Youth in Revolt: The Journals of Nick Twisp (58 page)

“No offense taken.”

“I mean, especially since we’re suing his ass for so much money. I hope, Nick, our cleaning out your dad won’t affect your finances for college.”

“That’s OK, Frank. Dad wasn’t saving a cent for my college education anyway. He prefers to spend his money on bimbos.”

“You talking about my mother?” demanded Fuzzy, offended.

“No, Frank. I meant his previous underage girlfriends like Lacey. Your mother is a very fine person.”

“Well, I don’t know if I’d go that far,” he replied.

The needle, I noticed, had become lodged in a groove on the record. Fortunately, with sitar music it was difficult to tell the difference.

“Well, Frank, I better go. These international calls cost 200 rupees a minute.”

“Boy, Merle must be loaded to let you make such expensive calls.”

“She’s very generous, Frank. With everything.”

“I hope that means what I think it means, Nick.”

“I can say no more, Frank. Well, see you. I’ll keep in touch.”

François is furious. He wants to recruit a skinhead to deal with Vijay. He believes the cops will view the assault as another case of random, unprovoked immigrant bashing.

But where do you find a skinhead? And do any of them offer budget rates?

FRIDAY, November 28
— Joanie’s condo is getting crowded. Dr. Philip Dindy showed up at 1:30 this morning with two suitcases, his squash racquet, and an extremely attractive Power PC laptop—the first I’d ever seen outside of a magazine.

“Who are you?” he demanded, after I crawled sleepily out of Joanie’s bed and let him in.

“I’m Frank Dillinger,” I yawned. “A friend of Joanie’s. An old family friend.”

Philip studied me suspiciously through his thick glasses. I was clad only in my thrift-shop underwear. “Joanie never mentioned a friend named Frank.”

He was, as Miss Ulansky would say, dreadfully short, practically a midget. He had wild red hair, freckles, a prominent nose, no chin, and a paunch. Not exactly the overeducated stud I had been anticipating.

“Well, Joanie
did
mention you to me,” I replied. “But she didn’t say anything about expecting you tonight.”

“I, I’ve had to move on short notice,” he said, still suspicious. “Where’s Joanie?”

“She’s off attending flights,” I replied. “She won’t be back until tonight.”

Philip gave the living room a quick, shifty-eyed scan. “Are you staying in Kimberly’s room?” he asked.

“No, I’m borrowing Joanie’s bed,” I said. “Feel free to camp out on the carpet here if you like. It’s nice and soft.”

Philip had other ideas. Obstinately asserting his territorial rights, he barged into Joanie’s bedroom, bouncing me back onto the Couch from Hell.

“You’ll regret this, Dr. Dimby,” I said, making up my torturous bed. “I know for a fact Joanie will be furious.”

“It’s Dindy,” he said. “With two ‘d’s and one ‘n.’”

“It’s the middle of the night,” I snapped. “I am not interested in a spelling bee at this hour. Good night!”

“Up yours,” he said, slamming and locking the bedroom door.

Boy, Joanie can sure pick them, I thought, settling into my bed of horrors. Nice expensive new chest implants and all she can attract is the Creature from the Atomic Accelerator.

10:30
A.M
. Philip was a little friendlier this morning. He wanted something.

“Uh, what did you say your name was?” he asked.

“Frank Dillinger.”

“Uh, Frank, do you know if Joanie has a spare door key around?”

“No, Dr. Dimby, I don’t believe she does,” I answered coldly, pretending to scan the job ads in the
Los Angeles Times
.

“Uh, Frank, will you be here this afternoon, say around four, to let me back in?”

“I don’t think so,” I replied. “I don’t think I should have let you in in the first place. Joanie told me explicitly she never wanted to see you again.”

“Joanie will want to see me now,” he said confidently. “I’ve left my wife.”

“How fortunate for her,” said François. “Your wife, I mean.”

11:45 A.M. After the runty physicist departed for his lab, I sent François
into Joanie’s room to snoop through his stuff. His bags appeared to have been packed in considerable haste. Among the tumult of preppy knit shirts (size small), chino slacks, argyle socks (some with holes), and Kevin Clein bikini briefs (ditto), I found a checkbook (balance of $273.12), a framed photo of a chihuahua-like woman surrounded by three befreckled children (the Dindy clan?), crumpled reprints of a dozen boring monographs on particle physics by you know who, and a box of Trojans.

