Miss Wyoming Part 19

Chapter Twenty-five.

John sat beside his rescuer, Beth, in a security office adjacent tothe private jet facility at Flagstaff's airport. Outside the wired-gla.s.s windows, in the warm gray air, hydro and aviation towersblinked rubies and diamonds. John was wearing clothes Bethhad a.s.sembled from her husband's castoffs. His pale aqua shirt was crisply ironed and his skin was brown as if he were bakingon the inside, like a bird just removed from the oven. His hairhad been hacked off a few weeks before with a hunting knife ina Las Cruces, New Mexico, Sh.e.l.l station rest room. His eyes wereclear and wide like a child's. Beth said to him, "I'm sorry aboutJeanie and that tape. She's a wild one. I've never known what todo with her."

"It doesn't matter." said John.

Beth bought two weak coffees from a grumbling vendingmachine. "Here," she said, "take one."

"Oh-no thanks."

"Go on.

John held on to his coffee with the same unsureness he'd feltwhen holding a baby for the first time, Ivan and Nylla's daugh-ter, MacKenzie. A fuel truck drove by in a mirage of octane. Bethsaid, "Your friends really have their own private jet, then?"

John nodded.

"Jeanie never would have done it if she hadn't found outabout that jet."

"It doesn't matter. Really. It doesn't."

Beth's daughter, Jeanie, had sold the tape of John's nakedclimb from the ditch and the hour that followed to a local net-work affiliate. It would be a lead story on a nationally broadcasttabloid show the next night.

"What makes me mad," said Beth, "is that she's going to usethe money to pay for her boyfriend's car, not even her own.Dammit, she doesn't have to do that. Royce has a good jobalready."

"Young people."

"You said it."

A shrillness called out from the black air, and John, staringat the floor, placed it as quickly as a dog recognizes the firingpattern of the cylinders in his master's engine. It was Ivan andthe G3. John heard it land and then taxi. He heard the heavy metal staff doors opening, footsteps and voices: Ivan, Nylla,Doris and Melody.

"John-O?"

John stood up and tried to raise his head, but his eyes weretoo heavy. "John-O?" Ivan crouched down and looked up atJohn. "We're here, John-O." But John couldn't speak or look up. The coffee dropped from his hand and the cheap plastic cup rat-tled on the floor. Nylla, Doris and Melody kissed him on the cheek and John could smell their perfumes, so kind and decentthat he choked.

Ivan looked over at Beth, who was holding John's launderedclothes inside a paper grocery bag. "Are you . . . ?"

"Yes, I'm Beth."

Ivan handed John over to Melody and Nylla. "Thank youfor your . . .""It was nothing. Butyour friend here, he's in a bad way."

Ivan handed Beth an envelope from which she pulled out astack of hundreds. "Jeremy from my office got your address andnumbers?"

"He did."

There was nothing left to do but go out onto the tarmac andinto the plane and head west. Beth said good-bye and hugged John, whose arms flailed out from him as if made from straw.The two younger women escorted John on each side up thestair ramp, and Ivan followed behind, a glen plaid jacket drapedover his left arm. Soon they were up in the warm night sky, butJohn had yet to make eye contact with his old friends.

"Johnny," said Melody, "can you hear me okay?"

John nodded.

"You're not on drugs are you, John?" asked Doris.

John shook his head.

Melody said, "Do you want a drink? Ivan, where's thatwhisky? Pour him a shot." She held a crystal gla.s.s up to John'slips, but the taste triggered a convulsion. He felt as if his chestwere being crushed by ten strong men.

"John," said Nylla, crouching down beside him, "breathe.Breathe deeply."

"What's going on?" asked Ivan.

"John," Nylla continued, "please listen to me. You're having apanic attack. You're panicking because you're safe now. Yourbody's been waiting all this time until it felt safe enough to letgo. And you're safe now. You're with your friends. Breathe."

John's stomach felt as if it had been given a swift boot.Melody sat on the floor and held him from behind as he rocked. "Johnny? Where've you been? Johnny?"

John said nothing. He'd wanted those rocks and highwaysand clouds and winds and strip malls to sc.r.a.pe him clean. He'dwanted them to remove the spell of having to be John Johnson.He'd hoped that under a Panavision sky he'd wake up to find thedeeper, quieter person who dreamed John Johnson into exis- tence in the first place. But there was nothing any of them in theplane could say or do. They were just a few pieces of light them-selves, up there in the night sky, and if they flew twenty milesstraight up, they'd be in outer s.p.a.ce. It was a quick flight andsoon they were back at the airport in Santa Monica, and they drove into town.

