Revenge of the Spellmans
Page 34
I’d like to thank Morgan Dox 5 for all her help along the way and give another shout-out to the rest of the Dox-Kims, the aforementioned Steve, and, of course, Rae Dox Kim. Thanks to Dave Hayward, employee of the month and captain of the Spellman Enterprises softball team. 6 Also, Gretchen Rice for all her research and assistance, and my friends from Desvernine Associates, who continue to show their support and welcome me with hugs, crazy stories, and valuable information—Des, Pamela, Pierre Merkl, Debra Meisner, Yvonne Prentiss, and not Mike. A few more thank-yous to the people who helped the book take form, or at least helped me survive the process: Julie Ulmer, Frank Marquardt, Stephanie Dennis, Peter Kim, Carol Young, Lisa Chen, Warren Liu, and Mayumi Takada. Thanks to Dr. Linda Lagemann for showing me that therapists can be funny, too. And to my French friend, Charlie: S’il vous plaît prendre vos vitamines. Chacun d’entre eux.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
LISA LUTZ is the author of the national bestsellers The Spellman Files and Curse of the Spellmans . Although she attended UC Santa Cruz, UC Irvine, the University of Leeds in England, and San Francisco State University, she still does not have a bachelor’s degree. Lisa spent most of the 1990s hopping through a string of low-paying odd jobs while writing and rewriting the screenplay Plan B, a mob comedy. After the film was made in 2000, she vowed she would never write another screenplay. A motion picture adaptation of The Spellman Files is in development with Paramount Pictures. For more information, go to lisalutz.com.
1Dr. Sophia Rush—Therapist #1.
2 Dr. Ira Schwartzman—Therapist #1.
3 I’ve found the long pause an excellent way to pass time in therapy. Until this session, I thought it had gone unnoticed.
4 For other surefire ways to kill time in therapy, see appendix.
5San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
1 For an incomplete dossier on Dad, see appendix.
2 Mom hired a recent graduate from the American Conservatory Theater and armed him with a tape recorder and a list of questions to casually integrate into the conversation. For example: 1) Have you ever been in therapy? 2) Is it helping you? 3) Do you plan on being a bartender forever? 4) Are you seeing anyone right now? 5) How many tattoos does he have?
3 Not true. I’ve done all sorts of other things, like go to movies, take strolls in the park, drink coffee, drink other stuff, eat food, sleep, etc.
4 That was an accident and he knows it.
5 These kinds of questions one should never answer. So I didn’t.
6 He’s laying it on thick now, working the guilt angle.
7 Finger quotes.
8 Old in the literal sense. He’s eighty-four.
9 Mortimer Schilling, retired defense attorney. For more information, see appendix.
10 A San Francisco landmark. Easy to locate. Serves a mean black and white milkshake.
11 Once again, if you’ve failed to read the previous two documents—The Spellman Files and Curse of the Spellmans (both available in paperback!)—and you need further background information, see appendix.
12 Henry’s diet veers toward extreme health consciousness. If you want any food with flavor in his house, you really must bring your own supplies.
13 For David’s dossier, see appendix.
14 Indeed I do.
15 Namely, the good stuff.
16 Olivia Spellman. For brief dossier, see appendix.
17 Um, yes!
18 See appendix.
19 Namely, the PI and bartender lines.
1 This might surprise you, but I’d grown quite comfortable with these extended silences in Dr. Ira’s office. A fifty-minute session is a fifty-minute session. There’s no wiggle room. Long silences kill time. Silence means less work. This I have learned.
1Curse of the Spellmans—now available in paperback!
2 My dad’s actual word choice.
3 I intend nothing derogatory by using the word “shrink”; it’s just faster to type than the alternatives.
1 The first few times are extremely awkward. Ride it out. It gets easier.
1 Even though I’m a firm believer in not mixing booze.
2 Details to follow.
1 This was in fact my first case as an independent contractor.
2 Linda was scheduled to leave at 11:15.
3 Mom always takes the prescription but never the pills, in some sort of sick test of her pain threshold. I’ve been meaning to mention this to Ex-boyfriend #9, Dr. Daniel Castillo, DDS.
