by Bruce Wagner
Cat Basquiat had his tongue in Obie’s mouth. When Les reached for the M&Ms, Moe said, “What are those, Percocets? I got a headache, Les. Gimme.” Lancelot laughed. Obie said, “Don’t tease, Moe, you know how delicate he is.” Les managed a smile as he faced the screen again, then whoosh back to the clink for some requisite cyst-popping and rimming of trusties whoosh to a DEA meeting, where he stroked out in mid-testimony, crapping his Tommy Nutter trousers as he fell from the witness stand. The rest of his days would be spent in a gold-plated wheelchair, feet drooping down like an unemployed marionette.
Les shuddered, shrugging off this specialized humoresque, knocking a loafer askew and propping a foot up. He reached into the bowl and licked another sugarcane pebble, dreaming of Rock Candy Mountain mistily shrouded by this boy Basquiat’s anal fumes, all vinegar and tuberoses.
How thrilling the proximity, and how improbable to share the citadel! He would have accepted the lowliest position—polishing marble there, or candlesticks. For Big Stars were different than you and me, this he knew from an early age. The boy who watched reruns (The Rifleman, The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, Father Knows Best), too ashamed of his looks to go to school, knew. The boy who locked himself in the bathroom, tetracycline vials around the sink like votive candles, his face an angry mask of suppurating knots, knew—fussing with them till they wept clear fluid, as if drawn from spinal waters. All he wanted was to be Kurt Russell. Won’t someone make it so? Jan-Michael Vincent…any old sunbaked smooth-faced boy in hip-hugger jeans would do. He longed for fields of undamaged skin, craving Sal Mineo’s buttery cheeks—when they finally came (still sitting on bathroom floor, eyes clenched shut, mirror forgotten for now), he rode to the dusty ranch and necked with Johnny Crawford while his father was at the General Store. The things they did in that barn…he would have “Lucas” next.
Les planned to become a psychiatrist—he would listen to Big Star woes, a shoulder for Big Star tears—but changed course in mid-residency. He was moonlighting at a Malibu emergency room when Streisand came in with an allergic reaction to fish. She was hyperventilating and badly mottled. He shot her up with Benadryl and right away she could breathe again. Any intern could have done it, but Streisand thought he was God. She invited him to her home for a troubled-youth charity hoedown. Les didn’t know a soul yet there he was, bonding with Larry Hagman and Ray Stark, Ann-Margret and Shirley MacLaine. That’s when he had the vision, more like a religious exfoliation: skin as the Comer, hotter than plastic surgery. O Pioneers! Now, after all these years, they wanted to drag him from penthouse to pillory and march him down Wilshire to the hillock of Via Rodeo, for all the Big and Little Stars—and the nothings—to see.
“How are you?”
Obie tucked herself into the chair, hunched in a fetal position. “It’s been a real shitty week.”
“What happened?”
“Stuff with Cat. Career shit. Bullshit.”
She was going to cancel, but had canceled the last three sessions already. She blew her nose and Calliope pushed some Kleenex.
“Are you sick? You don’t look like you’re feeling well.”
“I think I have a—this sinus infection. And there’s…this drug thing, so stupid. With Les. It’s more a pain in the ass than anything else. Have you read about it?”
“I saw something in the paper.”
“It’s like, enough. It’s so ridiculous. Poor Les—he’s really upset, he’s like, shaken. You know, he’s concerned about his career.”
“As he should be.”
“Has he talked to you about it?”
“You know I wouldn’t share something like that.”
“Nothing’s going to happen.”
“There are no guarantees. And it can’t be much fun.”
“I know—I’m not in denial, I’m not saying it’s nothing. It’s just, I’m so used to—he’s not. He’s never been in the glare of the whole whatever. But there’s no way, that would be insane. I mean, for them to—I’m the one, if anyone. And it’s such a victimless crime, if a crime at all. I mean, don’t these people have better things to do? I want to talk about something else.”
“Did you take anything today, Oberon?”
“What?”
