At First Sight

by Stephen J. Cannell

  “I made reservations for you at the Beverly Wilshire. It’s close to Rodeo Drive, good stores. Evelyn shopped there all the time, and you won’t have far to go by cab to get to my place, or you can rent a car if you’d rather not mess with taxies.”

  “I’m not much of a shopper, Chick. Didn’t you get my e-mail? I’m already booked at the Langham Huntington in Pasadena.”

  He smiled as he opened the passenger door and let me in. “That’s the old Ritz-Carlton, right?” I nodded. “Great hotel, but a helluva long ways away,” he said, pulling down his wraparound sunglasses and sliding them onto his nose. “It’s all the way out at the end of the 110. Even if you use the 210 or try to go over Coldwater, you’re gonna hit killer traffic most times of the day.”

  “I want to see Chandler’s family and they live out there. Since Evelyn’s funeral is at Forest Lawn in Hollywood, I figured I could just shoot right out the 210 to the 134 and hang a left on Forest Lawn Drive by the river and I’d be there.”

  I could see I’d surprised him with my encyclopedic knowledge of the L.A. freeway system. I got to know my way around out here pretty well right after Chandler and I were married. We’d spent a lot of time in L.A. while Chan was working with his family’s attorneys, setting up the learning foundation.

  “Okay,” Chick smiled, “the Langham it is, then.” He pulled out of the parking structure and drove onto the freeway heading east, toward Pasadena.

  It was one of those L.A. days that made you want to move here. The Santa Ana winds were blowing and had swept the basin clear of air pollution. The few flags I saw stood at right angles, rippling and snapping in the stiff breeze. In honor of the day, convertible tops were down, sunglasses flashing, blonde hair flying. A regular Pepsi commercial. It was November, but it felt like springtime. The grass at home was already beginning to freeze at night, turning brown with the first chill of winter, so despite the circumstances, it felt liberating to be here.

  “They caught the guy,” Chick said, not taking his eyes off the road. “Black kid named Delroy Washington with a long record of carjacking and gang violence. Cops think it was random. He saw her car, went over and shot her so she wouldn’t be able to identify him later. Took the Mercedes and ran.”

  “That’s awful,” I said.

  “Y’know, sometimes I just sit and think what if she hadn’t gone to the Valley to get her hair done? What if she’d canceled her appointment, which she often did? Or what if her hairdresser had moved the time, told her to come a half-hour earlier or later? What if she hadn’t been in Van Nuys at that exact moment, and had never run into this angry, screwed-up kid? I keep trying to make sense of it, but what it comes down to is Evelyn was just at the wrong place at the wrong time and hit the double zero. Even so, I still can’t keep from thinking, what if?”

  He looked over. I couldn’t see his eyes behind his wraparound sunglasses, but I could imagine what was reflected there. I had asked all the same unanswerable, self-torturing questions. What if I hadn’t gone running that evening? What if my back hadn’t flared up? What if I’d decided to just tough it out with no Percocet, instead of calling Dr. Baker and getting him to prescribe Darvocet? Then Chandler wouldn’t have gone out to pick up my medicine. He wouldn’t have been in that drugstore parking lot, wouldn’t have been crushed by the hit-and-run driver.

  “There’s no answer to the what ifs, or the whys,” I finally told him, “any more than there’s an answer for why some people get cancer and others don’t. It is what it is. It’s just life.”

  That sounded like a lame platitude even as I said it, and if he was like me, he was probably still too close to Evelyn’s death to deal with it philosophically.

  He nodded slowly but seemed unconvinced. “It’s just … being at home without her … it’s like punishment. Did you feel that way?”

  “Exactly that way,” I said. “But where else can you go? How do you hide from your feelings?”

  “Exactly,” he said. “And then, there are all the funeral arrangements. I’ve been trying to handle that. It’s so hard to even know what to bury her in. I keep thinking, does it really matter? She’s dead. Does it make a difference if she’s in her pink summer dress, or the green A-line she liked so much? What about jewelry? I know it’s silly, but some part of me wants it to be exactly right. It’s sort of like the final communal gesture I’ll ever make for us.”

