Catch My Fall (29 page)

“Yeah? You two all good? He was fucking intolerable the past couple days.”

“He was?” I cringed at the hopeful tone of my voice. He’d been affected. Despite my self-flagellation, my heart leapt at the thought. “Yeah. We’re good. We had a bit of a screaming match this morning, but I think we’re good.”

Evan gave some errands to someone on the other end of the line, and I waited for his attention to return. Suddenly the notion of him having company struck me. “Who was that?”

Evan coughed, as though almost uncomfortable. “That was Louis.”

“Who’s Louis?”

Evan paused. “He’s my assistant.”

I called him out. “Do you have a fucking butler?”

“What? No!”

I could tell by the tone that the answer was, in fact, yes. “Are you fucking kidding me? You have a Mr. Belvedere?”

“No! I have a Louis! He’s different.”

I shook my head, laughing. My mind was suddenly flooded with images of Dudley Moore in Arthur, and placing Evan’s face on his tiny, clumsy body. “My whole world is blown.”

Evan chuckled. “Shut the fuck up, you.”

“Why didn’t you bring him to the party? Does he not travel with you?”

Evan coughed again. “No…” I waited for him to continue. “I have staff on the East Coast.”

“Blown, I tell you!”

“Don’t you fucking judge me, woman!”

“Oh, I’m gonna! Does he actually live with you?”

“No…yes.”

I shook my head. “Evan Lambert has a butler. One who butles.”

“I believe the correct term is a ‘Gentleman’s Gentleman,’ thank you very much.”

I managed to get Evan to admit to a few more regular staff in his household – housekeeper, chef, he even had a clothes shopper, though he assured me they did not live with him.

I mocked him mercilessly the whole time. The truth was, his life sounded beyond blessed, but the notion of naked ass, acid-loving Evan running through his house on mescaline while a man in a vest and tie picked up the clothes trailing behind him made me warm.

Evan expressed a desire to come back home soon and promised to keep me posted when he would be in town. I assured him I would have my assistant make time in my busy schedule to see him and we hung up.

And somehow, I felt better. Evan was like an island. He was this entity that existed outside of the rest of my life, outside of the drama and the anxiety of my relationships, my job hunt, my failures. Talking to him was like time traveling to days before I saw myself fall.

I glanced at the clock and cringed. I’d woken him up at seven in the morning, his time. Still, he hadn’t begrudged me the company. I promised to be considerate of the time difference if the need to call him arose again and headed for the couch. There, I wasted away the day in front of the TV. I never stopped in to see Stellan.

CHAPTER Fourteen

I
could say the month of October barely happened, or perhaps passed with a whimper, but after that morning with Stellan, I hardly interacted with anyone.

By the time Halloween rolled around, I’d seen Stellan maybe twice since that morning he’d camped out on my porch. Yet, somewhere in that span of complete antisocial behavior, I’d managed to clock several hours on the phone with Evan Lambert.

I couldn’t quite express the comfort I felt when he and I spoke. There was solace there, when everything else felt like din. He didn’t know my failures unless I told them to him. He still knew me as the bright, shining, glorious version of myself; the one he’d last spent time with before the night of his Halloween party – before I’d learned to be ambitious, before I learned how to succeed at life, before I’d set myself up for complete and utter disaster.

Sure he knew the sordid details of my downfall, in fact it felt almost nice to retell the story to someone who hadn’t looked on in pity as it all happened.

Evan and I shared that same ingrained memory, that mark that children of troubled parents have. He could understand why the notion of failing, of falling apart seemed like such a sin. Achieve something, and you’re the exception to the rule. Grow up to mediocrity - or less for that matter – and no one will be surprised.

God damn it, I wanted to be a surprise.

Evan often reminded me that I had a long way to go before sucking cock for crack rocks.

I said, “Wait, is that a bad thing?”

Despite the wishes of my inner hermit, Halloween came with a tradition. Every year, Stellan and I sat on my porch handing out candy, and every year we played the Beetlejuice theme, dressed up in matching costumes, and made goofball comments about the little ones’ costumes. Or Stellan made snarky comments about how a nineteen year old in a hole ridden t-shirt should by principal, be required to give
him
candy.

