It seems the only person I don’t hear from is Drew.
I feel the encumbrance of gravity of this world—not the Kathi Kannon world but my world, the real world, with its judgments and consequences and disapproving looks. I feel a backslide into my depression, of a dark void welling within me, of untenable and unsavory solutions to this mess—I don’t want distance, I don’t want to quit, I don’t want to leave her.
“Mommy will fix it. Problem solved!” Kathi shouts as I enter her bedroom. She’s getting dressed to go out.
“Not really,” I say. “What kind of drugs are we talking about here, Kathi? What’s happening?”
“It’s like nothing,” Kathi says, growing impatient. “Jesus, it’s not crack or something. It’s just medications. I’m just supplementing.”
“Supplementing? Supplementing what? A doctor should make adjustments to your meds if that’s what you need.”
“Who needs doctors? I once played one on TV,” she says, mocking her mother, making knowing eye contact with me, a star’s attempt to reassure me, her audience, though it’s not working, not this time.
“I’m going to Veg—” she says, pausing and restarting. “I’m going out.” She storms into her bathroom and slams the door behind her.
“No, you’re not! We have to have a big fight about this!” I yell to the bathroom door.
Roy hops off her bed and sits by the bathroom door, angry he’s been shut out. He’s glaring at me, willing me to open the door for him, begging me to help him. I say quietly to Roy, “I can’t save you.”
Suddenly, Kathi opens the bathroom door and looks at me, mistaking my comment to Roy as a comment to her. She says to me, “I don’t need you to save me!”
Roy trots inside, and Kathi closes the door again, safe and sealed off from the rest of the wild world, with its silly standards of health and wellness and responsibility.
I don’t need you to save me.
I’m thinking, Maybe you do.
I’m thinking, What are people going to think of her?
I’m thinking, What are people going to think of me?
* * *
Date night should be a grand distraction from the fits and starts of life with Kathi Kannon, but I can’t get in touch with Drew. Texts have gone unanswered for a couple of days. I’m sure he’s busy. I’m sure life is hectic. I don’t want to be a pest.
I decide to reach out in a different way.
I stop at the grocery to buy him a little oak tree in a cute, industrial-styled vase that’ll be a perfect match to the décor in his loft. I’m pretty sure this “tree” is just a trash plant, but it’s the closest thing I could get to an oak sapling, a nice way (I hope) to show my affection, and a bribe to fill in the space between us when I’m out of town and unavailable because of my job. It’s also a way to soften what might be a weird day, seeing the guy you’re dating photographed in a tabloid beside an accused drug addict/film icon.
Hey, Siri, I want this to work out.
I park outside of his apartment building and make the journey up. I approach his door and wonder if I should knock. I lean forward and listen to see if I hear anything inside, but there’s only the same thing I’ve heard from him of late: silence.
I put the oak tree on his door’s welcome mat, along with a little note I scribbled: “Thinking of you. Hope all is well. All good with me. Miss ya. xo Oak.”
Back at home, I’m starting to feel crowded by my own filth. I’m still not caught up with laundry and housekeeping after all my travel with Kathi. My luggage is still on the floor, plus all of the boxes Dad sent—I legit look like a hoarder.
Despite Dad’s protests, I have yet to open Mom’s boxes. It’s my small victory over him, my baby step in usurping his authority, his demands.
Fuck him.
I wonder what Mom would think, me using her stuff as a coffee table, eating my TV dinners on her old boxes of—what? I assume old clothes and books and kitchen utensils. I can’t help but also wonder what else I’m avoiding, what else I’m not unpacking.
I fall in and out of sleep on my sofa, me with my phone in hand, no response all night from Drew, and my last text to Kathi, also unanswered:
ME: You okay?
13
A scrappy firing squad is assembled, waiting for our target: Kathi Kannon, film icon. She’s expected at any moment from a jaunt out to run “errands.” Of course, Kathi Kannon doesn’t run any real errands on her own. Errands might be the new code for Vegas.
Seated in the circle of imported leather emperors, animated by the twirling bits of sunlight reflected from the dangling disco ball, is the team of assassins: me, Miss Gracie, Roger, Agnes, and Benny.
“How much longer?” Miss Gracie yells. “All this waiting is giving me arthritis.” Roger immediately takes her hand from her lap and starts to massage it.
“She’s on her way,” I say.
“This is important,” I say.
“This is for the best,” I say.
Hey, Siri, I want Kathi Kannon to live a long, happy life. Or at least long.
The front door swings open, and Kathi Kannon is there, backlit by Beverly Hills. She’s not the least bit startled or worried to see everyone encircled in front of her, silent and waiting in her living room.
“Oh, God,” she says wryly. “You guys need to get out more.”
“Kathi,” I say. “We need to talk to you. This is an intervention.”
“An intervention?!” Miss Gracie pipes up. “No. I’m not dressed for that.” She stands and motions for Roger to help her exit. Roger jumps up and Miss Gracie admonishes him, “You told me Kathi had an announcement.”
“That’s what he told me,” Roger says, pointing to me.
Glaring at me, Miss Gracie shouts, “Him! He can’t be trusted!”
I catch a glimpse of enjoyment on Kathi’s face, a reveling in the discord.
“Okay, okay,” I say. “Calm down. Please stay. I really want to have an honest and helpful chat about recent issues.”
“There’s nothing to discuss,” Kathi says. “That tabloid story was nothing, not true.”
“That’s not what you told me in private.” I turn to my tepid teammates. “She said she was using but barely.”
I’m surprised by the faces absorbing this news: Agnes looks at me with almost a cringe, pity, sorrow, like I’m the one getting bad news; Benny is detached; Roger is focused on Miss Gracie, who is exasperated; and Kathi is stoic, practically daring me to continue. “I think we should discuss whether Kathi’s prior manic episodes were from doctor meds or Vegas meds.”
“Cockring, I’m telling you, that’s all over, okay?” Kathi says, looking around the room. “Are we done now? I feel good about this.”
“Sounds good to me, boss,” Agnes says, waving goodbye.
“Me, too,” Benny says.
“Call me later, dear,” Miss Gracie says, now arm in arm with Roger and heading to the front door.
“No, no, no,” I say. “This is an opportunity to effect real change and start exploring root causes of … things. And to set boundaries and expectations and hope and all that, right?”