by Rick Boling
The only thing keeping me from formulating a plan of action was my reluctance to do anything at all for fear of causing some unforeseen disaster. Still, I couldn’t get the thought out of my mind. And, after hours of contemplation during which I tried to approach the problem from every angle I could think of, the only solution that seemed feasible was to somehow find a way to remove Charlotte from the picture. If she were to simply disappear, Dad might come to his senses in time to salvage his relationship with Mom. I was trying to think how this might be accomplished, when I got a call from Carol Henderson that gave me an idea.
Since I hadn’t jumped headlong into rock & roll as I had in my first life, Carol still held out the hope that I might someday return to the fold and continue my studies in classical music. And, to make sure I didn’t drift too far toward “that trash being perpetrated on the American public,” she would occasionally call to ask if I would sing a solo at church or for some special event she was promoting.
In the twelve years or so since she’d introduced me to fried mush and discovered my musical talents, Carol had climbed the social ladder in St. Pete and was now one of the most respected and connected women in town. She had not only become the music director at our church—which boasted the city’s largest congregation—she also directed the Municipal Boy Choir, was the only female member on the city council, and served as president of the Pinellas County Women’s Club. This time, the event at which she wanted me to perform was the annual Woman’s Club Ball, the crown jewel of yearly social affairs, always attended by the cream of St. Petersburg’s rich and powerful. It was the type of soiree I hated, and I was trying to think of a good reason to refuse, when it occurred to me that I might be able to use her help.
“There will be a full orchestra,” she said when I hesitated, “and everybody who’s anybody will be there. It would mean a lot to me, Ricky.”
I vaguely recalled turning her down before, but that was at the height of the Nite Cats’ popularity, when Skip School Flu was all over the airwaves and I didn’t want to perpetuate my earlier image as a classical vocalist. “Okay,” I said, with what I hoped was a clear lack of enthusiasm. “But no opera this time. And I’m going to need a favor from you in return.”
“As long as it’s legal and doesn’t involve heavy lifting, you got it. Now, about the song: it doesn’t have to be opera, but it’s going to be the highlight of the night, so we need something powerful. How about something from Broadway, like Bali Ha'I? Or maybe traditional, like Danny Boy?”
I remembered having covered Conway Twitty’s version of Danny Boy back when I was with The Madisons. It was a dynamic and emotional rendition that made use of my full range, so I told Carol that’s what I wanted to sing. She agreed, and we set up a date for rehearsal at her place.
When we’d moved to the big house some seven years before, Carol made arrangements with Dad to buy our old one, and after church the following Sunday I rode home with her for the rehearsal session. I knew the song well, so about all we had to do was decide on a key. We ran through it a few times until she was comfortable with the arrangement I wanted, and I was still trying to figure out how to broach the subject of Dad and Charlotte when we were ready to wind things up.
“So,” she said, making a couple of last-minute notations on the sheet music, “what’s this big favor you were talking about?”
Carol, I knew, had always admired my dad, not only for his dedication as a doctor, but because of his generous contributions to the church. He’d also been instrumental in seeing to it she was hired as the music director, so convincing her he was having a secret affair with a younger woman was going to be difficult. One thing I had going for me, though, was that she’d become close friends with Mom, and I was hoping the strength of their friendship would be enough to rouse her anger.
She listened attentively to my story, which began with my accidental discovery of a love note from Charlotte in the backseat of Dad’s car. I followed this with another fiction about approaching his nurse, Doris, who roomed with Charlotte. I said that after I confronted Doris with the evidence, she broke down and told me about Charlotte’s master plan to seduce Dad, so I had it more or less from the horse’s mouth. I watched Carol’s reaction slowly change from skepticism to shock to concern, and when I got teary-eyed talking about how devastated Mom was going to be, that concern turned to red-faced, speechless anger. While she was trying to come up with words to vent her outrage, I hit her with my request.
“I don’t know what to do, Carol,” I said, my voice cracking with emotion. “I mean, I’m just a kid and nobody’s going to listen to me. Heck, I don’t even want Mom to find out about it. All I want is for that little slut to disappear from Dad’s life. So I was hoping you might be able to help.”
What happened next seemed to start out as a distant, inaudible rumble, though the only evidence of it was in her eyes. I watched the smoldering anger gradually transform into tiny flashes of conspiratorial calculation, imagining I could hear gears grinding and cogs falling into place one after the other. After a while, she picked up a notepad and began to scribble, nodding from time to time as if she’d written something satisfying.
“Yes,” she said finally. “I’m going to handle this. I can’t tell you what I’m planning, but I will need your help.”
“Anything. Just say the word,” I said, unaware that my carefully constructed lies would lead to an assignment I had no desire to take on.
“You’re going to have to get Doris away from Charlotte,” she said. “From what you told me, she’s already disgusted about the affair, so you shouldn’t have any trouble convincing her she needs to move out of the house they share.”
“Me?” I said, “But—”
“No buts about it, Ricky. I don’t know her personally, other than seeing her at your dad’s office a few times. She’s already confided in you, so it’s going to be your responsibility to make sure she gets out of that house as soon as possible.”
