Memorial

by Bruce Wagner

  They tried to revive The Twilight Zone a few times since the Golden Age but never got it right. Maybe it was something about being filmed in black and white or the extinct theatrical craft of actors like Agnes Moorehead and Burgess Meredith. The old man thought the writing was superb. Rod Serling was one of those special characters—Ray loved that he smoked on camera, just like Ed Murrow, and even Johnny Carson—a real creator of mood and dialogue. That era, Playhouse 90 and Paddy Chayevsky and those General Electric shows, was gone forever. He tried watching Curb Your Enthusiasm and Deadwood but they left him cold. Either the comedy couldn’t hold a candle to Skelton, Burns, and Berle, or the “Western”’s language was so vulgar he forbade the sometimes curious Big Gulp to tune in. (Though he did enjoy Rescue Me.) Even the big network commercials were obscene. One of them showed a handsome older couple dancing. It said “Second Marriage”—and turned out to be an ad for adult diapers. She could watch that crap with the cousins. Not in his house.

  He only kept the cable for his Cold Case Files.

  VII.

  Chester

  SOMEONE called from the LA Times—the “My Favorite Weekend” feature.

  Each Thursday showcased a half-celebrity nitwit expounding on how they typically wiled away their Friday through Sunday. The lady on the phone said they wanted to do something different, and focus on an Industry person who was “below the line,” kind of like those promos for the Times in movie theaters that show animators or key grips or bestboys in their habitats. She’d been given Chester’s name by a location manager of a Hyundai commercial he had scouted, and especially sparked to the idea that Chess was a guy who made his living knowing Los Angeles inside and out. He certainly knew where the Lautners, Lloyd Wrights, and Googie coffeeshops were buried. She wanted to email some questions and follow up with a phone interview.

  Fine with me. Fine and dandy.

  The funny thing is he’d just been goofing on “My Favorite Weekend” with Maurie. He fished it out of the Herlihy Archives: the days-old column spotlit Fran Drescher, the sinus-challenged former TV star who had suffered through a home-invasion rape and uterine cancer. Chess wondered if they were related, in a cause and effect kind of way.

  The headline read NOW JUST FRIDAY NIGHTS ARE FEVERED.

  Some of my most fun times are when I go out with a posse of my girlfriends and paint the town rouge…. Alicia Keys was fabulous. We got to go backstage and meet her, and we saw Tom Cruise too, and pretty soon the people in his posse were introducing themselves to the people in our posse—it was so much fun.

  “I want my Mapo! I want my rape-o!” said Maurie, over the phone.

  “That’s harsh,” said Chess, with a laugh.

  “Yeah, well, life’s a bitch and then you get posse-fucked.” Then he sang, “Hold me closer, tiny cancer.”

  Maurie said they should get together and talk about his A&E “dillio.” He wanted to know if any progress had been made with locations. Chess said he was still looking but Queen of Angels seemed promising. Then Maurie mentioned an empty clinic in Alhambra where a friend just shot a Fiery Furnaces video. Chess scribbled down a phone number and said he’d check it out. They made plans to have dinner at Chameau, a Moroccan dive on Fairfax that had migrated from Silver Lake. Maurie’s girlfriend, Laxmi, would join them. Chess really had a hard-on for her. He was a sucker for strawberry-blond Manson creepy-crawlers—freckle fields and tiny tits, intrepid, sociopathic girls-next-door with Sweet ’N Low hankerings for all things mystical.

  Roll-up for the mystery tour—

  ON the way to the restaurant, Chess wondered if he should ask Ma for money. She must be doing all right. He’d only talked to her once since the funeral. That was dumb. Might be awkward—though she’d probably be happy to hear from him. Of course she would. Maybe he’d just put in a call without asking for bread, tough it out awhile longer, get the check from the A&E gig, then rock on over to Beverlywood. That would probably be better form. How much should he hit her up for? The most he ever got in one lump was 5 grand. (Asking Joan would be out of the question.) She never pressed but he was always careful to pay off debts to Marj. He wanted her to know he was good for it in case he ever got in a really tight spot, that he wasn’t a deadbeat. Maurie always said it was best to appear prosperous when asking for hand-outs (even a guy like not-too-long-

