“Are you alone?” she asked sadistically.
“Not permanently,” Coco smiled as her heart plummeted. How cruel women could be to each other.
“Would you like a table?”
Coco tried to make a logistical survey of the room, but it was too dark. So she shook her head. “I’m waiting for someone; I’ll just sit at the bar,” she lied coolly.
The hostess motioned her forward.
But by the time Coco’s eyes adjusted to the darkness, she discovered the bar was an island unto itself far from the mainland of tables. This isn’t working out, Coco thought grimly, as she walked forward in a blind panic, still ignorant as to whether she would ask the bartender to change a dollar for the cigarette machine or actually slide her buttocks up on top of a clammy leather bar seat. But in one surprising motion Coco mounted the first stool she saw, leaned an elbow on the bar, lit a cigarette, and found herself facing a rather raunchy-looking bartender.
“Good afternoon,” he said.
“Hello.” Coco gave him a soulful, preoccupied smile. “A G-and-T please.”
The bartender set down a glass. “With a tan like that, you must have been out at the beach,” he said approvingly.
Coco smiled vaguely and donned an expression that indicated she was expecting a specific person at a precise moment.
The bartender swirled his wet bar rag near Coco’s elbow space for what seemed an insultingly long period of time.
So Coco looked away, toward the dark horizon of a distant bandstand sobered and sad. She shouldn’t have come here. She should have gone shopping for fall pants suits in Georgetown or for a pair of Gloria Steinem tinted aviation eyeglasses out in Chevy Chase. Although there was a constant changeover of men at the bar—most of whom looked like ITT lobbyists or retired brigadier generals—Coco remained unmolested. No one had heard the thunderous announcements of her terrible loneliness. She decided to remain aloof and spend her free time with her P.L. in a favorite mini-fantasy that featured them quarreling and then reconciling in a small pensione on a little Greek island. But the fight ended much too quickly as they fell on the bed in a wild embrace and Coco felt gypped because even her fantasies fizzled out too fast—like premature ejaculations—leaving her to her own devices, much too soon, again.
I’m going to die, Coco thought. All of my life strength came from hating Gavin, and now that he’s not around to hate anymore, I haven’t got any life force left. For a brief moment Coco decided Gavin was only deluding himself, that he could not voluntarily stop loving her. Beneath his hate there had to exist an eternal, unalterable, unconditional, and immutable love. Some things in life had to be permanent.
“May I have another G-and-T please?”
The bartender slid Coco a fresh drink and she gulped it down like a glass of lemonade. Then she opened her purse to take out her notebook. She flipped through the pages and decided that in many ways her notebook had now become obsolete. Her Current Condition would obviously necessitate the removal of certain Permanent Friends who would have to be crossed out and recopied under Acquaintances since they clearly belonged to Gavin. And how long would it take until she found out which way their friends would split? Who would belong to whom? Who liked whom more? Who would be in and who would be out? Would Gavin get the Prestigious and Coco the Lightweights? Of course, some Acquaintances would have to be switched to different listings under new headings, such as Possible Affairs or Potential Second Husbands or Occasional Companions or Who to Call When Things Really Get Bad Until Dr. Finkelstein Returns like a Swallow from Capistrano Early in August. Flushing with embarrassment, Coco printed: People I Must Entertain if I Want to Get Invited to Their Parties Where There Might Be Some Interesting Men and hid it behind XYZ. Then, with the tip of a quivering finger, Coco pressed the ring release and inserted a clean paper under M.
Men with Money
Men with X-L Schlongs
Important Men
Available Men
Single Senators and Congressmen
Men Who Have Indicated Interest
Married Men
How pathetic, she thought with disgust. Flipping to the front of the notebook again, she started another page:
WHAT KIND OF WOMAN SHOULD I BE?
a. An earth mother—very good for Jewish ladies—have more children, especially illegitimate ones—live on commune in Vermont—bake breads, buy Honda, burn bras (save one strapless), get very thin, dye own yarn.
