“He’s probably hurt.”
“I’m hurt too. I’m going to go. I’ll call you, and here, take this.” Sandy hands me a wad of bills. “Here’s money for dog food.”
“You don’t have to.”
“It’s Dick’s money. Take it.” Sandy leans down and gives Ed a hug. “You be good for Mags.” Then she picks up her bags and leaves.
“Well, Ed,” I say, “welcome to your new home.”
I unpack my bag and put some water on for coffee. I’m dying for some caffeine. The light on my answering machine is blinking, which means I have messages. I walk over and look at the display window. The number seven flashes on and off. I wait until I make my coffee before I listen to them. I’m sure one of them is from Jack. I feel it. I press the play button. The first one is from Charles, saying he’s sorry about the whole video art thing and that Chad is in fact a great guy. “We want to take you out for a really expensive meal. What do you say? Please, you know I can’t live without you. Call me.” Charles knows I’m a sucker for pleading. And expensive meals.
The next two are from Dee-Honey giving me the call times for the Pied Piper show this weekend and then calling back to give me the revised time. “Call me to confirm,” she says.
The fourth call is a hang-up. I hate that. Maybe it’s Jack. The next is my friend Patty, followed by a message from my agent: “Call me as soon as you get in. I’ve got an audition for you on Monday.”
The next message is a voice I don’t recognize. “You don’t know me. My name is Bob. I’m a friend of Jack Eremus. Call me when you get this. It’s important.”
My heart almost stops. I quickly copy down the number he left. Why in the world would a friend of Jack’s call me? I sit down and take deep breaths. I feel anxious. Free floating. Like I could pass out.
Bixby climbs in my lap and I scratch his head. “I’m sure it’s nothing, Bix. Maybe it’s a surprise birthday party. I can’t remember when Jack said his birthday is or if he ever did.”
“It’s in December,” I hear a tinkling voice say. Goodie is standing on the arm of the sofa. “December seventeenth.”
“Well, where have you been? And how do you know Jack’s birthday?”
“He told you the first night you met.”
“Oh, right. I don’t remember much about that first night.”
“I do,” Goodie says rolling his eyes. “I saw the whole thing.”
“You were there?”
“Don’t you get it yet? I’m everywhere.” He puts a little hand on my shoulder. “I think you better make that call.”
“Do you know what it’s about?” I ask him.
“Just call, Maggie,” Goodie says flying onto my knee. “I’ll be right here.”
I dial the number. It rings six times, and then the same voice that was on my message machine answers.
“Hi,” I say. “This is Maggie. You left a message for me. About Jack.”
“Yeah, this is his friend Bob. We went to high school together. I got your number off his cell phone. I’m sorry to tell you . . .”
“Oh, God,” I gasp.
“Jack died two days ago. He had an aneurysm. It was very quick. I thought you would want to know.”
I feel like I’m going to faint.
“Do you want to take some time and call me back? I’m sorry, I know this is a shock. Everyone is in shock.”
“Yes. I’ll do that. Where was he?”
“He was driving and luckily he was able to steer the car off the road before he hit anyone. The doctors said the pain would be paralyzing, but Jack managed to get off the highway before he went unconscious. Someone stopped and called for help but by the time they got there he was . . .” Bob’s voice trails off. I can tell he is crying.
“Thank you for calling me, Bob.” My voice breaks. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry.”
“Me too.” Bob sobs and we hang up.
“I’m sorry, Maggie,” Goodie says.
“How could you let this happen?”
“I didn’t let it happen. I have no control over these things.”
“What about all your magic?”
“I don’t have that kind of magic, Maggie, nobody does.”
“You’re my fairy god-queen. You’re supposed to take care of me.”
“I can’t take care of you Maggie, I can only love you. That’s all anyone can do for anyone else.”
“I’ve got to get out of here,” I say, getting up and stepping into my sandals. I grab my wallet and keys. “And don’t you come with me, Goodie. I want to be alone.” Mr. Ed whines and follows me to the door.
