Billy Lives

by Gary Brandner

  “I’m not worried,” Driscoll said. He shook hands with the author and paid the check on his way out.

  He should be feeling proud of himself, Driscoll thought, now that he had Hardeman and the book moving again. Anyway, Joyce Hardeman and her ex-husband were washed up long before he came into the picture.

  So why did he feel guilty?

  CHAPTER 25

  When he finally left Denny’s and walked back to the apartment-hotel, Dean Hardeman was shaky and bone tired but clear-headed and fully sober for the first time in many days.

  He found that the maid had thoroughly cleaned his room, changing all the linen and letting in the fresh air. She had gathered up all the bottles and conscientiously lined up on the kitchen counter those that still had some whiskey in them. Hardeman put the bottles away in a cupboard out of sight.

  He did not have the energy to do any real writing in what was left of the day, but he did spend several hours organizing his manuscript. This involved throwing out most of what he had written in the last two weeks. It was rambling, self-indulgent prose done while he was drunk, and it was an embarrassment to read.

  When he had pared the manuscript down to just the good pages, Hardeman sat back and figured out how much he had to do in the next two weeks to deliver as he had promised. It was going to be a difficult job, but not impossible. He folded out the freshly made sofa bed and slept deeply and without dreams.

  In the morning Hardeman returned to Denny’s for a big breakfast, then hurried back to his room, eager to be at the typewriter. At first the words came slowly and painfully, with much wringing of hands and grinding of teeth. But by noon Hardeman had the old rhythm back and was writing smoothly and well. He smoked continuously, as always, but left the window wide open to keep the air in the room breathable.

  By evening he had exceeded his personal page quota for the day, and felt he could have kept going for another couple of hours. He knew, however, that it was time to quit. If he worked on now he would be tempted to keep going past the point where the brain gets soggy and the writing starts to blur. By knocking off now he could leap right in tomorrow without missing a beat.

  The trouble was that he was restless now. He was not ready to go to bed, did not feel like reading, and found nothing in the TV Guide that would hold his interest. He considered and discarded in the same moment the idea of calling up Joyce to apologize. A phone call like that could produce a number of results, none of them good. Sometime before leaving California he was going to have to talk to his ex-wife again, but he was not yet ready for it.

  Hardeman wandered aimlessly about the small apartment. The closed door of the cupboard where the bottles were kept falling into his line of vision. He knew better than to open that door.

  He might go for a walk, he thought, but that really didn’t appeal either. He had seen Hollywood Boulevard, and it depressed him. The idea of picking up a hooker occurred to him, but he rejected it. It would be just his luck to find one with a bunch of friends waiting in an alley to bust his head.

  Still, company of some kind would help him relax tonight. Whom did he know in town? Conn Driscoll? No, Hardeman was still a little uneasy about seeing Driscoll again after yesterday. When someone has seen you in as wretched a condition as that, you like to give the memory a chance to fade before the next meeting.

  Al Fessler? No, Fessler really didn’t seem like his kind of people.

  There was nobody else, really. His friends, those who remained his friends, were all back in the New York area. Why not give somebody back there a call? A telephone conversation was no substitute for human companionship, but it was better than nothing.

  Hardeman pulled out his wallet to get the small address book he kept in one of the pockets. As he did so, a folded sheet of paper fell to the floor. Hardeman opened it up and saw a name and telephone number in his own handwriting: Iris Ames. For a moment the name did not register, then he remembered. At Billy Lockett’s funeral — the blond girl with the great body in the Indian dress. The groupie. Hardeman smiled, remembering the girl’s pleasure at learning that he was, or at least had been, a famous author. He started to tuck the sheet of paper back into his wallet, then hesitated. What the hell, give it a try.

  He sat down and pulled the telephone over, dialing the number written beneath Iris’s name. After three rings a girlish voice answered.

  “H’lo?”

  “Hello, may I speak to Iris?”

  “This is me.”

