Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter Thirteen

Whirlpool Eddy

Ruby


My endgame was Broadway – or off-Broadway – but I knew I couldn’t go there directly. I needed to go to some third place, so I could reinvent myself, rewire my circuitry. The first item on the scrap heap would be that nasty director’s omniscience; the first purchase would be a brand new suit of flakiness.

Things began with my old college chum, Shelley, who lived in San Francisco, in the Ocean District. Shelley was a singer-songwriter, trying to figure out how to work the music scene. The day I called, she had just discovered that one of her roommates was moving out. This served to further confirm my instincts – the fates were intervening on my behalf. My production company was between projects, so I really didn’t even have to quit – just let them know I wouldn’t be around for the next film. Stacey was pretty sad to see me go (all that competence out the window), but it’s not the general policy of the Dream Machine to step on an aspiration.

I was moved in in a matter of a week. The place was a cool old Arts & Crafts – the living room a dark hardwood plain covered by an enormous Persian rug, several guitars and every percussion instrument known to humankind. I expected Carlos Santana to walk in any second. Maybe Jefferson Airplane. I found an acting conservatory that operated out of Fort Mason, and signed up for a beginner’s class. I wanted to go right back to the roots.

The classroom was a dance studio – miles of floor, lots of mirrors, a barre for stretching. The teacher, Mr. Burman, was a playwright-director with a gruff, blue-collar exterior: rumbling voice, big Polish nose, thinning hair. It became readily apparent, however, that he was also kind, and the owner of a guerrilla sense of humor. (His actual humor was brilliant and twisted, a discovery I made at a performance of his satirical skits. In one of them he took the Catholic molestation scandal to its logical extreme: the priests were now eating the children.)

On the first night, we started with a few standard warmups – acting games I had done in college – then he gathered us for the night’s central activity, something he called “one-minute wanders.”

“This is largely for my own evil purposes,” he said. “I want to know how your little thespian minds work – what level of raw material we’re working with. This here cowboy hat is filled with slips of paper. Each is the beginning of a monologue: ‘The last time I went to London, I…’ ‘I have never been able to tapdance because I…’ Your job is to improvise from there – fact, fiction, doesn’t matter – for whatever seems like a minute. You are to speak as continuously as possible, and to avoid stall words like um, er, yaknow. The main thing is, don’t think too much. Thinking is our enemy. And I’m thinking I should begin with this eager young lady in the front, or else she will burst from her shoes. Um… damn! What was your alias?”

(This from the evening icebreaker, a name game.)

“Red slippers,” I said.

“Dorothy. No – Ruby!”

I extracted a slip and got I hate peanut butter because… And here’s what I said:

“I hate peanut butter because I once read that you could put it on the roof of your dog’s mouth, and it would take him, like, hours to lick it off? Now, I know this sounds really cruel, but what was even more cruel was the way that our dog Sputter, who was a Shih-Tzu (isn’t it fun to say ‘Shih-Tzu’? It’s like you’re swearing but really you’re not). Well anyway, that fucking dog would yip and yap and yop all day long, and one day I just got fed up, so I loaded a spatula with peanut butter and spackled the roof of that furball bitch’s mouth. It worked so well that she spent the next three days licking, and the problem was, her doggie bed was right next to my human bed? And all night long: licklicklicklicklicklicklicklicklick! Finally I put her outside, and she snuck under the gate, wandered into the road and – sniff! – got ran over by a garbage truck. The driver told us he didn’t see her until it was too late, and Sputter didn’t move a muscle, she was too busy licking the roof of her mouth. And that – sniff! – is why – sniff! – I hate peanut butter.”

A director’s note here: for comic effect, I actually spoke the word “sniff!” instead of actually sniffing. I had the class laughing pretty hard, but they stopped when they saw Mr. Burman glaring at me. I knew exactly what he was up to, however, so I glared right back until he broke.

“There is nothing more rude,” he said, “than a student who gets more laughs than her teacher.”

And then I got my applause.

The nice thing about going first was that now I could relax and study my classmates. All in all, they were a remarkably quick-witted bunch, and I was feeling more and more certain that San Francisco was exactly the right place for me.

One student who really caught my eye was Eddy (whose alias was “whirlpool”). His monologue wasn’t actually all that good, but he was such a character to begin with. His face was all sharp angles – sharp chin, generous sharp nose, and small, quick eyes. Very coyote-like. Plus an improbable pile of curly brown hair that reminded me of Lyle Lovett, or a young Bob Dylan. He spoke in a rapid London accent, very clipped and (here we go again) sharp. The rapid speech, in fact, was his prime handicap, forcing his brain to improvise at an untenable pace and dragging “erms” and “ehs” into his monologue (which began, The last time I played golf with John Travolta…).

I had no need of seeking him out after class, because I looked up and there he was.

“Hey, that peanut butter. That was fucking brilliant.”

“Thanks.”

He said “fucking” in that particular British way, verging on “fawking,” that made it seem much friendlier.

“And condolences on poor Sputter. Such a loss!”

“Eh!” I said. “She was expendable.”

“Oh!” He feigned shock. “Heartless. Say, would you let me buy you a drink and simultaneously interrogate you? I know a fabulous microbrew on Columbus. They have every ale known to mankind.”

How could I say no? After taking ten minutes to pick a pear cider from Rhode Island, I sat as Eddy regaled me with the story of his brother’s wedding, which ended with the groom swimming across a small pond in nothing but his top hat. The story was terribly long, but never boring – a rare combination.

“No offense, Eddy, but where was all this storytelling talent during your one-minute wander?”

“Oh God yes, I know!” He beat himself on the forehead for full effect. “I was thinking too much – precisely what he told us not to do. Halfway through, I was thinking, ‘Where the hell is this story going, Eddy?’ And that mucked me up even worse. I think that’s why I’m taking this class, actually. I need to rid myself of that internal critic, learn to dive out and stretch my boundaries.”

“So you’re not on the acting track?” I asked.

“Nope. Strictly for funsies. Although I can’t figure out what that Bear, Fish, Mosquito nonsense was all about.”

“Just silliness, I’m sure. I’d guess almost the entirety of most acting classes is just to give you license to do things you wouldn’t dream of doing in everyday life. How long did you last?”

“Three seconds,” he said, laughing. “I went for the bloody obvious Bear, and a cute little Asian Mosquito gave me the malaria.”

(He pronounced it “malari-er,” in that peculiar British fashion.)

“Ha! Good thing I didn’t run into you. I went straight for the fish. But then, I’m a good swimmer.”

“Rrowr!” he said, swatting a hand. “Not good enough to avoid my enormous claws!”

As it turned out, Eddy was an inventor. His latest pursuit was a hydrofoil wakeboard that would lift waterskiers above the water. He spent most of his summer weekends performing test runs on the lakes of the Central Valley (and most of his summer Mondays recovering from the bruises).

The acting class was one of a long series of endeavors that he pursued just for the hell of it. He referred to this as the NUP, or No Ulteriors Program. I found this aspect of his personality most endearing, and vowed that I would pursue a few NUP activities of my own.