“At least put some effort in. Seriously,” he’d say.

They never agreed and were learning not to come to my house at all.

Stellan raised an eyebrow when he got to the house and found me in jeans and a black cable knit sweater.

“Don’t tell me, let me guess. You’re a nihilist?”

I laughed.

“Jehovah’s witness? Wait, who doesn’t celebrate birthdays?”

I assured him he’d been accurate on the religious reference, but not on my costume. “I couldn’t think of anything.”

He shrugged. “Suppose it’s good I didn’t put my zombie makeup on before I came over then. Would have made your nihilism truly frightening, and we have children coming.”

I stifled a laugh. “Shut up”

I had trouble looking him in the eye as we meandered into the kitchen. He didn’t seem to notice, quickly grabbing the first bag of candy he saw. The pile of bags was bigger than we would need, but given Stellan’s habit of eating a good amount of the candy each year, I always made a point to buy extra.

He seemed his usual self. As far as I could tell, he had no sense of the chasm that had opened between us.

“So I hear you and Evan have been talking.”

Oh, maybe he did.

“Yeah, it’s been nice to catch up with him.”

Stellan stuffed the first Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup into his mouth, offering me one as he did.

I declined. As expected, my stomach had turned to violent churning the moment he’d walked up to the house. I could no more put that Reese’s in my mouth than I could a Mack Truck.

“He seemed pretty chuffed about it.”

I smiled. When I glanced at Stellan, he showed the subtle glow of a man in chocolate and peanut butter heaven. He tossed the bag toward me.

“Run, save yourself.”

I grabbed the bowl from the cupboard over the sink, a tired old mixing bowl my Grandmother used for making pancakes and stuffing at Thanksgiving. We filled it with Reese’s, Snickers, Twix, and Three Musketeers, and made our way out to the porch. Stellan took the chair closer to the stairs, despite not being dressed to terrify. The children would be forced to pass him in pursuit of the bowl of candy. Perhaps his sheer size might give them pause. If not his size, surely his sarcasm would.

Our first visitor was Bethany from across the way. There were a couple younger families on my road, some with kids, some with teenagers. The teenagers brought parties and double-barreled park jobs, but they became rare for one reason – Mr. Hodges did what the rest of the neighborhood was too ‘polite’ to do and called the cops. Parents were informed, privileges were taken away, and parking equilibrium was restored. Now, it was Mr. Hodges’ pride and joy, his eldest great-grandchild, coming up the walk. She was a shy thing, being slowly coaxed toward our steps in her mother’s intricately made princess costume. Her sleeves flowed at her sides and her dark hair was framed in a floral wreath.

Bethany froze at the bottom of the steps, glancing back to her parents who stood smiling and urging her on from the sidewalk. The chair beside me lurched, and Stellan was up, the bowl of candy in his hand. Before Bethany could run, Stellan had slipped down the stairs with unnatural grace for a man his size, knelt beside her on the walk, and held the bowl to her with his head bowed.

“M’lady,” he said.

She seemed to bloom before him, blushing a deep red. She smiled and hid her face behind her plastic pumpkin.

I feel inclined to say I would have responded the same way. When I caught Caroline’s eye, her expression said I wasn’t the only one.

Caroline was a playmate of mine when we were very young. She visited on weekends here and there until her weekends were taken over by going to campgrounds with foam weapons and elaborate dresses, beating the hell out of other similar minded people. She’d met her husband at just such an event – Jason, a long haired fellow who roamed the world dressed like a pirate. Though I rarely saw them now, I liked them both. They seemed to feel the same, given that she invited me to their wedding years earlier, which had been one of the strangest events of my life. Fun, but strange. Stellan and I were two of the only people not dressed like employees of Medieval Times. Mr. Hodges had made a face at me from behind a knight, and I’d been reminded of why my Grandmother liked the man so much – why I liked him so much. He didn’t take anything too seriously.

Except parking, that is.

Bethany took a piece of candy only to be met with the declaration that “M’lady receives no less than three pieces of candy. Per order of the Queen.”

He glanced back at me.

Yep, I was right about that blooming sensation.

