Some Nerve

by Jane Heller

  No, I wasn’t always so blunt. I’d hardly ever been blunt with Harvey. But for some reason Goddard brought out the fire in me, the emotion in me, the fighter in me. I had planned to be on my best behavior when I visited him—to flatter him, pamper him, do whatever it took to make him like me and confide in me. Instead, I was succeeding only in pissing him off.

  “Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to be rude. I was only suggesting that—Well, I see a lot of patients when I come to the hospital and many of them aren’t as fortunate as you. They won’t be going home in another day or two. They may not be going home at all.”

  He nodded begrudgingly. “Okay. I get that. You’re right. I should shut up and count my blessings. Thanks for the reality check.”

  “You’re welcome.” Wow, I thought. Two semi-apologies in one visit. Maybe when they shocked his heart, they also shocked his brain. “Speaking of going home,” I said, “what brought you to Middletown in the first place? It’s a long way from Miami.”

  “I was scoping out property,” he said without missing a beat. “I’m always in the hunt when it comes to areas that are ripe for development.”

  “I see,” I said. “So you were—what?—looking at farmland while you were here?”

  “Exactly,” he said. “I was standing in a cornfield when I felt the palpitations and fainted.”

  I had to turn away for a second or he would have seen me laughing. “That’s so interesting,” I said. “I’m not aware of any cornfields in Middletown and I’ve lived here all my life. Wheat, but no corn.”

  He hesitated, stymied briefly. “Yeah, well, it’s all the same to me. I’m from a blue state.”

  “Didn’t Florida go for Bush in ’04?”

  He fiddled with a snap on his hospital gown. “Yeah, but Miami’s pretty liberal. Personally, I’m a libertarian. I don’t want the government interfering in my life.”

  “That’s because you can afford the most expensive health care,” I said. “You wouldn’t be on the sixth floor if you couldn’t. But there are patients on other floors who’d be very relieved if the government would help them out.”

  He regarded me with another quizzical look. “Do you lecture those patients too?”

  I had to laugh at that one. “Not unless they ask for it. Mostly, I bring them magazines. Are you sure you wouldn’t like something to read?”

  He lowered his head back down onto the pillow and exhaled. “I’m too tired to read. Whatever they injected me with on Wednesday morning kind of knocked me out.” He pointed at me. “But I’m not complaining! I swear I’m not!”

  I smiled. “That’s okay. You’re allowed to be tired.”

  He smiled too. “To tell you the truth, I’m glad you reminded me of how grateful I should be that I’ll be walking out of here as good as new. But all this has been tough for me to absorb. I’m in my thirties, I’ve been healthy all my life, I’ve got more money than I’ll ever need. It never dawned on me that I could drop dead from some heart thing I didn’t even know I had.”

  “So you felt invincible before this?”

  “Yeah. I always figured I’d die of old age—a crabby guy with nobody but a paid companion to watch over him.”

  A Hollywood hermit to the end. “That’s a very sad image. Why crabby? Why a paid companion? Why no wife or children?”

  “I’m a loner. It’s a character flaw.” He narrowed his eyes at me. “Did I mention that you ask a lot of questions?”

  I laughed nonchalantly, scolding myself for not being more subtle. “I’m just curious about people, I guess.” Especially famous people who’ve made themselves inaccessible to journalists.

  “The difference between you and those parasites who write for the entertainment magazines—the ones my buddy in Hollywood can’t stand—is that you aren’t out to exploit people. You genuinely care about them. You wouldn’t give up your time to volunteer here if you didn’t.”

  Okay, so I felt like a fraud and an impostor and a rat at that moment. But he wasn’t exactly authentic himself, checking in under a fake name and trying to fool everybody by masquerading as a civilian. “Volunteering is incredibly rewarding. I really enjoy talking to the patients.” That part was absolutely true, I realized. I may have signed up for the program in a desperate attempt to get my job back, but I was reaping other dividends from it. I hadn’t had a panic attack in days, for one thing.

  “What do you do when you’re not at the hospital? Do you have a paying job somewhere?” he asked.

