“And your girlfriend?” she asked as Tobias reentered the room.
“Ah…well, I think I’ve gone into permanent hiding where she’s concerned,” he said, handing her a glass of water.
“I see. I’m getting the impression she doesn’t know about that yet.”
“I’m sure she’ll get the picture soon enough,” Tobias said, settling on the arm of the sofa.
“Ouch…that’s cold-blooded,” Priscilla said, edging toward the other sofa.
“She’s young, she’ll get over it,” Tobias said nonchalantly.
“You’re terrible,” Priscilla said, eyeing him warily from a safe distance. “Somewhere in Manhattan there’s a young girl crying herself dry over you, and you toss her off like yesterday’s garbage.”
“How do you know she’s young?”
“You just told me. Yeah, I can see it now…she’s probably blond, wispy, taller than average. Ah, of course—she’s a model,” Priscilla deduced, thrilled to see how her newfound clairvoyance was making Tobias squirm. “You’re not one of these cliché rock n’ rollers who habitually chase after nineteen-year-old cover girls, are you?”
“I don’t remember giving you permission to probe into my love life,” Tobias said snidely. Priscilla laughed heartily at that crack. “Okay, if it’s open season on love lives, let’s hear about the state of yours,” he said.
“I have none. That’s why I can pick up and move to Florida,” she countered.
“Oh, come now—you don’t expect me to believe that, do you?”
“You can believe what you wish,” she said, trying to act impervious to his taunts.
“Okay, I’m supposed to believe that a decent-looking chick with all her limbs and facial features intact, who lives in New York City and is not a lesbian—can I assume that you’re not?—can’t find a boyfriend? You’ll have to do better than that.”
Priscilla ruminated on that one for a moment. “It’s not that I can’t find them, it’s just that I’m tired of finding them.”
“Then you are a lesbian?”
“Don’t be an ass.”
“C’mon, I’ve practically admitted I’m a dirty rotten son-of-a-bitch, ditching both wife and lover, and you won’t give me a hint as to what kinds of relationships you’ve had,” Tobias said, enjoying turning the tables on her.
“Stupid ones, all right? Dead-end, idiotic, cataclysmic, horrendous ones—okay? Getting the picture now?”
Tobias’s grin became more crooked. “Well, I guess you haven’t found the love of your life, or you wouldn’t be so wound up about leaving town,” he surmised smugly.
“Maybe I have, and that’s the reason I am leaving town,” Priscilla volleyed back at him, making him chuckle.
“Ah…I get it…he’s too good for me…it’ll never work…we come from different worlds…” Tobias mocked in a high, girlish voice. Priscilla glared at him. There was a little too much reality in his stab-in-the-dark attempt to rile her.
“What an asshole you are,” she said after a lengthy pause. Tobias merely laughed.
“I know, that’s what all the girls tell me,” he said, kissing the top of her head on his way to the kitchen, leaving her stunned and feeling out of her depth once again.
“I think I’m going to take a quick shower before dinner arrives. Feel free to do the same. Here, let me show you your room—the one furthest away from mine, for reasons of propriety,” he said. Priscilla smirked and followed his lead.
“I don’t care how many channels they give you, they’ll always find a way to fill them all with crap,” Tobias complained, flipping through the stations too fast to see what the contents actually were.
Priscilla, glass of red wine in hand, watched from her relaxed position in a daze. She hadn’t owned a television since hers was stolen over eight years ago. The brief glimpses she got at today’s programming made her feel as if she were having an especially chaotic dream.
When she felt as though her eyes were going to cross, she casually reached over and extracted the remote control from Tobias’s hand and turned it off. She handed it back to him without a word. He looked at it for a moment then tossed it lightly onto the other sofa and picked up the wine bottle. Priscilla covered her glass with her hand. Tobias topped his up and leaned back to join her.
“Well, the TV idea wasn’t much of a success,” he said, turning to face her. “Got any other ideas?”
