The Family Man Part 29

"Are you going to ask him if it's a trick to get you to jump ship?"

Smiling, she presses one number, waits, then nods to Henry. "Leif! It's Thalia. Just wondering if you heard about the plan?"

She listens, then says, "In an e-mail from your publicist. So here's my main concern: Think we'll get into the Box?"

Her smile is fading. She says, "Okay ... yup. I should have figured that."

Henry whispers, "Ask him how he feels about it."

Thalia asks rather soberly, "How do you feel about doing this?" The rest of her responses are all brief and terse: No. I see. Today? What time?

She claps her phone shut and says, "He wants to talk to me in person. Alone."

Later she will act out, complete with baritone impersonations of Leif, what she characterizes as their watershed heart-to-heart. Side by side on her living room futon, he confided that it could have been worse; that ideas were batted around which he absolutely could never have agreed to and would have meant the end of Caitlin.

"Such as?"

"I'd rather not say."

"You wouldn't mention Caitlin if they didn't involve s.e.x." He had looked away, nodded at the radiator on the far wall. "Intercourse?"

He'd said, eyes still averted, "On videotape."

When Thalia laughed, Leif had asked what was funny about that.

"It can't be on the level. It's in my contract, no s.e.x, let alone s.e.x on tape."

He'd turned his doleful gaze back toward Thalia. "They weren't planning to show you in the video. Just me."

"Meaning they'd hire a body double for me?"

"No. Not necessary."

"What's left then?"

"Close-ups. Wendy thinks they'd be good for my image."

"Meaning they'd only be showing Leif Dumont having s.e.x? How is that good for your image? All that says is 'I videotaped myself having s.e.x like you other perverts out there.'"

"Wendy thinks it would get people talking."

"Then she's an idiot! How much are you paying her to come up with ridiculous ideas like make a s.e.x tape?"

"I'm very tall," he'd finally allowed.

"We know that."

"And sometimes, when a guy is tall..."

"Are we talking about the length of your p.e.n.i.s?"

Leif had nodded gravely.

"And Wendy Morelli knows this how?"

"She asked me! Point-blank. She must have figured this could be a possibility in someone who is six feet four."

"And you, I'm sure, said it was none of her d.a.m.n business."

"No," Leif had told her. "I figured it was business. She works for me. I wasn't bragging. I told her I had a nickname when I was in high school, back when guys showered together after gym."

"I'd love to know," Thalia had prompted.

He had clamped his lips together and shaken his head sorrowfully.

"Nightstick? Pogo Stick? Long Dong Silver?"

"Just Hose," he'd whispered.

When debriefed, Henry and Todd exclaim, "And that's it? You didn't ask for specifics?"

"How does a guy answer a question like that? Are you supposed to know your own stats, in feet and inches?"

"A follow-up question was absolutely imperative!" says Todd. "And since when are you a shrinking violet?"

"And weren't you raised by a mother who specializes in inappropriate conversation?" Henry asks.

"I did go as far as asking if Estime International got to see the goods as part of their intake procedure."

"Why would she ask to see the goods if he's vetoing her idea?" asks Henry.

"Maybe just curious. Maybe she was taking advantage because he's got that autistic thing going and it would be like asking the slow boy in the schoolyard to pull his pants down."

"For science. Like a nurse," says Todd. "Like a urologist."

"Like I did," says Thalia breezily.

They are cl.u.s.tered on the sidewalk outside their respective doors, but now Todd says, "Shall we take this inside?"

"No. I have an appointment-nails-so I'll be quick."

"Tell me you didn't ask him to pull his pants down," says Henry.

"Guys, please. I've seen plenty of p.e.n.i.ses. I was looking only for quick and clinical. I wasn't going to touch it. I asked like I was being shown a dessert cart." She points to Todd's zipper. "Comme ca, very coolly: 'So? Can I see it?'"

"Thalia!" says Henry.

"Did he oblige?" Todd asks.

"Of course not. I told him I was only kidding."

"Good," says Henry.

"What a prude," says Todd.

"Can we get back to the subject at hand?" says Henry.

"Todd and I have lost track of what that was," says Thalia.

"Is Leif endorsing the big bar scuffle?"

She is backing away, pointing to her watch. "Gotta run. I'm thinking it over. I'm thinking: performance art. I'm an actress. If a director asks me to slap someone and throw a drink in her face, I'd do it, wouldn't I? In fact, I'd consider it a juicy role."

"That's different," says Henry. "If that gets your picture into a newspaper, it's a still from the movie. And then there's the whole other follow-up plan, if you cooperate: The world will think you're engaged."

"You'll get presents," says Todd. "First you'll have to write fake thank-you notes, and eventually you'll have to shlep everything over to Mail Boxes Etc. to send them back."

