The Bette Davis Club

by Jane Lotter

  Kelsey is with him. Boone points one of his large, meaty hands at Tully. “I’m gonna hurt you,” he says. “But first I want that script. And you’re gonna give it to me because if you don’t, I will not just hurt you, I will seriously kill you.”

  Tully holds up the tin, and his own chocolate biscuit as an example. “Biscuit?” he says.

  “That’s not a biscuit,” Boone says. “It’s a goddamned cookie!” He crosses the room and throws himself at Tully. Tully rises from the table, but Boone puts him in a headlock. They shuffle in a circle, Tully flailing haphazardly at Boone.

  “Stop it!” I cry. “For God’s sake!”

  Dottie and I abandon the table, but all that does is provide Boone with a work surface. He begins slamming Tully against the tabletop, the same way he slammed him against the hood of the MG. Indeed, slamming people seems to be Boone’s main mode of communication.

  Dottie moves quickly to the coffee machine. She picks up the carafe. Somehow I don’t think she’s about to offer everyone hot beverages. She approaches the table, where Boone continues battering Tully.

  Kelsey screams a warning, but it’s too late. Dottie dumps hot coffee down Boone’s back.

  “Fuck!” Boone yells. He pushes Tully off the table and onto the floor.

  Boone plucks his wet shirt away from his body. He spins round to face Dottie and me. “My code,” he says, “is if a woman hurts me, I do not hesitate to hurt her back.” He takes a step in our direction.

  Tully reaches up from the floor, snatching at Boone’s pant leg. “Leave them alone,” he says hoarsely.

  Boone stops. He looks down at Tully.

  “Just a sec,” Boone says to Dottie and me.

  He bends, seizes Tully by the collar, and begins pulling him along the floor. Tully’s fingers scrabble at the wood planks like Wile E. Coyote being dragged across the desert sands. As Tully is hauled past me, we catch each other’s eye.

  I’m worried Tully will be hurt, yes. I care about him. But there’s something else. In that moment, Tully and I share the truth of our existence. We’re twins; we’re soul mates. We are life’s underdogs. We’re the defeated, the conquered, the vanquished.

  We were made for each other.

  Boone whistles to Kelsey. She opens the front door. Boone tosses Tully out into the darkened street.

  With an ominous click of the brass lock, Kelsey bars the door against Tully.

  Boone turns back to Dottie and me. “Give me that script,” he says.

  “I don’t have it,” I say. “It’s gone. There was a fire, and it burned up.”

  “Liar,” Kelsey says. She rakes her hand through her long hair. “Boonie, she’s lying!”

  Boone comes toward me. He seems about to demonstrate his personal belief system concerning acceptable violence with regard to women. His hands shoot out in front of him, and he shoves me roughly up against a cupboard, so roughly that I swallow my gum.

  Dottie yanks on Boone’s coffee-soaked shirt, trying to get him off me. But Kelsey isn’t having it. She pulls at Dottie’s hair, then pushes her to the ground. Startled, Dottie stares up from the floor. Her legs are collapsed under her, and she’s swearing a blue streak in French. She looks like a surprised mushroom.

  Boone again thrusts me against the cupboard. This time he knocks the wind out of me. I gasp for air.

  “Do not mess with me!” he shouts in my face. He smells of aftershave, liquor, and spilled coffee. “I will tear this junkyard apart, and everybody in it!”

  There’s a loud pounding at the front door. It’s Tully, I’m sure, trying to get back in.

  At that moment, Charlotte exits the bathroom, adjusting her suit jacket. She’s behind Boone and Kelsey. They do not see her.

  Charlotte stops. She spies Dottie on the floor, me pushed up against the cupboard and gasping.

  The fire poker rests nearby. It’s in the same spot it’s been in all day, since when I set it down this morning after using it to menace Dottie. Charlotte doesn’t hesitate. She crosses to the fire poker, picks it up, and raises it high in the air. She brings it down on Boone’s head.

  Boone releases me. His hands drop to his sides. He stands there, teetering.

  “Not again,” Kelsey wails.

  Kelsey advances in Charlotte’s direction, murder in her eyes—but Dottie thrusts out a leg and trips her.

