Best to Laugh: A Novel (16 page)

This had to be a first.

“—because if I talk too much about it, my blood starts to boil.” Melvin’s mouth scrunched up and he stretched his fingers before balling his hands up in a fist. This he did several times, as if it were a calming exercise.

“The thing of it is, one evening Frank’s looking for Rayna—she came to the club all the time for dinner or to see a show—and he finds her shtupping Phil in Gladys’s office!”

“Francis caught his wife shtupping the husband of his business partner?”

“
Finally
caught them. It came out that Rayna and Phil had been carrying on for over a year. Both couples divorced and then Rayna the bitch—excuse me—and Phil the bastard got married, but not before Francis attacked Phil and sent him to the hospital for nearly a week. Beat him up pretty bad.”

“Oh . . . my,” I said, borrowing my grandmother’s response to monumental news.

“My wife—God rest her soul—and I used to go to the Bel Mondo all the time. That’s where Francis and I met, and to watch that man go through all he did . . . well, it was just terrible. The scandal, the shame. It was only because he had a hell of a lawyer that he avoided a jail sentence. Then Rayna takes little Frank with her when she and Phil the bum move back east, and poor Gladys wants nothing more to do with the club—the scene of all the love crimes, you see—so Francis buys her out, losing first his family, then his partner. A couple years later, Vegas is taking away so much business and on top of that Francis isn’t paying his taxes—really, I think he just didn’t care anymore—and he loses the club. He went from a man who was king of a real Hollywood kingdom to . . . to what Queen Crisp called everyone—a knave.”

Melvin fondled his whiskery chin with a liver-spotted hand. “Everybody wanted to be Francis Flover’s friend when he ran the Bel Mondo, and nobody wanted to acknowledge his existence after all the trouble. Robert X. Roberts, for example.” Acrimony darkened his voice. “When his own career wasn’t exactly going gangbusters, he was a regular at the Bel Mondo, and never said no to a free drink or a ringside table, but afterwards, he wouldn’t give Francis the time of day. Francis won’t even go to the pool because he’s afraid of running into that bastard!” Melvin shook his head. “Sure, some people with consciences have thrown him work over the years—mostly script reading, although Janus Weinberg—hell of a guy—had him on his studio’s payroll for years; had him coaching the dancers on
The Jackie Kenner Show.
He just barely hangs on, though, and well, you can see why I worry about him.”

I felt as if I had been slugged with information. “I’m glad he has you to worry about him.”

“Ha! Tell that to Nancy! She thinks her poor old dad’s being taken advantage of by a devious schemer!” Melvin’s cheeks rounded before he expelled a long sigh. “Pardon the soliloquy, Candy. I just wanted you to know.” Clamping his hands on the knees of his houndstooth pants, he braced himself to stand up.

“I’m glad you had a good time. I’m glad you helped Francis have a good time.”

As I opened the door for him, Melvin proffered a scratchy little kiss on my cheek.

“Hope that doesn’t get you all riled up,” he said with a wiggle of his eyebrows, and he shuffled across the short landing to his apartment.

28

“
C
HARLOTTE!”
I said, opening the door to the tall blonde. “What are you doing here?”

“Just making sure you haven’t pawned all my stuff,” she said, strolling into the apartment.

“The pawn store wouldn’t take it,” I said, slipping as easily as she had into our push-pull relationship. “But, really, what are you doing here?” My voice was light, even as I seemed to have broken out in a sweat.

She twirled once before flopping on the plaid couch. “I forgot how sunny this room gets. Do you have anything to drink? Pop, iced tea? Anything cold?”

Like a compliant servant, I ran hunched and splay-footed to the kitchen, and to Charlotte’s credit she did laugh, but when I returned to the living room and threw a plate against the wall she yelped.

“Candy, what the hell?”

