Lala Pettibone's Act Two

by Heidi Mastrogiovanni

  “Aunt Geraldine’s fourplex is in Manhattan Beach!”

  “Yes, I know where it is, but we think—”

  “Manhattan Beach is not in New York! It’s in Southern-fucking-California!”

  “Yes, I know, but—”

  “I am not leaving my beloved Manhattan for a town that has shamelessly appropriated the name of my beloved Manhattan!”

  “Stop shouting!” Brenda screamed. “Look, think about it. Maybe it’s a good idea to have a change of scenery.”

  “Sure! A change to Paris! Not to Southern fucking . . .”

  Lala stopped raving. The throat-centered bundle of tears suddenly held sway once again.

  “Paris,” she whispered. “Ohhhh, Gérard. Gérard, pourquoi tu ne m’aimes pas?”

  “Lala, listen to me. You can rent out your apartment as a hotel alternative. There are websites for that. You can make major bucks doing it. And you can live rent-free with Aunt Geraldine because she said she has enough money for her next three lifetimes. You’ll do that for, y’know, however long it takes until you get back on your feet.”

  “But it’s in Southern fucking—” Lala began to yell.

  Brenda grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her violently.

  “Shut up and listen! No. More. Word. Processing.”

  Lala grabbed Brenda’s arms and held them still so that they could no longer rattle her to the core. Lala and Brenda stood together as motionless as sumo wrestlers for several moments.

  “Wow,” Lala finally said. “Okay. There’s actually no way I can deny that that would be great.”

  “See,” Brenda said. “The sun will come out tomorrow.” She winked. “That’s very nearly a given in Southern California.”

  “Wait. Wait, wait, wait. How’m I going to rent out an apartment in a building with Three Mile Island downstairs?”

  Brenda snorted. “You live in the Village. No one gives a shit how toxic your basement is.”

  Eat Her Dust, Dodge

  Brenda insisted on buying Lala a first-class ticket to LAX.

  “Shut up. Okay? It’s your birthday and Christmas present for the next two years, okay? Sheesh.”

  Brenda also insisted on arranging for a private car service to drive Lala from LAX to Geraldine’s place in Manhattan Beach.

  “Shut up already. Sheesh,” Brenda said. “What’re you gonna do? Rent a car and drive yourself? You drive for shit. You always have.”

  “I’ll take a shuttle bus,” Lala sniffed with wounded pride. “It’s cheaper. I can pay for it myself. I can charge it.”

  “It’ll take like five years to get there on a shuttle because they’ll stop at like five million other places before they finally drop you off. So the private car is your birthday present for two years from now, okay? Sheesh.”

  Brenda also insisted on arranging and paying for a pets-only airline to lovingly transport Petunia, Yootza, and Chester to their new temporary home.

  “No!” Lala shrieked. “It’s a bad idea! Puppies won’t like traveling! Puppies have never flown before! Puppies won’t like it!”

  “Shut up!” Brenda screamed. “Stop screaming! I checked it out! It’s great! We’ll bring them to the airport together! Puppies will love it!”

  Brenda and her husband Frank, a thin, balding man a few years older than Brenda whose reserved air belied any association with the massive, dramatic Neapolitan family he had grown up in, rented a minivan so Lala could sit in the back with her dogs while they drove to LaGuardia Airport. Brenda knew Lala would be crying the entire trip.

  “Mama will see her babies tomorrow,” Lala sobbed. She buried her face in each of the dog’s necks, going from one to the other to the other in rapid succession, looking like a dashboard bobblehead statue. “Don’t be afraid, babies. It’s going to be okay. Mama loves you. Mama will see you tomorrow. Mama is not abandoning you. We’re traveling so we can all be together without Mama going crazy from trying to make money as a word slave. An attorney once called me that! As a joke! He thought it was funny! Because I was his word serf. His word minion. His keyboard sycophant. His data entry servant. His office temp toady who had to—”

  “I think they get it,” Brenda said. “Turn here, Frank.”

  “How many times have I been to LaGuardia?” Frank muttered. “I know how to get there.”

