Truth in Advertising (36 page)

No one has noticed my father and me. We turn and walk away.

•   •   •

Martin asks me to walk with him. He's spent the morning on calls, occasionally checking in with Flonz and making sure Jan was happy.

He says, “I'm off. You're back in New York tomorrow, yes?”

“Yes,” I lie.

“I'll see you at the editor. I told Jan she can come by as well. What's in the box?” he asks.

I'm tempted to tell him. “Nothing. Candy. It's a gift. For a friend. Late Christmas gift. Candy and wine. Small bottle. See you in New York.”

•   •   •

After lunch, Ian and Pam oversee the green screen shots. There's little for me to do so I walk outside. The sky is still overcast. It feels like rain. Two PAs sit in matching golf carts watching a movie on one of their iPhones, sharing the headset. I ask if I can use one of the golf carts.

Beyond the soundstages, in the backlot, sits a seemingly real world without human beings. Streets you know, houses you've seen hundreds of times. There's the pond where they filmed the close-up shots of
Jaws
. There's the street where
Leave It to Beaver
lived. There's the
Munsters
house. There's a corner of Greenwich Village and Little Italy.

Up and down each street, the all-American homes, the manicured lawns, the driveways, not a soul, not a car, not a sound. I've stepped out of our soundstage of make-believe and into a neighborhood of make-believe.

I park and get out of the golf cart, walk to the Cleavers' front door, peer inside. It is a shell of a home, pure façade. I shout, “June! I'm home! And I'm not wearing pants!” It comes out louder than I thought it would and I am sure Universal security will arrive any minute.

There was a boy on my street growing up, Bobby Sullivan. We went to grade school together. One day, his older brother, Phil, told us a joke. He said, “What was the first dirty joke ever on television?” We had no idea, boys of eight, nine, ten years old. Phil said, “‘Ward, you were awfully rough on The Beaver last night.'” Phil laughed. We laughed. We had no idea what he was talking about.

I sit down on the steps and call Phoebe, desperate for her to answer but surprised when she does.

I say, “Guess where I am.”

“I don't know.” Her voice is different. Flatter, trying, polite. She means,
I don't care
.

“
Leave It to Beaver
's house.”

“Tell the Cleavers I said hello. How's the shoot going?”

“Okay. I hear you have some news.”

“Yeah. I was going to call you.”

“You got my messages?”

“I did. Yes. Thank you.”

Silence.

I say, “So what are you going to do?”

“I'm not sure. I was thinking about maybe going back to school. Photography.”

“That'd be great.”

“Or maybe teaching,” she says.

“You have no plan, do you?”

“Not a clue.” She forces a small laugh. “I just know I don't see myself in advertising.”

“I can understand that.”

Phoebe says, “Why is that? Why are there so few people who seem to enjoy working in advertising?”

“I don't know. But it seems to be that way.”

More silence.

I say, “What are you up to today?”

“Going to see a movie.”

“What movie?”

“
Grey Gardens.
”

“Fun. Is that the one with Steven Seagal?”

“Yeah.” She fakes a laugh. “I actually should head out soon.”

“Oh. Okay. Well, I won't keep you.”

My breathing comes in short, uncomfortable breaths. It begins to rain very lightly and I slide back, against the front door, under an eave.

She says, “The Frenchman asked me to marry him.”

Dolly zoom. Vertigo. Hand to forehead involuntarily. Panic.

Why wasn't there an episode where June Cleaver left the house to go to the market for milk and turned and looked at The Beav for an unusually long time and then got in her car and drove into a tree?
That
would have made for interesting TV.

I say, “Are you going to . . . what are you going . . .” I'm unable to form a full sentence.

