Four of us—Patti, Kim, Lauren, and I—drove to 11663 Gorham, in Brentwood. Michael could not bring himself to come along. He had been there before during happy times. He did not want to walk into apartment #3 ever again.
We felt very strange being there, and purposely left the door ajar.
Ron’s dark slacks and white shirt, the clothes he had worn during his last evening of work, were still hanging on the bedroom door. Kim and I put them on hangers.
The work “uniform” of simple black slacks and a plain white shirt was perfect for Ron; he was color-blind. On mornings long ago, back in Chicago, when Ron was ready to head off for high school, he sometimes appeared dressed in what Kim called “the most godawful combinations.” She would shake her head and command, “Ron, go back upstairs,” and then tell him what shirt and sweater would go well with a particular pair of pants. Ron always took the razzing with a good-natured grin.
We made arrangements with the landlady to leave the water bed and a few other things, because none of us felt up to moving large pieces of furniture. Patti spotted a few pop-open water-bottle caps. She carries water with her constantly; she quietly slipped them into her pocket. Working quickly, we shoved everything into cardboard boxes, crying as we packed up kitchen utensils, clothes, and all the minutiae of Ron’s existence.
There were a thousand little details to attend to, small fragments of Ron left dangling in the wind. We found a dry cleaner’s receipt and realized that we would have to stop there to see if Ron had left clothes to pick up. His checkbook reminded us that we had to close out his account.
Lauren mentioned to Kim that she would like to have a baseball cap that Ron had worn frequently. It had a “Stüssy” logo on it, and it evoked many memories. Lauren had owned two Stüssy caps, and it had become a long-running prank for Ron to swipe them. Lauren used to pretend to be mad at him, but he knew that she was not, and the mock confrontations often ended in tickling sessions. Finally Ron had bought one of his own, and now Lauren wanted to keep it. She would always picture Ron wearing it in the style of the day, with the brim turned to the back.
Little decisions became monumental. Do we wash the clothes in the laundry basket or pack them the way they are? Kim finally decided that washing them would be like washing away a part of Ron. She could not bear that. She took his down comforter, noticing that it too was soiled, and had a small rip that needed to be sewn. However, she folded it gently and placed it in one of the boxes.
I spotted one of those big, plastic coin cups such as slot machine junkies use in the Las Vegas casinos. It was full of change, probably tips from Mezzaluna. There was also about $60 in cash. I knew that Ron owed Kim some money, so I tried to get her to take it. It was an irrational, emotional gesture and although Kim understood my intentions, she recoiled. There was no way that she could take any of Ron’s money.
I spotted a bracelet that Ron wore frequently and tried to slip it on my wrist, but it was too tight. I decided to have it enlarged so that I could wear it.
When we were finished at Ron’s apartment, we drove to Mezzaluna. The staff had told us that many people, not knowing any other way to reach us, had sent us mail in care of the restaurant. We told them we would come by to pick it up after we left Ron’s apartment.
None of us had ever been to Mezzaluna before. We arrived during the quiet time, between the lunch and dinner crowds, and the restaurant was almost deserted. Manager John DuBello was there, along with the owner, Kareem Suki, and Stuart Tanner, a waiter and friend of Ron’s. They were very gracious and wanted to serve us lunch. Lauren accepted a slice of pizza, but the rest of us declined; we were very uncomfortable there.
As Lauren picked at her food, a heavyset man, sitting next to the window, continued to stare at us. Finally he rose and walked over to our table. He said that he lived in Texas and was in Los Angeles on a business trip. He had come to Mezzaluna because he felt a need to be connected in some way. We were not really sure what he meant. “It’s really weird that on the day I chose to come, you are here,” he said. He was pleasant and courteous, and while we were sure that he meant well, the encounter was unsettling and a little creepy. It was the first time we sensed that people we did not know somehow felt they knew us, and it left us feeling vulnerable.
At the dry cleaner’s we learned that Ron had put in a claim for a pair of damaged pants. When they realized who we were, the clerks came from behind the counter, hugged us, and began to cry. They mumbled something about wanting to help with funeral costs, and gave us the money that was due Ron.
