The Boys in the Mail Room: A Novel

by Iris Rainer Dart

  Now the backstage area was flooded with people. Faces Stan hadn't seen in a long time. Barry knew a lot of them. So did David. Everyone was chatting and it was noisy and happy. Barry was the center of attention.

  "Mr. Rose?"

  Stan turned.

  It was Annie Jordan. She was a vision. Her hair was pulled tight and back on her head, emphasizing her huge eyes. She wore a straight-lined black Lurex dress and a big flouncy black fur stole.

  "Hi," Stan said. He was surprised she remembered him. Annie left the Etoiles only one year ago to work alone and she already had movie deals and deals with the networks to do specials, and a new album that was at the top of the charts. People in the backstage crowd were looking over at her. The kind of looking over where they try to act as if they're not.

  "I want you to know that I didn't forget what you did for me a few years ago," she said. The way she was speaking was different. It was slow and precise, as though she were making a very conscious effort to sound more intelligent. "I told Arthur Blake that. I called him when I saw your partner on the news gettin' busted." A momentary slip. "And I want you to promote my concerts, too. Okay?"

  Stan was moved. "Okay."

  Annie squeezed his hand then moved into the crowd. Stan saw her take the arm of an elegantly dressed black man and head for the door. Annie Jordan. He had helped her. Now she was helping him. She'd been talking to Blake. Jesus. No wonder Blake was apologetic for canceling those dates.

  "For your own good," he'd told Stan earlier today. Stan had arrived at Colossus at noon today. Just to check. To make sure. To be there when the concessionaires arrived, and the ushering staff and the sound crew. "I hoped you would sever your connections with that no-good partner of yours." Blake added, "Now we can do business."

  A funny picture in Stan's mind. Annie Jordan talking to Blake. And who had talked to Joe Rio? Joe Rio called just yesterday with a similar apology.

  "If I had let you do those dates with my acts, it would have looked as if I condoned Walter Barton's actions," the soft-spoken fat man told Stan in one of his rare phone calls. Maybe the first time they'd actually communicated without secretaries as intermediaries since Stan's visit to Chappaqua. "It would have looked as if my acts condoned Barton's drug dealing, too. I couldn't have that."

  "But, Joe, I called your house the day it happened to explain. You never came to the phone. Someone just put the phone down. It was strange."

  Joe Rio made a sound that was a cross between a giggle and a snort.

  "I'm a strange guy," he said.

  Stan nodded vigorously. He was glad he was talking to Rio on the phone and not in person.

  The crowd was beginning to thin out a little. Stan was relieved. His feet always ached after several hours of standing on concrete.

  David and Allyn and Barry and Beau Daniels were standing in one group now. A lot of people were looking at Beau the way they had looked at Annie. Stan walked over to them.

  "Let's all go out and get some supper," David said.

  "Okay," Stan said. "But let's stop at the box office first and see what the final totals are for tonight."

  "Here comes Harley," Barry said.

  The enormous auditorium at the Colossus was eerie and full of echoes when it was empty. And as the group walked up the aisles they passed the late-night custodial staff, whose mops made clicking sounds against the bottoms of the metal folding chairs. They moved toward the lobby. Stan and Allyn and David and Beau, and a little bit farther behind, Barry and Harley. Stan and Barry took a quick look at the figures the box-office manager had prepared, and were satisfied. Then the group opened the heavy doors that led outside and walked toward the parking area.

  "Let's all go in my car," Barry said. His dark-green Corniche was across the lot.

  "Great. Sure. Okay."

  As they headed toward Barry's car, they were all glad to be together. All of them feeling the kind of relief that follows a successful show. Not just for the people who produced it, but for the people who saw it as well.

  Harley walked with Beau. They'd met before. They were both signed to Rainbow Records and now they were talking about a record producer they both knew and disliked. Stan was telling Barry about his conversation with Annie Jordan and David and Allyn walked with their arms around one another.

  Not one of them noticed the faded blue Corvair that was parked in the far corner of the same section where Barry's Corniche was sitting. But the man who was sitting in the Corvair was watching them. He was red-faced and had a few drinks in him. It was Mickey Ashman. He'd been sitting in his car since he had paid to park in that spot tonight at seven fifteen.

