Temporary Insanity

by Leslie Carroll

  I sat up in bed and blinked the slumber from my eyes. “What are you talking about?”

  “Come with me, Alice. You’ll see. I was looking for a news program, but instead there are Japanese men inside my television set and they won’t go away.”

  Was this like the purple men in Atlantic City? At least this time she knew I was her granddaughter. I followed her into her bedroom and looked at the TV. Then I looked at the cable box, noticing that the channel number was an unfamiliar one.

  “They won’t go away,” Gram repeated. “I don’t know how they got in there. I don’t know any Japanese people.”

  “I think I may have figured out the problem,” I told her, and searched the room for the weekly TV supplement. She’d been using it as a coaster for a china teacup. I looked up the channel number that was illuminated on the cable box’s digital readout and sure enough, it was for a station that ran Japanese programming at this hour of the night. “You must have pushed the wro—different buttons than you usually do,” I explained. I asked her what channel she wanted and showed her how to access it, then sat up with her for a while until she’d calmed down. By the time she seemed ready to drift off to sleep, I don’t think she remembered a thing about her television’s Japanese invaders.

  “Hello, Alice,” said the pleasant-faced woman standing in front of the locked door to the offices of Balzer and Price. Apparently I’d arrived at work before Louise and the two attorneys. “I’m surprised you’re in so early after you were up so late last night with your grandmother.”

  “Oh, hi,” I replied casually. Something suddenly registered and I gave the woman a funny look. “Do I know you?”

  “I’m Rosa Santiago,” the woman said. “No, we’ve never met. My sister Mercedes is one of your uncle’s clients.”

  “Aha! You’re going to be Mr. Price’s new secretary, aren’t you?” I unlocked the door and showed her inside. “Well, then, welcome to the madhouse.” I realized I might have just scared her away and then Mr. Price would be gunning for my head. “I was just kidding. So how did you hear about me?”

  “I didn’t.”

  I showed Rosa which secretarial station would be hers and suggested that she start to acclimate herself, while I took the messages off the answering machine and turned on the photocopier.

  “Maybe you should get that. Louise isn’t in and you haven’t told me how I should answer the phones yet.”

  “Get what?” I asked her.

  Then the phone rang.

  “That.”

  I felt like I was in the middle of a Twilight Zone episode. I answered the phone, took a message for Uncle Earwax, and hung up. Turning to Rosa, I said, “Okay, I get it. Weren’t you recently—”

  She interrupted me. “Yes, I was. Working as a psychic. But it’s sometimes more of a curse than a blessing. Like when you go to the cops because you know a murder will be committed and you feel it’s your duty to prevent it, and first they just think you’re crazy, but when it happens, then they come looking for you and lock you up, thinking you were an accessory to the crime.” She changed out of her white cross-trainers and put on a pair of black heels. “You can predict things, but you can’t prevent them, and sometimes when people come and ask you questions, you know, like is so-and-so going to marry me, and they look so much in love, you can’t bear to say the truth. So I quit. I don’t have the stomach for it.”

  I was still sizing up Rosa, unsure as to whether she was for real or putting on a great act. I’d never met someone who claimed to be a psychic, so her behavior seemed a little P. T. Barnum for me. She seemed so normal, not like a Madame Woo-Woo type with gauzy scarves draped over crystal balls, gaudy jewelry, head wraps, and raps on the table. “Rosa, just a bit of advice about Mr. Price and Mr. Balzer? I don’t think they go in for the voodoo-y psychic thing, so if you want to keep this job, apart from being a good secretary, I wouldn’t bring up the second sight stuff too much if I were you.”

  She smiled. “I know. Alice, you don’t have to worry about me. Oh, be nice to your uncle today. He’s going to be very cranky.”

  Knowing my uncle, this was a very safe prediction. I can’t recall a day when he wasn’t cranky.

  “Oh, it’s nothing you screwed up, Alice. I know that’s what you were just thinking. It’s not about you. Just that he’s got a touch of stomach flu this morning and the Maalox he took didn’t help.”

