David Lazar

by Robert Kalich

  “Whatever happened to Sheila?” Joya asked. And that started more words, more memories, and then, of course, it was back to my best friend, Noah.

  “Noah was more a brother than a friend to me, Joya.”

  “I know that,” she said. “He loved you too.”

  Do memories remain till our last breaths? Memories, breaths of yesteryear with the oxygen to sustain. Like climbing a ladder till you reach the top step, and then some of us jump. What is left? I asked myself when we completed our connectedness.

  So many gone. I mean friends of a lifetime. Guys who never tweeted even once in their entire lives. Some of my friends have still never even heard of iPhones. Men with whom I’ve laughed and cried. Went all the way to somewhere with. Some of these guys went to the top of their professions. Some to the bottom. We shared lives. Were there for one another. Some of us raised families; some didn’t.

  “I’m thinking of having another child, Dave,” Stickers said.

  I had just handed him the money to pay the three months back rent that he owed. He was over seventy by then.

  Now I’m thinking of Morty Lefko, The Colonel. He’s gone, too. So is Rodney Parker. He’s the friend I miss the most. The only one who knew all the women in my life.

  “Jessica was the sweetest, Broadway. She made me feel like June was bustin’ out all over. Leslie. She was as cold as frost, but she had everything else. Debbie Turner was hard to figure. One day she was a swan in a pond; then next a vulture scavenging for its dinner. Amy. She was always in her own world.”

  Unfortunately, Rodney Parker never got to know Elizabeth. By the time Liz came into my life, Rodney was closing in on death in a senior citizen’s facility. But here’s who Rodney Parker was. He bought McDonald’s burgers, milkshakes, and Nike shoes for his Playground Prodigies and preached, “Don’t ever take drugs! Don’t go out with bad women! And don’t—and I mean never—hang out on the street

  after ten!”

  Rodney had seen so much violence growing up in Bed-Stuy. He helped boys reach their dreams; he saved lives. Hundreds of them.

  Not everything I’m recollecting is from yesterday.

  Today, I’m walking to the TDF window on 47th Street to purchase a matinee ticket. It’s a whole lot cheaper than paying full price at the box office.

  I stop in the middle of the street. Right in the slush and puddles. There are snowdrifts on the curb. I hear, “Mr. Lazar...Mr. Lazar.”

  I turn around. It’s Norma Meyers. I worked with her at Welfare.

  “How you doin’, Mr. Lazar?”

  Before I can get in a word, Norma’s telling me, “My husband used to be so lively. Now he sits home all the time.”

  I tell Norma that I didn’t recognize her without her Afro. “I cut it, and I’m not dyeing my hair any longer.”

  Norma starts telling me about the old crew. “Sue Bethel died, and so did Carolyn Shipp. Remember how much Mrs. Shipp loved you? And then there’s Mattie Mixon and Joan Pryor. Remember when all of us went to see Joanie in that Van Peebles musical? And did you hear about John Ryan? He moved to Montana when he retired.”

  Norma shook her head. “That man was always reeking of alcohol and sporting red, watery eyes. And how is Mr. Stiloski? Do you keep in touch with him?”

  “‘Big John’ lives in Tarrytown. He got lucky, Norma. ‘Big John’ has a fabulous wife.”

  Stiloski played football at Notre Dame in the fifties. He’s dead weight now. Can’t walk without the aid of two canes and his wife, Annette. But his voice hasn’t changed.

  “I still speak to ‘Big John’ every now and then, Norma. And he never fails to call me on my birthday. He’s the one guy from our unit that I’m still in touch with.”

  Norma Meyers rattles off another football team of dead people. People who once had real lives, dignity, clocked in every morning to do something useful, earned a paycheck. While Norma is rattling away, I’m thinking that my time is just around the corner. And then she says, “Do you ever hear from that pretty young girl, Debbie Turner?”

  “Never!” I tell Norma. Still, after all these years, it’s like a dagger going through my gut.

  I lied to Norma Meyers. I had heard from Debbie Turner. I recently received a letter from her on fancy stationery.