  He wasn't sure why, but he hadn't been able to bring himself to go in to the concert. He never even picked up his ticket. Just sat there. In the car. Watching the people stream into the building. Like ants. Then the doors closed. It didn't seem to be for more than a minute, but it must have because then the people streamed out of the building. And cars were starting. And people were laughing and people were singing. Singing. And now there they were. The others. And whoever that blonde woman was with them. But he couldn't tell them he was there. Couldn't let them see him like this.

  It wasn't until after the Corniche started and its headlights went on, and it glided slowly forward and out of the parking lot and made a left turn and was out of his sight, that Mickey was able to start his own car and head back home to the Valley.

  thirty

  Stan drove into Westwood to Bullock's to buy himself shirts that night. He thought maybe he'd get a new robe, too. His blue one was really ratty and he'd had two different girls sleep over at his apartment last week, and both times he felt self-conscious about the ratty robe. The new robe was also blue, but navy instead of powder, and velour instead of terry cloth, and he bought four of his usual plaid shirts, laughing to himself about his Jughead image, and then walked to the Baskin-Robbins and got himself an ice cream cone. Pralines and cream. His car was in the Bullock's lot. A white Cougar. Maybe next he'd get himself a Grand Prix, he thought as he paid the parking lot attendant. It was only seven o'clock. He'd finished shopping sooner than he thought he would. Maybe when he got home he'd call up one of those girls he was with last week. He started the car, turned on the radio, and pulled out of the lot onto Weyburn. He turned the dial. Music. More music. KFWB news. "A twin-engine jet carrying rock star Harley Ellis crashed this morning in the San Bernardino Mountains. The cause of the crash was unknown, although thunderstorms and severe turbulence were reported in the course of flight. The members of Ellis's road crew and the pilot of the aircraft were also killed. The co-pilot is in critical condition with massive head injuries."

  Stan made an abrupt right turn and headed west. Harley dead. They hadn't mentioned Golden. Golden said he couldn't go back East. He had to stay in town because Minnie Kahn was recording and needed him here. Stan switched the radio dial. He'd try to find out more. Golden. What about Golden? It was still rush-hour traffic on Wilshire. Bumper to bumper. Shit. He continued to turn the radio dial. Nothing. Nothing. Barry. He couldn't have been on the plane. He must be at his house in Malibu. Stan would go there. What could he say? Poor Golden. It was such a strange thing. It had always been understood. No one ever discussed it. Anywhere you saw Harley, Barry was there. And that's just how it was. Of course, Barry was Harley's manager and that could have been the reason they were always together. But no. The feeling between the two of them wasn't about business.

  The traffic began moving now. Stan made a right onto San Vicente Boulevard, and took it to Seventh, made a right and followed it down to Entrada and the Coast Highway. Barry's house was in the Colony. So fucking far. Stan was speeding. It was dark outside. Maybe he should have called Golden. Of course. Golden wouldn't be at home. He'd be wherever it was people went to pick up their loved ones' remains from plane crashes. Oh, Jesus. Webb Way. A left. The Malibu Colony guard looked into the car.

  "Golden," Stan said. The man nodded.

  The Corniche was
in Barry's open garage, but the house was dark. Someone had come to tell Barry already. To take him. Stan parked in the street and got out of the car. He could hear the ocean pounding hard on the beach in front of the house as he opened the gate and walked along the redwood deck to the front door. It was unlocked. Stan opened it.

  "Barry?" he said softly. He thought he heard voices from somewhere in the house.

  "Barry?" He walked into the living room and pushed a light switch on the wall. It was an outside floodlight and the surf directly behind the house was illuminated as it repeatedly pounded forward and then slid back. Stan was starting to feel foolish. He would get in his car and go home. He heard the voices again. He walked toward the steps. It was the television upstairs. "Barry." Stan walked up the stairs. The door to Barry and Harley's oceanfront bedroom was open. In the dark, Barry lay silently on the bed, looking very young and small and afraid. His eyes were open, and he was staring at the ceiling.

  "Barry. It's Stan Rose. Are you all right?"