  In the end, Kelsey and Boone go down simultaneously. Kelsey, like a child falling off a bicycle; Boone, like a felled tree. He lands against the ten-thousand-dollar mirror. It shatters.

  “Damn,” Charlotte says.

  “On ne fait pas d’omelette sans casser d’oeufs,” Dottie says. “You can’t make an omelette without breaking eggs.” She removes the pink bubble gum from her mouth, reaches over, and sticks it in Kelsey’s hair.

  Charlotte and I are the only people in the room still upright. We stand, shoulder to shoulder, regarding Boone. He lies on the floor, groaning.

  “I’m warning you, buster,” Charlotte says. “I don’t know who you are, or what your game is, but don’t you ever again mess with Arthur Just’s two little girls.”

  A while later, the police have come and gone, taking Boone and Kelsey with them. Tully, Dottie, and I are bruised, but otherwise okay. It was Tully who, when he was locked outside, called the police on his cell phone.

  Dottie sweeps up broken glass from the mirror, and Tully puts the kitchen table and chairs back in order.

  I approach Charlotte. She’s standing to one side, gazing at a hideous, open-mouthed stone gargoyle. “This thing reminds me of the woman who sold me lingerie at Bloomingdale’s,” she says.

  “Thanks for saving my life,” I say.

  “Balls to that. What did that fathead think? Women can’t defend themselves? I’m from Los Angeles. I work in the entertainment industry! I’ve taken so many female self-defense classes, I’m my own pit bull.” She pinches the gargoyle’s cheek.

  “Charlotte,” I say, “there’s something I’ve been wondering about. Why wasn’t Donald at Georgia’s wedding?”

  “My husband?” she says. “I suppose I could tell you he was in Barcelona, scouting vacation property. But I’m done lying to you, Margo. Marriage number four has come to an end. Donald has substance-abuse issues. Did you know he keeps cocaine hidden in a globe in the library? That’s bad enough, but then I found out he’s been having an affair with his personal trainer. His male personal trainer.”

  From across the room, Dottie overhears this. She and I exchange looks. I know what she’s thinking: The Bette Davis Club has a new member.

  “I’ll tell you what the takeaway is,” Charlotte says. “I’m going to fix up Daddy’s office. Turn it into a yoga studio. Breathe in, breathe out.”

  Once things get tidied up, Dottie takes me aside. “You’ll be all right?” she says.

  “I’ll be fine,” I say.

  “Bien. I’m going home and soak in a hot bath. That will make Gerard happy—he can bring me chocolates.” She gives me a hug. “What a day it’s been, chérie! I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Charlotte also hugs me good-bye. It’s the first heartfelt physical contact she and I have shared in years. It feels a little awkward—like being hugged by Richard Nixon—but it’s a start.

  Dottie and Charlotte decide to share a cab. They walk out the door together, discussing restaurants, shopping, and the finer points of antique mirrors.

  For the first time all day, Tully and I are alone in the shop.

  “You must feel pretty bad right now,” he says.

  “No,” I say. “I’m kind of happy.”

  “I mean physically. Quitting booze, withdrawal.”

  “I think I’ve been going on adrenaline,” I say. “But you’re right, I have a headache. And I feel sort of . . .”

  “Flu-ish?”

  “Yes, like I’m getting the flu.”

  “That’s how it is. I’ll fix you some eggs and toast. And orange juice.”

  It’s nearly midnight when Tully co
oks me breakfast. He sits with me at the kitchen table while I eat. “It’s not enough going to round-the-clock meetings,” he says. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

  “Well,” I say, “if today’s any indication, there’ll be armies of people trooping through here. No one visits for years and years and then, all of a sudden, it’s busier than . . .”

  “Pennsylvania Station,” Tully says. “The old one, before they tore it down.”

  After I finish my eggs and toast, Tully accompanies me upstairs to the mezzanine. The room’s antique wall sconces give off a golden glow. I settle on the edge of the Victorian fainting couch and stare at the worn Persian rug.

  “Remember that day we talked about hidden value?” Tully says. He stands next to Finn’s desk, fiddling with a glass paperweight. “About seeing things other people don’t see? Just to be clear, Georgia has no hidden value for me. Not anymore, if she ever did. You, however, have unplumbed depths.”

