Mary Ellen Courtney - Hannah Spring 01 - Wild Nights

by Mary Ellen Courtney

  I got home and sat on the deck with my feet on the railing and watched the moon on the waves at the end of my tunnel. The view was blocked by a figure walking my way. A tingle of L.A. fear ran through me, but it was just Jon.

  “You want to share?” he held up a champagne bottle. “We didn’t get a chance to talk.”

  “Is this because Grandma’s gone?”

  “No, it’s because I was busy and we didn’t get a chance to talk.”

  “Sorry. Bad joke. Let me get some glasses.”

  We sat with our feet up on the railing and toasted the Christmas that had just spun through the cosmos to us.

  “That was a lovely party. Thank you for including me. I’ve never been alone on a holiday like this.”

  “Mike took care of you. I thought he might be here.”

  “No, sorry. He gets a kick out of saying I’m in the movie business. He knows the effect it has on people.”

  Jon said his daughter was graduating from high school and considering colleges; UCLA was at the top of her list. The physicists were pushing for Cal Tech.

  “UCLA is my alma mater,” I said.

  “I’m not sure she’s ready for L.A.”

  “In my business, L.A. is like the center of the universe. Unless you’re from New York.”

  “Then maybe I’m not ready for her to be ready for L.A.”

  “That sounds like algebra. But I don’t blame you, I’m an old cat in L.A. who’s running out of lives.”

  “Do you know algebra?”

  “Not since high school. I majored in anthropology. As my last director said, and I quote, ‘I will not be held captive by the laws of mathematics’.”

  He wanted to know if I was more Margaret Mead or mummies. I told him I hadn’t been able to decide, so went into production design instead where I gathered intense knowledge about slices of life for brief periods of time.

  “I know a little about a lot of things,” I said. “What the Sufis might describe as digging shallow holes, but it’s never boring. Brushing dirt off shards in a museum basement could get old.”

  We poured the last of the bottle and sat in the balmy silence.

  “A cat?” he said.

  “It looks like you’re having fun.”

  “Having fun?” He looked at me, then at my hair. He probably figured they’d stopped the shock treatments a little short of the mark.

  “I didn’t mean that in a bad way,” I said. “At least someone is having fun.”

  “You’re not?”

  “According to my mother, I’m a cat in a world of kittens. My window of opportunity for finding the right man is slamming shut.”

  I could swear he was considering my hair again. I doubt it looked like right man hair. “Do you want to find the right man?”

  “Of course, I don’t want to spend my life banging bar rats. But apparently I have no idea how it all works.”

  He was quiet; I glanced over at him. “Sorry, that was incredibly crude. I didn’t mean to go all L.A. on you; we have a tendency to spew our little stories. And I have a tendency to say stupid shit when I’m drinking champagne. I won’t bang bar rats. I don’t intend to bang anybody.”

  Okay, obviously I’d already had too much champagne. I was not only saying stupid shit, but I was saying bang and shit while I was at it. My parents would not approve.

  “I should go to bed. Now I’m saying banging shit with my stupid shit. I can hear my parents clucking their tongues. Thanks again for inviting me tonight. I was feeling lonely and it was a perfect Christmas Eve. And thanks for sharing; it was really thoughtful.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  I could swear his hair was sticking up even more than usual. He headed home. I stripped off my sarong, washed my face, and took note of the fact that my hair looked like I’d pulled the bathroom light chain while standing in water. The grow out was going to be a trial. At least I’d be in India where no one would care how I looked as long as I did my job. Well someone would care. There’s always a man or two on location who thinks he cares, or who has lost his moral bearings in a Bermuda Triangle of strange place, opportunity, and horniness.