“Sorry, Ed. I’m not taking you with me,” I say. He sits back on his haunches and looks so miserable I relent.
“Okay,” I say, getting his leash. “But no talking; I don’t feel like any chitchat. Understand?” Mr. Ed nods.
NOTE TO SELF . . .
Don’t expect your fairy godmother to have all the answers.
I get out on the street, I can barely walk, my legs feel heavy and my chest is tight. It’s early evening. The air is warm and the sky is turning a pretty sunset pink. Slowly Ed and I walk over to Riverside Park. I have to stop every half block or so and take big gulps of air. Ed sits quietly at my feet until I can move again. When we get to the river, we sit and watch the sun go down. Jack told me once that as a kid he thought God pulled a big circus tent over the earth at night to make it dark, and that the stars were little in the tent where the sun peeked through. I sit completely still in meditation like at the monastery. People pass me by, people on rollerblades, on bicycles, pushing baby strollers—people living their lives.
Ed curls up next to me on the bench. The sun slips behind the buildings across the river. The sky turns from pink to mauve. The streetlights come on and reflect off the river as the warm summer evening rests an arm around my shoulders. I wonder if I’m in shock. The tears have stopped but I can’t move. I can only sit and stare. Maybe if I don’t move, nothing else bad will ever happen. Maybe if I don’t move, Jack’s soul will return to earth and reclaim its place, and the corpse that is now cooling at some funeral home in Queens will start to breathe again and the heart will pump and Jack will rise up from the dead. A miracle, a medical anomaly, a mistake by the coroner—it happens. People have been buried alive. Doctors make mistakes and so does God, if indeed God is the one who determines fate, the one who gives and takes life. God made a mistake with Jack, dammit, and if I sit still enough and pray hard enough and believe deeply enough God will perform a miracle and Jack will take a breath and live. I sit perfectly still and stare straight ahead. Ed sits next to me. We say our separate prayers. Finally Mr. Ed stirs and licks my face. It’s dark and the lights in the buildings across the river have started to come on.
“Okay, Ed,” I say. “Let’s go.” Ed jumps off the bench and we leave the park. I decide not to go home. I walk down Broadway to the Dublin House. I could use a drink. It’s been almost a week since I’ve had a one. I won’t smoke. I just need a shot of scotch. I can’t give up everything. Ed and I sit at the end of the bar and I order. Scotch straight up. The bartender delivers my drink. I take a sip. It burns going down, which is the way I like it. I like to know that something is happening. Then it hits my empty stomach and goes to work. I take a deep breath and feel the neurons leaping back and forth between the synapses in my brain, and everything slows down and I relax. I don’t need all that information—all those feelings. I take another sip and I can feel my shoulders drop an inch or two. Mr. Ed looks at me from his position on the floor. I reach down, pick him up, and put him in the barstool next to me. The Dublin is slow this time of night.
“Bowl of water for my friend,” I say to the bartender. And then I smile my million-dollar smile. In the half light of the bar I can still pass for a pretty young thing, especially with some scotch in my belly. I drain the glass. “And another round for me,” I call out. He brings the drink and a bowl for Ed.
“My name is Artie,” he says. “And we’re really
not supposed to serve anyone with more than two legs, but I’ll make an exception because the boss isn’t here and your friend looks thirsty. I had a Westie when I was a kid. They’re cool.”
When Artie was a kid wasn’t long ago. He looks like he’s about eighteen, but I’m sure to be serving liquor he has to be older.
“Thanks. Mr. Ed appreciates it, don’t you Ed?” And sure enough Ed barks in agreement. God, he’s a smart dog. I should try to find him an agent—as long as he’s going to be living with me for a while he should earn his keep.
I finish my drink and Artie buys me another round. “On the house,” he says, putting the glass down in front of me. “You’re the woman on the cereal commercials, aren’t you?”
“Special K? Yeah that’s me,” I say.
“Wow, I’m an actor too.”
“Great.” I say. Someone from the other end of the bar orders another brew and Artie hops to it. The scotch has definitely done its job. The room seems fuzzy and I feel hot. Mr. Ed has dozed off on his barstool. One drink and he’s out.
