“Yes, sister. And I’m free. I can stay out all night on Fridays and drink with my friends after the show tapes. We blow off steam. We laugh. Carry on. I answer to no one.”
“Well, I do. I answer to this company of actors. I listen to the audience, dwindled as it is, as you’ve pointed out. I listen to my gut, and that has failed me. I try and listen to any voices from the other side that might offer some direction, but my mother and father, ostensibly in heaven, are not speaking up, and all I hear is the banging of the pipes that need fixing on the mezzanine floor. We live different lives, Nick, but what I don’t understand is why you came over here to remind me what a failure I am. Again. You must take some glee in that, which makes you sadistic, which means that your success has made you not humble but proud, and turned you into one of those men that likes to tell the rest of us why we’re failures, as if we don’t have the talent you possess, when in fact it’s not about talent at all, it’s about luck. Sheer luck put you where you are. Talent, yes, that’s a factor—when luck appears, you need it. But without the luck, all the talent in the world doesn’t matter.”
“You really believe that?”
“I’m living it! I went to Frank Arrigo. I asked him to buy the place. I made him an offer. And he turned me down. He said he’d wait for the auction. He’d get a better deal that way. What are the chances that the only business in town that wants this building happens to be a man I used to see?”
“An old flame you put out with a fire hose. You shouldn’t have gone over there. That’s my fault.”
“No, it’s mine. I thought he was my friend. But you see, he didn’t get what he wanted from me, so that makes me the enemy. Men have a crazy way of moving through the world. You don’t do things their way, it doesn’t get done. I will never understand it. Ego before progress.”
“He married Peachy. Who knew that bookkeeper was Joan of Arc, and her cause was slaying me to get to Frank Arrigo?”
“Shut up, Nicky. She’s over you, and so am I. I’m down to the last of my money. I asked my sisters to bail me out, and Portia said no—she was done supporting this theater. Helen—you know, she’s pretty smart—she said, ‘Calla, when are you going to stop trying to redeem Dad’s life? When are you going to realize that he never made it because he was chasing a silly dream?’ And I said, ‘Is that what you thought when you watched him from the mezzanine? I thought he was astonishing. I was fascinated when he worked with the actors. When he blocked the play. When weeks later the sets rolled in and the lights came on, and the costumes appeared, and a world was unveiled right before our eyes. There was nothing but a dark space, and suddenly it was filled with life. Who does that? Who can do it? Not an ordinary person but an extraordinary artist! My father! Our father! Perhaps in heaven!’ My sisters thought he was a crackpot. They didn’t appreciate how he searched for meaning and tried to create work that mattered. All they knew is that there was never enough money. Mom never had what she needed. The house was never repaired. We wore hand-me-downs so the actors could have new costumes. We had to work the box office and scrub the restrooms and seat the patrons. We had to get up early in the morning before the sun came up and hang posters throughout South Philly, hoping that they would help sell some tickets.
“All my sisters remember is the worst of it—like when Dad burned the bad reviews. And they looked down on him for getting bad ones in the first place as though it was his fault. And when he got good ones, they weren’t enough. He couldn’t win. He was being judged all the time. How can an artist survive that? Well, we can’t always. We quit.”
“This isn’t really about art, Calla.”
“That was my dad’s life.”
“Yes, it was. But this theater is just another family business. Some people cut lumber, some people make pants, and others drive cabs. Your family made shows.”
“Not anymore. I’m done.”
“What will you do?”
“Maybe I’ll work for the Philly opera company. I can do crew work. Sew costumes.”
“Crew? You’re a director.”
“It didn’t work out.”
“So you’ll just quit?”
“It quit me.”
“I see. The scribes and pharisees of the American theater got together and took a vote and ousted you.”
“None of this is your problem. Thank you for listening to me. I told you some things I haven’t told anyone. I guess I thought no one wanted to hear them. But it seemed like you did.”
Calla looked down at her clipboard. She removed the pencil and began to tap it against the board until the sound drove Nicky to gently take the pencil from her.
“Are you hungry?”
“Do you think that’s why I can’t think straight?”
“Yes I do. You can’t eat cookies and think big thoughts.”
“Too much sugar”—Calla sighed—“brings crazy ideas and a fat fanny.”
“I’m trying to get as thin as I was when I came out of the army. The television camera adds some pounds. But right now I don’t care. Before I go back to the city, why don’t we have a cheesesteak? In honor of our long friendship. What could it hurt? I promise not to be critical of you. Let’s eat. Why not?”
“Why not?” Calla smiled.
“I haven’t seen your teeth in a while. You have a smile.”
“I’m keeping it under wraps until something good happens.”
“Might happen sooner than you think.”
Calla locked up and soon followed Nicky out of the theater. Nicky helped her into the passenger seat of the cab and closed the door behind her, then went around the front of the car. Calla shielded her eyes from the street light as he moved through it. It was just a momentary thing, but he seemed to disappear in the light, and while she heard the click of the driver’s-side door and felt the body of the car rock gently when he sat in the seat, she had a moment of believing Nicky gone, and that made her think.
*
Nicky picked up two cheesesteaks at Sal’s window as Calla cleared a spot on the outdoor table, where he soon joined her with their dinner.
A woman of sixty sitting across from them, her blue-gray hair set in tight curls, was chewing her sandwich when she recognized Nick Carl from the television set. A grin spread across her face like a pat of butter melting over a hot pancake. The soap opera fan reached up and adjusted the small saucer hat on her head, so the button adornment might face out properly. She got up and went to their table.
“I was wondering,” she said, flirting with Nicky.
Calla took a bite of the sandwich and nodded. “Yes, this is Nick Carl from Love of Life.”
“I knew it!” the lady said. “I love you on the show. Will you sign something?”
“He’d love to. He’s not hungry at all,” Calla said through a bite of the sandwich.
Nicky shot Calla a look, then smiled politely at the fan. “Of course.”
The woman fished in her handbag until she found her checkbook. She snapped the fountain pen off the jacket. “Here,” she said excitedly. “Make it out to Ethel. That’s me.”
“A check?”
“No, no, just your autograph.”
Nicky followed her instructions.