“Looks like Dr. Dimby intends to lock the barn after the bun is in the oven,” observed François, mixing his metaphors.

Next François turned his attention to the gleaming, state-of-the-art laptop. He switched it on and watched in awe as the powerful CPU hurtled through its self-test.

“I wonder how big the hard drive is?” said François, calling up its directory. “Holy shit, 785 megabytes! And nearly full of programs.”

François typed “Format C.”

“Uh, François,” I said nervously. “Do you really want to do that?”

“Did you enjoy sleeping on the couch last night?” he asked. François hit several keys, and the hard disk began to spin, industriously performing a form of electronic housecleaning. After ten minutes, the whirling stopped.

Joanie’s apartment may be crowded, but Dr. Dimby’s hard disk is as desolate as François’s conscience.

3:45
P.M
. Today’s movie was
My Man Godfrey
, a 1936 comedy starring William Powell, Carole Lombard, and Bertha Ulansky as a jaded parasitic socialite. I’d seen it before, but enjoyed watching it again on Miss Ulansky’s giant screen. This time I watched carefully and noted that in several scenes suave Boston-Brahmin-in-disguise William Powell was shown full length against common objects of a known size. No way that great star was a midget.

“He may be of average height, possibly less,” conceded Miss Ulansky, “but he wears a toupee. The man is as bald as a monkey’s butt.”

7:30 P.M. The dingy Dr. Dindy returned right on time this afternoon, but unfortunately Kimberly was here to let him in. Cutting me dead, he changed into one of his innumerable polo shirts and called his wife for some aerobic telephone shouting. I predict their divorce will be ugly in the extreme. Like many men of science, Philip is obsessively rational about all matters except his private life. Only within this sphere can he let down his hair to revel in primitive emotions, unprincipled manipulativeness, and unrestrained vindictiveness.

Just as he slammed down the phone (I could hear his wife’s violent sobs), Joanie arrived home from her stratospheric hostessing.

“Philip!” she shrieked.

“Joanie darling,” he said, smiling lovingly, “I’ve left Caitlin.”

“Oh, Philip!” she exclaimed, falling into his freckled arms.

They embraced, kissed, and groped each other. Embarrassed, I pretended to read my book
(Superstar Los Angeles on a Depression Budget)
.

The groping grew more flagrant. I wondered if silicone was formulated to withstand that sort of handling.

“Uh, Philip honey,” whispered Joanie, “maybe we should go into the bedroom.”

Still joined passionately, they moved as one toward the sanctuary of the bedroom.

Joanie paused. “Philip honey, have you met my brother Nick?”

“He’s your brother?” asked Philip. “He told me his name was Frank Dillinger.”

“Nickie Twisp,” called Joanie, drunk with happiness. “Why did you tell Phillie your name was Frankie Dillinger?”

“I forget,” I replied.

“Is he staying here long?” demanded the lipstick-smeared swain.

“Oh, no,” replied Joanie. “He’s going soon!”

“We must have our privacy,” he insisted.

“We will, honey,” she said, as they disappeared into the bedroom.

“Call 911,” suggested François. “Tell them a short rapist with freckles is attacking your sister.”

I thought about it, then remembered. I can’t call the cops. I’m a fugitive from justice!

SATURDAY, November 29
— This morning Joanie telephoned out and had bagels and lox delivered (she paid). Everyone gathered around the table for a celebratory feast—the two roommates, both boyfriends, and me. Nearly everyone looked well rested and sexually fulfilled.

“I never thought you’d leave your wife,” observed Kimberly, biting into her third bagel.

“I had a little help,” confessed Philip. “I think one of my Pakistani grad students told her about Joan.”

“I’m glad he did,” declared Joanie happily.

“Me too,” said Philip, draping a freckled paw over her shoulder. “But it was still none of his business. Next spring the guy comes before me for his orals. I can’t wait. I’m going to tandoori his skinny brown ass.”

“That doesn’t sound very ethical,” commented François. “To ruin a man professionally because of a personal vendetta.”

“What’s it to you?” demanded Philip, glaring at me over his lox-laden bagel. “What business is it of yours, kid?”

“Ethics are everyone’s concern,” replied François with conviction. “Or should be.”

10:45 A.M. Joanie made us all talk in hushed tones and walk around on tiptoes after Philip retired to the bedroom to work on his “important new book.” Five minutes later, we were startled by a bloodcurdling scream. Moments later, Philip—looking more than usually deranged—burst through the doorway.