  “Hi, this is Dean Hardeman.” He paused for a beat, but there was no sign of recognition from the other end. “I don’t know if you remember me, but we met at Billy Lockett’s funeral.”

  “I remember the funeral …”

  “You and I were both interviewed for television,” he said hopefully.

  “Oh, sure, you’re the book writer.” She sounded honestly pleased.

  “How’ve you been?”

  “Okay.”

  So much for the preliminaries. Hardeman took a deep breath and continued. “Look, are you doing anything tonight?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Hardeman mentally kicked himself. Someday, perhaps, he would learn better than to use that particular opening line. No woman ever wants to admit that she is not doing anything.

  “Well, I’m not,” he said, “and I thought we might get together.”

  “Sure, I guess so.”

  As easy as that.

  “Wonderful,” he said. “What time do you want me to pick you up?”

  “My apartment’s in such a mess I’d hate to have you see it. Why don’t I come to your place?”

  Didn’t men ever come to pick up their women in California? He told Iris his address on Franklin.

  “That’s not far,” she said. “Give me a couple of hours to get cleaned up and I’ll see you there.”

  “Do you have a car?” he asked.

  “No, I’ll come on my bike.”

  “Bike?” he repeated.

  “I’ve got a ten-speed Fuji Road Racer.”

  “Oh. Good for you. I’ll look for you here, then, in about two hours.”

  “Right. ’Bye.” She hung up, and that was that.

  Hardeman sat for a minute looking at the silent telephone. “Did I do the right thing?” he asked the instrument. “Hell, yes,” he answered himself, and broke into a wide grin.

  He went into the bathroom and shaved, splashing his face liberally with Brut. Choice of athletes. He leaned closer to the mirror and examined himself. He tried thrusting his chin forward to firm up his jawline.

  “Nothing to be done about it,” he told his reflection. “You’re forty-nine years old, and you look it.”

  He consulted his watch. There was more than an hour and a half to kill before Iris would arrive. On an impulse, he left the apartment and headed for Hollywood Boulevard. He pinned a note to the door for Iris in case she came early.

  Hollywood Boulevard, in addition to the skin flicks, the schlock shops, the tattoo parlors, and the Orange Julius stands, had a dozen bookstores in the six-block stretch between Highland and Wilcox. Hardeman went into four of them before he found one that had a copy of one of his books — upstairs with the remainders. Hardeman paid the marked down price for Yesterday’s Years and carried the book back to his apartment.

  The note was still pinned to the door, so he had not missed Iris. He took the book inside and wrote on the title page: “To Iris, with affection, Dean Hardeman.” It was the first book he had autographed in years.

  Shortly after eight o’clock Iris arrived at his door, bicycle and all.

  “Hi. You don’t mind if I bring this in, do you?” she said, rolling the Fuji Road Racer across his threshold. “A person can’t leave a bike outside five minutes without getting it ripped off.”

  “Bring it on in,” Hardeman said expansively. “There’s plenty of room for all of us.”

  Iris leaned the machine carefully against a wall, then turned to face Hardeman, giving him time to look her over. Sh
e was wearing a striped tube top across her big breasts, and white jeans so tight they showed the V-shaped crease of her crotch.

  “Do I look all right?” she asked.

  “You look better than all right.”

  She smiled and made a kissing mouth at him, then looked around.

  “So this is where you live,” she said.

  “For the moment.”

  She prowled around the apartment, examining pictures, poking at furniture, like a cat checking out new surroundings. Hardeman stood by the door waiting for the girl to complete her tour.

  “Kind of small,” was her judgement.

  “It’s big enough for me and my typewriter.”

  “You’re not going to live here all the time, are you?”

  “No, just a month or so.”

  “Then where are you going?”

  “Back to New York, probably.”

  “Oh.” Iris had little interest in New York. She crossed to the window and drew aside the drapery. “At least you’ve got a pool.”

  “It’s something,” he agreed. Hardeman realized that he was suddenly quite hungry. He said, “Do you want to go out and have some dinner?”

  “Not especially. Why don’t we have something sent up here? Do you like pizza?”