  I woke up with a massive hangover complicated by eating too much chocolate. I cleared the empty bottle off the porch and washed glasses then dug out the bottle of Gatorade I’d had the foresight to buy. I was hours earlier than the mainland, so I had time to get my act together before the Skype calls started. I dragged out and dove in the water. There is nothing better for a hangover than the ocean. I forced myself to body surf, figuring a little pounding might goose my system to life. Maybe I could restore my internal chemistry through osmosis. It worked, sort of. Argh. I swam out past the breakers and floated to give my stomach a chance to get rearranged. I was beginning to feel cleansed.

  “You okay?” Jon was treading water next to me.

  “I’ve been worse, though I can’t ever remember being so rude to someone. I’m really sorry about that. How about you?”

  “It’s okay, holidays aren’t always happy. I’m fine. I’m a little bigger than you and don’t think I put down quite as much.”

  “No, that was stupid. Now I can check ‘drink too much at a party’ off my to-do list.”

  “What else is on the list?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  “Sure I do.”

  “Well, chop off my hair, which I didn’t even notice I was doing at the time. Talk endlessly at friends, which I have never had a tendency to do. I do it with complete strangers instead, as you are my witness.”

  “That’s it?” he asked. “Sounds doable.”

  “Add take up stupid hobbies; I’m thinking wood burning, it runs in the family. The last is no joy sex with random unavailable men, that’s done and done. If I can get extra-curricular credit for that one, I’ll finish early.”

  “What about finding the right man?”

  “First things first. Gotta work the program.”

  “That last part doesn’t sound too bad.”

  “No, it sounds like more inappropriate blabber,” I was smiling at the sky. “Your restaurant open today?”

  “Yep, people don’t come here to cook a turkey.”

  “Good, I need burger and fries therapy.”

  “Try the Maui onion rings, they work better than the fries.”

  He took off while I continued to float. I had absolutely nowhere to be, and no one to be nowhere with. That’s mathematics, zero sum total. Or is it sum total zero? Total sum zero? I should have worked harder at math. Oh well, at least I could get some fatty food.

  I felt much better after the swim. I sacked out on a towel and dozed with a gentle breeze consoling my skin. I slept for hours. When I woke up, someone had put up an umbrella and thrown a white sheet over me, weighted down with driftwood. There was no one around. It was strange to think someone was so busy while I slept.

  I got dressed and headed in for food. The place was packed so I sat at the bar. My burger and rings arrived just as Jon pulled up a stool and sat down next to me with a bowl of chowder and chunk of bread in his hand. I was getting a little more consistent. I knew two men who ate soup.

  “How you feeling?” he asked.

  “Almost human. Were you the one who covered me up?”

  “Yeah, the way you were sleeping out there, you would have ended up in the hospital.”

  “Thanks, you saved my vacation, if not my life.”

  “Merry Christmas,” he tapped my glass with his bread.

  “Merry Christmas.” A wave of sadness swelled over me. I should be home with my family. Steve was probably off dancing, badly, with his new woman. I could see Stroud stroking the skin on his wife’s belly, the new life poking out in places like my grandmother’s bird. Nose and fists through silky skin. I wiped my eyes; I was not going to do this. Jon was watching me with interest. I smiled at him. He was odd to me; he was a little like looking in a mirror.

  “Sorry, lonely woman stuff. Not enough to be stupid.”

/>   “Yeah, that’s all behind you.”

  “You’re funny,” I said.

  Mike came in and Jon gave him his seat. By the time lunch was over I had a pretty good handle on beer making ingredients. We made a plan to hike the Napali Coast.

  I went home and Skyped Karin; she was home alone. I pulled out her gift. She enjoys watching because she never remembers what the hell she puts in the boxes she gives. She just starts buying and wrapping until it’s full. First up, a book on ikebana, one of the hobbies I was going to take up in those first haircutting days.

  “That’s great,” I said. “I can try it here.”

  Richard had included a hand-painted dinosaur, a raptor like in Jurassic Park. He knew those guys scared me. I hated the relentless way they moved when they hunted. He thought it would help me get over my fear, the little therapist. Callie included a pink baseball cap, something she considers a fashion necessity.