  I would have one if it weren’t for you, I thought. I’d even let my freelance gig at the Crier slide once Goddard had come to town. “Actually, I’m between jobs,” I said. “A high school friend—he’s the assistant chief of staff here—told me the hospital was looking for volunteers so I decided to help the cause.”

  He whistled. “The assistant chief of staff, huh? Is this guy a boyfriend? Or are you married?” He glanced at my left hand. “Nope. No ring. And I always thought you Midwestern gals with your Midwestern families and Midwestern values went for the husband and kiddies right out of the womb.”

  “That’s a little patronizing, isn’t it? We’re not as stereotypical as you make us seem.” Not quite, anyway.

  “I’m reacting to the statistics I’ve read, that’s all.”

  “Maybe you need to get out of Miami more.”

  He held up his hands in protest. “Hey, look. No offense intended. I just figured that a beautiful woman like you would be married by now.”

  By now? Like I was a hundred years old or something? And since when did he think I was beautiful? Not when he was throwing that cheesecake at me. “Well, I’m not married, so there goes your stereotype.”

  “You sound defensive.” He was mimicking the charge I’d leveled against him and enjoying it.

  “No, I’m just not of the opinion that women have to be married by a certain age.”

  “Duly noted.” He arched an eyebrow at me. “So what’s up with this doctor? Are you two…” He interlocked his fingers.

  I laughed. “Hardly.”

  “Ah, come on. I bet you’ve got it bad for him.”

  “No, I don’t. We’re just friends.”

  “So why no ring?”

  “I haven’t met the right man.” I thought of Skip then, of how he’d told me he loved me and wanted to live with me, then dumped me. “I’ve spent too much time around guys who break their promises. I’m holding out for one who doesn’t.”

  “Ouch. Sounds like you’ve had some heart problems yourself.”

  He didn’t like it when reporters pried into his personal life, but he had no qualms about prying into mine, apparently. “I have, but let’s get back to you,” I said, pulling up the chair next to his bed and sitting down, hoping for more interview material. Tuscany had suggested I stick a tape recorder in the pocket of my smock, but I have a good memory. I just needed to get him to open up and then enter every morsel into my laptop. “What’s your life like in Miami? Do you have hobbies, for instance?”

  He yawned, stretched his arms. “Listen, I’m exhausted. Whatever they’re putting into me is sapping all my energy. How about we talk tomorrow, after my procedure?”

  Damn. I wasn’t volunteering on Saturday, although I didn’t see why Shelley would mind if I did. It would be my last chance to pull an interview out of Goddard. I had to come back and see him before he went home. Amazingly enough, he’d actually invited me to come back.

  “You sure you don’t want me to stay?” I tried. “You can take your nap and I’ll keep this chair warm and we can talk when you wake up.”

  “Nah.” He yawned again. “There’s no telling how long I’ll sleep. Wouldn’t want to keep you dangling.”

  He was already keeping me dangling, for God’s sake.

  I got up from the chair and smiled sweetly, even though my frustration was building. I’d had two shots at him and neither had produced enough for a magazine profile. “Then get some rest and I’ll be back tomorrow,” I said resignedly. �
��After they’ve installed your battery-operated vibrator.”

  He laughed. “Vibrator. Defibrillator. You’re right. No difference. See you tomorrow.”

  I had turned to go when he called out to me, his tone more serious than before. “Ann?”

  “Yes?”

  “I know what you’re up to.”

  I felt my throat tighten. “Excuse me?”

  “All the grilling, the baiting, the kidding around. I know exactly what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.”

  My face burned. My ears too. Had I given myself away somehow? Had he suddenly remembered me from our one encounter in L.A.? Had somebody at the hospital tipped him off that I used to work for Famous? What? “I was only—”

  “Trying to distract me, take my mind off the heart thing, lift me out of my own head.” His expression relaxed into a smile. “I didn’t get it when you first knocked on my door, but I do now. I get it and I appreciate it. You’re good at your job.”