  “I’m explaining it to them because it’s important to explain things to your pets, so they don’t get confused or feel scared,” Lala explained to Brenda.

  “I understand,” Brenda said. “You’ve been explaining it to them since we crossed the bridge. They get it.”

  Lala, Brenda, and Frank each held the leash of one of the dogs as they wound their way through the crowds at the terminal where Precious Pets on Planes had its welcoming lounge. Many of the people in the terminal smiled and cooed and admired the dogs.

  “I wish they would stop doing that,” Brenda whispered to Frank, pulling him to walk ahead of Lala and Yootza. “She’ll go completely crazy at some point if too many people remind her how cute her dogs are.”

  “I heard that!” Lala yelled from behind them.

  “There’s the lounge,” Frank said. “Lala! Look! Lounge!”

  “I know what you’re doing, Frank,” Lala said. “And thank God you’re distracting me because I’ll go crazy if I think about how precious my babies are.”

  A smiling young woman wearing a pilot’s uniform was standing at the doorway to the lounge. She saw the dogs approaching and got down on her heels.

  “Who is adorable?” she purred.

  “She seems very nice,” Lala whispered to Frank.

  “One of my colleagues uses this service all the time. They’re top-notch,” Frank said.

  “I can never thank you both enough for doing this,” Lala said, her voice trembling.

  “Shut up and do not start crying,” Brenda said.

  The smiling young woman stood, after giving each dog a treat and a big hug.

  “I’m Valerie. My crew and I will be responsible for getting Petunia and Yootza and Chester to Los Angeles safely and comfortably.”

  “Wow,” Lala said. “You know their names. That’s impressive.”

  “You must be their mom,” Valerie said. She grasped Lala’s hands. “We’ll take very good care of them, I promise.”

  “Here we go,” Brenda whispered to Frank.

  “I heard that,” Lala said, valiantly sniffling back tears.

  “Why don’t you all come inside, and we’ll get the kids settled,” Valerie suggested.

  Valerie ushered them into Doggie Disneyland. Cozy beds were everywhere, next to rows of elevated and floor-level water bowls and food bowls and more playthings than Toys-R-Us has in stock the day after Thanksgiving. Petunia, Yootza, and Chester strained at their leashes.

  “Let’s let them go, shall we?” Valerie said. She unhooked the dogs, and all three of them barreled toward bowls full of kibble.

  “Hounds,” Lala said.

  “Don’t I know,” Valerie said. “I’ve got four rescued bassets at home.”

  “You are my new best friend,” Lala said.

  Brenda biffed her on the shoulder.

  “I’m speaking hyperbolically, of course,” Lala said. “To indicate that Valerie is clearly a lovely, caring person who shares my devotion to animals.”

  “I share your devotion too. We have five rescued cats,” Brenda huffed.

  “They do,” Lala told Valerie. “Brenda and Frank are wonderful people. Brenda is the best best friend anyone could ever have.”

  Brenda smiled.

  “Great. Now I’m gonna start crying.”

  “Look! Ladies! Chihuahuas!” Frank bellowed.

  He pointed toward a mound of little sleeping bodies in a large pen.

  “Ohhh, come see this,” Valerie said.


  Lala looked around for her dogs and found the three of them curled up next to each other on the biggest, puffiest doggie bed she had ever seen.

  “Well, some babies are apparently not having much separation anxiety,” Lala pouted.

  “It’s because they feel safe and secure,” Brenda assured her. “Because you did such a great job of explaining everything to them in the car. Repeatedly. Over and over. Until some of us wanted to scream our heads off.”

  Valerie picked up a sleeping Chihuahua puppy. There were dogs of all ages in the group. She handed the puppy to Lala.

  “Ohhh, how precious,” Lala said. She covered his little head with kisses.

  “They’re going to the West Coast too,” Valerie said. “On their own plane. They were with a hoarder in a very small house. They were in terrible shape. A rescue group in Oregon is taking them all.”

  “You fly rescued animals?” Brenda said.

  “Almost half our work is pro bono, I’m very proud to say.”