Everything slows down. The sound goes away. I watch myself.
Look at him
, I think.
Look at Fin
. I do a quick flashback of his life, watch from overhead as he wanders through the maze, making wrong turns, wanting to turn back, sitting down, unable to go forward. Running in circles. I want to help him. From high up I can see it all so clearly. I want to steer him in the right direction. But I know he won't listen. He doesn't have the courage to listen. He just wants to keep moving. If he keeps moving he's safe.

“No,” she says.

I'm not sure how much time passes. And maybe it's all my imagination, my particular narrative and view of the world. But in that “no” I hear the greatest hope I've heard in a long time.

I say, “It's raining here.”

“It's snowing here. And windy. It's snowing up outside my window.”

“I'm sorry.”

“It's okay.”

“It's not. It's really not,” I say. And then I say, without knowing I was going to, “I saw her.”

“Saw who?”

I'm reaching the point in life where a door is about to close.

“I saw her. I mean, I was there. My mother. I saw her . . . It's not an excuse. I'm just. I'm so sorry.”

“What?”

The slow-motion film again. Long stretches in my life where it didn't run. Then stretches where it ran all the time. And always I found a distance from it. The boy. The boy on the bike. I wrote a spot just like it once. Except it's a girl and her father. Very clever change, I thought. It was for tampons and I had it as a flashback at the now grown girl's wedding and it was complicated. In fact, it made no sense. The creative director said, “What does this have to do with tampons?”

I've never told anyone before. But now it tumbles out. I tell her the whole story. I tell it as if it happened to someone else. I tell it like a narrator, like I have always told it to myself.

“Fin.” Her voice low, intense, so pained.

I say, “That's how I got the scar.”

It's colder now, the rain steadier. How lovely it would be to walk into the Cleaver home right now, their clean, warm, loving home. June would have something in the oven, cookies or a cake, a roast for dinner. The boys would be doing their homework, reading a comic book. Maybe The Beav would be up to his usual wacky shenanigans; glueing the cat to the chimney, masturbating outside the window of a female neighbor, attaching a scope to a high-powered rifle and lying in wait for Eddie Haskell. Crazy kids.

I say, “I'm just so sorry. I'm not sure . . . I mean, I'm not sure you understand how much you mean to me.”

“Then tell me.”

•   •   •

Flonz turns to his first AD and says, “Call it.” The first AD says, “That's a wrap. Thank you, everyone.” It's a thing that happens at the end of every shoot. Everyone applauds.

Within thirty minutes the energy of the shoot has dissipated. Pizza and beer arrive for the crew, but they're eager to break the set down and go home. Flonz hugs everyone and tells Ian he's wasting his time as an art director and gives him his cell phone number. Everyone
hugs everyone else. Flonz's entourage whisks him away, the clients hop into a waiting van and head to the airport to catch the red-eye. Ian and Pam will do the same. But not before stopping for dinner at Chez Jay in Santa Monica. The plan is to meet at the editor in New York tomorrow.

“It was genius on paper,” I say to Ian.

He smiles and hugs me.

“You good?” he asks.

“I'm good.”

“Call me.”

Keita and I watch as the world that we created is quickly and easily dismantled and put away. Outside, the skies are clearer. Wispy clouds move fast in the high winds.

•   •   •

Keita and I walk back to the hotel from dinner, an overpriced Italian place on Robertson. He'd asked at dinner when I was going and I told him I was on a morning flight to Honolulu. He asked how I was going to do it and I told him I hadn't thought that far ahead, that I'd probably just rent a boat. He smiled, as he almost always does, and changed the subject.

We walk through the driveway to the hotel. Instead of walking in, Keita walks over to the life-size statue of Marilyn Monroe, frozen in her famous skirt-billowing moment from
The Seven Year Itch
. A vintage Aston Martin, a Porsche, and the cleanest Range Rover in the world are waiting for their owners.

Keita says, “Would you take her life and fame for being dead at thirty-seven?”

“No. I like being no one. Plus I wouldn't date a Kennedy.”

“Can I ask you one question?”

“Sure.”

“Why are you doing it?”

