by Bill Scheft
“So, then she gets a big promotion, I told you this, and we go out for Indian food at this place overlooking the park. My last hundred dollars. She grabs my hand and says, ‘Your patience has paid off, Suss. I’m finally making enough for us to get a decent place.’ I didn’t panic all that much. I mean, I don’t think she saw it. I just told her I wasn’t interested. Just like I wasn’t interested in getting whatever a real job was. She said, ‘Well then, fuck you.’”
“Was that before or after you came back from the bathroom?”
“What?”
“Go on.”
“No, that was it.”
“It’s been, what, five years now? And you stay in touch?”
“Sure.”
“She called you?”
“Yeah, but I called her back. And, like I have to tell you, it wasn’t easy. Still isn’t.”
“And no relationships since then?”
“Um…not counting Robin Byrd? No.”
“You seemed reluctant to talk about Trish.”
“No, you kept changing the subject.”
“Like now.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Was she pretty?”
“Gorgeous. Like a young Phoebe Cates. We met in the smoking car on a train to Greenwich. What a voice. She would say the word ‘man’ like ‘mahhhhnnn.’ Great. Sexy as hell. I just sat there and let her yak the whole ride. I’m a good listener. What does that take?”
“We’re a little hostile, Harvey?”
“What do you mean?”
“That it doesn’t take much to be a good listener. You’re implying that I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Shit.”
“There’s that word again. So, she rolls over, says, ‘Well, I came,’ and then dumped you. Is that correct?”
“No. I told you. We dated for two years. Casually. It was like I was on call. Couple times a week I’d take her out so she didn’t have to be single. Never had to pay, which was great. Never had to call her, which was insane. Unheard of. She’d call me, always twenty-four hours in advance, and I had to be available. She was a fashion photographer’s assistant, so she had all kinds of connections. We got in everywhere. Didn’t even mind the softball ringer thing. In fact, she thought it was cute, unless a game ran long and screwed our chance of getting a table at the Mudd Club or Café Central. Then it was, ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ Actually, with Trish it was pretty much always ‘What the fuck’s wrong with you?’”
“What was wrong with you?”
“I don’t know. And I don’t know why, but one day she called—it was ‘The Tunnel. Ten o’clock. Pick me up. Get some new shoes’—and I just said no. It was in the winter, too. Off-season, so I could have used the free meal. But I just couldn’t do it anymore. Couldn’t take the whole thing. It became too much of a charade, even for me. Like a competition over which one of us was less willing to commit.”
“You play ball, Harvey. What the hell is wrong with the Mets?”
College Boy rose up from the couch with a “What are you, fucking soft?” look on his face. For Bettles, the present normally served little purpose, except when he said, “Our time is up.” The past, that was where the action was. The future was where the money was. In Teaneck. At eighty dollars a session. Pay to the order of Gary Beitleman. Bettles scribbled on his notepad, then tore out the page and handed it to his patient.
“Here are the names of two geriatric psychiatrists. They’re both very good. I’m glad you came.” College Boy stuffed the paper in his pocket. “This situation with your uncle must be very tough on you. You’re reaching out, and I don’t know if you’ve ever reached out to me.”
“Well—”
“But our time is up.”
“Come on.”
“You’re right. We’ve got another minute.” They faced each other. “Harvey, I don’t want you to take what I’m going to say the wrong way. You have the emotional maturity of a four-year-old who’s embarrassed by his own penis. You are covered with the feces of your gambling, which we conveniently never discuss. You avoid relationships, preferring to wipe yourself with people. I’ve counseled convicts, rapists, and murderers who are more in touch with their feelings toward their mother than you are. Analysis is your only hope. Real analysis. Four days a week. In Teaneck.”
Like those cops everyone’s heard of, but nobody actually knows, Bettles had beaten him up and not left a mark. He pushed the four big buttons, and found a few new ones….
