Mr Toppit

by Charles Elton

  Merry had lived in Modesto all her life so she was almost as much of a stranger in Los Angeles as I was. Travis said he had been there a few times and knew it quite well, even though he seemed incapable of going anywhere without getting lost. He kept saying he wanted to show us what he called “secret LA.” Actually, I wouldn’t have minded doing some of the touristy things, like the Universal Studios tour or Disneyland, but they did not seem to be on Travis’s agenda. We spent most of one afternoon trying to get to the Hollywood sign but it proved elusive: streets that seemed to be heading towards it petered out into dirt tracks, while others twisted and turned with the sign above us vanishing and reappearing behind the hills.

  In fact, many things proved elusive for Travis. He tried unsuccessfully to find the house where the Charles Manson murders had taken place, way up on a street called Cielo Drive, but Travis couldn’t remember the number and thought he would recognize it from a photograph he had once seen. That wasn’t the only confusion: he seemed unsure whether it was Sharon Tate or Sharon Stone who had been among the victims, until Merry corrected him.

  Several times a week, Merry went to have her chakra healing lessons. Travis went with her but I couldn’t tell whether he was just driving her there or having the lessons, too. Her teacher, Wade, lived at the top of some canyon and apparently he was longing to meet me. According to Merry he thought the books were the “most awesome things” he’d ever read and had “total respect for their philosophy,” but he also seemed rather shy so it was always the next time that I would be taken to visit him.

  When they came back from Wade’s they were fired up with excitement and—after the usual bear hugs and hand-slapping—we sometimes drove up the coast to a place called Paradise Cove where there was an old-fashioned shack-like restaurant. There, we had beer and hamburgers, then walked up the beach to go swimming. If you went far enough it was almost deserted, and if there was absolutely nobody around, Travis and Merry would skinny-dip. I tried hard to avoid having to do it, too. Showers at school were bad enough but it was just about okay there because everyone felt embarrassed. A beach in California, well, that was different.

  Merry and Travis seemed totally casual about it and they had brown, easy bodies, as if they’d been hewn from a single piece of wood that had been carved and sanded and oiled to smooth perfection. I had to pretend that I didn’t feel like swimming—I couldn’t go in wearing trunks when they weren’t. I had a stomach ache, I didn’t like swimming after a meal, I was worried about a cramp, I didn’t want to get sunburned. How many excuses could you come up with? Finally, after we’d been to Paradise Cove three or four times, Travis said, “Hey, bro, you’re not shy, are you? Nothing to be frightened of,” and Merry giggled, and so, as if I didn’t have a care in the world, I peeled off my trunks and ran, with my white, uneasy body, which had been bolted together from various scrawny bits of driftwood, as fast as I could into the surf, hoping that nothing shrank in the cold water.

  What we did in the days and evenings when Laurie wasn’t around remained between us. It became a secret for no particular reason other than maybe it was more fun that way. When Laurie asked what I had been up to, the cover-up you do when talking to a parent kicked in like a reflex: “Oh, you know, we drove to the beach, then went to Century City and had Thai in the mall food court.” If Travis was with us when she asked, there might be the tiniest eye contact between us, a telepathic agreement not to mention skinny-dipping or the margaritas Travis had made in the poolhouse with the limes and tequila we had taken from the store cupboard, or that either the little baby monster from Alien was burrowing through Travis’s jeans when we went to see Big at Grauman’s Chinese Theater or it was Merry’s hand.

  On Friday nights, a different Merry would arrive with her parents, more of a high-school cheerleader, wearing a little light makeup, her long blond hair tied demurely into a ponytail, and a short, powder-blue dress that made her look about fourteen. She would give Travis and me a sophisticated both-sides peck on the cheek and was ready to discuss with bright-eyed eagerness the shows Laurie had done that week or how the rehearsals were going for the amateur musical Rick and Jerrilee were starting rehearsals for.

  “You’re going to come to the opening, aren’t you, Laurie?” Rick said. “You know how much it would mean to us.”

  They had obviously been through this before. “Oh, Rick, you don’t want me there,” she said disingenuously. “It’ll turn into a circus. It’s about you two, you and Jerrilee, and the show.”