“Nope, I’m fresh out of ideas myself,” Priscilla admitted. “I guess we could just sit here and get drunk.”
“Looks like you’ve beat me to it,” he said, as he reached over and righted her listing glass. “Here, you need to eat more. Have another bite of cheesecake.”
“Oh, God,” Priscilla said, waving his hand away. “You eat it. One more bite and I’ll explode.”
“You know what you need?” Priscilla eyed him suspiciously, fearing he might produce a vial of white stuff. “A little physical activity,” he said, getting up to turn on the radio. “All that food and wine has made you lethargic. You need to dance!” he announced, pulling her to her feet. She fought him off long enough to safely put her glass down, but then he became a force she couldn’t resist.
“I can’t dance,” she protested weakly, but Tobias seemed deaf to her claim. He danced her around like a demented Gene Kelly, humming along with the music when he didn’t know the words. Priscilla did her best to keep up, though the surprise of finding out that the stoic rocker danced like a cotillion all-star had a pronounced effect on her performance.
“Well, if your comeback fails, you can always make a living as a dance instructor at Arthur Murray,” she said, when the song was over. She seized the opportunity to put some distance between Tobias and herself while he searched for a better station.
“Classic Rock,” he announced. A song came on from the seventies that made both of them cringe simultaneously. “Some of this stuff should have been given a proper burial a long time ago,” he said, consulting the programming schedule again.
“Too bad they don’t have a station that plays just Absent Among Us,” Priscilla said from her perch on the arm of the sofa.
“Yeah, that’d be a good way to bore everyone right out of their minds,” Tobias said, flipping to a blues station.
“I’d listen to it,” she said.
Tobias threw her a doubting sneer. “You’re just saying that because you’re drunk,” he replied.
“If I am drunk, it’s your fault. If I love your music, that’s your fault, too,” she said, bobbing slightly as she spoke.
“How’s this?”
“Fine,” she replied, thinking she’d be safe from the mad dancer with that kind of music. She soon found out she was wrong.
“I think you could do with more dance and less drink,” Tobias said as he commandeered both glass and body.
“Nobody dances to the blues,” Priscilla said petulantly as he pulled her close and rocked her back and forth with slow, small steps.
“What are you talking about? I bet you more children have been conceived after their parents boogied to blues than all other forms of music combined.” Priscilla thought about this. The implication made her nervous. She had little time to dwell on this statistic due to a sudden change in footwork.
“You’re a regular twinkle toes, aren’t you?” she said, as Tobias increased the dramatics.
“You’d be pretty good yourself if you put more effort into moving your feet and less into moving your jaws,” Tobias said, promptly putting her into a dip before she could respond. The tactic worked; she was too flabbergasted to answer the insult. Tobias spun her out and drew her back for the grand finale. Another song started on its heels, but Priscilla went as limp as a rag doll.
“I’m done,” she said, begging off. “I concede the championship to you,” she said, holding him at arm’s length.
“Oh, come on—we were just getting warmed up,” Tobias said, pantomiming a dance for her entertainment. Priscilla giggled hoarsely and made for th
e closest sofa, where she collapsed unceremoniously.
“Hey, I’m the old guy here,” Tobias said, standing over her looking down. “Come on, be a sport. One more dance,” he said, tugging on her arm.
“No. I can’t. I’m afraid I’ll get pregnant,” Priscilla said, hiding her face with her free arm.
“You’ve had too much to drink.”
“Whose fault is that?” Tobias wrenched her arm until she was in an upright position. Before she could flop back down on the sofa again, he slid in beside her. When she fell back, her head landed in his lap.
“Hi,” she said, looking up at him.
“Scoot down,” Tobias commanded her. She shimmied down a few inches and Tobias shifted around so that he could cross his legs and rest her head in the crook of his ankles.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to massage your temples.”
“Why?”
“Because it will keep you from getting a hangover,” Tobias said, gently kneading the sides of her head.
“I never heard that before.”