“Did you take anything today?”
“No! Why?”
“You’re slurring some of your words.”
“I am?”
“Yes.”
“It’s the Zoloft.”
“Zoloft doesn’t make you slur.”
Obie blew her nose again, then closed her eyes. “There’s something I really need to talk about.”
“In a moment,” she said, sternly. “I don’t want to see you in here under the influence.”
“I’m not—”
“That’s a rule, Oberon.”
“I haven’t slept in two days and I have this sinus thing that I took some—what’s it called, Atarax?—it’s like unbelievable, they’re like reds. I haven’t felt this good since high school. I’m kidding. I mean, I could barely drive over here.”
“Just so we’re clear on the rule.”
“We’re clear on the rule.”
“If you can’t drive, we’ll call your assistant to pick you up.”
“There’s an idea. It’s just I’ve been sneezing for, like, forty-eight hours and this is the first time I’ve stopped. I was freaking out ‘cause I read somewhere about someone who had to be hospitalized because he couldn’t stop sneezing and then he died.”
“What did you want to talk about?”
“I’ve been offered this really interesting role. A remake, for no money. Italian film. Pasolini. But really interesting. And I did something—I think—I know it was connected to the part and some of it was the drugs, which I’ve now stopped. But I feel weird about it and wanted to talk.”
“Something with Cat?”
“God, I wish. Someone I know befriended a homeless woman. I don’t want to say who it is. He picked her up on the street and gave her money. Put her up at the St. James—or the place that used to be the St. James. She has a little girl. Anyway, they came to the house and she blew lunch over the whole celebrity thing. Meeting me. I mean, this is a woman who has been living in weeds off of freeways. We all got loaded and fooled around—I mean, she’s clean, not your standard homeless person, I know that sounds terrible. But very pretty, kind of like Annette Bening. My friend wound up taking her to another room. You could hear them…fucking so I took the girl to the other side of the house.”
“How old is she?”
“Around seven. Calliope, it’s really awful!”
“Why are you so upset?”
“I just feel so weird about this but I know why I did it. God, sometimes I wish I wasn’t an actress—the fucking burden. See, in Teorema—that’s the project I’m going to do for, like no money because it’s so great—this character I’m supposed to play is totally free, totally uninhibited. She has no…sexual morality. That’s what attracted me to the part. She’s a seducer. She sleeps with a whole family: husband, wife, daughter, son, the whole deal.”
“You’re saying there are no boundaries.”
Obie closed her eyes and nodded. “We played this game where I made her reach inside me.”
“You what?”
“I’m not a monster and I know she wasn’t…aware—what was happening. She was already sleepy because I think her mother gave her part of a pill, a Valium or something. So she was groggy, whatever, to begin with. My friend said that’s what she did, and I remember thinking how weird it was to give your kid a pill. But my mother did that too. So—she was half awake and I—took her to the guest room.”
“And what did you do?”
“I was going to put her to bed—should I…can I tell you this?”
“Yes.”
“You won’t judge me?”
“I won’t judge you.”
“This is exactly what the woman would have done—”
“What woman?”
&n
bsp; “The character. From Teorema. I was totally covered by a blanket and she was more than half asleep, Calliope, I know I was completely covered the whole time. I feel weird but I’m not even sure it’s wrong—there’s no way she had any idea. ‘If an arm falls in the forest’—”
“She put her arm inside you? How?”
“I said I lost a diamond and if she found it, she could have it. I pushed it in…I mean, there was no way—it was only like ten seconds and that was all. She went to bed immediately. I mean, she was half-asleep during.”
“Simon? It’s Mitch.”
“Oh hi, Mitch.”
“Your mother’s very upset. She’s so upset that she asked me to call.”
“What’s up?”
“You know what’s up.”
“‘Fraid I don’t, Mitch.”
“Did you pay a visit to Hassan DeVore?”
“Pay a visit is a bit much, Mitch. I saw him, at the studio. Did he tell her that?”
“How else would she have found out, Simon?”
