This Monkey's Gone to Heaven

Chapter 11, This Monkey's Gone to Heaven

Chapter Eleven





Losing Nicole for some reason was one of the hardest things I'd gone through. I don't know why. We'd only known each other a few weeks. I guess I was in a time of real need and I needed her companionship. But I wasn't bitter about it. I honestly hoped she’d be happy with Howser. My feelings toward Howser on the other hand were not so innocent. He came over one day as I was performing a test with the new video camera. I had it set up on a flimsy tripod in my bedroom and I was doing all sorts of shots with it, playing with its shutter speed and all its fancy programs. The door to my bedroom was closed and someone started knocking lightly, so timidly I could barely hear it.
"Is someone knocking?" I asked.
"Hon?" It was Dorothy, her voice cautious and muffled behind the door.
"I'm busy, Dorothy. Maybe later."
Long pause.
More shy knocking at the door.
"Hon?"
"Dorothy! I'm not in the mood! Come on, how many times do I have to tell you I need time to work?"
"Howser's here. He wants to talk to you."
"Well, I don't want to see him. Tell him I'm sleeping or something. "
"Monk," Howser said on the other side of the door. "Please, I want to say something to you."
For a second I thought of saying nothing, just keep quiet and pretend I wasn't there.
Suddenly, I blurted out, unclear, "Should've thought of that before you started boinking Nicole. Some fucking friend you are."
He started to open the door and I ran across the room and hurled myself against the door to keep him out.
"Monk, don't do this. Please."
I started blubbering. "Some fucking friend! You can go to hell, you bastard!"
"God damnit, Monk! Don't do this! I read your script, I think it's great. I want to help with the movie!"
It had an immediate effect on me. I thought about it.
"You liked it?"
Howser said, "I loved it, Monk. I think it's great! I mean, it even reminds me of Eraserhead. It's ambiguous like Eraserhead."
The first person to have read the script actually liked it? This was amazing to me. I felt the euphoria rising up in me. I could feel myself turning towards the door. I wanted to open the door and have a flurry of rose petals and confetti flung at my face, to be lifted up and carried out into the streets on the shoulders of my fan(s). I was a great success and it only took the opinion of one person to place me there. I had done it. I started reaching for the doorknob in slow motion, a warm smile etched onto my face like a harmless mental patient. I was so eager to be accepted as a talent by anyone that it took several seconds before the reality of the situation sunk in: the image of Nicole down on her knees, gazing upward with those big brown eyes of hers, asking--no, begging for it--as she worked the zipper, the individual teeth of which as they parted sounding amplified and industrial like slowly pushed furniture to expose Howser's pumping enormity as it spilled out in waves of undulating, silky smooth, meaty flesh. It made me sick to my stomach. Good God, how did I manage to lose this angel?
I turned around and threw my back against the door. "Get away from me! I don't want to see you again as long as I live!"
I heard him step away from the door and start walking out of the house. Like a dog Dorothy had her face pressed up against the door and I heard her raspy breathing. I went to the window and watched Howser drive away in his car. Suddenly, I felt horrible. It wasn't his fault. Why did I have to act like such a pig?
I turned and shouted, "Dorothy, get away from the door and leave me alone!"
About one second later my mom came bursting in through the door. She marched right up to me and grabbed me by the ear. It was a scene right out of a Norman Rockwell. She pulled me by my ear to her bedroom where Dorothy had flung herself and was now sobbing into a bunched-up pillow.
"I didn't raise you to be this way, now you say you're sorry!"
"Jesus, Mom..."
"Say it!"
"Ma, please..."
"I said, say it or you'll be sorry! I mean it, Emmett."
I stood there, staring down at Dorothy's lumpy form.
"Dorothy, look...I'm sorry."
"That didn't sound too convincing. All right, I'm gonna leave you two alone. Looks to me like you two have some issues." My mom left the gloomy room and closed the door behind her.
Reluctantly, I laid down next to Dorothy. She swung an arm over me and tried to heft me towards her.
