You'll Never Nanny in This Town Again: The True Adventures of a Hollywood Nanny (14 page)

I let a few more weeks fly by before I worked up the courage to ask Judy if I could use the Jeep again. Even though I knew they weren’t going to the beach house that weekend, I still didn’t know if I could pull it off. But she said yes. Freedom! But what to do? Since I had no off-duty friends to spend time with, I decided to cheer myself up a different way. I’d spotted a nice little spa when I was buying shoes for the kids at the local Brentwood shopping mall. The nail salon experience had been disappointing, to say the least, but I hadn’t given up on my spa fantasy. All I could think of that morning was my noon facial appointment and how I would luxuriate in all the little attentions they would provide. Soothing music, herbal teas, and a zen atmosphere. The package even included a neck and foot massage, which sounded heavenly. I had earned some relaxation time in Eden. I was going to live it up, LA-style; I even thought I’d treat myself to lunch at a bistro after.

The sign in the window read
SALON FLEUR DE LIS. HAIRSTYLING, FACIALS, AND PEDICURES
. The girl at the desk immediately whisked me to a back room and told me to change into the white bathrobe that hung on the back of the door. Then I was to have a seat in a large Naugahyde chair.

Within minutes, a small woman wearing a starched white lab coat began circling me. She was stroking her chin, poking at my face, and saying, “Uh-huh. Uh-huh,” under her breath, as if I were an antique piece she was appraising. I didn’t know her ethnicity, but her heavy accent and very dark eyes intrigued me. You don’t get a lot of cultural diversity where I’m from, and it sounded exotic to my ears. She introduced herself as “Sa-meen-a.”

“Hi, young lady,” she said. “Weee must give you a peeeel.”

I blanched. Did I really look so bad that she had to comment on my need for improvement? I was so embarrassed. I had no appeal. I knew I should have put on makeup before I went to the appointment.

“No, no, my deeear. A peel,” she shot back after seeing my shocked expression. “You need an acid facial peeeel. The sun has caused your skeeeen great damage. And you have had act-nee in your life.”

No kidding. I was still a teenager.

“Weee must go far beyond a simple facial. Something that penetrates much deeper. You must be from the country,” she added.

“Uh, yes. I guess I’m from the country.” This woman must think I’m in the blazing hot sun out on the prairie each day, with no sunscreen. Just like Laura Ingalls. Now I know why Nellie Olsen always had such pale skin. She was from “the city” of Walnut Grove. “You can actually tell where I lived from looking at my skin?” I asked.

“Oh yes, most definitely. Wait, you will see. When I am done your skin will look and feel like silk. Like a little bambino’s behind. I suggest our most powerful peel. It is exactly one hundred and ninety dollars,” she said.

So much for my lunch at a bistro; it looked like it was going to be Carl’s Jr. instead.

Simina began to dance around like she was possessed, draping me in a large plastic apron from my neck to my ankles. Next she worked a healthy lather of cleansing cream over my face and then wiped that off with a scalding hot towel. I felt as if I’d been instantly sunburned. With my face still glowing, she slipped on a pair of twelve-gauge rubber gloves that ran past her elbows. The kind firemen wear. Then she draped a heavy flame-retardant apron over her neck. She opened a large jar and began to dip a small paintbrush into it. Taking great care not to spill the
toxin onto herself, she spread the chemical jelly over my entire face, skipping only my eyelids and lips. I tried not to think about why she was treating the stuff like Ebola.

Almost immediately I could feel a pleasant tingling sensation. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.

“Do not move, Miss Sue-zah-na. It will take seven minutes to activate. I will come back to check on you,” she said, backing out of the room.

But the tingling changed to a stinging sensation, and my worry flared up full force. Agonizing over the unknown is part of my DNA. Had she said it would take seven minutes to activate? What if my body made it kick in early for some reason? A full seven minutes would land me in a burn unit. As the minutes ticked away ever so slowly, the stinging intensified. Could my face actually be disintegrating? Impossible. This was a spa in LA, for Pete’s sake. On the right side of the tracks.