I was getting a weird feeling about this. Carol had started sounding like a character from The Godfather, and I was beginning to think she might be planning to have the house burnt to the ground, or perhaps have Charlotte murdered and didn’t want Doris to be implicated.
Seeing the fear in my eyes, she chuckled. “Don’t worry, honey, I’m not going to do anything crazy. A little fraudulent, maybe, and certainly unethical, but in this case, we have to fight fire with fire. Like I said, I can’t go into the details, but if I’m successful, which I’m sure I will be, Charlotte will disappear like a puff of smoke on the breeze. You will need to talk to Doris in person, not on a party-line phone, so maybe you should call her after I get you home and see if she will meet you somewhere.”
I couldn’t tell Carol I hadn’t really spoken to Doris, as that would blow my whole story out of the water. The problem was, I had no idea how to approach Doris with the fact that I knew about the affair. I did know from my talks with Mom that in my first life Doris had been so angry with Charlotte for stealing Dad away she’d terminated their friendship, so at least I had that. But how the hell was I going to talk her into moving out before it actually happened?
“You’ve got to give me something to work with,” I said as we pulled up in front of my house. “She’s never going to move out simply because I tell her to, at least not without some practical reason.”
Carol stared straight ahead, tapping her fingers on the steering wheel for a full minute before turning to look at me. “Okay,” she said. “I’ve got an idea.”
Carol’s idea was, I thought, pretty brilliant. The upstairs apartment she’d rented from us when we owned the house happened to be vacant, and—as if to emulate my Godfather analogy—she was willing to make Doris an offer she couldn’t refuse. It was a nice apartment, clean and furnished. Plus, it was only five blocks from Dad’s office, as opposed to Charlotte’s house, which was easily ten miles away in Pinellas Park. Carol usually rented it to snowbirds for a couple of months during the winter, but s
he would offer a substantial discount if Doris agreed to sign a six-month lease. The rent would be far below market value and include all the utilities, so the total monthly cost would probably be less than what she was paying Charlotte. Considering Doris’s anger over the affair, she should jump at the chance to move, while also saving money and being within walking distance of work.
My job, then, became much simpler: all I had to do was mention the opportunity to Doris, and she would surely take advantage of it. Unfortunately, it didn’t turn out to be as simple as I’d hoped.
When I called her that evening, she was, understandably, surprised to hear my voice. I did my best, telling her Carol had asked me if I might know someone who would be interested in renting the apartment. But since I was only a teenager who should have had no idea about her housing situation, she was skeptical from the get go. I told her Dad had mentioned that she lived pretty far from the office, but that didn’t quite cut it.
“Why would he mention that to you?” she asked.
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “It came up in conversation, I guess.”
“Ricky,” she said, clearly unconvinced by my irrational explanation. “What’s going on?”
Doris was a smart lady who’d always joked around with me when I was at the office. She was the one who stabbed my finger for blood counts, took my blood pressure, and gave me vaccine boosters. Occasionally, if she wasn’t too busy, she would let me look through the microscope or test my own urine with litmus strips. I’d known her since I was five, and she obviously knew me better than I realized.
“Nothing’s going on,” I said. “I was over at Carol’s to rehearse this afternoon, and she asked me if I might know someone who would want to rent her apartment is all.”
“Uh, huh,” she said. “Sounds pretty good, but I’m not buying it. There’s something you’re not telling me here. And until you do, I’m not going to even consider this seemingly unbelievable offer.”
I was beaten, and I knew it. But somehow I had to get her to agree, so I decided to try a different tact. “Look,” I said, “you’re right. There is something I’m not telling you. I will tell you, though, just not on the phone, because someone might be listening in on the party line. Maybe I could come by the office after school tomorrow so we can talk about it?”
“Mmnnn,” she said. “Mysterious. Okay, you have me intrigued now, so I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”
The next day, after sneaking past Charlotte and poking my head in to say Hi to Dad, I found Doris in the lab. She was busy with the centrifuge and didn’t acknowledge my presence, so I waited, breathing in the familiar smell of alcohol and listening to Sam Cooke sing You Send Me.
Finally, she turned the radio down and spun around on the lab stool. “Well, if it isn’t the mystery man. So, tell me, what is all this crap you’re trying to feed me?”
“Can you take a break for a few minutes?” I said, ignoring her question. “I’d like to talk to you in private.”
“About renting an apartment? Come on, Ricky, you can’t be serious.”
“I am, though. Real serious. What I have to say is for your ears only, and I don’t want anybody interrupting us or overhearing. Maybe we could go for a walk or something.”
“Sounds a little overdramatic to me,” she said, “but I guess I could use a breather. Give me a couple of minutes.” She turned back to the bench, took a couple of test tubes out of the centrifuge, and held them up to the light. Then she corked and labeled both tubes and inserted them into a rack alongside several others.