  “With my husband, I feel like an equal; with you, I always felt as if you were looking down on me. And when you weren’t handicapping or watching ballgames or at Solomon’s restaurant with your horrible friends, you were writing nine hours a day. And when you weren’t doing those things, you still were only involved with yourself. I admit that you’ve done a whole lot of big things with your life, David, but it’s the smaller things that make a relationship work.”

  Today I visited Ron Nevins at Presbyterian Hospital on 220th Street and Broadway. The Uber drove straight up the steep incline, more like a hill, to the front entrance. I stepped out of the car and drew a deep breath.

  When I entered his hospital room, he was still in a deep coma. I took out from of my shoulder bag Shusaka Endo’s novel Silence and started to read, “Like sand flowing through an hour glass, each day here passed quietly by, my feelings formerly tense and taut like iron now gradually relaxed...”

  Nothing was left of Ron Nevins. Blind, speechless, lifeless for the past nine days. Before he was transferred to Presbyterian, purely by chance, a friend of mine who was one of Ron’s neurosurgeons at Mt. Sinai, told me, “Don’t worry about your pal I’m sure he’s going to be just fine.”

  He alleviated some of the pressure on Ron’s brain, but it didn’t change a thing.

  Ron’s son Jake, my godson, enters the hospital room. He’s taking it hard. He can’t let his father go, but he must. The Presbyterian Hospital social workers are compassionate. They’re trying to give my godson sufficient time to make the ultimate decision. “It’s been nine days...” I hear one of the hospital administrators conspiratorially whisper to a social worker.

  I tell Jake, “It’s your decision. Take your time. You’ve got to be ready.”

  At my age, your life is reduced to stories, and that’s what I tell Jake. Stories! Stories that his dad and I lived and experienced.

  “Here’s one about a woman I met back in the day. Her name was Julie Rizzo.

  “At midnight, Julie knocked on my door.

  “‘My boyfriend is in the lobby. He’s afraid to come up. He doesn’t have the money he owes you.’

  “I invited Julie to my rooftop terrace.

  “‘Wow!’ she exclaimed.

  “Did you ever hear of Joe DiMaggio? I asked her.

  “‘Yeah. Sure. He was a baseball player.’

  “Joe DiMaggio was famous for his fifty-six-game hitting streak. And in your own way, Julie, you’re breaking a streak, too.

  “‘What’s that?’ she said and chomped down on her bubble gum.

  “You’re the first woman up here after midnight with whom I’m not going to bed.

  “Julie laughed. It broke the ice.”

  “Tell me about Solomon Lepidus,” Jake said.

  “I once had a really bad year. Of the seven men I took in as limited partners, only six made money. The seventh was Solomon. He told me, ‘It’s not you, Davey boy. It’s me. I’m a jinx.’

  “Jake, Solomon lost over $200,000 on my college selections that year. I reimbursed him for every cent he lost. It was simple enough. I walked into his office with two brown paper bags and dumped the cash on his desk. Solomon looked up.

  “‘What’s this for?’ he asked.

  “‘It’s what you lost with me this season.

  ‘Oh,’ he said and that ended the conversation.”

  I didn’t tell Jake that Solomon always kept Chapter Eleven papers in his desk drawer. If Solomon didn’t want to help you, he would open his drawer and confide, as if he were a father talking to his son, “No one knows this, buddy
boy, but I’ve been forced to declare bankruptcy.” Everyone’s best friend would shake his head and take your hand. “I just can’t help anyone, anymore.”

  My godson winced. Minutes later, he was asking about The Tutor, one of my early creations that his dad always favored.

  “I couldn’t blame John Farrar for my book not getting published, Jake. He prepared me. As soon as I walked into his office that day, the first thing he told me was, ‘Young man, are you aware that we receive upwards of 2,400 manuscripts a year from unpublished novelists. At the most, we publish maybe three or four of them.’”

  Jake and I sat in Ron Nevins’ hospital room for four days. Never did I run out of stories. Never did Jake ask me to stop. By the fourth day, Jake was making contributions on his own.

  “My dad was a great admirer of Ulysses S. Grant. When I was little, he would tell me almost every night what the general had told his own son, ‘In order to win respect, never deceive nor play an artificial part. Simply be yourself.’”