Handing her the glass of lemonade I held in my other hand, I apologized. “I just wanted to show you the dishes I won on
Word Wise.
They’re unbreakable.” I picked up the plate and handed it to her. “Here, you try.”

Looking at me like I was crazy, she nevertheless took the plate and Frisbeed it against the wall. It clunked to the floor, all in one piece.

“How much money did you win on that game show, anyway?” asked Charlotte and when I told her, she nodded. “I made twice that on the cruise ship.”

Taking a long sip that emptied the glass of half its lemonade, she wiped her mouth and said, “Ahh. Okay, so here’s the story, Glory: Cray and I are here on business for a couple days.”

“Are you going to stay here?”

When she said no, I could have done a cartwheel. And a back flip.

“They put us up at the Beverly-Wilshire! We’ve been here since Thursday and we’re leaving tomorrow. We’re driving my car back, too—that is, if you haven’t totaled it.”

“Car’s untotaled.”

“Cray’s meeting with some big shots from the network, so I had him drop me off on his way to the studio. I thought it’d be fun if we got a head start on New Year’s Eve. Ever been to the Toy Tiger?”

“
C
HARLOTTE
F
IELDS,”
said Billy Gray Green, leaning over the bar. “You just made the end of the year better and the prospects for the new one dy-no-mite.”

“Oh, Mr. Gray Green, how you do go on,” drawled my cousin, batting her eyes. “Now what’s the recommended drink to get this party started?”

“Ever had Sex on the Beach?”

“Every time I’m in Malibu,” said Charlotte.

Not being the focus of anyone’s attention, my eyeballs took a tour around their sockets.

“So how’s New York treating you?” asked Billy, setting before us drinks that were not sand colored, as the name would imply, but a gaudy orange.

“New York’s treating me fabulously,” said Charlotte. “I’ve got a theatrical and a commercial agent. I’ve already been on tons of auditions; in fact, I’ve got a reading for a soap the day after I get back. For the part of Suzanna Jade, Eden Valley’s newest temptress.”

Charlotte tossed her hair and struck a pose.

“You’re hired!” said Billy Gray Green.

“Hey, bartender!” A man in a party hat waved his empty glass and bleated a paper horn.

While Billy Gray Green attended to the guy who was probably not going to see in the New Year in any state of consciousness, Charlotte suddenly shot up, as if a joy buzzer had been activated on her bar stool.

“Cray!” she said, waving her arm wildly. “Cray, over here!”

The man approaching the bar looked as if he were out of another time and place—at least his face did, much of it obscured as it was by big muttonchops and a handlebar mustache.

“Ciao, bella!” he said, opening his arms to catch Charlotte as she tumbled into them.

“Ciao innamorato!” answered my cousin.

Gee,
I thought,
I wonder if anyone’s been to Italy lately.

Their kiss was long and sloppy, and I swiveled on the barstool until Charlotte finally came up for air and shoved her make-out partner
toward me. “This is Cray, Candy! Isn’t his mustache cute? He’s growing it for
Bellwether.
He films his first episode next week! Do your Scottish accent, Cray!”

“Ach, the infamous Candy.” Taking my hand, he laid his whiskery lips on it. “The one who wrecked Charlotte’s first dance recital.”

“Oh brother,” I said to my cousin. “You’re still telling that old story?”

As five-year-olds, we had both been enrolled in Miss Mila’s Tippy Toes dance class and that I had been the inadvertent star of the recital by milking my mistakes was an unforgivable offense to Charlotte.

“It might be an old story,” said my cousin, flicking aside a hank of her long blonde hair, “but it doesn’t mean it’s not important.”

As the bar’s population swelled along with the sound decibel, we thanked Billy Gray Green for our on-the-house drinks and waded through the crowd, pushing through the doors into the cool night air.

“Where should we go first?” asked Charlotte as they discussed their party options, of which there were many.

“And we’ve got to go to Blake’s,” said Cray. “There’ll be a ton of industry people there.”

