Cease to Blush

by Billie Livingston

  “Do we have to talk about this now?” She puts her watch arm behind his back.

  “I’m just saying, maybe it’s better if you don’t talk about that stuff. But they’ll ask you things. If you ever made a delivery or—”

  “I didn’t!” she blurts.

  He laughs and nods.

  A beat or two of waffling and she says, “I don’t understand this Friars Club thing. What’s it got to do with you?”

  He shrugs. “Guys were playing cards, games were fixed. They figure I had a piece.”

  “Did you?” Her insides twist.

  “Listen, I’m in a certain position—”

  A coughing fit takes Celia. She waves her hands and hacks into her tissue.

  “Let’s get you some water.”

  “I’m fine,” shaking her head no. His face is quizzical. Grazing her eyes over the park, she cradles her wrist and taps her forefinger at the new watch. “I think I’m just hungry.”

  “All right. Let’s go eat.” He offers his arm and walks her back.

  “So, how was Boston? You see your mother?”

  In the car, she rummages in the glove compartment as he talks about how ill Mamma Rosselli is, how much it hurt to see her that way. She pulls out the owner’s manual, rips the back cover off and prints, THEY’RE LISTENING. MY WATCH.

  He looks out the windshield. She writes, I’M SCARED.

  “She couldn’t have been more than seventy pounds.” He swipes at his nose.

  In the restaurant they settle in, order drinks, casting glances about the room. She flips the business card she took from the maître d’s podium and writes, HELP ME GO AWAY.

  He nods. “You ever hear from those pricks again? Pudge and Snitchards.”

  She spurts a laugh. “Not since the subpoena.” Slides the business card to his side.

  “Gotta get you a good lawyer. Here …” He reaches into his jacket for a pen, takes out one of his cards and turns it over. “This guy knows his way around the G.” He writes, YOU GO, YOU DISAPPEAR FOR GOOD.

  She gives him a startled look. “What’s his number?”

  “Oh,” he tsks and writes some more. “This guy’s great.” He passes the card over. “Remember those Boy Scouts on the way from Drucker’s? ’Member the big one? Turns out he’s queer as a three-dollar bill.”

  She keeps her hand over the card as the waiter nears. Johnny orders appetizers. Waiter gone, she says, “I wonder if that’s the guy Truman told me about. He had a fling with an FBI agent once who liked it from behind. Hard.”

  Johnny pounds the table as he wipes a napkin over his chin. “Oh, that’s rich …”

  She uncovers the card. CHANGE NAME. NO CONTACT. “I can imagine that.”

  He reaches a foot across and touches hers.

  Johnny has just dropped her off when there’s a knock at her door.

  “That was a strange conversation you had tonight, Audrey,” Dodge informs her.

  “What do you expect? I can’t sleep I’m so self-conscious.”

  “You’re not doing yourself any favours,” Richards says. “If you extract the sort of information we need, you won’t even have to show up in court. You can be far away from all this.”

  “What makes you think I want to be far away?”

  Dodge interjects. “We have bank records that show you withdrew five thousand dollars from your savings yesterday.”

  “So?”

  “So, we’ve frozen your accounts.”

  The next day Celia answers the phone to Johnny. “Hello, lovely. It’s my last night in town and I thought if you girls don’t have plans, I’d love to take you to dinner.”

  “That sounds wonderful,” she says, suddenly sick to her stomach again.

  At quarter past eight, Johnny pours gin and vermouth into the martini shaker as Celia fits one of her dark wigs on in the bathroom mirror. “I’ll be there in a sec,” she says, adding a last swipe of Annie’s screaming-red lipstick. “I’m just changing my bandage.” The bandage is gone. She stares in the mirror at her altered nose, dabs concealer on any redness.

  When she comes in the living room, Annie smirks at the sock-filled bust of her dress on Celia. Celia sticks her tongue out.

  Wearing Celia’s Peggy Lee wig restyled, and a bandage across her nose, Annie is bursting out of the stretchiest gingham dress her roommate owns.