At Union Bank I explained to an official that we needed to close Ron’s account. Checking the files, the banker noted that Ron had designated me as his beneficiary. Just hearing this simple business detail brought the weight of the emotional day crashing down upon me. Tears flowed down my cheeks. I thought: This isn’t right. It should have been the other way around. Ron should have been my beneficiary.
As I struggled to complete the paperwork, Patti, Kim, and Lauren walked across the street to a restaurant known as the Cheesecake Factory—another place where Ron had worked. A men’s clothing store called Z 90049 that billed itself as “Only 127 Steps West of the Cheesecake Factory” ran a full-page ad in the restaurant’s menu. The clothing store manager, spotting Ron in the restaurant, had asked him if he would model for the ad in exchange for free clothing. Ron said, “Sure.” It was a one-time thing, but it explained why the press referred to him as a “sometime model.”
Kim asked the manager of the Cheesecake Factory if she could have one of the menus. The woman did not understand her request and asked why. Kim pointed to the picture of Ron, and sobbed, “That’s my brother.”
The menu was a slick, quarter-inch-thick package of ring-bound, laminated pages. On page 9, across from the listing of exotic pastas, was the beige-tinted “Z 90049” ad. Ron was one of two men in the photo standing on either side of a woman. He wore a trendy, double-breasted suit with a tennis shirt underneath, buttoned up to the neck, with no tie. He looked very handsome. The woman in the middle, wearing a man’s blazer, had long blond hair that was eerily reminiscent of Nicole’s.
Patti, Kim, and Lauren cried as they examined the photo. The entire staff of the Cheesecake Factory gathered around. Soon everyone was weeping.
* * *
When two families merge, the transition inevitably produces some rough edges. Once, shortly after Patti and I were married, we all visited a family counselor. During the session both Ron and Kim broke down as they told the therapist how, years ago, Sharon had just walked out of their lives. Until that day, Michael had not realized how much both of them had been hurt by their mother’s rejection.
This was the one issue, more than any other, that bound Ron and Kim together. During their childhood it was still fairly unusual for a father to have custody. They jokingly called me “Mr. Mom,” but in fact, each tried to fill that role for the other.
As far back as I can remember, when we lived in Chicago, and later in the suburb of Buffalo Grove, Ron was Kim’s other caretaker. As youngsters, they walked to school together. Later, when they began riding a bus, Ron always made sure that he sat with Kim. After school, before I came home from work, they kept close tabs on one another.
When I close my eyes I can see Kim, the tomboy, tagging after Ron and his friends. I see them playing Wiffle ball in the cul-de-sac and I see her trying to be brave during all the inevitable times that she took a ball in the face. I picture them playing catch and frisbee, and laughing—always laughing.
When she grew a little older, Kim would follow Ron to the baseball diamond and watch him play. She stood with her nose to the fence, cheering him on. After the games, he and his friends would take her for ice cream. She was always shadowing him, and he never seemed to mind.
Often, during those early years, Ron and Kim had dinner ready for me when I came home from work. I have a sneaking suspicion that Kim did most of the actual cooking, but the meal was always presented as a joint effort.
Dinnertime frequently brought on giggle attacks. One evening they annoyed me so much that I separated them, sending Ron to the upstairs bathroom and confining Kim to the downstairs bathroom. Instead of settling down, they tapped out coded messages on the plumbing pipes.
It was impossible for Kim to stay mad at Ron. He would come after her with a silly grin on his face, jab her in the ribs with both of his index fingers, and chide her: “Oh, Kimmy, you know you can’t be mad at me. You love me, you know you do!” And she did. She always will.
When Kim was old enough to show an interest in boys, Ron claimed the right to pass judgment. “Don’t hang around with him,” he advised. Or “He’s a good kid. He’s okay.”
In fact, both Ron and Kim insisted on approving my dates. Whenever I introduced them to someone new, the instant she turned her back, Ron and Kim would flash me a thumbs-up or thumbs-down.
I did a lot of dating in those days, looking for the right woman who would complete our family and fulfill the role that Sharon had abdicated. In 1978 I married for a second time. Joan had not been married before and had no children of her own. By that time, Ron, Kim, and I had formed such a tight circle that it was difficult for Joan to break into it. She felt like the proverbial fifth wheel, and I still had a lot to learn about sharing my love and attention. After only a few years, Joan and I decided, amicably, to go our separate ways, and I was once more on the dating scene.
