The Stork Club

by Iris Rainer Dart

  Barbara looked at Lainie. "Our situation is pretty screwed up right now because we're still living apart, but my mother and Rose have a very nice relationship. She takes care of her some evenings when I go to class or to the gym, and I like knowing they're together. I always feel when I pick Rose up at her house that the two of them are better for having spent the time together. I also have my friends Sharon from school and Carin from work, and they're a lot closer to Rose than my sisters-in-law. Her so-called real family."

  "My sisters have been pretty busy lately," Mitch said defensively, "but sometimes Rose gets to be with her cousins, and I think family is real important.'' Without looking at her, Barbara could feel Lainie's tension from across the room.

  "Well, we've learned by virtue of this group that we have a new definition of that word," Barbara said. "A family is what and who you make it. And that's why I think it's healthy to widen the circle of people who love the children, so they feel they have many ways to turn for affection and warmth."

  "You know, I was always so proud of the fact that Shelly and I are so self-sufficient, didn't need anybody, but now I think you're right. It's important for the kids that we expand their worlds," Ruthie said.

  Barbara looked at Rick. "What about you, Rick?"

  "My uncle Bobo has been everything to me, and the other person who's been an incredible support to me is the widow of my best friend. She's completely unlike anyone I've ever known. A great mother to her own kids and a kind of wise aunt to David, so that's been very worthwhile, and her sons are like nephews to me.

  "Anyway," he said, his thoughts slipping away to all the sweet things Patty had done for him and for David, "she's been a fine friend to me and I really respect the way she takes the time to—" That was the moment when he looked around the room and saw that all of the others were smiling knowingly at him, and he stopped short. "What's so funny?" No one answered, they just continued to grin. "Why is every person in this room wearing a dopey grin?''

  "You're in love with her," Judith said, and when Rick flushed purple the others erupted like schoolchildren. "It's completely obvious to every one of us."

  "Oh, please," he said. "I think very highly of her. Very highly, and I've known her since she was a kid. I mean, my best friend was her . . . " Rick stopped then to think about it, and he was obviously rattled. "Let's go on to somebody else," he said to Barbara, who picked up the ball by looking around at the others.

  "The point is to try to find people the children can count on to be positive forces in their lives." There was a big silence in the room, punctuated only by the happy sounds from the play yard, until Rick spoke, this time to himself, but out loud.

  "Maybe I am," he said, and a titter of laughter filled the room. "I mean, I'll be goddamned. Maybe I'm in love with Patty."

  After the group he walked with David to the car, thinking he should call Patty and tell her. But he was sure she would laugh and hang up, or say, "If this is your way of trying to get me into bed, dream on." Or maybe she'd say that she wanted him too.

  On the second day of shooting his new film he crouched next to the big double bed on the set, having a quiet conversation with his two stars, while the crew waited patiently behind the scenes. Over and over he talked to the two formidable talents facing each other, their heads on the satin-covered pillows, and told them the back story of what their characters had been through to get to this moment.

  Shooting scenes out-of-sequence was a necessary evil, but he was going to make it work by talking them into the heat of the moment. For a long hushed time he waxed poetic about how hungry the characters must be for each other, how they were finally to be consummating their love of so many years. It was the kind of moment he was famous for capturing better than any other director in the business. And it was the close personal work he did with the actors just before the cameras rolled that was the key.

  He'd been lulling them into the mood for nearly an hour, telling his erotic story, but timing was everything and he could tell by the way they were looking at each other now that they were ready to go at it. He knew that it was time for him to stand ever so slowly and steal away out of the shot, behind the camera, and softly say "Action."

  It worked. The passion between them during the shooting of the scene was powerful. Rick felt elated when he called, "Cut and print it!" Now, right now, he should shoot the close-ups, get them set up while the mood was thick and sultry. But just as he was about to do that, he looked around and saw Andrea enter through the heavy studio door. He knew when he saw her there that something was wrong. He always cautioned her not to come down and disturb him unless there was an emergency with David. Only his son had the power to call everything in his life to a halt. "What's wrong?" he asked.