“It’s gone!” he gasped. “My entire manuscript! Three years’ work totally evaporated!”

That will teach the twit to backup his files. As a scientist, he should know the infallibility of technology is a cruel myth.

4:30 P.M. Before today’s movie
(The Long, Long Trailer
, starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, and Bertha Ulansky as a gregarious trailer court resident), François asked our hostess if she would like to have a live-in caretaker companion.

“You mean you, Frank?” she asked doubtfully.

“Well, yes,” I replied. “I could get you videos whenever you want. And I’m a pretty fair cook. You could cancel your Meals on Wheels.”

“But, Frank,” she replied, blushing under her rouge, “you’re a man.”

“So?”

“Well, whatever would people think?” she asked, her penciled eyebrows arching far into her wrinkled forehead.

“But I’m only 14,” I said. “You’re much, much… more mature.”

“Frank, I’m afraid you’ve been watching too many of those filthy new movies,” she said, pressing the play button on her remote. “I do not share the industry’s present obsession with sex. This picture we made at Metro in 1954. I suggest you study it well. You’ll see Lucy and Desi don’t spend a single night together in the trailer until they are married.”

François had one more ace up his sleeve. “Miss Ulansky,” he suddenly blurted out, “will you marry me?”

“Why, Frank, this is so unexpected,” she replied, smiling coquettishly as she pressed the pause button. “I shall, of course, have to think about it.”

“Please do,” he said.

“This is the sixth proposal of marriage I have received,” she observed pensively. “There were four young men before my husband Tom. I feel you should know that, Frank.”

“I appreciate your candor, Miss Ulansky.”

“Not to imply, of course,” she added, “that there was ever any hint of promiscuity on my part. I was quite innocent when I married.”

“I could never believe otherwise,” François answered. “I feel you should know, Miss Ulansky, that this is my second proposal of marriage.”

“The first young woman declined?”

“Yes, she wanted to finish high school.”

“The course of love is never easy,” Miss Ulansky observed. “Or so 10,000 screenwriters would have us believe.”

7:35
P.M
. When I returned, Kimberly was microwaving dinner for Mario; Joanie and Dr. Dinge were cuddling on the couch with take-out Chinese food.

“Oh, Nick,” said Kimberly, “before I forget, I’ve got something for you.”

I prayed it required turning out all the lights and removing her USC sweatshirt. As usual, my prayers went unanswered. Kimberly wiped her hands on a towel, dug into her skintight jeans, and handed me three one-dollar bills.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It’s a refund,” she explained. “I got a better offer on the couch.”

“Like what?” I asked, shocked.

“One hundred dollars!” she beamed. “From Philip. He’s renting it for a month.”

I turned to face the chinless chow mein-gobbling runt. “What do you want it for?” I demanded.

“I forget,” he replied, smiling innocently. “But you can camp out on the carpet, Frank. It’s nice and soft.”

It was all I could do to keep François restrained.

MONDAY, November 30
— 9:55
A.M
. I am now batting zero-for-two in marriage proposals. After a restless night, Miss Ulansky turned me down. She said that try as she might, she could not excuse the fact that I did not have wavy hair.

“Call me superficial, Frank,” she said. “I don’t know why it is, but I never could warm up to men with straight hair. My husband Tom had the loveliest wavy brown hair. Until he went bald, of course.”

“I could have my hair curled,” suggested François.

“Sorry, Frank. It wouldn’t be the same. I’d know, you see.”

“I understand, Miss Ulansky,” I said. “Well, thanks anyway.”

“Thank you, Frank,” she replied, patting my hand. “I want you to know I’m extremely flattered that you asked.”

10:45
A.M
. Securing the number from long-distance information, I called
Redwood High School in Ukiah and asked to speak with ninth-grader Frank DeFalco.

“It’s an emergency,” I told the suspicious secretary. “There’s been a plane crash.”

After several interminable minutes, Fuzzy, sounding scared, came on the line.

“Nick! What happened? Did Merle’s plane crash?”

“No. Listen, Frank, the monsoon was bad. Our penthouse was wrecked. Cholera is breaking out all over. I’m thinking of coming back.”

“You can’t come back, Nick. I just heard the FBI is looking for you now.”

“Frank, I’m coming back. Can you hide me out in your room over the garage?”