The Boys in the Mail Room: A Novel

by Iris Rainer Dart

  Barry could see himself in the mirror, of his mother's dresser. He was only wearing his pajama bottoms and his body was lean and hairless. If not a girl, he looked like a very young boy. He felt like that, too. Young and helpless and afraid. What could he say to her?

  Now she was staring at him.

  "How did you find out?" he asked quietly.

  "From Mashe," she said. "I called there this morning and Eleanor, my sister Eleanor who's been so good to you, sounded very strange. We talked a few minutes and she said to me, 'Listen, Mashe would like to tell you something.' So Mashe got on and told me that about you. He heard it from one of the secretaries."

  "Rita," Barry said, realizing out loud.

  "He told me he can't fire that boy. He needs him. So you can't work there anymore. And no college either. He's too ashamed and sick to even know you. And so am I."

  "That bitch Rita," Barry said. "I'm going over there." He ran to his room to get dressed.

  "Don't you go to Eldor," Barry's mother shrieked at him. "Don't you embarrass my brother-in-law who is a saint. You get out of town and go be in a freak show somewhere."

  Barry rushed past her on the way to the door. She would calm down and he'd deal with her later.

  Barry bolted up the steps from the subway, moving around the people who were walking, and then headed down the street briskly. He didn't know what he'd say to Mashe, but he had to make this right. The elevator doors opened on the Eldor floor and Barry looked directly into the face of Rita. She flushed. She was shocked to see him there.

  "You cunt," he yelled at her. There were a few people in the outer lobby.

  "You filthy big-mouthed cunt," he screamed.

  "Drop dead, you little fairy," she said. "So you finally got caught. Big deal."

  Barry was amazed at how tough she was.

  She picked up the phone and dialed.

  "He's here," she said into the phone. She was warning Mashe.

  Barry stormed through the reception door and down the corridor to Mashe's office. His jaw was clenched and his nose was running when he threw the door open. Mashe sat on the sofa across from his desk. Over his head was a portrait of Eugene in his tallis and yarmulke.

  "Barelah," Mashe said, "what is there to say?"

  "Uncle Mashe," Barry began. But Mashe was right. There was nothing.

  "If you came here to look for your boy friend, don't bother. I sent him away for a few days. He won't see you when he gets back either, because if he does and I find out, I'll fire him. And he needs the job more than he needs to put your cock in his mouth, or his in your ass, or vice versa."

  Mashe winced at the thought.

  "Oh, God, and to think my wife and I took you into our lives like you were our son. And my own son, who was an angel and a perfect human being, is dead. Oh, God."

  Mashe was crying. Barry looked at the portrait of Eugene. By the time Eugene was bar mitzvahed he'd already been in bed with Howard many times. If Mashe only knew that. Well, he would. Barry would tell him. Now.

  "You know what, Uncle Mashe, you poor bastard," Barry said.

  "What?" Mashe looked up at him.

  Mashe, the saint, the millionaire, the president of Eldor Dresses, and the buyer, or at least the renter, of Barry Golden for the last six years, was reduced, falling apart, ashamed, and humiliated because his wife's nephew was having a sexual relationship with a member of his own sex. Barry knew he couldn't say what he planned.

  "I'm leaving for California," he said instead.

  For a moment he thought someone else had said those words instead of him, because he didn't remember even thinking about doing that before. But once he realized he'd said it, he also realized it was right. Mashe only nodded.

  Barry had no trouble leaving town. When he got home that day his parents had sequestered themselves in their room. He packed in twenty minutes, only taking a few pairs of jeans and some shirts, then went to the bank and took out the five hundred dollars he'd saved from working at Eldor and his bar mitzvah money plus interest which he'd never touched, got into a taxi, and headed for the airport. As the taxi got close to the New York airport the driver asked, "Which airline?" and Barry didn't know.

  "American," he guessed.

  In Los Angeles he told the cab driver to take him to the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel because he'd heard the name once on television. He checked into a room there, and cried and slept for three days. At the end of the three days he placed a long distance call to Andy's apartment. For a moment when Andy answered, Barry froze. "Andy?" he finally managed to get out.

  "Who is this?" Andy asked.

  "Barry."

