In one whole year, Cat has never seen Rocky so completely enraged. She is almost beautiful this morning, uncharacteristically down-to-earth, without any makeup and with her hair a grizzly mass. Her caftan moves like waves as she rushes back and forth through the penthouse, snapping orders. “Cat!” “Annie!” They respond like soldiers, aiming for the end of the day. Rocky comes in and out of Cat’s office, holding a little piece of paper which she recognizes from Annie’s GOOD INTENTIONS kitchen pad. It is covered with words scrawled in red marker. Rocky looks at it, issues an order and leaves. At one point, she says, “No one can be trusted. There’s going to be a complete changing of the guard around here.”
A messenger comes with a big package from Charlie Webb’s office. Cat opens it and finds copies of letters, notes and contracts dating back years. A short cover letter wishes Rocky good luck finding an agent she’ll feel “confident can steer you where you want to go.”
When the phone rings with a return call from Rocky’s lawyer, David, Cat braces herself and puts it through. Rocky has been waiting for this call all morning. Cat is not surprised by the war cry that emanates from Rocky’s study the second the red light on the phone has faded. Feet pound the hallway and suddenly a crazed mass of Rocky is filling the doorway.
“Take a letter!”
Cat spins around and poises her fingers above the keyboard.
“Dear David,
This letter will officially terminate our professional relationship, effective immediately. Your refusal to cooperate with my decisions, and your admitted collusion with my former agent, Charles Webb, with whom you spoke this morning before contacting me, indicates an inappropriate hierarchy of priorities in concern to my best interests. The legitimacy of my dismissal of both Charles Webb and John Paglia should be a matter of faith and trust between you and me, not a forum for discussion. Because you have failed to discharge your professional obligations as my legal servant, I find no alternative but to sever our relationship. Therefore, you are ordered to return to me all papers and files related to me or my business which are currently in your possession.
Sincerely,
Rocky Love Barthoff
RLB:cg
“Messenger that over right away.” “Will do.” “Where is Nathan?” “He went out.” The pupils of Rocky’s eyes darken and shrink as they pin themselves accus ingly on Cat, as if it’s her fault Nathan disappears. “Where?” “I have no idea.” Cat twists around to put a piece of letterhead in the printer. “I saw him talking to you before.” “He said he was hungry. Maybe he went out for something to eat.” “When he gets back, tell him we’re going to the country.” “Okay.” Rocky paces quickly between the window and the door, slowing down occa sionally to scan her GOOD INTENTIONS list. She stops and faces Cat. “Print out a copy of the memoirs.” Cat nods, turns to the computer and pulls up a directory at random. She begins to scroll the cursor up and down the screen, wondering how this will effect John, for whom she feels no small amount of sympathy. Just last night he called her at home to say he was going to sue Rocky. If Rocky goes ahead with this, she’ll be breaking their contract. Doesn’t she realize that?
“Rocky, maybe that’s not such a good idea.”
“What?”
“I said —”
“Just do it.”
“But he’s suing you. You’ll only make it harder on yourself.”
“How do you know that?”
Cat shrugs. “I must have overheard something.”
“I’ll print it myself, then!”
Rocky rushes over to the desk and tries to sit on the chair with Cat still in it. Cat falls against the edge of the desk, which she grabs in an effort not to fall to the floor. But Rocky’s rear end bumps her with such force that, before she can get a good grip, she makes a twisted landing beneath the desk.
“Ouch!” Cat cries, but Rocky ignores her.
Rocky is banging away at the keyboard with her long chipped red fingernails. “How do you work this thing? Where is the print button?”
Cat crawls to the other side and stands. “That hurt.”
Nathan appears in the office, knapsack over his shoulder, sucking on a long string of red licorice.
“Tell me how to print!”
Cat eyes her purse underneath the desk next to Rocky’s feet. If she could only reach it, she could get out of here — for good.
“Nathan,” Rocky says, “do you know how to print?”
“Print?”
“Get packed, we’re going to the country.”
“Country?”
“Hurry up. We’re leaving as soon as I finish this.”
He stands behind her, places his large hands on her neck and, licorice dangling between his lips, begins to knead. In a garbled sounding voice, he says, “Hey, sister, relax, relax.”
Her jaw clenches as she taps keys at random. The computer beeps repetitively and then the screen flashes to a blank blue slate. She hits the keyboard with a flat palm and the computer instantly reboots itself.
“I said get packed — we’re leaving!”
“Don’t go,” Cat impulsively says to Nathan. “She’ll eat you alive.”
Rocky pitches forward, in Cat’s direction, like a missile aimed for flight. “Who do you think you are?”
“No one, Rocky. I’m no one.” Cat crouches down under the desk and reaches for her purse. Just as she’s about to grab the strap, Rocky’s foot slams down on it.
As Cat tugs, the strap weaves between Rocky’s toes. Her enraged face swings down to look under the desk just as Cat liberates her purse strap.
“You’re fired!” Rocky says.