  “You should invite your ventriloquist to the opening,” Erica said. “That would get you some publicity. What is he—Puerto Rican?”

  “You’re making fun of me, Erica. You maybe don’t have ventriloquists in Europe but they’re part of our vaudeville tradition over here. He’s named Johnny Del Guardo, and he’s going to be big. You wait.”

  “What play are you doing?” I asked.

  “Last year we did Hello Dolly,” Jerrilee said. “Back in Modesto we did everything—Finian’s Rainbow, Oliver, Man of La Mancha, Grease …”

  “You name it,” Rick said.

  “You were so great as Sandy,” Merry said.

  “Isn’t Sandy a young person, a teenager?” Erica said.

  “We tend to cast by voice,” Jerrilee said primly. “It’s about the music. We’re doing Camelot this year.”

  “But it must be so time-consuming,” Erica said. “How do you fit it all in with the management company, the clients?”

  “Actually, it’s been tough this year. In Modesto, people stood in line to be in the shows. They don’t seem to get it here. Still haven’t cast some of the parts.”

  “I expect people who work hard just don’t have the time,” Erica said pointedly.

  “Everyone finds time for their passions, don’t they, Erica? So much to do for Alma and yet you still manage your tennis practice every day,” Jerrilee retorted.

  Rick gave a manly chortle. “If only we could get Mr. Jerry Herman to do us a musical version of The Diary of Anne Frank we might even get you on stage, Erica.”

  Erica ignored this. “It’s what I like about LA,” she said. “People have such a strong work ethic here. It reminds me of home.”

  Jerrilee gave her tinkling laugh and put her hand on Erica’s arm. “Oh, Erica, only you would get the similarity between LA and—what little town is it you’re from?”

  “Amsterdam,” Erica said curtly.

  “What’s the show about?” Travis asked.

  “It’s the love story of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere.”

  Travis looked blank. “Like Charles and Diana?”

  “Not exactly, Travis,” Jerrilee said. “It’s set in medieval times, like in the Dark Ages.”

  “And who will you be playing, Jerrilee?” Erica asked innocently.

  “Look at her!” Rick said. “Doesn’t she look like a queen?”

  “Will you be wearing a wimple?” Erica said.

  Jerrilee was momentarily shocked. “A what?” She seemed to think it was a dirty word.

  “You know, it’s a kind of hood. The women wore them on their heads then,” Erica said.

  “Actually, we’re keeping the costumes real simple,” Rick said. “Everyone’s going to wear a canvas shift with a leather belt round the middle. They didn’t have fancy clothes in those days. Jerrilee and I’ll have crowns to make us stand out from the rest because we’re royal.”

  Jerrilee had been helping Consuela take the plates off the table and shouted from the kitchen, “You ever acted, Luke?”

  “Only in school plays. I was one of the witches in Macbeth and I was Reverend Parris in The Crucible.”

  “I bet you were good,” Laurie said. “So tall.”

  Suddenly Jerrilee was back in the room, a dishcloth in her hand, her eyes shining. “Rick! He should do the show!”

  Rick seemed confused.

  “Mordred!” Jerrilee squealed. “Mordred!”

  There was a silence while this sank in. “You can si
ng, can’t you?” Rick said.

  “Not really,” I said. “I can’t—”

  “That’s okay,” Jerrilee butted in. She turned to Rick. “He’s only got one song. He could speak it, like Rex Harrison.”

  “Hold on, Luke doesn’t want to be in a play. This is his vacation,” Laurie said.

  “No, no, no,” Rick said, cutting across her. “This is so great. We haven’t cast Mordred yet.”

  “Who’s Mordred?” Travis asked.

  “The story’s kind of complicated,” Rick said. “King Arthur has this weird sister named Morgan Le Fay. She might be his half sister or stepsister or something, but that’s not the point. Way before the story starts Morgan Le Fay casts some kind of spell on him and they have a baby together named Mordred.”

  “This is absurd, Rick,” Laurie said. “You can’t be serious.”

  “He sleeps with his sister?” Travis said.

  “It’s incest,” Erica said.

