Almost Like Being in Love (26 page)

Streaker’s

Restaurant and Bar

(around the corner from the St. Louis Cardinals)
CUSTOMER COMMENTS

A.J., I didn’t mean to piss you off about the olives. I just thought the bar would look neater if all the pimentos were pointing down.

Do you need any help cleaning up? I’m a little nervous tonight.

Beaver, stop setting the fucking tables. I’m not insured for you. And the customers think you’re an outpatient.

Go back to your hotel. Get into bed. Go to sleep. You’re making me nuts.

Motel 6 is a terrific place for staring at the ceiling in the dark.

Especially when your entire life is hanging in the balance. If you’ve got four quarters, the bed vibrates. Big deal. Craig used to make it do that for free.

What if his mother’s on vacation? What if she won’t tell me where to find him? How do I get her to trust me?!

OPTION 1:

Dr. McKenna, I’ve just gotten over a bad case of strep throat, and I wanted to make sure I wasn’t contagious any more. By the way, how’s Craig?

OPTION 2:

Dr. McKenna, I’ve been having this pain in my abdomen, and I just wanted to make sure it wasn’t appendicitis or—Oh my God! That picture on your desk! I went to school with that guy! He’s your what? You’re kidding! What’s his address?

OPTION 3:

Dr. McKenna, I’m the history professor you spoke with on the phone and I was hoping—OW! Doctor, my fingers are still in the door!

OPTION 4:

Dr. McKenna, I don’t really have irritable bowel syndrome, I’m just in love with your son. How much do you want for his phone number?

OPTION 5:

Where’s the Rolodex, bitch?

A.J.’s right. I’ve lost my mind. But I’ll go with appendicitis anyway.

G:

Why didn’t somebody tell me she was a gynecologist?! Do you know how it looked?! Nine pregnant women in the waiting room, and I’m up at reception holding my stomach and moaning! “What trimester are you in, sir?” Fuck
you
, lady!

G, I couldn’t have been more than 15 feet from his address. I could practically smell it. So here’s the plan. Unless one of your Internet harlots lives in St. Louis and can help me out, I’m going to ask A.J. I have an idea.

T

T:

I know where this is going. Don’t.

G

FROM THE JOURNAL OF

Travis Puckett

Streaker’s

Restaurant and Bar

(around the corner from the St. Louis Cardinals)
CUSTOMER COMMENTS

A.J., please don’t take this the wrong way, but would you have any strenuous objections to playing the part of my wife? It’d only take half an hour. Just long enough to have a pelvic exam. I can explain if you want me to.

Apparently, there are fixed limits to A.J.’s sense of romance. I just found them.

My life is over. When I die, they’ll discover me on this bench in the middle of the same downpour, staring at a vacant lot on Kensington Avenue in St. Louis. “Roses are red, John’s name is Truett, Esther’s in love, and we always knew it.” Kiss my ass.

These are the facts: (a) His mother is the only one who knows where he lives; 'b( She thinks I’m a serial killer; 'c( Unless I grow an ovary, I’ll never get in to see her; and 'd( It’s raining on me.

Oh, no. Not another déjà vu….

August 1978. The Mets game was rained out, so we took our hot dogs and
each other to Flushing Meadow Park, where we found an empty bandshell
next to the Unisphere that was custom-built for making out in the middle of
an achingly romantic thunderstorm. Since we were soaked to the skin by then,
we pulled off our Mets T-shirts in a single yank. ( ot that we really needed the
pretense. Being naked with one another—even a little bit—remained a potent
narcotic. Fuck pot.) In moments, we were stretched out on the rain-spattered
grass and locked together in an embrace so singular in its execution, we’d
already applied for a patent.

‚Craigy?‛ I murmured, kissing the top of his head. ‚How come they call
snapdragons ‘snapdragons’?‛

‚Because ‘snapdragon’ is Chinese for ‘eternal sunshine’,‛ he replied, not
looking up. ‚Like you.‛

‚It is?‛

‚No. But it sure sounded real, didn’t it?‛ This was his cue to reach for my
hand and nod toward the big steel globe in front of us.

‚Hey, Smerko?‛ he asked, pointing at orth America. ‚If I promised you all of
that, would you believe me?‛ Suspecting he was serious and determined to
find out for sure, I crinkled my forehead as though I were deliberating in front
of Congress.

‚I dunno,‛ I mumbled dubiously. ‚That’s a lot of work. It’d prob’ly mean we’d
have to spend the rest of our lives together.‛ As soon as the one-dimple thing
happened, I knew I’d given him the right answer.

‚When do we start?‛ he grinned.

We start right now, Craigy. Remember what Madame Rose said in Gypsy? “Desperate people do desperate things.”

FROM THE JOURNAL OF

Travis Puckett

THE PUCKETT/DUBOISE DEBATES

GORDO: Hello?

TRAVIS: Gordo?

GORDO: Travis, where are you? Why are you whispering?

TRAVIS: I’m in Dr. McKenna’s office. I had to break in.

GORDO: You what?!

TRAVIS: How else was I going to get my hands on her Rolodex?

GORDO: Travis, that’s a felony!

TRAVIS: No. The cleaning people are here and the door was already open. It’s only a misdemeanor. Now, listen to me. I found Craig. He’s in Saratoga Springs, New York. If I can hitch a ride as far as—

GORDO: You’re going to call him first—right?

TRAVIS: Call him? You mean talk to him?

