“Does she have someone?”
“She did. Marianne. They were together for a long time— longer than my marriage lasted. She died a little over a year ago. Of breast cancer—same as your wife.”
This news takes Herbie all the way down. Whatever crag he has crawled himself out of—so as to feel and talk and breathe like a human being again—crumbles under the weight of this news. Death, aloneness; Billy and her dead partner; Annie gone forever; the whole mishigas. He sits there unable to think of anything to say. Roxanne’s at a loss, too. She knows she sank him and there’s no way back from that. Finally she pokes him, fairly sharply in the arm. “So, you still like to chase girls?”
It was the right thing to say. “No, I got too old for that. But occasionally I let ‘em chase me.”
And they have a good laugh over that.
Herbie feels good when he gets back to the motel. Roxanne is fun. She’s good for him to be around. When he left, he asked her out for dinner the next night. He said he’d take her for a steak and she said fine.
He checks his phone and there’s a message from Olive. “Call me no matter how late. I want to hear about the golf pro’s sister.” There’s a smirk in her voice that bothers him. He sits on the bed and thinks about why he’s irked. Is Olive really jealous or is this all just a tease? To make an old guy feel better when he’s down. A pity tease. That’s got to be what it is, he decides, and he’s not feeling up to that at the moment. A pity tease makes an old guy feel worse, not better. If she were a little older she’d know that. I didn’t get anything like that from Roxanne, he thinks—no false moves, no bullshit flirting. He’s now got himself worked up into a snit about Olive and he turns his phone off for the night. Let her think about it.
In bed his mind is racing. The dope hasn’t worn off yet and his mind’s eye is stuck on an image he has of Olive when he saw her at the memorial service, in that simple dress, with her sad mouth, in that ethereal light that seemed to come from nowhere. Where the fuck was that light coming from?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE NEXT MORNING OLIVE TRIES HERBIE AGAIN AND his phone is still off. She leaves another message. “Hey you. Are you mad at me? Did you elope with that woman? I have rehearsal at eleven, so call me back before then if you get this. I think we start to stage the play today, which is pretty exciting, but I need you to tell me some more smart things—like don’t trip over your feet and other insights like that. Call me, okay?”
Olive is feeling agitated. She’s pretty sure Herbie didn’t call her back deliberately. She paces the floor of the tiny apartment trying to remember what she said the night before until she decides to put her coat on and take a walk. She puts her script into her handbag so that she can go straight to rehearsal at eleven.
It’s cold outside and that’s good. She puts her hands in her pockets and sets a brisk pace going nowhere in particular. She passes the theater and sees the poster for the play with her name in alphabetical order with the rest of the cast. Even that doesn’t make her feel better. She picks up her pace. I don’t know what I’m so upset about, she thinks. He’ll call when he calls. I’ve got my rehearsal and that’s what I have to concentrate on. I mean, my God, it’s not like I need Herbie to do this play. I have a director to guide me along when I need help, wonderful actors to work with; I don’t need to talk to Herbie about every damn thing that comes up. Then, as if he heard that, her phone rings.
“Hey, where you been?”
“Sleeping it off,” he says.
“Late night?”
“I guess so.”
“Are you mad at me?”
“I was a little bit.”
“Because I teased you about the golf pro’s sister?”
“She has a name.”
“Oh. Sorry. What’s her name?”
“Roxanne.”
“Nice.”
“You sound like I killed your dog. What’s going on, Olive?”
“Nothing. I mean if you liked her, that’s great. If you’ve got a thing for her, I’m okay with that.”
“I don’t have a thing. But let’s say for a minute I did. Is that a problem for you?”
She feels tears coming up, so yeah, she thinks, it’s a problem.
“What’s she like?”
He sighs.
“I’m serious. I really want to know. Is she good-looking? Is she a babe?”
“You know you’re talking like a sixteen-year-old kid?”
“I’ll tell you what, don’t give me any more shit about how young I am. Because it’s insulting.”
“I’m lost here, Olive. What do you want?”
“I’m late for rehearsal.”
“No, tell me. What do you want from me?”
“I don’t know; maybe nothing.” She starts to walk but she can’t lose the lump in her throat. “Just don’t disappear on me like that, okay? Don’t do that. I gotta go.” And she disconnects.
When she gets to the rehearsal studio, the rest of the cast has already started to gather around the big table. She apologizes to Sam for being late and he tells her she’s not, she’s fine. Just take a minute, he says. Get yourself together and then we’ll start another read-through.
“I thought we were getting on our feet today.”
“No, not yet. No hurry, is there?” And he holds her eye a little longer than need be, just to let her know that he likes looking at her. Olive takes it in, just to let him know that she doesn’t mind.
“We’re going to read again,” says Sam to the cast. “Actually we’re going to read for the rest of the week. But if anyone feels an undeniable urge to get up, walk around or change seats so that you can be next to the person you’re doing the scene with, feel free.”
“Ah,” says Bob. “You want us to stage the play for you.”
“Precisely. Shall we?”
