A light flurry of snow blew down as they pulled into the drive. It felt like high school, playing hooky to do something dirty.
“How long you been here?” she asked as they stepped out.
“About a year,” he said. “My grandma stays with me.”
“I thought Grannie was dead!”
“That’s Mom’s mom — remember Elsa?”
“Sure do,” she said.
“Well, Elsa died about a year after Mom.”
“That’s terrible.”
“Yeah, well, it was time for her to go.”
“So this is your dad’s mom?”
“Uh huh.”
“I don’t think I ever met her.”
“She lived in Rochester. She’s kind of a hermit.”
When they entered, the house was filled with shadows. A cloud of perfume pressed on Lisanne like a rag of chloroform. A petite, hawklike figure watched them from the other side of the kitchen counter.
“Maxine?”
“Yes?”
Lisanne was suddenly self-conscious that she hadn’t showered. Robbie’s eyes were bloodshot. She felt dodgy and illicit.
“This my friend Lisanne, from L.A. — her dad died. I told you about her,” he added. “We went to high school together.”
“Hello,” said Lisanne, brightening like a loser.
Perky whore.
The pot was still kaleidiscopically working on her.
“Hiya,” said the woman.
Her features grew more distinct as Lisanne’s eyes adjusted to the light. She looked around seventy, of slender frame and predatory countenance. She was meticulously groomed, and Lisanne pegged her wardrobe as vintage — Chanel or YSL.
“I was just getting ice cream,” said Maxine. “Y’all like some?”
Robbie turned solicitously to Lisanne, who shook her head. In the full fluorescence of her stonedness, her man looked wild and bereft, startled to have put them in this wrong, weird predicament.
“Actually,” said Maxine, “it’s soy. They call it Soy Dream and it’s raspberry. I am absolutely hooked and don’t care who knows. Do I, Robert?”
“No ma’am!”
“Aren’t I absolutely hooked?”
“Yes ma’am!”
“Hook, line, and stinker. Bell, book, and candle.”
“May I use the bathroom?” said Lisanne.
She could feel her smile becoming fixed and ghoulish; Robbie pointed the way.
Lisanne listened to the voices engaged in low argument as she douched.
The Greenroom and Beyond
“HE’S BEEN VOTED People magazine’s ‘Sexiest Man Alive’ more times than anyone on the planet — and he can type too. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome… Kit Lightfoot!”
The supernova took the stage with his patented self-effacing panther walk. The band raucously played the well-known theme from an early megahit. There was a large contingent of fans and screamers toward the front.
They embraced. After the applause died down, Jay did his jokey debonair thing. “Those screams — if our viewers at home are wondering — are partially for me. Something in the aftershave.”
Laughter. More swoons, hoots, and hollers.
“All right,” Jay chastised. “That’s enough now!”
He turned to his handsome guest. “So how the hell are ya?”
Hair-trigger whoops came before he could answer. Kit raised an eyebrow at the audience and chuckled. A few isolated screams.
“I’m great. I’m great, Jay.”
First words greeted by more electric commotion (everyone was having fun, and fun was what it was all about) which gradually though never completely faded away.
“I saw you at a benefit last week,” said Jay.
“For scleroderma,” said Kit, nodding.
“Yes. For a lovely lady who Mavis, my wife, has actually known for years — Char Riordan. They’re doing wonderful research.”
“Yes.”
“Making great strides. Do you go to a lot of those things? I would imagine you get asked to lend your name to causes.”
“This business is so frivolous, Jay, and so many of us have been absurdly blessed. I mean, let’s face it, I put on makeup for a living—”
“You could always work on Santa Monica Boulevard…”
“Don’t quit my day job, exactly! But I think we get compensated on such a ridiculous scale, that we’re… compelled… to do what we can. Otherwise, you’re just a kid in a sandbox. I try to do my share.”
Applause kicked in, soberly encouraged by Jay. “So you went last week—”
“I had a personal connection. Viv and Char — the woman being honored — are very, very close.”
“That’s of course Viv Wembley,” said Jay, pausing to acknowledge the audience as they whooped and applauded. “In case the folks out there didn’t know,” he added with a wink. “The very lovely, and by the way very funny star of Together. And I want to get to some other things — it’s well known you have an interest, a long-standing interest, in Buddhism, and you’ve agreed to talk with us a little about that tonight in connection with an upcoming event — which is something you rarely do and I’m thrilled you’re going to enlighten us, so to speak. But first, I’m dying to ask you a question.”
“Shoot.”
“Someone told me you and Viv have nicknames for each other.”
The audience hooted while Kit squirmed appealingly. “Who told you that?”
“Vee haff ways. Now come on, Kit, tell us what she calls you.”
He hemmed and hawed. The crowd cajoled.
“She calls me Bumpkin.”
The audience let out a happy groan. Warm laughter. Wolf whistles.
“Now come on!” said Jay, admonishing the mob. “I think it’s very sweet.” He turned back to Kit. “She calls you Bumpkin.”
“That’s right, Jay.”
“And… what’s your nickname for Viv?”
“I don’t think we should go there.”
The audience protested, then began to plead.
“This is a family show,” Kit added.
Laughter. More pleading. Isolated begging whoops.
“Now, you were supposed to do a cameo on Together—”
“Jay! I thought we were moving on!”
“We are, but this is important. I heard Viv was mad because that cameo hasn’t yet happened.”
Kit looked at the host with keen-eyed admiration. “Oh, you are good. You are really good.”
Audience laughter.
“Bumpkin’s been a very bad boy,” said Jay.
“Yeah, she’s not too happy. But I’m busy! I’m in the middle of shooting a picture! I’m in a little bit of hot water here, Jay, help me out!”
“I’m trying to be sympathetic. But to most of us, being in hot water with Viv Wembley probably isn’t the worst thing in the world.”
“Think you’re man enough to handle it?”
The audience laughed. Jay cracked up, blushing.
“When we come back, I want to talk about the Dalai Lama — he’s a friend of yours, right? — and the important work you’ve been doing building clinics over there.”
“Helping to,” Kit added, with a modest smile.
“Where are they, India?”
“Yes,” Kit said matter-of-factly. “India.”