“I’ll have one more,” she smiled as the bartender passed.
b. Become a serious novelist but also big commercial success like Jacqueline Susann. Hang in with arty set. Write for Esquire, Harper’s and Atlantic.
c. Radical-Activist-Intellectual—work hard to end war. Get indicted for conspiracy. Organize demonstrations and street actions. Check out Weathermen types (young—but hung). Cut hair like Jane Fonda’s. Use grass for aphrodisiac and to cut smell when fucking freaks who have B.O. Make it once with a priest.
d. Socialite-type. An older Amanda Burden. Become companion to international financier or multinational conglomerate executive president. Military-industrial complex? Henry Kissinger? Ugg!! Read Fanny Hill and Lolita for turn-ons when nec.
e. Become a tough “new” journalist—eventually Washington correspondent for N.Y. Times. Buy new attaché case (avocado green). Use silk scarves tucked through suit-jacket buttonholes as trademark. Get assignments which necessitate traveling, especially overseas. Come on like Oriana Falpaci.
f. Remarry (possibly Sen. McCarthy, Sen. Tunney, Sen. Proxmire, or Ralph Nader) Be Bazaar wife-type.
Buy large country home in West Virginia. Hire large staff for formal dinner parties. Teach children to ride horseback and ski.
The third gin-and-tonic arrived. Coco smiled gratefully and took a deep breath. Bored with her laundry lists for the future, she decided to dredge up some of Dr. Finkelstein’s technical advice. Certainly it was expensive enough—like a good basic black that could be worn anywhere—to be applicable now to her Current Condition. Neglecting Dr. Finkelstein’s therapeutic insights was like buying a Chanel suit and never wearing it. Coco closed her eyes, nibbled on a refreshing particle of lime, and decided to try updating one of the thirty-dollar lectures that she repressed the moment she left his office.
“All right, now, Mrs. Burman. You don’t have to go around acting frivolous or superficial or self-hating anymore. You can be your own woman now. You can take yourself seriously. You can throw away all those false eyelashes and begin to pursue your real interests. You are an extraordinarily beautiful woman, Mrs. Burman. You don’t need all that makeup and crap. Develop some new friends. Find genuine pleasure in being with your children. There are many enjoyable things for you to do. There are trips to take. Places to see. Books to read. You don’t have to waste your life persecuting Gavin Burman. He is no longer your sole and exclusive access to an identity. Now that you are free, you can become yourself.”
Free? Coco shrieked silently.
She opened her eyes and saw an attractive man enter the bar, momentarily illuminated by light from the lobby. He paused long enough to look around with the proper amount of nonchalance and curiosity. His hair was graying at the temples, and he wore his suit in a style that suggested he always hung it up in a closet when he stripped to ball.
A cold shiver slid through Coco’s body.
Listen, Dr. Finkelstein, she said. I happen to have a number of hangups and a great variety of needs that are not being met. But that doesn’t necessarily constitute an Identity. In fact, Dr. Finkelstein, when I’m all alone, my me disappears. It vanishes. My identity tends to evaporate, so that all that’s left is a lot of anxiety. And what will I do if I never get married again?
The man sat down at the nearest table.
I don’t want to live alone the rest of my life. Coco began speaking more rapidly to Dr. Finkelstein’s remembered face.
Why should a woman like you have to get married? Dr. Finkelstein asked in his usual fifty-minute-
seminar voice.
Well, why don’t you live alone if it’s such a groovy idea, Doctor?
Agitated by the development of her silent scenario, Coco glanced over toward her new neighbor.
Nothing doing. He was staring toward the door, waiting for his wife.
No. The only thing left for Coco was work. She must now write, not only fiction, but also frequent articles studded with insight and intelligence, until she became an authority on something. Literary criticism was already passé, indeed, counterrevolutionary; but, muckraking was very in. She must choose or carve out some new subject area where she could squat and homestead. But what should it be? Non-verbal Behavior? Community Controlled Schools? How to Dismantle National Security State? Methadone Treatment for Heroin Addicts? What? Ethel Kennedy and Her Kids? Coco’s values and interests obviously needed sorting, like the hundreds of mixed-up playing cards in the middle desk drawer of the den. One constructive thing she could do right away was clean all the drawers in her house. Now, since the children no longer had a father, there would be plenty of time for them to sort cards into decks and put a rubber band around each pack. Even Nicky was old enough now to match up suits even if he didn’t know all his numbers.
