I’m Losing You (4 page)

“Ho ho. Ships in the night,” said Phylliss.

“It's like a
New Yorker
cartoon,” he said.

“Only better drawn.”

The diminutive man in coveralls squinted as the day nurse led him to the living room. In the center of the space was a round marble table with a gigantine flower arrangement befitting the lobby of a small hotel. Modern paintings—little Dines and Twomblys—mixed with sculptures of antiquity and a piano so grand it seemed a parody; upon it, a thicket of family photos in the small, elaborate, variegated frames favored by the rich. Serena Ribkin sat on a Donghia sofa, on a slice of bedsore-repelling sheepskin. Simon realized what he'd
smelled at the door was emanating from the frail, elegant woman with black bangles and grayish skin.

“What seems to be the problemo?”

“There is a family of raccoons on the hillside,” she began, most grandiloquent, “and I am worried one of them has died in the house.”

“Okay. Yes. That could be una problemo.”

“It's particularly strong in the guest room and den.”

“Okay. Right. How long have you been aware of the smell?”

“Juana?” Simon thought it an odd name for the nurse, who looked Danish. “Juana, how long have we had that smell?”

“A few days.” With this, the saturnine aide took her leave.

“What makes you think it's a raccoon?”

“I feed them at night. They come right down the hill, a mama and her two babies. But now they don't come.”

“Right. Okay. And you think one of our friends died under the house.”

The woman looked stricken. “I hope not! If it was one of the babies, do you think the mother would—what would she do? Keep vigil by the body?”

“Right. Uh huh. Okay.”

“Would she try to
bury
it?”

“That's one for Marlin Perkins. Can I go to the—den, did you say it was?”

“Please. What is your name?”

“Simon. But people know me as the Dead Animal Guy.”

“I am Serena Ribkin.”

“Beautiful home. Used to live a hop, skip and a jump from here, on Saltair. My mom still does.”

“The smell is so awful.”

“It tends to be—always part of the problemo. If our critter's found a nice little niche to make his quantum leap to the Great Unknown, there's not a whole heck of a lot I can do short of taking a few bites out of your wall—which I don't think would thrill either one of us. To summarize, I'm not actually equipped to do that. I pretty much go under houses, and that's all she wrote. To summarize, the last time I looked, I didn't have the Jaws of Life handy. If that
is
the case and Fluffy has gone and wedged himself in a remote area, these
things usually burn themselves out in three to seven days. I'll still have to charge you sixty-five dollars just for saying hello. Now, if we
find
our Roger Raccoon or Peter Possum or what have you and it's purely a matter of crashing a maggot party, we have no problemos. While I'm here, I'll take a nice look at your screens. I have to tell you that I am against hiring someone to do a patch job; it's almost part of my covenant. They will rob you blind. If you're not all that worried about aesthetics—judging by this place, you are!—but if you're
not
all that worried, you can spend a fraction of what a professional would charge, by doing it yourself. But I'll take a nice long look. Part of the package.”

Knowing that this American Gothic, this spindly hired hand, was rooting around below was a source of immense comfort to the old woman, who closed her eyes and listened for subterranean maunderings. She hoped he would find no coons yet the satisfaction derived from knowing the thing was being faced head-on gave her a moment of peace that felt innovative, potentiating the effects of the Demerol. All her life she had taken solace from the good offices of those involved in service—the handymen of Rockwell's America, armies of commonsense illuminati with natural born dexterous gifts, men who dismantled and trimmed, gutted and washed away, improvised and cobbled, unstopped, unplugged and unstuck; men who removed unwanted things, useless or dead. She wanted him down there forever, guard of the underworld; now and then, he could surface for a meal, sitting with her at the captain's table of the kitchen banquette as she sipped her painkiller, telling all the Huck Finn things he'd seen from the mystic engine room as they trawled their way to the far sodalities of Raccoon Cove.

It was cool and vast beneath the house. The place was like a showroom, tightly packed dirt so clean it might have been the floor of a natural history exhibit featuring basements of rich suburban hillside dwellers of the late twentieth century. The Dead Animal Guy liked this woman and was faintly embarrassed for her. He knew he would find nothing.

Suddenly tired, Simon sat cross-legged, lighting a cigarette. Maybe he should call Calliope before dropping in—sometimes she went nutzoid if he didn't. Oh the hell with it. He was so close, he'd stop and have a sandwich on the way back to Huntington Beach. What
was the problemo? Visiting the old homestead was a bit of a dysfunctional detour. He should really go straight home to work. Eight months ago, he'd bought half a dozen
Blue Matrix
episodes at Script City in Hollywood. They'd been gathering dust on the floor beside his bed; it was high time to enter ye olde Writing Phase. Back at Three Strikes Exterminators, before he was an independent contractor, he'd met one of the
Blue Matrix
producers on a job, removing what looked to be a mephitic, larva-shimmering leather shoe from the crawlspace beneath a Studio City home—
ur
-Fluffy, in fact. Simon had a
Matrix
premise concerning a dying Vorbalidian emperor, and the producer, Scott Sagabond, had been encouraging. The veterinary mortician still carried the man's scuffed-up card in his wallet.

“Mother?”

The voice resonated with eerie clarity, and Simon scurried to a vent. Pairs of feet shuffled above.

“Is that you, Donny?” Serena asked.