  I was surprised at that one. Chick had never seemed very metaphysical to me. More of a business accounting type. But he was absolutely right. I’d felt all the same things he was feeling.

  “Somebody actually suggested that we bury Chandler in his football jersey,” I said.

  “Ridiculous,” Chick said. “Evelyn liked to work out. Maybe I should bury her in a sport bra.”

  We were both suddenly smiling—laughing at the idea of what other people thought was the essence of a person’s life.

  “Part of me just keeps looking for answers,” he went on. “Part of me is looking for a place to stash all this anger I have for Delroy Washington. Sometimes I pray he’ll get the needle and I’ll be standing behind the glass watching. But I also know that’s not going to help me get past this. I can’t bring Evelyn back by punishing some angry kid who’s just a violent product of our own societal mistakes. Suffice it to say, I’m confused. Sometimes I sit in my backyard and look at the trees, see the wind blow the leaves away, and wish I could just sail away with them, get out of here on a gust of air. Does any of that make sense?”

  “Perfect sense.” I reached out and squeezed his hand in a gesture of support as we were swept along in the flow of sixty-mile-an-hour L.A. traffic.

  Chick pulled his hand away so he could shift into a lower gear. The Porsche growled and buzzed around a Vons produce truck.

  “Is there anything I can do to help you with the funeral arrangements?” I asked.

  “Just being here is help enough. Having somebody who’s been through this to talk to … it’s all I need.”

  I looked over at Chick’s profile. His eyes were still hidden behind those trendy glasses. I wondered who was really inside there. I decided one way or another, I would do everything in my power to help him get through this.

  Big mistake.

  CHAPTER 28

  JORDAN WEISMAN WAS ONE OF THE ACE COMPUTER programmers at bestmarket.com before the company sold. Chick pulled a guilt trip on Jordy and he had finally agreed to hack into all the major airlines’ computers to find out what flight Paige Ellis would be on from Charlotte. Jordan didn’t like pulling hacks, but Chick b.s.’d him saying he was doing a new start-up and there might be a job in it for him. Jordan came through in less than thirty minutes.

  After that, Chick spent the next six hours going for the perfect ensemble. Nothing seemed exactly right, so he ended up driving to Bloomingdale’s and buying a cinnamon shirt and maroon tie. He already had a charcoal suit, so what it came down to was he had pretty much ended up stealing Apollo Demetrius’s entire look, right down to the Aqua Velva.

  Chick then spent almost forty minutes trying to select the right watch. He was a watch collector, an aficionado of world-class timepieces. Over the years, he’d bought every expensive or trendsetting chronometer available. He had Breitlings and Piagets, Rolexes and Cartiers. Over fifty watches were displayed in velvet-lined cases with glass tops in his walk-in closet. Each polished mahogany box contained six timepieces. He remembered reading somewhere once that sociopaths often had a fascination with clocks …

  He wondered, Are my fifty watches trying to tell me something?

  Finally, he selected the Breitling Navitimer, the same model John Travolta wore in their ads. Sporty, expensive, but not ostentatious. He snapped it on and set it.

  His mind was swirling with anticipation and resolve. Only one lingering fear … if he got lucky … if he pulled this off … if he could talk Paige into it …

  COULD HE GET IT UP?

  He washed down a Viagra, waited twenty minutes for it to hit the old blood
stream, and then with his heart racing picked up the girls from Hustler and headed to the bathroom.

  Nothing.

  Not a quiver.

  He was deader than an opening act at the Laugh Factory. Then, just as he decided to stop, he got a slight tingle down there. Not one of his old Chick Best blue-vein specials—but he was at least getting some blood flow. Flop-sweat gathered on his brow as he coaxed this poor wobbler up. It rose weakly, like a patient at a rest home. Finally, he was at half-mast, hanging out over the toilet seat, barely erect.

  He couldn’t believe this was happening. Paige Ellis was actually on an airplane, heading to Los Angeles to see him, and he couldn’t get a decent hard-on. He was in the middle of a heavy dose of self-administered performance anxiety when he finally decided to give it up and stop. He zipped up, rushed out of the bathroom, and entered his den to fire down two scotch shooters. As they hit bottom, the knot in his stomach lessened.