  Both Johnny and Annie come in for a closer look at Celia’s nose, turn her face right and left. Annie touches thumb to forefinger in an O of approval. Johnny kisses his fingertips. He grabs the martini shaker and begins to joggle it up and down. Celia holds her watch to the clatter as Annie undoes the clasp.

  “So are you going to do Dean’s show?” Annie asks as she fastens the watch around her own wrist. “I think you should try and get on Laugh-In.”

  “Yeah,” Celia says, trying to keep her mouth as near to Annie’s wrist as she’d be to her own. “I can’t believe the cracks they get away with.”

  “The censors don’t get half the jokes,” Annie says, reaching over and tucking a stray lock under Celia’s wig. “Somebody was telling me they had seven pot jokes in the first show and the censors never caught one.”

  Johnny nudges her and hands over a new passport, driver’s licence and birth certificate. He sighs and sets his mouth. “Better get going, we’ll lose our reservation.”

  “I’ll get my coat.” Annie excuses herself and returns with her mink, Celia’s sable and a brown envelope. She looks haunted. Celia takes Annie’s coat and Annie holds on to Celia’s.

  “Jesus, how’d you get a tear there,” Johnny asks, taking Annie’s coat from Celia. Sitting on the couch, he takes out his wallet, pulls a razor blade and makes a slit in the lining near the collar. Annie and Celia stare as Johnny pulls several stacks of money from inside his jacket and drops them down the cut.

  “So you don’t forget,” Annie says, pulling Celia’s attention back and handing her the envelope. “It’s your turn to vacuum tomorrow.” Celia looks inside: first, an eight-by-ten of Annie: To Celia, Ain’t life grand when you got the guts for it. xox, Lifers, Annie. And Frank’s: Celia, You’re cruel, baby! But when you’re right, you’re right. The last photo is one of her own. Also in the envelope is a small album, You Oughtta Be in Pictures! in pink glitter across the front. A slip of paper inside reads WRITE ME AT MY MOTHER’S and a San Anselmo address. The first photograph is a shot of Celia and Annie at the El Morocco.

  Celia wipes her eyes.

  “You driving tonight, John?” Annie asks.

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Cuz I think I’m going to bring my car too. I kinda made a late-night date and he’s way off in Brooklyn.”

  “Brooklyn,” Johnny hoots. “I had higher hopes for you, kid.”

  Outside on the sidewalk the three of them mill for a couple moments. There is no more hugging, only long looks offset by chipper words, Annie now wearing Celia’s sable, Celia wearing the cash-heavy mink, the gold of Annie’s dress catching flashes of light underneath. The white bandage on Annie’s nose is incandescent.

  The girls fix on each other.

  “Okay, we’ll see you at the restaurant then, Annie?” Johnny winks at Celia. “I’ll order you a drink if we get there ahead. Another martini?”

  “Vodka this time.” Annie says. “I’ll see you there,” and Celia walks off, brunette locks bouncing as she gets into Annie’s black Valiant. Johnny and Annie head for his car. Streetlight glints off Annie’s new watch as Johnny dominates the conversation, something about breaking spaghetti, whether this makes a difference in taste.

  He turns his engine over and moves into traffic, watching Celia in the rearview. The van heads off around the block and the black sedan slips in behind Johnny.

  Back in the Valiant, Celia grips the steering wheel, coasting behind, toward the restaurant. Slowly she allows cars to cut in between herself and the black sedan. When she can no longer see them, she turns a corner.

  “So was she pregnant or not?”

 
“Pregnant. Who said she was pregnant?”

  I couldn’t remember now whether it was me or her. “I just—well, she was with both those men and I started thinking, one of them could be my father, couldn’t he?”

  “Your father?” Her dark eyes sat on me for a good five seconds before she said, “How do you figure that? She say that?”

  “No. She said my father died in Vietnam before I was born. But my birthday is in spring and that was in the summer and she didn’t seem to want me to know much.”

  “When’s your birthday?”

  “March 29, 1969.”

  She put out her hand and started counting off, “June, July, August … that’s a stretch, kid. Anyway, it was the sixties. Show-business people aren’t like other people, you know, we’re not virgins till marriage. We had lots of boyfriends.”