  ago-beleaguered Trump sued some journalist who wrote a book saying he was only worth a couple hundred mill) and maybe Chess would do a little posturing before he popped the question. Cash out A&E and buy a new suit. Rent a Jag or an Escalade for a few hundy, just for the day, then drive on by. Tell Mom he was in the middle of producing his old friend Maurie Levin’s new script and needed something to tide him over between bank drafts. Tell her there was some temporary international monetary snafu, it was a Canadian/UK/German coproduction and the Krauts were being crabby, whatever. The Canucks were being canny. The Brits were being Britney. He’d ask Mom to dinner at Ruth’s Chris or Mastro’s in Beverly Hills. Spago, wherever. Or maybe they’d go Indian; she was a freak for India, from when they were kids.

  Chess began to have warm feelings about Marj but couldn’t separate them from the fantasy of unsolicited largesse. He imagined her giving 10 times what he planned to ask for, the act of spontaneous generosity opening a new era of intimacy between mother and son. There was no reason to feel guilt; he wasn’t going to leave her hurting. It was the opposite. He would give her the collateral of his heart, knowing it would make her feel better to help her son. Chess knew she’d been left cash and property, and had jewelry as well—old-style brooches and pins, earrings, whatever. She had to be sitting pretty. Hamilton was an ace provider. He didn’t know if the house was paid off. Wasn’t his place to ask. He wondered, fleetingly, if you could find out that sort of thing online.

  About a mile from Chameau, he began to parse in his head the “My Favorite Weekend” questionnaire the chick had faxed over, thinking he’d use tonight as a typical evening out with friends at an exotic local fave. (He’d have to “take its pulse”; sometimes these boîtes died a sudden death.) He needed to come up with something special for Sunday brunch; Sunday brunch was the “My Favorite Weekend” cum shot. He never went out for breakfast but it’d be nice to say he was a regular at JAR’s or Casa del Mar (Inn of the Seventh Ray, Father’s Office, City Bakery, and the chink places in Monrovia were played out—MFW had already covered them) and that before brunch it was a “ritual” to take his girlfriend—he was definitely going to have a fictional girlfriend—to the Echo Park/Palisades/Hermosa Beach farmers’ market for fresh flowers, dried fruit, star anise, whatever. That kind of gay horseshit. Maybe throw in poor old Trader Vic’s before they tore it down. But since he was a location scout—that was the angle—they’d probably want him in diverse parts of the city instead of the usual Santa Monica, Malibu, or East Side haunts. He could go to Memphis (Jane’s Room), or Ford’s Filling Station, or ’Sup Nigga, or the hungry cat, or the Bucket (Eagle Rock hamburger joint), or some Jap joint (for yoshoku). Fine and dandy. It’d probably be better if he went to a chocolatier in Altadena or the coffeeshop at the Long Beach airport or maybe bought his fake old lady a customized scent at that place on Abbott Kinney. Then he thought he should do his homework because he might have read about the perfume place in a “My Favorite Weekend.” (Got the idea, subliminally.) Maybe it wasn’t even there anymore. He could probably go online and find out which My Favorite Weekenders frequented wherever. He didn’t necessarily want to bother the chick about it but could feel her out when they had their follow-up phone interview.

  VIII.

  Marjorie

  THE Super Lotto was now at $78,000,000.

  She went to Riki’s, on Robertson. It used to be called “You Are My King Liquors,” but when the owners sold, Riki not very effectively covered the sign with his name. He was always promising customers that one day when he had the time, he would “do it right.”

  When she bought her tickets, Marj always wore the lucky la
pel pins Ham had given her on their 20th: malachite peas in gold pods and a green jeweled parrot with blue enameled feathers dropping down. They were designed by Jean Schlumberger in the 50s and sold at Tiffany’s. Ham got them at auction. (Her husband had a wonderful eye. One year, he surprised her with a vintage sapphire bracelet by Seaman Schepps. He collected vintage pictures of society ladies in Charles James and Madame Grès that he hung in the apparel offices downtown.) She filled out the lottery form as usual, picking her children’s birthdates and Hamilton’s too. She used to spend $3 but since Ham’s death, she was spending 5.