GORDO: Isn’t that the general idea?

TRAVIS: What if he figures out who it is? If he remembers me like I remember me, I’m sunk.

GORDO: Travis, you’re squeaking again.

TRAVIS: I have to go.

GORDO: Don’t leave any prints.

TRAVIS: I’ve already dusted.

FROM THE DESK OF

Gordon Duboise

Pop:

The first half of the outline. Let me know what you think.

ARGOSY ENTERTAINMENT

Literary Representatives

LOS ANGELES

NEW YORK

TORONTO

LONDON

Gordon:

There may be a problem on page 6. Are you sure you want to have him break into her office? No one’s that much of a nut ball.

When do I get to find out what happens?

Gordo:

You don’t know me, but I own a restaurant in St. Louis and Travis is in jail. He called me from the police station and asked me to remind you that the freezer needs to be defrosted next week.

It’s probably my fault that he wound up in the clink. I shouldn’t have kicked him out for rearranging my olives or asking me to pose as his wife. Ever had a pelvic exam? It’s like driving a Ferrari through a keyhole.

If this doesn’t make any sense, tough shit. Pathologize him yourself.

The arraignment’s at 2:00 A.M. All he needs is somebody to vouch for him (I ought to have my head examined) and $175 for the trespassing fine. That’s if he doesn’t tell them what he was really doing in a gynecologist’s office at midnight. Personally, if I was a judge and he spilled the genuine beans, I’d lock him up for ten to twenty. Maximum security. Anybody who’s willing to hitch three thousand miles after twenty years to find a boy who’s probably forgotten him in the first place is either a public menace or an angel. And so far the evidence is pretty conclusive.

After I spring his ass, he’s sleeping on my living room couch where I can keep an eye on him. Call it a time-out. He can have his motel room back when he learns how to behave.

By the way, your website is pretty unappetizing. Most women already think that men are just penises with support systems. You’re not helping.

A.J. Larkin

A.J.:

Which olive routine did he pull? Taking out the pits or pointing the pimentos down?

He’s only got $837 in traveler’s checks on him 'not counting the Neiman-Marcus credit card), but he needs it to find Craig. So I just wired $175 to the Western Union office on Lewis and Clark Boulevard. It’s in your name and they’re open all night.

I think you got the wrong impression from my website. I am a penis with a support system. Didn’t you check out my Speedo pictures while you were there?

Call me as soon as you get Travis home. I don’t care how late it is. I have a date tonight, but since I can’t remember her name we ought to be in and out of bed pretty quick. (Actually, I made that up—but I figure you deserve a run for your money.)

Gordo

P.S. One word of advice before you invite him over: lock up the Pine-Sol.

ST. LOUIS POLICE DEPARTMENT

STATEMENT

Please detail your recollection of the circumstances surrounding your
arrest. This statement is inadmissible as evidence until you have signed it
where indicated.

Dear Your Honor:

In the event you have issues about sexual orientation, please global-search the name Craig and replace it with

Mar or Beth or Heather at your discretion. In any scenario, the points of law remain the same.

Craig and I fell in love with each other when we were kids, but for some reason it didn’t sink in until last week. So I tried to track him down and ran into a brick wall instead. Then I remembered that his mother was a doctor in St. Louis—but when I called her, she didn’t seem to respond well to the fact that I was sleepdeprived and incoherent.

That’s why I decided I needed to talk to her in person. But after I got here, I found out she was a gynecologist, so I couldn’t exactly make an appointment with her. Which brings us to the night in question.

While I was pacing the streets deciding whether to jump out a window or hang myself, I passed the Jefferson Medical Center, which is approximately two blocks from my motel. It was then I noticed that the front door was open and the security guard was nowhere to be seen (presumably, he was relieving himself elsewhere(. I didn’t intend to enter the premises, but the opportunity was irresistible. It was kind of like when Fanny Brice stuck the pillow under her wedding dress just before the bride number so she’d look pregnant. She didn’t mean to do it, but it was sitting there on the couch practically daring her.

Once inside, I discovered that the door to Dr. McKenna’s suite was ajar and a cleaning cart was in the hall. Since I saw no one else present, I kind of squirmed my way past the reception desk and into the doctor’s office. Which is actually kind of touching when you think about it. After all, it’s not like I was stealing anything.

Having found Dr. McKenna’s Rolodex sitting on her desk, it was only a matter of moments before I’d located Craig’s address and telephone number. Period. That’s all I did. But by then I could hear a vacuum cleaner coming down the hall, so I knew I couldn’t go out the way I came in. And seeing as Suite 100 is on the first floor, I saw no harm in leaving by the window. That’s when the alarm went off. They have an excellent security system, Your Honor.

If I hadn’t slipped in the mud and landed in an azalea bush, I’d have been back at Motel 6 before the police even showed up. But it didn’t work out that way.

That’s the whole truth, Your Honor. And if you were in love, you’d have done the same thing.

Respectfully submitted,

Travis Puckett

On second thought, this is a really bad idea. Especially if they still have firing squads in Missouri. Maybe I’d better lie. Through my teeth.

1
MUNICIPAL COURT OF THE ST. LOUIS JUDICIAL DISTRICT

COUNTY OF ST. LOUIS, STATE OF MISSOURI

2

3

4 CITY OF ST. LOUIS,

)

CASE NO.

M98–020331

5

)

6 Plaintiff,

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