Alligators in the Trees (39 page)

“You know what you need?” Priscilla eyed him suspiciously, fearing he might produce a vial of white stuff. “A little physical activity,” he said, getting up to turn on the radio. “All that food and wine has made you lethargic. You need to dance!” he announced, pulling her to her feet. She fought him off long enough to safely put her glass down, but then he became a force she couldn’t resist.

“I can’t dance,” she protested weakly, but Tobias seemed deaf to her claim. He danced her around like a demented Gene Kelly, humming along with the music when he didn’t know the words. Priscilla did her best to keep up, though the surprise of finding out that the stoic rocker danced like a cotillion all-star had a pronounced effect on her performance.

“Well, if your comeback fails, you can always make a living as a dance instructor at Arthur Murray,” she said, when the song was over. She seized the opportunity to put some distance between Tobias and herself while he searched for a better station.

“Classic Rock,” he announced. A song came on from the seventies that made both of them cringe simultaneously. “Some of this stuff should have been given a proper burial a long time ago,” he said, consulting the programming schedule again.

“Too bad they don’t have a station that plays just
Absent Among Us
,” Priscilla said from her perch on the arm of the sofa.

“Yeah, that’d be a good way to bore everyone right out of their minds,” Tobias said, flipping to a blues station.

“I’d listen to it,” she said.

Tobias threw her a doubting sneer. “You’re just saying that because you’re drunk,” he replied.

“If I am drunk, it’s your fault. If I love your music, that’s your fault, too,” she said, bobbing slightly as she spoke.

“How’s this?”

“Fine,” she replied, thinking she’d be safe from the mad dancer with that kind of music. She soon found out she was wrong.

“I think you could do with more dance and less drink,” Tobias said as he commandeered both glass and body.

“Nobody dances to the blues,” Priscilla said petulantly as he pulled her close and rocked her back and forth with slow, small steps.

“What are you talking about? I bet you more children have been conceived after their parents boogied to blues than all other forms of music combined.” Priscilla thought about this. The implication made her nervous. She had little time to dwell on this statistic due to a sudden change in footwork.

“You’re a regular twinkle toes, aren’t you?” she said, as Tobias increased the dramatics.

“You’d be pretty good yourself if you put more effort into moving your feet and less into moving your jaws,” Tobias said, promptly putting her into a dip before she could respond. The tactic worked; she was too flabbergasted to answer the insult. Tobias spun her out and drew her back for the grand finale. Another song started on its heels, but Priscilla went as limp as a rag doll.

“I’m done,” she said, begging off. “I concede the championship to you,” she said, holding him at arm’s length.

“Oh, come on—we were just getting warmed up,” Tobias said, pantomiming a dance for her entertainment. Priscilla giggled hoarsely and made for the closest sofa, where she collapsed unceremoniously.

“Hey, I’m the old guy here,” Tobias said, standing over her looking down. “Come on, be a sport. One more dance,” he said, tugging on her arm.

“No. I can’t. I’m afraid I’ll get pregnant,” Priscilla said, hiding her face with her free arm.

“You’ve had too much to drink.”

“Whose fault is that?” Tobias wrenched her arm until she was in an upright position. Before she could flop back down on the sofa again, he slid in beside her. When she fell back, her head landed in his lap.

“Hi,” she said, looking up at him.

“Scoot down,” Tobias commanded her. She shimmied down a few inches and Tobias shifted around so that he could cross his legs and rest her head in the crook of his ankles.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to massage your temples.”

“Why?”

“Because it will keep you from getting a hangover,” Tobias said, gently kneading the sides of her head.

“I never heard that before.”

“Shhh…”

“You know this is going to put me right out,” Priscilla warned.

“No, it not. It’s just going to make you feel…very…relaxed…” Tobias whispered, his voice trailing off. Priscilla was besieged by a fit of giggles, which she did her utmost to suppress.

“Stop it,” Tobias said in a low, far-away tone.

“I can’t help it—this is too weird.” She pursed her lips together, trying to think of something that wasn’t remotely funny. It was hard. No matter what image she conjured up, her mind was continually interrupted by the sight of Tobias Jordan sitting cross-legged on a sofa in a swanky hotel suite, rubbing her temples so she wouldn’t be hung over the next morning.

The very thought of such a thing happening made her feel she had finally gone round the bend. A decade plus of living in New York City had been too much for her damaged psyche to deal with and she had lost hold of her last wisp of sanity. None of this was really happening. She had simply imagined all these episodes with Tobias. In reality, she was probably crouched atop a heating vent in front of some department store, huddled with her few measly possession, penniless and panhandling for change to buy a bus ticket to somewhere warm…

“Aaaagghhh!” she screamed, sitting bolt upright.

“What is it?” Tobias yelled back, equally frightened.

“Oh, my God—I’m losing my mind,” Priscilla said. She buried her head in her hands.

“What’s wrong?”

“Where’s my bag?”

“It’s over there on the floor, where you left it.” Priscilla sprung up and fetched the bag, frantically searching until she found her stash of traveler’s checks and cash.