College Boy sat on what was left of a dilapidated bench, waiting for the next bus back to Port Authority as darkness fell without a clue over Teaneck, Vienna-on-the-Hudson. The bus wasn’t due for another 10 minutes. He could still do it. He had time. Cross Teaneck Road, walk back two blocks to Gary Beitleman’s house. Drop his Gap Easy-Fit khakis and unload right there. Just a huge shit. Leave a dump that would be the envy of every Rottweiler and bullmastiff in the Teaneck-Hackensack-Ridgefield Park metroplex. A turd the most hardened municipal worker would refuse to clean up. Pay to the order of Dr. John G. Bettles. Now that—to come out here and drop a load on Dr. ShitMommy’s lawn—that might make riding New Jersey Transit for four sessions a week worth it.
But Harvey Sussman, College Boy everywhere else, stayed put. Sitting on a bench slightly less broken than himself, like a guy who still had choices. A guy who wasn’t, as some thought, down to his only hope.
9
When he finally put the key in the bottom lock, it was 10:45. The return bus had coughed into Port Authority by nine. And although he was cross-country-drive tired and still sticky with the Teaneck-Bettles glaze, College Boy kept his next appointment and met Julio Rentas at the Improvisation on Forty-fourth and Ninth. There, on College Boy’s 50 percent ringer discount, they ate, drank, and smoked weed with the comics to celebrate Papa J’s forty-sixth birthday. The same thing they had done four weeks earlier to celebrate Papa J’s forty-fifth birthday.
He left the door open as he dropped Bagzilla on the couch he stopped folding out in 1987. He walked seventeen feet and retrieved a twenty from the tape slot on his VCR. That left eighty dollars in Hiding Place A. And he was back out the door. If he caught every break, he could be home from Mort’s apartment with groceries in time for the first shitty sketch on Saturday Night Live.
Before their dress code dust-up in the hospital Friday, Mort had given College Boy a vague bunch of keys (“You’ll find the right one. You’re a bright man.”) and a short list of things he needed from his apartment. There were three items on the list: his checkbook, which could be found in one of the four drawers in his desk; the half-eaten box of Droste chocolates in his refrigerator; and any and all pairs of glasses which College Boy found in his desk or refrigerator. College Boy was more than up to the errand. He knew what a big step it was for Mort to ask anybody for help. And he knew an uninterrupted Valium run when he saw it.
College Boy started on the wrong end of Mort’s key chain and went through two Medecos, two Schlages, and three Russwins before hitting upon a toothless, nameless piece of glint that looked like something a tourist might dig up at an Apache burial ground. Thank God, Mort was one of those Manhattan deadbolt decoyists, who used the other locks on their door for display purposes only.
Mort Spell liked to joke that he lived in a “one-and-a-half bedroom.” He said that hoping you’d say, “There’s no such thing.” That’s when he could say, “Well, I passed out in the hallway between the living room and my bed last night and got eight hours sleep, so I’m counting it.” He wasn’t lying, and he wasn’t wrong. The six-foot by three-foot hallway, besides giving the impression that Mort had tunneled from his studio into another apartment, was damn cozy. Mort loved the hallway. Eddie Foyer Jr., he called it. Or the Aisle of Black. The walls were lined with gushing thank-you letters from President Eisenhower, Joe DiMaggio, Bob Cousy, Mrs. Don Budge, Bing, and Ernie Hemingway. Letters that could only be read in daylight, between 11:00 and 11:20, when the sun elbowed in and no one
was there. Except Sheila.
College Boy was still young enough to think this floor plan (seven-by-four-foot terrace, five-by-five-foot closet, 14.5 cu.ft. refrigerator) was high-living, but wise enough to know the place was not worthy of half the writer of Morton Martin Spell. The kitchen had barely the counter space to fit four wire-handled Chinese take-out containers. The living room horseshoed three hair-oiled chairs, a couch, and a kidney-shaped desk around the threadbare landing strip on the oriental rug where Mort practiced his golf swing. The bottom third of the bathroom door smiled from its thrice-daily collision with the toilet bowl. The bedroom seemed spacious, but only because you had to enter through Eddie Foyer Jr…. It all explained Mort’s standard reply when he was asked why he never married. “I never found a girl who could fit in my apartment.” If only College Boy could come up with a line that clever. Five years now, and he still had no line. It might be easier to come up with a girl.