  In a theatrical flourish of mock exasperation, Lala handed the Chihuahua she had been cradling to Valerie and then whacked both sides of her forehead with her open palms. Hard.

  Owww, Lala thought. Easy on the special effects, Melodrama Queen.

  “Is anyone expecting me to be able to function now?” Lala demanded. “Does anyone imagine I’m not going to lose it among this much kindness and cuteness?”

  “No one expects that, Lala,” Brenda sighed. “Trust me. I think not even Valerie expects that, and she’s only just met you.”

  _______________

  “Good thing you don’t have to function on any higher level than drinking and eating and watching movies,” Brenda said.

  Lala and Brenda and Frank were standing in the lobby of the Holiday Inn Manhattan View. Lala had chosen the hotel for her last night in New York not because it was the cheapest, which it was not, and not because it was the fanciest, which it was not, but because it had the words “Manhattan” and “View” in its name.

  Brenda and Frank were dropping Lala off there with her one small carry-on bag. All of Lala’s books and clothes and personal stuff had either been shipped out to Geraldine or put in storage. Her Greenwich Village apartment was now pristinely furnished with only the things paying guests would need for an enjoyable stay.

  A very nice young husband and wife had moved into Lala’s apartment that morning. They were visiting from Barcelona on their honeymoon, and they would be staying at Lala’s place for two weeks at three thousand dollars per week, and they were thrilled to get such a bargain compared to what hotels in Manhattan were charging. Lala’s place had been booked continuously for the next six months through a website run by a woman whose voice on the phone betrayed a childhood on Long Island and a healthy serving of world weariness.

  “You live in the Village,” Ruth said when Lala told her about the problems in the building’s basement. “In the Bancroft, for fuck’s sake. No one gives a shit. We’re thrilled to have you join our vacation-and-short-or-long-term-furnished-rental-hotel-alternative family. Let’s make some big bucks together.”

  Lala had welcomed the charming newlyweds to her home. Then she had slung her small, carry-on bag over her shoulder and had commenced her farewell tour of Manhattan before she headed uptown to Brenda and Frank’s place for the journey to points far west, via a certain airport in the Borough of Queens.

  The dogs were already at Auntie Brenda and Uncle Frank’s house because they had spent the night there, so Lala could thoroughly clean her apartment before her first guests arrived.

  Auntie Brenda and Uncle Frank had been delighted to have their canine niece and nephews over for a slumber party. Auntie Brenda and Uncle Frank’s five rescued cats had not.

  Lala’s first goodbye started in the doorway of Pyotr’s apartment.

  “Come in, please,” Pyotr urged. “We’ll have a little glass of something bubbly to toast you on your journey.”

  “I don’t want to interrupt your morning. You must have a million things to do today. Oh, perhaps a sip for good luck.”

  Lala’s second farewell was right in front of her when the doors to the elevator opened in the Bancroft’s lobby. Lala ran up to Victor and gave him a hug. Then she immediately started pulling wads of tissues out of her bag, tapping them all over her eyes and face.

  “I don’t want to stain your uniform, Victor,” she gasped, through sobs.

  “Just think of it as a nice, long vacation,” he said. Victor patted her shoulder. “We’ll all be here when you get back.”

  Lala stopped at her local branch of the New York Sports Club to hug all the employees there who were always so nice to her.

  “I bet the gyms in Southern California suck!” she brayed through sobs. “I bet they suck big time!”

  Everyone in the Pilates class in the nearby glass-walled exercise studio stopped stretching their muscles and firming their cores to turn toward the lobby to see what the hell was going on.

  Lala was in and out of Bide-a-Wee before anyone, Lala included, could know what hit them. She ran out the front door only a few minutes after she arrived.

  “I’ll be back!” she yelled over her shoulder and through her tears. “Take good care of the precious ones for me! I promise I’ll be back! Sally, do not take any shit from your asshat of a boyfriend while I’m gone!”

  By the time Lala knocked on Brenda’s front door, she resembled nothing so much as a vine-ripened tomato on a clothed popsicle stick.

  “You just can’t cry this much,” Brenda said. She handed Lala a margarita. “It’s not healthy. Your head is going to burst right off your body from the pressure.”

