by Ames, Alex
Louise
Winter turned into spring. It brought changes to Louise, who battled cancer with everything that she had. Dr. Singh’s mood improved daily as his famous patient reacted well to the chemotherapy; the pretherapy of the experimental drug seemed to have helped. They made it without a bone marrow donor, as after two rounds of chemo, the tests were satisfactory, though Louise’s body had degenerated, her reserves being depleted further and further.
One day in early May after looking at the daily bloodwork, Singh looked up at Louise. “You are aware that we will part very soon?”
“As long as it’s on my own two feet and not in a crate, I am fine with that statement,” Louise said.
“I don’t know what I will do without your ever-present humor.”
“Finally get engaged to your Indian blind date?” Louise said.
“If you got your certification, you could start as a nurse here. You know it all by now.”
“That falls under the category Knowledge You Wish You Didn’t Have. When’s the day?”
“Next Friday, if nothing unexpected creeps up.”
“In three days, are you serious?”
“Dead serious,” Singh said with a straight face. Louise was the only patient with whom he could make these sorts of jokes.
“I need to make plans then!”
“Your manager was so kind to prepare a rehabilitation already.”
“You talked to Izzy about my condition?”
“No, he offered this a while ago, and I think the place he has in mind is excellent. So I took the liberty of alerting the resort of your upcoming arrival, and Mr. Floris had arranged the details of the trip.”
Louise almost made a flippant remark. But she knew everyone meant well, and she was in a sorry state. So she said, “Thank you, Dr. Singh.”
“You are welcome, Louise.”
Saying good-bye was an emotional affair for everyone involved except for Dr. Singh. After hugging and talking to nurse after nurse and various doctors, it was Dr. Singh who rolled her wheelchair to the sub-basement parking garage, where Floris and the ambulance were waiting, to take her to the airport. A strap had to hold Louise up, because she was so weak.
“Now it is good-bye, Louise,” Singh said.
“You saved my life,” Louise said and coughed. “Do you think that I will be the same after rehab?”
Singh shook his head. “Listen, you might be able to get your former body back if you work at yourself and concentrate on good balanced nutrition in parallel. But your mind and spirit are different now; you will see. Your priorities will have shifted over the past half year.”
“So I became a better person by facing death?”
Singh shook his head again. “You wish it was so easy! Some of my patients come out of treatment as changed people and leave their family to travel to the North Pole or live in a cabin in the woods. Not necessarily a better person, right?”
“I read in Variety that my former costar and friend Josh Hancock took that route, moving into a cabin. But my mind is empty right now.”
“Take it step by step. Get your body back first, the rest will follow. Safe travels. I hope never to see you again, Louise,” Dr. Singh said, smiling, and patted her hand carefully.
“Thank you for everything. I know where to donate a lot of money, when I am back behind my checkbook.” Louise smiled and squeezed his hand as hard as she could, which was not very hard.
“Remember rule one when it comes to donations.” Singh beamed.
“Which is?”
“There never can be too many zeros on the check.”
Louise was moved to an exclusive VIP resort in Palm Springs. Most of the other patients were battling addictions of various types, but Louise was here to become a human being again. From her former 120 pounds she was down to an ultra-skinny 72, which gave her body zero reserves. The walk from her bed to the balcony was an effort. Her new doctor assured her that after four weeks of rehabilitation and exercise she would be presentable again.
Palm Springs was hell. Nothing new, been there in Baltimore, done that. Louise wasn’t able yet to put herself under the same regimen that she had used for her action film roles in the past. The training—simple gymnastic exercises at first—slowly brought back strength and stamina, the good food filled up her reserves and modified her body shape. She picked up her old habit of looking at her reflection every morning to decide whether she was on the right track. It was hard at first. Her legs like matchsticks, big wrinkles on her upper thighs, her hip bones protruding, every rib visible, a flabby bag of skin where her breasts had been, crinkles everywhere, an old lady at thirty-seven. And then her face! Her hair had started to grow again; she looked like Sinead O’Connor, circa 1985. Her beautiful eyes were set back in their sockets, and the still perfectly white teeth looked like dentures in a grandma’s face. She had to have dental surgery to replace two missing molars that had not survived the war. Her face had a mousy look, with her nose pointedly dominating the features.