  I must have looked a little appalled. She said, “Sounds like she met a guy on her way up to Canada. What difference does it make? You’re here and you’re healthy and any way you look at it, he wouldn’t be around anymore. Doesn’t matter where you jump in the river, you still gotta swim.”

  I started to choke up again. “I just thought it would be nice to know someone who knew my father. Knew who he was or something.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “You know your mother. Some people don’t even know that. And now you know her a little better maybe. So, you can get on with things.”

  I drew circles in my notebook and let the air ease back into me. “Didn’t occur to me you’d have a car in New York. I thought everyone took cabs.”

  “I liked my freedom. You must like it too, driving around like that. You got a husband or boyfriend?”

  “So, the FBI, they kept bugging you?”

  “Actually …” She stares off. “I don’t think she had bandages by then. Aw, I don’t know. She must’ve. Giancana used to throw on a toupée and a mustache and it was like he was invisible.”

  “What was he like? Did you like him?”

  She shrugged.

  “When did they figure out it was you who had the watch on?”

  “I can’t remember how it all went. I moved out here and got married. Had a baby. They kept coming around though. Wanted me to tell them this or that, testify. Then they didn’t. Then they did. Then Johnny testified. It was in the papers. Then he was dead.” She shrugged again. “I got married a couple more times. Now, I’m alone. That’s how it is.”

  “Your daughter’s in New York?”

  “Yup.”

  “You talk to her much?”

  She looked out the window a moment then at me. “Sometimes when you have a daughter you start seeing yourself in her and you—well, maybe not hate, but you wanna wring your stuff right out of her. Who wants to see all that crap in a fresh new person?”

  She wouldn’t give me her phone number. And she didn’t see any point keeping in touch. “The past is the past and the truth changes every five minutes.” Her curtain moved as I sat out front in the rental car, feeling deflated, anticlimactic, wondering what to do next.

  I took out my cell and waffled, debating whether or not I could handle a night with Marcella, or whether it was rude to call her up out of the blue just for a couch to sleep on.

  She answered in a whisper. “Viv?” She had call display. “Guess what. I’m getting married.”

  Annie’s curtain flickered again. It must have been irking her that I hadn’t pulled away. “To whom?”

  “The cardiologist,” she hissed. “I’m in L.A. He’s got a big conference here.”

  “You finally sleep with him?”

  “Ah—yeah. I’m pregnant. I haven’t got tested but I just know, you know.” Suddenly her voice boomed, “Yes! And I’ve rededicated my life to Christ!”

  “Is he there?” Sudden visions of Marcella in the baptism pool, babbling her holy head off.

  “He’s wonderful! Would you like to talk to him?”

  “Not really. Well, that’s good.”

  “You have to be a bridesmaid!”

  “Sure. Terrific. Well, congratulations. Let me know when you’ve set a date.”

  Putting the car in drive, I found myself heading back to San Francisco International. In the boarding lounge I nodded off until a standby flight came available and my name squawked over the intercom.

  Twenty-one

  “… I STARTED THINKING MAYBE YOU WERE RIGHT. IT’S JUST as honourable to devote yourself to a person as it is to a vocation,” Len said. “Join the human race instead of leaving it.”

  “I said that? God, I’m full of shit sometimes.” I stirred bits of rice around in the little soy-sauce dish with my chopsticks. We were sitting across from one another in Miko Sushi finishing dinner.

  “So, that’s really it for Frank, then? Now what?”

  I shrugged and set the sticks down. “I talked to him on the phone once. He’s coming for his stuff tomorrow.”

  “I mean, what’s next for you. You going to move?”

  I watched the kimono-covered waitress pour more tea in our cups then mince away. “She just wanted to change everything, you know. Get rid of the crap. Change her world and her life and her—her brain.”

  Len watched me. “I know.”

  “She went really drastic though. I mean, talk about cutting off her nose to spite her face. Literally. Not that I blame her. I can’t imagine getting another acting agent right now and her life was … The way she was going, if she didn’t get out, they would’ve sucked the life right out of her.” I swallowed some tea. “She went to such extremes though.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  “Yeah well, look who’s talking about who’s talking.”