  There was a long silence.

  "Where are you?"

  "Hollywood."

  Andy began to laugh. "Hollywood!" he kept saying as he laughed. "Hollywood!" And Barry thought probably someone was with Andy and that was why he kept repeating Hollywood, and he felt bad to think maybe Andy had already found someone else to be with.

  Andy laughed so much he began to cough.

  "Listen, kiddo," he said after he stopped coughing, "I hate to sound like Foreign Intrigue and all, but if anyone knew we were talking, my cute little ass would be, how you say, grass, so I better jump off."

  Barry was silent. Why didn't Andy mention anything about Mashe and Rita and what had happened in New York?

  "Bar? You there?" Andy asked.

  "Yeah," Barry said softly.

  Andy's tone changed now. "Listen, Barry," he said. "Your uncle's an asshole, but I need the job. He said you were a minor, and he'd get me for contributing to your delinquency, and rape and all sorts of bullshit if I didn't end it with you. I had no choice. Barry?"

  "Yeah?"

  "I have a friend in Hollywood. It's Michael Allred, the designer. I'll call him tomorrow. No, I'll call him now and you call him tomorrow and remind him. Maybe he can help you get a job."

  That night Barry went downstairs to the Cine-Grill and had a cheeseburger and a Coke. He bought Life magazine from the newsstand on the corner and fell asleep in his room reading it. The next morning he called Michael Allred. Allred was effusive. Andy had been a student of his years ago. He called Andy "a beautiful boy." He told Barry how Andy raved about him over the phone last night when he called Allred. He asked Barry to come over to the studio for lunch.

  Barry was impressed. Michael Allred had won Oscar after Oscar for costume design.

  When Barry got to the lot that day to meet Allred he wasn't surprised that the man was a supercilious old queen, but he was surprised that Allred had already found him a job. The job was in the mail room at Hemisphere Studios.

  four

  On January 3, 1943, when Stanley Rose was born, his mother, Lena, received fifteen bouquets of flowers. The nurses were very impressed. Lena also received a pink-satin quilted bed jacket, a Teddy bear that was dressed in a blue crocheted suit, and a book called Watching Our Baby Grow. The book contained blanks which Lena could fill in, regarding the child's development.

  Lena Rose told the nurses she would only keep the bouquet sent to her by her husband, but that the other fourteen could be distributed among some of the less fortunate people in the hospital. Then she donned the pink-satin quilted bed jacket, tucked the Teddy bear under the sheet next to her, opened the book called Watching Our Baby Grow and began to fill in the blanks.

  BABY'S NAME: Stanley Rose. BABY'S WEIGHT: Seven pounds, fifteen ounces. BABY'S HEIGHT: Twenty and one-half inches. BABY'S MOTHER: Lena Rose. BABY'S FATHER: Albert Rose, D.D.S. LOCATION OF BLESSED EVENT: Jackson Memorial Hospital, Miami, Florida.

  Lena wrote in the book faithfully for a long time. She wrote about every gurgle and every coo Stanley uttered. She wrote about every hair and every tooth he sprouted. And as he got older and verbal, she wrote about the things he said.

  "Stanley already displays a keen mind and a great wit," was the entry Lena made when Stanley was three. "Today was his third birthday and Albert and I gave a party. All of Stanley's cousins were there and
his aunt Sally and his aunt Belle were both there too. Belle was devouring the cake (as usual) and Stanley said, 'Aunt Belle, I think the reason I love you so much is because it's like loving two people!' Belle put her fork down and swore to go on a diet tomorrow."

  When Stanley was seven years old he made up a riddle which he wrote out in newly learned cursive script. The riddle was about a dentist, and Stanley's father, Albert, was a dentist so his parents loved it. The riddle was "Why is a cat like a dentist's drill?" And the answer was "Because they both make me ow!" Lena saved the blue-lined paper sheet where the riddle was written, in a pocket in the back of the book for "Mementos."