John's old house and its James Bond contents had been soldto pay off the IRS. With his royalties caught in a legal snag, hewas cashless. As though traveling back in time, John returned tohis old bedroom in the guesthouse. Doris was now a living,breathingmille-feuille of ethnic caftans and clattering beads. Dur-ing his first few weeks home he tried to give the impression thatall was fine with him, like a defeated nation embracing the cul-ture of its conqueror. Each day he wore a suit and tie from a se-lection Melody bought for him. He went without drugs. To seehim on the street one would think he was swell, but inside hefelt congealed and infected. He felt as if he were soiling what- ever he touched, leaving a black stain that not even a fire couldremove. He felt as if people could see him as the fraud he knewhe was. His skin was sunburned, his hair had grayed, and sun-light now hurt his milk blue eyes, which he was unable to look at in the mirror, as if it could only bring bad news.

He tried finding shaded cafeterias in the drabber parts ofLos Angeles, where there was no possibility of encountering oldacquaintances. He occasionally spotted geriatric scriptwritersfrom the DesiLu and Screen Gems era beached like walruses in banquette seats eating Cobb salads, but he never made contact. John would sit and read the daily papers, but they held the samesterile appeal of grossly outdated magazines in a dental office reception area. He wanted to go home, but once he got there,he felt like a bigger misfit than he did out in the city. He triedbut couldn't think of any single thing that might make him feelbetter.

A few months pa.s.sed, and nothing within him seemed tochange. Then without at first being aware of it, he one day real-ized he was taking a measure of comfort in following a rigidschedule. He quickly developed a notion that he might just beable to squeak through if he could keep his days fastidiously identical. He told this to Ivan, who then lured John back to theproduction offices with the absurd promise that his days would be "utterly unsurprising." Both Ivan and Nylla were at wits' endas to how they might reintegrate John back into L.A. Mega Forcefinished while John was away, was scheduled for release, and there was no doubt that it was going to hit big. Test screeningsin Glendale and Oxnard evoked memories of the old days...o...b..lAir PI-yet to John it was nothing, not a flash of interest.

Among industry people John was considered a mutant. Con-sensus had been reached that he really had been out crossingthe country on some sort of doomed search. This made himseem charmed in an interesting but don't-get-too-close way. Ina deeply superst.i.tious environment, John was bad and good luck at the same time. If people wanted to do business, theywent to Ivan. If they wanted a bit of gossip to pa.s.s along at thedinner table, they popped their heads into John's office.

Around Doris, John felt like a burden. She'd come to enjoyher privacy and unaccountability over the years. While she waspatient with John, he couldn't help but feel like an anchor roped around her waist-and yet the thought of being alonein a place of his own was inconceivable. Ultimately, beneath Doris's Darling!-rich exterior John also sensed a veiled hostility-and he couldn't quite identify its root.

Until one night, just after John had returned home from theoffices of Equator Pictures-six fifty-five, in time for the news on TV-Doris came through the door in a filthy mood. Her carhad been broken into during her lunch with a friend at KateMantilini, and her favorite dress, just back from the cleaners,was stolen, along with a sentimental cameo brooch she kept in the dashboard's beverage caddie. She cut her fingers removingthe pile of shattered gla.s.s strewn about the driver's seat, and she'ddriven to Bullock's to meet another friend. There she realized, after waiting in a long lineup, that her credit cards and ID hadalso been swiped. She worried she was getting Alzheimer's be-cause she hadn't noticed sooner. She had a fit, and during an angry drive to the police station, ran a red light, receiving botha ticket and a scolding from a traffic cop. She was mutinous.

"Oh G.o.d, do I need a drink," she blurted as she scrambled forthe liquor cabinet. "Want one?" John said no. "You don't haveto be such a priss about not having a drink, John."

"I'm-not-drinking-these-days," he said in precisely metered tones.

"Aren't you a saint."

Out the side of his vision, John watched Doris pour a Cin-zano, gulp it down, pour another, this time with a lemon zest,gulp it down, and then in a more relaxed state, pour a third. Hewondered what was going on with her, but he didn't want tomiss the news.

Doris was looking across the room at John, his posture self-consciously erect, sitting on a stool watching reports from somewar-torn ex-Soviet province. It was like he was six and sickagain, trying to be a good little boy. The emotions she'd beenfeeling about her c.r.a.ppy day did a 180, and without warning,her heart flew back to the New York of decades ago when Johnwas the child who didn't want to be sick or a burden.The shutters were drawn, but late afternoon sun treacled in through the c.h.i.n.ks. Doris had the sensation that the hot yellowair would feel like warm gelatin against her body were she toventure outside.

She sighed, and suddenly she didn't want todrink anymore. She felt chilly and old. She wanted to slap John.She wanted to hold him, and she wanted to chide him for hisrecklessness and to tell him how much she wished that she'dbeen out there with him, out in the flats and washes andfoothills and gorges, begging G.o.d, or Nature or even the sun to erase the burden of memories, and the feeling of having lived alife that felt far too long, even at the beginning. She called tohim, "John . . ."

He looked around. "Yeah, Ma?"