He lived in an open space preserve in the Santa Cruz Mountains, forty miles south of The City, in one of a cluster of cabins at the end of a mile-long dirt road. They were originally constructed as a family hideaway for an early Silicon Valley industrialist, and “grandfathered” in after the open space purchase. The road was hell on my shocks, but I came to regard Eddy’s place as my own private retreat, whenever my packed schedule of classes and clerical day-job allowed a bit of sunlight.

Eddy maintained his tinker’s independence by running a one-man deck-staining business; he billed himself as the Deck Doctor. Once in a while I tagged along, and was always amazed at the places where he did his work: grand rustic palaces that overlooked miles of redwood forest, the Pacific a thin blue promise at the horizon. He invited me to become an employee, but I could see the amazing amount of abuse he piled on that wiry body of his, and I doubted it would gibe with my dance classes.

Once or twice a month, we would shimmy downhill to a bar in Menlo Park, to pursue this new thing called “karaoke.” I suppose I could rationalize it as another chance to work on my singing and stage presence, but for Eddy it was pure NUP – particularly because he had not one iota of talent. In the bizarro world of karaoke, however, he probably had more of a following than I did, because he was absolutely fearless. His one sure bet was “Another Brick in the Wall,” which matched his accent and chutzpah, but anything with much of a melody sent him into the William Shatner zone, where he was content to declare the lyrics with much enthusiasm and little regard for the music.

All this admiration might sound like the prelude to a romantic venture, but who can figure the roadmaps of chemistry, the crapshoot of two human frames of mind? For one thing, I had no capacity for it. I was determined to treat San Francisco as a way station – to tap a little syrup from her trunk and and head to New York in search of pancakes.

Or, it might have been Eddy. I had such affection for him, but compared to my serious-minded endeavors, his pursuits seemed inambitious, almost childlike. Or maybe he was just too bloody nice. Once, when my day-job fell prey to a round of layoffs, I was having a hard time coming up with the rent. When Eddy heard about this, he insisted on giving me a loan. But as he began to think out loud about all the fiduciary machinations he’d have to go through to come up with the cash, I stopped him and said, “Eddy, I have this thing called a father? I think it’s time to call him.”

Earnest generosity is not necessarily an aphrodisiac. It often makes it seem like the man is trying too hard. I think women prefer a certain level of self-centeredness, because that’s a quality we can trust.

In any case, Eddy never made a move, so it was easy to place him in that innocent big-brother category. We were great friends, and we had great fun – so no loss, right?

I did, however, take him up on a couple of pressure-washing assignments, which were really quite enjoyable. Each pass of the spraying wand took an impressive amount of grime out of the wood, which provided a pleasing sense of productivity. At the same time, the constant halo of mist kept the August heat nicely at bay. Soon after, I got some assignments from a temp clerical service, and my little cash crisis was averted.
Come October, my year – and my classes – had come to an end, and I was ready for the Big Apple. I had also managed, through my dear sweet casting director, Stacey, to find a year-long sublet on the Upper West Side. Nicely timed with my departure was a big blowout at Eddy’s cabin.

Not that the party was for me. Eddy was up to his elbows with Burning Man, a late-summer festival in the Nevada desert. It was simultaneously a brazen sex party, dustblown survival camp, artistic Carnaval and pagan hippie rite – centered on the immolation of a humongous man-like statue. The network of “burners” was broad and vigorous – almost like a new generation of Deadheads – and they conducted regional gatherings throughout the year. Eddy decided that his cluster of cabins was the perfect destination for one of these, and thus was born Burning Jam, an all-night music party.

With the musician network afforded by roommate Shelley, I was instantly a crucial cog, and happy to contribute before I abandoned the Bay Area. Eddy invited fifty people – three hundred showed up. But burners are great at this stuff; they’ve been trained by the Nevada desert to bring their own necessities, and to readily adapt to the unexpected. Almost instantaneously, the retired orchard next to the cabins became a campground.

The center of activity was Eddy’s deck (the rehabilitation of which was the genesis of his staining biz). Shelley kept the lineup of musicians rolling on- and offstage, owing largely to the use of a “community” drumset and PA system. This was also my first chance to see the end product of all those rehearsals in my living room. Shelley’s band, Slippery Sisters, was definitely pursuing a Lisa Loeb/Natalie Merchant vibe, with Shelley on acoustic guitar and spritely vocals. (Half of the Sisters were actually brothers, but no one seemed to care.)

There was no shortage of dancers, in various phases of exotic dress and undress. The invitation had expressly forbidden dour colors, which opened the door for burner standards like the feather boa, candy-colored spandex, dominatrix leather and various illumination devices that kept them from getting run over on dark festival nights. I went for a retro lime-green pantsuit and a pink British garden hat, plus an Irish brooch of amber-colored glass.

As the roster of official bands gave way to an all-out jam, Shelley proclaimed her duties fulfilled and grabbed me by the elbow. We proceeded to Eddy’s art-car, a chopped-off Honda Accord outfitted with a boat-like deck and pirate sails. He used it to conduct revelers around Burning Man at parade-float speed, and had fitted it with twin outboard margarita blenders. He had spent the whole afternoon there, dutifully sousing his patrons. I felt sorry for him, working so hard at his own party -–but then it was probably the most efficient way to get face-time with each and every guest. I had been to the well thrice already, and Shelley seemed eager to catch up.

Like everyone else who ever met Eddy, she was much impressed, and gave me the kind of glance that said, So what’s he, chopped liver? We assisted with his blending for an hour, then excused ourselves to drift across to a small barn outfitted as a disco, complete with spinning lights and a ‘70s-‘80s soundtrack. The old floorboards were not exactly conducive to dancing, but the crush of bodies seemed to prevent any falls. Shelley and I used this to our advantage, faking several stumbles so we could land on various hunky males.

We were pretty crocked, to be sure, but not half so gone as this one blonde girl, who was basically being propped up by the crowd. She looked about twenty, with the baby fat that a twenty-year-old can get away with, plus an impressive display of cleavage, threatening to escape the confines of a blouse that she must have purchased when she was twelve. She took plentiful opportunities to rub against neighboring physiques – be they male or female – and ended each song by lifting a fist to the sky and screaming “Fuck yeah!”

Shelley bopped over to me during “Rock the Casbah.” “Damn, woman! Have I ever behaved like that in my life?”

I laughed very loudly (because, why the hell not?). “You’ve come pretty close, Mother Teresa.”

She punched my shoulder, very boy-like. “No! I have not!”

“Okay!” I complained. “You have never screamed ‘Fuck yeah!’ in quite that fashion.”

“Damn straight.”

“Nor have your tits ever been close to that size. Ow! Quit it!”

A few songs later, we wandered outside to find a man and woman dressed like gypsies, spinning illuminated crystals at the ends of strings. Then we noticed a crowd gathering at the music-deck. I tapped on a broad, black-clothed shoulder and got a pirate: fake parrot, hoop earring, eyepatch – a pretty thorough job.