“Blake created the show
Dustin Drake, DDS,
” said Charlotte. “Ever seen it? It’s a riot.”

“Yes, but—”

“—to Blake’s then!” said Cray, bending his knees and motioning for Charlotte to get on his back.

“Hi Ho Silver!” said Charlotte, climbing on.

I followed the piggy-backers as they crossed the plaza and toward a town car parked curbside like a big black cat.

“Compliments of the
Bellwether
people,” said Cray in his serviceable brogue as a chauffeur opened the passenger door.

The couple groped each other as they got into the car while the chauffeur stood at attention, a Mona Lisa smile on his face.

“Candy,” said Charlotte, leaning over Cray to talk to me through the open door. “Are you coming or not?”

It took me less than a second to say, “Not.” I gave a little wave. “Thanks, anyway. Happy New Year!”

I
WATCHED
THEIR
CAR
MERGE
INTO
TRAFFIC,
relieved that I wasn’t in it.

During a lull in their bar groping, Charlotte had taken enough inter
est in me to turn away from Cray and say, “Grandma tells me you’re temping at some record store.”

“Record company. But the job ended.” I felt no need to fill her in on what else I was up to because the interest wasn’t there, and more so, I had learned to protect what was precious from the sharp claws of my cousin.

It might have been a smart career move to go with them and mingle elbow-to-elbow with people instrumental in making sitcoms about dissolute dentists, but I didn’t feel ready to introduce myself as a comic and didn’t want to explain what I did for a living—“I’m a temp!” (a guaranteed conversation stopper at a Hollywood party). And there’d be all those smiles I’d have to fake as Charlotte introduced me to some assistant director or screenwriter who’d look back and forth at the two of us before saying, “You’re cousins? Really?”

I thought about going into Limelight Liquors to say hello to the depressive Ukrainian chess pro who worked the cash register, but there was a line of revelers inside and so I crossed the street, heading toward my apartment. I had nearly passed the first rectangular blocks of shrubbery that flanked the staircases leading to each Peyton Hall four-plex when someone said, “Happy New Year, Sandy.”

The voice was suave and accented, and I looked up to see Jaz, the building manager, sitting on a chair next to the potted plant on his small landing.

“Candy.”

“Sandy, Mandy, Candy . . . what’s in a name? That which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet.”

I nodded. “Well, Happy New Year to you, too . . . Spaz.”

The building manager held up a bottle of champagne. “Touché. And for that, you must share a quick glass of bubbly with me.” With his other hand, he crisscrossed and jabbed the air, unable to greet me, it seemed, without some imaginary swordplay. “Or perhaps you’d like to go a few rounds first?”

His pronunciation was extra crisp, as if he were trying very hard not to slur his words, and although I would have rather kept walking, I climbed the steps, feeling charitable because of the holiday.

“I’ll pass on the duel, but I’ll take the champagne.” I nodded toward a row of stacked plastic glasses next to his chair. “You’re expecting company?”

“On New Year’s Eve, one should be prepared,” he said, twisting the top glass off the stack and filling it with champagne. “Here you go.”

“So where’s Aislin?” I asked, taking a sip.

To my great surprise, he did not offer a casual, “In the loo,” or “Watching Guy Lombardo.” Instead, he set down his glass and, stretching his mouth as if trying to stifle a yawn, he slumped forward in his chair, buried his face in his hands, and began to cry.

As he sniffled and snortled, I stood frozen even as I wanted to flee.

After a long awkward moment, he lifted his head, and drying his tears with a drag of his fingers, he said, “She’s gone, you know.”

“What do you mean? I just saw her on Christmas.”

He nodded. “She told me on the telephone all about your little beachside picnic. She sounded so happy, but when I got back from Vancouver on Thursday, she was . . . gone.”

“Gone?” I was suddenly scared for Aislin. “Are you sure she’s not just taking a trip or something?”

