink, then put it down again without taking a sip. “As you know, I’m always looking for writers for the show. I’ve been doing some of the writing myself lately, and I don’t mind that. But I thought you and I should get to know each other. I think you have a great handle on contemporary language and the … uh …”

“Postmodern imagination?” suggested Harry.

“Absolutely.”

“Of the young deracinated American?”

“Absolutely,” said Scarp.

Absolutely. It wasn’t even absolutely to Harry, and he was the one who’d said it.

“So just informally, as friends, tell me what you’ve been up to,” said Scarp. “There’s no pressure here, no design. We’re just getting to know each other.”

“Actually I’ve been working on this play that I feel pretty good about, but it’s long and is taking a lot out of me.”

“You know, I used to want to write plays. What’s this one about, or can’t you talk about it?” Scarp started in on his drink, settling back into a listener’s sit.

“I’m primitively secret about my work,” said Harry.

“I respect that, absolutely,” said Scarp. He scowled. “Your family from this country?”

Harry stared at Scarp: His eyes were lockets of distraction. What did it mean? “Yes,” said Harry. He had to get Scarp back, get him interested, and so he began telling Scarp, in the most eloquent sentences he could construct, the story of the town his ancestors had founded in the Poconos, and what had become of it recently with radon gas, and the flight to Philly and Pittsburgh. It was a sad, complicated tale, jeweled with bittersweet wisdom, and he was lifting it in its entirety from the central speech of his play.

“That’s amazing,” said Scarp, apparently impressed, and it gave Harry confidence. He barreled on ahead, with the story of his parents’ marriage, his father’s alcoholism, his cousin’s sex change operation, and a love affair he had once had with one of the Kennedy girls. These were fragile tales he had managed to hone carefully in the writing of his play, and as he spoke with Scarp the voices of his characters entered his mouth and uttered their lines with poignancy and conviction. One had to say words, and these were the words Harry knew best.

“Astonishing,” said Scarp. He had ordered another round of drinks, at the end of which Harry was regaling him with the play’s climactic scene, the story of Aunt Fussbudget Flora — funny and wrenching and life-affirming in its way.

“The lights went dim, and the moon spilled onto her pillow in pale oblongs. We were all standing there, gathered in a prayer, when she sighed and breathed her very last word on earth: ‘Cripes.’ ”

Scarp howled in laughter. “Miraculous! What a family you have. A fascinating bunch of characters!” Harry grinned and sat back. He liked himself. He liked his life. He liked his play. He didn’t feel uneasy or cheaply spent, using his work this way, or if he did, well, he pushed that to one side.