  My godson told me several things I didn’t know. I listened. Continued to contribute my own stories.

  “I met Lincoln Kirstein through your dad, Jake. When Kirstein strolled the city center, with his hands clenched behind his back in his wrinkled, blue serge coat, grimacing, his scowl was both menacing and perturbed. The leggy dancers blanched. Ron and I were seeing several of those long-legged ballerinas for lunch or dinner. Sometimes more.

  “But it was Lincoln Kirstein who was actually Mr. More. He was the founder of the New York City Ballet. He had accomplished the impossible dream of giving George Balanchine the keys to the kingdom. The Russian was one hell of a choreographer, but, in my opinion, the ballet company itself was Kirstein’s vision. My impression was that George Balanchine would have been just as content choreographing for a pick-up troupe. Balanchine was more like a pure-hearted writer. Give a dedicated novelist a Remington, and he’s just going to tap

  those keys.

  “Similarly, give Balanchine a hardwood floor and a dancer or two and he’s going to choreograph. As for Lincoln Kirstein, he was chronically agitated, obviously bipolar, and had little if any self-control. Librium was not around back then, and Kirstein was the mortal enemy of me and your father, too. Both of us would bring flowers—the most extravagant and beautiful bouquets possible—to the company’s female dancers. Your dad, of course, picked up the tab. Unfortunately, Kirstein would snap disapprovingly, ‘Girls! Girls! This is a workplace, not a boudoir!’

  “Here’s one story, Jake, that I’ve never told anyone. Your father and I were having dinner one evening at Cafe des Artistes with Janet Gretchler. Janet was a Balanchine dancer. Edward Villella, who was sitting at a table in a far corner, spotted Janet and rushed over. As he was doing so, George Balanchine enters the restaurant. When he notices Villella, he too rushes over. He asks your father if he can sit with us. Of course, your dad says, ‘Yes.’ You can only imagine how Ron was beaming, Jake. It was a glorious moment for him. For me, I sort of took things like that in stride. Anyway, here’s your father chatting and dining with Mr. B and Edward Villella. Your dad was great at playing that kind of role, Jake. He had panache. He thrived in that kind of scene. His dress was always impeccable. Your father always wore a bow tie with one of his classy Brioni or Scali or Jacques Denoyer suits. I usually had on a Balmain or a James Carroll sports coat. And I always made sure to wear Alexander Shields shirts and ties. Got to admit, Jake, both of us were sort of impressive in those days. Not only our wardrobes, but both of us were good looking.

  “Of course, the reason I had such a great wardrobe and looked so good was strictly because of your dad. Your father taught me how to dress. Where to go for razor cuts. How to hold a knife and fork. And so much more. Believe me, Jake, just in case you aren’t fully aware of it, it was your father who picked up the tab for everything back in those day. And I mean everything. Anyway, George Balanchine had this weird habit of naming his dancers after animals. He didn’t know your father or me outside of the two or three times we shook hands at one of Kirstein’s fundraisers. And now, here we are sitting with Mr. B. and I suddenly notice that he’s staring at the two of us.

  “And he keeps staring. I guess you could say, if you want to be polite, that Mr. B. was an observer of people. To me he was staring. Suddenly, he stops staring. ‘I’m going to call you “Fox,” he tells me. And you, Mr. Nevins, are “Sparrow.”’

  “Let me tell you, Jake, that might’ve been the highlight of your dad’s life. For the remainder of that year, your dad insisted that I address him as ‘Sparrow.’”

  Ron Nevins didn’t do much with his eighty-one years. The second half of his life was a disaster. The most he did was go to temple, genuflect to his god. For years and years, I would tell Ron, “Make a New Year’s resolution to do something different this year. I don’t care if it’s getting rid of your toupee or becoming a Roman Catholic. Just do something that will make you feel better about yourself.”

  “The same goes for you, Broadway.” For years and years, he would advise, “There’s a life out there with a loving woman, Broadway. You can still raise a family. Have children. Walk away from the world you’re in.”

  “I never believed in fairy tales,” I would tell him.

