by Bruce Wagner
There were certain obvious details that would have made things easier. For example: what, at the time of his leave-taking, did Marcus Weiner actually do for a living? Until she hit the PowerBook wall, Lucy made a pact with herself not to approach her parents—a true girl detective would never need to resort to such tactics. After conferring with AltaVista (there were 608,540 pages found pertaining to “Marcus Weiner,” many of which were translated from other languages), she decided to do a little flat-footing at the Beverly Hills Library to check local newspapers; one of them must have reported the Weiner-Trotter nuptials. But it was rainy that week, so Lucy found herself glued to the enormous screen of Joyce’s unused G-4 instead. Truth be told, there were some Webby diversions from her main cause—per usual, the pigtailed researcher was IM’d so many times that she couldn’t make much headway; a veritable fusillade of “creaking doors” and harmonic tantaras announced that endless Buddies were on-line. Along the way, she surprised herself by becoming seriously obsessed with the Boulder Langon homepage, a development the actress herself found hysterical.
Whenever the thought of approaching her mother with a few queries reared its torpid head, she stubbornly ruled it out. Anyway, that wouldn’t have been easy: an unnerving secrecy had dropped like a veil after Aunt Trinnie sat her son down and told all—as if there were nothing more to reveal! The party-line spin on “closure” was sorely artificial. Mysteries abounded, and the body of Marcus Weiner floated, pickled and unquiet—like the story she had read during an epic Internet tangent of a teenager who slipped and fell into a river in Georgia. Lucy and her Buds were riveted: trapped beneath the surface, wedged vertically between rocks for months, the teen’s body was impossible to retrieve save for damming the waters. Locals said leave the river alone, it would “give the girl up” in its own time; but that wasn’t good enough for the girl’s father—and not good enough for Lucille Rose, who loved Cousin Tull more than she could ever admit, even to herself. She would not wait for time or the river or Bel-Air to give Marcus Weiner up. She could see the crown of his head just below the surface and would do anything in her power to pull him ashore, and to rest. She was convinced Tull would one day thank her for kayaking him through such a watershed; it might even make him drop a knee and propose.
Meanwhile, the boy around whom these rapids swirled couldn’t be bothered. He became irascible, and refused to pay homage to Lucy’s night-surfing or the double-clicks of her anxious heart. Whenever she made the mistake of alluding to her ongoing detective work, he lashed out, leaving a jellyfish sting of hurt. She forgave him everything.
He raged. He plastered bumper stickers—MY KID SHOT YOUR HONOR STUDENT—on faculty cars. He stole hard-boiled eggs and batteries from 7-Eleven and a Schwinn from outside Borders on the Promenade. He provoked fights with stronger, wilier boys and for the first time felt the exhilarating, nauseous pain of hard knuckles against cheekbone, sinus, gut. He was winded and bruised, snide and weepy. He was all over the place. When Mr. Hookstratten beckoned him into his office, Tull said go to hell. At home, on the labyrinth’s cold stone benches or in the narcotized darkness of the cavernous living room, enfolded by walls with shutters of macassar ebony, sprawled on the Jean Royère sofa between Ming-style cabinets of gold-leafed wenge wood, under the Chardin or black-gold Rembrandt, he let his mother stroke his tousled hair, smelling her skin and clothes while he cried all over the fine bushy hairs of her arm.
But no one took him seriously, not even himself—his anger being merely a plot development of The Wounded Boy, Act Two. When a Four Winds Care Team suggested the boy be medicated (they’d carefully interviewed him after a rumor spread that he had a “hit list”), his mother went ballistic. Half the school was on Zoloft, Effexor or Serzone; Tull knew a twelve-year-old who’d been on Prozac since age five. Trinnie was of a mind to pull him out of there. Lackadaisical assholes! With their much-hyped zero-tolerance policy for drugs (whenever a child was caught using, power parents brought in attorneys and the school caved)—Hypocrites! Pushers! Sleazy fucks—she knew all about their fund-raising tactics too: a mom whose kid had been rejected told her how she and her husband were taken out to lunch as part of the “enrollment process” and hit up for half a million because a TRW on an estranged relative had shown income in the high nines. That’s how much the Care Team cared!
