TheRapist (7 page)

*

Meringue

Sunshine streamed through the windows of the little apartment just below Sunset, east of Crescent Heights. The sky looked as crisp as a bright blue cracker, as if it had preened itself to be cast as The Big Blue in a new Paramount epic. Across Hollywood, casting directors were sifting through headshots, achingly perfect 8’ x 10’s were plunging into garbage cans by the dozen, some hitting the trash without having even met the eyeline of the Casting Director. Still, there was promise in the air, after all this was Los Angeles: unknown one minute; Queen of the Universe the next.

Beige linen vertical blinds trembled slightly as the breeze wafted past them. Meringue leaned against the French doors, her violet eyes glazed over. She was bored. And homesick. Today she felt low and needing to ease herself out of this feeling, decided she had to bake. She moved into her tiny kitchen, comprised of just a few cabinets, a refrigerator and a stove along the back of the living room wall. She took out the ingredients she needed: butter; eggs; sugar; salt; sour cream; flour; baking powder; cinnamon; baking soda and vanilla. Good vanilla. The butter needed to be at room temperature if she wanted light, fluffy buns but it was as hard as a rock. She sat it out on the balcony and in a few minutes the sun had obliged and the butter was ready to cream with the sugar. Meringue pre-heated the oven and set to work. Twisting the radio dial to a talk station, barely acknowledging the quipping host but just wanting the company of a voice, she began to sift and cream, mix and stir. She took an ice-cream scoop, lovingly wrapped in an old blue frayed tea towel, from the drawer and scooping the mixture, put an equal amount into each muffin case. Within twenty minutes the muffin tray was in the oven and a couple of minutes after that she could smell the comforting scents of baking. She felt a little better. Getting herself a small glass bottle of strawberry juice, she sat at the table by the window and opened the drawer, taking out a pad of thick cream writing paper and matching envelopes lined with apple green tissue paper. Pulling the top off of her violet fountain pen, she pointed the nib to the paper and began to write: Dear Mom…..

After a while the letter was finished, there were tears in her eyes and a couple of the words were smudged with damson ink. She sealed the envelope, wrote the address and then the muffins were ready. Meringue took the tray out of the oven, put them carefully on a wire rack to cool, prised one out of the tray even though it was too early and went out onto the balcony. The view from the third floor was quite incomplete, paralleling most lives in the City of Angels. Flat, sparse rooftops, a red tiled roof, two palms trees swaying absentmindedly in a barely there breeze, a glorious orange tree with Junoesque blooms, all encased in a fine layer of smog that had drifted aimlessly into Hollywood with nowhere to go.

LA in a nutshell: once you had arrived there was no way out and you were trapped between the city and your mind.

Meringue ate her muffin. It was as light as air and as she chewed slowly, another tear rolled down her cheek. She had thought she was feeling better, but the tastes of cinnamon and vanilla reminded her of home.

You couldn’t let them see you cry. Couldn’t say or do anything to offend them. Just had to roll with it, until the real thing came along. The Real Thing. She had had the real thing. Peace of mind anyway. When she lived at home in Florida and worked in the beauty parlor and had dinner with her mom twice a week. She had liked dating Joe too. Going to the movies, dances at the Small Town Supper Club and occasional dinners at Reggie’s Diner. She had been happy enough, even borderline contented. If only she hadn’t decided to try Los Angeles, but there was a constant nagging inside her head that kept asking her, what if, what if, what if you never try? And now that she was there, she couldn’t get away. Her mind felt lost, tormented, raped. Maybe she should see her shrink? Maybe she could make an extra appointment? It was only Monday, and she felt as if she couldn’t wait until Wednesday. That was it! That had to be the answer. She called the office and yes, of course he had time for her later on today. She went back to the view, her relief palpable as she sat on her tiny balcony, a glorious blonde, lost in the City of Angels.

*

Jezzy and Adrian

Montgomery Clift took Elizabeth Taylor in his arms, or rather George took Angie, and the world felt right. He gazed into her as sh
e looked up at him with longing,
their combined beauty almost too breathtaking to
believe
.

Zing! The microwave had finally succumbed to the frenzied popping of the corn. Jezzy pulled herself away from the seduction of the movie, pressed the pause button and looked over at Adrian. He was asleep. How could he sleep through a movie like this? It was so poignant. There was a small bubble of snot on the edge of his right nostril and his mouth hung open ever so slightly. Perplexity had planted itself between her eyebrows and she turned from him, searching for a more pleasing sight, to look out of the window. The rain fell incessantly on the grey rooftops, thumping down relentlessly across London and her mind. She eased herself off of the sofa and went into the kitchen to get the popcorn. Pulling the bag diagonally apart, the steam giving her a fleeting, buttery facial, she tipped the yellow misshapen bulbs of corn into a wicker basket lined with a square of kitchen roll decorated with pale green circles, placed it on the white formica counter top and went to the bathroom. She sat on the toilet and rested for a moment. All she could hear was the sound of her wee in the bowl. Relief seemed to drain from her body and she decided that she must stop feeling so uptight. Listening more acutely, she heard the rain outside and Adrian’s gentle snoring inside. She wiped herself, stood up and looked down at the bowl, thinking she saw her life in the toilet and
that
she was the only one who had the strength to stop herself flushing her existence away. Don’t be so dramatic, she thought silently scolding herself. She washed her hands with blue anti-bacterial soap, plunging the bottle to get more and more liquid, rubbing at her hands again and again to create more foam. Everything is good, she insisted, you have met him again after all these years, so of course it must be right. It’s fate! Can’t argue with fate.

