Playground (39 page)

egg hunt.

Strolling past the buffet area, we notice James Caan, Smokey

Robinson, Jeff Goldblum, and Bill Maher, surrounded by tons of

Playmates. We fill our plates with hamburgers and French fries.

Then we sit on a lounge chair in front of the roped-off section

watching flamingos walk by.

Looking around at all the memorable faces I feel myself begin

to relax like I haven’t in years. What I was hearing and seeing

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around me was so absolutely familiar, so real, so much of what I

know, that it was like breathing fresh air again. I felt like I had

come home and many of the women I had known since the eight-

ies were like sisters. As I overhear them talk about different parties

and people they know, it was like listening to my own story.

Old-school Playmates, butlers, security guards, and Mansion

regulars ask where I’ve been, why I don’t come up as often anymore.

“I’ve reduced my Mansion drop bys to only the big parties,” I

tell them. But then I stop to think about why I don’t frequent the

Mansion as much, and the truth is there is a difference between

now and the wide-eyed delight I experienced as a child.

I look around at all the tan skinny girls who are still in their

early twenties and I begin to feel the wrinkles underneath my eyes,

the stresses that go along with everyday responsibilities.

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that my two very different

teenage lives were part of one lifetime. I cannot allow myself to be-

come lost in never-never land again, to escape reality to such a de-

gree that I can no longer differentiate between the two worlds.

Yet I continue to gravitate toward it because it was once my

home, a place where I felt most comfortable and complete.

I notice Hef sitting alone behind the roped-off secured section

next to the pool. There is a security guard standing in front of the

velvet rope. Hef is waiting for my father to begin playing backgam-

mon. Tyler and I walk up to say Happy Easter to Hef as the secu-

rity guard asks me if I know where my father is. I finally tell them

he is outside the back gate with one of his ex-girlfriends. I overhear

security guards on walkie-talkies communicating with each other

as they search for my father.

“I think he’s lost.” I overhear security guards on walkie-talkies,

communicating with each other as they search for my father.

“Jennifer says he may be off the grounds, near the back gate.”

There is silence as another security guard responds.

“Is the Doc off the property? Copy?”

“Jennifer says he is by the back gate. Mr. Hefner is looking for

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him to begin playing backgammon. Please find him immediately.”

The security guards “Roger” and “Over and out” each other.

We reach Hef, who is sitting underneath a yellow umbrella. He

taps the backgammon table, eager to play, as Tyler says, “Jennifer

has taught me how to play backgammon and now I’m hooked,”

she says, shaking me out of my thoughts.

“Well, I guess if you’re going to be hooked, it’s better to be

hooked on backgammon,” Hef says as my father runs through the

backyard half dressed.

“There’s Doc,” we overhear security guards say through

walkie-talkies.

He appears so dazed that all the security guards are laughing.

His shirt is off and his belt buckle is hanging undone. He races to-

ward us. “I’m not hired help!” he yells at me as if I have something

to do with his erriatic behavior.

“Sorry, Hef, a girl was in dire need,” Dad says as he stares Tyler

up and down. “Nice tits,” he mumbles under his breath. “What can

I say? She wanted me,” he tells Hef (regarding the girl in need).

“She must’ve been confused,” Hef says. My father grabs a

Cuban cigar in a long silver container out of his duffle bag, which

is filled with bottles of prescription pills. “Here, batteries aren’t

included,” he says, handing it to me. Tyler looks at the cigar, con-

fused.

“Do you care to inspect it yourself, little girl?” my father asks

Tyler and she turns away, embarrassed. We get up and walk back

down the cobblestone pathway to the bar.

One of the security guards whispers to me, “You’re father is a

crackup. He comes into the pantry every day looking for deodor-

ant, telling us he forgot to put it on.” He shakes his head. “You

should take a picture of him and send it to him on Father’s Day

saying, ‘Thanks for embarrassing me.’ ” The security guard chuck-

les and his laughter echoes through me.

“Your father reminds me of Ozzy Osbourne,” Tyler says,

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laughing. We laugh, but inside I am very sad. A fog surrounds him

now. He has become a shell of the man who in many ways is a

true genius.

He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth, my grand-

father continues to remind me to this day. He can diagnose any-

one, discover problems that other doctors often overlook. He has

an instinct about people and their illnesses. It separates him from

everyone else. He is respected and rewarded not only for his

knowledge but also for saving lives. People turn their cheek and

ignore his behavior because of his charm and quick wit. No one

knows what to say about it, so they don’t say anything. They sim-

ply acknowledge he is Hef ’s right-hand man, a medical genius

who enjoys himself a little too much, and they leave it at that.

It was as if I was now seeing him clearly, not only through my

eyes but also through the eyes of others, and the image was not

pretty.