“Juana called me in the car.”

“Why did she do that?”

“Actually, I called
her
. I had a meeting nearby and wanted to pop in.”

The old woman coughed with displeasure. “I don't know why you called him, Juana.”

“I didn't, Mrs. Ribkin.”

“I don't like being spied on.”

“Mother, you're being silly.”

“No one's spying, Mrs. Ribkin.”

“Don't you patronize!” A pause. “Are you hungry?”

“I'm fine.”

“Juana, will you tell Veronica to make a tuna salad?”

“Is someone here?” Donny asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Juana said someone was here.”

Simon stubbed out his cigarette and emerged from under the house. He knocked on the door and the man answered. He was around forty, pudgy, with thinning orange hair. He wore a deep blue suit and glary, tieless white shirt fastened to the top, each button a different size and shape, ranging from chunks of ivory to tiny animal horns. As Simon began his spiel, Donny Ribkin was already
digging in his pocket for cash: He sent the Dead Animal Guy packing without benefit of a migratory discourse on vent-cover aesthetics.

As he left, Simon heard the old woman call to her son, the nurse and whoever else might listen: “I tell you there is something dead in this house.”

“Oh hi, Mitch.”

Simon poked his way through the Traulsen fridge. The view of the yard—his erstwhile domain—was panoramic. Gardeners moved like beadles through hedges; swimming pool generator hummed. The guest house presented its anodynous, photogenic façade.

“Didn't see you come in.” His stepfather's bogus, in-patient smile lit up the room like a hospital cafeteria.

“I had a job over in Bel Air.”

“We haven't seen you in a while.”

“I've been a wee bit frantic—no estoy el problemo.”

“Does your mother know you're here?”

“That's a negative.”

“There's some wonderful cheese in there.” Mitch took over the Traulsen, reestablishing supremacy. He grinned, scanning Simon's coveralls. “I hope you're pretty well dusted off.” He went to the cabinet and got a plate. “How's business?”

“Things were dead but now they're picking up.” Simon heh-heh'ed and gulped a Diet Sprite. “Mom with a patient?”

“You mean
client
.” Mitch smiled correctively at Simple Simon. “
Patience
is something we
lose
. We don't lose
clients
—not hopefully, anyway.” Through the window, an Asian girl lingered by a table in front of Mitch's side of the cottage. The stepfather took note then said, “And yes, she's with a client.”

“I probably won't see her then. Need to get home to write.”

“I'll tell Calliope you said hello.”

“You know, I usually charge sixty-five for that—to say hello,” he said, nonsensically. Simon took a parting smear of Brie. “She's getting a real deal. Tell her the Dead Animal Guy stopped by, she
hates
that. No! Tell her Ace Ventura, Dead Pet Detective, was here.”

“I think I'll just say, ‘Your son came by to see you.' So long, Simon. And clean up after yourself, okay?”

Simon watched through the window as Mitch made a hammily breathless entrance, greeting the Client as if graciously squeezing her between photo shoots and tribute dinners—all he ever wanted, Simon thought, was to be famous like his wife. By the way the Asian looked at him, she was clearly in the honeymoon of transference. Probably some TV exec, but to Simon, she was a dead ringer for the sniper in
Full Metal Jacket
. “Me so haw-nee. Me analyze you long time.” Simon laughed, warm Sprite fizzing from a nostril. Mitch unlocked the door of his office, each movement performed with craftsmanlike felicity, a kind of in-the-now small-town ardor, a joyous, fraudulent humility that insidiously celebrated
himself
while reasserting the Client's pathetic station. Yes: if Dr. Markowitz was on a steady jog through leafy Brentwood byways, then his troubled flock was on a nude, witless jag through Bosnian streets.

Moments after Mitch and the whore from Saigon vanished, a large, elegantly dressed black plunked himself down in one of the Adirondack thrones. Simon did a double take: it was Hassan DeVore—aka Fista, the Vorbalidian antihero of
Blue Matrix
. The Dead Animal Guy fairly yawped. His very own mother just happened to be therapist to the Chief Navigator of the Starship
Demeter
! Simon glanced at the clock; twelve of. He swiped his lips and raced outside.

“Uh, excuse me…”

DeVore gaped at him, thinking he was an intruder.

“I'm Calliope's son.”

He broke into a smile as wide as a starship bridge. “Nice to meet you!” The actor was known for his basso profundo, as for his courtly, theatrical manner.

“She'll kill me for talking to you—”

“No,” he said stalwartly. “I won't let her.
And
it would be bad for her practice.”

“I just had to tell you how big a fan I am.”

“Why, thank you very much!”

“I'm Simon—Krohn.”

“Pleased to meet you, Simon. I'm Hassan.”

He warmly shook Simon's hand before settling back onto the chair.

“I went to the last
Matrix
convention. I didn't feel great about spending forty dollars to get in—”

“It's terrible,” he said, with real sympathy. “It's a lot of money, I know.”

“Some friends and I wound up counterfeiting passes.”

“Counterfeit passes! That's
marvelous
.”

“We have a kind of street-gang thing going. You know—hip-hop crypto-terrorists.” DeVore was baffled but charmed. “A little postmodern Yippiedom. It's retro, but it keeps Big Brother away.”

“How old are you, Simon?”

“Thirty-five going on sixty-four going on twelve.”