The Irresistible Henry House Part 30

"No," Henry said. "I wouldn't."

He realized immediately how wrong it had sounded, though he had meant it as a compliment.

Annie fidgeted with her new wedding ring. "You mean we're not going to stay friends?" she asked.

"No," Henry said. "I don't think we could stay friends."

He said it because, despite the ring on her finger and the exuberant first dance with her groom, Henry believed that Annie could still be his, and it wouldn't be fair to want her.

HENRY FOUND MARK HARBURG leaning against a wall, a gin and tonic in his hand.

"Gaines!" he cried with liquid conviviality.

Henry walked over to join him.

"Think of it," he said. "Our little Annie. Married off."

"Yes, sir."

"Bet you didn't think this day would come."

"Well," Henry said.

"Bet you thought you'd be the one," Harburg said.

"No, sir," he said with complete honesty. "I never did."

AT ANNIE'S WEDDING, Harburg, in his slightly oiled state, had told Henry that the studio was going to go ahead with making The Jungle Book The Jungle Book as an animated feature. Henry immediately knew that it was what he wanted to do. as an animated feature. Henry immediately knew that it was what he wanted to do.

On the surface, The Jungle Book The Jungle Book was a cla.s.sic children's film, filled with light and lovable characters and songs. To Henry, however, it was-darkly and unavoidably-a story of betrayal and, inevitably, of loss. First the boy, Mowgli, is orphaned, then handed off from panther to wolves, from wolves to panther, from panther to bear, and, finally and most painfully, from bear to humans. All of the characters care for him. But everyone he trusts is replaced. was a cla.s.sic children's film, filled with light and lovable characters and songs. To Henry, however, it was-darkly and unavoidably-a story of betrayal and, inevitably, of loss. First the boy, Mowgli, is orphaned, then handed off from panther to wolves, from wolves to panther, from panther to bear, and, finally and most painfully, from bear to humans. All of the characters care for him. But everyone he trusts is replaced.

"Trust in me," the python sings to the boy.

"I don't trust anyone anymore," the boy says.

Henry asked Phil Morrow to a.s.sign him to the film.

"I've got you on The Borrowers The Borrowers instead," Morrow told him. instead," Morrow told him.

"I've worked here three years," Henry said. "Isn't it time I have a say in what I work on?"

"I'll think about it," Morrow said.

Now, as if he were wooing a girl, Henry started doing daily drawings and leaving them on Morrow's desk. He drew himself as Mowgli beseeching Morrow as Baloo the bear. He penned a plea on a ribbon and wrapped it around Morrow's pink rubber ball. He slipped toy snakes into jacket pockets, and finally one day snuck into Morrow's office and left a life-size drawing of Mowgli on the back of his door.

At last, in March, Morrow told him he had the a.s.signment.

Throughout the spring he worked on The Jungle Book, The Jungle Book, making colorful cartoons out of hope, lies, trust, and sorrow. He met a woman named Maggie at the supermarket one afternoon, emptied her grocery cart into his own, brought her home, cooked her dinner, and went to bed with her. Another time, he asked a salesgirl at Woolworth's if she was ambidextrous, and somehow that led to a conversation about her father, and somehow that led to bed as well. making colorful cartoons out of hope, lies, trust, and sorrow. He met a woman named Maggie at the supermarket one afternoon, emptied her grocery cart into his own, brought her home, cooked her dinner, and went to bed with her. Another time, he asked a salesgirl at Woolworth's if she was ambidextrous, and somehow that led to a conversation about her father, and somehow that led to bed as well.

In June he was given an actual raise, and he moved into a slightly larger, slightly higher apartment in the Tuxedo. Someone in the building had persuaded management to clean the pool, and as the California summer unfolded in cartoon-background perfection, Henry took to spending weekends doing laps and reading or sunbathing. Two new tenants-sisters-had moved in, and Henry enjoyed their parade of poolside fashions: the large white-framed sungla.s.ses, the little kerchiefs in their hair, the two-piece bathing suits that were more provocative than the sight of their fully nude bodies would have been. Sometimes he invited Cindy for a Sunday swim, enjoying her company almost as much as the consternation her presence inevitably provoked from the sisters.

By September, Mary Jane was back at Berkeley for her junior year, and Henry began once again to spend every few weekends with her. He liked the freedom the visits gave him to be a less conventional version of himself, but he also liked the freedom from all the women he knew, all their expectations and hurt feelings, even all their gifts.

One late October Friday, he arrived at Berkeley to find Mary Jane's room dark, her record player silent, and Mary Jane herself curled up on the sofa, an unfamiliar look on her face.

"What's happening?" she said, without getting up. Her voice, usually unremarkable to him, seemed softer and lighter, as if she was having trouble finding the breath or the energy to speak.

"Hey," Henry said. He kissed her cheek, inhaling the complementary smells of marijuana and herbal shampoo.

"Did you drive, drive, drive?" she asked him.

"What?"

"Did you drive?"

"Why didn't you wait for me?" he asked.

"Huh?"

"You're already stoned. Why didn't you wait for me?" She smirked, a secret crimping her lips, then hidden by a toss of her hair.

Henry put down his overnight bag just as Alexa emerged from her bedroom, uncharacteristically free from her Samsonite case. "Hey, Alexa," Henry said.

"Hey," she said, the openness of her Southern tw.a.n.g completely belied by her sour expression.

"Got a date?" he asked her.

She glared at him through her cat-eye gla.s.ses.

"What?" he asked her.

"Ask your friend," Alexa said, and slammed out the door.

Henry took off his jacket and hung it on one of the hooks he had put up some weeks before.

"What was that about?" he asked Mary Jane.

She shrugged.

