He went back into the kitchen for another cup of coffee. As he sipped he thought some more. He could wait for Arthur to come up with something, but that could take days. Anyway, that wasn’t his style. If he was going to sit around, he’d start thinking about Casey, so he might as well get out and do something.
That’s half a decision, he thought. Now, exactly what should I do?
It occurred to him as he finished his coffee: his mother’s journals. He could go at the same problem from the other end. She would surely have made some mention of death threats, run-ins, things like that.
He rinsed his cup out in the sink, grabbed his coat, and headed out.
CHAPTER 19
R.J. took a cab over to his mother’s apartment—his apartment now—and spent the ride thinking he was taking too many cabs lately. He wondered what that meant.
Maybe it went with the apartment. People who lived at that kind of building took cabs. Or limos. And hired somebody to walk their poodle and pick up the droppings.
Belle had never had a poodle, he thought with approval. Or a cat, or a cockatiel, or even a goldfish, for that matter.
The cab pulled up in front of the building. If you didn’t know much about New York you might walk right by the place without a second look, and that’s pretty much the way the residents wanted it.
But if you knew the warning signs, you could almost smell the mink inside. This was a high-class place, in the old-fashioned, lunch at the Algonquin sense. The apartments inside could not be bought. There were almost never vacancies. You just about had to inherit them.
Christ, he’d have to sell the place or something. It wasn’t his style. It just wasn’t him.
But it was his mother. When he thought about that, R.J. didn’t know if he could bring himself to sell the apartment.
The cab pulled up in front of the building. While R.J. was paying the driver, Tony, the doorman, opened the cab’s door.
“Mr. Brooks,” he said. “Gladda see you.”
R.J. stepped out. “Thanks, Tony. How’s it going?”
Tony shrugged and waved the cab on. “Can’t complain. How’s about you, Mr. Brooks?”
“I could complain plenty, but nobody listens.”
Tony gave him a polite laugh and ushered him inside.
The elevator always worked in this building. And it never smelled like pee or cheap disinfectant. R.J. wondered if maybe he shouldn’t move here after all. Sure, he thought. And I can live off the interest on my inheritance. Learn ballroom dancing, grow a little mustache. Get a Pekingese.
His sour thoughts ended when he pushed open the door to his mother’s apartment. He closed the door and stood there in the small foyer for a minute. The place still felt so much like his mother that he half expected her to come striding down the hallway, calling, “Darling! We’re late,” as she tossed her hair back and shrugged into her coat.
He shook his head. She was gone for good, and he still wasn’t sure who she had been.
He went into the study and pulled out a stack of journals.
Because he didn’t know where to start, or even what to look for, R.J. figured it didn’t much matter. He had as good a chance to hit it random as by planning. So he started reading from a time about a year after his father’s death.
He opened it to the first page and was shocked at the handwriting. Instead of the neat, evenly spaced spider tracks he was used to, this was a shaky scrawl, going up and down the page in a series of uneven lurches.
He was jolted again as he began to read:
I’d give anything for a drink. It’s all I can think about. That beautiful, golden liquid, floating so serenely in the glass, sliding over my tongue and down my throat like liquid fire, lighting me up when it hits with its warm, wise glow—God help me, I don’t know if I can be this strong.
If only I had someone to lean on—but I don’t. There’s no one, nothing, nowhere to turn but inward to myself, and I’m not sure I like what I see there when I look.
Arthur has been calling twice a day, and so has that horrible little weasel from the studio. At least I know what he wants.
And I know what I want too—something to drink, anything. I’ve even been looking with longing at the lighter fluid.
But I have to beat this before I can face any of them—and I don’t know if I can.
I’ve never felt so alone….
So she had tried to kick by herself. God, he knew that feeling. And he hadn’t been drinking as long and as hard as she had when he did it. He had just barely pulled himself out of alcoholism. For his mother to fight it like that…
Of course, he had known she had stopped drinking. At the time it didn’t seem like a big deal; okay, she stopped drinking, so what?
But to read about it like this, to get a step-by-step account of her struggle—somehow that brought it home to him in a way nothing had before.
R.J. flipped ahead. About halfway through the volume the handwriting steadied again. He went back a few pages and started reading:
Well, if anybody asks me, the answer is yes. I do know Bill W.
I met him last night, in the fellowship hall at Bel Air Presbyterian Church.
So his mother had gone to Alcoholics Anonymous. That was not really a surprise, anyway. He’d known that for years. And why shouldn’t she have gone? The thing worked. Just because he had been too mule-headed to try it didn’t mean anything. He hadn’t tried it because he knew it worked. Had to prove to himself he didn’t need anybody or anything, that he was stronger than the need.
Okay, he’d proved it. But for his mother, it must have been even harder to go, to ask for help, to expose herself like that. Nowadays any celebrity with half a brain does detox as the first step in their professional comeback. They’re probably put through it by their publicity people. But back then, when Belle did it, a whisper of that kind of trouble killed careers.