I leaned up, squinting, trying to read the ingredients label on the jar of gel. I saw a long word and then “acid” afterward, followed by “propylene glycol.”

Oh God! I
was
in trouble. I may not have known any foreign languages, but I did get an A in auto shop, and I knew those words. She’d put antifreeze on my face! I tried to yell but remembered Simina’s orders to remain motionless. Would my face crack in two if I moved my mouth? I had to try something. There was
antifreeze
on my
face
.

“Suh-meen-hah, Suh-meen-hah,” I managed to mumble feebly.

No answer.

Suddenly an oven timer beeped, startling me. The seven minutes were up, and at that precise moment, Simina reappeared, checked her watch quickly, and then began applying scalding hot towels once again, this time to rinse off the nuclear residue.

I was afraid to touch my skin.

“It will be a little tender for a day or two, and then you shall see. You will have de skin of a baby. That will be one hundred ninety dollars, please,” she said, and with that I was left to my own devices.

I was okay. I still had a face. And I had forty-three cents left to my name.

Simina was right. When I got home, I noticed my skin was tender but not as bad as I expected, given the burning sensation I’d experienced.
What I didn’t know was that the chemical was supposed to penetrate the first two layers of skin. I might have rethought that $190 expenditure had I realized that little fact. I had been expecting moisturizing and toning, certainly not second-degree burns. She had given me a special lotion to use once in the morning and once at bedtime to ease the discomfort. It must’ve been pure Novocain, though, because after I smoothed it on, my entire head went numb, and I began slurring my speech. I decided to use it only at bedtime.

The next day, Grandma Ovitz happened to be visiting. She remarked on the nice pink glow I had, asking if I’d enjoyed my facial. I told her yes, it had been quite an experience and left it at that. On the second day when I woke up and faced the morning mirror, I jumped back in horror. My entire face was peeling more dramatically than the worst sunburn I’d ever had. I looked like I’d survived a fire. By that night, I was shedding complete layers of skin, like a rattlesnake in August.

I couldn’t keep my hands from peeling it away in large sheets. Underneath lay yet another layer of hot red skin just waiting to dry out and scale away like the previous layer. I began to panic. It didn’t help matters when Judy told me I looked like I’d just escaped from a leper colony. Terrified, that afternoon I drove back to the salon and approached Simina.

“Oh my God, Miss Sue-zah-na. You have touched your face, haven’t you? You’re not supposed to pick at it,” she said, as if it was
my
fault that my entire face was molting. How could I not peel it? It itched terribly and for the most part fell away on its own, anyway. I just wanted to keep the flakes off my clothes and off the furniture. Simina had no further advice other than to keep using the lotion and keep my hands off my face. I slunk home feeling defeated. How did people in LA look so put together all the time?

I’d had enough adventure for the time being, so I wasn’t too sorry when Michael and Judy decided to go away the next weekend. Grandma and Grandpa Ovitz came to stay and help out as they generally did when the kids’ parents left town, just in case of an emergency. That Saturday evening, we had one.

Earlier in the day it became clear that Brandon felt sick, and by nine o’clock that night his temperature had skyrocketed to 104.2 degrees. I hadn’t seen many fevers that high before, and Grandma Ovitz and I decided we needed to call the pediatrician’s office. The on-call doctor told me to bring the baby straight to the emergency room, and he would meet me there. Grandma stayed at home with Joshua and Amanda while Grandpa drove Brandon and me to the hospital. (I wondered if Grandpa was remembering our last trip to the ER. Thank goodness my head had healed.) Brandon was burning up, but oddly enough, he smiled and cooed at me. When we got to the ER, the doctor was just arriving and was busy helping find a seat for a woman who appeared to be straight off the cover of the
Sports Illustrated
swimsuit edition. He looked about Doogie Howser’s age, and I could hardly contain my irrational rage.
Focus, buddy! On the baby, not that Victoria’s Secret model, who I might add is probably just dating you because she thinks you’re worth big bucks
.