  There was a long silence before Barry looked at him.

  "Harley's dead," he wailed. "Oh, God," he said it out loud for probably the first time. "He's dead. He's dead. Harley's dead." And he turned over on his stomach and after a moment Stan could hear his long intakes of breath and then sobbing. Stan kneeled beside the bed so Barry would feel he was nearby, and waited for the sobbing to subside. It was slowing down.

  "We loved each other," he cried.

  "I know you did," Stan said. And now he was crying softly, too.

  "We loved each other more than anyone else ever loved either of us in our lives," Barry spit out. His words were angry and his face was flushed and wet. He grabbed a pillow and squeezed tightly and sobbed into it.

  Stan felt helpless. There was nothing he could think of to say. No words of comfort came to mind. So he sat on the floor until Barry's sobbing began to subside. Finally Barry turned a tear-filled face toward him.

  "I took him home with me last summer. To New York. We had to do some business there, so I figured maybe it was time for me to try and make some contact with my family. I mean, the only contact I've had with them in five years has been two letters from my aunt Eleanor. My mother's sister." He wiped his wet face with a corner of the down comforter on the bed.

  "So we stayed at the Sherry Netherland in a big suite and finally, after three days of my being nervous about it, and once deciding I couldn't even try it, I dialed my mother's number." He stopped and shook his head. Remembering.

  "I hadn't spoken to her in five years. Five years. And my whole life had changed. I'd really come up from being a shmatah schlepper in my uncle's dress business, and my mother knew it, too, because I sent her the articles from Newsweek and some of the other articles, too. So she said, 'Hello,' and I said, 'Mah? It's me, Barry.' And she said, 'Oh, hello, Barry,' as if I had just talked to her the day before. Not excited. Nothing. After five years. So I said, 'I'm in New York, Mah, and I want to come and see you. I have a limousine and a suite at the Sherry Netherland.' You see, I thought maybe if I was rich, like Mashe and Eleanor, my aunt and uncle, she would excuse everything."

  The ocean was relentless outside, and Stan was trying to put the story together in his mind. He had never even thought about Golden's family. About how middle-class Jewish parents feel knowing their son is a homosexual. At least it sounded from the story like they knew.

  "And she said, 'Isn't that nice?' And I said, 'So if you want to, we can go to a play or out to dinner or something like that. Would you like to?' And she said, 'I don't think so. Your father hasn't been well, and I'm involved with the Sisterhood, and I go to dinner on Thursdays with Mashe and Eleanor . . . ' and she started constructing this big phony schedule like she was trying to tell me she was too busy to see me. Her only child, so I stopped her. I said, 'Mah, I'm coming over. I'm coming to see you. Don't leave because I'm coming now. I love you and I have to see you,' and she said, 'No.' "

  Stan thought about Albert and the phone call from him right after Barton was busted. I'm here if you need me, Albert said. It made a big difference in Stan's life to know that about his father. He always remembered feeling safe and protected by Albert. Maybe it was what caused the difference between his approach to things and Golden's approach to things.

  "So then my mother said, 'Listen, Barry, why don't you come to see me another time? Yes, come to see me when you're in town with your wife,' " Barry remembered and propped a pillow behind him. "And she hung up. Harley made me laugh about it, though. First he said he was relieved it was canceled because he didn't have a thing to wear." Barry smiled. "But I couldn't understand. So much happened since I left home, so much changed, and still my own mother wouldn't let me see her."

  "What did you do?" Stan asked.

  "I had a few meetings. I made deals for my acts, and I came back here. But I felt like shit. Because I was planning to tell my mother that I am what I am. And I was going to forgive her for throwing me out the way she had. Because I was sure that for all those years she was walking around hating herself for doing it. But she wasn't. She hadn't been. She still thinks she was right, wishing me dead. I felt bad for Harley, too, because he watched me go through all that shit. But he just kidded me about it. I remember one morning we were running on the beach and I was talking about my mother and he said, 'What can you do? She just doesn't believe in fairies.' " Barry laughed remembering.

  Stan laughed, too.

  "I have so much to do;" Barry said. "I should make calls. To see how Harley's family is. They hate my guts. And the funeral." He closed his eyes. "Oh, Christ."