He read some more:
Don’t know why it should be a surprise to me, but to see some of the faces there and pretend not to know them, when everyone in the world would know them anywhere—These are marquis names of the first order, sitting in their folding chairs and sipping their coffee like it was the most natural thing in the world.
But anyway, it certainly made me feel a bit better. I’m not alone.
I guess that’s one of the strong points of these little get-togethers, letting all of us know we’re not alone, that others just like us are facing the same problem. It’s funny how much that one small thing seems to help.
R.J. could picture the gathering, all those famous names in one place, like one of those fantasy sketches from the fan magazines; lunch at the MGM commissary.
Of course, this would have a slightly different title: AA Meeting of the Stars.
And his mother had fit right in, had made herself fit in.
Or had she? He flipped ahead and read on:
And here I thought I was getting into something that didn’t relate to career at all. I certainly won’t make that mistake again. I can’t understand why that evil old bitch would snub me like that. After all, she was pleasant enough at the AA meeting.
Perhaps that’s why—she doesn’t want to admit to herself, in daylight, that she goes. So anyone who sees her there is poison.
Well, considering how her last picture did, she won’t be able to keep that attitude in place forever.
And considering how hard it is for me to get my next picture off the ground, how long can I keep pretending that anyone wants to see me on the screen?
I’m quite sure I’m too young to be a has-been, but it’s not up to me. I always felt just a little like I was faking it, like I didn’t really belong. Maybe that shows. Maybe the public can see that.
Maybe I am all washed up….
R.J. read the volume through and then another. He found himself liking this person, admiring her strength, her willingness to struggle, her vulnerability. He began to like her so much that when he remembered it was his mother, he was startled
into putting the book down.
I blew it, he thought. I really blew it. I never got to know her until it was too late. And I never let her get to know me. Maybe because I don’t know who I am.
Maybe all the things I thought were wrong with her were really just the way I looked at her because of what was wrong with me. Maybe it’s my life that’s a mess, he thought. Because he was pretty sure he didn’t have the kind of sharp, stubborn spunk his mother showed in her journals.
Sure, he was stubborn too. Pig-headed, in fact. But he had used his mulishness to keep her away, while she was using hers to keep trying to reach him. Even after he had pushed her away with all his strength, she was strong enough to keep pushing back, trying to get closer to her only son.
Whatever else she had been, his mother hadn’t been a quitter.
R.J. spent the rest of the day reading the journals, with long pauses between volumes. As he finished one he’d set it down and think, adding up what he was learning about his mother and contrasting it with what he knew about himself.
By the time it got dark he had reached a couple of conclusions.
The first was that if the killer had come out of his mother’s past, she hadn’t been aware of him; at least there was no mention, no hint, in the journals of anything that might lead to a name or a suspicious incident.
The second realization was that he owed her one.
He hadn’t done much with his life so far. He now realized that all his mother’s awkward calls and attempts at pushing him were aimed at helping him toward that goal. He’d shoved her away, distanced himself as much as possible, made it incredibly difficult for her to call or see him.
Okay, she’d been a lousy mother when he was a kid. But she’d gotten herself sober and tried to make up for it. It was his fault that she hadn’t managed it.
Was it too late? Could he make it up by salvaging something from his life before he was too far gone down that dirt road he stuck to so stubbornly?
He could carve a pretty good career out of what he had done already. And take over raising his son. God knew the kid needed a father right now. And then—
R.J. thought about Casey. He wondered if what bothered him most about her was that he was ready to make a commitment to her, and he wasn’t sure how she felt about him.
He thought of all the times some weepy-eyed woman had tried to sink her long red nails into his back and hold him down long enough to get a ring through his nose. How he’d always managed to laugh it off, wriggle away to the next one. How secretly pleased he’d always been with his fancy footwork.
And now there was Casey, keeping him wondering, off-balance, the same way.
Well, buster, he thought, the shoe’s on the other foot now. And it doesn’t fit so good. In fact, it hurts like hell.
He closed up the apartment and headed for home.
CHAPTER 20
Casey was waiting for him when he got back to his apartment.
“R.J.!” She seemed pleased to see him, even planted a kiss on his face.
“Hi, doll,” R.J. said, sliding in the door.
“What a great day,” she said. “I nailed my interview, got some stuff on tape that is major league. Hot damn, I’m good! This is absolutely going to jump-start my career.”
And she was off toward the kitchen, leaving R.J. to wonder if she was really glad to see him, or just happy to have an audience to hear about a good career move.
R.J. followed her into the kitchen, already feeling glum. On top of the emotional roller-coaster ride that reading his mother’s journals had put him through, he wasn’t up to another round of trying to figure out Casey.
He stopped just inside the door, his nose twitching at the strange new odors.
Several pots were bubbling on the stove. “What’s the smell?”
She flashed a smile. “Ratatouille.”
“Rat-what?”
“It’s a vegetable casserole,” she said. “To celebrate my day.”
He shook his head. “You celebrate with vegetables? Whatever happened to steak?”
“It’s good,” she said. “You’ll like it.” There was an “or else” hidden in her voice, but she was smiling as she shook a wooden cooking spoon at him.