  Ron Nevins worked for the same brokerage firm after he sold his father’s sportswear company in 1968. He became the confidante of many a little old lady, assisting them with their portfolios, singing out, “Isn’t Rebecca beautiful?” in internalized tones, about his lacerating wife, struggling to maintain an irresponsible lifestyle, eking out a static salary, piling up debt and more debt, each year.

  “Broadway, what do you think of this idea? At Fieldston and Dartmouth I had many, many great friends. I’m still in touch with some of them. I was thinking of drafting a letter. Advising them of my financial situation. Asking each one to contribute $2,000. It would mean very little to these men. Everything to me.”

  “Don’t humiliate yourself, Ron. I’ll give you whatever it is you need. Just don’t waste the money on a trip to Tahiti or by going to Le Cirque or by buying ABT tickets. Oh, what the hell! Do whatever you like with the money! You deserve better than that from me.”

  By the time Ron was fifty-five, he was completely dependent upon me. I paid for Jake to go to Ethical Culture. To Fieldston. From there to college. I was the one who beseeched Rebecca, “Do you think it’s possible to pay me back at least a small amount of what Ron owes me? Both of you are now working.”

  “How dare you? How could you ask that?” And the phone went click.

  Why did I ask? Stupid! That’s why.

  As Solomon Lepidus advised, “When you give someone money, Davey boy, it’s not a loan; it’s a gift.”

  End time for Ron Nevins. The hospital administrators met with my godson. “Polite” pressure was applied. Jake gave them a nod, a balled fist, tears. I care about my godson. I feel for him deeply. He’s sacrificed his own life for the past eight years to take care of his parents. His mother didn’t pass until last year. Alzheimer’s. Now, I’m telling Jake, “You have to find the strength to move on. The only thing that helps is time.” I couldn’t stop myself from adding, “Your father should have pushed you out the door. He was selfish.”

  Ron Nevins told his son, “Follow your religion. Say your prayers. If you run into a problem, talk to the rabbi. But don’t worry, Jake. You’ll never have money problems. I’m leaving you everything I have.”

  I’m happy I was able to help Ron and, of course, Solomon. And without handicapping, without all that entailed, I wouldn’t have been able to help either or live the life I do.

  Chapter 17

  I’m thinking how great the 1976 college basketball season was for me. I was picking nothing but winners, and a great deal of it was because of Bobby Knight. So, here’s a belated thank you to the retired coach. Yes, Coach Knight is my all-time number one coach. He did it when he was in his mid
-twenties with the brawny Mike Silliman playing the center position at Army, and, after that, he did it with maybe at the most, a half dozen legitimate McDonald’s All-Americans through his fabulous career.

  Enough about that kind of romantic nonsense. In 1976, “the General” won the NCAA basketball championship coaching at Indiana. Knight’s team won every game in the tournament by the points. I had made sure that Solomon and I parlayed the entire run.

  “Just stay with Indiana, Solomon. They’re going to cover every game.”

  It might have been the one time Solomon Lepidus followed my advice. That year, he won enough money on my handicapping to lose $2 million in Las Vegas later that year. Of course, I prospered too. After Knight won the championship, I stepped out on my rooftop and shouted, “Fuck you world! I’m free!”

  I think it was the first time, but don’t trust me on that.

  That same week I drove to Parksville, New York. I had a pick and shovel and maybe a dozen industrial-size black bags filled with Franklins. I buried them under a large elm tree. Scratched into the elm’s trunk FUWIF.

  Those black bags are no longer buried in Parksville. I had to hand them over to the RICO people. That was another time Solomon saved my ass.

  “Now, Davey boy. Tell me the problem you’re having with those RICO people.”

  “Two of them showed up at midnight. They took me downtown. I had to come up with $70,000 just to go home. They had me on tape calling in five dime bets to Angelo Ferrari’s office. The irony is they caught me because Giuliani’s DA had been investigating Ferrari and had his office phones tapped. Once they started investigating me, they discovered checks I wrote for Amy Cho to Ron Nevins’ brokerage firm. I know you always warned me not to leave a paper trail, but I wanted Amy to feel independent. Now, the DA’s office is looking into my taxes.”

  “Don’t worry anymore about it. I’ll make a few calls. But, Davey boy, I can’t get you back that seventy large.”