  “Sure.”

  “We can call Pizza Man. They’re pretty good, and they don’t take all night to deliver it.”

  “Good enough.” Hardeman looked up the number of Pizza Man in the directory and dialed. To Iris he said, “What do you like on yours?”

  “Everything but anchovies. They’re too salty.”

  He ordered a large deluxe combination pizza, hold the anchovies. “What do you want to drink?” he said, covering the mouthpiece with his hand.

  “Diet Coke, if they’ve got it.”

  Pizza Man had no diet cola, so Iris agreed to settle for regular Coke. Hardeman relayed the message, and Pizza Man promised to have the order there in minutes.

  “Why don’t we go down and look at the pool while we’re waiting?” Iris said.

  Hardeman agreed, and they walked downstairs and stood at the edge of the sparkling blue oval, illuminated now by underwater lights. Iris sat down, took off her shoes, and splashed her feet in the water while Hardeman enjoyed the envious glances of a couple of his bachelor neighbors.

  “It’s not heated,” Iris said. “It’s always better when the water’s heated.”

  “It doesn’t matter to me,” Hardeman told her. “I can’t swim, anyway.”

  She looked at him as though he had confessed to some incredible character flaw. “Really? As old as you are?”

  For some reason the reference to his age did not bother him, coming from Iris Ames. “Really,” he admitted. Then, to let her know he was not entirely unathletic, “I can ride a horse, though.”

  “Pooh, who cares about that? I’ll bet I could teach you to swim.”

  “As old as I am?”

  “Older people than you have learned. I’ll just bet I could.”

  “I doubt it, but it might be fun trying.”

  Iris nodded decisively as if the matter had now been settled.

  Pizza Man arrived with their order, and they went back upstairs to eat it. Hardeman found that three of the thick pizza wedges, along with a beer from the refrigerator, filled him up. Iris had no difficulty polishing off the rest of the pizza. Hardeman enjoyed watching her eat. She had the enthusiastic appetite of a healthy young animal. When she finished a slice she would lick the tips of her fingers, glancing at him playfully.

  When nothing remained but the empty pizza box, Iris thrust her legs out in front of her and stretched luxuriously with her arms up over her head. Her breasts rose and bounced sensually under the thin knitted top.

  Hardeman wondered how, exactly, to bring up the topic of sex. It had never been a problem before, but in this case he was dealing with a girl thirty years younger than himself. He did not want to make some terrible generation gaffe.

  Iris laid a hand casually in his lap. “I’ve got an idea,” she said, “let’s take off all our clothes and go to bed.”

  For a moment Hardeman stared at her, then he laughed out loud. “You’re a wonder, Iris. You must have read my mind.”

  She moved the hand in his lap, rubbing him. “I read you, all right, but it wasn’t your mind.”

  No further conversation was necessary. Hardeman rose, pulling Iris up after him, and folded out the sofa bed while the girl got undressed.

  Naked, Iris Ames’s body delivered everything it had promised clothed. Hardeman sat on the edge of the bed looking at her, liking the way she looked. Iris lay back easily on the bed with a soft smile.

  “You really have a hell of a body,” he said.

  “Yes, I know.”

  He traced a finger across the soft globes of her breasts. “Nice tan too. How come no swimsuit line?”

  “I sunbathe in the nude up on my roof.”

  “Is your roof high enough so you don’t get peeping Toms?”

  “Who cares. Anybody can watch me who wants to. I like it.”

  Hardeman leaned down and kissed her mouth. Her lips were cool and tasted lightly of oregano. He kissed her chin, the hollow of her throat.

  Once more, Iris seemed to know exactly what he wanted. She shifted her position on the bed, bringing one round, tan breast up into his face. He took the nipple into his mouth, then, cradling the resilient breast in both hands, he kneaded the flesh gently with his teeth, savoring the smooth, salty taste. When he brought his face back up next to hers, Iris again knew all the right moves.