  "Doreen Cobb," she said, coming closer and handing him a yellow Post-it with a phone number written on it. "She called from a phone booth. She sounds awful. I told her I'd do my best to get you to call her as soon as possible. She was pretty shook up so I'm not sure, but it sounded like she said she was at Port Authority in New York."

  The thought of that child in a den of horror like the bus station in New York City sickened him. If she'd run away as far as New York, she had to be leaving something pretty bad. As bad as he feared. He motioned for his first AD to come over and said, "Call a break. Ten minutes. Fifteen tops. I have to make an emergency phone call."

  The young man looked at Rick as if to say, How can you sacrifice the momentum of the shoot to go and make a phone call? But Rick was already out the door, heading to his trailer. The minute he was inside he dialed the New York City area code and the number Andrea gave him. It only rang once.

  "I'm sorry," Doreen's very shaky voice said instead of hello.

  "Doreen, just tell me you're all right."

  "I am, I mean, I think I am. I'm scared of all the weirdos here, but I'm all right."

  "Dear girl," he said, trying not to imagine how small and afraid and alone she must be in the vast Port Authority, "can you tell me why you ran away?"

  "Um . . . well I, I ran away because I couldn't . . . I couldn't . . . um . . .," she sobbed. "I couldn't stay there anymore."

  "Doreen, does this have anything to do with David's birth father?" he asked. "Doreen, who is David's birth father?"

  More sobs and finally she managed to ask, "Do you know?"

  "I do know. I think I know. Did he rape you?"

  "I hate him."

  "Is he still abusing you?"

  "I can't go back there."

  "Doreen, you have to go back and report him. Turn him in. For your sake. For the sake of the rest of the family. Does Bea know?"

  "Oh, no. It would kill her. She thinks they're happy together. It would kill my sister too. Ruin her life and the kids' lives too. And I love those kids—"

  "What about your life? I care about your life. Go home and tell Bea. She'll give you the strength to do this."

  "I can't."

  There was a knock at the trailer door. Damn. Rick opened it and gestured with a please-wait hand up to the assistant director who stood outside pointing at his watch, mouthing the words, What about the dinner break? A dinner break. If he let those two actors out of that bed, he would totally destroy the mood for close-ups. What was he thinking? He'd already destroyed the mood by walking out. Fuck the mood, he thought. I'll get it back. I'll figure it out later. There's a life at stake here.

  "Give them the dinner break now," he said out loud

  "What?" Doreen asked on the phone.

  "I was talking to my assistant director," he said. The AD nodded and closed the door. "Forgive me. Doreen, please listen to me and go home now, work this out. You can do it." He knew he shouldn't, mustn't, wasn't supposed to say the next, but all the rules were broken anyway so he decided he would bribe her. "I'll tell you what. Go home now . . . do you have money and a ticket?"

  "Yeah."

  "And if you do, if you go right now . . . I'll send you a ticket to come and be with me and David at Christmas
. Would you like that?"

  The voice on the other end of the phone now was the voice of a very young girl. "Oh, wow! Really? Yeah! That would be the best! To see the baby? I'm going home!"

  "Doreen. You must put a stop to this man. No one can do that for you."

  "I know," she said. "I will." But Rick was unconvinced.

  "David and I both love you," he said, and the line went dead.

  "Mr. R.?" Andrea opened the door of the trailer. "Is Doreen all right?" He nodded an absent nod. "The cast and crew are on dinner," Andrea told him.

  The cast and crew? Yes. He'd better get back to his own problems. He was in the middle of shooting a forty-million-dollar film, the success or failure of which could make or break his career.

  "Fine," he said. "Just bring me a sandwich." Now, where am I, he thought. Yes. The love scene.

