Loose Screws (15 page)

“I know. I'm wondering if the dog will live long enough to eat it all.”

Geoff whimpers.

“Sorry. Just a casual observation.”

“If I may ask a dumb question…why'd you buy such a big bag to begin with?”

“I didn't. Brice did. It was in the apartment after…you know.”

She nods. “What's happening on that front, anyway?”

I shrug, open the oven door, take out the lasagne, slip in the bread, let the door bang shut. “You know as much as I do. Probably more, since I haven't seen or heard any news in a week.”

Which topic naturally conjures up an image of Nick, an image I immediately, with paltry success, attempt to delete from my brain.

“Hey, honey,” Mark calls from the living room. “Come see this.”

Shelby leaves; I grab Geoff's empty dish from the floor, scoop out a bowlful of food and set it back on the floor, then stand there watching the dog scarf food as though he hasn't eaten since Clinton's first term in office.

The melancholia suddenly hooks one claw around my ankle, threatening to drag me under. I grab a pair of pot holders, carry the lasagne out to the table just in time to see Mark standing behind Shelby with his arms wrapped around her waist, both of them laughing at something the older kid apparently just said. I search my cousin's face, but see no sign that the laughter, or the contentment radiating from her eyes, is false.

Sorry, Terrie,
I think, breathing an inward sigh of relief that this one landmark in my life, at least, has remained constant. Except, right on the heels of my relief comes another feeling, not exactly resentful, but sharp-edged enough to be uncomfortable:

That Shelby has what I thought I was going to get, even though I didn't know I wanted it. That her life is basically all mapped out, defined, settled, while here I am, past thirty and suddenly unsure of what I want to be when I grow up.

Or who I want to be.

I plaster a smile to my face. “Hey, guys—let's eat!”

 

The following Monday, I get home from work, grab Geoff's leash and whisk him outside before he bursts, then come back inside to find three messages on my machine. One is from the caterers, asking—politely—if I'd sent them the rest of their money. One is from the florist, asking—not quite so politely—if I'd sent them the rest of their money. Now, if the universe had gotten its rear back in gear, the next call would have been from Greg saying, “Hi, Ginge, just wanted to let you know I've paid all the bills,” but, since the universe clearly wasn't interested in being the least bit orderly, the third message was instead from Curtiss James, who had finally answered the messages the lawyer had left about Brice leaving him Geoff.

“Hi, Ginger, we'll be up somewhere around seven-thirty to pick up the dog, but listen, don't get too bent out of shape if we're a tad late, since we're coming all the way from Forest Hills.”

Hmm. Does that make him the Queen of Queens?

I glance at my kitchen clock: 7:14. I look at Geoff,
who's lolling crookedly on one hip, panting away, his stubby little back paws facing north while the rest of him faces east. My heart cramps. He looks so happy. I've tried to prepare him for what's about to happen, but we haven't quite worked out the language barrier problems. I squat down beside him, stroking those wonderful, ridiculous ears. He snaps shut his mouth, clearly aware that something's not right.

“He's a nice person, I'm sure,” I say. “Brice wouldn't have left you to him, otherwise, would he? No, of course he wouldn't.” Mindless of my dress and panty hose, I slide my butt down onto the floor beside him, leaning up against the cabinets. Geoff plants the front half of his body on my lap, which isn't a particularly pleasant experience with those bony elbows of his. Especially when a thin ribbon of drool puddles on my right thigh. But I don't care. After tonight, there won't be any ribbons of drool to avoid, thin or otherwise, a thought that depresses the hell out of me.

Speaking of depressing. I have no idea why, maybe because I'm bored out of my ever-loving little noggin at work, but Greg's been on my mind an awful lot the past couple of days. For the most part, that whole episode of my life had congealed into a dull little ache in the center of my chest, but something—maybe watching Shelby and Mark?—has nudged it into life again. I've been so busy just trying to stay afloat that I hadn't fully realized just how much I'd missed him.

Not that I think things will ever go back the way they were. Not now. Intuition tells me too much time has passed, that if Greg were going to repent, he would have done it by now. I keep thinking I should give Phyllis a call, just to check if he's surfaced, but that would sound pathetic. And God knows, I don't want to sound pathetic.

I suppose I could sell the ring to pay the bills?

The doorbell buzzes. Geoff looks up at me expectantly. I give him a gentle hug around the neck, then clumsily get to my feet.

“Hi,” says the brightly smiling vision in the hall when
I open the door. The vision sticks out a much bejeweled hand. “Curtiss James. You must be Ginger.”

