“That’s not nice,” said Becca.
“Sorry, Virginia.”
“You don’t know that you didn’t get the part because of Kit,” said Gingher. “He’s not vindictive like that. Maybe Aronofsky thought you couldn’t act.”
“Well fuck Mr. Requiem for an Avant-Garde Blow Job too, honey-child, cause my audition was kick-ass. I was on my second callback when Mr. Lightfoot and I had our little run-in, and I got axed the next day.”
“I will always love you for working at the Coffee Bean as a retard!” said Gingher.
“He went off on me, and I just looked at him and said, ‘I’m sorry. I mean, you’re only like making twenty-five million a picture, or whatever, and I’m out there doing what I have to do so I can pay my fucking phone bill—”
“You didn’t say that,” said Gingher, agog.
“Under my breath.”
Gingher guffawed.
“And how do you guys know each other?” asked Annie.
“We met at the Grove,” said Larry.
“We were by ourselves,” said Gingher. “We’d just broken up with our boyfriends.”
“We were crying.”
“It was so pathetic! We were sitting an aisle away from each other at E.T.”
“The rerelease.”
“E.T. is the perfect movie,” said Annie.
“Gertie!” exulted Gingher. “How cute is Gertie?” She addressed the last to Becca, whom she deemed to be ambassador to the land of Drew.
“What was that, like four years ago?” said Larry. “I’d never even seen it.”
“Can you believe that?” said Annie to the others, outraged.
“I saw Close Encounters,” he said, “but I never saw E.T.”
“You know how the Grove — I love the Grove! — has those armrests you can lift up?”
“Lovebird seats,” said Annie.
“So Larry and I see each other crying. And we like started whispering to each other, really loud. Then Larry changes seats—”
“I thought you were Julia Sweeney.”
“—and we sobbed through the whole movie!”
“People were telling us to shut up.”
“Larry told this one person that he was really sorry he was crying but he just found out he had tuberculosis and AIDS. After the movie, we went to the Farmers Market and ran our stories.”
“About the mutual breakups.”
“Who were you going out with?” asked Becca.
“Some pimply-faced Puerto Rican trash,” said Larry. “I think he was, like, twelve.”
“Research for yet another amazing movie role,” said Gingher, with a wink. “And speaking of E.T., ohmygod, you do look so much like Drew!”
“Thank you,” said Becca, as if in rehearsal for when she would finally come into her own.
“Larry said you might be doing that Spike Jonze movie.”
“I hope so,” said Becca. “Because the look-alike stuff doesn’t pay the rent. Not this month anyway.”
Larry was saying how he read somewhere that look-alikes were always being flown to Japan for private parties, when Gingher gaped at a pregnant woman passing by their table. She took one look and blurted out, “Ohmygod, I can’t even believe I, like, forgot — Viv miscarried.” She clapped an embarrassed hand over her mouth, in exaggerated fear that the woman had overheard.
“No!” said Annie.
“When?” asked Larry, eyes agleam.
“You guys so totally have to swear you won’t tell anyone.”
“I didn’t even know she was pregnant,” said Becca.
“No one did,” said Gingher. “I mean, probably not even Kit.”
“Wouldn’t it have been weird,” said Larry, “if they had a kid and it turned out to be retarded?”
“That’s so sad,” said Becca. “I mean, she probably lost the baby because of what happened. The stress.”
“Ohmygod, that is so sad,” echoed Annie.
“But you guys have to swear you won’t talk about it until, like, after it’s in the tabloids. I signed a confidentiality agreement and could really get in trouble. Will you so totally swear?”
Transmigration of Souls
LISANNE’S WATER BROKE in the Century Plaza ballroom, at Tiff’s Heart Giver Courage tribute.
When she stood from her seat, she felt a pang and told Phil she was having a “bladder problem.” By the time they got to the dance floor, everything was soaked. She collapsed in a chair at a table of old people who went on picking at their veal. She was shaking and crying. When the Loewensteins rushed over, Lisanne said she was pregnant and that her water must have broken. Tiff kind of took over. There were five top OB-GYN guys in the house, and all of them kept wanting her to agree that maybe she’d only peed her pants. Just when Lisanne thought it had ebbed, she got flooded anew. They plunked her in a wheelchair and laid her out in the stretch limo. Phil was white as a sheet. One of the OB-GYNs went ahead to Saint John’s.
The nurse told her she was having contractions every five minutes, but she couldn’t feel them. They gave her something to stop the labor, though the discharge was continuous. Phil was so shell-shocked that Tiff, who had already received his crystal figurine and was exhausted as well, announced he would escort the scion home. Roslynn stayed on. She was a great comfort, kind and discreet. She left around midnight without ever broaching the issue of paternity.
• • •
LISANNE LAY THERE and assessed. She thought of calling Robbie — but why? Her boss would be shocked when he learned, though in a way, she was relieved. Her secret was out, or nearly so. Earlier in the day she had taken the deepest, most restful nap of her life, awakening at peace. Her concern for Kit was still there, but the agonized worries over his health and well-being had evaporated. She knew he would be OK. The water had broken and a rainbow now shone.
At 3:30 A.M. the nurse said the tests showed the baby’s lungs to be “mature.” The doctor wanted to deliver right away. The C-section took forever, and at delivery, the bloody boy screamed with elemental force — healthy, at thirty weeks.
They fed him through his nose because the suckle reflex hadn’t yet developed. Lisanne used a breast pump for milk, but it was hard to be productive. She was still able to make small quantities of what the RNs called “liquid gold,” which they added to the feeding tube. The hotel sent a basket of fruit and cookies. No one ever had her water break in the ballroom before.
• • •
THE SOUND WAS off while she watched Larry King.
“Do you know she here?” said a Mexican nurse who came in for the dinner tray.
“Who?”
“Viv Wembley. The girl from the show who go with Kit Lightfoot. The show Together.”
“What do you mean?”
“She miscarry.”
“She—”
“She miscarry. Ectopic — very dangerous. She right here! Same floor.”
“In the hospital?” The woman was confusing her.
“Right now! But I no tell you — is secret. Is terrible what happened to her fiancé. Handsome! Now no big fat Greek wedding. No baby. Is terrible. Is terrible.”
• • •