Her hands were getting raw as she rubbed them. Drying them gently as they felt sore, she quickly slathered on some hand cream from a pink tube. Turning to leave, she remembered one more thing and grabbing the handle, she flushed her life down the toilet.

*

Frankie &
Jezzy

Two red and silver balloons tied with ribbons of the same colours breezed into the café...and
Jezzy
tumbled in behind them. All that could be seen of her were her legs,
slim and golden within oiled appearance 7 denier tights
. Balloons
atop faux tanned
legs. Falling into a plastic-seated booth, the balloons now trailing obediently behind her, she gasped, inhaling more than her fair portion of air and grinned widely at Frankie who was casually sipping a bottle of Perrier through a straw. It was a bendy straw with yellow stripes. Frankie yanked at the little accordion b
it attempting to make it longer, causing it to split
as
Jezzy thrust the balloons toward her.

Frankie sat helplessly, holding the balloons and staring sullenly at her split straw. A man fighting with a tray piled high with steaming spaghetti bolognese and slices of pappy white bread tried moving past her and the balloons.

‘Could you move those out of the way?!’ he snapped.

Frankie wrapped the ribbons three times around her left hand to make them shorter, thinking that people like him should be silenced. Then she stared at him, imagining him trying to suck up his spaghetti through a steel muzzle. Suddenly she gave a little snort of laughter. She felt stupid and blushed, feeling like a fool holding two balloons that weren’t even hers and solitarily snorting.

Jezzy
returned with a tray bearing two cups of tea, two iced doughnuts (one pink, the other brown) and a fistful of straws. Frankie eyed the frosting and asked ‘Why do you always get one with pink icing and one with coffee icing when we both like the pink and hate the coffee?’

Jezzy
sank into the booth and pulled apart the coffee doughnut. ‘The coffee one always looks fresher than the pink. The icing looks crispier, don’t you think?’

‘People aren’t supposed to eat brown things on February the 14th,’ said Frankie, sticking her finger into the coffee frosting and licking it, her face developing into a mask of disdain. ‘It’s as horrid as always.’ She pulled down on the ribbons, jabbed at one of the balloons and handed them back to
Jezzy
. ‘Very theme oriented these, who are they from?’

They gazed up at the heart-flecked balloons, floating near the ceiling, bobbing up and down suggestively, daring anybody to question their zaftig beauty.

‘Sorry, I forgot to say Happy Valentine’s Day!’ said
Jezzy
.

‘Go on then,’ smiled Frankie.

‘Happy Valentiny Day!’
Jezzy
laughed al
oud, thinking herself to be very amusing
, and continued, ‘I don’t know who they’re from.’

‘Happy Valentine’s Day,’ sighed Frankie. ‘Are they from Adrian?’

‘No. He wrote me a poem that made me cry and sent an assortment of Valentine-inspired Origami. Please don’t comment.’
They
smiled at each other
, understanding without the need for explanation
.

Frankie plunged her hand into he
r bamboo knapsack, pulled out a printed
e card and pushed it towards
Jezzy
. She studied it, then looked up at Frankie with wide eyes. ‘Oh, it’s beautiful, it says really lovely things.’

‘I know.’

‘Who sent it?’

Frankie opened another straw, being very careful not to split its accordion. ‘Don’t know, it’s not signed.’

‘But you must have some idea!’
Jezzy
was showing the first signs of an onset of frantic behaviour.

Frankie shrugged and sipped, ‘Yeah, it’s the online guy, even though it’s not signed it came from his e mail address, duh!’

‘The guy you haven’t met?’

Frankie nodded and smiled up at
Jezzy
from her icing.

‘You haven’t given him your real address have you, he could turn up on your doorstep or anything!’

‘I gave him your work address, I’m not completely mad!’ Frankie smiled, ‘I thought he might send something there.’

‘Thank you so much for telling me,’ grunted
Jezzy
. ‘I’ll be sure to check my post box for your mail.’

‘I only gave it to him a couple of days ago, just let me know if anything arrives for me please.’

They both stared up at the balloons as the realization dawned on them.

Frankie was feeling calm now, serene almost, for she had a transatlantic
admirer and balloons and she shared this with her best friend.

‘
Jezzy
,’ she whispered. ‘He wants me to fly out.’

Jezzy
almost choked on her doughnut, but knew better than to waste the icing. She inhaled, chewed, swallowed and then exclaimed, ‘Never!’

Frankie nodded.

‘What about Sid?’ asked
Jezzy
.

‘He’s six, he’ll get over me.’

‘Frankie!’

‘No silly, it would be during school hols, I wouldn’t leave Sid in the middle of term.’

‘I quite like this Valentine’s Day,’ sighed
Jezzy
.

‘Yeah, it’s alright actually.’

‘Did you know Saint Valentine was beheaded in 269 ACE?’
Jezzy
had become extremely serious.

‘Really, where?’

‘Well, don’t quote me, but I think it was just above the neck.’ 
Jezzy
became spontaneously hysterical.