With what then besides a fresh delinquency was he left? The idea of a newly minted father, at first intriguing, now disgusted. King of dead-beat dads, a man who’d botched visitation on a heroic scale … Tull conjured a face floating in the air like a newsprint terrorist’s: Marcus the Jackal. He watched the sadistic groom flee in white tux and tails from that strange cracked column while his martyred mother slept. The jackal had ruined her, and Tull would make him pay. As he gamboled with Pullman through the sculpted grounds of Saint-Cloud, he imagined his father blowing up Buddhas with the Taliban—then, in a weaker moment, as the subject of an A&E hagiography—speedily supplanted by a careering, poorly lit chase and capture on America’s Wildest Police Videos. Authorities would usher the boy like a dignitary to his father’s cell. There, shackled, Marcus X (Lucy had not yet vouchsafed the last name) stood cowering in his dirty formal wear and sleepless coward’s eyes as the boy sent a gob of spit his way. The guards laughed approvingly and steered him out by his small shoulders while dearest Dad sank in supplication, old cold hands on cold steel bars.
“An amazing feat,” crowed Edward from the quaint, cozy middle of the Black Lantern Book Shoppe. “Replicating a folly as complex as that—and all in a year’s time! Look! Look here—”
He motored excitedly toward the reticent Tull, a pristine volume of the Amazon FedExed history of Le Désert de Retz in his gloved hand. La Colonne itself graced the cover, while the tower of Edward’s own head wore a blousy façade of red silk; his face the delicate half-mask of a raccoon-like beast he’d fashioned out of feathers and bamboo.
“But what I find so truly weird is how you found your way there! I mean, before knowing any of this.”
“And why you didn’t ever tell us,” whined Lucy.
“Pullman took me,” said Tull, his casualness a bit contrived.
The magnificent animal could be heard cavorting on the streets of the small European-style village where Edward lived. His father had built the fantasia for his son’s convenience and amusement—Edward called it Olde CityWalk—on an acre or so tucked behind the property on Stradella Road. The mobile invalid thought the corny “village” conceit trying, yet its ramps and customized dimensions did make it extraordinarliy livable. A full-time nursing staff was housed in a cobbler’s storefront; the workshop where Edward designed vizards and prosthetics from clay, wood and papier-mâché occupied the Boar’s Head Inn, with his private apartments above. Black Lantern was the perfect model of an English den of antiquities, its shelves stocked with both contemporary fare and volumes two centuries old.
“I mean, Pullman found it.”
“And you kept it all to yourself. Rather elitist, no?”
“How could you, Tull? I hate you!” said Lucy, unconvincingly.
“Still,” said Edward, “it is an astonishing coincidence.”
“There are no accidents,” said Lucy, sagely peering over from her celery-green Smythson steno pad. One thing was certain: she was thrilled to see her brother excited again, about anything—until the discovery of the broken Bel-Air column and its French counterpart, he’d been inscrutable and queerly unenthusiastic about the business of hunting for Mr. Marcus Weiner. “All is predetermined.”
“Then it’s settled,” Edward said, snatching the book from Tull’s hands. “You have to take us.”
“Vive La Colonne!” shouted Lucy.
“A major field trip is in order.”
“Fine,” said Tull, his languidness sounding more staged than he would have liked. If it weren’t his cousin who was asking, he’d have flat-out refused.
“You don’t really have a choice—this whole father thing has you backed into
a square corner. That’s a phrase pilots use: it’s when you run out of ideas at the same time you run out of experience. No bueno!”
“I’m not afraid to go,” Tull said, “but it won’t be easy for you. It’s not exactly wheelchair-friendly.”
Edward stared at the picture book a moment, like a preacher absorbed in a favorite verse before looking up at the flock. “La Colonne Détruite …” he mused, practically licking his chops. “Created on the eve of the Revolution by François Nicolas Henri Racine de Monville, gentleman of fashion. The most extraordinary folly in Europe, visited by everyone from Marie-Antoinette to Thomas Jefferson to famed Surrealist André Breton. Vive l’ancien régime! Nestled within a vast park of sycamores and chestnuts, lindens and blue cedars—oh! and let us not forget the imported Virginia tulips! The ‘shattered column’: an image common to the iconography of late-eighteenth-century Freemasonry. And who do we have to thank for this relocated heaven on earth? Why, none other than Grandpa Lou! Our very own Grandpa Lou! How crazy is that! Oh! How absurd! I knew Grandpa was a genius, but this! And kept secret all these years! Hidden! From even the architectural cognoscenti! How, how, how? I tell you, nothing short of astonishing!”