“Shhh…”
“You know this is going to put me right out,” Priscilla warned.
“No, it not. It’s just going to make you feel…very…relaxed…” Tobias whispered, his voice trailing off. Priscilla was besieged by a fit of giggles, which she did her utmost to suppress.
“Stop it,” Tobias said in a low, far-away tone.
“I can’t help it—this is too weird.” She pursed her lips together, trying to think of something that wasn’t remotely funny. It was hard. No matter what image she conjured up, her mind was continually interrupted by the sight of Tobias Jordan sitting cross-legged on a sofa in a swanky hotel suite, rubbing her temples so she wouldn’t be hung over the next morning.
The very thought of such a thing happening made her feel she had finally gone round the bend. A decade plus of living in New York City had been too much for her damaged psyche to deal with and she had lost hold of her last wisp of sanity. None of this was really happening. She had simply imagined all these episodes with Tobias. In reality, she was probably crouched atop a heating vent in front of some department store, huddled with her few measly possession, penniless and panhandling for change to buy a bus ticket to somewhere warm…
“Aaaagghhh!” she screamed, sitting bolt upright.
“What is it?” Tobias yelled back, equally frightened.
“Oh, my God—I’m losing my mind,” Priscilla said. She buried her head in her hands.
“What’s wrong?”
“Where’s my bag?”
“It’s over there on the floor, where you left it.” Priscilla sprung up and fetched the bag, frantically searching until she found her stash of traveler’s checks and cash.
“It’s all here,” she said, amazed by the sight.
“Of course it is. What—you think I lured you here so I could steal back the money I gave you?” Tobias said, clearly offended. Priscilla sank onto the coffee table, holding the bag listlessly in her arms. She stared at Tobias without seeing him. After a few moments, she began to shake.
“Come over here,” Tobias coaxed her. “Come on.” Numbly, she stood and navigated the three feet to the spot she had just vacated. He tugged on her arm until she lowered herself. Without moving her from the crook of his arm, he leaned forward and poured her a glass of mineral water.
“Here, you need some water,” he said, holding the glass to her lips. She took the glass from him and drank, tentatively at first, then guzzling it until it was gone.
“Feel better?” Tobias asked. She looked at him and nodded. “Were you having a dream?” The sight of herself in rags camped out on a public sidewalk flashed again in her mind.
“To be honest, I feel like I’m dreaming now.” Tobias pulled away slightly, grinning. “No, I’m serious. You may have encounters like this all the time where you hook up with someone out of the blue and just do whatever comes to mind. You’re rich, you can do that. You can be generous and hospitable with people who don’t mean anything to you, although I think it’s pretty risky given how phobic you are about your celebrity.” Priscilla met his stare head on.
“I’m being honest. It doesn’t make any sense to me that you—Tobias Jordan, world famous leader of Absent Among Us—would take up with a common working girl just out of the blue.”
“It didn’t exactly happen like that,” Tobias said, removing his arm from Priscilla’s back. “We didn’t just collide on the street today…”
“No, but—”
“You gave your lyrics to me. That was a pretty big ice-breaker, don’t you think? I mean, I got a fairly good idea of what kind of person you are by reading through that stuff.” Somehow, being reminded of this didn’t make Priscilla feel any more at ease.
“Just a little while ago you made the comment that you loved my music. Well, there you go. You feel a connection to me, have felt it for a number of years, without me being aware of it. This time the tables were turned—I got to crawl inside your head, take your views for a test drive. See, that makes us even. We’re starting a relationship on equal ground. It’s not as out of the blue as you think. And this is not a typical experience for me,” Tobias said, letting his gaze linger on hers.
“I guess we are even,” she said. “I never thought about it like that before. Of course, you willingly put your songs out there…”
“True, but you didn’t have to sell yours to me. You could have tossed them into the incinerator like you planned.” He had her there. “Why did you give me your material?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” Priscilla answered. “I think I’ve been in shock since that day. It was like absent-mindedly selling my kids to a stranger because he thought they were cute. I don’t know what I was thinking…”
“Do you want them back?” Tobias asked. “It’s not too late to undo the deal.” Priscilla let out a wheeze, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh.