  “Speaking of the devil,” I said, as I heard Uncle Earwax’s none-too-dulcet tones through the open door and halfway down the hallway to the elevator. He entered, with Louise at his heels, taking the time to scold her for getting in to work late when there was a new secretary coming in to work for Mr. Price.

  “And who are you?” he demanded of Rosa.

  “The new secretary,” she responded bluntly. “You’ll have to tell me what to start on because Mr. Price won’t be in until eleven.”

  Louise looked at her. “Oh, did you find the drawer with his appointment book? I hide it every night. He’s very paranoid about someone coming into the office and nosing about.”

  I knew for a fact that Rosa hadn’t opened Louise’s desk.

  “Act surprised when Mr. Price comes in,” Rosa instructed Louise. “He’s bringing you a big jar of jelly beans as an act of contrition. He’s very sorry he snapped your head off yesterday when you were talking about Hilda.”

  Louise’s hand flew to her mouth. She looked at Rosa, touched and a little amazed. “Did he tell you that?” she half whispered.

  “No, he didn’t.”

  “Then how did…”

  Before Rosa could reply, my uncle tossed a wrapped blueberry danish on my desk and handed me a black coffee in a paper cup. “Breakfast,” he said between bites of his own pastry. I handed him my napkin. He and Isabel could rival each other in a messy-eaters contest. I swear, Uncle Earwax didn’t own a tie that didn’t have a spot or stain in exactly the same place.

  “I’ve got an acting assignment for you for next week,” he told me. “On the Randall Dalton case—it’s a slip-and-fall on some grease in the garage where his car was parked—I’ll need you to read in the deposition testimony of one of the defendant’s employees.”

  “Who am I this time?”

  “The night manager of the garage. He’s a Czechoslovakian immigrant. Do they even have a Czechoslovakia anymore? In his examination before trial, he stated that there was always an accumulation of gunk in the area where the plaintiff had parked his car. This afternoon, we’ll each grab a copy of the transcript from the Dalton file and go over which sections I want you to read in. In the meantime, did you finish that tape I left for you yesterday?”

  When I told him I hadn’t, he got pissed off, despite the fact that I reminded him I’d spent much of the previous day organizing the mess that had been abandoned by his former secretaries.

  By the time I’d finished generating all the work that he’d dictated on both sides of the tape, it was the end of the day, and I refused to stay late to pore over the Czech’s transcript in the Dalton case. Besides, we had a Musketeers production meeting after work and I was sticking to my new rule of no longer allowing the boundaries between my temp jobs and my career to become blurred or co-mingled.

  “Well, get your butt in here bright and early,” he grumbled. “Don’t go off window-shopping first.”

  “When have I ever—?” I started to counter, but decided that arguing with him was useless. I would just end up getting defensive and giving myself a headache and he never listened to a damn thing I said anyway. Another note to self: Never work for your relatives or you may end up wanting to kill them (and vice versa). A “family business” is an oxymoron. Family and business don’t mix. Just look at the Corleones.

  Chapter 16

  Izzy showed up at the apartment positively glowing. “You look fantastic!” I said. “Have you been exercising lately or something?”

  “Or something,” she joked lasciviously.

  “Well, good for you! Good for Dominic
k!”

  Then Dorian arrived with great news. “I got a real part on Law & Order!” he crowed ecstatically. “A guest spot with a couple of meaty scenes and everything. I play a white-collar criminal who gets arrested for insider trading in connection with a murder. They called me in from my headshot because I look so squeaky clean. Then I read for them, and they liked it, so then they put me on camera and I used my sense memory about getting arrested…and they loved it, so I booked the job!”

  “Yee-hah!” I cheered. “This definitely calls for a celebration before we get down to business.” I took a bottle of champagne from the fridge. “Hey, Gram, come celebrate Dorian’s good fortune with us!” She was in her bedroom watching something on CNN. I poured four flutes of champagne and handed them around.

  “Oh, none for me, thanks,” Izzy said, declining the glass I was offering to her.

  “I’ve never seen Izzy refuse booze, especially champagne,” Dorian remarked, taking a big sip before waiting for anyone to make a toast in his honor.

