Benchley, Peter - Novel 07 (3 page)

 
          
 
"Look, the train broke down in the Meadowlands.
..." As if that explained it all. As if he expected her to lean back and
say, "Oh, no wonder! Then I guess we can adjourn. Sorry to bother
you."

 
          
 
Preston wondered if perhaps he was going mad.

 
          
 
“Are you trying to tell me you didn't have any
drinks this morning, Scott?"

 
          
 
“I’m not trying to tell you anyth—“

 
          
 
“Because you smell like a distillery."

 
          
 
“I do not! That's . . . that's ..."

 
          
 
“Impossible? Were you going to say ‘impossible'?"
Dolores Stark smiled, not unkindly. “Because you ate a bunch of mints? Come on,
Scott. Never try to shit a shitter."

 
          
 
Sweat coursed down Preston's scalp, dripped
off his hair and into his ears. He opened his collar button, loosened his tie.
He turned to Warren, who was examining his knuckles.

 
          
 
“Why are you doing this,
Warren
?"

 
          
 
Dolores Stark answered. 'This is what we call
an intervention, Scott."

 
          
 
"I'm not talking to you!"

 
          
 
"Fine, Scott. Talk to Warren, then."
She shifted her gaze to Warren and locked it on him, as if injecting him with
her strength.

 
          
 
Warren
shot an angry glance at Dolores Stark. He
probably hired her to be the assassin, Preston thought, and she put the knife
in, but now she's forcing him to turn it.

 
          
 
"Scott ..." Warren said. "We
want to help you see what we see. We want to help you help yourself, before
it's too late."

 
          
 
"I do my work. I do it damn well. And you
know it." Stupid! You've just begged him to find fault with you. He’ll be
on your back like a baboon looking for lice.

 
          
 
Warren's jaw set and his skin tone darkened a
shade as he looked directly into Preston's eyes.

 
          
 
“On February sixteenth at
seven p.m.
, you called Paul Sanders in
Pennsylvania
and spoke with him about a proposal for a
novel."

 
          
 
Warren paused, and Preston said,
"Guilty."

 
          
 
"On February seventeenth at ten a.m., you
called him again and began to repeat the entire conversation, as if the one the
night before had never occurred. You had forgotten it. Every word."

 
          
 
Oh shit. "No! I just wanted to clear
up—"

 
          
 
"On January twentieth, you had lunch with
Nat Brower and agreed on an advance for a book. Weeks later, his agent called
Accounting and asked where the papers were. You had never submitted them, had
never cleared the advance with me."

 
          
 
"Oh. Well. It must've-"

 
          
 
"What was the figure, Scott? How much did
you agree to pay?"

 
          
 
Preston's shorts were soaked. A searing spasm
shot through his lower bowel. "Offhand? I can't—"

 
          
 
"Would you like me to go on?" Warren
pulled a sheet of paper from his pocket.

 
          
 
Preston looked at his shoes. They were nice
shoes. From Brooks Brothers. Old and comfortable, made supple by a thousand
applications of Meltonian Cream. Good-bye, shoes.

 
          
 
Dolores Stark held up a hand to Warren. She
said softly, "Margaret?"

 
          
 
Preston looked at Margaret. She was clutching
her purse in a death grip, as if trying valiantly to transfer all her bilious
fury to that leather sack.

 
          
 
When she spoke, her voice was flat, dead. “When
was the last time Kimmie had friends home, Scott?”

 
          
 
The question struck
Preston
as petty, inane. “When was the last time
you had your legs waxed? How the hell should I know?"

 
          
 
“It was months ago, Scott, months and months
ago. And do you know why? Because she doesn't dare bring her friends home
anymore because she never knows what kind of shape you're going to be in and
it's no fun to be humiliated by your own father."

 
          
 
Resentment bred with anger spawned
recklessness. "That's nonsense! I never—"

 
          
 
“No, you never vomited on the living-room floor
or fell down the stairs. But do you remember the night you were in the kitchen
having a little Stoly from the freezer and Kimmie and Wendy Porter came in and
you said with a cute little leer on your face that you thought Mary Benson had
a really nice pair of hooters?"

 
          
 
"I ..." He did not remember.

 
          
 
"I didn't think so. How about her
birthday last year when she had a slumber party and you decided it would be
jolly to put on some ‘good' music and dance—just you and your friend Johnnie
Walker and SIX FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLD GIRLS!"