“I’m afraid I’m sort of dependent on your end of the bargain at this point,” she said.
“That’s okay. You can keep the money. Okay, it’ll be a loan. You pay me back when you get on your feet again.” Priscilla thought about this. She looked over at her duffle bag, too small to contain the sum total of thirty plus years of living. She looked at the heap of notebooks that represented countless hours of thought. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“That’s very generous of you, but…I think I actually feel freer without them. I probably wasn’t a fit custodian to them, anyway. You’re welcome to keep them, for whatever they’re worth.”
“They’ve been more valuable to me than you can imagine,” Tobias said, pouring some water for himself.
“Really? In what way?”
“They’ve helped me focus my writing skills. A ten-year hiatus can close down your creative conduit. Your words have inspired me.” Priscilla tried to absorb this enormous compliment.
“How do you like being back together with Brody Haversham? Does it feel like the good old days?” she asked.
“Yes, in some ways. We’re bitching and fighting like we never stopped. Some of the music magic is still there, but I don’t know…the whole thing feels too strained to me. I don’t like having to try so hard to do something that should come naturally.”
“Are you still planning on touring?”
“If we can get an album together with any real merit. The stuff we’ve put together so far seems pretty tepid to me. I think Brody would be satisfied with anything that got us back on the charts, which means the more humdrum and commercial, the better.”
“So, you’re having artistic differences?”
“That about sums it up. But don’t you dare breathe a word of this to anyone. Things are bad enough between us as it is,” Tobias warned, turning cold and impersonal.
“Who am I going to tell?” Priscilla asked defensively. The answer to that was obvious once the words left her mouth. “You don’t have to worry. I’m not going to sell m
y exclusive story to the tabloids. Who’d believe it anyway?”
“You’d be surprised.”
Priscilla decided to steer clear of his career concerns for the time being. “Can I ask you something?”
“Shoot,” Tobias said. He set down his water and poured the last of the wine into his glass.
“If you’re having so many problems with your wife that you’re actually hiding from her, why do you stay married to her? I realize this is none of my business…”
“It’s complicated,” Tobias said, taking a sizable sip of his wine.
“Sometimes people are deathly afraid of divorce, even when their marriage is sheer hell,” Priscilla offered casually.
Tobias laughed harshly. “Have you ever been divorced?” he asked.
“No, never been married,” she replied.
“Well, you sound quite sure of something you’ve had no personal experience with.”
“It’s just an observation.”
“Let me make an observation of my own,” Tobias said, “Due to the fact that you’re—how old?”
“Thirty-two,” Priscilla admitted, hating the idea of where this was heading.
“Okay, you’re thirty-two and you’ve never been married. From what I’ve observed in my fifty-four years is that if a good looking woman like you is not married and not career-obsessed, then she has a phobia of marriage,” Tobias pronounced smugly. Priscilla let out a laugh that was so natural and unrestrained, it made him frown.
“What’s so funny?” he demanded.
“You think I’m afraid of marriage? Are you kidding? I’m scared to death of everything—marriage, divorce, success, relationships of all kinds, death, life…”
“You don’t act like you’re afraid of anything or anyone,” Tobias said, scrutinizing her through narrowed eyes. Priscilla shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t believe you,” he said, watching her closely for signs that she was having him on.
“You don’t believe me? Tell me, then, if you’ve got such keen powers of detection, why would an able-bodied, halfway intelligent, semi good-looking person like me work in a dump like Frank’s, have a string of unfulfilling, contentious relationships with emotional losers, and shun the only decent, successful man to ask me out on a date if I wasn’t scared out of my mind by the thought of actually being involved in something that could work out? Answer me that, oh wise one.”
Alligators in the Trees Page 41