Dear God, it's a walking bordello. Skin-tight red leather pants, sheer purple shirt (heavily beaded), flowing print scarf, red cowboy boots. Spiked, bleached-blond hair, but with fashionably dark roots. Many earrings.

I smile, trying not to squint from the glare. “Unfortunately, yes.”

“Now, now, Ginger's a great name. After all,” Curtiss says, sweeping—and I do mean sweeping—into the apartment, “it certainly did well by Ginger Rogers. Christ, what a fabulous apartment! I've heard great things about some of the places up here, but this is the first one I've actually been in. Ohmigod, is this
Geoffrey?
” Curtiss turns to me, hand on chest. A pinky ring with a rock as big as Central Park winks back at me. “This
can't
be Geoffrey—he was just this big—” he spreads his hands six inches apart “—when I last saw him.”

The dog and I look at each other. Geoff's expression says, “You're kidding, right?”

“So…you've already met?”

“Oh, God, yes, although Brice and I were already having problems by then. I was the one who thought a baby might help save the relationship. But you know how that goes.” He squats down, pats the floor in front of him. “C'mon, Geoffrey. C'mon, baby…yeah, that's a good boy…”

Geoff has not only gone to Curtiss, but flopped onto his back to get his belly rubbed. The dog twists his head around to look at me, upside down.

Traitor.

Still, some of the tension inside me eases at how much Curtiss actually likes the dog. I mean, if I have to give him up, I just want to be sure he's going to be loved as much as I…

Damn.

“I'm sorry it took so long for the lawyer to find me,” Curtiss now says. “My honey had a photo shoot in Aruba, so we decided to make it a working vacation. And God, did we ever need one!”

A two-parent home is good, right?

“So how come Brice got the dog when you two, um, split up?”

By this time, Curtiss is sitting cross-legged on the floor (although how he's managed that in those pants is beyond me) dragging a set of manicured nails repeatedly across Geoff's chest. The dog is doing everything but groan.

“I decided Brice needed him more than I did.” He glances up at me, his smile a little sad. “He was a lonely sonuvabitch.”

“He was horri—” I catch myself. This man had been Brice's lover, after all. But Curtiss gives me a surprisingly charming smile.

“Yes, he was. Although with his background, it's not surprising his people skills were a little lacking.”

He says this as if I should know what he's talking about. I don't. Nor do I particularly want to know. Because then, knowing me, I'd end up feeling sorry for the man. And
poof!
Years of perfectly justified antipathy would go right down the tubes.

Curtiss gets to his feet, rearranging himself in the pants, then says, “Well, I hate to dash, but Liam's circling the block in the car. So, if you could just give me Geoffrey's things…”

“Oh. Of course.”

I've already filled a plastic bag with his bowls and toys and stuff. I get it from the kitchen, digging a pink rubber ball out of the bag. Geoff yips and wags his rump. “Not this time, sweetie,” I say over a tight throat, then to Curtiss, “This is his favorite. If I can't get him out much, I toss this for him for a half hour every night. Otherwise, the way he eats, he'd look like a torpedo. Which reminds me…”

I return to the kitchen, lug out the half-full bag of food. It's probably down to twenty-five pounds, but I still feel as though I'm dragging around a dead body. “This is the only dog food he'll eat.”

Curtiss eyes the bag curiously. “Guess I won't have to buy any for a while.”

“There's a…yogurt container already in it.”
I will not cry, I will not cry.
“He gets two scoops a day.”

“Got it. Well, honey,” he says to the dog, snapping his leash to his collar. “Let's go meet your other daddy!”

I stand at the door, watching them walk down the hall, the bag of food hefted onto Curtiss's nonexistent hip. They reach the elevator. Curtiss shifts the food to his other hip, pushes the button, calls out, “Thanks for taking care of him!”

“No problem.”

The elevator grinds into place; the door opens. And just as I'm thinking Geoff doesn't even have the courtesy to say goodbye, the dog swings his head around and looks at me, yips once, then trots onto the elevator.

 

The apartment seems almost unbearably empty. And quiet. Which is odd considering that, a) I've lived alone for ten years, I
like
living alone, and pre-Geoff, I'd never even had a parakeet to take care of, and b) the people upstairs must be getting ready to sacrifice that rooster, if the vibrations coming through the ceiling are any indication. But like most New Yorkers, I'm pretty good at tuning out noise not directly related to me, wild rumpuses included.

Hunger propels me into the kitchen, where I contemplate dinner. Gotta keep up my strength and all that. Let's see…I root amongst all the few mystery packages shivering in the fridge, my butt hanging out to Jersey….