College Boy was too busy being grateful all the lights were on to think it was odd. He grabbed the Droste chocolates and found the checkbook and three pairs of glasses in the first desk drawer he opened. He heard the moaning on his way to the bathroom. At first, he thought it was coming from him, excited over his impending Valium score. Then College Boy realized he didn’t squeal. Never. Not even when the triple came in at Belmont. He looked diagonally through Eddie Foyer Jr., through the open bedroom door, and saw a woman he assumed to be Sheila, riding some headless, shoulderless man like she had a shot at place money.
He stood there—five seconds? a minute?—until he frightened her. Nah, he hadn’t frightened her. She gave a quick surprise intake of air, smiled, and raised her left index finger like she was about to get off the phone. The headless guy didn’t move until she said, “Uh-oh…” By then, College Boy was closing the front door. That’s when he heard, “I thought you said this was your place.”
Well, now.
College Boy absentmindedly ate two Droste chocolates as he walked crosstown and tried to be outraged by what he had seen. Somewhere between Madison and Fifth, he came to this conclusion: It’s damn tough, impossible, to be outraged when you have an erection.
She was probably close to forty. If she was any older, then Bravo. Author, author. This was an eternally great-looking woman. Not gorgeous. Just great looking. The body was well thought-out. It moved like an athlete and a restless kid. The same breasts they probably teased her about in ninth grade, the slim God’s gift of a waist, and a gym-free round ass. Five, maybe six pounds overweight, but not an extra half-ounce of self-consciousness. The ample nose a dumb girl would have begged Daddy to fix. Eyes that acknowledged you were watching diagonally across the hall, but could still act surprised. The smile was easy, experienced, piercing. And red hair. The official hair of great-looking women. Red. Who cared how much help she got out of the bottle? Lots of red hair. And all of it worked.
And, even though at the time they weren’t doing anything except elegantly supporting the bouncing rest of her, good legs. Good wheels.
Well, now.
College Boy heard Sheila’s first message during an SNL commercial break just after he put away his Sunday provisions. The voice did not quite fit the rest of her. The voice sounded a little too beaten. A little too misunderstood. The voice sounded like it might be married. Her second message came around two A.M., while he was in conference with Robin Byrd. This voice was calmer, resigned. And the apology sounded more like an intro to an apology. It made nice background music to the flickering Ms. Byrd. Nobody ever apologized to College Boy. Well, no woman. He slept better than great.
The best part about Morton Martin Spell’s being in the hospital was what it did to College Boy’s Sunday. It killed it. By the time he returned home from the doubleheader in Riis Park, showered, shaved, put on a coat and tie, and made it up to Mount Sinai, it would be seven P.M. By the time he returned home for good, it would be at least ten-ish. Maybe half past ten-ish. And just like that, Sunday would be dead, and another week come and gone without self-confrontation. Beautiful.
Now it was nine-thirty A.M., College Boy still had an hour and a half before his life was forced to resume. It felt like the only hour and a half he’d had all week. The quarter pound of nova and two half-sour pickles from the Regency Deli that had somehow remained intact during his crosstown walk home. The Sunday Times, fresh orange juice, and three everything bagels from the deli downstairs. For $6.50, he could do-it-yourself two nova and onion sandwiches. He had the onion in his refrigerator. Onion and a half-jar of Skansen Matjes Herring, which would be mated with the third everything bagel when he got home from the hospital. Mort had hipped him to Skansen Matjes Herring (“By the way, kid, Matjes is Danish for ‘Jew,’” he’d say.). And buying the Times Saturday night. And all the isolation-soaked bliss of a Manhattan Sunday.
The only nonsports conversation he remembered having with Uncle Mort was at P. J. Moriarty’s right after he moved to New York and just before their first cocktails arrived. The conversation was three lines. Mort insisting that he read Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America, him saying okay, and Mort saying, “I think that bastard Pat Moynihan stole our drinks.” The only thing College Boy retained from de Tocqueville was the notion that there was no such thing as true freedom because one was always forced to make a choice. Unknowingly at first, then knowingly, and then finally settling in with the arrogance of delusion, he had been proving de Tocqueville’s point in reverse for the last fourteen years. Nothing but choices, and in the end true freedom, which turned out to be College Boy alone.