  By the time he was nine, Stanley thought the book was stupid, mainly because it was called Watching Our Baby Grow and he wasn't a baby anymore. He teased Lena about the envelope she kept in the book that contained curls she'd retrieved from his first visit to the barber, by calling the book "a hairy tale." But by the time he was ten, Stanley was glad Lena had kept the book, because in it she had written over and over how much she loved him. And though she'd kept a book just like that one for his younger sister, Bonny, she didn't write nearly the wonderful things in Bonny's book about Bonny that she wrote in Stanley's book about Stanley. He checked one day to be sure. The other reason he was glad Lena had kept the book was that by the time he was ten she had died of cancer.

  Stanley watched Albert do everything he could to try and save Lena. Taking her to doctor after doctor, to hospitals and clinics, but nothing worked. Stanley remembered never really thinking about romantic love before he stood with Bonny and watched his father lying on the bed next to poor sickly Lena promising her, assuring her, that she would be fine, and all of them knowing it wasn't true, except for Bonny, who was too young to really understand what was going on. Stanley's father loved Stanley's mother more than anything. He didn't even go to the office most of the time while she was sick. Just stayed with her, near her, caring for her until the end.

  When Stanley saw the look on Albert's face the day Lena died, for a minute he hated his father. Albert looked almost glad. Then Stanley realized that he himself was glad. There was a reason to be glad. There would be no more nurses in the house, no more having to be quiet all the time. No more visits from his big fat aunts, Sally and Belle, his mother's sisters, who would go to see Lena in her room wearing big phony smiles on their faces, and then come out when she fell asleep to sit in the living room and smoke cigarettes and cry to Albert, who would comfort them. Comfort them? Poor tired Albert. And the two aunts so fresh from shopping they had their bags from Burdine's with them in the back seat of Aunt Belle's car. Stanley saw them.

  Stanley couldn't understand how his beautiful mother had two sisters who looked like that. Maybe they weren't really her sisters. Like in "Cinderella." That's what it was. Sally and Belle were the ugly sisters. As he watched them coming up the walk to the house, Stanley would shout, "Hey, Dad, here come the sisty uglers," and sometimes Lena would hear him from her bed and laugh, and Albert would try to stifle a giggle as he opened the door to let the aunts in. For years after that, Stanley and Bonny referred to Sally and Belle as the S.U.

  The S.U. were certain that Albert would never be able to handle the job of raising two young children, as well as return to his dental office, which was only still functioning thanks to his associate, Dr. Charles, because Albert had spent so much time trying to take care of Lena. But Albert surprised them. He hired a daily cleaning lady named Vivian, then made car pool deals which allowed him to drive in the morning and another parent to pick up while he was at work in the afternoon. He marketed at night, packed lunches early in the morning, left tooth fairy money and made the best Halloween costumes the kids ever had. Stanley and Bonny adored him, even though Stanley prayed every night that Albert would get married again someday soon so the children could have a father and a mother, instead of a father and a cleaning lady, and Bonny, who was very young, prayed that Lena would come back to life.

  Stanley was watching television in the living room that afternoon when his throat started hurting. It was a Friday and Albert had promised to take Stanley and Bonny out for Chinese food and then bowling when he got home. It was their favorite evening out together. Stanley wouldn't mention the sore throat. Anyway, the hot won ton soup would fix him right up.

  Vivian was carrying the last load of ironing upstairs and muttering to herself when she stopped and looked at him.

  "You got somethin' wrong?" she asked.

  "Huh?"

  "You sure lookin' sick to me, my friend." Vivian dumped the pile of ironing on the sofa. "What's achin' you?"

  Shit. She would tell his father.

  "My throat."

  "You go get in bed now till your daddy gets home, hear?"

  Stanley wanted to go bowling tonight. Albert promised him if he started doing well he'd get him his own bowling ball. If he was in bed when Albert got home, Albert would never take him out tonight. But Vivian had picked up the pile of ironing agan and wouldn't walk up the steps until Stanley went ahead of her, so he did.

  Bonny was in her room holding a doll that was wearing leggings. She was trying to get teeny little red rubber galoshes on the doll's feet.

  Stanley went right to bed and fell asleep. When he woke up a few hours later he was sweating. Covered with sweat. And his throat still hurt. Worse now. Much worse. And his foot. His foot was aching. Maybe he'd tripped or something. But his foot was really hurting. What could this be? Suddenly, as he lay in the darkened bedroom, Stanley was filled with terror.