“It’s all here,” she said, amazed by the sight.

“Of course it is. What—you think I lured you here so I could steal back the money I gave you?” Tobias said, clearly offended. Priscilla sank onto the coffee table, holding the bag listlessly in her arms. She stared at Tobias without seeing him. After a few moments, she began to shake.

“Come over here,” Tobias coaxed her. “Come on.” Numbly, she stood and navigated the three feet to the spot she had just vacated. He tugged on her arm until she lowered herself. Without moving her from the crook of his arm, he leaned forward and poured her a glass of mineral water.

“Here, you need some water,” he said, holding the glass to her lips. She took the glass from him and drank, tentatively at first, then guzzling it until it was gone.

“Feel better?” Tobias asked. She looked at him and nodded. “Were you having a dream?” The sight of herself in rags camped out on a public sidewalk flashed again in her mind.

“To be honest, I feel like I’m dreaming now.” Tobias pulled away slightly, grinning. “No, I’m serious. You may have encounters like this all the time where you hook up with someone out of the blue and just do whatever comes to mind. You’re rich, you can do that. You can be generous and hospitable with people who don’t mean anything to you, although I think it’s pretty risky given how phobic you are about your celebrity.” Priscilla met his stare head on.

“I’m being honest. It doesn’t make any sense to me that you—Tobias Jordan, world famous leader of
Absent Among Us
—would take up with a common working girl just out of the blue.”

“It didn’t exactly happen like that,” Tobias said, removing his arm from Priscilla’s back. “We didn’t just collide on the street today…”

“No, but—”

“You gave your lyrics to me. That was a pretty big ice-breaker, don’t you think? I mean, I got a fairly good idea of what kind of person you are by reading through that stuff.” Somehow, being reminded of this didn’t make Priscilla feel any more at ease.

“Just a little while ago you made the comment that you loved my music. Well, there you go. You feel a connection to me, have felt it for a number of years, without me being aware of it. This time the tables were turned—I got to crawl inside your head, take your views for a test drive. See, that makes us even. We’re starting a relationship on equal ground. It’s not as out of the blue as you think. And this is
not
a typical experience for me,” Tobias said, letting his gaze linger on hers.

“I guess we are even,” she said. “I never thought about it like that before. Of course, you willingly put your songs out there…”

“True, but you didn’t have to sell yours to me. You could have tossed them into the incinerator like you planned.” He had her there. “Why did you give me your material?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Priscilla answered. “I think I’ve been in shock since that day. It was like absent-mindedly selling my kids to a stranger because he thought they were cute. I don’t know what I was thinking…”

“Do you want them back?” Tobias asked. “It’s not too late to undo the deal.” Priscilla let out a wheeze, somewhere between a laugh and a sigh.

“I’m afraid I’m sort of dependent on your end of the bargain at this point,” she said.

“That’s okay. You can keep the money. Okay, it’ll be a loan. You pay me back when you get on your feet again.” Priscilla thought about this. She looked over at her duffle bag, too small to contain the sum total of thirty plus years of living. She looked at the heap of notebooks that represented countless hours of thought. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

“That’s very generous of you, but…I think I actually feel freer without them. I probably wasn’t a fit custodian to them, anyway. You’re welcome to keep them, for whatever they’re worth.”

“They’ve been more valuable to me than you can imagine,” Tobias said, pouring some water for himself.

“Really? In what way?”

“They’ve helped me focus my writing skills. A ten-year hiatus can close down your creative conduit. Your words have inspired me.” Priscilla tried to absorb this enormous compliment.

“How do you like being back together with Brody Haversham? Does it feel like the good old days?” she asked.

“Yes, in some ways. We’re bitching and fighting like we never stopped. Some of the music magic is still there, but I don’t know…the whole thing feels too strained to me. I don’t like having to try so hard to do something that should come naturally.”

“Are you still planning on touring?”

“If we can get an album together with any real merit. The stuff we’ve put together so far seems pretty tepid to me. I think Brody would be satisfied with anything that got us back on the charts, which means the more humdrum and commercial, the better.”

“So, you’re having artistic differences?”

“That about sums it up. But don’t you dare breathe a word of this to anyone. Things are bad enough between us as it is,” Tobias warned, turning cold and impersonal.

“Who am I going to tell?” Priscilla asked defensively. The answer to that was obvious once the words left her mouth. “You don’t have to worry. I’m not going to sell my exclusive story to the tabloids. Who’d believe it anyway?”

“You’d be surprised.”

Priscilla decided to steer clear of his career concerns for the time being. “Can I ask you something?”

“Shoot,” Tobias said. He set down his water and poured the last of the wine into his glass.

“If you’re having so many problems with your wife that you’re actually hiding from her, why do you stay married to her? I realize this is none of my business…”

“It’s complicated,” Tobias said, taking a sizable sip of his wine.

“Sometimes people are deathly afraid of divorce, even when their marriage is sheer hell,” Priscilla offered casually.

Tobias laughed harshly. “Have you ever been divorced?” he asked.

“No, never been married,” she replied.