“No meat on the side?” he asked.
She shook her head. “No meat.”
“Not even a hot dog?”
“R.J….” she said with naked warning in her voice.
He sank woefully into one of the straight-backed kitchen chairs. “Jesus, I’m glad one of us is having a good day. No meat.”
Actually, the stuff didn’t taste too bad, and there was plenty of it, served on a bed of wild rice. R.J. wasn’t hungry when he finished eating, but he felt like he should be.
Casey washed hers down with two glasses of white wine, a little dismayed when she found out he didn’t drink. “You don’t mind if I do?” she had asked.
“Hell, no, I like the smell.”
“Then why don’t you drink?”
He showed her some teeth. “I like the taste too. In fact, I like everything about it. I like it a little too much, so I stay away from it.”
“But you don’t mind if I do? Because it’s not a big deal for me.”
“It’s not a big deal for me either,” he told her. “Go for it.”
“If you’re sure,” she said.
“I’m sure, for Christ’s sake. Cheers, bottoms up, skal, salud, prost, nostrovya. Drink, already.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” she said.
They sat across from each other at his awful old kitchen table. R.J. watched the muscles work in her neck and jaw as she ate. Funny, he thought. Eating never looked elegant before.
Casey looked so good, in fact, that for a long moment R.J. forgot to eat. Then he realized that she was staring at him.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing,” he said and put his face back in the plate. But when he was sure she wouldn’t notice, he snuck a few more looks at her.
After dinner R.J. trotted out his espresso machine, an old gift from his mother he had used maybe twice, and made cappuccino.
Rummaging in the refrigerator for milk, he noticed that Casey had been shopping. The whole damned box was filled with juices, vegetables, and fruits. And no meat, he thought to himself.
As he served Casey a small earthenware cup of cappuccino, she raised one perfectly shaped dark eyebrow at him. “Gorgeous,” she said, nodding to the cup, with its light dusting of spice atop the stiff peak of milk. She sipped the coffee and added, “And it tastes as good as it looks. You do this often?”
“Every time you celebrate.”
After they had finished coffee they moved onto the couch in the living room. She rattled on some more about how good her day had been.
“But Jesus, listen to me,” she finally said. “I’ve been talking my ass off.” She looked at him accusingly. “And you haven’t said a thing to slow me down, damn it.”
“That’s my fault?” R.J. asked with astonishment. “Damn, I always take the heat for not letting a woman talk, and now I’m getting both barrels because I do.”
“You should have stopped me. Told me I was talking too much. I hate a woman who babbles on and on. I never do this, it’s just I really was excited about this interview and I lost it for a minute. But I’m not a chatterbox.”
“There you go again,” he said.
She slugged him on the arm. “All right, asshole,” she said. “So tell me about your day.”
R.J. hesitated. He wanted to tell her about reading his mother’s journals and the things he had discovered—about her and about himself. But as he took a breath to begin, he found he couldn’t say any of the important things.
He really did want to tell her. He wanted to bring her closer by sharing what he was learning about himself. As his lover, she might want to know, and knowing might bind them together.
But she was a reporter too—and which person would hear these intimate confessions, the lover or the repo
rter?
He didn’t know. And because he had no idea what their relationship really was, he couldn’t figure it out and couldn’t really open up to her any more.
“Oh,” he said at last, “I tried to run down a few leads. I talked to Belle’s old agent, out on the Coast.”
Casey leaned forward, her eyes sparkling. “Did he know about any threats on Belle’s life?”
He gave her a bleak smile. “Ten or fifteen.”
She looked stunned. “Oh.”
“But he’s going to check around, see if anybody who made a threat is still alive, in a position to do anything.”
R.J. lapsed into a moody silence. Casey let him, saying nothing for fifteen minutes.
R.J. sank deeper into his thoughts. His mother’s life and her death, his own life, the killer, Casey—it all made an unsettling porridge in his mind. He couldn’t even come up with one piece of it solid enough to let him think about it. Instead, his brain just circled around the chunks, over and over.
He was so far away inside himself that it was several minutes before he noticed what Casey was doing.
When it finally occurred to him, he glanced down into his lap. Her hand was there, reaching inside his open zipper.
He looked up at her face.
“Cat got your tongue?” she asked him.
He tried to speak, couldn’t, cleared his throat, and tried again. “That’s not my tongue,” he said.
She moved closer. “I’m not actually a cat, either,” she said.
She leaned her head down upon his shoulder and slipped a hand inside his shirt. He could feel her hot breath on his neck.
“Cheer up,” she said, her voice husky.
For a while, he did.
* * *
The telephone rang a little after midnight. R.J. came awake on the first ring and carefully slid Casey’s weight off his chest before fumbling for the receiver.
“Hello?”
“Que va, hombre?” said the voice on the other end.
“Uncle Hank, where are you?”
“At Dulles. I’m about to get on the shuttle for Kennedy. I think I have some things that will interest you.”
Play It Again Page 12