4 A porcelain garden frog given to David by our eccentric Grammy Spellman.
1 In English this means “Moishe’s belly button.” Appetizing, huh?
1 David doesn’t make a habit of drinking coffee out of a can, but he keeps several units on hand in case of a natural disaster.
2 Literally—my name is taped to the label. David keeps the bottle around specifically for me.
3 No. No one knows how she got the password.
4 I believe Henry was referring to a few of the individuals on my list of ex-boyfriends (see previous two documents for details, if you’re curious).
1Don’t get me started.
2 There is indeed a file on each of the Spellman children. I wish I could say that these resemble scrapbooks, but they’re really more like official dossiers—think fingerprints, not finger paintings.
1 “He was soooo guilty,” according to Maggie. Not that she didn’t wage an excellent defense.
2 Yes, I asked. Apparently, Henry no longer allows marshmallows in his home since they are one of the primary ingredients in a few of Rae’s favorite and messiest recipes.
1 The hiding place where Maggie discovered the Halloween candy.
2 Ashleigh used to be Rae’s only other friend besides Henry, but in the last year her social network has greatly expanded.
1 I was giving him a special deal. Don’t think I’d charge you the same.
2 I agree, not terribly clever.
3 Consider it mentioned.
1For recipe, see appendix.
2 Lie.
3 Daniel’s neurosurgeon wife.
4 End of Court-Ordered Therapy.
1 Specifically, teeth-sucking.
2 In case you were curious, rule #2: no deli meats in the car.
3 Morty just wanted a chance to try out PI lingo. He was not actually concerned.
1 Henry refuses to keep overly processed grains in his home. Refined wheat flour (aka, regular old white flour enriched with vitamins) he claims is evil. I still can’t tell you what it ever did to him.
2 Minus Trail of the Pink Panther and all the loosely connected films not starring Peter Sellers.
3For every hour of television watched, Henry makes Rae read for an hour. He has been known to enforce this rule on adults as well.
4Spelled “Cato” in subsequent films; no explanation.
1 She pronounces them “Psssats.”
1 For your own free online ordination, visit www.themonastery.org.
1 His bed is way better than the one in the guest room.
1 His lucky shirt. Which she then held for ransom.
2 Okay, so she was doing it to help the vice squad, but no one asked her to.
1 I would need to return it to its appropriate place once I made a copy.
1Curse of the Spellmans—now available in paperback!
2 Don’t worry, the secret apartment was equipped with a coffeemaker. Oh, but I need filters. Thanks for reminding me.
3 White Night. An all-night festival in Rome, the second Saturday of September, just before David’s visit.
4 Labor strikes are a fact of life in Italy. There are more strikes in Italy than in any other country. It’s good to check before you travel.
5 Celebrated on September 12 in Verona.
6 He had something, but not jet lag.
1 The phone was on vibrate, don’t worry.
1 At this point in the game, I didn’t find the pause in any way awkward.
1 It seriously has no name.
1 If I were Maggie, here’s how I’d see it: He’s doing the cleaning and I’m not. Who cares about motivation?
2 Note to self: Mention this credit to your character in therapy.
1 He doesn’t know. That’s what I was counting on.
1 Translation: Can we speak freely? (pig Latin).
2 Sliced fruit. Rae would argue: not dessert.
1 There are two job interviews I mentioned here and then my meeting at a temp agency, which is more like a medical intake than a job interview.
2One of our neighbors at the time kept getting our name wrong. David and I started calling our mom and dad Mr. and Mrs. Melman when we were in the mood to annoy.
3I am well aware that this is an incredibly old joke.
1 I tend to be extra sensitive when I’m tired.
1 In my defense, I don’t usually cry when I discover there’s no coffee. Well, only once before.
2 This was a guess. But the missing camping gear made it an educated one.
3 Mid-life freak-out. But David used the term “existential crisis” instead. Tomato/tomato.
1 So far my record in David’s place.
1 Not his real name.
2 Rae has left a distinctive pattern of blackmail in her wake. See original document, The Spellman Files, for details.
1 See, I am evolving. These drugs are legal.
1 Right here I decided to change the subject. I trusted doctor-patient confidentiality, but I didn’t trust the doctor to keep her opinion about the new living arrangement to herself.