 
          
 
Preston saw the veins on Margaret's temples
pulsing, and he imagined rivulets of poison dripping from her lips.

 
          
 
Kimberly put her head in her hands and sobbed.
Preston
said, “Kimmie . . ." He wanted to go
to her, to hold her, but he felt dirty, as if his touch would contaminate her.
So he lashed out at Margaret. “Why did you bring her here? Why are you so
cruel?''

 
          
 
“Because she's part of you, Scott," said
Dolores Stark. “Everyone here is part of you. Everyone your life touches becomes
a co-alcoholic with you.”

 
          
 
“Whoa! Just whoa!" The four syllables of
the forbidden word had pushed
Preston
's
reflexive trigger. “Don't you steamroll me, lady. I may be a bad guy now and
then, but I am not an alcoholic."

 
          
 
“I see." A nauseatingly beatific smile
played on her face.

 
          
 
How serene she was, how imperturbable, how . .
. superior. She seemed to anticipate his every response. Was he so boringly
predictable?

 
          
 
“No fucking way," he said, using the
proscribed F-word to demonstrate conviction and determination. And to rattle
Dolores Stark.

 
          
 
She smiled again. “So what do you propose to
do about being a bad guy, Scott?"

 
          
 
“I’ll quit."

 
          
 
Margaret snorted.

 
          
 
“No, I mean it. Seriously. I know I've quit
before, but that was just to prove I could. I didn't have any motive to really
quit. But now I do." Preston warmed to his own argument. He saw an escape.
“This has been really helpful for me. I didn't see that I was affecting other
people. But now that I have, now that you've made me see it, I'll quit. Once
and for all."

 
          
 
He smiled at them all, imploring them to
believe this facade of gratitude, hoping that none of them could see behind it
to the scenario rolling before his eyes: a beaker of iced Stohchnaya floating
on a bar, reflections of mahogany dancing in the diamond liquid.

 
          
 
“When, Scott?" Dolores Stark asked.

 
          
 
“When what?"

 
          
 
“When are you going to quit?"

 
          
 
The answer was in his mouth. He intended to
say, “Right now," or ''This minute." There was no percentage in
telling them the truth because they wouldn't understand that it takes a couple
of days to taper off properly.

 
          
 
But before a word could be shaped by his thick
tongue, Dolores Stark said, ''Monday, right?"

 
          
 
He stared at her. The bitch is psychic.

 
          
 
"You don't want to quit on a weekend. You
can't do it. Nobody can. It's unreasonable to try. There are just too many
pressures. You're bound to fail. And then you feel even worse." She
paused. And then that accursed smile again. "Right, Scott?"

 
          
 
Preston's mouth must have been hanging open,
for he felt a breeze on his teeth. He whispered, "Right."

 
          
 
"You're not going to quit, Scott."

 
          
 
He was hypnotized. "I'm not?"

 
          
 
"No, because you can't. We think we can,
and we try, we really do try, and we do quit. For a week or ten days or two
weeks or, some of us, for a month or two. But we always go back." She
wasn't smiling now. "No, Scott, there's only one way, and that's the way
you have to take."

 
          
 
"What's that?"

 
          
 
Dolores Stark looked at Margaret and Kimberly
and Warren—a final confirmation of unanimity—and then said to Preston, "We
want you to go into treatment."

 
          
 
"Huh?" It took a beat for the
euphemism to register and then to shed its nicety and reappear as the monster
it was. "A loony bin? Me? Forget it." Preston didn't realize he was
shouting until he heard Warren's stem voice in soft contrast to his own shrill
protests.

 
          
 
“We didn't come here to vote on it, Scott. The
only choice you have is: You can go into treatment, or you can get fired."

 
          
 
“And divorced," Margaret added.

 
          
 
Preston
swallowed acid. “Nice,
Warren
, really nice. Judge and jury . . . Look, I can't just hop on a plane
and-"

 
          
 
Warren reached inside his jacket and withdrew
an airline-ticket folder. "
One o'clock
, JFK to
Santa Fe
."

 
          
 
“
Santa Fe
? What's in Santa Fe?"

 
          
 
“The Banner Clinic."

 
          
 
"Banner! That's a lush bin!"

 
          
 
Dolores Stark leaned forward and smiled.
"And . . . ?"