  Riki was from Bombay—she could never help but think of “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi,” the Kipling story Father read to her at bedtime. He didn’t speak much but boy, could he smile, greeting each customer as if they were an old friend (many were). Riki had a son in high school who occasionally helped out. The young man had the same kind, winning disposition, and perfect manners, to boot. Marjorie often felt she should engage them in conversation—afterall, she’d been to Bombay as a girl, for almost a month with her own dad—but the words never came. That was all right; it was enough to feel their warm familiarity. Just being in the shop made her feel like a culture buff, a woman of the world. Besides, she didn’t remember much about the city, mostly recalling the grand hotel they had stayed in, the Taj Mahal Palace—to make any further claims would have been a shallow and possibly embarrassing assertion. It would have devastated her to be thought of as “the ugly American.” (Not that they had those sorts of judgments in them, though one never knew.) One thing she did ask was if a person was supposed to say “Bombay” or “Mumbai.” The city names had changed, which seemed to happen periodically, all over the world. The son unleashed that winning transgenerational smile and said, “Bombay. If you are the cool people, you call it Bombay.”

  AS Marj rounded the corner toward home, she saw Cora watering the lawn and the neighbor waved her over for a coffee. Cora said her son Stein bought her a machine that made “perfect cappuccinos.” She stage-whispered that it cost $3,000 and Marj literally gasped when she heard the figure.

  One of the pipes did the foam part and the old woman let Cora enjoy herself. Cora loved talking about money. She knew Hamilton had left Marj “comfortable” and was always fishing for a number. Marj knew Stein was richer than Croesus and showered his mother with gifts the way wealthy children do to substitute for quality time. Then she chastised herself, remembering she had neither gifts nor visits from those she had brought into the world. She treasured her daughter’s drop-ins, few and far between as they were; at least Joan was honest, and didn’t try to buy her off. Joan had a life. She’d have hated if her daughter sent costly care packages as a charade. Marj’s lips pursed again in quiet reprimand, cringing at her judgments. Pahrump, the King Charles, limped into the kitchen, and Cora scooped him up in her arms. Pahrump cried out.

  “Why is he limping?”

  “They think it’s something degenerative—don’t they, Pahrump?”

  She planted kisses on the foppish dog’s snout.

  “Poor, poor thing.”

  “Well,” said Cora, fussing over him. “Not too poor. You have a 3,000 dollar cappuccino machine, don’t you, sweetheart? That’s a limited edition, did you know that, Rump? You can make Mama a cappuccino, can’t you. We can teach you how to make Mama a cappuccino, wouldn’t that be fun?”

  Cora asked if she’d thought about traveling.

  The old woman blinked and said, “Yes.” She hadn’t planned on confiding to anyone just yet but it seemed as if Cora had been doing a little mind reading.

  “We should take a cruise, Marjorie—once Pahrump gets a teeny bit better. 2 lonely gals. We could get lucky!”

  They laughed. Cora pursued the topic and Marj realized she was serious. The neighbor began talking about cruises to Mexico or the Caribbean. She’d read an article. Men were employed by ships to dance with the widows—that was a comfort because Cora said she didn’t like the idea of being a wallflower.

  “If youz gwannah pays your moneh,” said Cora, in a creaky imitation of Marj knew not what, “youz gottuh gets yo moneh’s worth.”

  Marj surprised herself by suddenly saying, “I’ve been thinking of going to India.”

  “India! But why?”

  “I was there as a girl.”

  “But it’s so dirty!”

  “Oh, I don’t remember that. I just remember how beautiful it was.”

  “Well, I know Stein does lots of business with them. The Indians. They outsource. Very good at that. But it is not the United States! He’s been there a few times and, Marjorie, you cannot imagine what he describes. The filth. The homeless. The smells. Did you know the hospitals charge the mothers to see their babies?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The mothers have their babies, then the nurses or whatever they are, snatch them away—and the new moms have to pay rupees to have them brought back. You have to bribe someone to hold your newborn!”

