The Comedy Writer (37 page)

“You're a tough guy, huh?! Real tough guy! Now, tell my friend you're sorry!”

Pit Bull paused just long enough for Herb to punch him in the face. His head snapped back against the floor, which sounded as if it hurt more than the punch.

said, Tell him you re sorry!3 “

“I'm sorry, man. I didn't mean nothing.”

Another punch, a little blood from the mouth.

I said, “It's okay, Herb. He's sorry.”

But Silverman wasn't finished.

“You know, I think I remember you,” Herb said. “Yeah, that's right, your mother sucked my dick one night when you were sleeping in the other room. Yeah, it was definitely you. I'm surprised you didn't wake up when that big black guy fucked her ass.”

Another punch, a gusher of red now, a frightening twinkle in Herb's eyes.

“You uncoordinated piece of fuck! Tell him you're sorry
and mean it!”

“I'm sorry, man, Ym sorry!”
This in a pathetic cracking voice. “I don't want no fucking trouble. I'm sorry … I'm sorry …”

The whole thing lasted maybe forty-five seconds and as Herb stood back up, a slew of bouncers came running over, but they were reluctant to take on this smiling, loudmouthed redhead with the broken bottle in his hand. They made a semicircle around him and one of them said, “Okay, take it easy, dude.”

My dreamgirl was suddenly back, pointing at me and screeching, “He started it! That guy started it!”

The guy on the floor sat up, teeth coated red with mucus, and said, “He's crazy, man. He hit me with a fucking beer bottle.” He was rubbing his forehead, but he didn't dare stand and I actually felt bad for him because he had tears in his eyes.

The bouncers walked us to the door, but they were wary of Herb's volatility and quite nice once they saw that he wasn't going to punch any of them out. I was a little shaken by the suddenness of it all and wanted to get in the car and disappear, but the parking valet seemed to take forever. Even though the bully was down, I wasn't convinced he wouldn't regroup and come after us again, maybe with a gun. I figured he had to. Everything he stood for was at stake. He'd been beaten, he'd been humiliated on his home court,
he'd cried in front of the blonde babe.
The guy was on steroids, he'd ruined his liver and joints, taken years off his life—for
this?
He would forever be a muscly, arthritic joke to these people.

Silverman had been through this kind of thing before and couldn't have looked less threatened if they'd taken the guy away in a body bag. He was pumped up and talked with a couple girls at the door, never showing any indication of what had just happened, and I was impressed with Silverman's poise, his resiliency, and suddenly I suspected he was going to make it big in Hollywood after all.

It was after 1 A.M. and Silverman wanted to go to another club (“It ain't over till the fat lady says no”), but I was shot, so we compromised and went back to our hotel lounge, which was dead. We sat at the big stained mahogany bar and drank brandys. The only people left were the middle-aged Brit with the long blond hair and his
companion, a slight woman with big droopy tits and a short dark coif. The Brit had an amiable way about him, but his friend looked miserable. I can't say she wasn't pretty, but there was something dark and unhappy about her.

Over a brandy, Herb tried to solve my problems.

“Just throw her out.”

“It's not that easy.”

“Why not? Is she stable now?”

“Very
un”

“All the more reason to kick her ass out. And if she comes back again, you should push her off the goddamn roof yourself.”

“Ah.”

“Just do it, get her out, boot her, it's your place.”

“You don't understand. I feel bad for her. Her sister … you know, I can't just … I've got to wait for the right time.”

“What right time?
She's driving you crazy, what is there to feel bad about? You tried to save her sister and she jumped—end of story. What the fuck could you do?”

“Well …”

“You're a fucking idiot, you know that? You deserve anything you get.”

“I'll get her out.”

“Want me to do it? I'll drag her out by that mop of a cunt. She won't be back either.”

“I'll get her out, don't worry. You're right, I've just got to be firm.”

“Be a man. Walk in there and say, 'Party's over, Superbush.' As for the producer, just cut the bullshit and give the guy what he wants.”

“Really?”

“Sometimes you gotta make sacrifices to get what you want in life.”

“Herb, giving him what he wants wouldn't be the sacrifice.”

“Exactly. So just do it. You got off easy—you've just gotta lie to a couple lawyers—count your blessings.”

When the bartender Bill brought another round, he leaned in and informed us that the Brit was a famous director. I'd never heard his name before, but I knew the movies, and Herb quickly sent them a couple drinks, which I paid for. The Brit was most grateful and struck up a conversation with Herb. As I listened, I wondered if maybe he was an Aussie or South African, or just from a dumb-sounding part of England. The somber woman never looked my way, so I started chatting up the bartender. Bill was a third-generation Californian, and we got in a light-hearted debate over which coast was superior. Bill said, “How can you defend a place that has freezing temperatures and snow half the year?”

“Sunshine is like anything else. When you don't have it all the time, it's better. Like, if you get in the car and drive up the coast and sleep at a little place on the beach and drink martinis while watching the sun go down, it'd be nice, right? But if you did it again tomorrow, it probably wouldn't be quite as nice, and if you did it every day this month, you'd undoubtedly get sick of the whole thing, and if you had to do it every day for a year, the whole trip would probably lose its beauty. See, the very thing that makes Southern California so desirable is the thing that ruins it. It's sunny and warm, and that's great, but it's exactly the same every day, more or less. Yeah, winter back East sucks. It's a tremendous letdown, a cooling off period, a drying out time. Actually, in the beginning it's okay, right up to Christmas—”

“It blows,” Herb piped in.