2 Actually, it’s not so long. During the three-month stretch at the age of twelve when I was forced to take ballet, I committed a series of pranks in which I took great pride. My crowning achievement, and the cause for my expulsion, was when I mopped the studio floor with vegetable oil right before class.
3 Had a nice twenty-minute nap.
1 Petra is the only person who refuses to identify herself in voice mail messages.
2 Milo calling.
3 I refused to give Connor the satisfaction of ordering it by name, so I said, “Pour me a cup of coffee and put some whiskey in it.”
4 I couldn’t help thinking he meant “gorgeous” ironically.
5 The implication that the communication rift extended beyond my sister was intriguing.
1 Bravo, Petra. Bravo. For a partial transcript of their conversation, see appendix.
2 Wouldn’t it be simpler to call the restaurant directly?
1 Note to self: Do not refer to it as “our residence” in David’s company.
2 See appendix.
1 Yes, a lie.
2 If you’ve read the second document ( Curse of the Spellmans—now available in paperback!), maybe you’re thinking that I can’t really vouch for her. But my theory is this: David made Petra feel too much like a grown-up. Gabe will always live in a state of boyishness. Petra, too, needs to pretend she can stay young forever. That’s my theory and I’m sticking to it.
1 In the Spellman household, “disappearance” means “vacation.” It can also be used in its usual sense. (For full explanation, see appendix.)
1 I will have you know that I did not once mock his use of the modern matchmaker.
2 Of course, it could be that self-involved thing at work again.
1 I always wait until at least noon.
1 Ernie was cooking dinner that night. Tuna casserole. He got the recipe from a women’s magazine that he picked up at the doctor’s office.
2 Not a president, Ernie.
3Diabolique (1996), starring Sharon Stone and Isabelle Adjani. A remake, of course.
4 Which remained purely a “cheating incident” in the eyes of her unmoved guidance counselor.
5 If I had a dime for every time that banana incident was mentioned to me…
1 For a list of Rae’s past culinary experiments, see appendix.
2 It’s basically a bunch of outtakes from previous films, but it’s the last Pink Panther film starring Peter Sellers.
3 Sometimes it’s best not to ask. So I didn’t.
1 Yes, I really did think she’d let one week slide. Some people are very inflexible.
2 No, not the actual license plate.
3Yeah, I used finger quotes.
4 We should probably update this phrase. I vote for: “Sorry, it won’t happen again.”
1 Of course, I argued the mathematical impossibility of that statement.
2 The ex-cop kind.
3 Note to self: Consider getting a hobby…or your own apartment.
4 I remember burying his wand in a flower box, hoping that would end the nightly performances. I sadly discovered that a chopstick works just as well.
5 I found it at a garage sale. It had a giant backgammon board beneath the glass.
6 I’m soooo going to mention this in therapy.
7 “Why don’t you buy a new one?”
8 Bad news for me. I would have to be on constant guard.
9 Here’s what you need to know about Grammy Spellman: She and my Dad barely speak. But she’s pretty good at sending a birthday card and a check to her grandchildren. She’s the kind of grammy who would open a brokerage account for her granddaughter and keep it from her son.
10 About three years ago, we learned that David had been giving Rae at least twenty dollars a week for no reason at all, other than to stay in her good graces.
11 Please, no letters from the Jack Daniel’s corporation!
1 A high-end but casual restaurant in the Mission named in honor of the quasi-official utensil of the Kentucky Fried Chicken that used to reside in its place.
2 During the time it took Morty to make the life-changing decision of what to have for lunch, I read the menu from top to bottom—three times—and learned that Spork recycles their cooking oil as diesel fuel.
3Yes, he actually wrote out “hoo-ha.”
1 Twizzlers.
2 Milo took over the rent-controlled apartment that I took over from Bernie, after Bernie took it over from me—but changed his mind. See previous document, Curse of the Spellmans (now available in paperback!), for details.