Into the pillow she said, "I forgive you, hon."
I started getting up, saying, "Hold on. I'll be right back. You want something from the kitchen?"
She lifted her head up and smiled, her face streaked with running mascara, and she shook her head no, cute as a toddler.
In the kitchen my mom was sitting at the table having a beer.
"Before you sit down, get me another beer," she said.
"What makes you think I'm going to sit down?"
"Like I don't know you."
I sat down and handed her the beer.

Mom started, "Look, I know she's goofy and she's probably not the sharpest tool in the shed, but look, you're doing me a favor by doing this, Emmett. And you're doing yourself a favor, too. All that shit she's got on the shelves down in her basement, it's gotta be worth thousands."
"What shit?"
"All kinds. Her basement is loaded. Say it, and she's probably got it, I bet."
"What do I care about that?"
"Well, how else do you think you're going to be able to do your stupid movie?"
"What? What are you talking about?"
"What, you think she's just got ten thousand dollars sitting in the bank? Are you crazy?" She threw her head back and started laughing.
"Ten thousand dollars? The deal was for twenty thousand dollars. And now you're trying to tell me it was all about the crap in her basement? Shit, Mom, are fucking kidding me? The woman's a kleptomaniac! It was probably stolen!"
"Oh," she waved her hand. "What do you care? Suddenly, you're Mr. Goody-two-shoes? Please..."
I stood up from the table. I couldn't believe my ears. "You two aren't going to get away with this! We had a deal!"
"Oh, stop. Your luck with women at least now you got one that'll probably stick with you. You and good-lookers, it was a bad combo. They used you and when they were done with you, they just threw you away, like some disposable...diaper."
"God damnit, Ma! I can't believe this!"
"Oh, stop. What were you thinking? Look at the clothes she wears, the car she drives, you think that's got money?"
"I thought maybe she had some inheritance or something! Not all people with money look like they have money. Jesus Christ, Mom, are you trying to tell me we have to sell all that crap, that's how we're going to make twenty thousand dollars? Shit, I should've known better, to be dealing with you two. Fuck, I'm an idiot!"
"Look at it this way. You get some money for your movie, you do your stupid movie, and then when you're done you gotta place to shack up. I'm not going to let you live here forever, you know. The neighbor's are starting to talk. I wasn't supposed to tell you this, but during the day sometimes when she's gone she goes to her place and she's been fixing up one of her rooms. She's turning it into a study for you, so if I were you I'd be on my best behavior. You don't want to lose this one. She's the last thing you have, so I'd start treating her like that."
It only takes one step to fall into a trap. One wrong step, one foot forward. Out of thousands, out of millions of similar thoughtless steps. Be conscious of where you're walking. The path least-traveled is not the path of least resistance, I’m telling you now.
"Damnit, Ma! I can't believe this...I never..."
The phone started ringing.
I stared at my mom.
"You answer it!" she said. "It's not for me!"
I picked up. It was Tori.
"Come on over," Tori said. "We want to show you something."
"Come over? I'm in Minnesota, Tori. You called Minnesota."
"Yea, no shit, Holmes. I'm at your brother's. I'll see you in a bit, bye."
She hung up.
"Who was that?" my mom asked.
"Tori."
"Tori? Your ex-sister-in-law?"
"She's still my sister-in-law, me and Beth Ann are still married."
"What'd that bitch want?"
"How do I know?"
"She's a whore."
I looked at my mom and heaved a sigh.
She screwed up her face and said, "What's that sigh for? You don't think I'm right? You're crazy."
I grabbed Moonshine and started walking out the door.
My mom said, "Where in the hell do you think you're going? You're just going to leave your girlfriend crying her heart out like that? Emmett? You can't leave her like that? I'm not dealing with her! You're not leaving you're girlfriend like that! You get back here, mister! Emmett! Emmett!"