  • • •

  She seemed in no hurry to get out of bed afterward, and that suited Dean Hardeman’s mood completely. When the only sex a man has had in three months is an overfed, orange-haired widow, he wants to enjoy every moment he can lying naked beside a beautifully built nineteen year old. Looking down at his own thickening middle, Hardeman wished he had done more to keep in shape.

  “That’s all right,” Iris said, patting his stomach, “I kind of like it. You’d better not put on any more, though.”

  “You must be a witch,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “The way you always know what I’m thinking is uncanny.”

  “I’ve always been able to do that,” she said. Not boasting, merely stating a fact. “Just with men. People tell me I would have made a sensational hooker.”

  “Did you ever consider it? Becoming a hooker?”

  “Not really. I like to choose the men I go to bed with. Hookers can’t do that.”

  “True,” Hardeman admitted. He kissed her on the ear. She turned her face to him and gave him a deep French kiss, then pulled away.

  “You’re not going to fall in love with me, are you?”

  “Maybe. A little bit.”

  “No, I mean it. I like you, and I love to listen to you talk, and you’re fun in bed, but I don’t want love messing up things for us.”

  “Okay,” he said seriously. “I promise. I will not fall in love with you.”

  She relaxed and came into his arms. “That’s good. Now tell me about all the famous writers you know and what kind of things you talk about when you get together.”

  Hardeman tried to remember what he talked about with other writers. All that came to mind was whose agent was robbing him and what publisher was excessively slow with the royalty checks and how come some Hollywood hack was doing the screenplay of a New York novel. He doubted whether such paranoid palaver would interest Iris Ames, so he dredged up from memory a string of Hemingway-Fitzgerald anecdotes, some of the Algonquin Round Table crosstalk, and a few Oscar Wilde ripostes and retold them, placing himself in the midst of the action. Iris loved the stories, even though most of the famous names he dropped were unfamiliar to her.

  He sat up suddenly in the bed. “I almost forgot, I have a present for you.”

  “Oh, good, I love presents.” Iris clasped her hands beneath her chin, looking much like a little girl, until you l
ooked at her woman’s body.

  Hardeman got out of bed and walked over to the typewriter table, where he had left the copy of his book. “Don’t get too excited,” he told her, “it’s just a book.”

  He handed her the copy of Yesterday’s Years, and grinned with pleasure at the unfeigned look of delight on the girl’s face.

  “One of your books!” She hugged the volume to her, squeezing her breasts out around the edges. “I love it! You couldn’t have gotten me anything I’d like better. Did you sign it?” She opened the book and flipped quickly through the introductory pages until she found where he had written.

  “Oh. That’s nice.”

  He sensed her disappointment. “Only nice?”

  “It’s all right, but I wish you’d written something a little sexier. I mean, when I show it to people I don’t want them to think I just came up to you on the street like any old autograph fan.”

  “When I wrote that,” Hardeman said, “I didn’t know you as well as I do now. But we can fix that.” He picked up his pants from the floor and dug a ballpoint pen out of the pocket. He took the book from Iris and sat down again on the edge of the bed to revise his dedication. When he handed it back to her it read: “To Iris, the best lay in California. With lust and affection, Dean Hardeman.”

  “Much better,” Iris said, nodding her approval. Then she looked over at him mischievously. “But only in California?”

  He took the book back from her again. With the pen he crossed out “California,” and wrote in “the West.”

  “Okay?” he asked.

  She batted her eyes at him. “What about the East?”

  “Now just a minute, young lady, you’ve got to remember that I spent nearly fifty years on the Eastern Seaboard. It would be premature, not to mention disloyal, for me to immediately award you the national championship.”

  Iris reached out for him. “We’ll see about that,” she said with the confidence of youth.

  Forty-five minutes later Hardeman lay happily exhausted, his head sunk into the pillow. On the title page of his book, “the West” had been heavily X’ed out, and in it’s place he had scrawled, “the whole damn world and parts of New Jersey.” Iris sat beside him reading the words over and over again, thoroughly pleased.