by Sam Cooper
"Boris Diaw" will appear in 2 parts. The second half will be on LL tomorrow, Tuesday, March 23rd.
Ellen unlocked the car and Elliot grabbed the passenger side door handle. Rob pushed him and said “Nope,” and got in the front seat of the green 1994 Isuzu Rodeo while Elliot walked around to sit behind the driver.
“It’s ok, I prefer to be chauffeured,” he said, and then gave two dainty claps.
Ellen drove him three blocks to the yellow house where he had a basement room. Elliot thanked Ellen, said he would give them a call, and then waved as he entered through the side door.
“You complain to me about Elliot all the time, and then when we are all together, you encourage him like that. His idea about pulling down puzzle master Will Shortz’s pants and filming it for Youtube was awful, and you kept laughing and egging him on” Rob said.
Ellen had one hand on the wheel on one her belly. “I do complain about Elliot, but I like him. He is funny and smart and I have known him as long as I have known you. What I complain about is his drinking, and the terrible things he does. Last night I watched him pee in a Suburban’s gas tank. He saw me see him, and then slurred something about political integrity and the Kyoto Protocols. He then tried to drive home and it was only when I pulled out my phone and said I was going call the police to report him as a DUI that he gave me his keys. This was after he vomited on that girl. That’s another thing…”
Rob interrupted “Ok, I admit, and I think he would to, that he has some issues with women.”
“What about the girl whose cat he drove to an animal shelter in Olympia.”
Rob shook his head. “You always bring that up. It was two years ago. He’s gotten a lot better about that sort of thing.”
Ellen huffed and sighed. “He is sleeping with two girls he works with, one of whom is only eighteen, and…”
“She’s 19, almost 20.” Rob said.
Ellen shook her head. “That is not really the point. I would never let any girl I know near Elliot, but I have felt that way for years. Nothing new. What I really hate though is that he is such a bad influence on you. I drink, you drink, we both occasionally get drunk. I am not trying to be hypocritical, but when you drink with Elliot you turn into his minion. He says “Jump” and you say “from what bridge?” You can be as cruel as he is, and you make a terrible mess. When you've been out drinking with him and come home the sink smells of urine and half the contents of the fridge are in the bathtub.”
Ellen parked and Rob got out of the car. “It is not as bad as it used to be,” he said.
“That’s because I said I wouldn’t live with you if you let him come over and drink at our place.” He and Ellen walked up the stairs.
They entered the apartment they had moved into three weeks prior. Rob pulled Ellen to the couch and began an act of conciliatory cuddle. Ellen reciprocated and they cooed and moaned and kissed and then Rob attempted to perform cunnilingus on his girlfriend of fifteen months. She passively discouraged and then passively encouraged the act. This lasted for four minuets before Ellen pushed Rob away and ran to the bathroom and had loud diarrhea with the door open.
Rob called out, “I am going to go out for a run.”
Ellen responded, “I am going to stay close to the toilet. Can you return those DVDs to the library?”
“Sure, do you need me to pick anything up?” Rob asked.
“Um, no, maybe, I don’t know, ginger ale maybe, saltines.”
“Ok,” he said as he changed into his short running shorts and running sneakers and then left the apartment, DVDs under his arm.
Rob slipped the DVDs through the return slot at the Albina branch of the library then crossed the street. Rob ran on the outer loop of the park lined with wood chips, around the two baseball fields, four basketball courts, the big and the little play grounds the soccer field. Twice around was almost a mile, and Rob ran seven times around in one direction, and seven times around in the other. There were guys at the basketball court shooting, waiting for more to show up to run three on three. Eight or nine dogs with an even mix of couples and singles handling them strolled around the wood chipped loop. Rob finished and stretched by the backstop. A man with a gray pony tail tried to fly a kite on the soccer field and an unattended boy of six or seven urinated on one of the goals.