As I walked to my brother's, I considered the reasons Tori might be here. Good God, I knew something was up. What the hell was she doing here? Her only comment about this town eight years ago during my wedding to Beth Ann was, "Now I know of yet another place I never want to live." (This coming from someone who lived in Lousetown, Alaska.) Something was up. I could smell it. I tried to imagine everything possible, but of course it didn't come close to the reality of the situation as I stood at Stanley's door with my hand poised ready to knock and then saw the curtain move to the side revealing Tori's look of surprise.
Excitedly, Tori shouted, "He's here! He's here! Hold on, Emmett, don't open the door yet."
I heard them scrambling around inside the house and giggling like children.
"OK," shouted Tori. "We're ready! Come on in!"
I opened the door and Moonshine and I started walking inside my brother's house. We couldn't see a thing. It was murky and actually pretty spooky in there. I started getting nervous.
"Hello?"
Moonshine started growling a little. I was ready to start backing out when suddenly a light turned on, like a beam from a flashlight. The image registered on my brain. I stood there transfixed, seeing the image before me. But my brain kept telling me that in order for me to be seeing this, I had to be at my desk writing. It was the scene I had imagined countless times as I wrote my screenplay. What I saw before me standing in my brother's living room was the fat man lying on top of his dead wife. You know, in your mind, when you imagine things, it's sometimes foggy at best. Maybe you see the outline, the grainy gist of it, but here it was laid out before me in stark reality. It was my brother lying on top of Tori. Tori was made-up to look like a dead person, her eyes were rolled up in her skull, and it was so convincing it gave me goose bumps. My brother was pretending to be in shock. I just stood there staring, trying to let it sink in.
Finally, the dead woman's eyes moved and she spoke, "Well, what do you think?"
Stanley rolled off her and heaved himself to his feet, making the whole house shudder and shake. He spread his arms and flamboyantly said, "Ta-daaa!"
They had even fabricated a support so that Tori wouldn't get crushed to death by my fat brother, a contraption made from two-by-fours under which Tori laid. It was the very device we would end up using in the movie.
I said, "Holy shit, Stanley. I'm impressed. How did you guys know about that scene?"
"Dad made copies of your screenplay, he didn't tell you?"
"Dad? No way! When?"
"When you were on your road trip. He thought Mom was going to toss the copy you left in the trash, so he made a bunch of copies at Welman's. Nice, huh?"
It was their audition, they admitted. I was touched. This was so unlike Stanley. He was acting very strange. When Tori got up off the floor, he grabbed her and they started dancing around each other. I had never seen him act so animated. He had really dropped his guard.
He said, almost lisping, "We want you to make us stars, Emmett! We want our names big as the day up on the marquee!"
It was just too weird. It made me feel very uncomfortable. I didn't know how to act. In one second flat Stanley's fresh behavior was forcing me to find a new method of interacting with him. It was like meeting a stranger that had been raised by another family.
I looked down at Moonshine to see what his reaction was, but he had already laid down and fallen asleep at my feet, unimpressed. And then too, it all seemed so easy. A week from production without any actors and suddenly my depressed brother and ex-sister-in-law from Alaska decide that they want to act in the movie? I don't know. Crazy as it sounds, I had visions of myself finding the actors in the supermarket at the very last minute. I wanted them to be complete amateurs and then make stars out of them, like shooting them out of a cannon. I thought it would make a good story, too, in the end that we could tell the press. In my mind I saw the reporter tip his hat back before slapping his knee in a fit of laughter, "Ha ha ha, you mean to tell me you made (Joe Blow) do an audition in the canned goods aisle? Ha ha ha...That's craaazy! You're craaazy!"
I said, "Tori, you flew all the way down from Alaska for this?"
"Well, I never got any response from you after my first audition?"
"What first audition?"
She smiled. She studied my face, then her smile faded, and she looked surprised.
"Oh, my God? You didn't actually believe that, did you?"
"What?"
"About Beth Ann?"
"What do you mean?"
"You didn't call her?" she asked. "I thought you'd call her and she'd tell you the truth. You do know that Marco is normal, right?" she ventured.
I looked at her.
"He's not a midget?"
"No. He’s not."