Still on her hands and knees, Cat notices for the first time in her year of service to the great Rocky Love that there are three hardened wads of gum stuck to the undersurface of the desk.
“I said, you’re fired!”
“I heard you the first time.” Cat crawls backwards, purse in tow, and stands up. Rocky stands and Nathan puts his arms around her in a hug whose obvious motive is to restrain her. He directs a quick wink to Cat.
“I mean it, don’t go with her,” Cat says to Nathan, hoping her words will reach him, tug him back from the edge of a precipice off which he has fallen before.
“Don’t worry about me,” he says. “I’m going to the country, to the country. If I don’t get out of this city I’ll go crazy.”
“I order you,” Rocky says, “to print the memoir before you leave this room!”
On the verge of refusing, Cat stops herself. Yes, she will stay a little longer, but not to print the manuscript for Rocky. She has a better idea.
“Okay, I will. I’ll stay and do it and then I’ll leave.”
“That’s right, you will.” Rocky lifts her chin defiantly, conquering windmills.
“Come on, Rock, let’s go pack,” Nathan says.
“You’re the only person I really need,” she says to Nathan. “Do you know that?”
“Yup, yup, let’s get ready.” He pulls her out of the room. Cat stands in place, listening as they travel the hallway and Rocky’s bedroom door slams shut.
Cat moves quickly now. She doesn’t have time to sift through things carefully, to remove every cartoon she has taped to the walls, to locate loose papers she has set aside to take home. She only has time for this: she flips open the plastic disk case and finds the diskettes John gave her so she could transfer each draft of the memoirs onto the hard disk for revision. When she has accounted for each disk, she calls up the hard disk directory on which she has stored every draft of the memoirs, and systematically deletes them. When every byte of memoirs is erased, she shuts down the computer and slips the floppies into her purse.
At the last minute, she decides to call Teddy to tell him she’s been fired and ask him to meet her for lunch. She dials his number and is listening to the answering machine when the office line rings. On reflex, she answers it.
“Hello, Cat, how are you?” It’s Rocky’s father, Dr. Libbon. Cat has never met him in person but she knows his voice well.
“Fine. You?”
“All right. Is Rocky home?”
“Sure, I’ll try her.” Cat buzzes Rocky’s bedroom, then her study. No answer. “She’s busy with....” But no one has divulged the presence of Nathan to his parents. He is Rocky’s secret weapon — and Cat’s. But why use it? The game is over, and it never had any real purpose, anyway. “I’m sorry, I guess she’s not around.”
Dr. Libbon sighs. “Is everything okay? I had a distressing call from a reporter this morning. I understand Rocky’s put the penthouse up for sale.” He hesitates. “This reporter seems to think she told a broker her apartment is haunted. Can you tell me anything about this?”
“No, I hadn’t heard. Actually, Dr. Libbon, Rocky has been upset. She’s fired everyone, well, except Annie.”
“Everyone?”
“Her agent, her lawyer, the man who was helping her write her book, me.”
“I see. You don’t know where she is?”
Maybe, Cat thinks, maybe there’s still time to save Nathan. Maybe, if their father gets to the beach house soon enough, he could help his son before Rocky has a chance to dabble with the poor man’s pliant mind, not to mention his body.
“She was going to the country today.”
“On a weekday?”
“Actually, she’s in pretty bad shape, Dr. Libbon. Maybe it would be a good idea if you talked to her. Maybe in person.”
“I’ll give it a little time,” he says, “and if I don’t hear from her, I’ll drive out.”
Cat hangs up the phone and looks through the window into the lush autumn blaze of Central Park. She has finally come to hate Rocky. She is ready to leave. But she will miss Annie, and she will miss this view. As for the rest of her credit card debt, she’s close to paying it off. She’ll figure something out; get another job, now that she’s got a year’s worth of office experience under her belt.
She finds Annie in her room across the hall, sitting quietly on the edge of her bed.
“I’m gonna miss you,” are Annie’s first words.
“You heard?”
“Everything.”
“Are you going to stay?”
“I don’t know. I can’t walk out that easy; I got Parker to think about.”
“Right, that’s tough.” From down the hall they hear the sound of something crashing against a wall. “I better go. I don’t want to be here when they come out.”
“I don’t blame you, hon. Good luck.”
“Tell Parker goodbye for me, okay? Tell him I’ll send him some more comic books.”
They share a long hug before Cat leaves, the memoir-disks tucked safely away in her purse. With all the gossip Rocky has kicked up in her fury, the media’s interest is piqued. Last night on the phone, John said that Charlie was already putting out feelers for a deal.
It is a spectacularly beautiful day for an eastward drive to the sea. Breezes swish gently through the roadside foliage. The sun is brilliant on the windshield and Norman adjusts the visor to block the glare. He peripherally observes the weathered competence of his hands as they grip the steering wheel of their old reliable Volvo wagon. He has had a good life, been a steady husband and a responsible father. And now his daughter needs him. She hasn’t answered any of his calls from yesterday or this morning. Mabel advised him not to run to Rocky: “She’s a grown woman. She made her own bed — let her lie in it.” But she is their daughter and Norman loves her. He can wait it out no longer.