  “Well, I’ve got some news, too,” she said. “Good and bad, I guess, depending on how you look at it.” She motioned for us to sit down. “I suppose you’re wondering why I called you all here today,” she said, laughing at her mock invocation. “My life is an open book. You guys know that it’s always been a roller-coaster ride for me and Dominick, and it’s a real lovefest when we don’t want to strangle each other or get a divorce. So we went into counseling a few months ago and the couples therapist told us that we needed to prioritize our lives, and that if our marriage had any chance of survival, we needed to block out time to be together.”

  “So you did…” Dorian prompted.

  “Yeah, did we ever,” Izzy laughed. “And the upshot of it is…that we’re going to have a baby. So that’s the good news!”

  Dorian and I stared at her, our expressions somewhere between stunned and delighted. “So, congratulations, Mama!” he said, raising his glass to her.

  “Oh, my God, that’s amazing!” I exclaimed, going over to hug Izzy and feeling myself tear up. Despite my feelings about whether or not, with their volatile marriage, it was the right time for them to have a kid, I was thrilled for her. Izzy has desperately wanted a child for as long as I’ve known her. “How many weeks are you?”

  “Six.” She beamed.

  “When did you find this out?”

  “Friday. We told our parents first, and it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done to keep it a secret from you two and not phone you right away, but I knew we were going to get together this evening, so I wanted to tell you in person. Oh, shit, you know what? I just thought of something. I don’t think hair dye is supposed to be good for you when you’re pregnant. That means we’re going to discover what my natural hair color is these days! It could be a great TV topic for someone like Geraldo Rivera. Certainly more suspenseful than finding out what was in Al Capone’s safe.”

  “So what’s the bad news?” Dorian then asked after refilling his glass.

  “You think that wasn’t it?” Izzy joked. “I might be a brunette!” She sighed, then fell silent for a few moments, running a hand through her short, soon-to-no-longer-be-blond locks. “Well, the bad news is…and don’t hate me, guys—oh, shit, I know you’re gonna hate me for this—but this isn’t a good time for me to work on producing our own show. I just have too much going on right now. I’ve got to find a job that’ll grant me maternity leave, and no one wants to hire a pregnant actress anyway, not even you two; so unless we do A Streetcar Named Desire instead, and do it fast, there aren’t too many roles I can credibly play after I start showing…and besides, Dorian would be the world’s worst Stanley Kowalski. Sorry, Dorian,” she rattled on, “but you’re just not—well, not exactly central casting’s idea of a barely literate macho brute. Maybe the two of you could do Cat on a Hot Tin Roof together or something…I’ve got Tennessee Williams on the brain tonight…Dorian’s right on the money for Brick, and you’d make a killer Maggie, Alice.”

  If I hadn’t held up my hand to stop her, she’d still be talking. “Izzy! Don’t worry about doing a show with us right now. We’ll…we’ll put it on hold, won’t we, Dorian?”

  Oh, God, now I’m going to be stuck in survival-job hell forever with Uncle Earwax.

  “You guys hate me. I knew you would.”

  I knelt by her chair. “No, we don’t. There are much better things to hate: A-line skirts. Orange and brown horizontally striped ‘poor boy’ sweaters,” I teased. “Now stop that. We could never hate you. And we think it’s wonderful that you’re going to have a baby. Really, we do. It puts things in perspective.” I ruffled her hair. “I mean, this is what’s really important—in the grand scheme of things.”

  “You mean it isn’t all about us?” Izzy teased. “Damn! I hate when that happens!”

  Dorian came around to the other side of Izzy’s chair. “We’re both really happy for you. And if you look at it this way, as performers we don’t have anything right now that we didn’t have before. We hadn’t gotten so far with our Musketeers plans that we can’t postpone them.”

  “Yeah, but Alice went to all that trouble to make the cookbook.”

  I laughed. “Forget it for the time being. I did it on ARMPIT company time—as Ms. Hunt was very quick to point out the morning she canned me.”

  “You guys are the greatest!” Izzy said, hugging us. “I don’t know how to thank you enough, except name the kid after one of you, depending on its gender. Although Dominick may want to have something to say about it.”

  “It’s okay. It’s kind of his kid, too,” I teased her.