Oh, what the sam-flying-hell did I care? I didn't and I revealed as much as I gave Moonshine a couple of tugs on the leash and together we walked out the door. Tori called out after me, "Emmett, please! I thought you knew!"
Stanley came to the door and said to Tori, "Now, what on earth did you do?"
"Emmett, come back!!"
Stanley: Geez Louise, Tori. Did you just blow it for us?
Tori: Oh, shut up!
No one was home at Howser's bungalow, so Moonshine and I snuck inside (the door was unlocked) and started snooping around.
I went into their bedroom and found the drawer where she kept her undies. I started going through them to make sure she wasn’t buying anything new and sexy. It all looked the same, all normal and Hanes-like. Life was sad. I laid down on the bed and Moonshine jumped up with me. We both fell asleep.
It was Nicole who woke me up.
"Emmett, please...You have to take me away from here. I can't ztand one more minute of this. Pleaze, Emmett, pleaze. Howser, he'z crazy..." She kept looking over her shoulder, afraid he might appear.
I leapt into action, stole a car parked out on the street, and we drove away as far as that first tank of gas could get us. We holed up in a little funky town out in the middle of nowhere. I got a job at the radio station and she found work as a barmaid. My kids hated Mexico so they moved in with us. My nippers cried for a rugrat, so me and her, we obliged them forthwith...
Moonshine woke me up by placing a paw on my face. He had to go potty. We walked out of Howser's bungalow, Moonshine lifted a leg on a sycamore, and we started walking towards my mom's. It was getting dark and the mourning doves were calling. I don't know. I felt bad. I stopped and thought about it. I decided I didn't want to think about it. Fuck it. That attitude always worked. But not tonight. I just sat down in the middle of the sidewalk and Moonshine sat down beside me. I shook my head. I could only think of one thing: I was an idiot.
I thought about Beth Ann and I remembered that I was once in love with her (just like my dead wife Angie), but it was nothing compared to the way I felt about Nicole, even with those two combined. Angie had been my first wife and Beth Ann was the mother of my children and that was important to me, but I was convinced I'd never loved anyone more than I loved Nicole. Another very strange thing for me at the moment: I started missing my car, that ole piece of Americana. I wondered if in Colorado I'd made a bad decision. If I hadn't picked up Nicole and her old boyfriend, I'd still have my car and I wouldn't be so heartsick.
Moonshine got up, turned and started wagging his tail, which started slapping me in the face. Suddenly, I heard her voice call for him. She was on the sidewalk in front of Howser's and Moonshine excitedly loped off to go give her face a tongue-lashing. I sat there flush with emotion. I froze, I held my breath, and tried to keep calm. I heard her approaching.
"Emmett, what are you doing there?"
"Just sitting."
"Well, I can zee that, zilly. Why?"
"Just thinking."
She came up and sat down in front of me and as she did Moonshine flopped his head in her lap and turned over onto his back with his legs in the air, which is funny because that's exactly what I would've done were it not for a tinge of pride.
"You won't even look at me?" she asked.
I forced a laugh and tried to act casual. I looked at her, but quickly turned my eyes back to the crack in the sidewalk.
"Where's Howser?" I asked.
"Oh, ‘e'z doing a zhoot."
"Porn?"
She laughed. "No, zilly. Product."
"Listen to you, picking up the lingo."
She hung her head and looked into her lap. She started getting up.
"No," I said. "Stay. I'm sorry, it's just...I don't know. I guess it's been a bad day."
She said, "You zeem to have a lot of those..."
She had a point.
I said, "It'll change."
"I ‘ope zo."
I felt like I had something to get off my chest. It was very hard to do, but I decided to finally tell her about my wife and my two kids.
After I was finished telling her, she looked at me like I'd lost my mind.
"Are you zerious?"
"Look, I'm sorry," I said. "I know I should've told you."
"Emmett, it must've been what ‘appened to you that night on the ‘ighway, you must've forgotten. I knew about your wife and your kids. You told me that first night in the motel room in Grand Junction. You uzed to talk about your kids all the time. You wanted me to meet them. C and V, right? And your wife, she left you for zome millionaire?"