Perhaps his time for action was long ago, when his children were young and he could have offered more guidance. Perhaps it was wrong to wait for a crisis. Perhaps, in the past, if he had listened to his heart first and his wife’s advice second, some of the shattering of his family could have been avoided. Perhaps if they had pressured their children less and loved them more, they could have been saved.
Were he to be as honest as his private thoughts, he would have to admit that he blames Mabel. Oh, he blames himself, too, of course, but she made the rules that he followed. He didn’t have to follow them, but it seemed easier, it kept the peace. The children must have felt this even more strongly than he did, and with less definition between self and other; they absorbed her messages completely, and eventually they splintered and withdrew. Leo with his double life. Earl, poor Earl, with his need to please. Only Robby became who she wanted them all to be, and chances are he would have chosen medicine and family on his own, either way. But perhaps if Mabel hadn’t goaded Rocky into rebellion she might have calmed down, grown up, stabilized. And to think about Nathan, lost, breaks Norman’s heart.
Norman will never forget the look on Nathan’s face when he was told he was being sent away to boarding school. Even Norman thought it was ludicrous. But Mabel was set on it — to “straighten him out” and “teach him responsibility” and perhaps most telling, “get him away from Rocky.” Mabel really believed her daughter was being misdirected by Nathan’s adolescent angst. Norman argued with her, he remembers it clearly. “It’s harmless,” he had said. “They’ll both grow out of it. Don’t worry so much.” But Mabel’s mind was made up. There was no discussion; he had no voice in their children’s lives. He understood that then, that very day, in the ugly slash of Mabel’s closed mouth. When it opened, it released a directive and he couldn’t bear to challenge her, because to change roles midstream would have been to change the course of their marriage. He had thought if he could just keep the peace. He remembers her words exactly: “Tell him now.” And Norman did. Told him. As if he knew what he was doing. He tore Nathan from their home and their lives. They have not seen him since.
There has been too much loss to let Rocky go now, not if he can help her by stretching out a hand in love — not judgment but love — to help her back through whatever darkness is swallowing her. He remembers her birth clearly, that little hand reaching. Way back then, he would never have imagined how much that tiny hand would grasp in life, and how desperately it would struggle to hold on, and how self-destructively it would create its own losses. But no matter what has happened, or why, she is still his child. She will always be his baby girl.
He steers the car to the exit ramp and proceeds four miles or so to the house. It has been a long time since he has been here, what with Rocky’s and Mabel’s feuding, yet he finds that he remembers the route.
There it is: the bleached old house that looks innocuous enough on the outside and inside is a masterpiece of renovation. Norman pulls the car up the gravel drive and parks next to his daughter’s green Mustang convertible. The top is up, which probably means the car has not been used today.
The front door of the house is locked. Through the glass panels on either side of the wide door he can see right through the living room, which appears quiet and empty. A picture window on the far wall frames the ocean beyond.
He goes around to the other side and tries a glass door, which slides open easily. Wind chimes tinkle. It is cool inside the house. Were it not for the window being open and the glass doors unlocked, he would have guessed no one was home.
“Hello?” he calls. “Rocky, it’s Dad!”
There is no response, so he decides to look around. First, he tries the sun-porch, which is cluttered with newspapers and two coffee mugs. It occurs to him that she might have a guest, and he fears he has intruded. Then he remembers what prompted him to come here: Rocky has been unstable, taking drastic action, waltzing too close to the edge. These are not normal times, he reminds himself, otherwise he would not have come uninvited. He hopes he’s overreacting and he’ll find her happily entertaining some nice new or old friend. He will apologize, excuse himself and drive home, satisfied, in time for dinner.
He checks the dining room, the kitchen, the laundry room and the downstairs guest room. Nothing. So he heads upstairs.
At the top of the stairs he nearly collides with a tall man who, after a quick moment of surprise, he recognizes as his son, Nathan. He is stark naked. Norman’s breath catches in his chest. He feels, briefly, that he will suffocate. Then his breath flows and he steps back in confusion. It has been well over twenty years since he has seen his boy — this man.
Nathan’s smile is sudden, like a threat. He too has been taken by surprise. “Dokta Dad!” he bellows, laughing.
“Nathan?” It is Rocky’s voice, coming from the master bedroom. “What’s going on?” She appears in the bedroom doorway, wearing a black merry widow with garters and black lace stockings. Her large breasts are squeezed together and she wears no underpants. There are vivid bluegreen bruises on her thighs and red welts around her wrists, ankles and neck. Her teased hair looks metallic, unnatural, vulgar. She stands there frozen, staring at her father. Finally she says, “Daddy,” softly, just a whisper.
Norman calls upon all the strength of his whole long life to hold back the torrent of grief and regret pushing at his throat. In a low controlled voice he manages to say, “Get dressed, both of you, now.”