by Edward Vilga
I walk around for the next two and a half hours in a daze, wondering if there’s anything I can do to remedy the situation. Absolutely nothing comes to mind.
I show up for my lesson with Linney, pretty sure of what the outcome’s going to be. I am grateful that at least I can enter his showroom without going through a doorman security system. When he sees me, he looks genuinely sympathetic—crestfallen, even—but fortunately his wry, gay humor supersedes all.
“Tsk tsk, Blue Eyes. You’ve been a very bad boy. Were it not for this bum hip, I’d like to spank you myself.”
“The whole situation sucks.”
“I can imagine. I’m sorry, but of course, you realize …” he trails off, less willing than the rest to vaporize me from his life.
“That it’s over between us,” I finish for him.
“You make it sound so romantic. I like that.”
Despite myself, I smile against my will at his autopilot flirtation. He continues, downtrodden, “Although I’d like to think that given our vast, epic, and intertwined family histories, Brooke would never see fit to use her considerable influence to discourage and diminish my clientele, I can’t afford to kid myself.”
Even though it’s only noon, Linney pours us both stiff tumblers of bourbon. “She absolutely would. She’s not a woman who likes to be contradicted.”
“I understand.”
“Ah, Blue Eyes, don’t look so sad. You’ll get through this.” At this point, I’m beginning to wonder, but Linney continues, “Now of course, if you were willing to consider running away with me, I suppose I could close up the shop, sell off everything, and probably we’d have just enough for us to retire and live modestly but happily on some tropical isle together. We wouldn’t have more than enough to pay for a set of matching sarongs, but I think you’d look rather dashing, like a young Clark Gable in Mutiny on the Bounty.”
“I find it somehow strangely comforting that despite the fact that my life is falling to pieces, you can still flirt with me,” I half smile, sipping my bourbon.
“Oh, dear boy. Don’t take it so hard. You’re not a condemned man. And Brooke’s not God.”
He thinks for a second as he sips his drink. “Well, at least not below 57th Street, she isn’t.”
When I leave Linney three hours later, bolstered a bit by the pan-fried foie gras lunch he impulsively makes, topped off by crème brûlée, we exchange a long, comradely hug. It may be the three or four bourbons we’ve washed the foie gras down with, but I feel myself about to tear up—until he grabs my ass, and we both laugh. It’s a fitting ending—heartfelt but irreverent, harmlessly flirtatious to the last. I think it’s best I get going, as I’ve got a busy agenda of aimless wandering planned, with much stopping in taverns along the way.
God, how I wish Hutch were in town or even remotely reachable. Disregarding the fact that Fiji’s probably in some completely unfavorable time zone, I actually try his cell phone. It rings for a second and then goes dead, not even spiraling over to voicemail. It’s not encouraging that I can’t even leave a message about my colossally messed-up predicament. I try Janek’s as well, and the same thing happens. Clearly Fiji is somehow not covered under either of their calling plans.
After my third bar visit, I decide to take the fourth call that’s come in from Monique’s lawyer, prepared for the inevitable. Not surprisingly, the Cleavage Boyz have backed out of the deal.
“Can they do that?” I ask Monique’s lawyer.
“Did you read the contract?” she barks condescendingly. Frankly, I more or less skimmed it, trusting that Monique was looking out for every business angle with her ravenous eagle eyes.
I’m told straightaway that they absolutely can back out based on paragraphs x, y, and z, and subsection this and that. And here’s the kicker: they want their first $1.333 million back—nearly all of which has been spent, of course—except for Monique’s finder’s fee, which is protected and nonrefundable under any circumstances.
“No problem. I’ll be down there in twenty minutes with my checkbook,” I sneer.
“This is not a joking matter. According to the terms of the deal you signed, this is completely within their rights,” Monique’s lawyer tells me sternly.
“How is that possible? I can’t even get store credit at the Gap without a receipt.”