One night Jack and I came into the Dublin for a drink. We played the vintage pinball machine in the back and walked home to my place holding hands—one evening in a whole series of evenings. We made love and fell asleep and woke up and took a shower and made love again. We made love a lot. It was electric. Exciting. Jack made me feel like nothing had passed me by, that everything was in the future; that forty-one was just a number, an illusion, that you really could be as young as you felt, and that the feeling would last forever. Where was Jack going? What was he thinking in the last moment before he was struck with pain? Was he happy? Was he wondering what’s next? What was the next thing going to be? Did he get my message? Wow. I’d forgotten that. I had left him a message on his voice mail when I was in West Virginia, saying I was sorry. Did he get it? I hope he did.
“Hey, Artie,” I say too loudly. “Got a cigarette?”
“Sure, Special K, but you got to smoke it outside.” He bounds back with a cigarette and a light.
“I know,” I say as he lights me up. “Come on, Ed.” I pay Artie and leave a five-dollar tip. Mr. Ed and I head up Broadway. I’m drunker than I thought, and now the cigarette is making me more light-headed. Why am I doing this? Why? I get to my corner and Mr. Ed turns, but I pull him in the other direction.
“We’re not going home, Ed,” I say. I walk a few more blocks and find the building I want. It’s almost midnight. I perch on the front steps of the brownstone and Ed curls up next to me. A few people pass. I bum another cigarette. Then I see a familiar figure coming down the block with a dog in tow.
“Hey, remember me?” I say with a slight slur.
“Sure,” Spider says. “My damsel in distress.”
“Jack died. Remember Jack? You met him that night. Something happened in his brain. It was sudden.”
“And you’ve been drinking,” Spider says, sitting down next to me. Abby and Mr. Ed sniff at each other.
“I didn’t mean to, but I went to a bar because I didn’t know where else to go and, dammit, it’s not fair. Everybody keeps dying, why is that?” I start to cry, and then I cry and cry and cry. “Do you know that his mother abandoned him, ran off with a saxophone player. Mothers!” I say. “They get away with murder and yet . . .”
“Yet, what?” Spider asks, rubbing my back.
“In a crisis, that’s who you want. When I was attacked in the park that’s who I cried out for.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“Only if there is no mother around to help. Then you’re on you own, like Jack was in the end.”
“We’re all alone in the end,” Spider says.
“Yeah, and yet we’re all still waiting for Godot.”
“Who?”
“Godot. It’s the name of a play by an Irish existentialist,” I say. “It’s a comedy.”
“I see,” Spider says in a soothing voice.
I cry some more and then he walks me home. He helps me find my key and gets me into my apartment.
“I’m going to write my phone number here. Get some sleep and call me in the morning. You’re going to be all right. I’m sorry about Jack, and you’re right, life isn’t fair, but that doesn’t mean you get to quit and go home. It ain’t that easy.”
Spider leaves and I sit and stare at the wall, and I want to do as Spider said and get some sleep, but I can’t. Not yet. I put my sandals back on and head for the door. Mr. Ed is right at my heels.
“I’m just going down to the deli for a few things,” I say. “You stay here and keep Bixby company.” And I am out the door. I am definitely feeling the effects of the scotch, but it’s not enough. I weave my way down to Amsterdam Avenue and go to Vinnie’s Deli, which is a happening place at one a.m., with the lottery machine running at full tilt. The New York jackpot is over ten million, so everybody thinks they’re a winner. A couple of guys from the hood are leaning on a car in front of the store talking about shit. It’s hard to figure out exactly what shit, but from the pitch of their voices and the animation of their conversation it is some pretty important shit. I get a six-pack of Miller Lite and a pack of Marlboros. Vinnie behind the counter smiles and I smile back.
“How’s it going?” he asks.
“It’s going,” I say.