“Ahrr!” he inquired.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“My girlfriend… I mean, me wench, she’s got this fantasy about doing a public striptease – so hey, we’re here to push the envelope, right?”

“Groovy!” I said, feeling instantly that I had lost my moral compass and was quite happy to be rid of it. Shelley and I sat on a rug over the dirt as a thin Asian girl pranced about between two redwoods. The jammers served up a slow, chewy blues entirely appropriate to the occasion. The pirate, meanwhile, began giving me a neckrub, which might have been his way of releasing sexual tension – but I didn’t care, because he was good.

His girlfriend, however, was a dud. She took forever to take off her top and skirt, revealing a set of very unimaginative underthings. Then she sashayed around in her panties and bra for frickin’ ever, leaving all the guys waiting for more and not getting it. In both the British and American senses of the word, I was pissed.

“Come on!” I shouted. “I can see this much at the beach! Give us a freakin’ nipple!” I gave Shelley a hearty nudge, but she was involved in a liplock with her drummer. (Uh-oh, I thought. There goes that band.) Then the pirate abandoned his duties as my personal masseuse to wrap his girlfriend with a blanket. It seemed like a good time for a pee-break.

I climbed the steps to Eddy’s cabin and found a long line of women at the bathroom door (I assumed the guys were lined up at redwood trees). Every last one of them was snickering uncontrollably, and I soon understood why. Behind Eddy’s bedroom door, two or more someones were going at it like dogs in heat. The moaning and slapping built to a pitch until a successful O was punctuated with a cry of “Fuck yeah!” So the blonde from the barn had finally found her release. The girls in line were performing a kind of knock-kneed Rockettes routine, trying to keep from laughing lest they literally pee their pants. As the line inched forward, I came even with the bedroom door, and I could hear the clipped tenor of her partner: “Fawkin’ great, baby.”

I can’t quite recall my movements after that, but I do remember coming out on the orchard as the moon climbed over the trees, turning the brown California grass to silver pasta. I managed to find Shelley’s tent and crawl through the flaps, the air crackling with chips of laughter and conversation. I was deathly intent on sleep, but I heard another pair of lovers – this from the tent next door – and suddenly I couldn’t remember how to breathe. I imagined dying alone, surrounded by all this humanity, simply because I had forgotten how to let my body pursue its mindless occupations. But my body raised a coup d’etat. My lungs let go like an untied balloon, and the breath came out, turning to tears, turning to sobs.

I awoke to a street gang of Stellar’s jays and a far-off call that I couldn’t quite place. It gradually took on human syllables.

“Fuck-a-doodle-doo! Fuck-a-doodle-doo!”

The tent flaps made a papery ruckus, and in popped Eddy’s face, bearing a goofed-up smile and bloodshot eyes.

“Hello! I’m the morning cock! Time to wake the fuck up! I’ve got a shitload of blueberry pancakes for you morning lovelies.”

Shelley kept right on snoring, I shook out my hair, which felt like it had been stored for months in a musty attic, and managed to produce a bleary smile.

“You look awfully happy,” I said. “Or happily awful. Any blonde, big-titted reason for that?”
“Ah yes, the lovely De-bor-ah. Anything but De-boh-ring. Recently thrown to the dustbin by her brutish boyfriend, eager to seek vengeance by grabbing the first penis she could find and having her way with it. And imagine my surprise when it turned out to be mine!”

I laughed, and reached up to pat his whiskered cheek.

“Good for you, Eddy. I’ll be right out.”

“Lovely!” He vanished into the outside world, continuing his duties as town crier. “Fuck-a-doodle-doo! Fuck-a-doodle-fucking-doo!”

I was ready for New York, because I had become an excellent actress.


Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1

Image: Rupert Hart. Photo by Anne Gelhaus.

Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter Twelve

Friends Who Share Friends


I’m out on the back deck, but feeling like I’m somewhere else. Snow comes to the Puget Sound only two or three times a year, and last night’s was exceptional, painting my evergreen view with a vanilla frost. I sit with my third coffee on a thick-timbered picnic table and imagine myself at a long-ago trip to Tahoe. I’m nestled into the corner of a deck overlooking the intermediate runs, sharing a sourdough bowl with a handsome, dark-eyed devil of a man.

The present calls to me in a jangle of metal, and I know what’s coming: a merry flight of chocolate fur and a resounding “Woof!” I can almost parse the letters: W-O-O-F.

Java bursts through the trellised archway and takes a mighty leap onto the deck. He is completely unprepared for the effects of snow on a hard surface. When his paws fail to make purchase, he performs a four-footed Astaire routine and collapses, legs flying out like the poles of a wrecked pup tent as he slides on his belly, drops off the end of the deck and lands with a whump! During the entire stunt, he wears an expression that is both puzzled and ridiculously calm – and that’s the part that sets me off. When Floy Craig pops her blonde curls around the trellis, she finds me nearly suffocating with laughter.

“What the hell was that?”

“Oh!” I squeak. “Hard to… Can’t…”

She wipes off the opposite bench, takes a seat and watches me with much amusement. Then she sees the long swipe leading to Java, who’s standing in the yard, shaking himself dry.

“Ah! I can picture it now. He’s got the same problem with the tiling in the kitchen. Does that cartoon thing where his feet are just swishing around like a propeller. If we could only get one of these on tape, we could make some serious money. Can you talk now?”

I’m not going to take the chance, so I shake my head.

“I was going to ask you what the hell you’re doing out here, but then I saw this view. Must remind you of Alaska.” She takes a panoramic scan, then turns back to me and rests her chin on her hand.

“Are you doing better, Channy? Because… you seem like you are.”

Floy’s caring expression succeeds in disabling my funny bone, but I swallow a couple of times before answering.

“Yes. Yes,” I say. “Things are better. There are some things I needed to get out of my system.”

“Oh,” she says. “Well you know you can talk to me whenever you want, right?”

“Yes, I know. But this one thing, I needed someone a little, I don’t know, farther away? It’s hard to explain.”

Floy looks the slightest bit hurt. People do love the role of therapist, I think. But I can see her flipping my answer over in her mind, and her features relax.

“No, I understand. The things people tell me at the hospital… Well there you are! Are you done with your extreme sports?”

Java has found a safe route to the deck and is nudging Floy’s hand with his snout, trying to jump-start a petting session. He barely gets a response before he’s off again, streaking through the arch at full bark.

“Oh!” I say. “That’s probably my friend. I’d better grab Java so she can get out of her car.”

“Can you hang on to him?” says Floy. I’ll fetch the leash so I can take him for a walk.”

I arrive at the driveway to find Java on his hind legs, front paws planted on the hood of Ruby’s Toyota. Ruby’s inside, laughing hysterically. She rolls down her window to greet me.

“He looks like this director I knew in New York. Very gay and very fierce.”

I grab Java by the collar and pull him down. “Java is on a comic roll this morning.”

Floy trots out the front door and hooks a leash to Java’s collar as I reel off the introductions.

“Floy, Ruby. Ruby, Floy. RubyJavaJavaRuby.”

