by John Gaspard
“What keeps bringing you back?”
She nodded toward the tip jar. “And, of course,” she added with a smile, “the sparkling conversation.”
“You get a lot of sparkling conversation?”
“Do kangaroos get hiccups?” She grabbed a small rag and began cleaning the top of her portable bar. “You want to know the secret to reunions?”
“Lay it on me,” I said.
“The secret to a reunion is this: Forget it’s a reunion. Everyone approaches it like they’re still in high school, and when you do it that way, all the old patterns and responses come flooding back.
“But,” she continued, leaning toward me across the bar, “the truth is, if you met any one of these people for the first time today, you wouldn’t give them a second thought. They’d have no power over you whatsoever. So why are you giving them power just because their locker was across from yours twenty years ago?”
“Fifteen years,” I corrected, “but I see your point.”
“The fact is, the counter has reset to zero,” she said in a dramatic whisper. “The past has no power. Today’s a new day and history can go screw itself.”
“Well put.”
“Now get out there and knock ’em dead, tiger.”
“Eli Marks, man of the hour.”
I looked up from my lonely spot at one of the many empty tables to see Roger Edison, looking younger than his years and smiling ear to ear.
“Roger,” I said, dropping a limpy carrot and wiping my hand on the tablecloth before extending it to him. He returned my gesture with a fist bump, the conclusion of which included the sound effect of an explosion, courtesy of his lips.
“What are you doing sitting over here all by yourself and not sucking up to our resident TV star?” He gestured toward the crowd that still surrounded Jake.
“I rode in with him,” I said, “so I’ve already had my fill of wonderfulness. How’s it going?”
Roger sat down and leaned back in his chair, looking out across the room. “Typically pathetic. These people have no small talk in them,” he said. “Most of them are good for two minutes, tops, and then they start checking their phones for emails. What has happened to us as a nation in our ability to chat?”
“Well, you still have the skill,” I offered.
“That I do, but I chat for a living,” he said.
“Still selling insurance?”
“It sells itself, I’m just the midwife.” He stole a chip off my plate, flew it over the dollop of dip and then thought better of it. “Speaking of which, did you bring a wife tonight? A girlfriend? Or,” he added with a smile, “a boyfriend?”
“None of the above. I’m currently in the box marked Single.”
“Perfect timing.”
“It is?”
“Absolutely. From a strictly actuarial point of view, this is the ideal reunion at which to meet a potential mate.”
“How do you figure?”
“Look at the stats: Fifteen years from high school graduation, most of these folks have finished an under-graduate degree, some have a graduate degree, they’ve moved four-point-five times, and they’re on their third full-time job since college. Those who have married are getting tired of it and are ready for a change. And those who are single are getting bored with that lifestyle and are ready to settle down. It’s the perfect storm, relationship-wise. And you’re at the eye of the storm. Embrace it.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I was just in a relationship. We’re on hold. Or something. I don’t know.”
“Ambiguity is central to the human condition. The sooner you realize that, the happier you’ll be.” He stood up, grabbing one more of my chips as he did. “All right, I’m going to keep working the room,” he said, putting out his hand for a quick shake. After he’d gone, I opened my hand to find that he had been kind enough to leave me his business card.
Jake was holding court at a table, with a ring of people seated and two or three concentric rings of people standing and watching the action. There was a burst of laughter from the group as I approached.
“And that’s what happens when you cut in front of George Clooney in the Express Lane at Ralph’s,” Jake said, obviously providing a kicker to a longer story and inciting another round of laughter from the group. Just as the laughter subsided, Jake reached into his pocket and pulled out a deck of cards. “So, who wants to see a card trick?” he asked.
My experience has been the fastest way to clear the room at a party is to ask “So, who wants to see a card trick?” Next to “Anyone else here have the flu?” it’s a surefire method for inducing a mass exit.
However, Jake’s current celebrity status was enough to keep the audience in place, so he began to go through some standard tricks he had learned for his portrayal of Terry Alexander.
His performance surprised me. For someone who has been acting since high school and who currently makes what I can only guess is an envy-inducing salary on a hit TV show, Jake’s skills as a performing magician were surprisingly bad. As he had demonstrated in our coffee shop meeting, he had gained the chops to physically make the cards do what he wanted without drawing undo attention to his moves. But his performance in front of an otherwise enthusiastic audience drove home for me one of the axioms Uncle Harry has been spouting for as long as I can remember: It’s not about the trick or the effect; it’s about the connection the performer makes with his audience. And Jake was not connecting with this audience; in fact, he was headed full speed in the opposite direction.
His first trick was a simple ace production, where he made four aces appear at the top of an apparently completely shuffled deck. The woman who he chose to help him I first recognized as Roseann Roosevelt’s mother, until I realized it was in fact Roseann Roosevelt herself. I had fond memories of Roseann. We had suffered through a particularly grueling algebra class together, but that was nothing compared to what Jake was putting her through now.
The charm and poise that was so natural to Jake in real life completely left him in this setting. Admittedly, he wasn’t helped by the constant snap-snap of the reunion’s photographer, who saw before him a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity: celebrity alum does a card trick. I’m not sure there was a market for such a series of photos, but that didn’t seem to be slowing the photographer one iota.