  “So what are you going to do now, Isabel?” Gram asked her. “You know I gave up show business when I had my kids.”

  Izzy looked pained. “Did you ever regret it?”

  Gram nodded. “Having children is a blessing—although sometimes you need to remind yourself of that—and for a while I regretted it every day. And every time Alice’s father behaved like a brat, I wondered if I’d done the right thing—especially since I ended up a single mother.”

  “Oh, shit, is that what’s going to happen to me?” Izzy started to cry.

  I tried to console her. “Gram didn’t mean to upset you,” I said, giving my grandmother a dirty look.

  “No, don’t blame her; she just answered my question. Never mind me,” Izzy said wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “I guess it’s true what they say about pregnant women being all hormonal.”

  Dorian and Izzy stayed for a little while longer and then went home, leaving me feeling somewhat morose. “You’re disappointed, aren’t you?” Gram asked me. I nodded glumly. “I know, you worked very hard to try to start up something for yourselves…but life goes on. So, a door closed. You know that means a window will open. And it will offer you something even better.”

  I wanted to believe her soothing platitude. “It’s becoming harder to remain hopeful. I feel like I keep running and running and I’m just not getting anywhere. After years of trying, Dorian’s got a great part, and even if it’s a one-shot deal, he’ll get noticed. And Izzy’s got a husband, and now a kid on the way…they’re moving forward.”

  “You are, too,” Gram consoled. She handed me a cup of steaming tea. It was her cure for everything, the English side of the family showing through. “But your journey isn’t the same as Isabel’s. Or Dorian’s. Things have a way of happening when you’re ready for them to happen. And right now you’re on your own path of self-discovery.”

  “Yeah, well, it’s leading nowhere,” I muttered angrily.

  “That’s what you think,” Gram teased. “It just feels like it’s leading nowhere right now. In fact it’s leading you where you need to be and where you’re supposed to end up.”

  “Ahhh, the path to enlightenment. You’ve been watching syndicated reruns of Kung Fu, haven’t you?”

  I like to think that I’m fairly resilient, that after a minimum amount of moping, I can get back up in the saddle of the horse that t
hrew me. So the next morning, as I headed to my uncle’s office bright and early to review the deposition transcript I’d be reading into the record at the trial, I bought a copy of Spotlight, a performing arts trade paper that advertises most of the auditions around town—the ones you don’t need an agent to get into.

  I started to peruse the edition as I crossed Canal Street, like a typical New Yorker not particularly paying attention to traffic, when suddenly a taxi swerved past me, out of control. With my nose buried in the newspaper, it was only sheer instinct that made me jump back about three feet. My heart was thudding in my chest.

  “Whew! Close shave,” remarked a trembling Chinese street vendor, who had managed to yank his cart overflowing with knockoff purses and plastic knickknacks out of the intersection just in time. A moment later, we heard a screech of brakes and a horrible-sounding thump. A woman screamed, a high-pitched keening sound that pierced the heart, and I ran toward it. The young woman was kneeling on the asphalt, wailing at the sight before her: a young boy, maybe six or seven years old, lying motionless in the middle of the street.

  A mob of angry witnesses chased down the cabbie, who had fled the scene but was stopped by a red light at the end of the block. They pulled him out of the car and, yelling and pointing in a half dozen different languages, dragged him over to where the little boy lay. The anguished mother was screaming in Chinese, pointing at her child and sobbing, then turning her accusations on the driver.

  Several pedestrians rushed over to the mother to prevent her from trying to lift the child into her arms. “Don’t move him,” a woman yelled. “I’m a doctor.” But the Asian woman didn’t understand. With no other means of communication, the doctor forcibly pushed her away and the mother began to claw and scratch at the doctor’s face and clothing as a bystander attempted to restrain her.

  I whipped out my cell phone and dialed 911, reporting the accident, and requesting an ambulance ASAP. By now a crowd of curious onlookers had formed a circle around the boy, shielding his body from oncoming cars. A middle-aged man in a suit and tie put down his briefcase and voluntarily began to direct traffic. Anybody who claims New Yorkers aren’t caring souls should have been at the intersection of Broadway and Canal Street at eight forty-five that morning.