Ruby gets out and waggles a hand over Java’s floopy head.

“That covers all the combinations. Nice to meet you, Floy.”

“I’ll take this monster far away,” she says, “so you two can have a nice quiet talk.”

“Thanks,” I say. Ruby and I watch as Java drags her around the bend.

“Well,” says Ruby. “Where shall we take our story-swap?”

I can’t stand it. She’s wearing this long, lovely scarlet coat, and she has all this color in her cheeks, and her eyes are so full of energy. I have so carefully tended this garden, only to give it away to a houseguest.

“Like to freeze on my deck?”

“Hmm,” she says, sucking on a fingertip (what’s that about?). “No offense to your Northwest sensibilities, but I’ve had enough snow to last a lifetime. All right if we walk somewhere? Keep the blood pumping?”

“Sure.” The logical route is the loop trail – the opposite direction from Floy and Java – no artful landmarks, but lots of fir and cedar to hold the snow. “Want me to fill a thermos with coffee?”

“No, that’s all right,” she says. “Let’s walk unfettered.” She smiles much too widely.

“Okey-doke. Walk this way.”

We take a right at the end of the driveway, follow Water Drive for a block, then duck into the forest at the trailhead, onto a wide path covered in woodsy mulch.

“Pastoral,” says Ruby.

“Yeah, it’s nice. I could swear someone’s been tending it. It seems too neat to be natural. So I never though to ask, but what brought you here, exactly? To the Northwest.”

“A geopsychologist would say it’s the logical fourth corner: Florida, LA, New York – Washington. However, as a wise woman once said, that would be too neat to be natural. In actuality, I have a brother out here. He’s been having some trouble, so I thought some sibling-time was in order. Hey Channy, do you mind that I’m going out with Harry?”

Damn! I hadn’t expected her to bring it up first.

“I’m okay,” I say, not terribly convincingly. “He’s sort of like a big brother, mostly. He’s very sweet. He’s been through a lot.”

“So he says.”

In a pathway conversation, you can measure awkward silences in feet. This one takes thirty.

“So what’s he… like?” I ask.

Ruby laughs. “Well, you know what he’s like.”

Yikes. “No, I’ve never slept with Harry.”

Ruby stops and looks at me. “Neither have I.”

Twenty feet. The pressure gets too much, and I have to laugh at my presumption.

“Oh shit! Should I just shut up now? I think I’ll just shut up now.”

“No,” she says. “I’ve had too many cautious fucking friendships in my life. You say whatever you feel like, Channy. And I promise you I won’t get upset.”

Ten feet.

“So what did you guys do?”

“Went to a Shari’s in Tacoma. Had a two a.m. breakfast. Don’t you love those?”

“Yeah. I do.”

“I was pretty toasty.”

“Who wasn’t?”

“Harry. Or maybe he just holds it well. He drove me home, gave me a courtly goodnight kiss, and then – get this: the next day, he tows my car home. Knocks on my door, hands me my car keys – which I didn’t even remember giving him. Is this guy for real?”

“Yes,” I say. “He is.”

“Well, that kind of freakishly anachronistic chivalry demanded a reward so, that night, I took him to this place in Seattle. The Kingfisher. All painted up inside like a Louisiana roadhouse. And there’s some kind of unwritten code that only thee most gorgeous black people work there – and eat there. It’s like a casting call for Ain’t Misbehavin’. Hamster would fit right in.

“After that, we went to this play about a gay man who falls in love with a shark at the aquarium. And when the gay man is kissing the man who plays the shark, I peek at Harry to check the squirm factor, and he’s just laughing his head off, like everyone else. And I’m thinking, Damn! Is this guy for real?”

“Yes,” I say. “He is.”

Ruby stops for a second, reading my repetition, then shakes it off.

“And again, a goodnight kiss. Well, a long one. Yesterday, he had to work. I’m meeting him tonight at karaoke. I think we’re both rather covetous of Channy’s Sanatorium for Wayward Singers, so we’re circling each other rather carefully. But… well, I don’t want to turn you into a double agent, Channy, but I’m feeling a little dizzy. Can you toss me a couple of clues?”

I yank a handful of needles from a Scotch fir and hold them to my nose.

“‘Bout a year ago, Harry had his heart drawn and quartered. I think he’s okay now. Just…”

I stop, because I don’t like the quaver that’s working into my voice. But Ruby doesn’t miss much.

“Let it fly, girlfriend.” She slaps me on the back, like I’m choking on something.

I stop walking, and place a hand on her fuzzy scarlet shoulder.

“Don’t go underestimating him just because he’s nice.”

She looks at me for a second, then turns to walk. As I pull alongside, I swear I can feel the sadness pouring off of her. It’s no wonder she’s an actress, I think. Her emotions turn on a toggle switch.

We enter a long, flat stretch of trail beneath a high tunnel of Douglas fir. Fifty feet. When she speaks, it’s barely audible.

“Don’t worry. That’s a lesson I’ve learned.”


Next: Eddie the WonderBrit


Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1

Image by MJV

Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter 11, Part II

The Morning Tells All

I wake up on the floor. I can’t move my arms, and I feel something smooth and plasticky against my face. When I open my eyes, the ceiling is a maze of color and slowly moving dots. And a large brown blob with a single white stripe. And a shower of green confetti.

“Hamster?” God. I sound like Tom Waits doing a Louis Armstrong impression.

“Good morning, my little cash cow. This is your bonus for last night.”

I’m surrounded by presidents: Washington, Lincoln – Franklin?

“Jesus. What’d I do? Sleep with you?”

He laughs entirely too much. “Now that would be funny!”

I go to give him a playful slap, and discover why it is I can’t move. I’m wrapped up tight in a sleeping bag.

Hamster grins. “I don’t know what major corporations those kids’ parents own, but last night we separated them from large chunks of their trust funds. The biggest night in Karz Bar hiss-tow-ree!”

Hamster kisses me on the cheek – for him, an exceptional gesture. He claps his hands together and gives them a robber-baron rub.

“Now! What does my prize employee wish for breakfast? Sausages? I’ve got kielbasa.”

Just the word “kielbasa” makes my stomach gurgle. “Ooh! Can I start with a glass of Sprite? By the way, what was that evil drink you gave me last night?”

“Hamstah Hooch. Its exact ingredients shall remain a secret.”

“But probably include tequila.”

“Probably.”

He hops to his feet like a Ukrainian dancer and heads for the kitchen. “Sprite followed by coffee!” he declaims.

I snake my hand up next to my throat and locate a zipper pull.

“Hey!” I croak. “What happened to Ruby?”

Hamster leans into the room with a salacious expression. “Ruby was last seen leaving the bar with Harry Baritone.”

“Oh,” I say. Ten seconds later, the information arrives at my brain. “Really?!”

Next: Friends?


Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1

Image: Rupert Hart. Photo by Anne Gelhaus

Outro: The Serial Version

Chapter Eleven, Part I

Aloha Oy!

