Whackadoodle Times Galore

THREE-3

“We’d be great together,” he said.

“The s*x never stays this good,” I said. “How long were you married?”

He’d told me, but I didn’t remember.

“Four years,” he said, “and the s*x was never as good as this.”

“s*x is the least of any long-term relationship,” I said.

I could feel him getting hard up against me again.

“Although it is the most of our relationship,” I said

He moved a little away from me, so I couldn’t feel his hard-on. I turned around and smiled at him.

“I don’t like it when you talk to me like I’m some f*****g kid,” he said. “We’re only a few years apart in age. You’re not some relationship sage. If you were, you wouldn’t be down here f*****g me.”

“Right at this moment I’m not f*****g anyone,” I said.

I suddenly felt like a salesman: What can I do for you today that’ll put you into my v****a?

“Do you still f**k Hayword?” he asked.

I flinched a bit. Didn’t like him saying Hayword’s name.

“Of course I do,” I said. I felt naked. I wanted to put on my clothes. Some makeup. Have a f*****g drink.

“Does he wear a condom?”

“Yes, he does,” I said. I rolled over and got out of bed.

Mark reached for my hand. I tried to get away, but he was quicker than I was. He pulled me back onto the bed.

“He does?” Mark asked. “But you’re married. Does he cheat on you?”

“He did,” I said. “Once. At least as far as I know. I told him I’d kill him if he did it again.”

“Was it a long time ago?”

“I don’t want to talk about this.” I lay back. Mark kissed my mouth.

“I want to know you,” he said.

“You know me,” I said. “I want to f**k or I want to leave. I don’t have much time today.”

I was trying to make him mad so that he’d stop talking.

Weren’t men supposed to be so stifled in their emotions that they never wanted to talk?

Today Mark was a regular Chatty Cathy.

“I don’t have s*x with anyone else,” he said. “Haven’t since we started.”

“I appreciate that,” I said, “but you don’t have to do that on my account.”

“Why did he cheat on you?”

“What kind of question is that?” I said. “That sounds like you’re blaming me.”

“I’m not blaming you,” he said. “I was wondering how anyone could cheat on you. You’re smart, you’re beautiful, I bet you’re talented at more than just fucking.”

“I never asked him why,” I said. “My baby boy had just died, so I didn’t care why. I was about to lose my mind and then I walked in on him f*****g this blond bimbo. I mean I can still see it. They were standing up. He’d never f****d me standing up. And his pants were around his ankles. His shirt was still on. I could see his ass, could see him pushing himself up into this woman. And I’d just buried my child. We had just buried our child. Our baby boy. I couldn’t be alone with the kids any more. David was two and he cried all the time, and Fern was becoming a teen and she hated me, blamed me for everything wrong in the whole f*****g world. So I went to his office. I could see this woman’s blond hair and huge bare breasts. Her huge bare fake breasts. And her mouth was slack. Couldn’t see her eyes, but her mouth was slack. Like she was some kind of animal being f****d, like she didn’t know we had just buried our child. But he knew. He knew. If I had had a gun that day, I would have killed them both.”

I stopped. I couldn’t believe I had said any of that out loud.

Fuck, f**k, f**k.

I sat up. I wanted my clothes. I was too f*****g naked.

I didn’t want to see Mark’s face. Didn’t want to see the pity.

Crap, crap, crap.

Now I was a human being to him. A human being with problems.

No, a human being with a past. That was all.

“Can I ask how he died?”

“Sudden infant death syndrome,” I said. “He was eight months old.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I had no idea.”

“Just forget I told you,” I said. I grabbed his shirt that was still on the end of the bed and put it on. There, that felt better.

“I’m glad you told me,” he said. “It makes me love you more.”

Oh f**k.

“Mark,” I said. “Don’t say that. Don’t feel that. We are ships passing in the night and occasionally bumping up against one another.”

He laughed. “You know, Brooke, I can love you without wanting anything from you. I’m perfectly happy with the way things are.” He shrugged. “Maybe not perfectly happy but happy. Now wipe that look of terror off your face—you remind me of me when I saw Mrs. Donning in the tub this morning. I’ll make you something to eat or we can make love again.”

“I don’t want to make love again,” I said. “But I would be obliged if you wanted to f**k my brains out again.”

Afterward, we lay in bed together. Usually I was up and outta there, but something about telling him about Alberto had knocked the stuffing out of me. I lay in his arms, half asleep. I may have even fallen to sleep a couple of times.

“I’m surprised you never got divorced,” he said. “That happened to a friend of mine and his marriage didn’t survive. He told me that most marriages don’t survive the loss of a child.”

