Bruce Wagner - I’m Losing You

Hollywood didn’t make movies anymore so much as big-screen novelties and reruns of the Baby Boomer TV hit parade. Kibitzing at the Peninsula Bar with a Showtime exec, the decrepit producer concluded his only hope was to auction off the three films comprising his Undead opus — it was Bernie’s job to connive some Young Turk into having a go at the campy, mothballed omnibus. Miraculously, he still owned the series; he could thank Serena for that. What a head for business, marvelous. Bernie would give himself six months to raise studio money. Donny might be badgered into making some connections just to get the old man off his back. If the majors didn’t bite, Bernie would go cable. The Showtime fella was talking about the splash they had made with those American International re-dos a few years back — Sam Arkoff was no dunce. Cable felt like a slam dunk, but Bernie had to explore his feature options first. Cable was a fallback.

He was almost drunk. He parked in the underground garage and listened to the idling engine — something was in there, different from the piston sound. Kind of a ping. Or maybe a pong. He stepped from the car and pushed the lock-and-load button on the key ring: nothing happened. Again — nothing. It kicked in on the fourth try, securing all doors. As he walked to the elevator, he saw a dark figure weeping by the Dumpster. He stopped and stared. He thought it was a homeless person, then recognized her and softly said Hello? The woman braced herself against the bin and heaved with cartoonish agony.

“Are you all right? Did you hurt yourself?”

She was a neighbor. It was the first time he’d said a word to her in ten months of living there.

“My baby—”

“You’re upset. Can I talk to you? Can we talk a moment?” She nodded, childlike. “I’m Bernie — Bernie Ribkin, from two-oh-seven.”

“I don’t want to live. I do not want to live! ”

“Of course you do, darling. Let’s go inside now. Do you have your key? Darling, do you have your key? Is it in your purse there? Let’s find your key and I’ll take you upstairs. Let Bernie take you upstairs. You’re upset. Stop your crying. Is there someone I can call, darling?” She turned and faced him head-on, helpless. She was formidable, mega-uterine, her head a stone-carved monument to some corybantic race long dead. He surprised himself by putting his arms around her. “What is it? Darling, it can’t be that bad.”

She blurted out the tale of a paralyzed daughter, and when she told him her name — Edith-Esther, same as the building itself — Bernie put it all together: this was the bereft mother of Oberon Mall. The condolent producer invited her to his apartment, where she poured her heart out over Frito-Lays, non-pareils and Snappled Absolut. She could really drink. He called her Double E, and that made her laugh.

She reminded him of Gala, an old lover who kept horses in Chats-worth — both women smelled of stables, leaf and menses. Bernie felt sorry for this dappled gray mess of a woman, this rueful roan oak. Edie (he settled on that) said the terrible thing was that in brainstem injuries like her baby’s, the extent of damage was impossible to assess — doctors were reduced to using the patient’s tears as a crude gauge of awareness and mental competency. The somewhat jaded old man found that detail haunting.

Bernie walked her up to four-ten and they exchanged numbers. She told him he was a courtly man. She wanted to show him her computer “when the place was clean.” He had already turned to go when Edie asked if he would come see her baby: today, now , or at least in half an hour or so. She held his arm and begged him to walk over — they were that close to Cedars. All we have to do, she said, is pick up the cake before we go, around the corner at Michel Richard. Edie asked him again because she didn’t have it in her to go alone. If they could just pick up the cake; she already had the candles. Today was Obie’s birthday.

Late Friday afternoon, he went to see Jabba. She was dancing at Little Kink’s, a club in East Hollywood.

They met when he first came to town. Bernie picked her up on El Centro and she gave him a blow job but it didn’t work so well. He gave her a hundy to have lunch with him at Musso’s. She was impressed with the old man and his Range Rover. He was coy about what he did for a living, and Jabba thought for sure he was a Player — they had their little game. Nice for Bernie’s ego. He saw her every couple of weeks like that, usually for lunch or a movie. They never did anything, but he always slipped her a hundy.

This time they went to Locanda Veneta, a chic Italian place on Third. Jabba’s skin was broken out. Bernie pointed to a man sitting with his back to the kitchen.

“See that guy? Billy Friedkin. He directed The Exorcist .”

“He looks like a dentist.”

“And The French Connection , ever see that? What are you doing to yourself, you look like hell.”

“Thanks.”

“Are you eating right?”

“I’m fucking depressed.”

“You don’t have the right to be depressed. You’re too goddam young.”

Jabba glared, deciding whether to spit in his eye. She looked over to see what Friedkin was up to, then took a fork and farted with her food. “I need money.”

“Join the club.”

“Fuck you.”

“ Work for a living.” Bernie was afraid she was going to walk. Her head caromed between Friedkin and the front door.

“Why don’t you put me in one of your pictures?”

“I was going to.”

“Bullshitter.”

“My movie fell apart.”

“Such a bullshitter ! I can’t believe this— you , like everybody else!”

“How am I a bullshitter, Jabba?”

“You’re not a producer, you’re not an anything —”

“Tell me how I’m a bullshitter, you little punk!”

“All right — I’m leaving.” She rose but he stopped her.

“Give me the decency of a response. I had a picture — and that’s no bullshit. There was a nice part—”

“Oh, fuck you,” she said wearily, sitting back down.

“Would you lower your voice?”

“You’re sad, you know it? Mama!” she shouted, as two or three heads turned. “Mama, he’s gonna put me in pictures!”

The veins in his temples swelled like candelabra. “You want me to prove it?”

“Is that Burt Reynolds?” she asked of no one in particular as a nondescript man swept through the door. “That’s not Burt Reynolds. Every body’s a bullshitter—”

“Do you think I lie, Jabba?”

“No. You just bullshit.”

“I go out on a limb for you.”

“Oh right. Put your life right on the line.”

“I’ll show you. Then you’ll think twice about the kind of crap that comes from your mouth.”

He paid the check and Jabba said she just wanted to go home. Bernie took her arm and steered her across the street to Cedars. He told her Obie Mall was the star of his picture and he’d been struggling to find a replacement. Jabba only started to believe him when they reached the room. His heart was pounding, and he searched his pockets for stray tranquilizers — nothing. He made her wait in the hall while he ducked in to make sure Edith-Esther wasn’t there. The private nurse smiled and said he’d just missed her. The nurse toweled the Big Star’s chin and said, “Well, who’s the popular girl? Mr. Bernie’s back to see you, but he didn’t bring a cake.” She left the three of them alone.

“Oh my God,” said Jabba. “It is , it’s her .”

Bernie sat in the nurse’s chair and held Obie’s hand. “It’s okay,” he said as the agitated Big Star’s eyes bugged and darted about. “It’s all right, your mama will be back.”