  I laugh ruefully. “Like a sunken ship. Which is how I feel. Shipwrecked.”

  “You’re not a shipwreck,” Tully says. “You’re a lost treasure. And I found you.”

  I massage my temples. “I’m not good company right now, Tully. I’m so tired. You can go home, you know. I’m fine.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” Tully says.

  “Please just go home,” I say. “Really.”

  “No,” Tully says. “I won’t. I’ll sleep downstairs in the bathtub. If you need to talk in the middle of the night, we can talk. If you need me to wake up, I’ll wake up. If you want somebody to rub your head, I’ll rub your head.”

  He puts down the paperweight and comes over to the fainting couch. He sits down next to me. After a while, he slips his hand into mine. It’s such a human thing to do, so warm and comforting, I melt. A tear moves down my cheek. I turn and bury my face in Tully’s shoulder.

  “Hey,” he says, holding me, “it’s all right.”

  “It’s a big fat mess,” I say, wiping my eyes.

  “Well, yeah. But it’s all right.”

  He lets go of my hand and scoots himself round so that he’s behind me. His back rests against the wall, his legs stretch out on either side of me. He puts both hands on the back of my skull, and begins massaging my head. I do not resist.

  “I was wrong about something,” Tully says, moving his fingers gently over my head. “I said architectural salvage was an oxymoron. But I’ve been thinking about it, and it’s not much different from when someone dies and we look at their picture or reread a letter they wrote. That’s salvage too. If you think about it, people spend a lot of time trying to hold on to things that are gone.”

  He caresses my head a bit longer. His hands are superb.

  “There’s something I need to tell you,” he finally says.

  “Is it what you wanted to tell me this morning?” I say. I feel dreamy from the head rub.

  “Yeah, it is. Last night I was restless, couldn’t sleep.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “Was the bathtub terribly uncomfortable?”

  “It was fine,” Tully says. “I couldn’t sleep because I kept thinking about what Veronica said at her shop. That the Spy Team script was worth millions, that you should get an attorney. I was curious. You left your bag downstairs. Excuse me for doing this, but I went over and took out the script. I sat in an old armchair down there, and I read it.”

  “Could we please not talk about Spy Team?” I say.

  “We have to talk about it.”

  “I don’t know why.”

  Tully moves his hands from my head down to the nape of my neck. He begins kneading my neck and shoulders.

  “Because for one thing,” he says, “Veronica was right. Your father was a good writer. That story has a great ending. I bet your dad was proud of Spy Team. I bet he’d be proud now, if he were alive, and he saw that years later people still enjoy that show. Enjoy it so much they’re lining up to buy the Blu-ray high-def twenty-four-disc ultimate collector’s edition with pop-up packaging.”

  I’m ill with regret and remorse. Why did God invent cigarette lighters?

  “When I finished reading the script, it was late,” Tully says. “I went to bed. Then this morning, I woke up early. You were asleep, so I went out. I brought back milk, eggs, groceries. And I brought back something else.”

  “The New York Times,” I say.

  “Right, I got that. But did you know there’s a FedEx office near here? Open twenty-four hours. I took the Spy Team script over there.” He ceases rubbing my shoulders.

  I twist round and look at him. “You—”

  “Photocopied it,” Tully says. “I figured I better do that in case something happened to the original.”

  I jump from the fainting couch, turn, and stand there, facing him. “But you didn’t tell me! Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Margo, you were completely mental about Spy Team, your father, all of it. I saw your face when Veronica said the script your dad cowrote with Orson Welles wasn’t worth much. I knew how you felt about your dad working in television. You thought television killed him—when maybe it was, you know, other things.”

  I picture the many people I met today at AA. All of them finally accepting the truth about themselves. “It was other things,” I say. “I know that now.”

  “Okay. So anyway, I decided to wait until you calmed down. When you and Dottie were up here talking to Georgia, I put the original script back in your bag. Then I texted my literary agent. She’s here in Manhattan, but her agency has a Hollywood office. I wanted to see if she knows anything about Joshua Epstein, that LA attorney Veronica recommended.”

  “Does she?”

  “Yeah. I went and saw her, we talked. She says Epstein has a good rep.”