While the children made their plans, Bluey’s birthday was celebrated in the main house. The honoree, in her beloved Oscar de la Renta sequined jacket, sported a vintage Frances Whitney millinery mobile spiraling neatly off her head like a junior Guggenheim, from which it was inspired.
“But wouldn’t it be fun,” said Joyce, “having your old grade school named after you? I think it’d be a hoot.”
Hoot was a word Trinnie loathed. Though she did think her sister-in-law looked particularly becoming, sort of the way she remembered Claire Bloom—sexy in that rock-hard cold-mountain-stream sort of way. All the primping and preening had paid off; tonight, the skin and hair stars were definitely in alignment.
“Oh,” said Dodd. “I think that was bogus—you know, something that popped into Marcie’s head. She doesn’t have any say about that. The district would never consent.”
Trinnie fidgeted with her South Sea pearls. She wore a marabou-trimmed cardigan and a crocheted halter dress as green as her eyes; piercing her brother with the latter, she said, “You hated that school.”
“But why would he?” interjected Bluey. “It was wonderful. And that wonderful Dr. Janklow!”
“Yes,” chuffed Louis. “Extraordinary. Wonderful educator. Sensitive man. We had him to the house for dinner.”
“He came to dinner because he was a fag.”
“Oh come on, Trinnie.”
“Dr. Janklow,” said his sister witchily, “was interested in Dodd because Dr. Janklow was a fag.”
Her brother smiled, amused.
“And who was Dr. Janklow?” asked Ralph.
“The school psychologist,” replied Trinnie. “My brother spent lots of time with the school psychologist.” She turned on him again and sneered. “Dodd Trotter Elementary—why would you even dream it?”
“It was just a funny concept. I mean, come on, Trinnie, don’t you think it’s funny? Isn’t that your style of black comedy? Having the school you attended as a child named after you? Marcie said—” He swiveled to include Bluey. “Mother, do you remember Marcie Millard?”
“A little red thing? Like our Lucille? Oh yes. A go-getter! Father an ophthalmologist, no?”
“Mother! I’m shocked you remember,” said Trinnie.
Louis nodded enthusiastically while chewing the veal. Such demonstrations of his wife’s mental alacrity comforted—he hoarded them as evidence to present at some future sanity trial.
“Wasn’t he a councilman?” asked Dodd.
“The mayor,” said Trinnie. Then, in an aside to Ralph: “Beverly Hills used to be very Andy of Mayberry. The family eye doctor was actually the mayor.”
“He died,” said Bluey, her brow crinkling in concern. “Didn’t he? Didn’t the Millard man pass away?”
Louis chuffed, thinking it a tad early in the evening for obits.
“Yes,” said Dodd. “While jogging. One of the very first to be claimed by the craze.”
Ralph spoke up. “Aren’t the Beverly Hills schools completely Iranian now?”
“Well,” said Dodd, “Marcie showed me a PTA flyer that was printed in Farsi, Korean, Russian, Hebrew and Spanish. She said the children of the district came from fifty-seven countries and speak forty-six languages.”
“You don’t see that on Dawson’s Creek, do you?” said Ralph. “Or is that show not even on anymore?” The flâneur was emboldened by his first dinner en famille—and loaded for bearish faux pas. “You don’t see it in the teen masturbation flicks: no Muslims or Bahai’s shagging apple pie, no sir. They’re all rich and they’re all white!”
“Perhaps it’s not in their interest,” chuffed the patriarch, cryptically.
“When Dodd and I went to BV—and Beverly—there were pretty much only Jews,” Trinnie said.
“There was one black,” her brother solemnly corrected. “His name was Elijah—do you remember Elijah, Mother?”
“I do,” Trinnie exclaimed, her memory jogged. “Ralph, it was so weird. He was this skinny little kid, like, made-to-order: sweet and small and talented … completely inoffensive—I know this sounds terrible, but he was very … minstrel show—like a little Sammy Davis.”
“That’s horrible!”
“I am not being racist. It was the high school that was racist. It was like they—like the District literally cast a part.”
