“I agree,” Max said. “Look, your mother’s a nut job; there’s no way you’re gonna talk her outta this, she’s too stubborn.”
“Besides,” Katie added, “all three of us know she’s never gonna go through with it. Instead of knocking yourself out trying to talk sense into her let Nature do all the hard work for you. The moment Arlene finds herself alone in a bedroom with a woman she’ll suddenly remember how very heterosexual she is.”
Max was nodding.
“She’s right. Just let this play out. In fact…” He paused, considering for a moment. “In fact, if you really wanna get this over with then you should help her become a lesbian.”
“What are you talking about?” asked Danielle.
“Wait, wait,” Katie said, sitting up on the bed, “I think I know what he means.” She pointed at Max. “You mean we should be like those parents who make their kids smoke a cigarette as a sort of aversion therapy, right?”
“Absolutely,” Max said. Turning to Danielle he continued. “Look, you want your mother to knock off all this lesbian bullshit? Then treat her like a lesbian. For example, you can introduce her to your single gay friends like, like—” he snapped his fingers, trying to pull names from his memory.
“Jemima and Carmen,” Katie provided. “Or Lucy and Nita.”
“Right,” Max said. “Only make them your accomplices; have them make passes at your mother, things like that. And take her out to lesbian bars. If you actually immerse your mother in the lifestyle of a lesbian then your problem is solved.”
“I’m willing to try anything,” Danielle said. “Then maybe after she’s got this stupid idea out of her head I can send her on a trip to Greece or something.”
“It’s a shame, though,” Katie said thoughtfully. “Now that I think about it Carmen and your mother would make a cute couple.”
“Carmen?” Danielle jeered. “Are you kidding? Nita is way more Mom’s type.”
“You think?”
“It’s pretty obvious to me. Look at their personalities.”
“I have to agree,” Max stated. “That would be a match made in twit heaven.”
“Ah, but maybe your mother would be drawn more to a woman who’s the opposite of herself personality-wise,” Katie suggested. “Like Jemima.”
“You can actually see Jemima and my mom together? Jemima is a 51 year-old sales clerk in a clothing shop and has enormous thighs.”
“Oh, so what? Is your mom really that shallow?”
“Baby, I’m that shallow. Where do you think I get it from?”
Chapter 9
Max Bland didn’t have many friends; he preferred it that way, actually; it suited his private and solitary nature and also meant he didn’t have to concern himself with remembering too many birthdays. Back in New York his circle of friends was small and mostly made up of guys whom he had grown up with in the Bronx. Here in England the circle was even smaller. Other than Katie (whom Max would say didn’t count because he was more or less stuck with her anyway) and his archrival Diego Montrose (whom by virtue of being an archrival Max had mixed feelings about) there were only two other individuals Max labeled as friends. One was his barber, Jerry, coincidentally also an ex-pat New Yorker, and the other was Gresham Graham Gregory, the man responsible for Max flying from Heathrow to Leeds-Bradford on board a private BBC jet the day after Arlene’s arrival in London.
Gresham was one of Britain’s most noted poets, a laid back black man in his fifties with a soothing voice who also doubled as dean of Literature Studies at Liverpool McDonough University. While in London nearly a year ago promoting his new book of poems, Gresham had stayed in the Bland-Edwards-Shaw home for a couple of days. One evening during dinner the topic of conversation became centered on educating prospective writers. Gresham, of course, had a keen interest in this matter, being an educator himself, and offered his opinions on the tactics which should be employed when teaching students of writing, particularly at the university level where students are still trying to discover their voices as authors. Max, on the other hand, shared with Gresham his long-held belief that creative writing cannot be taught. You’re either born with the talent to tell stories or you’re not, he stated, and what will attending a class accomplish? In fact, Max believed teaching did more harm than good in that it often made writers distrust their natural instincts. Not surprisingly, the poet disagreed. A writer, like an athlete or a dancer or a singer, may very well be born with the requisite raw talent but may also need that talent fine-tuned in order for it to become mature and effective. Not every singer, he had added, is a Sinatra; not every footballer is a Beckham; not every author is a Bland.