As Jake, ever the trooper, plowed on, I could feel the energy draining from the group even as the trick reached a conclusion that should have been startling but in his hands was just merely perplexing.
Undeterred, he forged ahead, unwisely choosing to attempt Triumph, a stunning card trick in the hands of a master like Dai Vernon, but a train wreck in lesser hands. And tonight Jake was definitely steering his train into the side of a cliff, stumbling through the set-up and completely missing the nuance and drama of the trick.
“Someone’s clearly missing that magic spark tonight,” a voice whispered in my ear. I nodded in agreement and then turned to see who had taken me into their confidence. And I nearly fell over when I saw who it was.
While I certainly suffered through my fair share of high school crushes, the one that was the most fruitless (and thus resulted in the longest-lasting heartache) was Trish Henry. She was pretty, funny, smart, popular and—at least to the high school version of me—completely unattainable. If we had exchanged two sentences in four years I would be surprised.
Consequently, I was amazed she was standing next to me and even more surprised she had deigned to not only talk to me, but to actually whisper in my ear. I felt myself falling back into those high school feelings and could almost feel myself morphing into a sixteen-year old version of me on the spot. And then I remembered the bartender and her words of advice: Treat these people like you’re just meeting them for the first time. Wise words, I thought. Wise words.
So I turned to Trish, planning to give her a casual smile and no
d. And I was hit with a stark realization: if I were meeting her for the first time today, I would still be stunned into stupidity. She certainly had aged, like the rest of us, but somehow she had gotten prettier while getting older. Nice trick, if you can do it.
“Everyone has an off night,” I finally whispered in return.
She smiled warmly and I turned back to watch poor Jake, who had gotten lost in the middle of the routine and lacked the skills to bluff his way out of it. In desperation, he flipped over the top card. “Is this your card?” he asked with forced good cheer, even though the real stunner in the trick was that all the reversed cards in the deck should have returned to their original positions. His confused participant nodded grimly and Jake thanked her and looked around feverishly, trying to come up with a closer before his audience wandered off to find some actual entertainment. And then he spotted me.
“Okay, now you’re in for a treat,” he said, suddenly taking on the deportment of a club emcee. “Here’s the man who taught me everything I know—and then some! Put your hands together for the magical stylings of the one, the only, Magical Eli Marks.” He waved his arm in my direction and everyone turned more out of curiosity than actual interest. I could see Jake’s face noticeably relax as the audience shifted their attention from him to me. I wasn’t sure what was expected of me, but then I heard Trish say something I never expected the girl of my dreams to utter: “Eli, do a magic trick for us!”
Even fifteen years later the crowd instinctively fell in line with her wishes, and I heard enthusiastic utterances as someone stood up and offered me their chair. I pulled my ever-ready deck of cards from my coat pocket as I sat, not at all certain what I intended to do and hoping my performance instincts would kick in. Like, right now.
Searching for an inspiration, I looked up and saw Trish smiling down at me.
“Trish, what was the name of that dog your family had when we were in high school?” I asked, looking up at her. I could tell she was surprised I even knew she had a dog, and it took her a moment to pull the name. As she worked on it, I gestured toward the chair next to me. The current occupant bounded to his feet as Trish stepped forward and sat.
“Sam,” she said. “Or, Samuel J. Smithereens, which was the full name I gave him.”
“Sam was a great dog,” I lied, knowing nothing about the dog but glad that my gambit had paid off. I opened the blue bicycle deck and pulled out the cards. “And I think dogs and cards have a lot in common. They both travel in packs. They do tricks. And sometimes we pick a card or a dog…and sometimes they pick us.” While saying this, I had given the cards a quick Hindu shuffle. I then spread the cards, face up, and held them in front of Trish. “So, like a dog, do we pick a card or do they pick us? Let’s examine that idea. Trish, pick a card. Any card at all.”
She ran a finger across the card spread, finally landing on the Jack of Hearts. “Is that your pick?” I asked. She nodded and pulled the card from the deck. “That’s interesting,” I said, squaring the remaining cards. “Because out of an entire deck of blue-backed cards, you picked the only card with a red back.” I gestured to the blue-backed deck in my hands, while Trish turned her card over. It indeed had a red back. This produced the intended “ahh” from the group.
I set the cards on their box as I took the card from Trish and held it up. “Now, that’s a good trick for a card to do. And that might be all the tricks this particular card knows. Unless,” I said, setting the card face down on the table in front of her, “it knows how to change back to blue.
“Cover the card with your hand,” I instructed and Trish did what she was told, the corners of her mouth turning up in a smile of wonder. “And tell it to change back.”
She hesitated a second before saying it. “Change back.”
“Take your hand away.” She did and I could tell she was disappointed the card’s back remained red. “Perhaps it would help if you named your card. Can you give it a name?”
I could tell I had put her on the spot and she was having trouble coming up with anything. “It’s a cliché,” I said, trying to help her out, “but how about Jack?”