It seems impossible that we have told our stories (mine about meeting Harvey in the Signpost Forest), eaten our pizza and still have an evening of karaoke ahead of us, but that’s the nature of Northwest Novembers. The darkness stretches, on and on, and it’s your job to fill it up. We’re driving the Narrows Bridge in Ruby’s beat-up Toyota, and we’re not even running late. I’m hoping Ruby isn’t as stoned as I am – but then, I’m such an infrequent toker, it was bound to knock me around a little.

My misty vision makes it easier to marvel at the construction on the New Narrows Bridge. They’ve extended hanging footbridges from tower to tower so the workers can spin the cables, and strung it with white lights. The result is a luminous foreshadow of the bridge to come, lasered against the dark Sound. And you would never, ever get me up there.

It’s awfully nice to have my own roadie – much easier to lug the CD cases and set up the PA. I get the feeling, also, that for Ruby this is good therapy – a tiny vaccine of showbiz to fight off the gloom. I grab an extra chair and set it next to my station, just to make it clear that she doesn’t have to brave the general assembly.

I’m setting out my business card holders, and Ruby’s scouring a songbook, when Shari, Alex and Alex’s latest partner – a tempestuous-looking Russian lady in a leather skirt – walk through the door in a cloud of laughter. When they spot Ruby, they don’t exactly do the cliché stunned silence, but they do seem to make a subtle adjustment. Shari skips the usual huggy greeting for a friendly wave as they head for their usual table, just across the dance floor. Ten minutes later, they’re joined by Harry and Kevin the Cop, who have lately become quite the duo, and, a minute behind, Caroleen, looking unusually chic in a leopard coat.

I can tell that Ruby is taking careful notes (she is, after all, a student of audiences), and I sense something simmering just beneath the surface. Just as I’m about to tell her something reassuring, she’s up, clomping across the dance floor with a determined expression. She stops before my regulars (who are now exhibiting the aforementioned stunned silence), plants a hand on either hip, and turns into Streisand in Funny Girl.

“Boy! Do I have egg on my face!”

With an opener like that, the ice breaks all over the place. I’m having a hard time tracing the exact discourse, but the hills of verbiage have the shape of excessive mutual apology and good-natured jokes (“You should’ve seen the look on your face!”). She returns ten minutes later as if nothing has happened and goes back to her songbook.

I pick out a CD for sound check and give Ruby a stage aside: “You are a magician.”

“No,” she sotto voces. “I’m an actress.”

When I return to adjust the levels, the Choo Choo Ch’Boogie tootles in on its newly revamped track with two eggnog-and-vodkas. And a note.

Don’t think I don’t know what happens when I’m away. You’re grounded! –H

When I look to the bar, Hamster is whittling one index finger with the other, the universal gesture for Naughty, naughty.


The evening is odd in several other ways, as well. People keep arriving in groups of three or four, hanging out for one round and then leaving, disappointed at the lack of a crowd. If they had all stayed, we’d have a crowd.

Two that do stay are a tall Latin beauty and her thin, very gay guyfriend. She looks like Bizet’s Carmen as a supermodel, and sings in Spanish, from a Mexican CD I keep around. But she holds the mic away from her mouth like it’s a live rattlesnake, and we can’t hear a thing. So she’s a shy Carmen supermodel. Her name is Mariposa, which I believe means “butterfly.”

The guy, Jamie, has big black-framed glasses, sort of Buddy Holly as a mad professor. He also has a good upper range, handling some tough Bowie and Prince songs, but then making faces afterward like he really sucked. I’ve never understood that – it’s like some people think it’s uncool to think you might actually be good at something.

Mariposa and Jamie are also resoundingly drunk. Between songs, she sits on his lap, and they conduct full-blown makeout sessions. This little sideshow can not pass by without comment, so I turn off my mic and lean toward Ruby.

“You watchin’ Will and Grace over there?”

“How can I not?” she says.

“Two possibilities,” I say. “Either my gay-dar is way off, or they’re both suffering lengthy dry spells and trying to keep in practice.”

Ruby snorts into her hand. “Perhaps Jamie is… bi-curious?”

I slap her on the arm. “You’re bad! Bad I say!” But then I realize we’re distracting from Shari’s “Me and Bobby McGee,” so I try to regain my composure. Anyway, Ruby’s next.

“She’s doing “Mama Look a Boo-Boo” by Harry Belafonte. Last time she did “Mambo No. 5” by Lou Bega. Our little control freak, who took such care shepherding each note of her first two Gig Harbor sorties, has now decided to try every novelty song she can find. And still, every note out of that mouth is golden. I am pathetically envious.

And then the luau hits. No kidding. In the middle of Ruby’s calypso, a long train of youngsters spills into the bar, adorned in grass skirts, leis and aloha shirts. I scamper over to hijack a hula girl.

“What the hell’s going on?” I ask.

“Hi,” she says, half-crocked. “Luau party! UPS! Neighbors called the cops, so we said screw it! Let’s kay-ray-OH-kay! Whoo!”

UPS is the University of Puget Sound, across the Narrows in Tacoma.

“How’d you get here?” I ask.

She opens her sweet, perfectly betoothed mouth and says, “I have no fucking idea!”

“Okay, honey,” I say. “Sorry to keep you.”

There’s only one way to handle a drunken college party. I turn to Hamster at the bar and flash my middle finger, our little joke signal for Get me a fucking drink! What arrives on the Metro, two singers later, is a big bowl-shaped glass holding a lime-green drink with a stripe of raspberry red syrup. It’s mightily delicious. I take a long draught, then turn to find a dozen singers lined up at my station, song slips in hand. The first is “Tiny Bubbles.”

After that, I can’t tell you. It’s like driving a long ramp into a hurricane, and somewhere along the line you forget where you came in. The world is walled off at the bar windows, a swirling sherbet of color and noise, blurred like a slow-shutter photograph. When the bus rolls into the station I am screaming “Rock ‘n’ Roll” by Led Zeppelin as youthful bodies bump their parts around me (so clever how this generation has turned simulated sex into choreography). Just as I reach the tough part, I feel a hand gripping my left nether cheek. I turn to find Shari, wearing a Little Mary Sunshine smile.

“Oh!” she says. “Was that you?”

I pat her on the left (upper) cheek and return to my wailing. Zeppelin crunches to a finish, and the room explodes. I call up Kevin for “Suavamente,” wait till he gathers the inevitable salsa mob, reach into squeeze that firm constabulary butt and scuttle away like a cockroach


Next: Well-Paid Hangovers

Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1


Image by MJV.

Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter Ten

Ruby: The Curse of Competence


When I was an infant, my mother held me by the ankles and dipped me in the river Competence, bestowing upon my person the glow of professionalism. Let’s let Ruby handle this. If we put Ruby in charge, then the rest of us can be flakes. It began in preschool, at the end of coloring time. I was the one who gathered all the crayons, and the only ones I missed were those that had been ingested.

Myth number one about being an artist. You can only be creative if you’re flaky. Truth is, flaky artists are only flaky because they know they can get away with it. It’s very convenient, and it even adds to the aura. As far as the actual artistic product, it makes not one iota of difference – other than pissing off all the artists who have to work with you.

