Dorothy on the Rocks

by Barbara Suter

  It wouldn’t be such a big question if my bedroom was large and spacious and my bed sat in the middle of the floor with only the headboard against a wall, but I live in the Big Apple where personalities and ambitions are large but apartments are small. My standard double Mattresses-Are-Us bed is wedged into one end of my tiny boudoir and enclosed by three walls, which makes stripping and remaking a real pain in the ass. But since I’ve had company for the last few nights, and hope for more, I decide I better go for it. I wrestle my sunshine yellow one-hundred-thread cottons off and shove them into the top of my laundry bag. I grab my detergent, pour some scotch into a to-go coffee cup, and put everything into my shopping cart and head off to the Soap N Suds on Columbus Avenue. When I get there I dump my clothes out of the bag into one of the wheelie laundry baskets and stash my shopping cart under the clothes-folding table. The place is more crowded than I expect and I have to wait for a machine. I sit in a plastic chair, my wheelie basket of dirty clothes at my side, and sip from my coffee cup, which gives me time to think about, or rather gnaw upon, recent events.

  I’m a damn good Dorothy, and my Snow White is heartbreaking, particularly in the scene with the woodsman. I think I play that well. Kids are so mean nowadays. Disrespectful. I can’ t stand them most of the time. Those little mean faces out there in the dark, judging me. My talent. Who are they anyway? They are a bunch of overprivileged seven- or eight-year-olds without a care in the world. Wait until they are out on their own in the big unforgiving world. I’d like to see that heckler soldiering her way through life. Damn that little shit. She was no Dorothy. She never would have gotten home to Kansas. She would have given up before she even left Munchkinland. I drain the last of my scotch from the cup. A machine opens up and I feed in the requisite quarters and I measure the detergent and pour it into the top compartment.

  “Are those your clothes?” the man next to me asks.

  “What?” I say.

  “In the basket?” He points in front of me, and sure enough my laundry is still in the wheelie basket. I look at him and then at the basket and then at the front window of the machine which is washing away with soap and water but alas no clothes.

  “Damn,” I say under my breath.

  I feel so stupid. I consider telling the guy I’m a city sanitation inspector checking for faulty equipment, but instead I push my basket of clothes to another machine and try not to make eye contact. It’s that little girl’s fault. Damn her. I check my watch and go next door to the Firehouse Bar and Grill for a beer. I sit at one of the sidewalk tables and smoke a cigarette. The sun hits my face, and for a few minutes I let it work its magic—until I remember that the ultraviolet rays can cause all sorts of problems now that the ozone layer is so damaged. And who damaged that ozone layer? Beauticians. Everyone knows it is all that hairspray that did us in, which begs the eternal question: What price beauty?

  NOTE TO SELF . . .

  When someone catches you doing something stupid, say you work for the city.

  I get home at six o’clock with my clean laundry. I have a message from Dick Andrews asking me if I’ll walk Mr. Ed for him as neither he nor Sandy will be home until late, and a message from my agent about a couple of auditions. I’m starving. I open the refrigerator. There is cold pizza from the night before. I put a piece on a plate and get out a Rolling Rock and sit down at the table. I don’t switch on the lights. The summer sun is turning the room a warm pink.

  When I was a kid, I spent my summers by the pool at the country club sitting on beach blankets with my friends Ann and Jen. We played crazy eights and ate frozen Milky Ways that we bought at the concession stand. We stayed all afternoon and then rode our bikes home for supper. After dinner I would sometimes go back for a swim with my dad. He always bought a cup of coffee at the concession stand and let me drink half. He swam the length of the pool twice underwater, emerging red-faced and gasping for air. Then he would shake his head to the side and bounce on one foot to get the water out of his ear. We raced across the pool. I swam as fast as I could, and sometimes I would win, but only sometimes.

  “Like in life,” my dad said. “You don’t always win, but you must always try to do your best.”

  I finish the pizza and decide to tackle the awkward task of putting the clean sheets on my bed. It’s awkward because I sort of have to be in the bed to make it, and Bixby likes to pretend the sheets are a fun house that he romps through as I try to smooth and straighten them into position. I get the last corner tucked and then coax Bixby out from the middle of the bed so I can smooth down the quilt. Then I lie down for a moment and close my eyes. I drift off until the phone rings. I let the machine pick up. It’s Sidney from Don’t Tell Mama wanting to confirm the dates he gave me.