"I told you he was a millionaire?"
"I think zo."
"He's Mexican."
"Oh."
"Now I feel dumb."
"Don't," she said, giving Moonshine a pat on his stomach. "You know, this feelz good, talking to you like thiz. We ‘aven't talked like thiz in zuch a long time."
"Well," I joked. "You're usually zleeping."
She smiled. "Don't make fun of my agzent. You zilly guy."
I stood up and said. "I should probably get going. I need to finish some tests with the camera."
"Emmett?" She looked up at me. "Will you pleaze do me a favor and be nice to ‘owser? ‘e lofs you, you're ‘is bezt friend. ‘e really liked your zcript, too. ‘e thinkz maybe you're talented, like ‘ave a future or zomething. Let ‘im ‘elp you with your movie. You need it, too. Who elze can be the cameraman?"
"I'll find someone."
"If you let ‘owser ‘elp, I'll ‘elp you, too. Like I promized."
"I don't know, Nicole."
"Pleaze, Emmett. Don't be mean."
"Let me think about it."
"Alright." She smiled.
I started walking away. I turned back to look at her. "What are you going to do tonight?"
"I don't know. Watch TV."
"You want to help me do some tests. I could use your pretty mug."
She smiled. "I don't think that would be zuch a great idea."
"Yeah, probably not."
I started walking away and Moonshine got up and followed me.
"Emmett?"
I turned around smiling, acting all cute and coy, thinking maybe she’d changed her mind.
"What?"
"You're not really doing anything with that old woman, are you?"
"What old woman?"
"That woman, Dorothy..."
"You jealous?" I hoped.
"No."
"Then why you asking?"
"Are you?"
"That's for me to know and you to find out," I said stupidly.
"If you are, you should ztop."
"You are jealous."
"No," she said. "I just think it'z dizguzting. She's ugly and she's fat."
"Oh, and like Howser's the greatest catch in the world."
"Maybe not, but at least no one will miztake ‘im for my father."
I studied her.
"God, Nicole. I didn't know you could be such a bitch."
"I ztill care for you, Emmett. Don't throw your life away on that old woman."
"Throwing my life away?! How else do you think I'm gonna do my movie? I'm not throwing my life away, I'm making it happen. A guy's gotta make sacrifices to get shit done, Nicole. Life ain't free, you know."
"I think we both know I know zomething about zacrifices, zo don't preach to me, mizter. But ‘ow is going with that old woman going to make your movie ‘appen? Did she promized you zomething?"
I hung my head and lied. "No, she didn't promise anything. I guess I'm just shooting off at the mouth. You shouldn't listen to me."
"Oh, Emmett, you know I could never love someone elze, don't you? You're the love of my life, you're my zoul mate."
"Well," Nicole said. "I think you zhould move out of your mom's and get away from that craziness. Go to the Chicken Coop. That'z where you want to be anyway."
I felt picked on and disrespected. Why was she offering me advice? Did she think she actually knew better? I felt insecure. After all, she had dumped me, she had left me for my best friend. Another thing that was bothering me: I felt like a fool for having fallen for Tori's deception, having me believe that Paco was some fucking midget. Now I had to go back and in my mind take the time to re-size the guy. First Brittany making an ass out of me, then Tori. I was a fool, all right, and everybody could see it. It was obvious. I mean, I was, it was me. I was a huge target. I was a lumbering dump truck. I stood out. They saw me coming, looking all goofy with my head in the clouds. Why did I have to be such a clown? No wonder women kept leaving me. I was so ashamed. I was a ridiculous you-fucking-name-it. I didn't have a cool bone in my body.
I looked at her. She was so beautiful it made my heart ache. I was so heartbroken. I said, "You just want to get rid of me, don't you? Holy shit, Nicole."
"No, I don't."
"Yes, you do."
"Oh, Emmett..."
"Fuck, I can't believe you. You know, I honestly hope you two burn in hell, I can't believe you."