Competence was a trap, but I had no choice. I was a good Jewish girl, progeny of solid-minded intellectuals – the kind of girl who uses progeny in a sentence. The kind of girl who takes pride in her competence, who enjoys being a leader, and thus lacks the capacity to see the trap for what it is.

When I went for my theater arts degree at Florida State, I had one minor role in Lysistrata and then whammo! the director’s chair, ever after. Directing is another trap, because it allows you to be creative and in control at the same time. Even the most detailed of playscripts are just blueprints. Shakespeare’s are thumbnail sketches, filled up with perfect words. The director stands before a stage-wide canvas, equipped with a palette of movements, an assortment of brushes she calls actors, and has at it. The level of responsibility and respect is intoxicating; you begin to understand why so many generals turn into dictators.

I directed a dozen shows: Godot, West Side Story, Lear, Earnest, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Equus. By the time I graduated, I had the resume of a 30-year-old man, and magna cum laude, and all that other impressive crap. A month later, I got an interview at a film studio. I got it because of my dad – old college pal, that sort of thing – but when I got the job, that was different. Competent daughter of a competent father; the guy was hedging his bets, playing the DNA exacta. And he was right, I was so bloody competent.

The job was assistant to a casting director. Riding herd on extras, filing head shots – pretty mundane stuff, but every once in a while the casting director, Stacey, would turn to me and say, “So what do you think of our Mr. Davenport? Does he have the right mojo for Second Waiter?” Stacey called me Little Miss Binary, because I always answered yes or no. I had memorized the script, and I knew exactly the paintbrush we were looking for.

Within a year, I began to see my name in the credits of major motion pictures. Movies that were based on best-sellers, with stars that you didn’t have to describe as “the guy on that doctor show.” The kind of names you were sorely tempted to whip out at cocktail parties – but you never did, because you were too fond of being the consummate professional. I had college classmates who might work their entire lives, might give incredible, heart-rending performances – but who will never find the letters of their names mingling in such lofty constellations.

Three years into my personal Xanadu, my father came out west for a business trip and took me out to dinner. It was a ritzy new Italian place – Stelle, which means “stars.” In case you didn’t get the translation, there were stars everywhere: floating glass stars in the fountain, star-shaped napkin holders, whole galaxies etched into the plasterwork.

All through the meal, we could hear piano music in the lounge. Afterwards, we walked in to check it out, and found an old-fashioned piano bar – a massive grand piano with a counter around the edge for drinks. Daddy grabbed a couple of seats, ordered two champagne sours, then leaned over and said, “I think if a father buys his daughter dinner, the least she can do is sing him a song.”

Not that I needed much persuasion. I flipped through the little book on the piano and found the song I sang at my high school graduation party: “It Could Happen To You.” Sinatra recorded it. Also Robert Palmer, the rock singer.

So I waited my turn, finished my drink. It was different than karaoke; the singer had to provide the pianist with actual musical info: a key, a tempo. You could tell that some of them had been coming for years, working up their small repertoires. I had spent so much of the previous three years attached to a clipboard, I was actually a little nervous.

When I got up there, though, it was like firing up this alternate circuitry that I’d forgotten was there. I checked in with the pianist – this hip-looking grandfather type, wearing an old tuxedo with burgundy lapels – and asked him to play it slow and moody, so I could stretch out that fetching melody. It’s a restless old tune; each line is like a snaky staircase that winds around the next, you never know where you’re steppin’.

I didn’t expect much from the audience; they were Angelenos, after all, accustomed to world-class talents on every streetcorner. But they began to hush down as I sculpted the first verse – especially the older ones, who probably knew the song but hadn’t heard it for years. I, too, was busy with remembering -–that sense of attention and connection, the liquid light going out through my mouth, in through my fingertips. All those years ago, before I became a child genius. Heroin has nothing on a good stage buzz.

I got a huge applause, and was surprised when Daddy handed me my coat and led me out to the parking lot.
I laughed. “Are you in a rush, Mr. Cohen?”

“It’s always best to beat your applause to the door.”

“Ha! I thought I was the theater major.”

“I use the same principle for business meetings.”

A few miles later, as I drove him to his hotel near the airport, he said, “Honey, I still marvel that a product of my DNA can sing a song the way you do.”

“I’d almost forgotten I could.”

“Which makes me wonder. Are you happy out here? Are you happy doing what you’re doing?”

Just then, we were passing one of those monster billboards, the kind you only see in Los Angeles or Times Square. It was for a movie that I had worked on.

“I’m living out a dream, Daddy. I’m in Wonderland.”

“But are you Alice?”

His persistence made me laugh. Once Daddy landed on a notion, he was like a labrador with a rawhide chew.

“Mr. Cohen, why do you ask such silly questions?”

“Why are you crying?”

We pulled up to a red light. I put a finger to my cheek, and found that it was wet.


Next: Luau!

Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1

Image by MJV.

Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter Nine

Leap or Fall


The pivot point of Tacoma’s Stadium District is a triangular sliver of park where the avenues of Tacoma and St. Helens meet. Further on, the two roads are connected by what have to be the shortest streets in the city: First St. N and Second St. N, the former of which stretches all of twenty feet. Ruby is cutting figure-eights through all of them, looking for a parking spot. She drives an ancient blue Corolla with a bad carburetor, which forces her to pump the gas whenever we strike an uphill. All the aerobics makes her laugh with embarrassment.

“This is my stealth car,” she says. “Looks like shit, but she got me here from New York with nary a hiccup. Once she hits an interstate, she tracks in on seventy and just stays there. Damn! It’s the Rotarians, that’s why.”

A Masonic temple rises over St. Helens Avenue like a concrete King Kong peeking over the hillside. Bland businessmen in bland suits funnel beneath a marquee reading WELCOME TACOMA ROTARY. Ruby cuts a right onto Second, spots a car-size rectangle of dirt and seizes it with piratical zeal. We’re soon clip-clopping the sidewalk along window-size wedding portraits as Ruby gives me the neighborhood spiel.

“Call it a sickness, but all these old buildings remind me of New York. Check the crazy church across the street. Presbyterian congregation, Eastern Orthodox spire, Romanesque pillars and good ol’ Northwestern brick. I think the architect was a closet Unitarian. And now, on your right, the soulless white high-rise apartment building.”

The lobby and front garden are actually pretty inviting, but a glance upward illustrates Ruby’s point: flat windowfront fields devoid of ornament. The sidewalk holds something more interesting: a shrine of flowers and candles around a bus stop sign. I think of inquiring, but Ruby’s on to the next attraction.

“And this is my stealth apartment building.”

It’s a squat building of dark bricks, surrounded by a low wrought-iron fence. Ruby leads me into a lobby of mustard walls and floral green carpeting, the kind you might see in an old hotel. We board a flight of stairs that leads to a narrow hallway.

“Would you believe this was built in 1896?”

The hallway comes to a back stairwell. Ruby stops at a door to the right and pulls out her keys.