  “Sidney, Sidney I’m here,” I say grabbing the receiver. “I just walked in the door.”

  “I’m calling to confirm those dates with you Maggie.”

  “Right . . . yes.”

  “The twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth?”

  “Yes, of next month, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, dear,” Sidney says with annoyance creeping into his voice.

  “Absolutely. It’s perfect. Gives me enough time but not too much. In fact I was about to call you,” I lie like a rug.

  “Good. Got to go. You’re in the book. In ink, Maggie.”

  “Great,” I say, but he is already off and running.

  My digital clock on the radio next to the bed reads 8:05 in bright red numbers. Good grief, I slept for over an hour. I have to walk Mr. Ed. He will be so upset with me that I’m so late. And then I remember the dream I was having when the phone woke me.

  It was my recurring dream. In it I’m getting ready to leave my house, and, when I open the door, I’m looking down into a deep abyss. I can’t see the bottom. A rickety bridge spans the chasm, like the ones in the Tarzan movies, vines and a few planks of decaying wood. I grab hold of the vines and start to cross. I’m terrified but I keep moving, and just as I get to the other side I realize there is another bridge, but this one has snakes crawling on it. I gasp and wake up. This is, as I said, a recurring dream. My last therapist, who moved all the way to Michigan to get away from me, told me it meant I was afraid to go out into the world. Well thanks. And to think I paid money for that profound analysis. Yes, I agreed, I see the world as a challenge full of scary things—now tell me something I don’t know. Earn those seventy bucks an hour.

  I find the keys for the Andrews’ apartment. Mr. Ed is right by the door, waiting for relief.

  “Where have you been?” he barks at me.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Ed. I fell asleep. Let’s go. Where’s your leash?”

  Mr. Ed jumps up and down, his nose pointing in the direction of the kitchen counter. I grab the leash and off we go at a trot down the four flights of stairs. At the front door I clip on his leash. When we get to the street, Mr. Ed heads for the gutter and gratefully does his business. A smile of relief creeps across his doggie face.

  “Let’s walk over to the park, little fellow. I could use a heart to heart.” It’s a warm evening and the sun is going down. Twilight, I think; it is twilight time. A jogger passes us as we enter the park on Eighty-fifth Street. His breathing is labored and steady. He slows down as he approaches us and glances at his watch. He’s checking his time, grading his performance, logging his miles. Keeping track. It’s important. I keep track of my calories, and I try to exercise three times a week, and I try to keep track of my cigarettes. I pat my pockets and realize I left without them. Just as well. I’ve got to quit smoking, I remind myself for the millionth time, but the thought of stopping makes me crave one. One cigarette and then I’ll quit. And there it is, the whole damn merry-go-round, but my head feels groggy and only nicotine will set it right.

  Mr. Ed is happily sniffing everything in sight. He sniffs the ground and the leaves and the flowers and the dirt and the ants and the rocks and the occasional dog that passes and sometimes just the air. He perks his happy ears up and snif
fs the breeze as it rushes past his black button nose. I try sniffing the air with my pink button nose but it doesn’t make me as happy as it makes Mr. Ed. For dogs, things are simple. I envy that.

  We walk over to the Delacorte Theater and sit down on one of the benches. The park is filled with flowering plants and trees. I look out over the Great Lawn where the baseball fields are a warm brick red and the grass is a grass, grass green, as Dylan Thomas might say. “Arf, arf, arf, arf?” Mr. Ed inquires as he hops up on the bench and settles in next to me.

  “What’s up, you ask? Well, not much,” I answer. “I booked a couple of dates at Don’t Tell Mama, and I’m seeing this really nice guy, and I feel sad but happy but sad but happy all the time and it’s making me crazy. Oh, and I’ve been hallucinating, or at least I think I’m hallucinating. You haven’t seen a little pink or blue fairy flying around, have you?”

  “Arrf!” Mr. Ed says, spotting a squirrel next to the sycamore tree behind us. He leaps off the bench and barks like he’s possessed. It’s hard having an extended conversation with Ed because he is so easily distracted.

