“Good morning,” I say calmly but sternly to Kathi, still snug in last night’s nest, Roy asleep beside her, both with no knowledge of what the day holds.
Kathi doesn’t move. “I have to tell you something unpleasant,” I add.
“What?” she says, alive, awake.
“It’s a Google Alert.”
“Who’s that?” she asks.
“No, it’s not a person. It’s an email I get whenever you’re mentioned on the Internet. And you got several mentions this morning.”
“Oh, no,” she says, bracing, sitting up in bed.
“A tabloid posted a picture of you—”
“Oh, no—”
“And there’s an unflattering story attached to it—”
“OH, NO—”
“And it mentions me!” I yell. “What is everyone going to say about me? My father? My fellow assistants? Everyone’s going to think I’m not taking good care of you!”
“Who gives a fuck about you?” Kathi says. “Give me the phone. What about me?”
She reaches, but I turn away from her and read the headline: “It says: ‘Is Kathi Kannon Back on Drugs?’” I look up at her, glaring.
“WHAT?!” she screams. “Give it!” she yells, ripping the covers off her body and hurling herself out of bed. Roy perks up but doesn’t follow—he knows when to hang back.
Kathi tries to wrestle my phone away, but I block her as I read, “‘Kathi Kannon has been spotted suspiciously coming and going from a strange apartment in West Hollywood for at least a week, maybe longer. She always emerges a few minutes later, frazzled, jumpy, erratic. Sometimes she arrives driving herself,’” I continue, now getting louder, “‘AND SOMETIMES SHE’S DRIVEN THERE BY A YOUNG MAN!’” I face her and I gasp accusingly, “ME! And there’s a photo of me! Outside of that orange building I took you to in West Hollywood! Holy shit! Is that Vegas?! Is Vegas drugs?! I look like an enabler! Am I an enabler?”
Kathi rips the phone from my hand and looks at the article, the photos of her, ragged, dazed, unflattering, framed indeed by that orange West Hollywood apartment complex we visited before our recent trip. “Oh my GOD!” she screams, pacing the bedroom, kicking a pile of dirty clothes. “All these pictures must be photoshopped!”
“I don’t think so.”
My job responsibilities include: Tell her the truth.
“That’s what you wore,” I say. “That’s what I wore. That’s how you did—or didn’t do—your hair. And there are other photos, from other days, when I wasn’t with you.”
Kathi continues her nonstop movement through the room, a tour of shame in laps around her bed. “I mean, you could make anyone look like a drug addict if you take enough pictures of them at the wrong angle, with terrible light, with wind and whatnot, or, like this one, while I’m fucking blinking!”
“What about that picture of me in your car?”
“What do you care?” she asks. “Isn’t that your favorite part?”
“No!” I yell. “They’re basically saying I’m a fucking accomplice to you doing drugs!”
Snap: Look how cool I am now. Look at me, the fool, exposed.
“Am I?” I ask. “Am I an accomplice? Are you doing drugs? Were you doing drug deals?”
“Barely,” Kathi says.
“BARELY!”
“Please,” she says. “You feed me drugs every day in those pill cases.”
“I don’t feed you illegal ones! And I don’t put photos of it in magazines for everyone who knows us to see!”
“Has Miss Gracie seen this?” Kathi asks.
“I don’t know.”
“I’m innocent!” Kathi proclaims. “I was just visiting my friend from AA! So what if I didn’t brush my fucking hair for several days in a row!”
“What about me?” I yell. “I’m an enabler! What do I tell people? I’ve been bragging that I’m your stepson!”
“This is not about you!” Kathi yells, throwing my phone back at me, dashing from her bedroom, through the red room and the living room, out the front door, running down the hill screaming, “Mommy!”
Roy and I follow, sprinting behind Kathi to Miss Gracie’s house, passing her garage, noticing the Lincoln parked, the driver’s door open, and Miss Gracie sitting inside.
We all stop in our tracks.
“That’s an angel, that’s a sweet girl…” Miss Gracie is saying, apparently to no one.
“What are you doing in there?” Kathi asks, both of us wondering if it’s a stroke.
Miss Gracie looks up, revealing the spoiled four-legged bundle of fur in her lap. “Having a talk with Uta Hagen.” She notices the frenzy in Kathi’s eyes. “Oh, no, now what?”
“Mommy,” Kathi whines.
“But I’m so much more than that!” Miss Gracie says. “An accomplished actress—”
“A tabloid says I’m ugly and on drugs again!”
“Are you?” Miss Gracie asks coldly.
“Am I ugly?”
“No, are you on drugs again?”
“Of course not,” Kathi says. “Please help me!”
Miss Gracie turns to me and says, “This is why she needs her mother, dear. Never forget that.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I say.
Miss Gracie, her gaze still locked with mine, her hands now tightly gripping the steering wheel, asks me, “Is she on drugs, dear?”
When Miss Gracie looks at you—a gaze perfected by a lifetime in front of cameras of all shapes and sizes—it’s stunning. Not in a good way. I am actually stunned. Like someone is using a Taser on me. So I say nothing. This is a trap for sure. Miss Gracie continues staring. Kathi, not used to being out of the center of attention, is quiet, looking back and forth from me to Miss Gracie, wondering how this will play out.
I stand with my mouth open, blushing, still praying Miss Gracie will move on, as she says, “This is a question, dear. I’m asking you a question.”
Instead of sweating, I have simply “sweat,” with all my body’s moisture dumped out of me at once through my forehead, upper lip, neck. Armpits, too, but they’re not visible as I have my arms clenched tightly to my sides, as if I’m a Transformer action-figure version of a celebrity assistant, trying to convert back into an ink pen or notepad, trying to squeeze my arms into my body so the rest can fold up and disappear. The sweat causes my glasses to start sliding off my face.
“We’re innocent victims,” Kathi interjects, in my defense.
“I warned you,” Miss Gracie says to me, pointing her finger.
“It’s all lies!” Kathi says.
“Well,” Miss Gracie says, turning to Kathi. “You know what is true? I’m old and sick and have nearly died many times.”
“No, you have not,” Kathi says.
“I’m tired and fragile! And somehow you’re spending all of your inheritance on I-don’t know-what and being written up in these horrid tabloids and I don’t have enough time or enough heart medication to deal with this right now. I have broken ribs—”