Ron and Kim were teenagers when one day I brought home a cute, petite, blond woman named Patti Glass. She received an immediate double thumbs-up. Patti’s eldest son, Brian, was six years younger than Ron and three years younger than Kim. Michael was her middle child and Lauren was the baby. I had always sworn that I would not get involved with a woman who had children, but Patti and her kids were irresistible and I quickly changed my mind. After our first date, we were inseparable.
At first the five children did not spend much time together. Then one day Patti’s father suffered a heart attack during a flight to San Diego. The plane made an emergency landing in Michigan in order to get him to a hospital, and Patti and I traveled there to see him. Ron and Kim were old enough to take care of themselves, but Patti arranged for a babysitter for her children. Lauren thought that the sitter was mean to her, and she wanted to call her mom to complain. Instead, Patti’s children called Ron and Kim, since we lived only twenty minutes away. Even though it was snowing, Ron and Kim went over to Patti’s house and immediately assumed the roles of big brother and sister. They fired the babysitter on the spot and brought Brian, Michael, and Lauren home with them. After putting Lauren to bed, they invited a few friends over and included Michael and Brian in a huge snowball battle in the front yard. Afterward, they stayed up way past midnight, eating and talking and having fun. Looking back on the incident, we realized that it was the beginning of becoming a real family.
Ron was a skinny, gawky teenager, but always popular. The same traits that could sometimes drive us crazy were what drew people to him and made him so much fun to be with. Ron was born with a laid-back, “What, me worry?” attitude. Many of life’s petty irritations simply did not bother him. He was more concerned with living life than worrying about it. He had a good mind, and was very quick, but that did not always translate into topflight grades.
In our family, when you graduate from high school, it is assumed that you will go on to college, and that is what Ron did in 1986. Kim and Patti fashioned numerically coded labels for his clothes so that he could match the colors correctly. We all laughed because it reminded us of the ad for toddlers’ clothes when they are first trying to dress themselves. The labels on the shirts and the pants featured animals that could be matched. Only this time it was Grranimals Go to College! We drove him to the campus of Illinois State University, and helped him settle in.
But Ron simply was not ready. Like many eighteen- or nineteen-year-olds, he had no idea what career he wanted to pursue and had no real focus on the future. College is tough enough when you are driven by a goal you want to achieve, but when the goal is missing, it is hard to attend to classwork. Add in Ron’s zest for life and his engaging personality and you have a recipe for academic disaster.
During that semester at college, Ron majored in “fraternity.” Although he was never a heavy drinker, we guessed that he partied pretty hard. Predictably his grades suffered and, at the end of the semester, he was back home in Chicago. I was very disappointed, but Kim was thrilled to have her big brother back. For Kim, Ron’s reappearance came just in time because we were ready to make major changes in our lives.
Patti and I were married on February 21, 1987. Three days later we were all on a plane to California, where I had a new job waiting.
Kim had desperately wanted to stay in Chicago. She was “in love” with Brian Swislow. Also, she had just completed her first semester of high school. Her school in Chicago was huge, and she loved it. In contrast, the high school in California had only three hundred students, most of whom had grown up together. Kim was the new kid on the block, and she was miserable. She elevated self-pity to an art form. Now, more than ever, she depended upon her best friend—her brother.
My new employer supplied me with a company car, so I passed my white Nissan 200SX on to Ron. The license plate was perfect for him—UFORIC—incredibly happy. Ron drove Kim to school every morning. He pretended that it was a burden to get up so early and chauffeur her, but with the top open, and the stereo blasting the music of one of his favorite groups—The B-52s, Violent Femmes, Fine Young Cannibals, or Tears for Fears—he actually enjoyed the attention he got from the high school girls who giggled and stared at the new guy in town. When those same girls found out that he was Kim’s brother, and not her boyfriend, her popularity took a giant leap forward.