"John . . ." She tried to find words. John pushed themute b.u.t.ton. "John, when you were away-out on your jaunt a few months ago, did you . . ."

"Did I what, Ma?"

"Did you find . . ." Again, she stopped there.

"What, Ma? Ask me."

Doris wouldn't continue.

"What is it, Mom?" John was now alarmed.

And then it just flooded right out of her, in a rush: "Didn'tyou find even one G.o.ddam thing out there during the stint away?Anything?Any thing you could tell me and make me feel like there was at least one little reason, however subtle, that wouldrepay me for having been sick with fear all those nights youwere gone?"

Doris saw John open his eyes wide, religiously. She immedi-ately felt queasy for having been so vulgar, and apologized, though John said there was no need for it. But John knew hismother was mad at him because he was still seemingly un-changed at thirty-seven, because he was still alone and because she'd pretty much surrendered hope that he would ever accli-mate, marry and procreate like the sons of women in her read-ing group.

"It's my back," said Doris, thumping the base of her spineas though it were a misbehaving appliance. "It hurts like stinkand I have the one Beverly Hills doctor who doesn't like to over-prescribe for his patients."

"It's still that bad?"

"As ever."

"I thought you were trying a new-'

"It's not working."

"Can't you go to another doctor? Get more pills?"

"I could. But I won't. Not now. I'd feel so-I don't know,s.l.u.tty, openly hunting for drugs like that. And Dr. Christensenknows my life story. I'm in no mood to start from scratch withsomeone new."

"So you'd rather be in pain?"

"For the time being? Yes."

Her temper was brushed over. When the CNN news ended,John bad an idea. He went into his room and looked throughhis old address book. All these numbers and names and not afriend in the lot. John wondered why it is people lose the ability to make friends somewhere around the time they buy their first expensive piece of furniture. It wasn't a fixed law, but it seemedto be an accurate-enough gauge.

He flipped through pages of numbers and memories andmeetings and s.e.xual encounters and deals and washed cars andflights booked Alitalia and Virgin, and tennis games catered-asmall stadium's worth of people who would find John Johnsonwhatever he needed.

He removed his working clothes and shed them into a pile in the corner. He was sick of being Mr.

Corporate Office Guy. Herooted about his cupboard and found some old clothes Doris hadn't thrown out-old mismatched shirts and pants used forpainting the kitchen drawers and for yard work. Every day wasnow going to be casual Friday for John.

He returned to his old address book. In it he located thename of Jerr-Bear, a child actor of the Partridge Family era who as agrown-up had gone terribly s.k.a.n.k, dressed in the homeless ver-sion of Milan's latest offerings, with matted hair that smelledlike a barn. John tried to remember Jerr-Bear's full name and couldn't, yet he fully remembered Jerr-Bear's portrayal of theloyal son on a long-vanished cop show.

Jerr-Bear may have gone s.k.a.n.k, but the goods he carried werethe finest. John looked in his bedside table and found eighteenhundred dollars remaining from a five-grand float Ivan gavehim for the month. It was all in twenties and looked sleazy sit- ting in a heap the way it did. He dialed Jerr-Bear, and against the odds, Jerr-Bear answered.

"Jerr-Bear, it's John Johnson."

"The happy wanderer!"

"Yeah, that's me." John heard chewing sounds. "Are you atdinner now? Do you want me to call back?"

The thought ofJerr-Bear at a nonrestaurant dinner table seemed almost impos-sible for John to visualize.

"Yeah, it's dinner, but big deal. What are you, a telemarketer?How can I help you, John?"

"Call me back."

"Right."

Jerr-Bear maintained a complex system of cloned cell phonesso as to avoid tapping by authorities. A minute later John's linerang. Even then, the two spoke in veils.

"Jerr, what do you give someone who's in a lot of pain?"

"Pain's a biggie, John. Life hurts. Specifically-?"

"Back pain."

"Ooh-most people need heavy artillery for that one.

"You have any artillery?"

"I do."

They arranged for lunch the next day at the Ivy.

Chapter Twenty-six.

After the scuff with the other Chrysler, Vanessa took the wheel of the car and John sat in the back seat spinning theories aboutRandy and semipacked luggage.

"Drugs. It has to be drugs."

"No, John," said Vanessa. "There's nothing in Susan's bankingor Visa card patterns that indicates a consistent drain of drug-caliber discretionary cash."

"You got her banking info?"

"I gave her Susan's Visa number," said Ryan. "It was in thevideo shop's computer. I mean, once somebody's got your Visa number, they can pretty well clone you."

"Not really," said Vanessa. "In order to clone you they'd alsoneed your phone number."

"Why do I bother even trying to generate ideas?" asked John."You two are the most drag-and-click people I've ever met.You're wearing the pants here, Vanessa. Why don't you tell mewhat we ought to be doing next?"

"Okay, I will. We are currently en route to the North Holly-wood home of one Dreama Ng."

"She's a numerologist," said Ryan.