I look like a survivor. Or prison camp inmate. Maybe I’m both?
She kept her former life out. Floris lurked nearby the resort, but was not really needed. Izzy offered to come by, but Louise declined and had asked to the staff to discourage any visitors. With her skinhead and her emaciated look, other patients did not recognize her, even though some had heard that “the Louise Waters” was a guest at the resort. She kept to herself, sat alone at her dining room table or ate in her room, read books, slept the sleep of a healthy person, and went through her initial exercises.
After three weeks in Palm Springs, Louise picked up outdoor sports and intensified her training. Izzy organized an exclusive four-week gig with Simona to come in, and when she saw half a Louise in front of her, her first words were, “Your slacking days are so over, honey!”
To finish a jogging route around the resort’s golf course was the first challenge Simona set for her. Simona motivated her gently, and she made the four miles in an hour and a half.
“I felt like an old lady with a pushcart,” Louise said, puffing.
“She overtook us halfway. But don’t worry. In two weeks we’ll have you at sixty minutes flat. We’ll take the same pace tomorrow and then improve from there. See you in two hours at the gym.”
Louise was too beaten to answer.
To escape from Simona’s torture at least some of the time, Louise started golf lessons, something she had never done before in her life. The serenity, exactness, and the humbling experience of losing ten balls in nine holes over a period of half a day helped her coordination and concentration. And she had to admit that she actually liked it.
After six weeks in Palm Springs, her appetite had returned. Before that, it was simply a functional intake of nutrition with the aim of getting her old weight back. But Louise ate mechanically, without enjoying it, often even forcing herself to take in the calories. But the scale was merciless. As soon as she became too lazy or too tired to eat, the scale went down again, as her training burned calories straight off the new muscle mass. But one day at lunch, she sat at her private table, with a book in her hand—current news was of no interest to her—and saw the waiter carry a plate of eggs Benedict to an overweight patient with a heroin addiction. She had already finished her own breakfast, but the sight and smell stirred something in her. Go for it, Lou-baby. Louise smiled to herself.
That evening she ordered a porterhouse steak, no trimmings. Her waiter raised his eyebrow as he served it, as he had observed Louise’s lack of appetite and carb-heavy diet over the last weeks.
“Madam has gotten ambitious, if I may observe,” he remarked dryly.
“Madam has gotten crazy. And normal.” Louise grabbed the steak knife.
“Enjoy your meal, Madam.”
“Thanks!”
It was the first piece of meat after ten years, and she enjoyed every bite. Does that make me a bad person now? Well, we worry about ethics and vegetarian food when I hit 110 pounds. Or when Simona
finds out. Whichever comes first.
Louise summoned her lawyer.
“You look better, Louise,” Jane Schuster complimented her.
“Flattery will get you nowhere, and today you see me hitting one hundred pounds. Not there yet.”
“Your name is completely gone from the media. Sell! Sell! Sell! was released; did you know?”
“Actually, no. I don’t use the Internet, watch TV, or read the papers. My last movie—who would have thought? How did it do?”
Jane laughed. “A total failure. With both Josh and you out of the business, no one to sell the movie, and a cowardly studio marketing campaign, it made less than ten million in the first week. It was gone from theaters in three. Many people are not happy.”
“What a legacy! And we had so much fun with Roger, the German director. And poor Josh. The movie didn’t deserve this. No wonder Izzy couldn’t bear to tell me.”
“So, you are on track to become the new old Louise?”
“I am.”
“But do you know where this track is going?”
“Absolutely, and that is why you are here.” Louise smiled.
“Then let’s get to it.” Jane smiled, too, and spread out the prepared papers in three neat heaps. “Real estate left, stuff like cars, art, boats in the middle, project investments on the right. If needed”—Jane touched a separate folder on the side—“there are also your stocks and funds.”