Patti’s parents were already in California when we arrived. Her mother lived in Rancho Mirage, and her father and his second wife resided in La Jolla. Her sister, Joyce, lived in Menlo Park with her two boys. As a result there were lots of family gatherings on holidays and other special occasions. These celebrations were second nature to Brian, Michael, and Lauren, but Ron and Kim had never been surrounded by a large, extended family. During these events Ron and Kim often shied away, clinging emotionally to each other. Sometimes they took a walk together; other times they sat off to one side and talked. Once again, it was Ron and Kim against the world.
Kim was the bookworm, the good student, the serious, responsible person. Ron was the free spirit. He would tease Kim, “You’re Daddy’s little angel. Little angels never do anything wrong, do they?” At times Kim worried that he really thought that and was resentful of her. Kim could not abide the thought of Ron being mad at her, so she would try to list for him every little mistake she had ever made. In fact Ron was incredibly proud of his sister, and said so, frequently.
In typical sibling chats that always had a goofy overtone, they used to plan their future based upon their differing personality traits. Ron would see to the religious upbringing of the kids in their respective families. Kim would graduate from college and make lots of money. In the distant future when it came time to place me in a nursing home, Kim would pay for it and Ron would visit me.
Ron’s personality and affinity for children enabled him to step into the role of Brian, Michael, and Lauren’s big brother with energy and ease. They shared a very special bond, different yet deep. He was funny and very affectionate. He listened to them and made everything they said seem important. They sought his attention at every opportunity. At first Kim was resentful, wanting her brother all to herself. However, after a time she realized that there was enough of Ron to go around; his affection for the others took nothing away from her.
Michael likes to tell a story that happened when he was eight or nine years old: “Ron took me to the beach one day. I remember how dorky I looked, with my pants pulled up about ten feet above my belly button. I was all legs and arms. First he tugged my pants down to where they should be and then he said, ‘Okay, Michael, I want you to go up to that girl over there and tell her you have this really cute older brother who really wants to talk to her. Do you think you can do that?’ Of course I did what he asked, and this awesome girl just smiled at me and told me how cute I was. The next thing I knew she and Ron were deep in conversation. On the way home Ron said, ‘You know what, Michael? You’re not so bad. Good work!’ I think I was smiling for a week.”
In a large family someone usually assumes the role of mediator and in our case, that was Patti. I tend to be high-strung, sometimes critical and strict with children, but Patti has a more relaxed approach.
Patti’s goal was to be, first and foremost, a good friend to Ron and Kim; she never accentuated the stepmother role. And she succeeded. In some ways, Patti’s relationship with Ron was even better than mine. Ron and I were both headstrong, sometimes stubborn. We could easily let an argument simmer for days without resolving it. Patti was able to view any difficulties that Ron and I had through a more detached eye. When Ron and I clashed over something, Patti would be in the middle, listening to both sides and striving for compromise. Ron and Patti spent countless hours just talking things over. Ron thought that he had disappointed me by dropping out of school; but she wanted him to understand that I was tough on him because I loved him so much. Patti cautioned me to back off, relax, and give Ron some time and space.
Had it not been for Patti, Ron and I would have had far more difficulty getting past some of the natural father-son squabbling. For that I will forever be deeply appreciative, and thankful to her.
Ron went through a lot of external changes during those years. Our new house in Agoura was only about twenty minutes from the ocean, and Ron fell in love with the scene. He gloried in the sunshine and the lure of the beautiful girls. His diet changed dramatically. He no longer ate much red meat. He started to work out in a gym and discovered the tanning booth. He wore his hair a little longer, a little spiked, causing me to grumble, “Is that really what you want to do to your hair?”
He was already a bit taller than I was, but now he seemed to grow even taller, and his body filled out. The difference in appearance was dramatic, but inside he was the same happy-go-lucky, caring, and protective person we had known. He made friends easily. I had often said, “When Ron came to California, it was as if he had died and gone to heaven.” Now I regret those words.
He enrolled at Pierce Junior College and applied himself a bit more than before, but his grades still hovered around the average mark. I came to the realization that he was never going to be a dedicated student. His talents lay in other directions.
At college one day, Ron noticed a flyer advertising positions for camp counselors. Upon investigation he learned that the campers were all inner-city, minority children who came from really tough home situations. He was already working at a tanning salon, but he took this second job, which required him to spend nights at the camp in the mountains near Malibu. The pay was low, but he loved working with kids.