  "Why don't you rest now?" Stan said. "I'll try to reach your secretary and she and I can take care of a lot of those things." Stan thought to himself that he sounded like his father when he said that.

  Barry seemed to accept the offer. He put his head down on the pillow and was sound asleep in minutes. Stan took Barry's leather phone book from the bedside table and went downstairs to call and make the arrangements for Harley's funeral.

  thirty-one

  David sat in the living room of Beau Daniels' bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel. It was getting late and he was supposed to meet Allyn for dinner at eight o'clock at La Scala, but Beau was in the bedroom on the telephone talking to Benny. Shouting at Benny. And she told David not to leave until she got off the phone. The network was in an uproar about her walking off the show. Benny, who had always been able to push her around, was shocked when, on the day after she moved out of the house, Beau hired a lawyer to begin divorce proceedings. And Chuck Larson had taken David aside and said in his killer voice, with a smile on his face, "David, you handle this and I'll put your name on the door." He paused for a beat and then added, "Under mine," and both men grinned.

  Beau was like a petulant child. She knew she had power and money and she listened to the stories about the havoc she was creating with an excited gleam in her eye.

  "Tough shit," was the comment she usually made after hearing how much her absence was costing the network. They would bar Benny from the studio and get another producer. No. They would try to find a way to defer her earnings or invest them so that Benny couldn't touch them. No! No? Then they would sue her ass. "Fuck you," was the reply.

  David wished he'd counted the number of times he'd heard Beau say "Fuck you" on the telephone to someone this week. He could hear her now shrieking into the phone.

  "You filthy prick. You're nothing. You snake. You're a leech, and you've been living off of my talent since you met me."

  Now Benny was saying something.

  "Yeah?" she said. "Well, you liked it for ten years, you prick. What?" Benny was talking now. "Stop it. Stop it. Don't say that!" she screamed.

  David got up. Maybe he should go in and tell her to hang up. To stop exposing herself to Benny's abuse.

  "Fuck you," Beau said and she slammed the phone down and walked slowly into the living room. She was wearing a white chenille bathrobe, her face was flushed and she was trembling.

&
nbsp; "He said I have a loose cunt and that I'm rotten in bed, and I was never a good fuck. Ever. He said if it wasn't for him, I'd be sucking old guys' dicks for a living, for eight bucks a throw."

  Her fury was building.

  "He said if I don't stop acting like a baby, the network is going to see to it that I never work anywhere again. On any television show, or in any movie, or anyplace. That isn't true, is it?"

  "Beau, what you're doing isn't right," David said, softly. He was trying to do this the way he thought Larson would. "I know you're angry at Benny, and you certainly have every right to be, but—"

  "You too?" she snapped. "Now you sound like the lawyers. And Benny. That prick. That filthy son-of-a-bitch prick! It is right," she screamed. She picked up an ashtray and threw it at the wall. The ashtray didn't break, and the noise wasn't loud enough to be startling and that made her more angry.

  "He said I was never a good fuck," she screamed. "Never. In ten years."

  "Beau, he's trying to get even with you," David said.

  She didn't hear him.

  "That asshole."

  "Beau. Please."

  "Want to see what a good fuck I am?" she asked, turning to him suddenly. "Want to?"

  David was afraid. Beau Daniels. Under that robe was that million-dollar body, and she was offering it to him because she was angry at her husband. A grudge fuck. It was eight fifteen. Allyn was waiting at La Scala.

  "I don't think I—"

  "C'mon, David," she said. "You're supposed to be cheering me up." She sat on the sofa next to him. Then she took his hand and slid it into place where her robe was slightly open on her lap. He could feel the coarse pubic hair and she pushed his fingers down and into her wet cunt. Beau Daniels' cunt.

  "Maybe you can tell me if it's too big, huh?" she said.

  "Beau, I'm supposed to—"

  "I know. You're supposed to meet Allyn. So what? Be a little late." She was still holding his hand inside her and with her free hand she undid her robe. That body. That famous skinny body that America could see through every lacy and sequined costume she wore, bared and gorgeous, and her nipples were hard.