Max digressed from the topic at this point to say that as far as he was concerned soccer is one of the stupidest sports ever created and he still can’t understand the Brits’ obsession with it but then he returned to the issue of educating writers to say that if any writer’s raw talent needs to be fine-tuned then it should be fine-tuned by writing, not by sitting in classes taught by failed novelists.
The matter may have been dropped then but this last statement of Max’s reminded Gresham of something he’d heard recently involving a very famous novelist who had spent a semester some time ago at a Swedish university teaching a specially established creative writing course for advanced students. Out of curiosity Max asked who that very famous novelist was.
Gresham believed it was Diego Montrose.
Montrose! Max had railed. Montrose? Montrose couldn’t teach a baboon how to peel a banana! Someone asked Montrose to teach a “specially established” course in writing? There are unborn children who could do a better job of teaching than Montrose! Max had then told Gresham how Montrose had once tried to teach him how to play pinochle but that Max hadn’t been able to follow the man’s instructions so confusing were they and that they had ended up going to see a Marx Brothers film instead.
Gresham, while surprised at the vehemence of Max’s reaction to this bit of news was nonetheless happy because suddenly Max offered to teach his own brief course in writing at Gresham’s school, Liverpool McDonough, and he ordered Gresham to see to the details, which the poet eagerly set to work on that very night, telephoning LMU’s board members from Trinity Manor to tell them the good news and to begin strategizing the logistics.
But then things took an interesting turn.
Gresham’s wife, Janice, a former BBC TV producer who left television to focus more on raising their daughter, learned of this scheme to bring Max Bland to the university and suddenly became inspired as only an ex-producer can be inspired. What if Max were instead the star of a show pitting wannabe writers against one another in a contest to see who could win a publishing contract from a major British firm? What’s more, the show could be filmed at Liverpool McDonough, providing the school some good exposure. She was sure it became a ratings smash.
Janice outlined all of this and more to Gresham one evening at home. The only problem was, would Max go for it? The poet had difficulty imagining Max Bland involving himself with anything as pedestrian and mainstream as a reality show. But Gresham loved to see his wife so enthusiastic about something and so immediately phoned down to London.
“Reality show, huh?” Max had said after his friend put the proposal to him. “I dunno, I’ll have to think about it.” However, as he said this he was typing “Diego Montrose reality show” as a search string into Google. When Google admitted to coming up empty Max then said, “You know what? I’ll do it. Lemme talk to your wife.”
So then Janice had got on the line and she and the writer discussed the proposed show. The only thing Max balked at was her plan to reward the winner with a publishing contract.
“I don’t like it,” he had stated. “When you give publishing contracts away all you get back in return is mediocre writing. Every writer needs to pay his or her dues, not be given their lifelong dream on a silver platter. Come up with something different.”
***
Saturday--Liverpool
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Because principal filming was to start on Monday there was a lot of preliminary work to do over the weekend. After checking in at the Royal Liverpool Hotel and taking an hour to unwind after his journey Max was driven by hired car over to a popular Liverpool eatery where he met with not only Gresham’s wife, Janice, who had decided to fill the producer’s role for this show, but also the show’s director, Alistair, and some suit from the BBC. After hearing for the umpteenth time how excited everyone was at his involvement with this project Max was told that the thirty semi-finalists had been chosen from a pool of thousands and that the short stories which each of them had had to submit would be sent to his hotel this evening. It was Max’s job to read them all over the weekend because on Monday he would have to eliminate fourteen of them on camera to come up with the sixteen who would stay on the show and be eliminated one by one by him during the next two weeks.
