Ryan White - My Own Story (28 page)

I’d gone to black-tie parties before, but not to a high school prom. I definitely did not want to miss this one. Next year I might be in the hospital for mine! I was a sophomore now, but since I was older, most of my good friends were juniors and seniors. Sophomores couldn’t go to the prom unless upperclassmen invited them. Heather was a sophomore too, and she was going with a junior. Dee was a senior.

I would have liked to have been going to my own prom, with someone I felt romantic about. Dee would have liked to go with John, but now he’d moved on down the line. Still, Dee and I had each other and lots of kids go to the prom with a good friend.

So I started lobbying. I think I must have said, “Let’s go to the prom! Let’s go to the prom!” every five minutes the whole month of April.

At first, Dee didn’t get it. She thought for sure I was joking. “Are you serious?” she said at last.

“Yeah, I really am!” I exclaimed. “You know we both want to go. I can’t ask
you,
but you can ask
me.”

So we made it mutual. We were both really happy to be going with someone we knew well. I called Dee to find out what color dress she was wearing.

“Pink,” she said. “My favorite color.”

Well, it’s not mine. I’ve never cared for pastels. I like strong colors, like black and white and red. They’re cooler somehow. And I like the way red glows.

But I went out and bought myself a pink bow tie and a pink cummerbund. Dee had mentioned that her dress had spaghetti straps, so there was no place to pin flowers on it. “I hate those things you pin on, anyway,” she said. So I got her a wrist corsage of pink carnations, and another carnation for my tuxedo lapel.

The day of the prom finally arrived. It was overcast and a little chilly, but Dee and I hardly noticed. I have to say we looked pretty great—so well coordinated. Mom took a bunch of pictures of us with the lake in the background, and then we met some friends who drove us to Indianapolis. The prom was going to be in a big club there.

The club had several levels, and the prom was on the top. When we walked in, we had our picture taken together right away for our souvenir. The photographer had us stand against a glamorous-looking backdrop, kind of like the New York skyline at night, with towers and skyscrapers and bright lights in the windows.

Then we walked into the prom. The club was roomy, but Dee’s class was the largest ever to graduate from Hamilton Heights. So the room was packed. There was a band on stage at one end, and tables of food along the walls. As far as I was concerned, there wasn’t nearly enough food—just stuff like piles of fancy fruit and miniature meatballs. I’m not the world’s best dancer, but Dee and I danced one fast number and one slow—just to be out there on the floor. Mostly we hung out and made each other laugh and fooled around with our friends. A lot of people said to me, “It’s so great that you’re here!” They were glad I’d had a chance to come.

Around midnight we left the prom and went to the afterparty in a bowling alley in Cicero.
There
they had plenty of food, especially pizza. I dived in. We played video games and bowled until nearly four in the morning. I scored pretty well—better than Dee, I have to point out.

When I finally got home, it was almost light and birds had started cheeping away. Everything about the prom had been just about perfect. I’d lived a true chapter of teenage life and I could say it had been really wonderful—almost as great as I’d always hoped. I was happy.

In June Mom, Andrea, Heather, and I were due back in L.A. Athletes and Entertainers for Kids was having a benefit for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was retiring from playing for the Lakers. I was supposed to introduce Kareem. We would make a great photo. Kareem has to be the tallest person in the world—and then there’s me.

Athletes and Entertainers for Kids tribute to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 1989. Left to right: Angie Dickinson, Quincy Jones, Cathy Lee Crosby, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Ryan, Iris Williams, Billy Cystal.

From right to left: Ryan, Nikki Cox, Andrea, and Heather with The Boys at the Athletes and Entertainers for Kids tribute to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 1989.

Ryan on the set of
Cheers.

We called our friends to let them know we were coming. Matt Frewer was going to take us to a hamburger place in Hollywood. Annette Sutera, my old friend from the movie, promised she’d call a friend who was working on
Cheers.
Maybe I could visit the set. And Michael invited us to spend the day with him at his ranch outside of Santa Barbara. We’d be picked up in L.A.

The Kareem tribute turned out to be a big, fancy party with crowds and crowds of celebrities. The whole thing was broadcast, so I had to use a teleprompter to introduce Kareem. It wasn’t hard at all. What he did with Kareem’s Kids was great, I said, because now “kids know that someone important thinks they’re important.”

Kareem loves Indiana because we love basketball. He’s from New York City, but he went to U.C.L.A., and his coach there was John Wooden, a really big name in Hoosier basketball. “So I have wonderful roots,” Kareem told me. “New York City and Indiana!”