  Okay, jerking off was one thing. Making love was another. The old Love Master would grow some wood when the time came, but, to be perfectly honest, Chick was becoming sexually panicked. At the same time he was committed to this course of action, determined to push on.

  So he went to the airport and stood at the Delta baggage claim, waiting, and then finally saw her walking with selfconfidence up to the carousel. She was so beautiful, so slender and fine, that his heart actually clutched when he saw her. He waited while the bags began coming off, watching the way she stood as a few people talked to her, asking dumb questions like, “Is this the luggage from flight 216?”

  She was the most amazing person he’d ever encountered … a fantasy and a reality. An object of lust and at the same time the gold standard for feminine perfection … well rounded, talented, incredible. His descriptive words for her were endless.

  Chick felt diminished by her presence, unworthy and outclassed. He had spent his entire adult life trying to be worthy of other people’s admiration. He had acquired the symbols of success, while always looking right and left, jealous of all the things other people had. Now, as he watched Paige Ellis, he finally realized that she was what he had been after all along. He’d been put on earth to be completed by her. She was the yin to his yang … no sexual pun intended.

  When he could bear the ecstasy of watching her no longer, he called her name. She saw him, waved, and dragged her little bag over. They’d hugged and he’d led her to the car—and then the first minor setback … The fucking Langham Hotel in Pasadena.

  She wanted to stay way the hell out on the east side of town. How could he just drop in on her out there unannounced? What could he say? “Oh, hi. I was just walking in the Rose Bowl parking lot, which is only twenty fucking miles from my house, and I thought I’d swing by and see what you were doing.” Impossible.

  He’d tried to confuse her with his line of freeway bullshit. Most out-of-towners panicked when you slung L.A.’s confusing array of freeway numbers at them, but she’d come right back with, “I’ll just take the 210 to the 134, hang a left on Forest Lawn Drive by the river.”

  That was another thing: Evelyn was shit on directions and it had always pissed him off. Even though she was born here, Evelyn could never remember a freeway number. Whenever they were trying to meet at a restaurant, she’d say stuff like, “It’s easy to find, Chick … can’t miss it. Take the freeway—you know the one I mean—it’s right by where I get my nails done—and then get off near the shoe store where I buy my Prada sandals. Go past that cute antique shop where they give you coffee mocha, turn left, and you’re there …” Ridiculous. Paige didn’t even live here and she was right on the old button. Everything about her impressed him.

  And then she had reached out and held his hand, squeezing it while he drove. It shot a volt of electricity up his arm, straight into his heart.

  Chick also felt that after a shaky start with Demetrius, he’d finally hit a pretty good post-death performance stride. Just the right amount of heartsick grief and moronic psychobabble over Evelyn’s brutal murder.

  All that stuff about, “What if she’d changed her appointment?” “What if she’d decided not to go?” That stuff was really on target. Paige was eating it up.

  Of course there were a few other, more accurate what ifs. What if his angry wife hadn’t been spending money they didn’t have, on clothes she wouldn’t even wear? What if she hadn’t been screwing her trainer and turning his marriage into a sexless sham?

  Mickey D, by the way, hadn’t even called to find out about the burial—a testament to the depth of that Vaselinelubricated, penile-inserted relationship. If there was a bookmaker’s line on shallow behavior, Chick would have given the points and bet the house that Mickey D wouldn’t even bother to come to the funeral. The side bet was that he would probably also call sometime next week and offer to buy the gym equipment for ten cents on the dollar. What an asshole.

  They had finally pulled up at the Langham Hotel in Pasadena, and Chick waved off the doorman so he could get her luggage out of the trunk. He had his droopy, sad-eyed victim thing down pretty good now.