“It’s unfortunate for you, but they are entitled to a full refund of their money.”
“Yeah, except of course for your client Monique’s finder’s fee.”
“Well, honestly, why should my client suffer just because you blew the deal she got for you? Besides, hasn’t something like this happened to you before with investors?” the lawyer asks. I can’t tell if she’s asking rhetorically, just to salt the wound more deeply, or whether she really wants to know for some valid reason.
“Sort of. Why do you ask?”
“I just thought you might have paid more attention to that section of the contract, that’s all. These situations have a tendency to repeat themselves,” she comments pointedly.
I almost correct her: they don’t repeat—like viruses, they mutate and multiply. Instead of getting caught with one investor’s wife, I’ve been caught with two. And instead of losing $120,000, I’m out over a million. Tired of being lectured, I decide it’s easier to just hang up.
Via her assistant, I actually manage to reach Monique directly in Thailand.
Ten thousand miles away, she’s fully abreast of the sorry situation. Her no-nonsense manner is running full throttle.
“I’m sorry but I don’t see how I can help you,” is how she answers the line. “I’ve already called Richard Johnson at The Post to see about a possible retraction, although those things never do any good. Anyway, it doesn’t matter because although he won’t reveal them, he assures me his sources are impeccable.”
“Sources?” I question, noting the plural.
“Yes. Could be investigators from one of those jealous husbands eager to make some extra tabloid loot. Maybe one of the more vengeful ladies in the legions you’ve casually tossed off. Or maybe just some lucky dirt someone dug up on you while covering one of your celebrated private clients.”
Monique is neither angry nor rude, merely straight to the point.
“Certainly, I suspected that something like this might be going on, but I hoped that it would remain entirely discreet. It seemed a calculated, reasonable risk.”
Another thing I did not know about Monique is that apparently, she speaks Thai. For a few moments, she barks orders to underlings before returning to our conversation.
“Although sometimes this kind of tawdry exposure can bolster something’s appeal, unfortunately I just can’t imagine anyone who would take this on right now. I am afraid that the property will go back on the market, and you’ll have to face the liability issues alone.”
She issues more directions in Thai, working towards manifesting another five-star Becker triumph. “Well, anyway, I still wish you luck,” she says. “You’re going to need it.”
There’s a pause. Despite trying to be all business, I can feel a transcontinental wave of compassion wash over Monique. “Look, I really do wish I could do something more for you,” she says. “or offer something comforting. What’s the thing they say in yoga classes … ‘Remember to breathe.’”
“Yeah, that’s what I say whenever I don’t have a clue.”
“The bottom line is that no matter how bad this gets, you’re not dead. While there’s life, there’s hope. And when there’s hope, there’s always the possibility that something will work out. Most of the time, it usually does.” And with that, she signs off.
Having started at noon with Linney, I watch the hours pass as I wander the streets, grabbing drinks at various bars. Once happy hour hits, every now and then, while bellying up to the bar, I run into someone I vaguely know, which I take as a cue for immediate departure; when your world is falling apart, sometimes you really do need to be alo
ne in the crowd.
By the time it’s nightfall, I’m moderately hammered—not so bad that I’m staggering but enough so that I’m not exactly thinking clearly.
I stroll back toward Phoebe’s building. Seeing her, pleading with her to try to understand, has become dominant in my thoughts. Perhaps it’s because the $1.333 million is too staggering a problem to wrap my mind around. Or, perhaps it’s because hurting her reminds me a little too much of hurting Shane all over again.
During the afternoon, I’ve called Phoebe a dozen times, caller ID be damned. The first eight or so times, I just hung up. Then I left a generic message asking her to call me so I could explain. Then, I believe I left two different messages in which I started to explain, tried to delete my false starts from the voicemail system, but may or may not have hit the key to mark them “urgent” as opposed to getting rid of them entirely. How limitless, I wonder, is the possibility of things getting totally fucked up?