  Next came a pink pearl bunny vibrator from the sex shop on Hollywood Boulevard, an old standard, the bunny and the shop.

  “Obviously you have no faith in my ability to stay with the program?”

  “I was thinking of it more as a diversion, until you get back on your feet, or I guess I should say your back. Did you know it comes in a bunch of colors now? I threw in batteries.”

  To wind it up, she had included a set of Kama Sutra warming oils.

  “That’s optimistic.”

  “The Napali Coast might get interesting tomorrow.”

  “I’m on hiatus. Though I will say, he’s hot and very nice. I love everything. I’ll wear the pink hat while I have Christmas with the bunny. How you doing?”

  “It’s okay for now. It’s hard to deal with it with my parents right on top of us. What’s really strange is the sex. I thought I wouldn’t want him to touch me, but every time my parents take the kids on a field trip we go at it like in the beginning. We’re all the way back to the knocking over the furniture stage. We did it up against the water heater. Then I get furious all over again and throw things at him. He seems genuinely shocked that he did it. He really wants me to know he’s here.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “We’re going to start seeing someone as soon as my parents leave. I don’t know if I can get over it. I know people forgive. I can’t imagine I’ll forget.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Yeah, it’s driving him crazy that we never got married. It makes his position a little unclear.”

  I Skyped Eric’s house and talked to everyone briefly. I could see Binky slopping wine on Anna’s carpet from 2700 miles out. We made her drink white to reduce cleaning bills. I loved seeing all their faces, but seeing the old scene, I didn’t miss being there. I had no sense of where I belonged anymore.

  I wandered out to the beach. Jon was sitting alone in a low chair, legs stretched out under a straw hat, reading. I sat down in the sand next to him.

  “Perfect lunch. Mike’s so nice. We’re going to hike the Napali Coast tomorrow, unless you finally get around to telling me he’s a bar rat masquerading as a brewer. You’d tell me right? Not do some male solidarity thing?”

  “I’d tell you. Be kinda stupid to warn you and then not warn you, don’t you think?”

  “I guess.”

  He looked at me. “Well I wouldn’t, Hannah. He’s as advertised. He and his wife used to come every year and he still does. She was a rocket.”

  “When did she die?”

  “Three years ago, it was a tough one.”

  “Is he seeing anyone?”

  “Nothing serious that I know of. You want to paddle?”

  “You’re like a relentless raptor. You think a hangover has me in such a weakened state, I’ll sign on for more humiliation?”

  “You’re humiliated? All you did was drink a little too much and say shit a lot. You didn’t start a food fight. The way you float around, I just think you’d like it.”

  “Do people do that? Have food fights?”

  “They do it all.”

  “What else?”

  “Oh man, where to start? They pass out in the booths. Full moons are good for that. They get very creative under the tables, they don’t know the whole dining room can see them; and then no one wants to handle their money. The bathrooms are a big draw.”

  “Do they go in the stalls?”

  I know, but a girl wants to know these things.

  “Most people wouldn’t really care if they were in a stall.”

  “What else?”

  “Well, there are all the variations on the theme of how to get sick in a bathroom. They bitch out the bartenders for pulling their keys, then pass out before a cab comes and we can figure out where to ship them. They dump drinks on each other, pinch the waitresses; the waiters get their share of that too. There’s a certain amount of slapping back and forth, usually as a result of the pinching, but sometimes because people think confessing in public after too many mai tais is going to save them from a showdown. That usually involves some drink throwing. There’s lots of crying, by adults and children.”

  “I don’t like crying kids,” I said.

  “They can hit some ear piercing notes,” he said. “They’re their own subset. Parents drag them in overtired and fried to a crisp. They scream, cry, and pee on the furniture. They run around and ram into the waiters; they’re hard to see under a tray. They are experts at projectile vomiting chunks of cheese on the tables next to them. They litter Cheerios that get ground into the carpet and smashed down in the booth cushions. Last night one got a piece of crayon stuck in her ear. I’m going to have to rethink the coloring placemats. And that’s the paying customers. At the moment the crew seems to be having a contest to see who can get it on in the walk-in; it can’t be easy, it’s really cold in there. According to one patron, who stumbled into the kitchen by mistake, they’re doing a little warm up before they go in.”