“We don’t need those.” Louise took the project investment sheets and looked them over. They listed her various endeavors, such as movies, music, arts, or businesses where she was either investor or held active roles like producer or board member. A list of about forty items, many of projects had already been finalized but were now going through the various stages of publishing, like video-on-demand or online streaming, the various income streams were detailed out. “How many could we get me out of?”
Jane shook her head. “All, but at losses. The approximate resale value is considered here. All a matter of pricing.”
The total sum of estimated resale value was just short of $100 million. A lot of zeros. Louise looked at the titles, artists, and companies she once had been fond of. Strange. All these things that occupied and excited me in the past have now completely lost their meaning. If Jane hadn’t shown me the list today, I would have had difficulty even naming them. My lost project babies, floating away in a tar basket.
Louise put the list down. “Sell them all. First option is either the artist, the executive producer, or the major shareholder. Let them name a price they think is fair and come back to us.” She turned to the middle list, which was much longer. Louise took a pencil and simply circled a few things. “I’ll only keep these items. My Lexus hybrid, these four pictures. The Degas statue. The rest can go.”
All the places I called home. They all meant something to me; they all hold their memories. But who needs it all? There are hotels or temp housing everywhere in the world.
“Okay, except for the Malibu beach house, put everything on the market.”
“Do you think this is wise? Some of the real-estate markets are not back where they should be,” Jane pointed out.
“I don’t care. How many homes does a person need? I am single and unemployed.”
“You forgot stinking rich. But all right, I’ll see to it. You are aware that people employed by you depend on these homes? What about the maids and caretakers?”
“We keep them on the payroll until the sale is complete. Maybe the new owner will want to take them over. And please think of a fair compensation for the terminations.”
“Something like a month’s salary for each year under your employment?” Jane suggested.
“That sounds fair. On top, please put one more year of health insurance for the direct family.” Louise dazzled a smile for her, a little bit of the old star coming through. She pushed the stacks of paper over to Jane. “That’s it. Rich but assetless.”
“A radical move for you,” Jane said.
“There were two mistakes I made in the first attempt to change my life. Not doing a more radical cut was the first one. I hereby correct that. With a little help from the cancer.”
“And the second mistake?”
“Losing Rick.”
Rick
Winter turned into spring. It brought changes to Rick in his new job. Styler was a changed dude, still very relaxed but driven by a mission at the same time. The first collection came on the market after a mere two months and was sold out after a week. The changes of season also brought changes to the Flint family.
Spring turned into summer and Agnes graduated high school and moved to the next part of her life; she left for Annapolis on July 1. Summer brought changes to Charles, who had quit school, finally accepting that his path was a different one than that of the kids around him. He had started studying medicine at UCLA, based on a merit scholarship by a nonprofit foundation for the super-bright, which had also supported a Dr. Patil Singh of Mumbai, now Baltimore.
Louise
With golfing, jogging, and, a little later, outdoor tennis, she slowly got back into shape. Over the weeks she lost fewer and fewer balls in scrubs or in the water, the jogging round got well below forty minutes, and tennis became more than simply getting the ball over to the other side of the net. She still avoided outside life, watched no news, maybe a Netflix movie or series now and then, and still received no visitors. In her nonactive time, she relaxed, reading books on her eBook reader or luxuriously doing nothing.
Fourteen weeks after checking in, Louise Waters was back to 115 pounds, and she followed that good news with the first proper haircut she’d had since she had lost it all. That morning, a new person looked back at her. She looked younger, as the returned flesh, muscles, and fat had moved into new places, less feminine, and the short bob cut made her look boyish. She made a face at the mirror. Tomboy Louise, with a hint of Audrey Hepburn.
Maybe I’ll keep the look? The new Louise. One thing is for sure, I could walk past scores of paparazzi and wouldn’t get a second look.