"You're zo dramatic, Gaw."
"Oh, fuck you, Nicole."
She smiled, "Oh, Emmett. You're being zilly."
As I huffed my way back to my mom's, my mantra in my head was, Let's get this show on the road. I was going to beat this thing. Whatever it was. Moonshine kept lagging behind and I kept yelling at him to hurry up. I was going to call Beth Ann and apologize for the message I'd left in Nebraska when Nicole and I were still on the road. I just remember screaming into the phone at the top of my lungs, imagining her getting it on with the dwarf. "That, Beth Ann!? What the hell are thinking?!" She'd tell me later that I blew out the speaker in the recorder.
When I got home Mom was drunk and Dorothy was passed out, thank God, positioned on the floor like distorted road kill with an empty fifth of vodka lying by her head. She really looked like she'd finally found some peace.
My mom lashed into me immediately, "Where have you been? She was blubbering this whole time! What's wrong with you?!"
"Get me a beer, Ma. You and me are drinking together tonight.”
"Good. About time.” Her eyes followed me as I walked past her. “Well, where you going then?"
“I need to call Beth Ann and see how the kids are doing.”
“We’re drinking tonight.”
“It’ll only take a few minutes.”
“Well, hurry up.”
Moonshine started scratching at the door and I let him in.
To the dog as he went loping into the house Mom leaned forward and said, "Come here and give Grandma a kiss."
I went into the kitchen and called Beth Ann with my tail tucked ready to say I was sorry for leaving that nasty message about the dwarf. Beth Ann said, "What do I care, that asshole, anyway. I wish he was a dwarf, it'd serve him right, that asshole."
"You guys fighting?" I asked.
"We broke up,” Beth Ann said. “God, what a huge mistake that was. I can't believe I actually planned to marry that asshole. And I was going to give up my career for that guy?"
"You broke up? Already? What the hell happened?"
"I don't want to go into it."
I saw this as the perfect opportunity to suggest we get back together so we could try and be a family again. Plus, I was thinking it'd be a good excuse to get out of my deal with Dorothy. "We want to try and make it work between us, Dorothy. It's for our kids," I'd say. She'd have to understand. (As I thought this, however, I pictured Dorothy hanging by her neck from the rafters. Somehow deep down I knew it might have to come to that; she was so unstable. A break by death seemed to be the only solution.) But Beth Ann wouldn't have it. All she said was, "Come on, Emmett. You can't be serious."
"What about the kids? It'd be good for the kids, Beth Ann."
"Oh, come on. They're fine, you know they are."
"I don't want to do this stupid movie anymore, Beth Ann. I want to be with you guys. I want to go back to Alaska. I'll get my job back. I wanna help pay the bills. I wanna be a man about this."
"You're so wishy-washy, Emmett. What about that French girl? Aren't you guys together anymore."
"Who told you about her?"
"Your mom did."
"When?"
"I called a couple weeks ago, she didn't tell you?"
"Of course not, we're talking about my mom here."
"Well, aren't you guys still together?"
"Sounds like you're jealous, Beth Ann."
She laughed. "I want you to be happy, Emmett. You guys aren't together?"
"No, we are," I wished.
"Well, good."
Then this long awkward pause ensued and I could tell she was thinking something, it was going to be dramatic or traumatic, something new and awful I could just feel it. Sure enough, she started hemming and hawing, but finally after some coaxing she'd admit that she already found a new boyfriend, a doctor no less who just committed to a two-year contract at the Native hospital in Lousetown.
"Jesus, that was fast!" I shrieked.
"I knew I shouldn't have told you. I knew you were going to react like this."
"Wow, a doctor. Lucky you."
"Oh, Emmett. What do you care who I go out with?"
"I preferred you with the Mexican dwarf to be honest."
"I can't believe you'd actually think I'd go out with a dwarf. What kind of person do you think I am?"
"What's wrong with little people?"
"I didn't say there was anything wrong with them. I'm just not attracted to them.”
"You're such a princess, Beth Ann...God, you disgust me..."