“Well, you sound quite sure of something you’ve had no personal experience with.”

“It’s just an observation.”

“Let me make an observation of my own,” Tobias said, “Due to the fact that you’re—how old?”

“Thirty-two,” Priscilla admitted, hating the idea of where this was heading.

“Okay, you’re thirty-two and you’ve never been married. From what I’ve observed in my fifty-four years is that if a good looking woman like you is not married and not career-obsessed, then she has a phobia of marriage,” Tobias pronounced smugly. Priscilla let out a laugh that was so natural and unrestrained, it made him frown.

“What’s so funny?” he demanded.

“You think I’m afraid of marriage? Are you kidding? I’m scared to death of everything—marriage, divorce, success, relationships of all kinds, death, life…”

“You don’t act like you’re afraid of anything or anyone,” Tobias said, scrutinizing her through narrowed eyes. Priscilla shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t believe you,” he said, watching her closely for signs that she was having him on.

“You don’t believe me? Tell me, then, if you’ve got such keen powers of detection, why would an able-bodied, halfway intelligent, semi good-looking person like me work in a dump like Frank’s, have a string of unfulfilling, contentious relationships with emotional losers, and shun the only decent, successful man to ask me out on a date if I wasn’t scared out of my mind by the thought of actually being involved in something that could work out? Answer me that, oh wise one.”

“But…you act so tough and impervious,” Tobias said, struggling to reconcile his image of her with these very different self-perceptions.

“I act cynical. I am cynical. But you can’t confuse cynicism with bravery. I haven’t had any long-term relationships, none that have lasted more than a few years, not even with my parents. I guess I’ve come to view deep involvements as guaranteed emotional disasters. It’s made me leery of taking any kind of risk,” she said.

“But you were about to pick up and move to Florida. That sounds like a pretty risky thing to do,” Tobias reasoned.

Priscilla snorted. “You know how that whole idea came about? I got sick and tired of lugging my winter coat around.”

“So you wanted to move somewhere warm.”

“That’s about it. How’s that for sound decision making?”

“Were you really going to go through with it?”

“Yeah, and I don’t know that I still won’t. I’ve pretty much run out of options here.”

“Maybe you have options you never knew of before,” Tobias hinted. Priscilla merely smiled at the suggestion. She knew a charitable line when she heard it. “What about us? Does it make you feel anxious and frightened spending time with me like this?”

She shook her head. “No, it doesn’t. You did scare me a bit at first—after you gave me the money, and before, when you showed up at my apartment. But now, no, I feel perfectly comfortable with you, which
should
scare me.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Like I said, I’m not used to things running so smoothly.”

“Here’s to surprising smoothness,” Tobias said, lifting his glass. Priscilla picked up hers and drank to his goofy toast. “You know, if I were thinking straight, I’d get on the train with you.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Why not? I’m virtually in exile in my own town, hiding from everyone I know. When I take a good hard look at it, nothing in my life is going the way I want it to.”

“What about your wife?”

“What about her? If I’m going to be honest, I should admit I’ve only stayed with her so we could drive each other crazy. Other than that, I don’t really have a use for her.”

“Then you might as well divorce her,” Priscilla pointed out.

“No, I kind of like the idea of moving to Florida and keeping her in limbo,” Tobias mused.

“That’s ugly.”

“You don’t know Monique,” he quipped. “No, Florida might just be the answer…”

“What about your reunion?”

“I’m growing colder to the idea by the minute.”

“I thought you needed the money,” Priscilla argued.

“
Monique
needs the money,” Tobias corrected her. “I could learn to make do with less. It’s got to cost a lot less to live there than it does here. I think Florida might just be the ticket.”

“You’re nuts.”

“Why am I nuts for moving there and you’re not?” he asked.

“I didn’t say I’m not nuts,” Priscilla said. “But you have a life here, I don’t.”

“Yeah, but I don’t like my life.”

“That’s bullshit,” Priscilla countered. “You love your life. You love hiding and skulking and drinking champagne in the middle of the day—”

“I can do that in Florida just as easily as here.”

“Okay, you try it and let me know how you like it down there, and maybe I’ll make the trip myself,” Priscilla said.

“Hey, wait a minute—Florida was your idea. I’m not going there without you,” Tobias said.

“Now I know you’re full of bull. All I’ve heard out of you is how bizarre the place is, full of loonies and corruption.”

“I don’t mind a few loonies, and corruption is everywhere.”

“Okay, fine. Let’s head down to Penn Station right now and book our sleeper cars. It’s a long way down there, you know.”

“I don’t mind,” Tobias said cavalierly. “It’ll give me a chance to enjoy the scenery.”

“You’re crazy.”

“So I’ve been told.” Priscilla didn’t have the energy to call his bluff. She was so tired and relaxed, she doubted she’d ever work up enough enthusiasm at this stage of the game to make the haul to Florida. Even Brooklyn seemed too far in her current frame of mind. But if she wasn’t going to go through with that plan, she’d need to come up with another one quickly. Who could say how long the mercurial Tobias Jordan would feel like playing host to her.