The doctor ushered us into a small examining room and took Brandon from me. He felt the glands in Brandon’s neck and forehead, and then felt the top of his head. “Here,” he said, “feel this.” He put my hand on the top of Brandon’s head, over the soft spot that every baby has.

“Is this normal?” he asked.

“No, no, of course not,” I answered. Brandon’s soft spot was bulging right out of his skull, though Brandon just kept smiling.

I was screaming inside. He was a doctor, and he was asking
me?
Did this clown just get out of medical school? We needed answers!

But then the doctor said that he was very concerned, and I started to get scared.

“He may have meningitis,” he said.

I knew that was a serious infection that involved the brain. Grandpa Ovitz and I stared at each other in fear and disbelief.

What should we do? What should we do?
I felt very shaky.

“I’ve got to make a call,” the doctor said. I felt reassured that he was consulting with someone more experienced. He picked up the telephone, and Grandpa Ovitz and I listened intently. Apparently, this young doctor was just starting in the practice with the older pediatrician, the children’s regular doctor, whom I had met previously.

“Yes, Brandon Ovitz,” he replied. “No, you don’t have to come down here; I can handle it. Okay, if you insist, all right, good-bye.”

When the older doctor arrived, I began to relax a little. He must’ve seen cases like this before. But then right away he said, “This baby isn’t sick. Look at how happy he is.”

What? No!

The younger doctor disagreed with his mentor, and I felt my loyalties switch quickly back to him.
How long has this old guy been around? When’s the last time he had a refresher course?

“I want to do a spinal tap,” the young doctor blurted out.

“Are you kidding? You know whose child this is, don’t you?” the older doctor responded.

“Yes, that’s why I want to call them right now and get permission.”

“They’re on vacation,” I said. “But I’ve got an emergency number.”

That’s when Grandpa Ovitz stepped in. “I’ll call Michael. Everyone just stand by.” After Grandpa talked to Michael, he handed the phone to the young doctor.

“Yes, Mr. Ovitz,” he said. “Yes, that’s right. I want to do a spinal tap, and I need your permission.” Silence for a second. Michael must have
sensed how young the doctor was. “Well, uh, yes, Mr. Ovitz. Uh, me personally, I’ve done a hundred of them.” Then he handed the phone to me. Michael asked me for my opinion. What did I know about meningitis? I just told Michael that it didn’t look normal, that his soft spot was very swollen and that I’d never seen it like that.

“We’ll be there as soon as we can. We’ll try to get a plane out tonight,” Michael said. With that, the young doctor took Brandon down the hall. He brought along an assistant, who would be holding Brandon down while they put a needle into his back.

“It’s all in the holding down,” Doogie Howser explained. I pictured little Brandon stretched out under glaring lights while a young girl pressed down his tiny arms and legs and the doctor plunged a needle into his spine. I wanted to be there to soothe him and hold him. I tried to follow along but the assistant turned me back. I felt so bad for Brandon that I was getting a little nauseous.

Grandpa Ovitz and I fretted in the waiting room together. After we had been there about twenty minutes, the assistant came out and advised me to check on the other two children. “Have them touch their chins to their chests,” she warned. “If it’s painful or stiff, they may have the same thing.”

Worry threatened to overwhelm me. By then it was nearly 11
P.M
. Carmen picked up the phone right away. “I can’t wake them up,” she said when I told her what to do. “It’s the middle of the night. It will be terrible.” She and I both knew that Amanda would scream for hours after being woken from a sound sleep in the middle of the night. “Please, Carmen, just do it. This is serious,” I told her. I called back in ten minutes. Over Amanda’s wailing in the background, I heard Carmen saying they could move their heads just fine, with no pain.

After another ten minutes, a nurse came out carrying Brandon, and my heart did a tilt-a-whirl. He wasn’t smiling anymore and clearly had been crying a lot. He was stretching his arms out to me from all the way across the room. He needed me. He wanted me. I started to cry.