And they begin to read the play. Some of the actors stay bolted to their chairs, not ready to commit to movement; others shift their chairs to different places around the table; some stand while they’re playing a scene only to sit again when their characters are offstage. Alvin McConnell, who plays Astrov, decides to pace around the table whenever he’s talking. Bob joins him during one of their scenes together and the company laughs as the two actors circle the room, philosophizing all the way.
Sam is delighted. When they get through the play, he calls a lunch break and says that when they get back, they’ll spend the afternoon doing the same thing again. Olive crosses over to Bob, who’s getting his coat on.
“Hi Bob.”
“Hello, pretty one.”
Olive freezes. She has something to ask him, but she doesn’t quite know how to begin. Bob stares at her—and when he stares, his eyes fairly pop out of his head. It’s like talking to an angry lizard.
“So,” he says, “Do you hate our director? Is he driving you as crazy as he is me?”
“No, I think he’s great,” she says.
“Well, he’s clever, I’ll give you that. All you young people are very clever.”
“What are you doing for lunch?” she asks.
Bob looks at her like she has two heads. “You want to have lunch with me?”
Olive laughs. “If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t have lunch in the actual sense of word. I get some soup from the health-food store and find a bench in the park and I try not to freeze to death.”
“Sounds like fun. May I join you?”
“It’s a public park.”
Olive gets her coat on and they set off to the health-food store. Bob wears a Russian fur hat that covers the bald part of his head and the curly, gray fringe sticks out around his ears and down his neck, in dire need of a haircut. He sets a brisk pace and Olive has to scamper to keep up with him. Finally, she gets up her courage and taps him on the shoulder. He stops abruptly and looks at her as if she’s attacked him.
“What?”
“You know Herbie Aaron, don’t you?”
Bob is surprised. “Of
course I know him. He’s my closest friend.”
Olive tries to stifle a grin.
“You think that’s funny. Why? Did he tell you something nasty about me?” He shakes his head in disgust. “That doesn’t bother me; he’s still my best friend. We both loved the same woman and that can make you very close. You know Herbie? How could I not know that you know him?”
“I just met him recently and I…”
“You know that his wife died?”
“Yes. I met Annie, as well—the week before she died.”
Bob’s face is a mask of pain. He can’t speak.
“Maybe we should keep walking,” says Olive after a moment. “We don’t have that much time.”
“I can’t do that.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Walk and talk at the same time. I don’t do that. I either forget what I’m saying or I stumble. I walk or I talk.”
“I just saw you do it in rehearsal. When you walked around the table with Alvin.”
Bob thinks about it for a moment. “That wasn’t me. That was Vanya. He apparently has no trouble with it.”
“Well, maybe we’d better get our soup first and then we can talk.”
“Suit yourself.” They walk for a few more paces and then Bob wheels on her. “What do you mean you met Annie? You were in the hospital? Did Herbie take you there?”
“She asked him to bring me. She wanted to talk with me about him.”
“A stranger? She wanted to talk with a stranger?”
“Yes; I think because…”
“What did she say? Did she say anything about me?”
“No.”
“Then why are you bringing this up? This is painful for me. I didn’t see her in the end. I couldn’t. And you were with her? You talked to her? This is incomprehensible to me.”
Bob starts to walk again, leaving Olive to catch up.
“I want to ask you about Herbie,” she says when she catches him.
Bob stops. Olive has never seen anyone in such pain.
“I loved her like no one has ever loved anyone. You can’t have any idea how strong this love was. I’m still possessed by it. But I could never talk to her; I got all flustered. I couldn’t even look at her when we were in the same room. The emotion was too strong.”
He starts to walk again. Then he turns and charges back to her.
“The only person who understood me was Herbie. He loved her, too, so he understood. And because he loves me, he would let me talk to him about it. He helped me to live with it. Herbie is very important to me. My entire adult life, he’s the only person I can really talk to and… and not have to pretend I’m not who I am. Do you understand what I’m talking about? Herbie is rare.”
Olive nods and gently takes his arm. “Let’s get our soup.”
“Right.” Bob is still shaken and he allows Olive to walk with him, arm-in-arm to the health store, where they get their soups and pay for them in silence. Then they start for the park. Suddenly, Bob stops and looks at her with an uncomprehending look.
“He picked you up in a bar? While Annie was dying?”
“Not like that.”
“Jesus. He’s unbelievable. What is it with him? He’s catnip to women. Can you explain this to me?”
“You just explained it to me.”
Olive guides him to the bench, gently helps him take the lid off his soup and hands him a plastic spoon. “The soup is getting cold,” she says.
“What are you, the caterer?”
* * *
When they get back to rehearsal, Sam waves to Olive from the stage manager’s table across the room. She waves back, a bit puzzled and he gestures for her to come over.
“What, Sam? Am I fired?”
“Hardly. I was wondering if you’d like to have dinner together tonight.”
“Sam…”
“I’m not making a move. I promise. I can’t; I’m your director; that would be heinous and I’d be banished from working in America forever. But I can throw together a little pan-seared salmon with vegetables; we’ll have a little wine and feel like human beings in this strange remote outpost we find ourselves in. Seriously, no come-on, clean and chaste, all aboveboard. What do you say?”