Well, there's some deli stuff in the drawer that will soon need carbon dating in order to tell how old it is, about three bites of pasta salad, something in foil I no longer recognize, which I rewrap and stick back in. And some lasagne left over from the other night, although after three days, I'm getting pretty sick of it. But—and this is the bright note to the evening—I bought another loaf of that fine French bread, and thus can make some more garlic bread.

So. Pop a serving of lasagne into the nuker, slice up the bread, spread the garlic goop on it, turn on the oven…

What on earth is that strange…pinging sound? Yes…it's
definitely coming from the oven. Curious, I open the door—

Something flies out and bounces off my chest. I scream, throwing myself backward over the step stool, just catching sight of a gray streak zipping across my kitchen floor to vanish underneath the molding at the base of my sink.

It takes me a minute. Then I scream again, jumping up and down and forking my fingers through my hair whilst violently shuddering, vaguely aware of my current resemblance to my upstairs neighbors. After my hysteria runs its course, I drop onto the top of the step stool, listening to my thudding heart as I look over at the cabinet that Geoff had kept pawing at all the time.

And what were the odds Hunka Munka and all the little Muncateers were snickering behind their little furry paws? Or maybe not. Maybe their sentinel's close brush with broilerdom has sobered them somewhat.

I tell myself I'm only imagining the scent of seared mouse fur.

I give up on the garlic bread idea—wouldn't you?—eat the lasagne, the three bites of pasta salad, and half a thing of Godiva chocolate ice cream, then get into my jammies and click on the tube, where I sit, zombie-like (except for the occasional jerking to be sure I wasn't seeing rodents zipping past), until I apparently pass out in the wee hours without bothering to turn off the TV or pull out the sofa bed. At least, such is the state in which I find myself when, at some ungodly, still-dark hour, somebody decides it would be fun to repeatedly ram a four-by-four into my door.

“Jesus!” I yell. “What the f—”

“Get out!” a deep male voice booms on the other side. “The apartment above you's on fire!”

T
alk about your motivational speeches. Now gagging on the smell of smoke, I grab my robe, shove my feet into the first shoes I find, which happen to be the Lucite-bottomed mules, yank my purse off the kitchen counter and my tote bag with my laptop and cell phone off the wing chair and book it out of there. The hallway is riddled with cussing and yelling and about a million people all bumping into each other, the children excited and babbling, the old people wandering in dazed circles like rundown wind-up toys.

Trying to tie my sash around my waist while hanging on to all my crap and stay balanced on these stupid shoes, I take two or three seconds to wake up, get my bearings. Figuring the firefighters—there are two of them, scary as grizzly bears in their full attire, lumbering and jangling as they try to direct the tide toward the stairs—have better things to do, like, oh, put out the fire in the
APARTMENT RIGHT ABOVE MINE,
I take over herding the more confused and frightened of the older people down the hall and toward stairs I doubt any of them have used
since 1966. Yeah, I'm scared shitless, too, but at least I have a clue as to what's going on.

“There's nothing to worry about, I'm sure getting everyone out's just a precaution,” I say, smiling for one poor old gal, her scalp pink and fragile-looking underneath thin white hair held hostage in a row of pin curls. In a crisp, new housecoat splashed with tropical flowers, her feet encased in plastic slippers, she clamps on to my arm, her grip surprisingly strong. She smells faintly of mothballs and old perfume. “I'm sure everyone's apartment will be fine,” I say.

She's staring at the stairs with wide eyes. “You'll help me down?”

“You betcha. Hang on…there you go…”

We take one tentative step toward the stairs, the rest of the tenants swirling around us. The noise is deafening.

“What's your name?” she asks.

“Ginger.”

She glances over at me at that, then says, “I'm Esther. Esther Moskovitz.”

“Nice to meet you, Mrs. Moskovitz.”

That gets a smile. “How nice, a young person who uses my last name. Nowadays, nobody uses your last name,” she says, shuffling at about the speed of a glacier along the tiled floor. “Everybody wants to be your buddy, thinks it's okay to use a person's given name, like it's their right or something.”

Despite the load I'm already carrying, I find myself wondering if I can pick her up, carry her down the damn steps. It occurs to me at this rate, by the time I get her outside, either the fire will be out or the building will have burned down.

“You're that new girl who just moved in, aren't you?”

“Uh-huh.” Okay, three more feet before we begin what I know is going to be a torturous descent.

She takes another cautious step, then squints up at me. “You're Jewish?”

“Only half. Okay, now just lower your foot to the next step…”

“Damn,”
she says on a grunt as her knee cracks like a gun. “What's the other half?”

“Italian.”

She sighs, clearly disappointed. “Too bad. My grandson just got divorced, so he's back in the market. But no Italians. His last wife was Italian,” she says, as if that explains everything.