  37

  SO WHAT DO I DO? What's the etiquette when you think the teenage birth mother of your son has probably been raped by her sister's husband, which makes him the birth father of your child? Do you try and hire someone to kill the bastard, or just sit and wait for the phone to ring?" Then he added wryly, "And I used to think my relationships were complicated."

  "Rick, from all you've told us, Doreen is very strong," Barbara said. "She convinced Bea to let her come here and give you the baby instead of having him at a home and giving him away in an anonymous adoption. She lived in your house and you got to know her strength intimately. Up until recently she was able to keep what both of you felt was a healthy distance from the situation. It seems to me that you may just have to wait and trust that she'll work it out."

  "I disagree," Lainie said. "I think he owes her a lot, and that he needs to actively figure out a way to do something for her. She gave him an incredible gift, the way Jackie did me and Mitch, and in taking the baby he took on a lifelong relationship with her."

  Everyone turned to look at Lainie. She was even more pale and beautiful today, though her big blue eyes were ringed with red. "Jackie came to see me, came to my home one night and told me what she's been going through, and I'm beginning to have some understanding about how she feels. I still haven't forgiven Mitch, but at least I know now that there's some part of me that's starting to think maybe I can do what Judith talked about in one of these sessions. To learn how to change my definition of the way things are supposed to be." Her emotions stopped her from saying more.

  Barbara turned to Mitch. "Do you want to talk about this?" She hoped there wasn't any judgment in her voice, because for weeks what she'd felt like doing was grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and saying, Talk to this woman and work it out. Maybe now their moment was here.

  "I wish I knew what to say," Mitch said, and all of them watched as his tough front fell slowly away. "I come here and sit in these groups, and sometimes I'm feeling as if I want to run out there and grab Rose and leave with her. And other times I'm wishing like hell I knew how to break down and beg all of you to help me, because all I really want is for my daughter to have a good life."

  "And what do you want for your wife?" Barbara asked.

  "For her to understand I meant to do something loving and made a mess. That I love her and miss her and want her back, want my family back. But that I still believe we must somehow include Jackie in Rose's world."

  Barbara only nodded, and then she looked around at all of their concerned faces looking at Lainie. There was no doubt that the people in this group cared about one another. At the end of each session, before they went home to face their respective problems, they all hugged one another and wished one another well. And she was warmed by the way their interest in one another's lives seemed genuine.

  "Make it work, Lainie," Ruthie urged. "Remember what we're learning in here about new rules."

  Lainie couldn't look at any of them.

  "Life is too short to waste time withholding your love, Lainie," Shelly said. "We know that very well," he added so softly it was as if he was talking to himself. "Particularly in our family." Everyone looked at him, and he wondered how they would react to what he was about to tell them. "Because I've been diagnosed as being HIV-positive."

  Barbara glanced at Lainie, Mitch, Judith, and Rick for their reactions, and then at Ruthie, who had had no idea Shelly was going to tell them today. Her eyes shone brightly with her love for him.

  "I haven't wanted to talk about this in here," he said. "It's been hard on our lives, particularly for Ruthie, and though I'm feeling pretty damn good most of the time, I've been fired from my job in an acute case of prejudice. I worry about my family and how they'll be treated when more and more people find out. I want to keep writing, maybe even write about what I'm going through, but I've never written anything but comedy, and this ain't particularly funny."

  Barbara could tell that no one knew how to respond. She was surprised and glad when Rick spoke.

  "Shelly, you're an extraordinarily good writer," he said. "You have a completely unique point of view. I've watched your show at least a dozen times, and I always know which material comes from you and Ruthie, because the script always has your insight and style. You could write a hell of a screenplay about anything. And I for one would be very interested in it."

  "You're being kind," Shelly said.

  "No, I'm not. I'm being my usual selfish self. I think working with you would be profitable in every sense of the word. If you deprive the world of your talent because some homophobic jerk fired you, you're making a giant mistake."