She pauses. “I guess so. Sure, why not.” She smiles, a little ruefully at him and takes her place at the table. She really doesn’t want to start anything with Sam. She’s confused enough already. The reading starts and when they get to Olive’s first scene, she finds herself speaking in a tiny voice, unable to get herself behind the words. She feels Sam’s eyes on her and she’s selfconscious. Fuck this, she thinks. If he were a good director, he wouldn’t do this to me just before I rehearse; it’s like he’s inserting himself between me and the work. Herbie knows about this, she thinks. Herbie knew to pull away when I started working. He lived with an actress for all those years; he knows. She feels an overwhelming desire to talk to him.
During her second scene, she notices Bob looking over at her, his forehead all wrinkled and his eyes popping out. He knows something’s off, she thinks, and he’s worried for me. On an impulse, she gets up from her chair, crosses around the table and sits next to him. They don’t have a scene together at this point, so there’s no sense to it, but she sits down next to Bob and immediately manages to get herself more focused on the play. Bob is the anti-Sam, she thinks with a smile.
After the rehearsal, Bob comes up to her. “What happened there? You lost your focus. Was it me? Did I upset you during lunch? I have a way of doing that to people; it’s a gift I have.”
“No, it wasn’t you.”
“It wasn’t me? Then what? I’m curious.”
“Sam asked me to have dinner with him tonight and for some reason that threw me off.”
“Oh, sex. It’s everywhere, isn’t it? It’s all around me, all the time and I never see it. Listen,” he takes her by the arm like a Dutch uncle, “there’s plenty of time for that after we open. Tell him to buzz off.”
Sam is tripping over himself to apologize; he realized his mistake the moment Olive opened her mouth in rehearsal. “Darling, please forgive me. I was being a perfect asshole.” He pronounces it in the British way—ahhhshole—and that makes her smile.
“I was pretty awful in the reading wasn’t I?”
“Oh my God, no. You’re incapable of being anything other than wonderful. But I’ll pull back; I’ll let you do your work. No dinners, no flirtations; just business, okay?”
“Thanks.”
“And then, once the whole thing is over, all rules are off.”
He grins and she shakes her head and waves good-bye. When she gets back to her apartment, she calls Herbie and miraculously his phone is on and he answers it.
“You still mad?”
“I wasn’t mad.”
“Then what?”
“I can’t quite figure out what you’re looking for here. Sometimes you talk to me like I’m your lover, which we both know I’m not and that throws me off. It’s like I’m in a show and I don’t know what part I’m supposed to play. I mean if you’re working out your father issues, you’re talking to the wrong guy. Just ask my daughter. I’m lousy at that job.”
“So was my dad.”
“I can’t help you with that. Get a shrink.”
“What if I do have father issues and they have nothing to do with you? Have you ever thought of that? Maybe my relationship with you is one thing and my father issues are another thing altogether. Isn’t that possible?”
“No, not possible. I’m old, I’ve been around, I’m smart—so you want to make me into the good father. But I don’t want the part. Kindly old Geppetto. I don’t see myself that way.”
“What part do you want to play?”
He thinks for a moment. “I’ll play the confused guy. I play that part very well.”
That makes her laugh. “I think we’re still trying to figure out what we are to each other. I mean we haven’t known each other all that long, right?”
&nb
sp; “Right.”
“I just know that you felt far away from me today and I didn’t like it. Can I say that? Does that confuse you?”
“No.”
Then she tells him all about her lunch with Bob and then about how Sam came on to her and about how bad her acting was after that. She goes on and on, the whole story spilling out of her, feeling so happy to be talking to him again.
“He really threw you off, huh?”
“It just felt weird, you know?”
“Maybe it felt weird because you really wanted to go to his apartment and see what pops up.”
“Come on, Herbie.”
“Why not? He’s an attractive guy; you’re out of town, all alone; you’re in the prime of your womanhood. Why wouldn’t you want to fuck him? It’d be a great way to release some tension, no?”
“Because I don’t, that’s all.”
There’s a silence.
“Are you going out tonight with what’s her name?”
“Roxanne. Yeah, I’m taking her for a steak.”
“Ah.”
“It’s not like that. Her husband left her for an anesthesiologist and she’s feeling low. She’s sad; I’m sad; it’s a bond. If there was anything more to it, I wouldn’t be going out with her.”
“Why?”
“Because my heart has been shanghaied by a mysterious young beauty who toys with it like a tiddledywink.”
“A what?”
“That’s a toy we used to play with back in the fifties—a little plastic disc that you flicked with another plastic disc into a glass. The guy that gets the most into the glass wins.”
“I don’t think your heart is a tittlydink.”
“Yeah, you do. Just an old toy that you’ll play with ‘til you’re bored and then you’ll go off and play with kids your own age.”
“That’s really unfair, Herbie. You don’t know me well enough to say that.”
Herbie conjures an image that’s been on his mind a lot. He’s in a room with her and it’s time to take off his clothes. His skin is sagging in places where there used to be muscle tone. His drinker’s belly protrudes over the waistband of his underpants. He looks in her eyes and sees what she sees.
After Annie (9781468300116) Page 12