"You're being weird," he said.

"You're being weird," she repeated.

"Let me at least catch up," Henry said. "Where's your stash?"

AN HOUR LATER, Mary Jane had pulled the crocheted afghan over her knees and was systematically sticking her fingers through its holes.

"Come on, let's go eat," Henry said.

Mary Jane ignored him.

"Mary Jane," he said.

"Did you know that Mary Jane means means marijuana?" she said. marijuana?" she said.

"What?"

"Mary Jane. Marijuana. Marijuana," she repeated, this time rolling her r r and blowing out her and blowing out her j, j, Spanish style. Spanish style.

Henry just looked at her.

"You're not hungry? Come on. Munchies," he said.

"Not hungry."

"What's going on?"

She crossed her arms on top of her head, a model in a bathing suit pose.

"I dropped acid," she said.

"Where?"

"What?"

"What did you do?"

"I dropped acid," she said.

THERE WAS ACTION ALL OVER the campus that night: some kind of party at the Union, tryouts for the debate team and the university chorus, the usual fraternity and sorority things.

Mary Jane loped along beside Henry, the good-natured grin on her face occasionally giving way to openmouthed, full-out wonder.

"Talk about Disneyland!" she said. She had stopped under the main gate to the campus.

"What do you mean?"

"Colors," Mary Jane said. "And shapes. Everything has a tail."

"A tail like a dog?"

She giggled. "No, Henry. Not a tail like a dog."

Abruptly, she sat down in the middle of the path.

"Not a good idea," he said to her, and reached his hand down for hers.

She put her hand up, four inches away from his.

"Hey," he said to her. "Over here."

"I am am over there." over there."

Her depth perception was off, that had to be it, Henry thought. Odd, given that with only one good eye, she had effectively had to compensate all her life for just this problem. She had always been, by necessity, the one to see things flatly and without adornment.

Henry's mind leapt ahead with contingencies. So well trained by Martha, he searched for mental checklists of all the emergencies he knew how to handle: fainting and burns, rips and stains, gravy too thin and batter too thick; closed fireplace flue and leaking gas stove. He did not even really know what acid was, let alone what it meant to have dropped it, or what to do with someone who had.

AT THE FOUNTAIN, yet another hour later, Mary Jane sat on the ground, leaned back, and simply refused to move.

"Come on now," he said to her.

"No!" she shouted. "Leave me alone! Don't ruin it, Henry. For once I can see things you can't!"

HE STAYED WITH HER. Whenever people came by, looking curious about her location by the fountain, he hovered closer to her, blocked their view, and said she was fine. At one in the morning, she started running across the campus, then collapsed, giggling, on a patch of lawn. He followed her. She lay on her back on the gra.s.s and moved her arms, as if making snow angels. The ground was cold, and somehow colder for being dark. Henry couldn't decide if he hated Mary Jane or hated acid or just hated the moment, but he was never unclear about his job, which was to get her back home, safely.

"Henry," she said. "You doofus."

"Come on, Miss Fancy," he said to her, and he picked her up on his back-her arms around his neck, her legs threaded through his arms-and carried her home.

BACK IN BURBANK, work continued on The Jungle Book. The Jungle Book. But Walt, fully immersed in planning for "the Florida Project," was rarely seen in the Animation Building. Circulating around the studio were maps and plans for Disney World, a far larger and far more ambitious counterpart to California's Disneyland. In Disney World, Walt explained in a new half-hour film, there would be not only a theme park and exhibits, but also an attempt to create an entire model city. Walt called it EPCOT, and he said it would use all the latest scientific methods to create a new way of life, a city free of slums; "We won't let them develop," Walt said. There would be fifty acres of climate-controlled streets for stores and theaters where pedestrians, according to the film, would "enjoy ideal weather conditions, protected day and night from rain, heat and cold, and humidity." But Walt, fully immersed in planning for "the Florida Project," was rarely seen in the Animation Building. Circulating around the studio were maps and plans for Disney World, a far larger and far more ambitious counterpart to California's Disneyland. In Disney World, Walt explained in a new half-hour film, there would be not only a theme park and exhibits, but also an attempt to create an entire model city. Walt called it EPCOT, and he said it would use all the latest scientific methods to create a new way of life, a city free of slums; "We won't let them develop," Walt said. There would be fifty acres of climate-controlled streets for stores and theaters where pedestrians, according to the film, would "enjoy ideal weather conditions, protected day and night from rain, heat and cold, and humidity."

"It's not real life," Mary Jane said. It was November, just a month after her acid trip, and Henry was walking her back to her dorm from lunch. They walked side by side, hands in their pockets, only occasionally b.u.mping against each other with a laugh or a gibe.

"What do you mean?"

"EPCOT. It's this totally pretend world he wants to create. Perfect little kitchens. Perfect little people. Perfect little streets. Just like the World's Fair."

"It's bigger than that," Henry said.

"Which makes it worse," Mary Jane said. "Don't you think it's kind of fascist? 'You will be happy, or else?'?"

"No war," Henry said. "Peace and harmony. Isn't that what you're always for? What's wrong with it?"

"Henry," she said to him witheringly. "Just tell me this. What does EPCOT stand for?"

"You know what EPCOT stands for."

"Say it."

Henry sighed. "It stands for 'Experimental Prototype Community Of Tomorrow.'"

"Right," she said.

"So?"

"So no wonder you like the stupid thing," she said. "It's just one big practice house."

SHE HAD BECOME AN ALMOST fanatically political animal. She claimed to have cared all along-about the rising threat of Vietnam, and the racial divisions of the South. She talked-especially when she was high, which seemed to be almost always now-about the War, the Pigs, the Movement, Che, Dylan, and MLK.