  “Let’s go,” I say, pulling at the leash, and he has no choice but to obey. I like that in a companion. We walk around the Great Lawn. At the north end I stop and look south at the skyline. The view is magnificent from here. On a summer weekend it is almost impossible to make it past this part of God’s green acre without a couple of tourists asking you to take a picture of them framed by the vista. Mr. Ed spots a Great Dane and tugs at the leash, anxious for a sniff.

  On the way back to the apartment my dog companion confesses a rather intense infatuation he had with a very inappropriate Irish setter, or at least that’s what I think he says.

  He snarls at a poodle as we turn down Columbus Avenue, causing her to yelp and hide behind her owner’s legs. He “arfs” with satisfaction and then we ease into a stroll for the rest of the walk home.

  I give Mr. Ed some doggie treats and wish him a good evening. He’s asleep on the rug by the time I turn out the light. When I get home, my message machine is blinking.

  It’s Dee-Honey, wanting to set up dates with me for the summer. “So glad you’re available, honey,” her voice on the machine says.

  It’s already nine o’clock so I decide to call her tomorrow. I light a much-needed cigarette and get a beer out of the fridge and turn on the radio to the Yankees game. It’s the bottom of the seventh inning. They’re playing Baltimore and winning, which is not a surprise. I sit in the dark sipping my beer and listening. Derek Jeter hits a home run and the fans yell and the Yankees go ahead four to nothing.

  I try to concentrate on the action and not on the fact that I haven’t heard from my charming young prince of a fellow who now has a set of my keys and a place at the table of my life. I pick up the phone to make sure it’s working. It is.

  “Goodie,” I say out loud, “are you there? The Yankees are winning. Derek just hit a home run. Remember how you and Joe and I watched the games that summer?” The words catch in my throat. “Goodie, are you there?” I turn down the radio and hold my breath and listen for the flapping of little wings, but there is nothing except the sound of my Big Ben desk clock ticking off the seconds.

  5

  The next morning I wake up with a start and realize I have fallen asleep on the sofa with the radio on, and now it is seven a.m. and Curtis and Kuby are bantering away about Al Sharpton’s latest bid for notoriety. My head is pounding. I take two aspirin and decide to go for a run and start my life over—no more cigarettes, beer, scotch, sugar, younger men, and no more imaginary fairy godmothers. I have a singing gig to prepare for. The thought of it takes my breath away. I light a cigarette and remind myself I have six weeks. Plenty of time.

  I splash water on my face and try to get my hair to go in one direction. I make a cup of coffee, smoke another cigarette, then I feed Bixby and leave my apartment. It’s not even eight o’clock yet. Amazing! I stop in front of my building and start to stretch out my legs.

  Across the street, on the stoop of one of the beautifully-renovated-single-family-million-dollar-plus brownstones, sits a slightly balding, slightly overweight fellow smoking a cigarette and reading a newspaper. This guy spends a lot of time sitting on his front stoop smoking. Obviously he’s not allowed to practice his bad habit indoors. He sips his coffee and takes a drag off his cigarette. I’m sure his coffee is not the discount blend I drink but rather a robust, full-bodied import. I feel poverty stricken for a moment and jealous of this man’s big brownstone with the chandelier on the first floor and the flagstone patio in back, but then I think, so what? Maybe he does drink a better brand of coffee than I do, and lives in better digs, but nobody is telling me where I can or can’t smoke—except the city of New York, but that’s beside the point. So there, Mr. Big Bucks! It’s horrible, the mean thoughts I construct to bolster my ego so I can get through the day.

  I groan as my right hamstring relaxes into the stretch. Big Bucks looks up momentarily from his paper and nods almost imperceptibly. I nod even more imperceptibly and continue stretching. The sky is crystal clear and there is no humidity. A perfect day. I set off at a slow trot and head for the park. I’m more of a runner/walker than a pure runner. My knees have never been the same since I hyperextended the ligaments in a free-fall smash into a fence skiing about fifteen years ago. I stop at the red light on Central Park West and turn on my Walkman, which is clipped to my shorts. Cyndi Lauper fills my ears. “Girls just want to have fun,” I sing along with Cyndi as I run/walk down to the boat pond near East Seventy-second Street, and then under the Trefoil Arch heading toward Bethesda Fountain. Adorning the top of the fountain is a bronze angel with extended wings and a long skirt that billows around her legs.