“Okay, sonny,” she said, removing her lab coat and laying it on the stool. “Lead the way.” It was the first time I’d ever seen her without the shapeless white coat, and I was surprised to find she had a nice figure. I’d always thought of her as a sort of female version of my dad; an efficient, yet friendly technician whose humorous manner and quick wit kept my fear of needles and other medical procedures at bay until the last possible moment. Now, however, I saw a different version, one that was not only sexually attractive, but whose smile and quirky attitude lent a certain element of intrigue to my childhood image of her as an untouchable adult. Of course, these were the thoughts of an old man residing in a horny teenage body, and I remembered Heyoka warning me not to let my adolescent desires override my common sense.
“Uh, Ricky?” she said. “Are we going or not?”
“Sure. Sure,” I mumbled, pushing open the heavy back door and starting through. Then, remembering my manners, I stood aside and held it for her.
“My, my,” she said as she walked out into the parking lot, “Since when did you learn to be so polite?”
“Been practicing,” I said catching up with her and striding alongside. We crossed the dirt lot to the sidewalk, and when we reached the corner, I pointed to a bus-stop bench. We both sat down and I immediately found myself tongue-tied. I’d planned to use the story about finding a love note in Dad’s car, but at the last moment I decided against it.
“Look,” I said, “the thing is, I know all about Dad and Charlotte.”
I’d expected shock, or at least a little wide-eyed curiosity, but she showed no outward emotion. “Oh, really?” she said with a hint of sarcasm. “And exactly what is it you think you know?”
“I understand you’re trying to protect me,” I said. “And I appreciate that. But I really do know what’s been going on. And I also know you’re not the type of person who would approve of what Charlotte’s doing. The reason I’m bringing this up now is because it’s getting to a critical stage, and if it goes on much longer, Dad’s going to leave Mom, and that would kill her. How I learned about the affair is another matter, one I’d rather not talk about because it’s embarrassing. I’m telling you something you already know is true, so that by itself should be enough to convince you I’m not kidding around.”
“Oh, Ricky,” she groaned, looking at the ground between her feet. “I’m so, so sorry. I’ve been torn about this. I’ve threatened to tell your mom, but Charlotte said she’d kick me out if I did, and I didn’t have any place else to go. I can’t afford to live on my own, and—”
“But you can now. Don’t you see? In fact, you’re going to have to.”
“What do you mean, I have to?”
That was a good question, one I didn’t have an answer for because Carol hadn’t told me what her plans were. And that’s when something else Heyoka said came back to me. Being able to think on your feet will be a great asset when it comes to confronting situations that arise unexpectedly, he’d said. After all, you’ve been playing it by ear all your life. Suddenly, my mind went into overdrive, spewing out ideas so fast I didn’t have time sort through them.
“I hate to perpetuate the mystery thing,” I said, stalling for time, “but I can’t tell you what I mean. All I can say is something’s going to go down, something pretty serious that will rectify the situation with Charlotte. And you shouldn’t be around her when it happens.”
Now she was staring at me with narrowed eyes. “You know,” she said after a moment of silent scrutiny, “the really mysterious thing is how you’re talking. ‘Perpetuate?’ ‘Rectify?’ Since when did you start paying attention in English class? And what the heck does ‘go down’ mean?”
I realized too late that I’d been using words my younger self would never have uttered, and adding to the problem by employing idioms not yet in common use. I’d slipped up like this before with Sam and Mom, but had always been able to brush it off by quickly changing the subject or telling some white lie. Doris, however, was probably not going to buy that kind of avoidance tactic.
I was trying to come up with a plausible answer when I remembered an old John Cusack movie where he played a professional hit man attending his ten-year high school reunion. Oddly, whenever any of his old classmates asked what he did for a living, he told them the truth. Everyone thought he was kidding, but his bizarre answer always served to move the conversation past that question, which is what I needed to do her
e.
“If you want to know the truth,” I said, “I’ve been reincarnated from a previous life in which I was an old man about to die. This was in a parallel dimension, far in the future, so I was not only older and more knowledgeable, but I knew slang that hasn’t yet been used in this dimension. Anyway, that’s beside the point. The important thing is that I know you need to be out of the picture when whatever it is … well, goes down.”
She reacted to this outrageous claim with a completely blank expression, as if what I’d said had momentarily paralyzed her. But then the Mount-Rushmore look melted and she chuckled. “Had me going for a minute there. I have to say you do sound an awful lot more mature than the last time we talked, but it’s been a couple of months and you are growing up pretty fast. In any case, it’s clear you’re not going to tell me the truth, so let’s drop it. I do need to know what this is all about, however, so you tell Carol—whom I assume is in on whatever plan you have in mind—I’ll have to talk to her about it first.”
I didn’t know if Carol would be willing to tell Doris any more than she had told me, but I now knew I had to get the two of them together, which meant my little lie about Doris having confirmed the affair would be revealed.
“I can do that,” I said, “if you’ll agree to do me a big favor.” I waited for a reaction, and when there didn’t seem to be one in the offing, I continued. “Like I said, I don’t want to tell you how I found out about Dad and Charlotte, and I also didn’t want Carol to know. So I told her you were the one who told me about the affair.”
“What!” she shrieked. “You had no right to do that, Ricky! You’re making me look like a cheap gossip who has no regard for your feelings. I … I—”