I fought not to giggle as I waved magnanimously in their direction.

When Bethany skipped back to her parents, I heard her inform them that Stellan had given her far more than three.

“He’s a keeper!” Caroline called back to me as Stellan returned to the porch.

I waved. “Don’t I know it!”

Shit! Why did I say that?

I glanced at Stellan, who was making love with his eyes to another Reese’s.

Great. Make out with his face? Check. Announce in his company that I think he’s a catch? Check. Declare my unrequited and all-encompassing, misguided affection for him? As good as done.

I inspected him out of the corner of my eye. He didn’t show any signs of discomfort. He did, however, show an unhealthy affection for those Reese’s.

We waited another fifteen minutes, and the flood began. Kids from nearby neighborhoods, kids who came to trick or treat in their grandparents’ neighborhood like Bethany - we were one of those lucky parts of the world where you could actually feel Halloween in the air. Rather than deal with traffic, low house participation, or worse, unsafe neighborhoods, people would carpool in to trick or treat in my neighborhood.

We also give the good candy. Though Davis Court wasn’t one of the most populated roads in town, we were one or two roads over from the best Halloween streets in town, and we received runoff as a result.

Naturally we had a comment for everyone that came along:

Three year old Spiderman –

Me:
“Holy cow! Spiderman!”

Stellan:
“Hey Spidey, could you hop up there real quick and clean out my gutters. Thanks pal.”

Five year old Spiderman with full muscle suit, shortly thereafter -

Stellan:
“Whoa! You’ve been working out since we last saw you?”

Three year old Spiderman with his mask off –

Me:
“No, Spiderman! Your secret identity!”

Half assed seventeen year old Jack Sparrow -

Stellan (in pirate voice):
“Arrgh! You can’t have me booty!”

A truly convincing eight year old Jack Sparrow right afterward -

Stellan:
“Arrgh! You CAN have me booty!”

Spongebob Squarepants -

Me:
“How are you breathing, sir?”

As the evening wore down, and the crowds thinned, a twelve year old boy dressed in full drag walked up the steps in slow motion, sideways, staring us both down to the point of near discomfort until he finally spoke.

His English accented lisp was perfect. “Trick or Treat?”

We both sat, dumbfounded be how fierce this kid was.

Stellan:
“Here. No seriously, take all my candy. You deserve ALL my candy.”

I didn’t disagree.

The boy-girl gave Stellan a stare down with a cat like meow and left as dramatically as he arrived. We were both speechless for a moment, and down to our last bag of candy.

I checked the clock – quarter to nine. We were well past Trick or Treat hours, and the dwindling sounds in the distance gave evidence to it. Stellan and I shared the glory of the drag princess as though we both thought we’d imagined him. Stellan declared the boy his hero.

Further reason to love my Swede.

It was chilly, and the threat of snow was sharp in the air. I headed inside, but noticed as I reached the kitchen that Stellan wasn’t following. I turned to face him, still standing by the open front door.

“Wanna do something?” He asked.

I stared at him blankly. Stellan was the king of ‘sit at home and do nothing’ if the opportunity arose. I shrugged, letting one side of my baggy sweater droop down my shoulder. It was pretty early for us, but given the empty state of my pockets, I naturally faltered. “Like what?”

“I dunno. You hungry?”

Truthfully, yes. I wouldn’t be saying so though, obviously. “I’m alright.”

“Liar. You haven’t had supper. Come on, let’s grab something, go see
What’s Under the Bed
? afterward.”

What’s Under the Bed?
was a hokey horror movie I’d been hoping to see since catching the trailer.

I faltered for a moment. Stellan wanted to see
What’s Under the Bed?

I attempted to argue, but Stellan already knew damn well that I was pocket pulling poor. Confessing that wouldn’t change his course in the slightest. I pursed my lips, but I nodded and slipped into the kitchen to put the last of the candy into a zip-loc bag for Stellan to devour at the movies. In the living room he shifted, the familiar sounds of my car keys jingling as he grabbed them from the table. I stood frozen, almost petrified to spend time with him – time out in the world.

You stupid cow, I thought.

I grabbed my phone and started texting. By the time I reached him I was finished writing and pressed send.