“I second that,” from the skinny sourpuss.

I looked at them, then continued to Bill. “But that's why spring is so great. You've suffered, paid your dues, frozen your ass off for five months, so that first day of spring, not March 21, but the day it really hits—is more special than you can imagine.”

“I've zeen that in N'York,” the Brit said. “It is truly plum.”

“And back there you savor every nice day,” I said. “The nice days are nicer than here—spring, summer, fall—because you know they won't last. It'll get bad again, that's a fact. Here nothing changes, and that's the problem.”

“It's like pussy,” Herb said. “I don't care how great the pussy is, it can be the greatest pussy in the world, but if you get the same pussy every day, you get sick of it.”

“Oh, really?” from grumpy girl, looking very slutty now.

“That's right.”

The director let out a huge guffaw, which made me laugh.

“What would
you
know about pussy?” Herb said, looking my way.

“Ah, Christ,” I said, “here it comes. He's drunk, and he just saved my life, so he thinks he can be an asshole.”

The director nodded vigorously at me with a rousing smile, then said, “Ya gonna take that, 'erb?”

“Seriously,” Herb said, “when was the last time you had any real good stuff? And don't mention Sybil back in your apartment.”

“I'm too tired for this. I'm going to bed.”

I threw some money on the bar and started to leave.

Herb said, “Hey, hey, give me some dough, fucky. You're supposed to be covering me, remember?”

The director said, “That's 'kay, 'erb. I gotcha, mate.”

I watched a rebroadcast of the eleven o'clock news, then clicked off the tube and lay in bed pondering how to make itwork with Bowman. I knew there was an easy solution. There always is. An hour passed in a few minutes and suddenly it was 3:15 and I was more alert than ever. I pulled on my shorts and went for a walk on the hotel's golf course in my bare feet. The night air was still thick and warm and the grass was thick and cool. I lay down on the second green and searched for shooting stars to wish upon. The more I thought about it, the sillier the whole Bowman thing seemed. Herb was right, I was making a mountain out of a molehill. So he ran a red light and lied about it—that didn't make Bowman a bad guy. He was just vain. And it wasn't as if the Mexican was going to pay. His insurance would pick it up, and if he wasn't covered, then Bowman's would get it. It was very simple: Bowman didn't mind paying, he just wanted to be right. For a hundred grand I probably owed the man that much.

There are few places more peaceful than a desert golf course at night, until you remember that it
is
a desert and deserts have poisonous things. So I decided to head back to my room.

As I approached the hotel, I stumbled upon Herb getting a blowjob in the Jacuzzi. His legs were dangling in the water and he lay back on the deck with his hands behind his head, staring up at the stars. Tiffany Pittman was right about a couple things: Herb was as well-endowed as he was lazy.

The Brit's miserable girlfriend was kneeling in the tub up to her shoulders, doing all the work. Her hair was wet and, even from thirty feet in the dim light, I couldn't miss the freakish hunk of cock
in her grip. I decided to stay on the grass, take the long way around the pool, and not interrupt them.

I'd only gotten a few steps when I heard the clinking of ice cubes. Sitting on a chaise to my left, finally smiling, was the woman whom I'd just presumed to be gobbling cock. I jerked my head back toward the Jacuzzi. “Don't worry,” she said. “Your friend's just drunk, and mine's terribly persuasive.”

Her voice triggered a splashy commotion at the tub; I heard the Brit's startled voice. The woman took a hit on her cigarette and, as I hurried away, I smashed my shin on a glass table. I kept going, though, and I three-at-a-time'd it up the stairs, and it felt as if someone was on my heels, chasing me, but no one was.

about ten miles outside Palm Springs. I got a close-up of the desert while we waited for help. It wasn't like the deserts I'd seen in movies, with the Saguaro cactus and boulders. This looked like a huge empty lot, as if there'd been something there before that had been demolished. Scraps of paper and plastic and rubber and metal and boards and beer cans were scattered everywhere. About a mile away, I could make out trailer homes and, beyond that, an extremely tall Exxon sign. I'd been avoiding Herb's gaze all morning and trying to steer what little conversation there was. Then, without taking his head out from under the hood, Herb said, 'Tm not queer, you know.”

I didn't respond and he said, “Do you hear me?”

“Whatever, man. Don't worry about it.”

“Oh, I see.” This with an attitude.

“What? Look, Herb, you do what you … you know, choose to do. Everyone does. It's not for me to … whatever.”

Herb came around the car and got in my face. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to be a fucking actor?” He hadn't slept much and looked anxious, and I felt sick to my stomach for him. “No. You don't fucking know shit. It's not like being a writer, man. It's nothing like it. I have
absolutely no control.
Do you understand that? You can go home tonight and write. You can write every fucking day of the year. And each time you write, you get a little better. How the fuck can I get better, huh? Tell me. What am I gonna do—go home, stay up all night and
act?
Uh-uh. I can't act until they tell me I can act. I gotta wait for those motherfuckers to tell me I can act.”

“Well … there's acting class.”

“Yeah, and for three hundred bucks you get to stand up once or twice a month in front of a bunch of schmucks who are more interested in kissing the teacher's ass than learning how to be real. And the teachers—all they want to do is hear themselves talk, and what the hell could they possibly teach me anyway? Lecturing about acting is like lecturing about baseball. You've got to
do it
to get good at it … but they won't fucking let me. Why do you think I don't go to movies? Because
I can't.
Because it makes me sick to see guys up there who don't have a fucking clue … Because I can't get a break … Not a goddamn … fucking break.”