Rob did fifty push ups on the wet grass, wiped his dirty palms on his shorts, and walked to the natural food store. He took a green basket and walked the aisles looking for samples. He had a little square of free trade dark chocolate, a little spoonful of Greek style honey flavored yogurt and a little shot glass sized paper cup of persimmon flavored dandy-lion tea. He placed a six pack of the organic ginger ale in his basket and then went looking for the saltines. He found them, the package adorned with Paul Newman’s face, in the aisle with bulk nuts. He filled a plastic bag with what he thought was about half a pound of cashews and then sauntered to the register. A white guy about his age with blond dread locks and a light beard greeted him and asked how he was doing. Rob and this guy had the same 44 second conversation at least once every three days. Rob said he was doing well, and the dreadlocked guy said he was too, and then Rob swiped his card and then the dreadlock guy asked if Rob wanted the receipt, and Rob declined and took his paper sack of ginger ale, saltines, and nuts out of the store.
The door to their third floor apartment, D7, was unlocked. He came in, took the nuts, crackers, and ginger ale and placed them on the small table in the kitchen. He went to the bathroom and had a long pee with door closed. His urine was reddish orange. He shook his head, washed his hands, washed his face, drank a large glass of water, then took a hot shower during which he again peed reddish orange.
He got out, drank another glass of water, brushed his teeth, and then applied deodorant to his under arms and medicated body powder to his genitals and inner thighs. He went into the bedroom where he and Ellen each had desks and rolling chairs and their own closets and chests of drawers. He put on clean boxer shorts and the jeans he had worn to brunch. He then flexed his pectoral muscles and bulled his neck in the mirror before putting on a new white v-neck t shirt. He walked into the bedroom where he and Ellen slept. They had painted the walls a pale green two weeks before. Ellen’s laptop rested on their queen sized bed that remained frameless. Ellen said she didn’t want anything until they could afford a nice bed. Rob picked up her computer. It was warm. He entered password: bugsythebunnyRIP and saw that Ellen had been on a website devoted to life-sized butter sculptures of famous people: Oprah, Jesus, Drew Carey. He put her laptop down. On her night stand were her phone and keys.
He walked through the living room to the kitchen and didn’t see Ellen. He called out her name. He walked into each bed room, the bath room, went through the living room back to the kitchen, and then repeated that circle two more times. Rob shrugged, took a seat on the couch and read the arts section from last week’s Sunday paper. Maybe Ellen went out to get a fresh paper he thought, and then became lost in a long article about an off-Broadway play with a paraplegic Australian Muslim imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for 3 years who finds Christ through the kindness of a sympathetic Southern soldier. Rob finished the article and then walked around the apartment again, stopping in every room looking for Ellen. He checked the bathroom three times. He walked out to the hall, and then down the stairway, calling her name. He returned to apartment, checked every room again, and then looked out the windows for her. The ones in the bed rooms faced the street where her car was parked. The windows in the kitchen faced a nicer apartment building. In the alley between there was nothing but dumpsters. Rob picked up Ellen’s phone and there were six missed calls: two from her mother and two from each of her sisters. The last out-going call she made was to Elliot that morning inviting him to brunch.
Rob went to the room with the mirror and said out loud, “Don’t worry. Don’t worry. Don’t panic. It's ok.” He then took off his t-shirt and flexed his pectoral muscles five times, put his shirt back on, and then checked every room for Ellen.
He felt his phone buzz. It was Elliot. He picked up.
“Dude, Cecil’s mom just dropped by looking for Cecil and Sequoia, who are out at some new-age retreat near Hood River for the weekend, and offered me some Blazer tickets. They are playing the Suns. Good seats too. You in?”
“Uh, well, Ellen is sorta,” Rob stopped and closed his eyes to find the right word.
“Dude, only got two tickets. You will have to leave her be for a couple of hours. Can you handle it? She can watch the game on the TV down at the Triple Nickel and maybe see you and me so she knows you’re safe.”
“Uh, Elliot, Ellen’s not here. She was sick, and then I went out for a run, and now she is gone. Its been like 3 hours since I saw her.”
“Hmm,” Elliot said, “Call her.”
“She left her phone here,” Rob responded.
“Weird.”
“Yeah. Weird. Am I being paranoid?”
“No, no, I mean, yeah, probably. She is probably fine. Maybe one of her girlfriends came and picked her up or something and she forgot her phone. Or ran out to do laundry or something.”