He would not tell Uncle Mort what he had seen. That he knew. What he would tell Sheila, Mort’s cleaning woman, the next time he saw her—that he hadn’t worked out yet.
The nova was a color that College Boy had never seen. Past sunset, heading toward coral. Not orange. Shit, the orange juice. That was orange. Not red. The tomato he thought he still had in the refrigerator. That had been red, and it hadn’t been there for two weeks. College Boy’s refrigerator was everything Bagzilla was not. Onion, matjes herring, Smuckers Butterscotch Sauce. Iced tea steeping in a Gatorade bottle since the S&L scandal. That was it. Not even the jar of desiccating mustard every unmarried man was required by law to have.
His machine clicked. Another message from Sheila (“Please call me. I have to talk to you. There’s a very simple explanation….” ) That made three.
Wait. He had seen that color red before today’s nova. Last night. 301 East Sixty-fifth. Sheila’s hair.
(“…Your uncle knows all about this….” )
Really, College Boy thought with his mouth full. My uncle knows that you fuck guys in his apartment while he’s in the hospital? Guys who, judging from expressions like, “I thought you said this was your place,” don’t appear to be your husband? Exactly what part of the housekeeping process was this?
(“…So, all I’m saying is if you could just give me the chance—” )
“Hello, Sheila.”
“Oh, ah, hello, Mr. Sussman.”
“What’s up?”
“I’d like to come over and talk to you.”
“Well, I’m on my way out.”
“What time do you have to leave?” Nobody ever asked College Boy that question. It stunned him into the truth.
“Eleven.”
“Well, I can be over there by ten-thirty. I live on Roosevelt Island, right by the tram. You’re on the East Side, like Mort?”
“No, West Fifty-sixth. One-sixty-three.”
“Well, I’m sure I can be there in twenty minutes. This will only take a second, but I’d rather not do it over the phone. Okay?”
“Uh, okay.”
“Terrific. So, I’ll see you soon. Do you need anything?”
“Yeah,” said College Boy. “Some cream cheese.”
So, scratch that shit about another Sunday without self-confrontation. But then, maybe this meeting might not turn out to be a total loss. Maybe College Boy could wise-guy Sheila into helping him with his cu
rrent problem. Mort still needed a new shrink. The piece of paper with the phone numbers of Bettles’s recommendations was now a crumpled crouton floating in some N.J. Transit chemical toilet. And Mort’s former psychiatrist, Dr. Meyer Levitz, could not be reached. He was not out of town, just sulking. Some other doctor had decided to take Mort off Valium after he arrived at Mount Sinai. Without consulting Dr. Meyer Levitz. The nerve. Forget the fact that Mort had showed up with enough Valium in his system to get Liza Minnelli through a long weekend. Not to mention that when the admitting nurse asked him if there was any physician they should contact, Mort said, “See if you can get ahold of Linus Pauling. I’d like to play with him.” When Dr. Levitz finally found out, three days later, from Sheila, where Mort was, he threatened to sue the hospital for interrupting his patient’s “treatment.” The world famous, time-tested, “Fifty Milligrams of Psychotropics a Day for Ten Years to an Old Man” treatment. Instead, he waited a week and sent Mort a letter charging him for two missed sessions and giving official notice that he was no longer responsible for his mental health.
College Boy found out about the letter yesterday, Friday afternoon, when he called Dr. Levitz from the lobby of the Albert Einstein Pavilion at Mount Sinai, moments after Mort had kicked him out of his room. Something about not shaving. Levitz hopped on the line immediately because his secretary thought College Boy was a referral. “Mr. Sussman, I can see you at five-thirty today. I’ll need a credit card and the phone number of your pharmacy,” he accommodated. That was until College Boy’s second line, “I’m Mort Spell’s nephew.”
“Your uncle is no longer a patient of mine. I sent him a letter terminating our treatment.”
“So, you won’t see him or talk with him?”