I hear clanking and stomping and swishing coming up the stairs. A chocolate-eyed firefighter appears on the landing below, sizes up the situation immediately.

“Come on, sweetheart,” he says to the old lady. His grin is huge and heart-stopping, and I just know this man has a pregnant wife and three other kiddies at home. He holds out his arms. “Want a ride?”

And before Mrs. Moskovitz has a chance to think about it, he gently picks her up and carts her down the stairs. Over his shoulder, I see her startled, shocked expression slowly give way to childlike glee.

I clomp along behind and, finally, out into the muggy night. The firefighter once again consigns Mrs. Moskovitz to my care, directing us to where the rest of the evacuated tenants are standing, staring up in mute fascination. I turn, gasping at the sight of actual honest-to-God flames leaping out the windows, licking at the night.

“Oh, dear,” Mrs. Moskovitz says. “That's your apartment right underneath, isn't it, honey?”

My throat closes. All I can do is nod.

“Hope you have renter's insurance, because the water and smoke damage is going to be a bitch.”

I swallow, then ask if she'll be all right, I just need to step over…here to make a phone call. Nedra answers on the second ring, her voice heavy with sleep.

I burst into tears.

“Ginger?” she says, tentatively. Then, “Oh, my God, Ginger! What's happened, baby? Are you all right?”

“I need you,” was all I could say.

“I'll be right there,” Nedra said. “Just hang tight, sweetie, okay? I'll be right there.”

 

Twenty minutes later a taxi pulls up and Nedra flies out of it.

I fall into her arms, sobbing like a twit. I can feel her look up. “Wait…that's the fifth floor, right?”

“The apartment right over mine.” We watch as a fireman, cantilevered over the street in one of those cherry picker things on the back of the biggest truck, aims the hose at one of the windows. Eerily illuminated by the undulating flames, the hose jolts to life, water rocketing into the apartment. Gallons and gallons and gallons of water, all merrily finding its way down into my apartment, drenching my furniture, my rug, my books…my
stuff. My
stuff, dammit.

Not letting go of me, my mother twists us both around to look into the crowd. “You know who lives up there?”

I've stopped blubbering long enough to follow her gaze. “The m-man in the white sleeveless T-shirt, I think. The one with the heavy moustache.”

My mother gives me a squeeze, wipes my cheeks with the palm of her hand, then leaves me to go talk to the man in all probability responsible for ruining what scraps of my life were left to ruin. A minute later she returns. I notice she's wearing a sweater over a cotton nightgown.

“Grease fire in the kitchen. They were frying something, I didn't quite catch all of it, he was speaking a Spanish dialect I didn't know—”

“Chicken,” I say, my voice dead.

“What?”

“Were they frying chicken?”

She looks at me as if I've lost it. “I have no idea. Anyway, I just wanted to make sure they had someplace to stay tonight.”

My turn at incredulity. “You have got to be kidding me.”

“Noo-oo, why would I be kidding you?”

“You would actually offer the people responsible for destroying your own daughter's apartment a place to stay?”

Her brows dip, the expression in her dark eyes more stunned than angry. “No, I hadn't planned on bringing them home with us. But I know places where they could
have stayed, gotten help. As it happens, they've got relatives in the Bronx, they'll go there for a while, the man said. But honestly, Ginger…” She huffs out a sigh. “Those people have probably lost everything they owned. For all intents and purposes, they're homeless. You're not.”

She reaches over, takes my tote from me and starts toward the cab. I click along behind, hugging my purse—and my thoughts—to my chest. As I pass the upstairs family, I see the man my mother talked to, cuddling a toddler to his chest. A woman I assume is his wife clings to his arm, looking up at the apartment, her eyes huge with worry. Three or four older children huddle at her side, one little girl with her thumb in her mouth.

And, safe in its cage at the man's feet, the rooster cocks its head at me.

 

“I'm sorry,” I say sometime later in the taxi.

I sense my mother stir in the darkness at the other end of the seat. “For what?”

“For being such a shithead.”

She chuckles. “You've been through a lot this past month. You've every right to be a shithead.”

I find that comforting, in a bizarre sort of way.

At four in the morning, the streets are nearly deserted. The cabbie hits all the green lights; we're home in what seems like only a couple minutes.

Home.

I suck in my breath, shocked at how easily I slip right back into thinking of my mother's abode as mine. But it's only temporary, I tell myself as Nonna, in a sleazy nightgown through which one can easily see her udderlike breasts, greets us at the door, takes my purse. I can't stay here, after all. Not for a second longer than absolutely necessary. Just as soon as…

Just as soon as what? Nonna ushers me to my old room, my freshly made double bed turned back, welcoming me. I have no money, probably no furniture, and a job that pays diddly. I swallow down the panic that threatens to overwhelm me, reminding myself it could be worse, I could have been killed.