  She is the Angel of the Waters, commemorating the opening in 1842 of the Croton Aqueduct, which purified the city’s water supply. In the Gospel of John, an angel was said to have troubled the pool of Bethesda in Jerusalem and thereby bestowed healing power on its waters. I stop in front of the fountain and catch my breath. I am comforted in the Angel’s presence, knowing she is walking this earth, troubling the waters and healing the afflicted. I dip my hands in the fountain, splash the water on my face, and smile up at her. “Let out the bad air and let in the good air,” I think as I continue my run/walk up through the Ramble and past Belvedere Castle.

  Mr. Big Bucks is not on his stoop when I return. He’s no doubt down on Wall Street making gobs of money in that rarified world of high-stakes Monopoly, and good for him, because right now I feel rich too. My body is working in spite of the abuse I heap on it. My skin is clear, my hair still has some natural sheen, and my teeth are all my own. Life is good. Indeed, the waters of Bethesda have worked magic and I don’t, at least for the moment, need to find fault with the rest of the world so I can feel better about myself, and that is definitely some kind of miracle.

  I open the door to my apartment and find Jack sitting on the sofa reading the paper. I let out a startled yelp. He smiles at me. “Hey, baby, I brought some sticky buns.” He gestures to a Hot & Crusty bag on the coffee table. “I would have made some coffee, but I couldn’t find the filters.”

  I sit down and try to calm my heart, which is thumping in my chest like the percussion section of a John Philip Sousa marching band.

  “Are you okay?” Jack asks.

  NOTE TO SELF . . .

  Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s multimillion dollar brownstone.

  “Sure, sure,” I say, still short of breath. “I’m just not used to walking into my apartment and finding someone here and it caught me by surprise and at first I thought I was going to have a heart attack but I guess not so we won’t have to call 911.” I take a deep breath.

  “Sorry,” Jack says.

  “It’s fine, but I do think I need to sit here quietly for a few minutes and try to slow my heart rate down before it goes into arrhythmia which it has done a few times like when I was on a roller coaster in Sandusky, Ohio, and that’s how it feels r
ight now which believe me is scary . . .” I finish with the last bit of oxygen left in my lungs.

  “Gosh,” Jack says contritely. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I thought I’d drop by this morning and have breakfast with you. I’m looking at an apartment in the neighborhood.”

  He walks over and starts to rub my shoulders. “I know Swedish massage,” Jack purrs. “Why don’t you lie down on the bed and I can help you to relieve some of that anxiety. It’ll feel great.” Damn. He is going to get to me again. I’m a sucker for any form of body contact.

  “Do you have any oil? Baby oil or something?” Jack asks, heading for the bathroom. Damn and double damn. I am especially a sucker for body contact involving oil.

  “Take your clothes off,” he says as he enters with a bottle of discount you-know-what.

  “Maybe I should jump in the shower,” I suggest, suddenly feeling self-conscious about the run/walk sweat I worked up in the summer heat.

  “We’ll do that later. You smell great,” he says straddling me and pulling his shirt over his head. “This is going to be really good, Mags. Trust me. All right. Now close your eyes and breathe. I’ll do all the work,” Jack coos.

  Oh I do like it when someone coos, and I like it especially when someone else does all the work. I moan a little, hum softly, and try to relax.

  When I was about five years old, my mother and I tried an experiment we read about in Highlights children’s magazine. I don’t remember the exact directions or all the ingredients, but basically you combined food coloring with salt and other everyday substances, and in a few minutes the raw ingredients were transformed into beautiful crystal sculptures. Jack’s alchemy is beginning to transform my raw everyday ingredients into some new configuration, a warmer, softer substance. Or am I just more “me” in the presence of “him”? Or is the mix of exercise endorphins and gentle massage causing me to hallucinate? Whatever it is, it is good. It certainly feels good as I lie on my bow-tie-print quilt with a strong young man straddling my body massaging away the tensions of the world. The massage turns into sex and then into a shower and then into a day. Jack leaves to look at apartments, and I decide it is time to plan my show at Don’t Tell Mama. It’s time to call Thomas Garrick, the accompanist I like from Eleanor Roosevelt: The Musical! He had mentioned that he liked my voice, thought I had a sort of Barbra Streisand quality. So there, it’s true, flattery will get you something, maybe not everything, but definitely something.