“Ollie! Come quick!”
That’s when we realize that Mom isn’t calling just because she can’t figure out how to work the DVR.
Dad and I run up the stairs to our apartment, and Mom is in the living room, standing in front of the television with her arms crossed tight over her bedtime shirt. She clicks the remote and the volume gets louder. It looks like the news and I hate the news because there’s always a sad story about people crashing their cars or getting diseases or breaking their backs while skiing and the next day it’s some new story and you never hear about the first people ever again. I’m the only one who wonders what happened to those twins who were stuck together when they were born and got pulled apart. Are they okay now? And what about that rich guy who invented his own spaceship? Did he ever make it into space?
I usually try to walk out of the room if the news is on but the other night I was very interested because they were talking about a man who broke into SeaWorld in Orlando and he stole a walrus. He let the walrus swim into the ocean and then he tried to go back to get more animals but the police arrested him. Of course, the lady giving the news never mentioned the walrus again after that first night but I found a website where you can see where the walrus is swimming because SeaWorld stuck a sensor in his blubber.
Now the news lady is saying, “Gavin Winters plays Officer Beau Kendricks on the crime drama The Long Arm, whose second season, coincidentally, premieres tomorrow night.” Dad looks at Mom, and Mom looks at Dad, and I look at the television screen.
I’ve never met Gavin Winters, but I know him. I know him as my parents’ friend from college and also Dad’s old bandmate and also an actor on TV and also the boyfriend of Sydney, who used to come over to our house. But the way I’m seeing him right now doesn’t fit with any of those things. Tonight, on television, he looks like a man in his underwear standing very still in front of a giant fire.
4
A bird sings a lilting melody, serene and eternal. With my eyes closed, half asleep, I’m briefly fooled as to where I am. Maybe everything is okay. Maybe it was all a dream.
I awake, officially, and realize I’m facedown on a naked mattress in my ransacked bedroom, the sun bursting in. Waking up is harsh on most days. Today it’s especially cruel.
I take a moment to recalibrate. The bird outside my window is still singing. Sydney is still gone. I’m still here. Our house is in a shambles and that’s my fault. My head is in a shambles and that’s also my fault; the firemen quelled the fire but had no dominion over my thirst for cocktails.
It’s more bad news in the living room. The room is a shock and so is what’s happening outside my front window. There are three vans parked at the end of my driveway. On the sidewalk a half dozen people train long lenses directly at me. They wouldn’t have such a clear view into my home if the curtains were drawn. Unfortunately, the curtains can’t be drawn. I torched them.
I grab some towels to drape over the glass and take a seat on the couch, the only place left to sit in the living room, not counting the floor. The change in décor is drastic, to say the least. But somehow it feels appropriate; Syd always wanted us to declutter.
At some point my phone rings. I can’t say how long I’ve been sitting here pondering the mess; long enough to be startled by the sudden interruption of sound.
It’s a friend calling and I’m not sure I should answer. I pull the towel aside and take another peek at the media stakeout along my property line. Feeling outnumbered, I answer the phone: “Paige.”
“You’re alive,” she says.
“Unfortunately.”
The line goes silent. Maybe my joke was too macabre. My sense of funny has gone to shit.
“Listen,” Paige says, “you know I love seeing you on TV, but I prefer that it not be on the nightly news.”
She tells me my neighbor captured my impromptu bonfire from his window. Apparently he was more committed to getting the shot than saving me from peril. I’d like to say this behavior is strictly an L.A. thing, but the filmmaking bug is now a pandemic.
The footage may exist, but the night still feels unreal. Ditto the night before and the one before that. The days since I lost Syd have been less of an adjustment. I’ve always had stretches without work or auditions, times where I’m still in pajamas until late afternoon. But at night and on weekends, Syd and I were together. Now those are the parts of the week I dread most.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
It’s the single most popular question posed to me in the past few weeks. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“Are you sure? What about the house?”
“It smells like an ashtray, but it’s still standing.”
Turns out Ping-Pong balls are highly flammable. Who knew? Only the porch roof took a hit. The trucks arrived before the fire had a chance to spread inside.
“What happened?” Paige says.
“I don’t know.”
“It looked like you were burning furniture.”
“Just a few items.”
“Gavin…”
She doesn’t say more. What can she say? What can I say? Whatever revelry or relief I felt last night was stamped out long before the flames were. By the time I heard the sirens, I had regained enough clarity to search frantically for the fire extinguisher I assumed we had but couldn’t recall ever seeing. I was already asking myself over and over: What have I done? What the fuck have I done?
Whatever I did, I accomplished nothing. I dragged everything outside but still couldn’t empty the place. My phantom love lives on.
“Where are you right now?” Paige asks.
“Home.”
“I don’t think you should stay there.”
“Where would I go?”
“Can’t you crash with someone for a while?”
There’s nowhere to run. I realize, now, that this phantom love of mine isn’t a separate entity. He’s more like a limb after all. He’s part of me.
“You could come here,” Paige says.
“New Jersey?”
“Yeah, New Jersey. What’s wrong with that? When’s the last time you visited?”
I was born there, raised there, spent two-thirds of my life there. But since leaving, I’ve been back only once and that was many years ago.
“Maybe you just need to get out of L.A. for a while. You’re done filming, right? You should take a trip.”
“Maybe I’ll climb Everest.”
“I’m serious. We have a whole separate apartment downstairs. You can come and go as you please.”
“Thanks, Paige. I appreciate it.”
“Don’t blow me off.”
“I’m not.”
“We miss you, Ollie and I both. We should’ve checked in on you sooner.”
She and her husband flew out for the funeral last month. Before that, I hadn’t seen my old college friends in years.
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “I appreciate you calling.”