“I would have thought you’d have gone to private school,” said Ralph.
“Papa thought public schools were good enough.”
“Indeed they were!” piped Lou.
“Papa bought us a house in the flats.”
“I’ve always thought it amazing Mr. Trotter did that,” said Joyce. She had called him Mister ever since the halcyon days at Trotter Waste.
“Well, the kids at school didn’t think so,” said Trinnie.
“No, they didn’t! Oh God, Doddy! Mercy,” said Bluey.
“Everyone thought it was freaky. Like: why would someone with so much money not send their kids to school in Switzerland? Or wherever. And at the same time, they were—I don’t know, jealous.”
For a moment, the group ate in silence.
“Did you know,” said Dodd, again turning to Ralph, “that the Velvet Underground played at lunch, for a special assembly? The principal pulled the plug when Lou Reed sang ‘Heroin.’ ”
“Incredible,” said Ralph. “And now they get Curtis Hanson or Michael Bay to drop in—Tull told me Four Winds even had Robert Towne giving a lecture! What do kids want to be hearing from Mr. Chinatowne for? What are they going to learn from that high-brow Ron Shelton? At least Ron Shelton isn’t pretentious—well, not as pretentious as Chinatowne, anyway … and let’s not forget Callie Khouri!—oh, all you aspiring riot-grrrl-screenwriters have so much to learn from Callie Khouri!” Trinnie smiled at this arcana; the rest of the Trotters remained impassive. “By the way, what exactly does Callie Khouri do—aside from having her picture taken every month for the WGA Newsletter, and jacking off with her Oscar? I’ll tell you what Callie Khouri does! She’s on the guru circuit with Thelma and Louise! Asshole-buddies with the Council of Elders! Callie Khouri—Bride of Chinatowne!”
“You’re gonna hate this,” said Trinnie, eyes twinkling. “But next week they’re having Ron Bass.”
“Who is?”
“Four Winds.”
“No!”
“Because he’s an attorney. He can talk about writing and entertainment law.”
“Well … Ron’s OK. At least the man knows what he is.”
“You mean he’s OK now that the two of you are having cozy little Buffalo Club lunches.” She put the needle in a little further. “Hey, Ralph, did you know that Four Winds also has a mentor program going? Something called Young Storytellers—”
“Oh God, that makes me ill,” he said, ashening.
&nbs
p; Having achieved the desired effect, she turned to her brother. “That school’s getting so crazy. And don’t you dare put those kids up at the Hassler—he’s flying Tull’s entire class to Rome,” she explained to those not in the know, “to which I am highly opposed.”
“It’s not the whole class,” said Dodd impishly. “It’s Third-Tier Honors. And it isn’t Rome anymore. It’s … the world. All the places with roads that lead to Rome.”
“Whatever it is, it’s much too much.”
“I think it’s wonderful,” offered Joyce.
“It’s bullshit already. Those kids are so twisted—there’s no sense of reality whatsoever. Last week, I was waiting at the curb to pick up my son.”
“You picked up Tull?” said Dodd incorrigibly. “Epitacio must have been on his deathbed!”
“I sat there, forced to endure listening to Boulder Langon and her fucked-up friends—”
“What do they give her per movie now?” Dodd asked earnestly.
“Two, maybe three,” said Trinnie.
“She’s very talented,” said Joyce. “Did you see that fabulous film she did with Susan Sarandon?”
“It was shite,” said Trinnie.
Dodd laughed, and Joyce wasn’t pleased. The old man inclined his head, cuing his daughter to enlighten him. “Boulder Langon is Lucy’s best friend. She’s twelve years old, and they give her three million a movie.” His eyebrows knit dramatically as he chuffed at the figure. “So I’m parked at the curb listening to this horrible little girl and her clique from hell dish some punk actor. They want to know who he’s dating, and Boulder says, ‘A nobody.’ They keep pressing for the girl’s name until Boulder—this twelve-year-old—says, ‘A nobody! She’s a pedestrian!’ A ‘pedestrian,’ can you believe? And the sex. My God, the sex! You know what they say? They say, ‘Did you run barefoot?’ That’s what they ask each other. Did you run barefoot? Know what that means? Did you sleep together without protection—that’s what it means. And these aren’t even teenagers! So what kind of message are we sending when you load them up on the BBJ and—”