“What’s the problemo?”
“I think you know what the problem is.”
“Frankly, I don’t, Mitch. To summarize, why don’t you tell me.”
“Come on, Simon. You have a head on your shoulders, though you don’t always use it. That man is a client of your mother’s. Going to see him like that is not only a gross invasion of his privacy, but an act of aggression toward Calliope. I can’t believe you would have exploited her in that way. Or him.”
“I went to see Mr. DeVore as a courtesy, Mitch. I’m a writer! I’m not playing games! I know a producer on that show—”
“I can’t believe you’d even defend—”
“It’s moot that Sagabond’s no longer there, Mitch! The man extended me an open invitation—”
“Simon, I don’t care! Do you understand? Can you imagine her embarrassment? A client confronting her like that? With stories that her son’s soliciting work—”
“Confronting her? What does that mean, Mitch? Did Mister Vorbalid say he was unhappy I stopped by?”
“Mr. What?”
“He’s a fucking Vorbalid, Mitch—we’re not talking Anthony Hopkins here! We’re not even talking Michael Douglas!”
“This is pointless. I’m just calling to convey a message from your mother, okay, Simon?”
“But this is important, Mitch, this is subjective. Did my mother say DeVore was unhappy about my visit or didn’t she? Did she actually hear DeVore say—”
“This isn’t Court TV, okay, Simon? What you did was wrong and you know it! Calliope doesn’t want you to call, she doesn’t even want you at the house.”
“Oh, really. And what does that mean?”
“It means what it means. She doesn’t feel safe.”
“She doesn’t feel safe, Mitch?”
“That’s right and I can’t blame her. You crossed a line, Simon.”
“And now I’m the Unabomber.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Now I’m stalking my own mom, a moser! Pursuer of Jews!”
“You’re not to come by the house.”
“The house I grew up in. Oh. I see. Great. Wonderful, Mitch. I’m not to come by the house that I grew up in and the house you’ve inhabited for a relatively short while.”
“Don’t drag me into this.”
“You’ve done a pretty good job already.”
“This has nothing to do with me, Simon.”
“Oh. And what does it have to do with?”
“Your inappropriate behavior.”
“Oh. Right. To summarize. I see.”
“Let’s not belabor this.”
“I know you’re pissed off because she’s famous and you’re not.”
“I won’t even dignify that asininity with a comment.”
“You never will be, Mitch. I know that must hurt.”
“Goodbye, Simon.”
“Just one more thing. I was just wondering.”
“This conversation is over. Just stay away.”
“I only want to know one thing, it’s important.”
“What is it?”
“I was just wondering what your clients say when you show them your weasely non-famous little dick.”
When Simon got to Bel Air, Serena wanted to take a drive. The new day nurse was refreshingly indifferent to the announced itinerary. They brought the sheepskin from the couch and laid it on the cracked leather of the old Jag.
“This is a bit unusual for me,” he said as they got under way.
“Being abducted by a sick old woman?”
“But I have to say I like the anarchy quotient.”
“You’re a funny young man.” Serena coughed, readjusting herself beneath the strap of the seat belt. “I’m going to take this damn thing off,” she said, trying to undo it. Simon reached over and freed her. “Thank you. Silly for me to wear it. For you, no. But for me…”
When they got down the hill, she said she wanted to go see raccoons at the zoo.
“I’m not sure they’re part of the repertoire.”
“Well, of course they have raccoons, it’s a zoo.”
“Could be, could be. Maybe so.”
“You are funny.”
“Rocky Raccoon,” he sang, “went into his room…”
A tear spilled to her cheek and she wiped it away with the quavering back of a hand. “I’m so worried, Simon.” It was the first time she had called him by name, and he felt a deep tug within. “I can smell the mother—I know she’s unwell. What will happen to the babies, with the mother gone?”