“This is actually two separate buildings,” she says. “That little hall is part of the center section that joins them. And, even though my mailing address is St. Helens, technically I live on Broadway, which is perfectly suited to my sick, undying dreams of glory.”

This is Ruby’s primary shtick, the heart-piercing sentiment delivered in an offhand manner. Perhaps this is therapeutic, perhaps it’s just a built-in part of an actor’s armor. Whichever, you can still feel the pain behind the words.

We stop in the entryway to remove our coats. Ruby takes off a black cap to reveal her shock of red hair, then takes my hand and leads me into the living room, wearing an expectant, close-lipped expression.

What strikes me is not the room itself but the view framed by the wide center window: the port of Tacoma, lit up like the largest auto sales lot in the universe, a trio of mill stacks billowing steam into the frigid night air. Ruby drinks up my surprise with a satisfied grin.

“Stealth car, stealth apartment – stealth view.” She runs a hand along the sill. “All in all, I’m almost invisible. The natives seem wholly unaware of it, but that is the most beautiful fucking port in the country. It took me about five seconds to sign the lease.”

“You have got to have a party up here!” I say, sounding exactly like a gay impresario.

Ruby gives me a sad smile. Sad smile, tragic jokes – she is the middle child, bastard daughter of the comedy and tragedy masks.

“Give me some time to get some friends first,” she says. “Perhaps I’ll put out a casting call. But hey! Let’s have a party for two. Set that puppy on the coffee table, and I’ll get some wine.”

The “puppy” is a pizza called The Hipster, loaded with trendy toppings: sun-dried tomatoes, feta cheese, capers. Ruby sets out plates, forks, napkins and Pinot Grigio, and we embark on some much-needed consumption. It’s our longest stretch of wordlessness in the past two hours (she is a talker with remarkable stamina).

Ruby polishes off her first slice, takes a swallow of pinot and studies me with those unsettling stage-size features.

“Do you think the folks at Karz will ever forgive me?”

“I’m the KJ, Ruby. If I forgive you, they forgive you.”

“You’re that powerful, eh?”

“Yes,” I reply, and can’t help snickering. “Besides, there’s nothing the karaoyokels enjoy more than a good old-fashioned soap opera – and you certainly supplied that.”

Ruby snickers in return. “And I certainly got my comeuppance. Which was inevitable, by the way. I was so full of juice, I wasn’t going to stop until someone smacked me down good. Picture Ruby standing in line at the Safeway, eleven o’clock, Halloween, holding six dozen eggs. Could my intentions have been any more blatant? And I’ll tell ya, if your cop friend hadn’t wrassled me away, I would have stood there in that parking lot and chucked all seventy-two.”

“It actually worked out well,” I say. “You supplied all the necessary ammunition for your own eggs-ecution.”

“You’re a bad, bad girl,” says Ruby.

“Do you know how long I held on to that pun?”

“Well,” she says in a mothering voice. “Perhaps you should have buried it somewhere, honey.”

Her expression turns abruptly serious. For the first time tonight, I feel like I’m getting the real Ruby.

“There was nothing wrong with that CD at all. I was just picking a fight. And before, when I pulled that apocalyptic bitch session in the parking lot. My God, honey – why didn’t you just shoot me?”

“I was in shock. It was so far out of my experience that someone could be that… mean.”

The memory brings an awkward silence. I pretend to show some interest in my pizza. Ruby reaches under the coffee table and pulls out a small box.

“Would you like some herb with your meal?”

Her meaning escapes me, but then she takes out a plastic bag and a large ceramic pipe.

“Oh! Yeah, sure.”

“Such a relief,” she says. “Hauling out the ganja is so fraught with politics.”

“Where I grew up, pot was considered about as racy as chewing gum. I’m not a huge fan, but if someone offers a bowl – why not?”

She hands me the pipe and a lighter, and shows me where the carb is. I take a lungful, hold it in, then pass the pipe to Ruby. When I speak, my throat is already scratchy (and there’s the reason I’m not a huge fan).

“What’s up with that shrine at the bus stop?”

Ruby’s conducting a deep inhale, producing little snorting sounds that, in any other context, would be considered quite rude. She turns red and coughs it out.

“Oh God, that. Some guy fell out of his apartment. Ten floors.”

The thought of it is like a nail in my chest. All I can do is gasp.

“Can I tell you the story?” she says. “Let me tell it to you, just the way I heard it.”

This seems like a curious preface, but what the hell do I care?

“Yeah, sure,” I say. “Go for it.”

“I was coming home from karaoke – this was Jade, that little bitch. When I pulled up, there were four cop cars, all the lights flashing. They had roped off the entire street in front of the building. As I walked up, there was this one big cop – Asian guy – walking back to his car. He was shaking his head, like he had something in there and he was afraid of letting it settle. Over his shoulder, about thirty feet away, I could see a yellow emergency blanket spread out over something on the sidewalk. And I began to make connections.

“When the cop finally noticed me, I felt the need to justify my presence. ‘I live next door,’ I said. The cop looked at me like he really wasn’t seeing me and said, ‘I can’t tell you anything right now.’ And I took that as my cue to disappear.

“I was back two nights later – in fact, on Halloween – when I saw the shrine. There was a Xeroxed photo of this young, young, guy with his girlfriend, and a note that read, I met you once in the laundry room. You seemed very nice. I went to the grocery store to buy some flowers – alstroemeria, they were called – and I was setting them down when this big linebacker-looking dude came out from the lobby. It seemed like he was the apartment manager or something, he had that air about him. And this is what he said:

“‘It was a freak. That safety glass is just about foolproof, but once in a great while someone hits that single wrong spot at that single wrong angle – and when safety glass goes, I mean it disappears. Gerald was talking on the phone with a friend, maybe sitting on the top of his couch, maybe leaning against the glass. He swings an elbow, hits that single wrong spot and the gravity takes him right out.’

“Linebacker dude came over and and sat on the bus stop bench. He pulled off his baseball cap and scratched his bald head. I think he could picture exactly what was going through my mind: that awful split second when Gerald found himself airborne.

“‘There’s more,’ he said. ‘You know that nutcase who pulled out an AK-47 at the Tacoma Mall, shot all those people, then took hostages in the music store?’

“‘Sure,’ I say.

“‘That shooting took place the day after Gerald fell. And that was the very morning that Gerald was supposed to report for his first day of work at that same music store.’”

“No!” I say.

“Exactly what I said,” says Ruby. “Our friend Gerald was headed down a dark tunnel, with two trains coming the other direction.”

Ruby punctuates her conclusion by taking a luxurious drink of wine. I’m beginning to understand the power of her theatrical skills (Exhibit A, endowing the apartment manager with just the right gruffness of tone to set him apart in the narrative). She smacks her lips, places her glass carefully on the table and shoots me an expectant look.

“So. What do you think?”

“Awful!” I say. “Awful. Horrible.”

“Is it the truth?”

“Why… wouldn’t it be?”

She ruffles her hair, as if she’s wiping the slate clean.