  “This was before they had laws,” Rick said. “That’s why King Arthur invented the round table. Anyway, this Mordred stirs everything up. He gets Morgan Le Fay to put King Arthur behind an invisible wall, so Queen Guinevere and Lancelot think they’re alone and get discovered in bed together.”

  “You’re putting this show on in Sherman Oaks?” Erica said incredulously.

  “It’s a famous show. It’s a great part for you, Luke.”

  “I want you to stop this,” Laurie said.

  “I think it sounds cool,” Travis said.

  “Will you shut up?” Laurie snapped at him.

  “This is a big chance for Luke,” Rick said.

  “A big chance? He’s not looking for a big chance,” Laurie hissed. “For God’s sake! Some amateur show in a dump on Ventura Boulevard?”

  “The Seaton Theater is quite an upscale place,” Rick said, wounded.

  “He doesn’t want to be an actor,” Laurie snarled. “He’s going to be a writer.”

  That was the first I’d heard of it.

  “What do you think, Luke?” Jerrilee asked.

  “Don’t ask him,” Laurie almost shouted. “He doesn’t want to do it.”

  “If we can get Jerrilee’s hair colorist to do Lancelot—he sings in a gay men’s choir, great voice—we’ve got everyone cast. We’re rehearsing next week. ‘Luke Hayseed as Mordred’ might even get a TV crew at the opening.”

  “It’s like it’s meant to be,” Merry said excitedly. “Your dad was named Arthur and you’d be playing King Arthur’s son.”

  “You’re royal blood, you’re the king’s son. You could wear a crown, too. Just you and Rick and me. The others won’t have them,” Jerrilee said.

  “Yeah, you’d be playing my son,” Rick said.

  It happened very slowly or very fast, I couldn’t tell which. I think the first thing was the bottle going over and the wine chugging out across the tablecloth. Normally somebody would have righted it and put a napkin, or maybe salt, on the stain, but before that could happen Laurie was on her feet. There were blotches on her face and her eyes had constricted into little slits. She looked like a Halloween pumpkin.

  Rick was on the other side of the table but she seemed to be there in a second. It was as if she was trying to clamber onto him, like she wanted a piggyback. “Don’t you dare! Don’t you dare!” she kept shouting. Marty and BJ, who had been sitting under the table, scuttled out of the room.

  “Laurie! Be careful of your knee!” Erica screamed, and she was on her feet, too.

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Laurie was shouting at Rick. “Luke has a father—he’s got a father you couldn’t even imagine with your small-town mind!”

  Jerrilee’s mouth was hanging open. Merry had begun to cry. I was amazed by Erica’s strength. She was about a quarter of Laurie’s size but she was holding her round the middle and dragging her backwards.

  “Luke has something inside him you wouldn’t be able to understand if it was spelled out for you on a billboard! You could no more be his father than fly to the moon!”

  The last we saw of Laurie was her feet as Erica dragged her round the corner into the kitchen. Then a door slammed and it was quiet.

  “She’s kind of upset,” Travis said, to nobody in particular.

  “She can’t talk to you like that, Rick,” Jerrilee said. “I won’t put up with it. Not after what you’ve done for her.”

  Rick was smoothing his hair back into place. He looked a bit shaken but was philosophic. “It’s been a tough week. The ratings aren’t so great. Lot of pressure.”

  “It’s her,” Jerrilee hissed. “It’s Erica. She’s poisoned Laurie. Never been the same since she arrived. She’s just the help. She shouldn’t even be eating with us.”

  “So, are you going to do the show?” Travis asked me.

  “I don’t think so, Travis. Anyway I’d be really bad.”

  Travis turned to Rick. “Maybe I could play the part. I sing. You’ve heard me sing.”

  “Wrong kind of voice, son,” Rick said.

  Maybe we’d all had a lot to drink. My head was spinning by the time I got to bed. I think I fell asleep really quickly but I seemed to be awake again in minutes. It was two o’clock. Through the window I could see a dim light on in the poolhouse. I walked through the garden in bare feet and knocked on the door. “Travis? Are you still up?”

  There was a scuffling from behind the door, then Travis was peering out. “Hey, bro, what’s happening?”

  “I can’t sleep.”