My deep sorrow for him and who he has become affects me in

ways I cannot explain. It’s painful to watch the downfall of your

hero. In the eyes of my youth, he could do no wrong. As a child, I

recall standing next to my father, watching him with reverent eyes.

He was able to walk between worlds, calmly cross lines that most

people never dreamed of crossing.

I cannot reach my father now. We have grown apart. Though

he loves me, our language is a distant dialogue filled with years

of forgotten moments. I doubt if he recalls the tremors I still feel

from the past. I want him to admit how he brainwashed me to

view the world with an untrusting eye. I want him to take respon-

sibility for his behavior, the damaging words he fed me like a daily

poison, but that day never comes.

I am haunted every night by the unresolved horrors; the unan-

swered questions are calling out to me and I cannot unscramble

them. I cannot face them. My heart races and nothing will slow it

down. Thoughts spin out of control as voices from the past begin

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to resurface. Fear and anxiety are such a part of my life now. They

are my permanent escort, my eternal consolation prize.

I’m having a mid-thirties breakdown.

It is impossible to miss the message of my childhood: empti-

ness inside stemming from irreconcilable parental neglect. My

parents thought it was over once I became of age, once they were

free from responsibility. But they can never erase their unfortunate

mistake. I wonder if I will ever swim free from the anxiety that

binds me to my childhood.

That’s when things get pharmaceutical. Once a youth med-

icated for survival, now I self-medicate to ease the mental noise

that never ceases, never eases up on me. I seek solace in the chem-

ical courage of forbidden pleasures, trying to comfort the demons

that reared up and threaten to envelop me. I’m on a diet of anti-

depressants and anti-anxiety meds. I have succumbed to prayer

and massive doses of Klonopin. I’m on the fast track to nowhere.

The wonderful thing about anti-anxiety pills is that I can be at the

epicenter of my own personal tragedy and I don’t even know it.

I leave the Easter party and stop by my pharmacist’s house, a

few blocks from the Mansion, to pick up the bottle of Zoloft he

left waiting for me outside his door.

After a falling-out with Michael Jackson’s plastic surgeon in the late

nineties, Dad relocated his office and now shares office space in

Beverly Hills with the newest and hottest plastic surgeon of the

millennium.

I stop by for a botox injection. The reception area is high-tech

with flat-screen television monitors covering every wall. Samples

of various types of silicone implants are on display for women to

touch. Video monitors run footage of before and after pictures of

topless women.

I recognize ex-Playmates and many well-known actresses on

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their cell phones. Out of nowhere, a blonde screams “Jennifer!” as

I’m signing in at the front desk. At first I have no idea who she is

until she says, “I’m a friend of your father’s. Do you remember me?

Your father and I had dinner at the Ivy a few weeks ago.” I vaguely

recall running into my father and a soap opera actress while they

were having dinner with a few friends. He was obsessing over

some dumb Russian nineteen-year-old.

“I’m on the phone with your father right now! He’s yelling at

me because he’s running an hour late and expects me to wait!” the

actress laughs, and I attempt to fake a smile.

Two seconds later, the reception door opens and three cute

young girls rush into Dad’s waiting room giggling, asking to see

Dr. Feel Good. They are told to leave their head shots and naked

pictures of themselves at the front desk.

On their way out, I overhear them say, “I pray to be invited to

the Halloween party. I heard the list was closed days ago.”

The other girl says he’s “known around town as the guy to get

you in at the last minute.”

Dad finally arrives at his office and he gives the actress a wet

kiss on the lips.

“You’re next to see the Doc, Ms. Dunkin Donut.”

“Last night somebody told me you were dead,” the actress tells

my father.

“And you still kept your appointment?” he asks.

“Hi, Dad, remember me?”

“Have we met?” he looks at me through beady eyes.

“Very funny, ha, ha. What about all the other people waiting?

I ask.

“Those aren’t people, those are models,” he tells me as we go

into his office.

I immediately pour myself a cup of coffee as strong as heroin

as his secretary’s voice comes in over the intercom, announcing

that Hef is on line two. Dad picks up the phone.

“What? I’m extremely busy and important,” he says with a

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smile. “Okay, fine, send me an embarrassingly large limo with a

driver and a hooker, and I’ll be there in ten minutes,” he chuckles

and hangs up. “Call me shallow,” he shrugs as he quickly examines

the actress. “You’re fine,” he tells her. “Lose ten pounds and make

an appointment in two weeks,” he says as he quickly gathers all his

scattered papers and throws more bottles of prescription pills into

a duffel bag.

“You can’t leave. Don’t you have to work? I ask.

“I am working. What’s wrong with you? I’m being paid to treat

and undress ten gorgeous Playmates at the Mansion. Which would

you choose?” he says sternly, exiting his office in a mad dash

through the side door with his stethoscope dangling around his