Bruce Wagner - Still Holding

Toward the end, after a few peculiar acts — a lurid Celine Dion, and a ranting John McEnroe being interviewed by a long-haired Larry King — a second Russell Crowe took the stage. Becca thought this one to be nearly charismatic as the real thing. He did the hand-to-forehead tic of the character from A Beautiful Mind and spoke in “schizophrenic” tongues, a creative stream-of-consciousness monologue that Becca found funny and poetic, with pointedly scathing asides directed at his earlier, idiotic incarnation. This Russell was someone who didn’t relish sharing the stage.

Afterward, the two girls went out for a smoke. Annie got woozy from the wine and the weed and they decided to go home. On the way to the car, Becca saw the second Mr. Crowe and called out, “You were amazing!”

“Thanks,” he mumbled, head down, as if still in character.

She walked a little closer. “I’m a friend of Elaine’s,” she stammered. “Elaine Jordache. She told me you were in Japan — that you went to Japan.”

He eyed her warily. “Oh yeah? That was no thanks to her. She’s a cunt — worse — a Jewish cunt. And she’s trying to fucking rob me.”

His ears pricked like an animal’s and he bolted, sprinting down the block. Annie gasped then broke into laughter, while Becca’s mouth remained open in astonishment. They ran for the car and tussled awhile, Becca trying to wrest away the keys. Annie insisted on driving and made a screeching turnabout, stopping at the light in time to see the Russell chase down his inferior. He threw his shadow to the ground and pummeled him. Like puppet and despotic puppeteer, the weaker Russell squeaked and moaned, squirming under the rain of blows.

“Ohmygod!” muttered Annie, and floored it.

Sleepless in Albany

HE HAD BEEN dead just forty-five minutes when Lisanne arrived. The nurses stayed out of the room while the aunt and one of her father’s neighbors sat vigil. All of the medical equipment had been disconnected.

His skin was like tallow. The aunt spread baby powder on the hairless, purple-bruised arms, draping a small towel over the genitals, then gave Lisanne the powder and gestured for her to do the legs. She wasn’t sure why they were doing it, but it was somehow a comfort. His shins reminded her of slick wood handrails. The cologne of the talc commingling with death smells faintly sickened. His mouth twisted to one side, like that of a whispering conspirator in a medieval religious painting.

• • •

AFTER HE HAD been cremated, Lisanne kept dreaming that she was a victim of one of those undertaker scams and that what she thought were the dusty remains of her father were actually those of animals or indigent men. Finally, to break the cycle, she went downstairs.

Her aunt sat in Dad’s favorite chair half asleep, the cool, ash-filled vase poised on a thin shellacked table beside her. It took four hours — four whole hours to burn a body then grind its bones to dust. Lisanne picked up the urn, revolved it, then quietly set it down. She traced a half circle around it, then tapped the tabletop’s veneer. Just the kind of piece people bring to Antiques Roadshow, she thought randomly.

Lisanne heated up milk in a saucepan. While her aunt slept, she padded to the library to browse the bookshelves so she might further distance herself from the soot of nightmare. Her father had been a professor, a learned man. She drew a forefinger over the spines: Poverty — A History; Wedekind’s Diary of an Erotic Life; The Norton Dictionary of Modern Thought; The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa; The Book Lover’s Guide to the Internet; a cool green, five-volume set called Mexico — A Traves de los Siglos; Hardy’s Selected Poems. She never really knew him, nor would she now by his obscure and bloodless books. They would crumble soon enough, like the body of their collector, whose exit she’d been too late to observe.

“Why didn’t you fly?”

The aunt appeared in the door like a dark oracle.

“Because it terrifies me.”

Lisanne paused, wondering if she should go on. Why should she have to explain herself to this crone?

“And because I would have had to drug myself into a coma, which always makes me uncomfortable.”

The old woman winced at her niece’s low comedy but said nothing. She left the room.

Lisanne climbed the stairs and returned to the same bed she’d slept in as a girl — the same bed her mother chose to die in, ten years back. She had missed that death too.

She took half an Ativan and settled under the covers, imagining herself on a 747, first class, selecting wines and cheeses offered by the handsome steward… joshing with a flirty fellow passenger after a spate of turbulence… the uneventful landing… the connecting plane and swift arrival to hospital… Dad’s deep-water eyes rising just once more to surface sea brightness at the unexpected sight of her, and the aunt’s tearful relief as she entered the room… a convocation of hands prayerfully entwined as he shanty-sighed his last respirations, sinking back to the briny depths.

As the first wavy softness of the drug entered her bloodstream, Lisanne’s thoughts drifted to her high school boyfriend. The aunt said Robbie had moved back to town six months ago. It was at least ten years since they’d spoken and she decided to see him before the train left for Chicago on Sunday night.

Command Performance

“WHAT THE FUCK are we doing here?” asked Kit.

They were at a club on the Strip frequented by young television stars.

“My roots, baby,” said Alf. “Television made me what I fucking am. Jus’ loves comin back to look after the little ones.” He scanned the room with a vulpine smile. “You’re so mega, Kitchener. Your very fucking presence makes ‘em nutsoid. Look at ‘em! Look! Trying to be all cool and not make eye contact — sad but so sweet. ”

Kit looked around in exaggerated disgust. “I meet enough TV dickheads through Viv.”

“Think you’re gonna marry her?”

“Man, I don’t know. It’s hard. It’s fucking hard. Sometimes I think that’d be… kinda great? You know, I love her — I really do.”

“I know. I know. Great gal.”

“Sometimes I think: OK. Let’s do it. The whole yadda-baby thing. Because she’s hot, she’s in my blood, man. Other times, I just stare at the fucking ceiling. And it’s like… whoa! Can’t give up the whores. ”

Alf got quiet.

They erupted in laughter, tilting back shots.

“Still into the Buddhist thing?”

“Still into it,” said Kit, by rote. He was used to the tepid inquiries. “I’m a lapsed Buddhist,” he added with a smirk.

“Fallen monk.”

“That’s me, honey. After the fall.”

“I read this interview with Oliver Stone? He said he was attracted to Buddhism because it wasn’t on some morality trip like most religions.”

“That’s bullshit,” said Kit. “Buddhism’s all about morality. Right thought, Right action.”

“I think I’m really gonna try it,” said Alf.

“Uh huh.”

“I’m serious —at least the meditation thing. Friend of mine has this machine, this mask and headset that put out these crazy lights and sounds. Very sixties, bubba. Supposed to put you in an alpha state without having to sit for ten hours a day. Kinda jump-starts you. He drops the shrooms, then straps it on. Cause I don’t know if I could do that — the whole sit thing that you do. I mean, I got discipline but…”

“You’re disciplined at getting blow jobs.”

“From your daddy. And he’s good, too. Guess you gave him a lot of practice. I was listening to these Joseph Campbell tapes on the way to Vegas. The ones with Bill Moyers? Downey’s totally into them. We were on our way to see the Stones. Did you ever listen to that Campbell shit? He’s a trip.”