When she threatened to hang up, I apologized. I suddenly realized Beth Ann was the first taste of normal I'd ever had and like a good dream I couldn't believe I'd lost her. It was like the sweet dream of relieving yourself at the urinal only to wake up in bed. Here I was living a life wrapped in cold, piss-soaked sheets.
"Oh, I guess I just miss you and the kids, Beth Ann."
"I know. It's hard."
I wanted to change. I didn't want my life anymore. I wanted to be average and normal, to have the same aspirations as others. Why couldn't I be happy driving a Frito-Lay truck, making deliveries to a chain of grocery stores? How did I manage to fuck this up for so long and get in this deep without stopping myself? Why couldn't I just stop and say no to myself? I had to get away from Dorothy. She was killing me. And my health. I was too fat, all these years, Jesus, what was wrong with me? My teeth, too. They felt loose. My gums were bleeding. I hadn't been to a dentist in seven years. What if this movie sucked? What would I do to make a living? I longed to disappear. I felt an urge for cough syrup. I wanted to leap right out of my skin. I was on the verge of losing it, like freezing up at the controls of a plane in a whiteout, just waiting for impact, knowing this was it. (Coming back to consciousness, it would be just my luck in the mangled wreckage to hear the sounds of my moans and then hours later find that even my last breath failed to be cherished by a pecking bird...)
Beth Ann started telling me about this trip, the doctor wanted to take her to Italy, and could she send the kids down to me while they were abroad? She suggested we split the airfare.
"Sure," I said. "That'd be fine. They can help me with the movie."
She giggled. "You're still gonna do that thing, huh?"
"I don't know. Why, you think it's dumb?"
"I didn't say that."
I decided to change the subject. "Well, it'll be nice to see you again, Beth Ann."
"What do you mean?"
"When you come down with the kids."
"Actually, I was thinking maybe Johnny could accompany the kids."
"Your brother?"
"Yeah, he wanted me to ask you if you were still doing the movie, maybe he could help build sets. He is a carpenter, after all."
"Well, what about your sister, Tori?"
"What about her?"
"She and Johnny don't get along."
"Tori's on vacation. She went to my parent's condo on Maui."
"No, she's not. She told you that? No, she's down here. She's staying with Stanley. She's going to be in the movie. She's playing Melissa, the wife of the fat guy. She..." There was this loud sound coming from Beth Ann's background. It sounded like an old-timey car horn from a model T.
"What was that?"
"Carlos is here, I'll call you back later."
"Who's Carlos?"
"My doctor friend, I'll call you back."
"Is that his car making that noise?"
"Yeah, he's got an antique car. It must've just come in today on the barge. I'll call you later, bye." She hung up or tried to, anyway. The phone was still off the hook, it didn't disconnect, and I had to suffer the squeals of her giddy excitement as she scrambled out the door as the doctor squeezed off a few more old fashioned toots from his horn.
My mom started calling for me, sing-songy, from the living room, "Emmmeeet, let's get drunnnnk tooogethheerrrrr. You prooomisssed."
I hung up the phone, frozen with anxiety. Where was I going to come up with the money to pay for my boy's airfare? I thought first of Dorothy. But it just sickened me. I couldn't handle another intimate moment with her. I mean, for fuck's sake, I felt sorry for her. But how was her pathetic nature my fault? I wasn't responsible for all the sorry-ass decisions that resulted in the lumpy form science now classified as Dorothy. (The saddest thing was the confession during pillow talk that her parents named her after Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz with the hope that she might glean in her life the same luck bestowed on her namesake in the movie. I remember thinking, what good luck? Didn't she get swept away in the tornado? Wasn't she almost killed? Those awful flying monkeys, who'd wish that on their child?)
As I snuck out the kitchen door to avoid my mother, I was on autopilot. I wasn't thinking, someone else--something bigger and wiser than me--made me climb into Dorothy's car and drive to her house. Dorothy kept the house key with the car keys and I went to the back door and unlocked the door to her house. But then it occurred to me, so I re-locked the door, took off my shirt, wrapped my hand, and broke one of the windowpanes to make it look like a burglary.