  I was lying on the sand laughing so hard I could hardly breathe.

  “Does that happen every night?” I asked. “It sounds kinda wild.”

  “No. We’re usually able to pull off a nice experience for people. I have great crews; they keep the show rolling. They’re usually the only ones who know what’s going on.”

  “Do you get involved with the crew stuff?”

  “Not if I can help it, I’d never get anything done. I’m more like a ringmaster. I don’t let anyone get slapped or pinched with impunity. And the walk-in, yeah, the health department could shut us down over that stunt.”

  “You have no idea how much that sounds like being on location!”

  “So you want to paddle?”

  “Why not? Apparently I’m a saint.”

  I told him my banged up legs and inelegant ass hoisting reservations.

  He smiled while he got the board in the water. “You’re not going to have to do any ass hoisting today.”

  I got so I could step on with a little help and glide around. We went a little deeper. Still okay. He said I needed to relax and just breathe. Drop my shoulders and let my legs become one with the uncertainty, Grasshopper. Something like that. He needed to get to work, but we agreed to try again tomorrow, if I could still move.

  I’d never been alone on Christmas but it wasn’t as bad as I’d expected. It started to cloud up; the earth was spinning toward rain. Anna called to make sure I was doing okay. She was worried that I was alone. I told her I’d had a burger and rings, my first paddling lesson and was going hiking with a friend. She said Binky got worse and worse after we talked.

  “She was really over-the-top this year,” she said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

  “Everyone says that until Ted gets on board, there’s nothing we can do,” I said.

  Binky had passed out in the back of the car. None of the kids would sit on her, so Ted had to strap them all in the front seat. They were going to leave her there all night. That must be so strange for the kids on Christmas Eve. Everyone was anticipating Binky’s damage c
ontrol call. She always made a damage control call the next day and everyone pretended nothing had happened. It drove me nuts.

  I wandered out to the beach; it was dark and quiet in both directions. The new people in Grandma’s house were keeping to themselves. I sat on the cool sand and listened to the surf. Voices came through the opening at Jon’s. I couldn’t make out details but I recognized his voice. They walked off down the beach in the opposite direction; my eyes adjusted to long swinging black hair just as the darkness absorbed them.

  I got up early and took my coffee and a book out to the beach. Jon was already out, back in his chair reading. I waved and set up my chair. He picked up his chair and moved down the beach next to me.

  “Morning,” I said. “You have a nice night?”

  “It was okay. You?”

  “It was fine. I started a new book. What are you reading?”

  “Christmas gift from Phyllis the Physicist. Essays by a guy named Michio Kaku. Good stuff. Dark energy, parallel universes, oozing to other planets. What about you?”

  “The Wave. The woman at the bookstore in town recommended it. Amazing really, the ocean looks different. Not quite the same as yours.”

  “A lot the same.”

  My phone rang; it was Mike. We made a plan to go at 10:00.

  “You ready to try again?” asked Jon.

  We went back in the water and started out with the shallow stuff. I managed to crawl on and stand up by myself. I was better. Breathing really helps. That should be so obvious. I needed to cut it short to meet Mike. I threw on hiking clothes just as Mike pulled up.

  “You look rested,” he said.

  I told him about my paddling lesson with Jon. He asked if I’d seen Jon’s latest housing project.

  “A group of them build affordable housing,” he said.

  “I thought you were going to say fancy condos.”

  “No, the housing dovetails with his business. Affordable housing that they own and decent benefits keeps his key people around. That’s important. He still has about a fifty-percent employee turnover rate. That would kill my business. The bookwork and break-in eats up a lot of time. He ends up doing just about every job at some point during the year. He’s not as laid back as he looks. He really will make me come up with a great beer.”