Those people upstairs might have been killed. Their children…

“We talk in the morning,
sì?
” my grandmother says, pulling the covers up over my shoulders as though I'm still a little girl. Her heavy accent—the legacy of a woman who didn't even speak English until her marriage to an American GI during the war—washes over me like a gentle breeze. “In the morning, we plan. We start to fix.” She leans over, places cool, soft lips on my cheek, her long white braid slipping over her shoulder and tickling my neck. “You are safe,
cara,
” she whispers, then tiptoes out of my room.

A new round of tears slip from my eyes, stain my pillow. I hate feeling sorry for myself, but my resistance is shot to hell. So might as well enjoy my pity party, right? Even if I am the only one here to appreciate it.

Oh, dear God. That which I have most feared has come upon me.

Safe? Yes, I suppose I am. Physically, at least. But what do I have left, besides a ring I don't know if I can bring myself to sell? And a Vera Wang wedding dress that's still, as far as I know, in Ted and Randall's apartment somewhere. Everything,
everything,
has been taken from me. The man I loved, my apartment, my job…even my dog. Okay, so Geoff never was my dog, but you know what I mean. The point is, here I am at thirty-one, starting over from scratch.

This is the last straw. I'm exhausted. Defeated. And worst of all, no better off than one of those vagrants I used to resent my parents taking pity on, all those years ago.

 

The fire department let us into the apartment the next afternoon. And, yes, it's every bit as awful as Mrs. Moskovitz assured me it would be. There's no fire damage per se, but it smells like the Devil's barbecue. And the water damage…

I look at my lovely, drenched, sooty Pottery Barn sofa and begin to weep.

“Come on,” my mother says softly. “Let's see what's salvageable.”

There are places that specialize in cleaning fire-damaged stuff, she's saying as I pick through the soggy debris. (And here I was complaining about the upstairs neighbors' bathtub overflowing.) There doesn't appear to be any damage to the bedroom, other than that awful smoke smell, so maybe my clothes will be okay, she says. My papers and bills and stuff are all in a metal file cabinet, so all of that is fine, as are maybe half of my books if I can air them out enough. The other half, those in the bookcases closest to the kitchen, are ruined, as is all my furniture, my printer, my entire entertainment system, such as it was.

Silently, I carry over a box I brought, dump the files from the cabinet into them.

“Your insurance should cover most of this, you know,” Nedra says.

Yes, I do have renter's insurance. At least that. But that won't pay for replacing all my stuff plus the upfront costs for renting another apartment. Which depresses me just to think about, going through
that
again.

I call the insurance company that afternoon to file a claim. Very sweet, very sympathetic lady with a Southern accent on the other end of the line says to hold on while she brings up my account.

I hear computer keys clicking, soft music in the background. Then an, “Oh, dear.”

I shut my eyes. “Anything wrong?” I say, although of course there's something wrong, every goddamn thing I touch these days goes wrong so why should this be any exception?

“Well, um, according to our records, we never received your last premium payment.”

“Oh, no, there must be some mistake. I sent that check in…” I grab my checkbook out of my purse, frantically flip through the register.

I laugh nervously. “Okay, hold on a sec, I'm a little upset and not focusing clearly, here—”

“That's certainly understandable,” Miss Sweet and Reasonable says soothingly. “You just take your time, honey.”

But two more frantic flips does not reveal a check made out to my insurance company. Okay, I'm screwed.

“W-when was that due again?”

“May 25th.”

Which means the thirty day grace period ended…yesterday.

I thank the nice lady and hang up, contemplate doing the same to myself, except I know I don't have the
cojones
. And I'd never be able to live with myself if I gave Nonna a heart attack.

I've never, ever forgotten to pay a bill. Never. But I sure as shootin' missed this one.

I look up at the heavens and say,
“Why?”

There being no answer forthcoming, I do what any sane woman would do in my situation: I take to my bed.

 

Four, five mornings later, who the hell knows, I sense my mother looming over my bed. I don't have to see her to know her hands are planted on her hips.

“Okay, grieving's over. Get the hell up.”

“Get the hell
out,
” I mumble and pull the covers over my head.

“Hey. This is your mother you're talking to.”

“I know that.”

The covers are yanked back. Damn, it's bright. “You're worrying Nonna.”

The one argument for moving my carcass out of this bed I might actually consider. Which Nedra knows.