I sat on the sofa in the television room, looking up at all this from a turkey sandwich on a paper plate. Now and then, I sat back and tipped a plastic water bottle to my lips. No more wine. I was finished with that. I wanted my head clear so I could come to a final decision about what I was going to do about Serena.
After a while, I got tired of watching Europe die. I started changing channels.
On Feel the Fear! contestants were eating dung beetles for cash prizes.
On Sparkle for the Prosecution, a single mother-slash-DA was trying to convict a group of Christian child molesters.
On Shoutdown, an Egyptian feminist was crying out to an interviewer, "They're taking over our mosques, they stone and mutilate our women, they murder dissenters. If the West will not condemn them, who will save us?"
Oh, and look! Here was Sally Sterling on Hollywood Tonight- perky blond Sally with her kissable lips-saying, "Juliette Lovesey reveals the shocking truth in this exclusive emotional interview."
Listen, I wouldn't mention this, but it turned out to be important. No, really. What happened on this show during the next few minutes changed everything in the end. Hard as it may be to believe, Sally's interview with Juliette became a matter of life and death.
Juliette, you see, had cried on camera. Now this was a big deal. You could tell it was a big deal, because Sally wouldn't even show the whole interview right away. She just kept tantalizing us, showing us the moment when Juliette's lips trembled, when her eyes swam, showing it again and again, only to cut it off cruelly, saying, "We'll have more of that interview later in the program."
Then we-we whose tears fall piteously but off camera-we, the Great Unwatched-had to wait through the commercials for the full catharsis. Buy a pad that keeps your menstrual blood from staining your underwear. Get cheaper loans online, get a better credit card, watch a new TV series about a serial killer who works for the police. And don't forget to pick up a box of laundry detergent to get those really tough bloodstains out of your panties…
And then at last, at last, Sally delivered the goods. There was Juliette in the usual canvas chair, her tanned, shapely legs crossed, her hands resting ladylike on her skirted thigh.
"This is not something I ever wanted to talk about publicly," she was beginning to say, when… well, you remember that scene where the monster latched onto the guy's face in the movie Alien? That's how close the camera got to Juliette. It zoomed in so hard and tight we could almost feed on the trembling of her lips, practically drink the single tear that glistened on the long underlashes of one fabulously vulnerable eye. That crystal droplet hung there for a moment of indescribable pathos and suspense and then, as a grateful nation gasped with compassion and release, it spilled down over one sweet, high, fragile cheekbone to leave a trail of shine on the peach complexion by L'Oreal and…
"Yes," said Juliette, dabbing at the corner of her eye with a fingertip. "Yes. I am going to have Todd's baby."
Well, you could have knocked me over with a feather.
"And you're going to keep it," said Sally. She had her Compassionate Face on now. She was leaning forward in her own canvas chair, her own legs in their elegant black slacks crossed ladylike at the knee.
"Oh, yes," said Juliette, bravely flicking another tear from her eyelashes with a slender knuckle. "I love children, and I just don't think another abortion would be right for me right now."
"And Todd…?" Sally asked, with that infinite gentleness and sensitivity she did so well.
"Well, you know, in the end, he wasn't ready for the commitment I was hoping he would make," Juliette replied nobly. "But he really is a wonderful man, and I wish him every happiness."
"Even"-it was a hard question but, as a professional journalist, Sally had to ask it-"even if that happiness is with Angelica Eden?"
"Yes. Yes. Of course." Juliette's tears were over now. You could see in the set of her cleft chin that her native strength was flooding back into her. What a woman. "This is the way of things, you know. Love doesn't always last. People move on. It happens. You have to let them follow their hearts."
Now, gauging her moment, Sally began to alter the interview's tone, to lighten it, to bring it back from its dark, confessional depths. With a girlish, conspiratorial smile, she asked, "Do you know yet if it's a boy or a girl?"
And Juliette brightened instantly, pleased and shy as any young mother, only so much more beautiful. "It's a boy! I'm going to name him Portobello."
"Portobello." Sally giggled. "Like the mushroom?"
"Yes. I really-oh, I can't tell you how much I love them. And it's just always seemed to me such a beautiful word."
"Wonderful," said Sally. "So let's talk about your new film, The End of Civilization as We Know It."
So it went on-as it would, in fact, go on, days and years and even decades, I suspect. Because the thing is, the audience-the Great Unwatched-they loved her from that moment forward. From then on, endlessly it seemed, the TV, the magazines, the Internet would leap upon her every little lust and rumbling, spreading her joys and twitches and discontents across our consciousness as if they were some ocean-sized puddle making up in area what it lacked in depth. The audience would tune in for all of it. The pregnancy, the birth, the difficult partings when Juliette tore herself away from her baby to go filming on location, her son's picture-perfect childhood, his own early movie roles, his wild nightclubbing, his first stint in rehab, and Juliette's selfless dedication to preventing teen depression and suicide through the Portobello Fund, named in his memory. Even in her twilight, when her looks were fading, she would still command the magazine covers with interviews asking why-why? why?-were there no good parts in Hollywood for older actresses? On this night-this last night before the worst of it-Juliette went from being a starlet to a star.
And that, as I say, changed everything.
Cathy on the Phone
I turned the TV off after that. No Patrick Piersall tonight. I'd had enough of him that morning in the Ale House. And then, too, it was all Patrick Piersall somehow. On every show on every channel, he was the presiding spirit: The Wonderful Wizard of Me.
I phoned my wife.
"Hey you," she said. "When are you coming home? It's lonely in my bed at night."
"Tomorrow. The house is all cleaned out. Mitzi can stage it and put it on the market without me."
"Excellent. I can't wait to have you back."
"I have to tell you something," I said. "It's kind of nasty."
"All right." The warm, cheerful voice changed tone. It became flat and cautious. "What's the matter?"
"I went to see an old girlfriend the other day…"
I heard her breathing stop hundreds of miles away. Then, with false and pitiable lightheartedness she said, "And did you set your marriage vows at naught and destroy my happiness, your children's, and your own?"
I laughed. "No. I'm crazy, but I'm not stupid." She breathed again and I loved her. It was the first time it occurred to me to feel glad that I hadn't gone through with my visit to Anne that day. "I should've told you before I went. I'm sorry."
"Never mind. What happened?" It was typical Cathy. Not a word of anger out of her. Just another shift in tone. Now she sounded a little less like the wife and mother she was and more like the lawyer she used to be, ready to figure it all out, whatever it was.
I sighed. I pinched my eyes closed, holding the phone to my ear. "She has a kid. A daughter. She claims she's mine from the old days."
I heard her give a little grunt, as if I'd struck her. "Oh, no, Jason. Oh, no," she said. "Do you think it's true?"
"I can't be sure. I don't think she's even sure. She married another guy and told him the kid was his, too."