  Ruthie looked at Shelly and wondered what he was thinking. Rick Reisman may have had some bad luck in the past, but some of his films were classics. He was shooting one now that already had the buzz of success all over town.

  "You don't have to write an AIDS story. I'll sit and pitch any idea you like with you. Don't stop working, Shelly. You're too damned good," Rick said.

  "I appreciate what you're saying," Shelly said, looking at Rick, "and I'll certainly think about it." Ruthie crossed her fingers. If Shelly sold a treatment of a story to a studio, or better yet a screenplay, his spirits would soar. And thinking practically, his medical insurance would continue to be covered by the Writers' Guild.

  The children were toddling in to find their parents. Dana gestured to Barbara that it was break time, but Barbara asked her to entertain the children for a few minutes longer so that she could bring up one more issue.

  "Before the children get here, as I'm sure you're all aware, the Christmas holidays are fast approaching, and I wanted to talk about the stress that sometimes accompanies them. The stress for the parents is from the obvious. The traffic and the crowds, the financial pressures. Those adults who have had joyous family experiences at holidays frequently try to recreate those experiences, and that's potentially frustrating.

  "Those parents who haven't had good holiday experiences sometimes try to better the experience for their own children, which doesn't always work out the way they'd hoped either. So what I strongly urge you to do is to keep your plans simple. Ask yourself how much of the plans really are about the needs of the people in your life now, versus your needs from the past.

  "As for the children, even the best toddler has a hard time with holidays for a lot of reasons. His or her schedule is frequently changed around. Nap times, mealtimes are all topsy-turvy. The departure from their routine can make them grumpy or cranky and upset. Holiday situations may force them to be confronted by a lot of strangers who could seem frightening. So my suggestion is that you stay aware of your child's needs to keep as much of his or her life-style as intact as possible. Let them eat at home at mealtime and then take them to the party. Plan outings after a nap, don't insist that they be chummy with strangers at parties, because they won't want to be.

  "I'm bringing this up now so you can avoid the trap of inflated holiday expectations. I'm personally feeling sad about spending Christmas without my children, because my daughter is spending the holiday with her fiancé and his mother, and my son is going on a ski trip with a frien
d. My mother is going back east to be with my sister, so maybe I'm projecting my own trepidations, but I thought I'd mention it."

  "I've invited Doreen to come and be with me and my uncle and Patty and the boys."

  "Wow!" Judith said. "That ought to be emotional."

  "I'm hoping to get her out of her environment in Kansas and maybe find out what's really going on with her.''

  "We're just going to a few parties," Ruthie said.

  "I don't feel too much like celebrating," Shelly added.

  "Well, it's going to be just me and the girls and some friends," Judith said.

  Lainie didn't say a word.

  The children were at the snack table now and the parents rose to join them. They had a snack, sang "Five Little Monkeys Jumpin' on the Bed" and "We're Goin' to the Zoo." Then Dana read to them from Goodnight Moon.

  Barbara watched the families share hugs and holiday wishes with one another. Mitch parted uncomfortably with Rose, getting only a nod from Lainie. Ruthie and Shelly walked out with their arms around each other, and Rick helped Judith with her double stroller. After Barbara and Dana put away the toys, Barbara made notes on all that had happened and wondered if what she had told them about the holidays would help them, or herself.

  38

  IT WAS A FRIDAY a few days before Christmas when Barbara stopped on South Robertson Boulevard at a Christmas tree lot run by the Boy Scouts of America and bought a large Douglas fir. Then she helped two Boy Scouts tie it to the top of her car and she drove home. When she stopped the car outside her house, she thought about just leaving the tree outside all night and waiting until Stan came home from his business trip tomorrow morning so that he could help her carry it in and set it up.

  Of course in this city nothing was sacred, so she knew there was every chance she could come out tomorrow and someone would have stolen the tree. That was reason enough to pull the car closer to the front door and bring the big unwieldy thing in alone. The other reason was that doing all the chores to set up the tree would be a good test of her competence.