And when they finished with the cards, they could stick all the loose snapshots into the photograph album—in chronological order—and put all the records back into their proper jackets, and then Mike could file Coco’s recipe cards behind the dividers in her recipe box, and Jessica could hunt for missing earrings in Coco’s jewelry case to reunite separated pairs, and Nicky could line up the children’s books according to height and stack the over-sized ones in nice horizontal piles. And then they could start sorting the hundreds of unmatched socks stuffed into the pillowcase in the linen closet, and snag all the spools of thread so they wouldn’t unravel in the sewing box, and someone could re-organize the spice cabinet into some kind of order, and all the while they could listen to Elementary French lessons on the phonograph.
Nonsense, the post-libby lobby interrupted.… The only sensible thing to do is finish Take Heaven by Storm. Quickly. There was nothing else left to do, especially since the man at the next table was obviously not waiting for his wife but for Raquel Welch to join him. Coco must instantly finish a first draft that would be very close to the final form. Then she would take the shuttle up to New York, wearing a Pucci print, while hordes of literary agents, fiction editors, and publishing-company executives, alerted to her arrival, clustered together at the shuttle gate eagerly waiting to thrust large advance checks into her hands. Suede, of course, would be down in the crowd, milling around, trying to move out front. But Coco would pretend not to see him and concentrate on psyching out the sexual potentials of the various literary-industry executives. She would choose her hardback, quality press publisher, right there at La Guardia, with her skirt lifting in the breeze of the still-spinning propellers (did jets have them?), and rush off for cocktails talking of movie sales, and getting it on.
Within a few months Coco would come out in paperback and society. Once published, she would appear on the Johnny Carson Show, looking glamorous, a little gayer than Dory Previn but less abrasive than Germaine Greer, and with total unselfconsciousness tell that she wrote 1973’s best seller because her husband had abandoned her to run off with a professional libby who had huge tits, a fat ass, and a big mouth. Unlike Debbie Reynolds and Sybil Burton, Coco Burman had no Liz Taylor to explain away. Unlike Maria Callas, Coco didn’t have to swallow Jackie. She could come on as flip or coy as she wanted.
But perhaps too many talk shows would spoil Coco Burman.
Perhaps it would be better to move to Los Angeles and live in some foothills right down by the ocean, coincidentally renting the property right next door to a well-known West Coast artist with a thick red beard who loved children—Coco’s children—and her. They would all be poor—of course—but together, and the children would never suspect that Coco made love five or six times a night with their husky virile “uncle” after they went to bed.
Coco slipped the three plastic swirl sticks into her purse to give to Nicky, who used them as tomahawks for his Indian braves.
But, of course, the L.A. trip was absurd too, because Coco would not have enough money and would have to get a job. Now in her old age, she’d have to take a hideous job to support her children. She tried to picture herself as a bank teller or a receptionist in an employment agency, but Radio Free Coco immediately began jamming the fantasy waves so that static prevented reception of any jive about jobs.
Aware of a slight tingly sensation about her mouth, a familiar sign of intoxication, Coco clenched a cigarette between her lips. Then suddenly, dramatically, she was confronted by a flaming match. Although she was startled, Coco had certainly seen enough late-night movie reruns to know enough to light the cigarette before slowly lifting her eyes to smile speechless with gratitude up at her provider. Instantly she recognized the well-shaped head of the man from the next table. So Coco took a deep sigh of relief, along with her first inhalation of smoke, because yes, yes, yes—there were still strangers in the world who used the opportunity and ritual of an unlit cigarette to ignite a flaming affair which, in later years, would be consummated by marriage.
twenty-two
“Thank you,” Coco said huskily in an appropriately appreciative tone—more for the dramatic approach than for the light.
“Are you waiting for someone?”
“No.” Coco smiled alluringly.
“Well, maybe we can sit over at my table and have another drink.”