  He smiled. “We’re extremists.”

  I sighed. “Did I tell you my extras agent called me to play a reporter on the courthouse steps? Freaked me out. I’m thinking of getting some blonde stripes in front.”

  “Oh relax,” he said, rolling his eyes. “You don’t look like an anchorwoman. Reporters are more streety and cool.” He looked past my shoulder and suddenly his eyes brightened. He waved.

  A moment later Eunice Chelsey was beside our booth. Len stood and hugged her, kissed her full on the mouth and together they tucked back into his side of the booth.

  As Len introduced her, she extended her hand to me. I reached out and shook it, noticing her long slim fingers, the chunky yet elegant rings. Taking her hand back, she smiled at Len as she tucked her hair behind her ear. I ran my glance over her straight jaw and high cheekbones, the simple earrings that dangled. Everything about her looked breezily chic, cosmopolitan, accessories and manners she’d picked up in Italy, Greece, Spain.

  “Is it tomorrow that you’re going over?” he asked me then turned to Eunice and explained. “Viv still has a few things at her mother’s house.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What’s going on with you and Sally anyway?” He turned to Eunice again. “Sally is Viv’s mum’s girlfriend—well, like, her wife.”

  Eunice nodded as though she recalled that detail.

  “Going on?” I repeated.

  “Yeah. Are you hanging out at all?”

  “Let’s not go crazy,” I said. “We’re … whatever, we can be in the same room. We’re fine. I just have a few more things to get out of the basement.”

  “I’ve got an SUV,” Eunice interjected. “And the seats go down. If you need to move something bigger.”

  “It’s nothing big,” I assured them and tried for a smile but my face felt stiff.

  Len had lit up since she came in, the two of them had. They knew each other’s secrets. Like real lovers. I looked away.

  “Well.” I grabbed my wallet from my purse. “I should get going.” I put a twenty down on the table.

  “Oh.” Len looked at the money, then me, a bit startled. “Aren’t you going to come to the movie?”

  “Yeah … no. I’m really tired. I don’t know what’s with me lately.” I slid out of the booth. “But it was great to finally meet you
, Eunice.”

  I moved quickly out onto the Robson sidewalk and stopped. I stared up and down the street a moment, looked at the cars full of young guys cruising for girls. Their laughter careened from the open windows.

  The sun seemed to hang in the sky interminably this time of year, the last of it blinding drivers with long brilliant amber rays.

  I would’ve given anything to be cloaked in cool blue night right now.

  Twenty-two

  I STARTED TO PUT ON MAKEUP THEN WASHED IT BACK OFF. Why ruin a perfectly good clean slate? My fan was on high, the windows were open, the apartment door was open, all to get a decent cross breeze flowing. Vancouver had turned unreasonably hot in June, and half the province was in flames that summer.

  My apartment was the cleanest it had ever been. My mother’s things were put away. I’d pulled all nails out of the walls and ceilings including those I’d used to put up pictures. The framed prints were now on the floor, resting against walls until I decided the fate of each. Pollyfill stuffed the old holes and the new-paint smell had mostly disappeared. The kitchen whiffed of citrus from an old lemon I’d tossed down the garburator. I was making boxes out of the cardboard flats I’d bought at the housewares store.

  “Hey. What’re you doing?”

  I jumped.

  “Your door was open …” Frank said almost apologetically. He stood in the hall watching me with a look on his face just the bewildered side of blank. I recognized it from the reflection I’d seen in my mirror when I got home from San Francisco.

  “Hey. I’m just getting rid of some books.”

  It had been a couple weeks since Frank stormed out with his spycam.

  “It’s so bare looking in here. And white.” He walked past me into the kitchen.

  “It’s bone, actually.”

  He opened the fridge. “Man. You gone Zen on me or something? There’s water and mustard in here.” He came back into the living room and glanced into a box already filled with politicians, gangsters, strippers and actors. Seemed silly to separate them.

  He looked as if he didn’t know whether to shake my hand or French-kiss me, so he sat on the couch and bent over his laced fingers a moment. “Sally sell the house?”