  So, that was why Lala and Brenda decided it would be best if the decades-long best friends didn’t have a sleepover together at the Holiday Inn Manhattan View on Lala’s last night in New York.

  “It would only be a good idea if your vision of a fun slumber party would be watching someone cry constantly. All evening and all night long,” Lala had said.

  “Which it is not,” Brenda had agreed. “That does not sound like any fun. At all.”

  “Good luck, kiddo,” Frank said. He wrapped Lala in his thin but muscular arms.

  “I love you, Frank,” Lala said. “I’m not going to cry until I get upstairs.”

  “That sounds like a plan,” Frank said.

  “Thank you for everything.”

  Lala turned to Brenda.

  “No big deal,” Brenda said. “You’ll call me when you get to Aunt Geraldine’s, we’ll e-mail all the time, I’ll plan a trip out there in a few weeks. No big deal.”

  “Absolutely,” Lala said.

  “Hey, Ladies, look at the . . .” Frank began.

  Even before the first sounds came out of Frank’s mouth, it was too late to try to distract them. Lala and Brenda had already, with a serenity that completely shocked Frank, stepped toward each other to hug and to cry. It wasn’t loud or dramatic. It was just wrenching. They stayed there for a few moments. Frank put his arms around them both. Lala was the first to pull away.

  Lala walked to the elevator. When the doors opened, she stood inside and whispered to Brenda and Frank, who were standing at a bit of distance, where she had left them.

  “I’ll call you tomorrow. I will also adore and treasure you both forever.”

  Brenda looked at Frank. Frank looked at Brenda and shrugged.

  “Whadja say?” Brenda asked Lala.

  Oh, for God’s sake, Lala thought.

  “We couldn’t hear what you said because you were looking down at the floor and mumbling.”

  Lala thrust her arm between the closing doors.

  “I said . . . Look, I can’t yell it because that’ll ruin the effect. I’ll send it to you in one of those cute e-cards about eternal gratitude and friendship, and here’s a virtual hug and shit, okay?”


  _______________

  In her room on the top floor of the Holiday Inn Manhattan View, Lala gazed at the nighttime skyline of her treasured Big Apple. She had a glass in one hand and a fistful of pretzels in the other that she pumped into her mouth between gulps of champagne.

  “I’m leavin’ on a jet plane,” Lala sang quietly in her chronically off-key voice.

  Lala pressed her nose against the window.

  “LA’s fine, but it ain’t home,” Lala sang. Her voice trembled. “New York’s home, but it ain’t mine no more.”

  And then her voice found force from somewhere, and the volume rose, and the power in it almost made the tone deafness bearable, and maybe even kind of close to poignant. Kind of.

  “I am, I said!” Lala belted. “To no one there! And no one! Heard! At! All! Not . . . even the chair!”

  Somebody started pounding a shoe or a hammer or a brick on the opposite side of the wall.

  “Uh oh. Sorry!” Lala yelled. She grabbed the bottle and poured another glass of champagne.

  “That was self-indulgent,” she said for her ears only. “I need some lady schmutz.”

  Lala settled on the bed and flipped on the TV to the Pay-Per-View channel.

  There better be something romantic, Lala thought. Something romantic with a storyline and a happy ending and with lots of shots of men’s tuchuses. OMIGOD! “The Flame is Love” is on FX! When did it start? It’s just starting! Not technically gal porn, but I remember the little blurb for this masterpiece in the New York Times TV listing. Two words. “Shameless blather.” God, how fabulous.

  She scrunched herself up against the pillows in a paroxysm of delight and gazed upward toward the sky she imagined beyond the roof of the hotel.

  “Thank you for your tender mercies,” Lala whispered. She paused. “Were you able to hear that, Universe, God, Fate, I-Don’t-Really-Know-What, or should I send an e-card?”

  _______________

  Lala leaned back in her window seat with her eyes closed.

  God, first class is so fabulous, she thought. Look at me. I’m an island unto myself.

  Lala remained supine until the very gracious members of the cabin crew began their pre-takeoff beverage service.