“That sounds nice.”
See, Dr. Finkelstein, Coco cabled Europe in gloating triumph as she scraped herself off the stool to follow the man. See? A person never knows in the morning whether or not to risk leaving the house without gluing on at least a few individual lashes on the bottom. A person could get careless and feel satisfied with well-applied double-fringe tops. A person could get lazy and maybe not want to bother, every day, with those tedious carefully torn-apart bottom clumps. But Coco had been wise enough to know that in her newly precarious condition she could never afford to take such chances.
Puffing luxuriously on her cigarette, she sat down, looked toward the bar to see if the bartender had noticed the pickup, and then watched her handsome new friend settle himself back in his chair. His motions were very restrained and male. Instantly she decided that he would be a perfect lover—fortyish, rugged and with a corporate-executive style suggesting he preferred his sex straight-up rather than fancy—a type for which Coco had an unnatural fondness. Although it was dark in the bar, the first flare of his match had exposed the man’s seductively light-colored eyes, plus a thick dark coat of hair on his hands and fingers.
“Are you staying here at the Shoreham?” he asked, setting his drink down close to Coco’s and moving his chair in closer.
Coco smiled. Of course he would think that, but it gave her a moment’s pause.
“No. Actually, I just stopped by for a little peace and quiet before going home.”
Oh, no. That was wrong, she decided instantly. “Peace and quiet” announced the existence of a great number of children as clearly as if she had suddenly rung a little bell to summon them in for a march around the cocktail lounge banging pots and pans like Miss Audrey on Romper Room suggested they do on rainy days. Change your tone, Coco’s interior stage manager ordered. Hurry before he follows up the kid bit.
So Coco spoke before it was her turn. “Are you in town on business?”
“Yes. I came in last week for the APA meetings, and then I stayed on an extra few days to do some research.”
Oh, good, Coco thought. He’s testing me to see if I know those initials. The right answer would instantly establish Coco as an equal, a heavy, even while being picked up at the bar of the Shoreham Hotel.
“Oh. You’re a psychiatrist?”
“No. A psychologist. I run a clinic in L.A.”
Down one point for not having read coverage of the c
onvention and thinking it was the psychiatric meeting. Recoup, she ordered herself. Drop a name now. Some West Coast psychologist. A West Coast psychologist … But she couldn’t come up with one, before it was time for her turn again. Down another point. Take a different line.
“What kind of research are you doing?” she asked in an academic tone of voice.
“Well, it’s not in the area of psychology.” He inspected his glass. “Are you ready for another drink?” With beautiful suave authority he beckoned to the waitress. “Two more, please,” he instructed with official kindliness. “Actually,” he said, returning his attention to Coco as if bestowing a federal grant upon her, “I’m researching the effect of the increase of gypsy moths on the cuckoo birds along the eastern seaboard.”
There was a terrible protracted silence.
Coco was stricken dumb. Vengefully she cursed herself for having assiduously avoided reading any newspaper or magazine article beneath a conservation or ecology banner during the last three years. By shaving inches of newsprint to save time, Coco had now jeopardized her new life and thrown away any chance for remarriage. But how could she have known, way back then, what tests were to be announced later on in the course of her life. And she couldn’t even try to cover up her ignorance with a joke, because ecology heads, like professors, had no sense of humor and considered moth and whale shit equally serious. Indeed, now that she thought to think about it, what was there funny about nature anyway?
Coco lost her turn.
“I’m president this year of the L.A. branch of the Sierra Club.”
Wow. He was feeding her lines like Mike Nichols setting up Elaine May, but Coco was too spaced out trying to remember some basic ecological principles to pick up his throw-aways. She was desperate. “Why are the gypsy moths increasing?” she asked hurriedly, trying not to lose anymore ground.
“No more DDT.”
No more DDT? That must be good. Coco at least knew that no more DDT had to be a plus. So why was he so worried? But now he was watching her carefully, ready to make a final judgment about her intelligence. If she didn’t pass this exam, she would never be eligible for his course in Intercourse. She: had to ask the next question right.
Loose Ends Page 26