  Merry’s voice came from inside the room. “Let him in, Travis.” That was surprising because I’d said good-bye to Rick, Jerrilee, and Merry hours ago. “I came back,” she said, then pulled me into the room and, as usual, we all had to hug. I felt a bit awkward. I was still in the boxer shorts and T-shirt I had gone to bed in.

  There was only a desk light on so the room was filled with shadows. A bottle of tequila stood on the table.

  “Some night,” Travis said.

  “We were saying maybe Laurie’s going crazy, like that weird mother of hers. Like it’s in her genes. You want a drink?”

  “Why not?” I said. It had been such a strange evening that it seemed like a good idea.

  She showed me how they had been drinking the tequila. You put some salt on the back of your hand, licked it off, took a big swig, then sucked a lime quarter. Its sharpness made me shiver as the tequila went down.

  “She was so mean to my dad,” Merry said. “She wouldn’t have a career if it wasn’t for him. And us, I guess. When she was reading the books on the hospital radio, my mom was having surgery and we really got into them. It was us that got Dad to let her read them on KCIF. She should be grateful.”

  “I helped her at Holy Spirit. That first time she read them I was the one who told her how great they were,” Travis said.

  “Nobody heard them at the hospital, Trav.”

  “Your mom did. You did.”

  “Yes, but it was just a few people. Half of them are probably dead. It’s a hospital. It needed someone to give it a proper audience, like a national audience. Dad did that.”

  “KCIF isn’t national. It’s a local station.”

  “Well, I organized that Hayseed float on the Fourth of July. Everyone saw it.”

  “Everyone in Modesto. That doesn’t make it national.”

  Travis and Merry went on like this for a while, neither listening to what the other was saying. Then, without any apparent pause for breath, they seemed to be talking about which was the best Beatles song.

  “ ‘A Day In The Life,’ ” Travis said. “Obviously.”

  “You’re full of shit!”

  “I mean technically. Those chord changes.”

  “What do you know about technical?”

  “Okay—so what’s better than that? ‘Octopus’s Garden’?” Travis said disdainfully. “Please!”

  “ ‘Hey Jude.’ ”

  “Oh, come on!”

  “I like ‘Norwegian Wood,’ �
� I said.

  “That’s cool,” Travis said. “I mean, it’s kind of an early song but it is pretty good.”

  “We need some more chakra,” Merry said, and they burst out laughing.

  “You need some healing, bro,” Travis said.

  “You’ve done this before?” Merry asked, as Travis undid the package and began chopping up the white powder with a razor blade.

  “Yes,” I said, lying without a moment’s hesitation. “My sister and I do it all the time.”

  Travis’s tongue was curled up round his lip, like a child concentrating. “Ladies first,” he said, when he had finished, and three lines were ready on the table. I was glad I didn’t have to go first so I had some kind of guide, but I soon realized that all those movie jokes about people sneezing were just silly. It wasn’t difficult at all.

  “You’re going to love Wade,” Merry said, for about the hundredth time since I’d been in Los Angeles. “He’s so spiritual. Dealing’s just a sideline. He’s not even that into drugs but he needs the money. He only teaches a few people, just people he can see into. He could be a really famous teacher, but he’s just not into the fame thing.”

  I wasn’t listening to what she was saying. I was trying to concentrate. Of course, nothing happened instantly. I’d had quite a lot of wine at dinner and then there had been the tequila so I knew I was a bit drunk, but the odd thing was that gradually my head cleared. When you’re drunk you get a bit sluggish but suddenly the blood was moving round my body more efficiently. In a while I could feel every pulse inside me working in unison, like those oilfields you see with the pumps going up and down like crazy.

  The next time round we combined it with tequila. Lick of salt, slug of drink, suck lime, snort line. Merry did it quickest. I don’t know who suggested going into the pool then, but it seemed such an obvious thing to do. It was pretty dark outside and we thought it best not to turn on the lights because the house wasn’t that far away. There was a mist coming off the water, not because it was cold but because it was actually warmer than the air. It felt amazing, getting in. I didn’t worry for a second about not having any trunks. I had just slipped off my boxer shorts without thinking, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Anyway, it was dark and nobody could really see.