  The circulation returned to my body and I heaved a huge sigh of relief. “I’m giving it my best, Luke.”

  It was while I was sitting at the Caffeine Scene a little later, rereading what I’d just typed into my computer about him, that I smiled and thought, This guy is actually starting to let me in.

  No, I hadn’t elicited headline-worthy stuff from him yet or even more than half a page worth of quotes, but we’d established a connection. A tentative, fragile connection, maybe, but it was a whole lot more than anything Diane Sawyer had come up with.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “So nobody has a clue where Goddard is?” I asked Tuscany when I reached her at home on Saturday morning. Surprisingly, she was alone. She was still dating the actor from The Bold and the Beautiful, but they had yet to spend the night together. She said he wanted to take it slowly, and I was delighted to hear that she had agreed.

  “Nope,” she said. “Rumors are flying and reporters are staked out at every rehab facility in the country, but no one knows where he’s hiding.”

  “Amazing,” I said. “And I suppose Peggy Merchant is ‘No comment’ing everybody to death?”

  “You got it. So is Rebecca Truit, although she did tell Access Hollywood that she and lover boy are still devoted to each other.”

  He probably called her and told her not to come to Middletown, I realized, since her appearance would bring him unwanted attention. On the other hand, they couldn’t be that devoted. I had it from his own lips, right there on my computer screen: He wasn’t ready to make a commitment to her. “Harvey must be going nuts trying to dig up something on him.”

  “He is. Goddard’s a bigger get now than he was before.”

  And I have him, I thought with a sense of both personal and professional justice. Well, technically, I didn’t have him; I had Luke Sykes.

  “But since he’s AWOL,” she continued, “Harvey’s making do with Seamus Farrow.”

  “Who?”

  “Well, I think they named him Satchel when he was born, but now he’s Seamus,” she said. “You know. The only biological child of Mia Farrow and Woody Allen. He’s speaking out for the first time about how it felt when his father became his brother-in-law. He’s our cover story next week.”

  “Does he have a relationship with Woody or are they still estranged?” I asked, because, as I’ve already confessed, I cared about stuff like that.

  “He never really addresses their current relationship,” she said. “Of course, if you’d been the one asking the questions, we’d have a lot more info. Which is why I can’t wait for your story on Goddard. Just think, Ann. You’re on the verge of being the hottest reporter in this town. In the world!”

  “Down, girl,” I said. “The doctor’s discharging him tomorrow. I don’t have much time left with him.”

  “Ann, Goddard’s the guy everybody wants to read about, and you’re the only writer he’s talking to,” she said. “Whatever you get will be the scoop of the century.”

  “He doesn’t know I’m a writer, Tuscany. That’s the thorny part.”

  “Thorny part? Since when?”

  Yeah, since when? My words had surprised me too. Was I having a twinge of conscience all of sudden? And if so, why? I was a killer journalist with access to the biggest star in Hollywood. What was there to be ambivalent about? Well, except that he was a patient and I was a volunteer, and I had started to take my duties more seriously than I’d expected to. “I guess I can’t help thinking how sick he is. Richard called his condition life threatening.”

  “Was life threatening,” she pointed out. “They’re gonna fix him up today and send him home tomorrow.”

  “True.” Then was my hesitation because Goddard had been fairly pleasant to me for once? Because he’d thanked me and told me I was beautiful? Was I that easy? “You know what? There is no thorny part,” I said, reassuring her and myself.

  “Good. I can’t imagine a more spectacular way to make a comeback than turning in an exclusive on Malcolm Goddard.”

  “Neither can I,” I said as I allowed myself the fantasy of Harvey offering me a huge raise and of me renting a West Hollywood duplex on a sunny, quiet, upper floor.

  She sighed. “I still can’t believe you’re the only one at that hospital who knows his real identity. Maybe the nurses are keeping quiet about him just like you are.”

  “I don’t think so. He really looks different, Tuscany. Also, people often don’t recognize actors out of context. I just got lucky.”

  “You did, my friend, so don’t blow it.”