Two hours later it was midnight and I was pulling into the parking lot of the local pawnshop with a trunk full of stolen goods (actually re-stolen goods since Dorothy had stolen them first). I had to hand it to her. Electronics. She had taste. I was going to make a butt-load. I crawled into the back seat of Dorothy's car and tried to fall asleep, but I couldn't help the following montage: me getting caught for Breaking and Entering, Dorothy pressing charges to the full extent of the law and me winding up in prison where I'd waste away looking gaunt and thin--I'd lose so much weight the guards taking pity on me would sneak in Happy Meals just to entice me. "Please, Emmett. You can't do this. We'll lose our jobs over this. Eat, you must eat something! The french fries, we got some extra supersized, please!" But I was on a hunger strike to protest my stupidity and I wasn't budging. A few years later, guess who comes to pay me a visit? It was Nicole. She couldn't believe her eyes. "Mon Dieu, Emmett?! Iz that really you?!" After a few visits, she decides to leave Howser--they had even married. After a series of conjugal visits, she becomes pregnant with my child. And wouldn't you know it, my new cellmate is that big black guy from the movie The Green Mile. We really strike up a great friendship. He sees me longing to be back out on the streets again, to be with my new family--C and V are now living with Nicole. They can't wait for their new baby brother. My new big black friend says to me, "I cans he'p you, Emmett...Just trust me." (After all he'd done for me, you'd think I'd remember his name, but I don't. It's completely escaped me.) He puts his hand on my shoulder. I'm frightened. He has a strange look in his eyes. "Just trust me," he says. "I cans he'p you. I cans make you free." He puts his mouth to my head and starts breathing in. He sucks me in completely and blows me out as a horde of bugs out the barred window. I reform somewhere on the outside and turn to wave goodbye to my benefactor staring now with a look of horror from the barred window. I turn to run for freedom--now realizing my mistake. Like a fool I had reformed in the prison yard. I'm surrounded by prison guards, brandishing their Tommy guns. I dart from wall to wall as they shower me with bursts from their Tommy's. I'm bleeding from every bullet-poked orifice. They open the gates just to see how far I'll make it. One guard says, "You'll never make it." I'm holding my guts in, blood soaking the ground, and I realize this odd-looking man, he ain't lying.
The following morning I woke up doubting myself. Throwing my life away, would that bring me happiness? I was confused. I missed Nicole. I felt groundless now without her. I used to fantasize about living alone in a cabin, just have time to write and go for walks alone, but now I can see that I was fooling myself. I needed a woman in my life. I needed to be in love.
I had made fourteen hundred dollars from the pawn store, seven hundred of which would go into buying the ticket for one of my boys. I was really looking forward to seeing them. They were the world’s best company. I imagined all the happy times we would share, like a montage from a sappy, sentimental movie.
Dorothy knew it was me that had broken into her house. She couldn't help but know since I'd left her a letter of confession on her kitchen table. After coming back from the pawn store yesterday morning, I just assumed the cops would be waiting for me at my mom's house. While waiting for them to show up, I even packed a bag. But then I started thinking: shit, if I went to jail, who'd take care of my kids? I was growing nervous and paranoid. Someone started knocking on my bedroom door. I opened the window and started climbing out. The door opened and there was Dorothy. She had this woe-is-me look on her face. She forced a smile and said, "You know I forgive you, hon."
"I'll talk to you later, Dorothy." I hopped out the window and then shut it behind me. Dorothy just stood there, looking bewildered.
I walked to Howser's, snuck up on the window ever so carefully, and spied on Nicole as she sat on the couch watching some morning talk show. Howser was gone and she was all alone. I went to the front door and was about to go inside, but I stopped myself. I went back to the window and watched her admire the television show. The host of the show did something silly and she smiled warmly. My mind jumped to the future with this last image of her fixed like a tattoo on my oversized heart. It would be the last time I’d see her. Or so I thought.