“The Laundry room!” Rob hung up and ran down the four flights of stairs to the basement. In a windowless white room with five big white washers and five big white dryers lay Ellen slumped on the folding table. Rob shook her. She woke up, startled. Her face was red and blotchy and her breath had a stench of expired dairy with a metallic tinge. “Hey.” Rob said.
“Hey” Ellen said groggily. Rob hugged her, and she hugged him back and said “I shit the bed.”
“Oh.” Rob said and hugged her tighter. “I didn’t know where you were.”
“Oh.” Ellen said, “I hope you didn’t worry.”
“I did a little.”
“Oh, sorry.”
“Why don’t you go up and get in bed and I will take care of this. I’ll put on the other sheets and you can lie down. I got ginger ale and saltines.”
“Ok.” Ellen said. “Comforter is in the dryer. It probably needs another go round in the machine. The sheets should be done. And my clothes are in there too. I’m really sorry.”
“No, no, no” Rob said gently. They walked up the stairs together. Rob put on the extra set of sheets, pale blue flannel ones Ellen’s sister Gwen had given them as a house warming present. Ellen climbed into the bed and Rob brought her a plate of crackers arranged in a fanned circle and a tall glass of ginger ale with ice. She thanked him, and asked if he could go pick out a few DVDs from the shelf.
“Goonies?” he asked.
“Goonies is in the right ball park. Goonies, Back to the Future, and surprise me.”
Rob liked Ellen’s DVD collection. He had 25 or so DVDs, mostly from the bargain bin at the chain video store, the 2 for $10 kind, where the price accurately reflected the films’ quality.
Rob picked out Volunteers, one of his movies. He brought the three to Ellen in bed. “Is this the one where Tom Hanks is in the Peace Corps in Thailand in a tuxedo, and that his wife is also in?”
“And John Candy.” Rob owned four movies with John Candy.
“Perfect.” Ellen said.
“I am going to go and deal with the laundry. Feel free to start the movie, I’ll be back up in a few.”
“Ok. Thank you.” Rob kissed her on the forehead and didn’t cringe when he smelled her breath.
Rob moved the sheets and Ellen’s underwear and jeans and shirt to a dryer. He took out her bra, unsure as to if it could be machine dried, and then set the comforter to another dry cycle. He carried the bra back up to the apartment and hung it on shower door as he had seen Ellen do with such sundries.
He felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. He pulled it out. Elliot. Rob answered.
“So should I call the morgue?”
“Dude.” Rob said.
“Sorry. You find her?”
“Yeah. She was asleep in the laundry room.”
“So I was right. Another life saved by the towering genius of Elliot Green. Chalk it up.”
“I don’t see how you saved her life.”
“I didn’t. I saved yours. You were all frantic - you could have had a heart attack, or driven distractedly and ran into a telephone pole, or hung yourself.” Elliot said. “Anyway, I got Blazer tickets. It’s the Suns. Should be a great game. Amare is back. Nash vs. Roy. The seven-seconds-or-less offense against Rip City’s occasionally smothering defense. Come on.”
“Uh, Ellen is pretty sick. I should probably stay here.”
“Come on. She fell asleep in the laundry room. Come on. She needs sleep. Not you fetching this and that and then trying to feel her up. Come on.”
“Let me go check on her. I’ll call you back, but you know,” and Rob hung up.
Ellen was asleep and Tom Hanks was still at Yale. Rob sat on the bed next to her. Ellen snored. He closed her laptop and moved it to her night table. He took the plate of pale crumbs and the glass of watery soda and put them in the sink.
He called Elliot back. “When is tip off?”
“8:30.”
“Ok, I have to finish a load in the dryer and then I will come and pick you up at around 8:15.”
“Lets have a few drinks first. I love eight dollar beers as much as the next guy, but I love them even more after I am a little hammered. Why don’t you come over here, bring some nice beer, we'll get a little drunk, then go to the game and stay buzzed without going broke.”
“Ok. I’ll be there soon.” Rob said and hung up the phone.
He wrote a note on post-it that said, “Went to the Blazer game with El (free tickets), hope you are feeling better. If you need anything call. Love, R.” He stuck it to the fridge. He then went into bed room and took Ellen’s keys from her night stand. He patted her head and she snored. He walked out of the apartment, locked the door and drove to Elliot’s.
View: Part 2
0 comments:
Post a Comment