When I was actually standing beside Kareem, all of a sudden I thought, Wow! Maybe it’s as tough to be seven foot two as it is to be only five feet. Turns out that when he first started growing, his mother told him to stand tall and be proud. Kareem’s mom told him the same thing mine did: “Don’t let anyone intimidate you.”

At the tribute I met Billy Crystal, one of my favorite comedians—after Matt Frewer, of course. I’d seen Billy so many times on
Saturday Night Live
, I felt like I was in the middle of one of their routines when I talked to him. I met my namesake, Ryan O’Neal. He was there with Farrah Fawcett. It’s hard to get more Hollywood than that. The next day we went to see a Hollywood landmark—the stars’ handprints and footprints in the cement on the sidewalk in front of Mann’s Chinese Theater. Mom took a photo of Jeanne Crain’s handprints.

“Wait ’til I show Grandma!” she said.

Athletes and Entertainers for Kids also asked me to help some teenage TV stars open a new ride at Disneyland called Splash Mountain. Now it’s the most popular thing there. It’s a little like a roller coaster. You ride along a track inside a fake mountain through swamps and bayous—and all of a sudden you whoosh over a waterfall at forty miles an hour! The first time, you aren’t prepared for what’s coming, and it just takes your breath away. You can’t see the bottom when you go over the falls. There’s too much fog and water spray in the way. Well, we took turns going down the flume and getting a little damp. In the pictures we look like we belong at the beach. I had had the good taste to wear a T-shirt that said, “Life’s a beach.”

Michael Fishman and Ryan at the opening of Splash Mountain at Disneyland, 1989.

While we were at Disneyland, we checked out the 3-D movie of Michael as Captain EO, which I had already seen before. I planned to talk to him about it.

On the day we were going to spend with Michael, a limo picked up Mom, Andrea, Heather, and me very early at our hotel. After we climbed in, we were told that we couldn’t take any cameras with us because we weren’t allowed to take pictures. About three hours later, about ten in the morning, we drove up to the entrance of Neverland, Michael’s ranch. We had to stop and let the security guards check us out again. They escorted us to the main house. Michael was busy, we were told; he’d be there in about a half hour.

So we had some sodas and Heather, Andrea, and I found a game room. The girls started on the video games. I climbed into an airplane that rocked around just as if it were really flying. All of a sudden, I caught a glimpse of Michael, playing along with the girls. I kept trying to look around at him and say hello, but I was trapped! I couldn’t figure out how to stop the plane. No one else could either, so finally Michael had to stop laughing and unplug it!

Michael was wearing black pants and a red and black jacket and a black hat. He always wears my favorite colors. He showed us around the main house. Just like me, his dream is to have kids, so the house had a bedroom for a little boy and one for a little girl, plus a playroom with all kinds of toys and arts and crafts—even a miniature merry-go-round. Just like me, he collects things, especially dolls that are about three feet tall and look very lifelike. Mom loved them.

Besides the main house, the ranch has a pool, four bungalows for guests, and an old-time movie theater, with a popcorn machine and candy and a soda fountain. You use golf carts to get from one building to another, and to see the animals that are outdoors. There’s Michael’s giraffe, and cows that graze on his land but really belong to other ranchers.

At lunch—chicken, corn on the cob, and pumpkin pie—we met Michael’s monkeys. His famous one, Bubbles, wasn’t there, but the others made up for him. They all wore diapers and T-shirts in different colors. They have their own baby-sitters, and they go to school every day to learn manners. Their manners were pretty good! They hopped around and played with our shoelaces while we ate. Every now and again Michael fed them a treat. I never wanted to say good-bye to them.

I felt very comfortable around Michael because I could see he was just as shy as I am. He seemed like a regular person to me. I certainly could relax with him. At lunch there was juice and Pepsi. Mom asked if there was any Coke. Then she remembered Michael’s Pepsi commercial. She really thought she’d blown it.

Michael smiled. He knew what she was thinking. He said that Mom was just like his mother. So Mom got up the nerve to asked a mom-type question. “Michael,” she said, “is it true that you sleep in an oxygen tank?” That’s something the tabloids have said about him.

Michael laughed. “Now Jeanne,” he said, “you know all the stuff that’s been written about you and Ryan.”

“Oh gosh,” Mom said. “I understand!”

After lunch Michael asked me if I’d like to ride around part of the ranch in his four-wheeler. “Yeah!” I said. Andrea was going to try his trampoline, and Heather and Mom were checking out his outdoor hot tub that had a video screen on one side.

Michael and I set out over the ranch’s dirt roads. I was at the wheel and he rode in the back. I took off and Michael yelled, “Slow down, Ryan!” After we’d gone a few miles he asked me if I could find my way back to the house.