  He knew what it was. No one had to tell him. Polio. It was going around. Public pools had been closed down. Children were told not to drink from public fountains. Polio. Oh, God. He would be in a wheelchair. Maybe an iron lung. And Albert would look at him with sad eyes the way he'd looked at Lena when she was sick and helpless, like Stanley was going to be now. Oh, please. His crying was loud and the door opened. Albert. He was home.

  "Baby?"

  Albert called Stanley baby. He also called Bonny baby. It was his favorite endearment.

  "Anything wrong?" he asked.

  "No," came the tearful, through a clogged nose answer.

  "What is it?" Albert asked, turning on the light.

  "I—I—" Stanley couldn't say it.

  ''Are you ready for bowling?" Albert asked.

  "Daddy," Stanley managed to say. "I'm afraid. I think I have polio," he blurted out and began to cry.

  "What?" Albert said, still standing in the doorway. "That's silly. Don't you think that. You must have been having a bad dream. Now your sister's all ready. So you wash your face and comb your hair and we'll go."

  "I can't."

  Albert Rose walked over to the bed and took the boy in his arms.

  "Well, you do have a fever, baby," he said. "You're hot as hell."

  "And my throat hurts . . ."

  "Just some flu bug or other." Albert rocked him now. He was so strong and sure.

  "But my foot," Stanley said. He was afraid to say the rest. "My foot hurts real bad, Daddy."

  Albert no longer looked so sure.

  "I'll call Dr. Grogen," he said.

  A few minutes later, after making a phone call and asking Vivian to stay with Bonny, Albert bustled his son into the car and drove him to Harry Grogen's office. After the examination, the white-haired pediatrician told Stanley to dress and took Albert into his office. He put his hands on Albert's arms as if to hold him up.

  "I think the boy has polio, Al," he said. "I want to do a spinal."

  "You're crazy," Albert said. But there was fear in his voice.

  "He's got all the signs," Grogen said.

  The door to Grogen's office opened. The eleven-year-old boy stood in the door dressed and pale and shivering. He looked at Grogen's long face looking back at him. And then at Albert's face. He recognized Albert's expression of helplessness. He'd seen it before. Stanley broke the silence.

  "I guess this sort of rules out bowling," he said softly.
/>   Albert closed his eyes for a moment to stop the tears.

  "Let's go home, baby," he said then, and he lifted the boy into his arms and carried him out to the car.

  Bulbar polio. Crippling. That was the diagnosis. Grogen wanted Stanley to move into the hospital immediately. Albert said no.

  "He could need oxygen fast, Al," Grogen told him. "You can't care for him the way we can."

  "The hell I can't," Albert Rose said. "I don't want my boy in any goddamned hospital."

  "You plannin' to give up your life again?" Grogen snapped. "The way you did with Lena for so long? Staying around that house doin' twenty-four-hour-a-day service, giving up your own life? What about Bonny? That poor baby probably only knows you as a nurse, Al."

  Albert was stone-faced.

  "You bring that boy into the hospital tomorrow, Albert Rose, or you're making a mistake. I'll fill out the forms right now."

  "Shove the goddamned forms, Grogen," Albert said.

  Stanley was afraid. He was glad his father wouldn't let him go to the hospital. On the day he had to go there to have his tests, he saw children in wheelchairs. Children on crutches. It was awful. The hospital must have done that to them. But then there was the other side. What if Albert was wrong and Stanley was supposed to be in the hospital? Couldn't get better without the hospital? Then what would happen?

  Albert began treating him the next day.

  "What's that?" Stanley asked.

  He was lying in his bed upstairs and Albert was carrying a big tray that had something on it that looked like giant versions of the steaming dumplings they served in the Chinese restaurant.

  "Hot packs, baby," Albert said. "We're gonna do these every two hours till we make you well."

  The packs were boiling. Blankets. Boiled. Packed on Stanley's legs. The first few times Stanley cried and begged Albert to stop, but Albert said, "Now, now, Daddy loves you. Daddy wouldn't hurt you. This is what we have to do." And sometimes Bonny would stand wide-eyed in the doorway of Stanley's room to watch.