He's looking at the fake grill that Marilyn is standing on and I'm looking at Marilyn's breasts.

I say, “Because the others won't.”

He looks at me and says, “I do not think that's true. I think you go because it makes you feel better than them.”

I say nothing. But he knows he's right.

He says, “I hope you are not offended.”

“No. I'm not offended.”

“I think maybe it is not enough, your reason.”

“So why should I go?” I ask.

“Because he is your father. Because this is what we do as sons. Even when they hurt us and ruin us.”

Shame and embarrassment wash over me. Such an obvious thing. I know nothing.

I say, “Yes.”

Keita smiles.

A man and woman walk out of the hotel to the Aston Martin. Both are on their cell phones, the man wearing a headset. He points to Keita, then points to the door of his car. My adrenaline goes nuclear and I'm on the verge of telling him to go fuck himself when Keita opens the car door as the man slides in. Keita closes the door and the man hands Keita a five-dollar bill.

The man says, “Save up. Maybe someday you'll be able to afford one.” He winks and drives off.

The calm smile still there, Keita says, “Our family actually has two.”

In the lobby we shake hands and Keita bows deeply. We agree to keep in touch. He looks like he wants to say something but then turns and gets in the elevator.

•   •   •

I'm in bed, having foregone brushing my teeth or doing anything with my clothes except stepping out of them. I'm so tired I can't sleep. The fan clicks on and off in an attempt to keep the room at a constant temperature.

The little voice is Katie Couric. No. It's Joan Rivers. No, wait. It's Barbara Walters.

The voice says, “You thought it would be different by now.”

I say, “Yes.”

She says, “You thought things would be clearer at this point in your life. But you're just more confused.”

I say, “Yes.”

She says, “You thought with age would come a sense of security, of knowledge about how life works. But you still don't know anything. You haven't figured anything out yet.”

“No.”

She says, “You don't know what you want.”

“No.”

“You live in New York City and yet you almost never go to museums or theater, to hear music. You might as well live in Houston. Do you find that very sad?”

“I find your blouse sad.”

“Are you a happy person?”

“Yes.”

“What makes you happy?”

“My work.”

“Is that a true statement?”

“No.”

“Why don't you quit, find another job?”

“I can't.”

“You can't or you won't? Are you afraid?

“I choose not to. And no, not out of fear.”

“Are you afraid?”

“No.”

“Are you afraid of what might happen if you quit?”

“Who wouldn't be?”

“A courageous person.”

“I'm not afraid.”

“What would happen if you quit?”

“I don't know. I'm not very good at a lot of things.”

“Well, at least we know that's true.”

“There's no reason to turn to the camera and wink.”

“Are you happy?”

“You asked me that already. Yes. I'm happy. I'm very happy.”

“Are you happy?”

“You
asked
me that already.”

“But you didn't answer me. You lied. What makes you happy?”

“My friends.”

“Who? What friends? You don't really have friends. You have acquaintances. You don't let people in.”

“I have almost two hundred friends on Facebook. How many do you have?”

“Over three thousand. Are you happy?”

“Stop!”

“You had plans when you first moved to New York, didn't you? You were going to try new things. You wrote that the first New Year's Eve you were here, didn't you?”

“Don't read my journal.”

“You've written it every year since, haven't you?
‘Try new things. Be fearless. Take a class in something. Change careers.'
You wrote those words. You've written those words every New Year's Eve for seven years. And yet you've done none of it. Why?”

“I don't know. Time slips away.”

“Do you have regrets?”

“Not using Brian Williams for this dialogue.”

“Are you a happy person?”

“I'm begging you. Please leave me alone.”

“You name me Barbara Walters.”

“Yes.”

“You name me Oprah or Terry Gross.”

Yes.”

“You give me names and let me savage you.”

“Yes.”

“And yet you know who I really am.”

“Yes.”

“So answer me. Are you a happy person?”

“No.”