Bruce Wagner - I’m Losing You

The phone rang. Serena wanted him to come to the house again. He reflexively began the sixty-five-dollars-just-to-say-hello spiel but stopped himself. She had pots of money; that made it easier. She was lonely, that’s all. He’d make a token inspection, then sit awhile, like a volunteer at a hospice.

When he got there, it was late afternoon. Simon hung back in the entryway. The regressed old woman sat on the living room couch while a doctor gathered up his medical bag. “If the spasms return, I want you to call.” Serena nodded meekly. The nurse stood by the piano watching, vaguely aroused, vaguely punitive. “You’ll promise to call then, Serena?”

She bowed her head contritely. “Thank you, Dr. Stanken.”

“You know, this business of being brave is for the birds. And I know Donny has encouraged you to use the phone. Serena?” He squatted before her, staring into her drifting, blepharotic eyes. “You need never suffer from pain again — not so long as I am here to help. Do you understand?”

“Thank you,” she mumbled, mouth pursing involuntarily in the wake of the gentle scolding. Stuart Stanken took his bag and said goodbye. They were suddenly face to face in the front hall.

“I–I’m the Dead Animal Guy,” he whispered. Nothing else came to mind.

“I’m the pain guy. Nice to meet you.” The doctor smiled, sailing out.

The nurse swooped on Simon officiously. “You’ll have to go — Mrs. Ribkin isn’t feeling well.”

“Sorry to hear it.”

“I don’t think she really needed you.”

“I’ll just take a quick look under the house and be on my way.”

“This nonsense —if I had known she called—”

“Juana? Is that the young man?” Simon muttered “Baby Jane” under his breath as the nurse turned back to the living room, steeling herself. He followed her in. “Why didn’t you tell me he was here?”

“You should be going to bed now. You’ll be passing out from what Doctor gave you.”

“I want to sit on the terrace.”

“You should be lying down.”

“I want to sit on the terrace, goddammit!”

Outside, they propped her on a chaise, and Simon tucked a Ralph Lauren throw around. His knees acted as a hedge to keep her from falling.

“Can you smell it?”

“I smell skunk, but it’s far away.”

“Poor raccoons — it’s their mama, I know it. How awful!”

“How long have you been sick?”

“Awhile. But I’m just about done.”

Something stirred on the hill.

“I could take another look. I mean, under the house.”

Serena coughed, and he asked if she needed water. She waved him away. “I heard a marvelous joke. Farfina told me, she’s the night nurse. Stupendous gal.” She pointed toward the house with a hitch-hiker’s thumb and coughed some more. “ This one — Juana — is a Nazi.”

“I’m not excessively fond of the ladies in white myself. They’re all Nurse Ratcheds.”

The old woman was fading. He morfed her face into younger versions of itself, to pass the time. Serena coughed, bad one this time, eyes opening wide in an alarm of pain. She fidgeted and the blanket fell. Simon helped her cover up.

“There’s a man, he’s dying. His wife and him don’t get along too well, physically — haven’t done anything for years. He knows he’s not going to make it through the night. He tells her that, and asks for sex. She turns him down. He says, ‘How can you do this to me?’ The wife says, ‘I’m tired, I’m exhausted, I worked all day.’ He’s shocked, of course — like they all are. And he says, ‘But I’m dying! How could you be so tired that you couldn’t give me sex on my last night on earth?’ She looks at him and says, ‘That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have to get up in the morning’!”

She laughed and coughed and Juana gathered her away.

He was in his office at ICM, thinking about Katherine and her lover. Phylliss Wolfe had told him about as much as he could stomach. Well, his ex could have done far worse than Stocker Vidra, tribadic film critic, book editor and part-time novella-ist: Katherine might just as easily have wound up in the arms of some agent-turned-successful-producer. This way, there was less exposure. Less embarrassment for him. Better a récherchée clitterateur than some art-house director in the thralldom of a freak crossover hit. Better some dyke of Academe than a lawyer-turned-screenwriter. Lawyers-turned-writers were the worst.

He sat there, Dirk Bikkembergs pants at mid-thigh, hand around dick, wondering what they were up to. Probably in Joshua Tree, fisting each other between hits of ecstasy, laughing over his stubby, herpes-ridden shlong.

Taj let him know Phylliss Wolfe was on the phone.

“Hi, Donny. It’s Eric.”

“Hi, Eric.”

“I met you at Sweets. I brought Phylliss the script.”

“I know that, Eric. You’re very memorable.”

“She’s just getting off this other call. I thought I had her but—”

“Old gal’s slippery.”

“Would you like me to call you back? Or would you mind holding a second longer?”

“I don’t mind holding.” Donny looked down at his lap. “Do you?”

“Do I—?”

“Do you mind .”

“Holding?”

He was actually flirting with Phylliss’s assistant. She jumped on, interrupting the volley.

“Donny dearest , is that you?”

“Yes, Mother.”

“I want to thank you again for the lunch. I thought it went very well.”

“It was a stone groove, Mother.”

“Have you heard from her?”

“Don’t be desperate, Phyll.”

“Does she hate me?”

“She thinks you’re the best.”

“Well, I think she’s wonderful . So we’ll see. And if she doesn’t do it, she doesn’t do it. Fuck her and fuck you.”

“That’s my girl.” A message flashed on the Amtel: YOUR FATHER ON 4. Donny hiked up his trousers. “Phyll, I gotta jump.”

Twenty-five years ago, Bernie Ribkin produced a string of low-budget horror films that made a fortune. An over-tan Mike Todd wannabe, he disappeared in the mid-seventies, after the divorce. The story was he’d been living in Europe, producing films, but Donny didn’t buy it. He resurfaced a few years ago and was living in a stuccoplex on Burton Way. On occasion, the agent ran into associates after Bernie introduced himself at Eclipse or Drai’s the night before (“I didn’t know you had a father!”). The Veepee always cringed. He called him “my crazy stepdad.”

They exchanged guarded hellos. Donny promised himself he wouldn’t blow up. That would be his meditation exercise.

“How’s your mother?”

“Why don’t you ask her?”

“I’d like to be able to. I put several calls in but she won’t answer.”

“Serena’s not doing too well.”

“Somehow I don’t think she’s too eager to see me.”

“Guess you’ll never know.”

“She wasn’t all that eager to see me when she was tip-top!”

The agent could smell the cigar and the lox, eggs and onions. “Listen — Dad.” He hated himself for calling him that. Mistake, mistake. “I got five people waiting for me on a conference.”

“I’ll let you go. Do you think we could have lunch?”

“Talk to Taj.”

“What’s his last name, Mahal?” laughed the old man. “Looks like I’ve finally got my fucking sequel in place.”

“Great.”

“Can you believe it took me thirty years?”

“That’s Hollywood. Gotta jump.”

“I could use some of your casting ideas.”

“Talk to Taj and he’ll make a time.”