“I wanted a divorce,” I said. “I was going to take David with me and move back to Michigan or up to Oregon. I told Hayword he could keep Fern. She was terror on wheels even back then. It was as though she came out of the womb loathing me. But Hayword begged me to stay. He promised it would get better. He swore he would never cheat again. I could have anything I wanted. I told him I wanted my son back and I wanted the image of him f*****g the blond bimbo out of my brain. He couldn’t accomplish either of those miracles. Not that they would be equal miracles. He could have f****d anyone he wanted if that would have brought back my son. But life isn’t like that.”

Mark had to stop asking me questions because I kept answering them.

I wasn’t going to tell him that I had never talked about this to anyone before. Not even Hayword. Certainly not Hayword.

“I told him I wanted a place of my own. This place. I saw it from the outside first. Seemed peaceful. Never went out back before I bought it—just saw the yard from the windows. Then after I got the keys and it was mine, I went out back. It’s got a nice big yard. Used to be a garden there. And there was a swing set. An older metal swing set like the kind I had when I was a kid.”

“In the olden days,” Mark said, chuckling.

“Yep, like in the olden days,” I said. “Something about that swing set broke my heart. I fell to my knees right then. Bawled my eyes out. I had someone come and take it away the next day. I’ve hardly been out back since.”

And I had hardly cried since then either.

“I remember when I got divorced,” Mark said. “I know it’s not the same. Not even close. But it was so sad to me, and when I returned to the house, you know, months after I’d moved out, and I went in the backyard for something and saw a new swing set and plastic playhouse. I felt completely lost. It wasn’t my life any more. I had always wanted a swing in the back for my son, Ian, but we’d never gotten one. And my ex had always wanted a little playhouse for him, but I couldn’t stand the idea of him playing in plastic. I kept promising to build him a fort or tree house, but I never did. At least not there. I felt bad about it all for a long time, but then I bought my own house, and I built a tree house for him.”

“Wow,” I said. “You handle adversity better than I do. I’m still mad about all of it.”

“Yeah,” he said. “It was good, except Ian fell out of the tree house. Broke his arm. That was fairly traumatic. More for us than for him.”

I got up on my elbow and looked at him. “Are you making that up? He really fell out of the tree house?”

Mark nodded.

I started to laugh. I lay back and laughed and laughed.

“You have a sick sense of humor,” he said.

“Now that is the truth.”

I heard the phone ring. An old-fashioned ring, like a rotary phone. That was the ring tone on my emergency phone. No one was supposed to call me on that phone unless it was a true emergency.

My heart started to race. I quickly got out of bed, found my purse, and dug around in it for the right phone. My other one was off.

“Please let Davey be all right,” I whispered. “Let him be all right. Let Fern be all right.”

I answered it.

“Brooke?”

Hayword.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Is everyone okay?”

“Everyone is fine,” he said. “I tried you on the other phone, but I couldn’t get through.”

“I told you I had an appointment,” I said.

I went into the bathroom and closed the door. I began putting on my clothes.

“You scared the s**t out of me,” I said.

“I’m sorry, Brooke,” he said, “but there’s been a change in plans. The studio head really wants you to be at this meeting. If you were done with the doctor, I thought you could pick up David, bring him with you, and head into the city.”

“I’ll never get there by four,” I said. “The traffic will be a nightmare.”

“They’ll wait,” he said. “Look, they’ve really got a hard-on for this movie, but they need it doctored. They want you. They want to see your take on it.”

“Did you tell them I don’t give a s**t about some goddamn zombie movie?” I asked.

“Yes,” Hayword said. “But come on. Aren’t you flattered? They want you!”

“For a f*****g zombie movie,” I said.

“I called David’s school,” he said. “I said we needed to pick him up early. You could even drop him at home. Let him stay with Eartha. I promise you she’ll be great with him.”

“Too late to send me a driver?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said. “Come on, Brooke. You can do it. It’ll be painless. These guys are the real deal.”

“None of those guys are the real deal,” I said. “Where are you meeting?”

“Juliet’s, off Wilshire,” he said. “You can call me when you’re about twenty minutes out.”

“Like I’ll know,” I said. “Okay. I’ll try. But don’t expect me to be charming.”

“I expect you to be yourself,” he said.

“Don’t be nice to me, Hayword,” I said. “I don’t respond well to that.”

He laughed. “But I’m always nice to you.”

“Yeah, see.”

I hung up. Turned the phone off. Whatever it was they called it now. I ended transmission.

I sighed. How the f**k was I going to do this? And why was I going to do this?

So I didn’t have to spill any more of my guts to Mark P.

Christ with a camera.

I went into the bedroom.

Mark had his pants on.

Too bad.

I handed him his shirt.

“Everything all right?” he asked.

I nodded. “I have to go to a meeting in L.A. My husband thinks it’s an emergency. Not sure why.”