Two days later, she checked out and had Floris drive her to Malibu. Which was unorthodox, as he was the bodyguard and not the driver. Plus, she sat down beside him instead of in the back. He said nothing, but a glance told Louise that he disapproved.
“We need to talk. And there is no escape in a car. I heard that marriages have broken up during in-car conversations going out of hand.”
“I might crash, Madam.”
“We are not married, so don’t worry!” Louise said. “No seriously. There is one point we need to talk about, and I need to give it to you straight: after five years in my service, I need to fire you.”
Floris gave a small, sad smile. “I had expected this much earlier.”
Louise swallowed. “Floris, you were the rock in my life when everything went to hell. And even though you are my bodyguard and you don’t talk much—actually you never talk—you were much more. You are one of the few people on earth I trust with my life and everything else.”
“Thank you, Madam,” Floris mumbled. He was not an emotional person but was definitely moved now.
“The truth is, I won’t be needing bodyguard services anymore. I have been out of circulation for over eight months, have taken no phone calls, no mail—hell, I don’t even know who won the Super Bowl. I won’t work as an actress again and will continue to stay away from the public. Anyway, that was the first thing I wanted to tell you. I doubt you will have issues finding other work; I’ll recommend you unconditionally to anyone who asks.”
“Thanks, Madam.”
“I’ll kill you if you ever call me Madam again.”
“Thanks, Ma . . . Thanks, Miss Louise.”
“Miss Louise sounds even worse. We are not in the South.”
Both continued the ride in silence until they arrived in Malibu. It was early evening in mid-August, and the sun was beginning its dip into the Pacific.
Floris parked the car, carried the few
items of baggage toward the house, and disarmed the alarm while Louise looked around. She had been away for eight months. Almost a whole year of other people’s lives had gone past her. The gardener had kept the small front garden immaculate, the caretaker had given the windows a new coat of paint. The gardener’s kid had started school this year, Louise remembered from the small talk before Christmas. Other people bear a child in nine months, giving life. I spent the time fighting death. I spent the time beating death!
She entered the house, glancing around. Floris had already helped the maid move the luggage upstairs and then had retreated downstairs to his room.
All as I left it. Dusted, kept clean. The maid let in fresh air. The pool is maintained. But they are caretakers. Like taking care of a tomb. The person living here, moving things around, buying new things, watching TV, eating Greek yoghurt, has been gone for a long time, not leaving her impression. Is this what Rick felt in the house of Vera Folsom?
She rummaged in her handbag and retrieved the three small items that had accompanied her through the last nine months. She placed them on a small desk close to the kitchen. Beside them, she put her Baltimore hospital wristband.
Do I want to be reminded of that life? Don’t be too hard on yourself, Lou-baby, and don’t rewrite your history like an Eastern Bloc dictator. Keep all these little tidbits of your past, all the photos, the stones, the postcards, the knickknacks. The time formed you, made you, and the collection here is a reminder of times gone by, but it is not who you are.
She looked at the little display, then went to the terrace and greeted the endless ocean.
Only one more thing to do.
thirty-three
Forever
Louise
She took the Lexus and drove west toward Oxnard along the coast, like that first time she had gone with Josh. That trip felt like it was from another century. Louise was free. And alive. She had not cheated death, she had won square and fair, and that meant promises to keep. The weather was August perfect, the reason why she would always love Southern California. The street where the Flints lived still looked the same as she drove up. She came unannounced; no reason to explain anything in advance. The Flint house had a taxi service passenger van parked in front, an impatient cabbie pacing. Britta and Charles came out of the front door, each with a suitcase on wheels at their side. Neither had noticed Louise’s car right away. She opened the door and stepped out. First a glance, then another. Unknown woman. Then Charles’s head snapped up again and he stopped in his tracks, she saw his mouth move, and Britta’s eyes also fell on Louise. She said something back to Charles that, from lip reading, looked to be a collection of four-letter words. Louise closed the car door and came closer. She didn’t know what to say, so she simply let things happen. Things were already written long ago.