Jaz swiped at his nose with the back of his hand. “She left me a note. Well, actually a Christmas card. Left it propped on the kitchen table, against the little cactus plant we got in Joshua Tree. It read”—he looked up like a child about to recite his lessons—“‘This will be a Merry Christmas for me as I’ve finally decided to give myself the gift of leaving you. Don’t bother looking for me because even if you find me, I’m never coming back.’”

His Technicolor blue eyes widened as if registering what he’d just reported.

“Where,” I asked, taking a step forward then rocking back, “where do you suppose she went?”

Jaz shook his head and exhaled a sigh that was close to a moan.

“Most of her family’s still in Ireland, but she’s got a sister in Boston. Maybe there.” He finished the remaining champagne in his glass and looked at me for a long moment. “Why are you standing like that?”

“Like what?”

“Crouched over. Like you’re about to run a race.”

“Maybe I am.”

Jaz’s smile was weary. “Don’t worry, the invitation to Plato’s has been revoked.”

“Please. Don’t make me gag.”

A question that had nagged at me popped out of my mouth before I could consider the wisdom in asking it. “Did you ever hit Aislin? Is that why she left?”

Color faded on Jaz’s face.

“Because the first time I ever met her, she had a big bruise on the side of her face. She tried to hide it behind the door.”

We stared at one another. I was breathing fast, as if I’d just sprinted up and down the stairs instead of merely spoken a few sentences.

Breaking the stare, Jaz looked at his glass.

“I never hit her,” he said, his voice low. “But I did throw a cream pitcher at her. After she threw a sugar bowl at me. I know that’s no excuse—I could throw a lot harder than she could—” His words were choked by a sob, and he leaned forward, as if he were trying to expel it. His plastic champagne glass fell to the cement with a little bounce. “God, I never meant to do that!”

His fingers made a cage over his face and he cried behind them. “I never, ever meant to do that!”

I stood there, to use an expression of my grandmother’s, like a dumb cluck. Several New Years seemed to pass before I laid my hand on his shuddering shoulder and patted it.

Finally he lifted his tear-streaked face, laughing a little by way of apology.

“My movie is supposed to start production in March. Did I tell you I’ll be playing Errol Flynn?”

“Only every time I drop off the rent.”

“Aislin was so excited when I got that part.”

Five minutes with the guy and my emotions vacillated from amusement, pity, disgust, and now pity again, but a softer kind.

“She said something nice about you at that picnic,” I said.

“She did?” He swiped a finger under his right eye. “What was that?”

“Well, we were sharing little Christmas memories, and she said that the two of you had spent your first Christmas together in Madrid.”

“Yes, yes, I was in a touring company of
Guys and Dolls.
” Jaz smiled at the memory, and I saw how truly handsome he was when he wasn’t trying so hard to make sure I noticed.

“She said you played Sky Masterson and that when you sang, ‘Luck Be a Lady Tonight,’ all the young señoritas swooned.”

“She said that?”

I nodded.

“That was nice of you to tell me that. Thank you.” His mouth bunched up and he stared at his hands for a moment. “And who knows, if she said that . . . maybe she will come back.”

“Maybe she will. Happy New Year, Jaz.”

The building manager picked his glass off the stoop and after refilling it held it up in a toast. “Happy New Year, Candy.”

T
HE
SONG
“
Y
OU
L
IGHT
U
P
M
Y
L
IFE”
streamed from the radio of a passing convertible, and from the stereo of an apartment across the street Mick Jagger sang that Lord, he missed me, and as I walked to my apartment, I repeated my secret power mantra like a chorus. I considered how its message applied to the events of the day, the year about to close, and no doubt would apply to the year about to begin. Maybe that would be my resolution: to be a devoted yogi with a serious practice of brandishing my life saber.

Another resolution: I would ring in the New Year by baking a cake. When I got back to my apartment, I started humming as I got out the flour and eggs. A yellow cake with my famous fudge frosting.