  “GOING TO THE hospital on a Saturday, sweetie?” asked my mother a few minutes later. She was in the kitchen, lifting a sheet of brownies out of the oven. She looked startled when I appeared in my volunteer uniform instead of my jeans.

  “I thought I might be needed,” I said, popping a chocolate crumb into my mouth and burning my tongue on it.

  She regarded me with a smile. “Are you sure you’re not going there to see Richie?”

  “Oh God, Mom. You’ve got to give that up, okay?” I hugged her. Her belly protruded from her bathrobe and her flesh was rubbery from lack of exercise and too much snacking.

  “When I was dating your father, I always found ways to see him.” She chuckled. “We couldn’t stay away from each other.”

  “I know how much you miss him, Mom. You never talk about it, but the way he died—I mean, how drawn out it was—must have been traumatic for you. It was for me.”

  She shook her head, as if I’d just suggested the earth was flat. “No, sweetie. I have my happy memories of Jim, so I don’t dwell on the unpleasant ones.”

  It occurred to me that Aunt Toni was right when she’d accused my mother of always trying to make things “nicey-nicey,” of putting an unrealistically positive spin on them, of avoiding the negative at all costs. While Toni’s glass was half empty, Mom’s was filled to the brim, and maybe it was hers that was the unhealthy approach to life. Where was the sadness? The grief? Even the anger? In the years since Dad died, I’d never once seen her express those emotions. It was as if she’d buried them along with him, and now here she was, agoraphobic and not doing anything about it.

  “How do you think Daddy would feel if he knew you couldn’t leave the house?” I asked, not to guilt her but to try and pull her out of her self-imposed confinement.

  “I can leave the house, sweetie,” she replied. “I choose not to, as I’ve told you time and again.”

  I took her hand and looked her in the eye. “Then if I got married, you’d come to the wedding?”

  She laughed. “Of course I would. What a question.”

  “And if I were in an accident, you’d be there to visit me in the hospital?”

  “Ann. You know I would.”

  “What if I needed you to walk outside to the mailbox? Would you do that?”

  Her smile faded and she slid her hand out from my grasp. “Now you’re just being foolish.”

  “You didn’t answer me, Mom,” I persisted. “There’s no sno
w. The weather’s beautiful—for Missouri in March. If I held your arm very tightly and promised to bring you back inside the house the minute you felt panicky, would you walk out to the mailbox with me? Just to the curb? We could take it as slowly and gradually as you want.”

  “I…”

  She looked at me with pleading eyes that were saying, Don’t make me do this. I knew the look. I knew the feeling. I’d been there. That afternoon at the Santa Monica airport still plagued me.

  “I’m going to leave for the hospital now,” I said. “But one of these days, we’ll take a short walk to the mailbox. Just the two of us. If you decide you’re too shaky to make it to the curb, we’ll turn around. It’ll be your call. Okay?”

  She thought for a few minutes. In the end, she didn’t say no, which I considered a tremendous victory. What she said as I was rushing out the door was, “Drive carefully.”

  “YOU MUST BE running for volunteer of the year,” Shelley teased when she spotted me signing in at the office. “I’ve heard of dedication, but on a Saturday?” She laughed. “At least I’m getting paid to be here.”

  “I hope it’s okay,” I said. “I know my shifts are supposed to be on Tuesdays and Fridays, but there are a few patients I wanted to check on. I’d like to be there for them until they’re discharged.”

  “Oh, Ann,” Shelley cooed. “What a lovely thing to say. You should be volunteer of the year.”

  Yes, I felt shabby. I wished I were as noble and heroic as she thought I was.

  As we stood next to each other at the reception desk, she smiled down at me as if from a mountaintop covered in fall foliage. The color of her pantsuit that day was bright orange, a shade that only people who don’t give a damn about fashion can pull off. She was the opposite of the Hollywood phonies I used to deal with. I respected her and craved her respect in return.

  But I needed to have my career back and move out of my mother’s house. Malcolm Goddard and whatever pearls of wisdom I could extract from him were beckoning.