You know, Park Avenue is not an easy place to stalk someone, I realize drunkenly. It’s all very exposed, something I assume to be the antithesis of the stalker mentality. There are no nooks or crannies, no places to hide and view from afar. Just big buildings and doormen and stretches of sidewalk. From across the street and a little down the block, I keep monitoring Phoebe’s windows—even though I’m not sure what I’m looking for.
I do see lights go on and off occasionally in Phoebe’s apartment, but I have no idea what any of the flickering means. Is it Phoebe’s maid doing a final dusting … or is Phil searching for sandwich crumbs? How many hours are appropriate for a stalking? Am I required to stay here until I am escorted away by the police or the local sanitarium? When it starts to drizzle lightly, I am even more confused. Getting soaked to the bone and dying of pneumonia seems a fitting end, but I’m not sure if even I have the masochistic endurance required to take another pummeling today.
For better or worse, my musings are cut short when I see a figure that, even through the blur of alcohol and from across the street, is unmistakably Phoebe, appearing in her building’s lobby.
Barely glancing at the traffic, and nearly getting sideswiped by a cab in the process, I race across the street to her.
I realize it’s the first time I’ve seen Phoebe in anything but a yoga stretch outfit. Dressed now for some formal function, she looks like a pint-sized goddess in a flowing gown and all the jewelry that wire hangers can buy. She waits underneath the awning as the doorman attempts to hail her a cab in what is rapidly turning into a downpour. This is a night-shift doorman, and thus someone I’ve never met, who seems just as surprised as Phoebe when I race forward toward her.
“You’ve got to talk to me,” I blurt out.
The doorman looks like he might be reaching for a handgun, or at least pepper spray, but Phoebe holds him at bay. Somehow, she manages to signal him that while police intervention is not in order, he should nonetheless not stray too far.
“I shouldn’t be speaking to you,” is the first thing Phoebe says me.
I want to ask, why “shouldn’t?”—is it because whatever she’s feeling is too painful or simply because Big Stepsis Brooke has forbidden it—but I don’t.
Though half drunk, I try to stay focused. “I need to explain everything to you,” I start.
“I don’t think any explanation is going to help much.”
She’s probably right—there’s not really much I could say that would improve, much less fix, the situation—and more to the point, despite patrolling outside her building for the past few hours, I haven’t prepared anything particularly compelling to say in my defense.
I don’t even know where to begin. Should I start by explaining that the Cleavage Twins were just meaningless, diversionary sex?
Or should I confess that, despite her unique, high-minded view of me, I am possessed of a deeply if not hopelessly flawed character, and that perhaps my greatest mistake was letting her think well of me?
Or do I lead my defense with an admission of true and intense feelings for her, feelings that made me run straight from her willing and loving arms?
Or do I have to start from the beginning, spilling my guts about my entire story, knowing that the only way to perhaps forgive me is to understand my entire pathology?
“I … I … It’s not like you think,” I fumble again.
Phoebe looks at me, and I fancy that her eyes are pleading me to make things right. “So, it’s not true, then?”
I’m silent. This is was clearly the wrong tactic.
“It’s all lies,” she continues, hopeful yet worried. “Seducing students at Epitome. Sleeping with your investors’ wives.”
I can’t lie to her, so I say nothing. She continues. “Rejecting me, not because you’re some ethical person, but because … because …” Phoebe’s holding back tears, unable to fill in the blanks about why I turned her away so abruptly when I am clearly a base, horny dog.
I realize it is not without irony that this is perhaps the singular incident in my life where I have made matters worse by not sleeping with a woman.
I’m not sure what I can say to her that doesn’t involve endless explanation, and even then, it might not be forgivable or made right. I’m spared this next failure, however, as Phil waddles toward us, dressed in what is probably a $3,000 Armani tux that manages to make him look like, well, a bullfrog in a $3,000 tux.