They stopped at the park across from the pink hotel, to sit awhile. Serena didn’t look well, and Simon was afraid she would die on him. She thought about Sy Krohn with a drowsy, bluesy yearning; every once in a while his voice keened on the radio of a passing car. She got loopy and asked Simon if “the old Jurgenson’s still sold fumigants”—frankincense and myrrh—“anything to blot the smell.” Serena wanted to know if he’d ever been in love and Simon said he didn’t know. Of course that meant he hadn’t, she said. Simon felt an unbearable melancholy, like a weed killing his meager gardens. He remembered a boy in grammar school he thought he loved, and a girl too. The boy smelled like Zest soap and the girl, Jungle Gardenia—now, they were barely memories. Serena asked about his family and Simon said his father died long ago, a mythic figure distant as a king on the cover of a vintage comic. He thought of telling her more, but Serena was in pain and asked that he drive her home.
If they had stayed a while longer, Simon might have spoken of his father as a murdered man, a cantor. “His name was Sy Krohn,” he might have said. It can only be wondered whether Serena, already hemorrhaging, would have felt the impact of this rogue revelation and held it long enough to bony breast to declare the fallen idol as the very one she’d loved to near madness; how she had been with him when he died and for years after wished to die herself. For better or worse, those details would remain under shifting sands, consigned to the Rub al Khali of memory for all time.
After a few sleepless nights, she called an old therapist friend. They met at a coffee shop, Calliope in her big dark glasses. Of course, she didn’t name names. Her colleague said, “You must report this.” You are not an attorney, he said. Hence, certain things your client tells you are not privileged under California law. But if the child is indigent? Calliope heard herself asking, knowing it came out wrong. She meant it in a habeas corpus, not a class sense—the child would have to be submitted, no? But you told me they’re with this person’s friend, said the colleague. So they are not indigent. Aside from the actions of your client, which are criminal, this little girl is being put in harm’s way by her mother—your client said the mother is feeding her pills. Not only is she negligent but her judgment is impaired. You’d better do some serious thinking, said the colleague. Because you have a serious problem on your hands.
Calliope went to bed, where she remained for three days. How could this have happened? If t
he esteemed psychiatrist acted according to law and contacted authorities, her assiduously cultivated practice might easily topple; the legal nuances of confidentiality were not an issue her paranoid, illustrious clientele cared to grapple with. Anyhow, it was Oberon’s word against hers. The claims might be thrown from court, and Calliope left with libelous egg on her face—Obie could even countersue. The psychiatrist would become tabloid-fodder.
She lay there sweating and channel-surfing. One moment, she was reaching for the phone to make the Call; the next, freeloading on Big Star’s twisted reasoning, wondering if, in fact, there really was a crime…if the girl truly had no knowledge of what transpired—she groaned, seized by a wave of self-revulsion. What is wrong with me? Yet what was the alternative? She’d talk to Oberon and share her dilemma, that might help her decide. Describe the hard-and-fast legal obligations of a California therapist—frighten Obie to death. I want you to think carefully about what I’ve told you, Oberon. And I want you to tell me…whether what you said happened with that child was the fantasy of an actress preparing a role—or was it real? Pause, while the actress took in the full import; answers it was “fantasy.” Good. That’s what I thought. I’d like to know: did the drugs have anything to do with this active fantasizing? Pause. Says yes, “Yes, they did.” Drugs. Good. Very good. It’s good to be honest. Now, I want you to enter a drug treatment program—today. Do you understand, Oberon? Somber nodding of the head, along with expiatory tears. Calliope would make it clear that when she got out of detox, they’d get to the bottom of this perverse, imagined act—the tough-love therapist wasn’t about to let her off the hook. They would face Big Star demons together. She would help Obie because that’s what Calliope did, that’s how she’d built her practice—helping and healing, not destroying clients’ lives. Or wreaking havoc on her own. If the Obie thing broke, the famed cottage (therapeutic oratory, refuge and sacrarium, Brentwood’s own confessional Taliesin of above-the-line tears, fears and renewal) would be the sudden locus of Hard Copy helicopters, Vanity Fair layouts and O.J.ish lookie-loos. No one should be subjected to that.