Rebecca Schwartz 05 - Other People's Skeletons

doldrums. But I didn’t. I put some baroque music on the stereo and applied myself to the task of picking out something to wear. I had a new dress that would probably be perfect— ankle-length black crepe. But somehow I’d been meaning to wear it to something more cheerful. If I put it on now it would always make me sad— it would remind me of the day I knew I was going to have a mastectomy, that I was probably going to die…. The music obviously wasn’t working. Suddenly, I just wanted to get out of the house.
    I slipped on a pair of black pants, a gray silk blouse, and a tapestry vest. I hoped the effect was sober enough. My mood certainly was.
    I waited downstairs for Rob, something I’ve probably never done before, and found the air felt good, the velvet of the night did a lot to still the panic.
    Rob was five minutes early. “Am I late?”
    “Not at all. I was just restless.” He gave me a funny look, and on the short drive I was aware of his trying to start conversations and of my trying to participate, but I was so unfocused nothing ever really went anywhere.
    It was the only wake I’ve ever been to where there was valet parking. It was being held in a sort of dance hall whose proprietors had been friends of Jason’s. The whole idea, it seemed, was for every entertainer who’d ever known Jason to play a song or give a speech in his memory. A no-host bar was doing a good business, and people were milling, talking, only half listening to the earnest performers. It was an eerie scene, frankly. Because of the performances, the place was dark, yet it had the curious quality of a gathering where people had gone to be seen. Some people, anyhow— I saw the mayor there, and a couple of assemblymen.
    Everyone I knew from the Chronicle was there— and there were plenty; when Rob and I were dating, we’d been to lots of Chronicle parties together. And there were other people I recognized, from the society and entertainment pages, from television news. Genuine grief hung in the air along with the scent of celebrity. Jason had been a popular man— this shindig was invitational, though signs had been posted at the Chron and backstage at certain theaters. I found myself wishing I’d known him— a person so complicated he could live in filth and poverty and never, I gathered, invite anyone to his apartment, yet be so influential, so well liked that the city’s celestial beings turned out at his death.
    Rob went off to work the room, leaving me to do the same if I chose, and I did. It was the surest way of forgetting my own troubles and a golden opportunity as well. I went to get a glass of wine and found myself standing in line behind a man in a suit and a tie with a stain on it, a middle-aged man with a red, sad face and a voice that carried. He had buttonholed the woman in front of him, a stranger from the look on her face.
    “Would you look at that?” He pointed to the stain on his tie. “Some asshole just bumped into me, never even said excuse me. Whole drink splattered all over.” The woman shook her head as if to say that was a shame, but she didn’t really want to talk to him.
    “Place is full of assholes, you notice that? Nothin’ but assholes, the whole damn place.”
    The woman’s smile froze, and she turned around. That made the drunk mad. “Hey! You an asshole, too? Huh? What’s your problem? You too good to talk to a hick from across the Bay?”
    I wondered if there was a bouncer. He was getting so loud it was time for somebody to do something. Suddenly I was aware of motion behind me, and a black blur came up on my left.
    “Dad! Dad, you’ve gotta calm down.”
    It was Adrienne. She recognized me and looked embarrassed, but she couldn’t be bothered with that now. She was stage-whispering to her dad: “You just don’t know how loud your voice is. They’re going to throw us out of here if you don’t quiet down.”
    “Goddammit, I don’t care if they do! I didn’t want to come to this goddam thing in the first place.”
    “Okay.” She stopped whispering, the urgency gone. Her voice was low and placating. “Okay, Dad, you’re right. Let’s just leave. I’ll take you home right now. Come on now. Let’s just go.”
    “I want a drink.” His voice was low also, for the first time, and sulky.
    “I don’t know, I don’t think…” But the bartender by this time was asking him what he wanted. Adrienne shrugged and turned to me. “Hi.”
    “Hi. You doing okay?” It