He stares at me, surprised. Then he reads the choreography of my positioning with Phoebe—turned close to her, my hands gently on her upper arms in intimate, forgiveness-beseeching mode—and his face goes beet red. Clearly, today Phil has had a rude awakening not only to my true sexuality but also to the possibility that his lovely wife was perhaps an available tender morsel for this carnivorous wolf.
“You better get out of here, son.” Phil says, standing between us. Even though my advantages include a foot of height along with thirty years and forty pounds in my favor, Phil manfully steps up to bring Phoebe behind him, away from my sullying hands.
Despite hours of brooding, I’ve somehow not thought any of this through. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do here, or what I can say. Technically, no adulterous crimes were committed with Phoebe. I want to reassure Phil of that while simultaneously also convincing Phoebe how much I genuinely want to make love to her—that even now, drunk and disgraced, I want her even more. Not even the most experienced diplomat could rescue this situation.
Phil puffs up his chest—bullfrogs do that—and I flash on the crazy street fighter Phil must have been to have clawed his way up to the top floors on Park Avenue. The look in his eyes conveys both eagerness to duke it out with me and a reasonable level of reservation at the prospect of taking on someone with much greater physical advantage.
I look at Phoebe, who just seems utterly lost and confused. If only this were a clearer, cleaner situation. If only I’d admitted something of what I was feeling for her rather than running from it the moment it nearly rose to a boil. Then the fight we’d be having would make sense. I, the Lancelot interloper, stealing the fair Guinevere would be entirely deserving of a pummeling from this Bullfrog Arthur. Instead, my crime is wimpy omission: I’ve passively allowed Phil to think I’m a show-tune-loving gay guy and Phoebe to miscast me as a mystical poet. For entirely different reasons, both seem rather unglued by their parallel revelations that I’m a run-of-the-mill heterosexual with dubious moral standards.
Backing away, I know there’s no way I can fix things here today. I have no choice but to add Phoebe to my ever-growing list of “People to Whom I Need to Redeem Myself.” Phil seems both disappointed and relieved. “I’m sorry,” is all I can muster toward Phoebe.
“I’m really sorry,” I repeat numbly as I exit from underneath the safety of the awning into what can now only be called a downpour. I fantasize that Phoebe’s lips silently mouth, “Me, too.” But truthfully, she seems only sad, yet grateful, to see me go.
As I travel downtown to the site of Di
wali Almost, needing one more dose of misery, I stop by the bridge gallery. Sure enough, it delivers. Close to a year ago, I saw Shane herself here at Andrea’s show, and as I’m approaching, there she is again. Well, almost. There’s a huge painting of her on the wall, a new work that’s the centerpiece of Andrea’s solo show.
I stare at the canvas through the glass. Maybe it’s that I’m already haunted by Shane, but even at this distance, the painting is striking and evocative. I don’t think Andrea’s woven me into the imagery, and frankly I don’t care. I’m sure if I wanted, I could take partial credit for the fiery yet wounded look in Shane’s eyes. What the fuck does it matter?
I head off for my graveyard march to Diwali.
Someone—I suppose someone from Monique’s lawyer’s office—has let the crew know that that the jig is up. As if the building were ruins leveled by an ancient volcano, it seems that the workers have fled midday, abandoning everything they couldn’t take with them.
Besides all the money that’s been spent here, I don’t even want to think about all the items that have been placed on order and all the unpaid work already done by the architect. Will anyone, contractor or tile maker, be willing to just forget about the whole thing? Or am I going to be stuck with seventy-five barstools that will take up more than the space of my apartment? Just then, I realize that I’ve ordered close to another million dollars’ worth of shit that will be arriving over the next few weeks; who knows how much of that I’m liable for.
Sitting around—squatting on the floor, actually—I’m quite convinced that this must be rock bottom. Like a co-ed who’s trapped by the killer in a horror movie, I realize I’m at that moment in which I think things can’t possibly get any worse.