“Let me tell you a second story. Gerald is hopped up on ‘shrooms, desperately depressed, surrounded by personal crises. He calls 911, tells them he’s going to kill himself. They tell him someone’s on the way, but no one comes, so Gerald takes a run at that window and smashes right through. That shrine is not just a shrine – it’s a landing spot. Notice the distance from the building. No way he gets there on a dead fall.”

I feel like a mouse nibbling on spring-loaded cheese. But a woman’s gotta eat.

“Who’s your source?”

“Inge, the manager of my apartment building – and close friend of Gerald’s ex-girlfriend.”

I give it a careful study. “Could Gerald have struck the building early in his fall and… bounced?”

“Not likely, but possible. However, that’s not the point I’m selling. Notice how these stories cross over on themselves – how the sources seem to flout their own self-interests. The apartment manager confesses the danger of his own windows. Friends of the dead doing nothing to protect his reputation. And the connection with the mall shooting – added for dramatic effect? Useful distraction? Comforting apologia for the hand of fate?

“Private lives being private, I don’t think you or I will ever know. See how slippery the truth is? How like a moray eel covered in Vaseline?”

This is much more thought than I had bargained for. I feel the need to move, so I pick up my glass and wander to Ruby’s window, which feels much safer than poor Gerald’s. Landward from the gray freighters and the blue loading cranes, toward the flatlands of Fife, fifty sawhorses line the highway, blinking their hazard lights in patterns that never seem to sort out.

Ruby knows the question that comes next, but she also knows it’s flammable, so she speaks it to the air without turning.

“Are you going to tell me about your husband?”
All I can conjure is a long exhale, but alas, she waits me out.

“That seems to be the reason you were sent my way, Ruby. To leach the poison out of my system. But it’s not gonna be easy, and it is gonna be messy.”

“Start out slowly,” she says. “Tell me how you met.”

Hazard lights.


Next: The Curse of Competence


Purchase the book at: http://www.amazon.com/Outro-Michael-J-Vaughn/dp/1440111405/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231020486&sr=8-1


Image by MJV.

Outro: The Serial Novel

Chapter Eight, Part IV

The Eggsecution of Ruby

A half hour later, we’re nearing the bottom of the barrel. Harry does “Rock Lobster” just for the Munsters organ music, then Sergio, one of the college boys, takes on “Jeremy,” that Pearl Jam song about the high school kid who shoots all his classmates.

Followed by a gunshot, which startles Sergio out of his song. He spins around as a second shot spatters the window with a phlegmy sunburst.

Kevin the Keystone Kop, fully inflated by a half-dozen brewskis, stumbles to his feet to declare the obvious.

“Eggs! Evidently some sort of Halloween…” (wait for it, wait for it) “Prank! This! is a job for a. Constabulary!”

“Yeh!” says Harry, all Sly Stallone. “Do we got wonna dose?”

Kevin’s on his way to the door, nighstick at the ready.

“Kevin!” I shout. “Take it easy. It’s just kids.”

My plea for mercy is answered by a trio of eggs, striking the window in a yolky constellation.

“Give ‘em hell, Kevin!”

Kevin dashes outside, suddenly coordinated. We hear shouting, and the scuffling of footsteps. A minute later, in comes Kevin trailing a red flapper in handcuffs. I guess I’m not entirely surprised.

“I have apprehended this prostitute in the parking lot,” Kevin announces. (He seems to think he’s in a Vaudeville melodrama.) “From her attire, I’d say she was trolling for senior citizens.”

I walk over and stand at a safe distance to give my appraisal. Gem-girl is ready to claw and/or bite anything that comes close. It’s a good thing we’ve got a genuine cop holding her back.

“Helly, Ruby.” I throw in as much sneer as possible. “If that’s your real name.”

“Let me fucking go!” she hisses. “Let me go or I’ll call the cops.”

Kevin almost buckles laughing. Harry comes up to assess the situation, flipping a silver dollar as he speaks.

“She does have a point. According to habeus corpus subjiciendum polly wolly doodle, we really can’t hold her without a charge. But perhaps we could solve the problem by jumping directly to the punishment.”

Kevin uses a foot to nudge forward Ruby’s grocery bag, which still contains four dozen eggs. “And why not make the punishment fit the crime?”

This is how ten otherwise normal adults find themselves tying Zelda Fitzgerald to a deck railing and lining up a firing squad, armed entirely with eggs. It’s utterly logical in design – overshots will land harmlessly in the water (though I’m not sure the Russell Foundation would approve). I have given Ruby a certain level of eye protection with the Elvis sideburn sunglasses, and duct-taped her mouth to keep her screams from attracting any non-Keystone cops.

I’m beginning to think that we have wandered into something criminal, or at least barbaric. These thoughts disappear, however, as Kevin kneels at my feet and presents me with a perfect white ovoid.

“First offended, first avenged,” he says.

I approach the railing with deliberate steps, running the cool enamel skin across my lips. I stop and hold the egg to her face, savoring the look of anger and anxiety beneath her sunglasses.

“You… are a lovely singer, Ruby. As a human being, however, you suck eggs. And that’s why we’re here.”

I tear off Ruby’s pageboy wig, revealing short pinned-back hair. I hold the egg at the top of her head, cover it with the wig, and press down on the whole assemblage with a delicious crack. Trails of yolk descend her forehead. I smile, walk to the side – well out of range – and I declare “Gentlemen! You may fire when ready!”

What follows is hard to describe. The public execution of a transvestite Elvis – were Elvis’s blood composed of a viscous yellow-white fluid. Ruby’s body bursts forth in splatter after splatter. After thirty seconds, the flapper dress is caked with goo. I am utterly enjoying myself.

Schadenfreude, however, has its limits. After taking the first barrage with a defiant posture, Ruby curls to one side and slowly sinks to the deck, dangling from her handcuffs. She’s sobbing, which is entirely unfair. But alas, I do have a conscience. I take a step into the firing zone and hold up a hand.

“Hold it, guys! That’s enough. Harry, can you get me some damp towels?”

Eric the college dramatist complains: “But we’ve still got a dozen left! What’ll we do with ‘em?”

Eric’s chums immediately savage him with eggs. He runs inside, squealing “Assholes! Assholes!”

Kevin undoes Ruby’s cuffs, as Harry returns with a towel. I remove the Elvis glasses and start with Ruby’s forehead, making sure that nothing drips into her eyes, which are closed and flooding with tears. I’ll be damned, but I’m beginning to feel sorry for her.

“Ruby, Ruby. How can you sing so beautifully and still be such a raving bitch?”

“Try…” she chokes, and stops to sniffle. I hand her a fresh towel so she can wipe her nose. “Try putting yourself in front of every fucking director in New York for eleven fucking years, and being rejected by each and every one. Try doing that when you know exactly how good you are.”

I peel off the pageboy wig and run a towel across her hair

“Oh yeah?” I say. “Try having your husband put a bullet through his head.”

So this is what finally brings it out. A pity contest with a human omelet. We compare tragedies. I win.

Next: An Unlikely Friendship


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