I’ve been coming into this place for the past ten years for cigarettes and beer, and the past two weeks are the longest time Vinnie and I have been apart. His brother runs the place during the day and Vinnie is the night guy. “Have you been out of town?” he asks.
“Upstate for a while,” I say, taking my change from the twenty-dollar bill I handed him.
“Have a good one,” Vin says.
“Yeah, you too.” I leave with my contraband. At least it feels like contraband. I don’t wait to get home to open the cigarettes and light up. I fumble around in the bag for the matches and light one as I walk, then I sit out on the front stoop and crack open a beer. I’m drunk but not too drunk. I’m high enough to feel like I’m in an alternate universe, but not so high I’m stupid. And for now I like being in a different universe, the one where things don’t happen—nothing happens and nothing goes wrong and life is one endless evening with the person you want to be with and the food you want to eat and the music you want to listen to and the place you want to be and you stay there forever.
I hear laughter down the block. A couple is coming in my direction. They are wrapped around each other and giggling and stumbling toward me. As they get closer I realize it is Dick and a young woman with strawberry blonde hair. She is probably early twenties, and seems to be wild about Dick—no pun intended. I wish I could disappear. Dick looks up and sees me and freezes.
“Hey, Bucko,” I say. “How’s it hanging?” Oops. Now that’s not nice.
“Maggie,” Dick says, poison darting off the word. He searches in his pocket for his keys. Miss Strawberry Blonde gets very quiet and prim. The whole picture is getting clearer. Apparently the fact that Dick was having sex with Sandy only once a month doesn’t mean he was having sex only once a month. I suddenly have reason to think he is actually quite active in that department. They make their way past me and get the key in the door and escape from my knowing gaze. The things one learns on a summer’s eve.
I take the rest of my six-pack and go up to my apartment. Mr. Ed and Bixby are asleep on the couch. I open another beer and sit by the window and smoke another cigarette. I fold myself into the chair and place the ashtray on the overstuffed arm. I take a long pull on the beer and lean back and smoke and smoke and smoke. The nicotine and beer and scotch have successfully conspired to ease my mind and numb my feelings, but they haven’t made me truly drunk. At least not so drunk that I can just pass out. So I sit and watch the lights flicker off in the apartments around the courtyard as one by one my neighbors brush their teeth and pat the cat and kiss the kids and fold down the sheets and go to bed. Day is done.
When I was in high school I competed in poetry reading competitions. The poetry
readers and the debaters traveled to events at other high schools. And if you were good enough you competed in the districts and the states. I made it to states my junior year. I won second prize and lost my virginity in a Ramada Inn to the captain of the debating team. I always find that expression interesting. Lost my virginity. Like something happened, I didn’t see it happen, couldn’t remember what happened, but one minute I had my virginity and next minute it was gone, and now as I reflect maybe lost is the perfect word. Because often it does happen like that, and before you know it you’re searching around on the floor, under the bed, in the medicine cabinet for something you thought you had a minute ago but now it’s gone. And once you’ve lost it there is no getting it back.
I can still recite the poem I read or rather “interpreted” when I won second prize. It begins,
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.
I see the lights of the village
Gleam through the rain and the mist,
And a feeling of sadness comes o’er me
That my soul cannot resist.
A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrows only
As the mist resembles the rain.
It’s Longfellow’s poem, “Day Is Done.” I recite it slowly in hushed tones. Bixby climbs in my lap and Mr. Ed snores on the couch.
Come, read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.
I don’t even have a picture of Jack. Not one snapshot. I’m not a picture taker. My sister-in-law carries a camera with her at all times and constantly records moments. She has hundreds of photo albums filled with snapshots of her kids eating at McDonald’s, swimming in the ocean, standing at the bus stop, sleeping in a chair in front of the TV. I would give anything to have one picture of Jack. His face recorded forever. I have an umbrella he left by my front door and a pair of tube socks. And I found my virginity. Yes, and it’s not the beer talking. I felt like a virgin again when I made love to Jack, I guess because he made me feel young, he made me feel the world was new and fresh, not burdened with loss.
Dorothy on the Rocks Page 23