She nodded in appreciation. I gestured toward the card and once again she covered it with her hand. “Okay, Jack,” she said hopefully. “Change.” She waited a beat and took her hand away, again instantly disappointed the card back steadfastly remained red.
“Not to despair,” I said. “Changing from blue to red might be the only trick Jack knows and he can’t change back. Or,” I added, picking up the face-up deck, “it’s possible Jack is in fact the leader of the pack. And, if that’s the case, it would be simpler for the whole pack to change.” With that, I turned the deck over and spread the cards, revealing the once blue-backed deck had magically changed to red.
This produced the awed reaction I anticipated, but I didn’t stop or even slow down; I rode that momentum. “Let’s see what other tricks Jack might know,” I said, instructing Trish to bury the card deep in the deck. I shuffled and cut the cards and continued the routine, with Trish’s card continuing to perform like a dog—jumping up to the top of the deck, coming when it was called, and finally rolling over. This last bit closed out the routine, as I fanned the cards for her, revealing that only one card in the entire deck had rolled over and was face down—the Jack of Hearts.
Trish started the applause and everyone, even Jake, joined in. But for me the best part of the crowd’s reaction was Trish’s smile and her subsequent request, asking shyly if she could keep the card. I gladly handed her the Jack of Hearts and her smile seemed almost demure as she took it from me.
I looked at that smile and wondered how things—like my whole life—might have been different if she had smiled at me like that fifteen years before. And, later on, I would look back at this night and wonder how things might have also ended up quite differently if Jake hadn’t, at least figuratively, aspirated a filbert.
Chapter 5
“So are you allowed to tell me how you did that card trick? Or would you then have to kill me?”
I smiled and shrugged, still amazed Trish had let me buy her a drink and marveling at the fact we were having an actual conversation. “The sad thing about magic,” I finally said, “is that the solution, when it finally comes, is almost always a letdown and a disappointment.”
“Well, I certainly don’t need more disappointments,” she said dryly, and then quickly changed topics. “So, should we join everyone out on the Observation Deck?”
Trish was gesturing to the large picture window, through which we could see the majority of the party, which was taking place under the night sky. I felt a familiar sensation of rubberiness race through my legs and hollowness in my stomach at the thought of getting that close to the forty-story drop.
“No, thanks,” I said, “I’ve got, um, seasonal allergies. Need to avoid the night, the outside, the outside tonight.” Smooth, I thought. Very smooth.
“Oh, come out just for a moment. You have to say hello to Dylan, my husband. Your remember Dylan, right?”
“Dylan Ratner? Wasn’t he the guidance counselor they made a guidance counselor because you can’t just be the tennis coach? You married the tennis coach?” I was rambling, trying my best to stay put.
“No, silly, Dylan Lasalle. There he is.”
She pointed out the window and I peered through the crowd, finally spotting Dylan Lasalle. I was surprised to see him, as I would have guessed he’d be in prison by now, or at the very least, just getting out.
He was in a very close conversation with a woman I didn’t recognize. The way his hand cupped her shoulder, I would have pegged her as his wife, and not the woman currently sitting next to me. I could sense Trish was regretting pointing him out at this particular moment.
“Oh, he’s such a flirt,” she said, adding a hollow laugh. “You know me, I always had a soft spot for the bad boys.”
If that were real
ly true, then she had hit the Bad Boy jackpot with Dylan Lasalle. The fact he made it to graduation without going to jail I attributed more to the boys-will-be-boys attitude rampant at our school than to any innate intelligence, although he did possess a raw charm that had gotten him out of many scrapes. Our paths hadn’t crossed much during high school, but that was not by chance alone. Most people with any sense had wisely stayed out of his way.
The necessity to coax me out to the Observation Deck vanished as I saw Dylan headed our way, holding two empty drink glasses in his hands. He was clearly on his way to the bar for a refill for himself and his new best friend, but he re-adjusted his course when he saw Trish waving him over.
“Just freshening up some drinks,” he said to Trish with a too-wide smile. “Can I get you anything?”
Trish shook her head. “I wanted you to say hello to Eli Marks,” she said. “You remember Eli, right?”
“Absolutely,” he said in a tone that convinced me he had no idea who I was. He put out a hand for a handshake and then realized he didn’t have a spare hand to shake. He finally settled for a quick fist bump. “How you been, man?”
“Can’t complain,” I said flatly. “At least, not since they instituted the No Complaining rule.”
My joke, such as it was, produced a polite laugh.
“I hear ya,” he said, turning his head to watch a young woman pass by. “There’s a lot of that going around.”
“Eli just did a great magic trick,” Trish said, trying to pump some life into a conversation that had immediately flat lined. “He’s quite the magician.”
“Great, I’ve got ten extra pounds I’d love to see disappear,” Dylan said, belying the fact that he was not just in good shape, but scary good shape. “Think you can help me out?”
“Here’s the secret: Diet and exercise,” I replied.
“Oh, you’re no fun,” Dylan said and at that moment I couldn’t help but agree with him. There was something about his oily personality and demeanor that sucked the fun right out of me. I just wanted to get away from him and was almost willing to move out to the Observation Deck if that would have done the trick. Thankfully, he pulled the plug on the conversation and took us out of our misery.