  “Well, you’ve had a long flight and I’ve got a million things to do,” Chick said. “By the way, I thought the scripture you put on Chandler’s Memorial Program was perfect. It seemed to capture the essence of him. I’ve been reading the Bible, looking for something for Evelyn.” This was such bullshit he couldn’t believe he was saying it. He was thankful he hadn’t removed the cool Silhouette darks. If there was anything in print that captured Evelyn, it wouldn’t have been in the Bible, but in the Book of Human Conceit, somewhere between Larcenous Debt and Lustful Behavior. But, in preparation for this moment, he had found one Bible passage that he thought seemed deep and sensitive, so he reeled it off from memory.

  “Last night, I found something in Proverbs that sort of got me. ‘For her proceeds are better than profits of silver. She is more precious than rubies, and all the things you may desire cannot compare with her.’” He looked down at his shoes as he finished.

  “That’s very beautiful, Chick,” Paige said.

  “Yeah. Well, maybe it’s the right one.” He turned sadly and moved away from her, stopping beside his car door before finally looking back.

  “Well, see ya.” He started to get into the car, wondering if she was just going to let him drive away. She couldn’t be that hard-hearted. Even pound puppies didn’t look as sad and lost as this.

  “Chick, I came out here to help. Are you sure there isn’t anything I could do for you?”

  “Finally,” he thought. He was behind the wheel of the sleek black roadster, and looked up, giving her his best angle. “I don’t want to impose on you, Paige. It’s so sweet you even came at all.”

  “I want to help. That’s the main reason I’m here.”

  “Well, I’m going to pick out the coffin now, but I could sure use some help on the flowers and stuff …”

  “I can do that.”

  “They have a shop right there, at Forest Lawn. They told me they can do wreaths or sprays, anything I want. Evie loved spring flowers—purple jasmine, especially.” He looked down sadly. “Purple was her favorite color.”

  “Why don’t I come and help you?”

  “Are you sure? It’s been a long day for you. You just got here.”

  “Chick, of course I’ll help. What time do you want me to be there? I’m renting a car from the hotel agency.”

  “Is five-thirty too early?”

  “Five-thirty is perfect.”

  Chick couldn’t believe how well this was going. By the time they’d finished picking out flowers, it would be six or six-thirty. After a stressful time selecting wreaths and bouquets for his poor dead wife, what could be more natural than two friends going out to dinner to try and get past the horrible specter of Evelyn’s passing?

  He had just the place. The Bistro Garden on Ventura Boulevard. A little wine, a little pasta, the special fish dish they did only for him. He felt his package twitch. Nothing overt, just a little throb
and some subtle stiffening. His johnson was telling him, “Hang in there, pal, all is not lost.” He was beginning to pitch a nice little tent in his boxers.

  He put the car in gear, waved, and roared out, giving the Porsche a little extra pop of the clutch for effect, laying a chirp of rubber just like the sexy hero in one of Jerry Bruckheimer’s blockbusters.

  CHAPTER 29

  CHICK WAS DRINKING WAY TOO MUCH. WE HADN’T even ordered dinner and he was already on his fourth scotch. I looked across a white tablecloth littered with unused bone china and crystal goblets. Chick was beginning to slur his words, but showed no sign of backing off on the liquor.

  “Damn people. Vultures. Who do they think they’re kidding? Like it makes any damn difference what kind of box she’s buried in.” We had already been through this once. He was talking about the account supervisor at Forest Lawn, who Chick was convinced had tried to embarrass him into upgrading Evelyn’s coffin, from a medium-priced box, known as a Heaven Rider, to a top-of-the-line, mahogany monster with silver handles called the Eternal Rest.

  “They prey on your grief,” he slurred, “saying it will be her accommodation for eternity. Like I’m gonna fall for that bullshit guilt trip.”

  “They were just showing you what was available, Chick. The choice was always yours.” He grunted and downed his scotch, the ice clicking against his teeth. Then he held up his glass for a refill.

  “I think we should order,” I said. We’d been at the Bistro Garden for almost an hour and he’d shooed the waiter away twice. Emotionally, he was all over the place. At times, it was like this next part of life without Evelyn was going to be unbearable, and then he would suddenly change. He’d start talking about a new business venture and his eyes would sparkle, as if he were about to begin a wonderful new journey. It was very strange.