"I'm hating this more by the minute," pleads Henry. "I say we stop it now. If we have to buy our way out of the contract, so be it."

Thalia says, "I still think it's a trick. And I'm also thinking 'Fair is foul and foul is fair...'"

"Macbeth" says Henry.

"I know," says Todd.

"Stay tuned," says Thalia.

31. The New Neutral.

HENRY IS ON an escalator with Thalia, descending into Whole Foods, when his caller ID alerts him to a male Krouch on the line.

"I'd better take this," he tells her.

"Meet me in Salsa," she says. "Or Chips. Or page me. Is everything okay?"

"Could be good news," he says.

In the lobby, he is not happy to discover it is the less sympathetic Glenn Junior calling. Sorry, no, says Glenn; no second thoughts about wills and trusts. "No one can reach Denise," he grumbles. "The listing broker needs to get into the apartment, but all she gets is an outrageous outgoing message."

"Outrageous in what way?" Henry asks.

"It's a speech! No matter what time of the day or night you call, you get her diatribe. Have you heard it?"

"I have not. And you're calling because you think I have some sway over her outgoing messages?"

"Could you try?"

"No" says Henry.

"Call her landline," says Glenn. "Then talk to me."

From halfway down the escalator he spots Thalia, discussing avocados with a grizzled produce man. He thinks, I don't do her justice, worrying about her open and possibly promiscuous arms. She talks to everyone. That's all it is: good old-fashioned charm. She should run for something.

When he reaches her side she says, "This is Omar. He used to work in the Chelsea store, but his commute is shorter to this one. And his fiancee is a cashier, at number nineteen today. Omar, Henry."

"How do you do," says Henry.

He listens in his kitchen with a pencil poised over a scratch pad. "You've reached the home of Denise Krouch," he hears. "Thank you for calling. I'm probably at work now, or, if it's a weekend morning, at the cemetery. If this is in relation to the alleged sale of my apartment, please know that I am in no way a party to that. Any such viewings or open houses are being scheduled without my consent. I repeat: I am opposed to the sale of this apartment by Glenn Krouch Junior and Thomas Krouch, especially while legal matters are still pending. Proceed at your own risk, knowing that possession is ninety-nine percent of the law. No visitors outside the immediate family will be let up..." A pause follows; Henry senses that Denise is wondering, What immediate family? Her tone softens to merely businesslike. "If you're calling about anything else, I'll get back to you as soon as possible. Ciao. Thanks. And thank you for respecting my privacy."

What's all the fuss about? Henry wonders. He rather enjoyed the oration. Would Thalia find this decidedly Denisean rant at all entertaining? Probably not. He phones George at the firm and asks, "Would you mind? It's only a minute long. If you think she's going to get into more trouble for this, give me a call." He tells Todd's voice mail: "You won't believe your ears."

He decides to make her office his destination and will tell her he was motivated by those marinated artichokes he once purchased on Lex. He walks by the office, once, twice, then pretends to study the photos of properties in the window. Neither Denise nor Albert Einstein is visible inside. He hesitates to inquire, knowing from decades of office etiquette that part-time receptionists should not be receiving visitors. Finally a woman with an intelligent face behind her fashionably narrow gla.s.ses opens the door to ask, "Do you have any questions?"

Henry says, "Actually, I'm not in the market. I was looking for Denise Krouch."

The woman's face registers what Henry reads as perplexity over the ident.i.ty of a part-time n.o.body. He adds, "She brings her dog, a greyhound, to work? I think she's here mornings."

"Please come in," says the woman. "You are...?"

"Henry Archer. A friend. I haven't been able to reach her and I was getting worried."

She invites him to sit in one of the chairs opposite the reception desk. "Denise," she begins carefully, "did not come to work yesterday. Nor did she call in."

Henry nods, waits.

"We called her cell and then the apartment to no avail. Ordinarily we'd have left it at that, but her message sounded a little odd. Enough so that her boss went over."

Henry now understands where this is going and how bad it is: The boss found Denise, who never woke up- "No! Sorry! I didn't realize how this was sounding. She was there, alive. The dog, too. In fact she yelled, 'Come in, the door's open.'" The woman pauses, then states as if the news couldn't be more disturbing, "Even from the hallway, Sheila knew it was paint."

"Pain?" he asks.

"Paint. She was painting the apartment."

"And that explains why she's not here today?"

"She was painting the walls black. Angrily, like a woman possessed. A flat finish."

"You fired her because of that?"

"She didn't show up for work, she didn't call, and she seemed, frankly, out of touch with reality."

Here I go again, Henry thinks, the default advocate and mediator. "I'm sure you know that she lost her husband a few short months ago and that her stepsons are putting the apartment on the market-"