The format of the show, tentatively titled Writers Block pretty much followed the same pattern of similar programs. A group of contestants would share a house positively swarming with video cameras and they’d also have to endure being followed by cameramen every time they so much as took two steps outdoors. The general idea was to have these prospective authors, sixteen at the beginning, compete against one another daily in a variety of game show-like challenges meant to gauge their skill with the written word and their knowledge about literary history. However, the last challenge of each day would require each contestant to write a short story on a topic provided, doing so within one hour. These stories would then be evaluated by Max who would choose a winner, said winner gaining immunity against being eliminated the next day, and a loser, who would be sent home.
At the end of the contest the winner would be rewarded not with a publishing contract as Janice had originally suggested but a lump sum cash payment equaling twice the winner’s current annual salary so that he or she could take some time off from work in order to write their first novel.
After the meal Max and the others were driven to Liverpool McDonough on whose campus the show was to be filmed. BBC had procured a house just across the street from the campus for the contestants to live in and had also commandeered the abandoned Alumni Social Club on campus, retrofitting it so that it could serve as Writers Block primary set. Here Max met other people involved with show, busily tending to final details before Monday’s shooting began. He was taken to Wardrobe and fitted for his black suits, taken on a walkthrough of the set and given some directorial instruction from Alistair involving what to do and when.
It turned out to be a long day and it was surprisingly late when he was chauffeured back to the Royal Liverpool. As soon as he stepped into the lobby the concierge informed him that a package had arrived and would be sent to his room immediately. It was the collection of stories, each one in a folder with a clear cover and each one including an 8x10 glossy head shot of the author/contestant. On the back of each photo was a label with a typed mini-bio. One bloke, for example, works as an auto mechanic and has two kids; one young lady is inspired by Edith Wharton and reads to the blind; this guy wants to lead an all-gay expedition to the summit of Everest; this woman has six grandkids; this one swears she can channel Dora Carrington.
Max sighed, formed two stacks of stories, poured himself a brandy at the suite’s bar and then started reading.
***
Saturday--London
It was only about an hour after Max left the mansion to begin his trip to Liverpool when Katie demanded of her wife that they put some extra urgency toward getting Arlene back to normal. The impetus for this demand came after a disturbing experience Katie had had with Arlene early that morning…
Danielle had slept late, this thing with her mother having given her a mild case of insomnia. Katie, who had fallen asleep at around eleven, had stirred around 2 a.m. to find Danielle still in the far corner of Katie’s bedroom, on the settee, bundled up in a comforter and reading the same collection of Noel Coward stories she’d been reading on her Kindle when Katie had nodded off three hours earlier. Danielle swore she wanted nothing better than to go to bed but that her mind was racing so fast it was hard even to concentrate on reading the book; she then spent a few minutes once more cursing her father to eternal damnation and mumbling something about the Book of Bland. So Katie had gotten up, retrieved some sleeping pills from her medicine cabinet and in less than twenty minutes her wife was completely unconscious.
In any case, Katie awoke early on Saturday, carefully got out of bed so as not to disturb Danielle, gargled some mouthwash, finger-combed her hair until it graduated from messy to unkempt and, since it was nice and toasty in the house, went downstairs clad only in a pair of blue panties, intending to fix herself a breakfast of yogurt and coffee. In the kitchen she selected a vanilla-raspberry Dannon from the fridge, a spoon from the silverware drawer and was reaching for the coffeepot when her brain finally registered what her nostrils had been trying to tell her: the coffee was already made, in fact there were tendrils of steam curling up from the stainless steel pot. A movement caught the corner of her eye and Katie turned to see Arlene wave at her from the breakfast nook in which she sat sipping her own cup of coffee, the new Smithsonian on the table before her and Pelham sitting happily in her lap.
“Oh, fuck!” Katie had said, suddenly becoming very conscious of her nudity. “Oh my God! Fuck! I’m sorry!” In a flash she had one arm placed laterally across her chest, masking her breasts, and backed out of the kitchen quickly, feeling as if her whole body was blushing.