  I’m lightheaded, dizzy. I may swoon onto the fainting couch. “You made a photocopy of Spy Team?” I say.

  “Actually,” Tully says, “I made two.”

  “You’re a genius!”

  He grins. “Some people do say I have a very high IQ.”

  “I could kiss you,” I say.

  He throws open his arms. “Baby,” he says, “what’s stopping you?”

  I return to the couch, and do what I’ve wanted to do for a long time. I kiss Tully Benedict. Even more wonderful, he kisses back. He is a fabulous kisser, and he kisses me back many times. In many places. In many ways.

  The next morning, I wake up feeling better than I have in years. For someone still suffering the effects of alcohol withdrawal, I have a surprising amount of energy. Sitting at the kitchen table in my bathrobe, I telephone Joshua Epstein in Los Angeles and take him on as my legal representative.

  Then I pull out the creamy vellum card Malcolm Belvedere gave me that day we first met in Malibu. The card that lists all his private numbers.

  I call Malcolm and tell him he can have Spy Team, but he’ll have to work with Joshua.

  “Done!” Malcolm says into the phone. “With Spy Team in my pocket, I have a shot at reclaiming my studio. Hah! You’ve done me a great kindness! I’m back in the game!”

  I tell Malcolm that, as part of the deal, I’d also like a month-long stay this summer at that beach cottage of his in the Hamptons.

  “Dear girl,” Malcolm says. “Anything. Hardly use the place. Month-long stay every year for the rest of your life if you want.”

  I tell him, Yes, that’s exactly what I want.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  BEACH COTTAGE

  Assuming you live through it, the best thing about falling apart is you get to put yourself back together. I go to Alcoholics Anonymous two nights a week now, more if I’m feeling shaky.

  My outburst at that first meeting is legendary. I can’t tell you how many people in my chapter have come up to shake my hand. They tell me they thought they’d seen it all, until the night they shared fellowship with me. I’m the benchmark for out-of-control behavior, the poster child for escaping the hellish jaws of alcoholism. And escape it I have. Or at least, you know,
as Kay said to me that afternoon at the Museum of Science and Industry: One day at a time.

  Charlotte wrote me a check for sixty thousand dollars, plus expenses. And she gave me title to the MG. She was right, you can’t keep a car in Manhattan, the garage fees are astronomical. So I store the car out of the city, but Tully and I often take it out on weekends. We go for long drives in the country. Sometimes we stop for ice-cream.

  With the cash Charlotte gave me—plus the obscene amount of money I received from the sale of Spy Team—I paid off my debts and then some. I won’t have to worry about finances for a long time now, if ever. Dottie is helping me find homes for the things in Finn’s shop, many of which we’re simply donating to museums and restoration projects.

  After we empty the shop, I’m closing the business. I’m done focusing on the past—my own past anyway. I’m looking to the future. And I’m going back to school. Eventually, I want to train to become an architectural conservator. I want to work at saving important buildings before they’re torn down.

  Tully has nearly finished his book on miniatures. He asked me to move in with him, into his flat in Brooklyn, and I did. We plan to be married in the fall—I in the strapless Donna Karan, he in the Armani tux. Georgia has volunteered Ricky Wallingford to play at our wedding reception. We’ll see.

  In the meantime, it’s summer, and Tully; his daughter, Emma; and I are spending a month at the beach. We’re staying in Malcolm’s seaside cottage—which, to be honest, is a sort of luxury oceanfront home.

  Emma, I should tell you, is beautiful. I don’t mean physically, though she’s nice-looking. I mean, her energy, her exuberance. I love the way she dances by the water, turning cartwheels and laughing.

  She and I take long walks along the shore and talk about many things. I’m not trying to replace her mother, and she knows that. But I do hope to be her friend. Together, we worked out that “Margo” was too formal, and “Mom” belongs to her real mother. So I told her about my own mum, who came from England. Because of that, and because of my accent, she decided to call me Mum.

  This morning, for instance, while Tully works on his book, Emma and I go for a beach walk. She stops and picks up a smooth white stone and holds it in her hand. Then she looks out at the blue, rolling sea. “Mum,” she says, “is everything in the world connected? I mean, you know, except for what’s up in the sky?”