  “I cannot believe…”

  “Oh, I assure you, I read it in the Times! In Bangalore. It’s extortion! $12 for a boy, 7 for a girl! One of the mothers-in-law had to pawn her earrings! And they throw acid on the Untouchables. If you’re not of a certain caste, you either have to clean waste from the toilets without gloves—the toilets, if you can call them that—and if the elite think you’re not doing your job correctly, they throw acid on you! I saw pictures of a horribly disfigured man in the National Geographic when I went for my epidural. And the elephants! The elephants come out of the jungle and snatch the peasants, and tear them to pieces! Oh no no no, Marjorie, I do not think India would be a suitable place for Pahrump. You don’t want to be snatched by some big ol elephant, do you, Rumpelstilskin?”

  Marj felt slightly uncomfortable having shared her dream only to be called a fool. She knew she was being oversensitive, and Cora didn’t mean anything by it. The 2 women spoke of their husbands awhile, then agreed to see a movie later in the week at the Westside Pavilion. Cora walked her out and Pahrump limped after but paused inside the doorway as if before an invisible gate. (Usually he bounded into the frontyard.)

  The car Stein bought his mother gleamed in the driveway. He’d traded in the Mercedes when his father died and leased a new Audi through his company. Cora put an eye on Marjorie’s Imperial and said, “When you gonna get rid of that old thing?”

  Marj shrugged.

  “Sweetheart, get an Audi. I know you’ve got a pile of money sitting there—Ham would have wanted you to be safe. You need side airbags. The Audi drives like a dream. It warns you if anything gets near the rear bumper. Parallel parking is a dream. And there’s a camera—I don’t know how to use it yet!—so you can actually see a small child behind you. Do you know how many people back over small children each year? Stein calls it ‘auto versus small child.’ ”

  Pahrump barked.

  “All right, baby,” she said, turning toward him. “Mama’s coming. I guess you want another cappuccino, huh?”

  Cora went back in without saying goodbye.

  MARJ reclined on the La-Z-Boy. She thought about what she’d do if she won the Super Lotto Plus. She would provide for her children of course and maybe buy a place on some land—no 2nd floor so she wouldn’t have to climb stairs. She’d had it with stairs. She started to think she would pay off the house before realizing she had paid it off, with term life, that in fact she had a nice savings, and no worries. She’d already won the lottery, so to speak, and was grateful. She’d had a good life, and a good husband, and her children were healthy and seemed happy, as far as she knew. She was footloose and debt-free and in reasonably good physical shape herself. A bit lonely but who knew? Might be something to that cruise idea afterall. (The thought made her blush.) Then she pushed all that nonsense from her head, supplanting it with her dream of India. There was a train she’d read about called the Deccan Odyssey that was supposed to rival the Orient Express. You could go on it for a week—its starting point was Bombay. There
was an onboard spa and hot showers and dining cars and manservants and all day long you could visit temples or wade in the Arabian Sea. The other night she had been watching A Passage to India on television, when there it was, a sign in the train station: THE DECCAN QUEEN. It nearly made her neck hairs stand on end.

  She smiled at the sculpture of the Indian elephant goddess that graced the mantelpiece along with a picture of Ham, photos of Joan and Chester as young children, and a silver Jesus. There was bounty in her life—and new beginnings.

  IX.

  Joan

  SHE lay in bed watching Larry King. That was a guilty pleasure. Why should she watch Larry King?

  It was probably something her mother enjoyed. What would Zaha think? She doubted if El Zorro ever watched TV. ZH assuredly watched outlandishly cutting-edge films only available in PAL. Her best friends no doubt were the moviemakers Haneke and Kusturica, or Barney & Björk, and Joan imagined she’d cultivated Hedi Slimane to make dandruff-proof caftans for the whole psychotically pretentious claque. Or maybe she was a buddy of that hack Indian director, the Maya Angelou/Penny Marshall of Orissa who was married to the scholar everyone ludicrously compared to Edward Said. Edward S’Hadid. To be sure, ZH would soon be directing something à la The Cremaster Cycle. The Clitoris Cycle. The Cycling Clitoris. The Recycled Arclitect. Arclitoridectomy.

  But maybe I’m wrong…