Fortunately, the coat closet was a few short steps away. Katie grabbed the first garment her fingers closed upon which happened to be a black tweed trench coat of Max’s and shoved her body into it, cinching the belt tightly around her waist. She returned to the kitchen, smiling sheepishly.
“I am so sorry,” she began, still blushing from follicles to toenails. “I completely forgot you might be up and about. Please forgive me. In my defense, though, it’s unusual for us to have overnight visitors; Max pretty much scares everybody off.”
Pelham jumped off the older woman’s lap and began licking Katie’s shins in greeting.
“No harm done, darling,” Arlene said. “We’re all girls here.” She made a motion toward the counter where the kitchen gadgets gleamed. “I made a fresh pot of coffee, will you join me?”
“Happily,” Katie answered and in a matter of moments joined Arlene in the breakfast nook with her own cup of brew and the yogurt.
Arlene said, “Harold—Danielle’s father—has a problem with nudity, even mine. I never could understand it, really. I work hard at maintaining a nice figure and yet the only time Harold can tolerate nudity is when we have sex. Or rather when we used to have sex.”
“Ah,” Katie said.
“Even then he always kept his socks on.”
Katie spooned out a dollop of yogurt and swallowed it. “I dated a woman like that once,” she told Arlene. “Only with her it wasn’t socks, it was her bra. Never took it off in front of me unless the room was pitch black.”
“Do you realize, darling, that I never once felt like I could walk around my own house naked just like you were doing a moment ago? When I was watching you before you ran off you seemed so liberated, so…unfettered, so breezy, if that makes sense.”
Katie shrugged.
“It’s just something I’ve always done,” she said after another taste of yogurt. “I don’t know…I like how it feels. Personally I think we all spend too much time in clothes; nudity is our natural state and so it’s kind of a spiritual state of being. I mean, if you truly want to be conscious of how you really feel each day and if you want to give your mind the freedom to roam then you need to give your body the freedom to sense its environment. I’m sure Max won’t admit to anything so ‘new age’ but I think that’s why he likes walking around naked, too.”
Arlene sighed dreamily.
“You put that so beautifully, darling,” she said. “‘Give your body the freedom to sense its
environment.’ That is so true, isn’t it? Look at me, though,” and Arlene opened wide her arms. “Here I am on a Saturday morning with no plans and I’m dressed as if I’m expecting company to stop by. I even have high heels on! But it’s habit, darling. Harold would never have tolerated me sitting down to breakfast au naturel; he would have had a conniption fit!”
Arlene slapped her hand determinedly on the table. “Well, no more!” And she stood up.
“Um…what are you doing?” Katie queried, but the answer became obvious instantly because right there in the breakfast nook before Katie’s startled eyes Arlene began disrobing. First she kicked off her high heels and then unzipped and shimmied off her pencil skirt; she next pulled her gray cashmere sweater over her head and did the same with the white t-shirt she had on beneath it. Last but not least came off the peach Victoria’s Secret bra and just like that, with the exception of the panties which matched the bra Arlene was nude, once more sitting across the octagonal table from Katie and looking very satisfied with herself for taking such a big step toward personal growth.
Naturally, Katie was stunned. Being in the same room as Danielle’s nude mom was not how she expected to begin her weekend; however, what was most disquieting was that once the clothes had come off the lesbian side of Katie had instantly seized control of her brain, appraising the older woman as a sexual object and coming to the conclusion that Danielle’s mom or not, Arlene was pretty damn hot and certainly hadn’t been merely boasting when she had said earlier that she maintained a good figure. “Good figure” was, in fact, an understatement; Katie knew women thirty years Arlene’s junior who would commit suicide if they saw the body this middle-aged woman was sporting and then compared it to their own and for a few alarming seconds Katie was actually aroused. Only by shaking her head briskly and taking a purposely careless swig of coffee, allowing the inside of her mouth to be scalded, did she return control of her brain to her more rational side.
Two for One-Relatively Speaking (The Two for One series) Page 8