After his death, the woman who ran the camp contacted us and praised the work that Ron had done. Ron never pigeonholed people; he saw everyone as an individual. The woman explained that Ron was a role model who talked easily to these children, saying, “Let me tell you what you can do right, and let me explain to you what you can do wrong, ’cause I’ve made all the mistakes already.” It was the same way he talked to Michael on their long walks to the shopping center.
In truth, Ron continued to make his share of mistakes. He was a young man speeding into his early adult years, often without bothering to look at a road map. For several years he bounced in and out of school, in and out of several apartments, and in and out of various jobs.
He worked for a time at the Westlake United Cerebral Palsy Residence Home. His job was to help patients get out of bed, bathe, get dressed, eat, and do all the other daily activities that most of us take for granted. Even though many of the patients were so physically challenged that they required help for the most fundamental tasks, Ron saw them as people who deserved respect and dignity. He never patronized them. To him, they were simply people who had an illness, and they were perfectly capable of controlling their lives and making their own decisions.
On an outing one day, Ron and several patients stopped at a fast-food restaurant. A patient named Jane attempted to place an order, but the counter clerk either could not understand her or simply grew frustrated. He turned to Ron and asked, “What does she want?”
“Why are you asking me?” Ron responded. “This is Jane. She can order for herself.”
The director of the residence recalled for us a day when Ron put music on the public address system and set about dancing with patients in wheelchairs; it was almost like a Fred Astaire routine. The director said that she had never seen so many smiles on the patients’ faces.
However, it was the restaurant business that seemed to captivate him. Over the years he worked at several establishments, and thoroughly enjoyed the constant interaction with people. Seeing him in waiter’s clothes always bothered me a bit because I wanted him to do something more substantial with his life. But I had to admit that he was good. One evening, Patti and I stopped in for dinner at a place called Truly Yours, where Ron was working. It was a modest establishment, but Ron hammed it up for us, acting as if Truly Yours was a five-star restaurant. He placed a towel over his arm, deferred to our every whim, and called us “Ma’am” and “Sir.” I was not surprised when the manager told me that customers often requested his tables.
Ron never expressed any interest in being an actor. That notion was raised when reporters learned of his one and only television appearance. Kim was in college in Santa Barbara when Ron called one day and teased, “Guess what I did!”
“Uh-oh,” Kim said, her anxiety level rising.
“I got dared to go on Studs,” he said. Studs was a low-budget version of The Dating Game.
At the time, the show was very popular in a campy sort of way, but Kim knew that it had a sleazy aura. She thought: Oh my God.
The show was supposed to pay for three dates with three different women, but Ron did not feel that the money they offered was sufficient, so he spent some of his own, just to make sure that the women were treated properly.
When the show was ready to air, Kim threw a small party for her friends. “I was so embarrassed,” she remembers. “There he was, larger than life, hair slicked back, assuming the cocky, arrogant role he could slip on when he wanted to. I knew it was all a lark, and that he was blowing smoke, but half the time the show was on, I hid my eyes.” We all got a kick out of it, though.
I watched the show at home, alternately laughing and cringing as he camped it up. I knew that he did not take it seriously; he was just having fun. But at one point I slunk down on the couch, hid my eyes, and muttered, “Oh my God! Where did that ego come from?”
Later, when we teased him about it, Ron just laughed. “It was a blast,” he said. “Who cares?”
Sometime after that one of Kim’s friends talked her into auditioning for the same show. When Ron found out, he informed his little sister: “You are not the kind of girl who goes on that show! No way! I won’t allow it.”
There were two Rons. The one that the world saw now, in abbreviated clips on the nightly news or the tabloid shows, was carefree, a little cocky, and could dismiss any problem with a shrug of his shoulder. With family and close, trusted friends, however, he was a warm, vulnerable, incurable romantic who loved to send flowers, create intimate dinners, write notes, and send cards. Kim knew far better than the rest of us that Ron, at age twenty-five, desperately craved stability. He had come to the point in his life when he was ready to start his own business. He wanted to put down roots. He was searching for the woman he would marry and who would bear his children. Whether a boy or a girl, he wanted to name his first child Dakota.
Ron was ready to settle down. All he needed was a little more time.