Tales of the City 04 - Babycakes

notes on that by now.”
“On what?”
“Kids. I thought you and Brian were planning … God, listen to me. I sound like Mother.”
“That’s all right.”
“You just mentioned … the last time I saw you …”
“Right.”
“But I guess … the career makes it kind of difficult to …” She let the thought trail off, apparently shamed into silence by the realization that they sounded like a couple of housewives pounding a mall in Sacramento. “Tell me to shut up. O.K.?”
They had reached the door, much to Mary Ann’s relief. She gave DeDe a hasty peck on the cheek. “I’m glad you’re interested,” she said. “It’s just that … things are kind of on hold for the time being.”
“I hear you,” said DeDe.
Did she? wondered Mary Ann. Had she guessed at the truth?
The rain was clattering angrily on the canopy above the restaurant’s entrance. “Are those your people?” asked DeDe, indicating Mary Ann’s camera crew.
“That’s them.” They looked wet and grouchy. She didn’t relish the thought of making them wetter and grouchier. “Thanks for the tip,” she told DeDe.
“That’s O.K.,” her friend replied. “I owed you one.”
    The Baby Thing
B RIAN HAWKINS FOUND HIS WIFE’S NOTE WHEN HE GOT home from work, and he went up to the house on the roof to await her appearance on television. The tiny penthouse had been his bachelor pad in the old days, but now it functioned as a TV-room-cum-retreat for all the residents of 28 Barbary Lane. Nevertheless, he still seemed to use it more than anyone.
He worried about that sometimes. He wondered if he qualified as a full-fledged TV junkie, a chronic escapist who needed the tube to fill a void he was no longer capable of filling himself. When Mary Ann wasn’t home, he could almost always be found in his video aerie, lost in the soothing ether of the Quasar.
“Brian, dear?”
Mrs. Madrigal’s voice startled him, since her footsteps on the stairway had been drowned out by Supertramp singing “It’s Raining Again” on MTV. “Oh, hi,” he said, turning to grin at her. She was wearing a pale green kimono and her hair hovered above her angular face like random wisps of smoke.
Pursing her lips, she studied the television, where a man in his underwear was threading his way through a forest of open umbrellas. “How very appropriate,” she said.
“Really,” he replied.
“I was looking for Mary Ann,” the landlady explained.
It was a simple statement of fact, but it made him feel even more extraneous. “You’ll have to wait in line,” he said, turning back to the set.
Mrs. Madrigal said nothing.
He was instantly sorry for his pettiness. “She’s got a hot date with the Queen,” he added.
“Oh … another one, eh?”
“Yeah.”
She glided across the room and sat down next to him on the sofa. “Shouldn’t we be watching her channel?” Her huge Wedgwood eyes forgave him for his irritation.
He shook his head. “She won’t be on for another five minutes.”
“I see.” She let her gaze wander out the window until it fixed on the intermittent blink of the beacon on Alcatraz. He had seen her do that so many times, as if it were a point of reference, the source of her energy. Turning back to him, she shook his knee playfully. “It’s a bitch, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“Being a media widower.”
He came up with a smile for her. “It isn’t that. I’m proud of her.”
“Of course.”
“I had just … counted on being with her tonight. That’s all.”
“I know the feeling,” she said.
This time he was the one who looked out the window. A small pond had formed on a neighboring rooftop and its surface was being pitted by yet another downpour. It wasn’t night yet, but it was definitely dark. “Do you have a joint?” he asked.
She cocked her head and mugged at him—a reaction that said, “Silly question.” ‘Then she foraged in the sleeve of her kimono until she located the familiar tortoiseshell case. He selected a joint, lit it, and offered it back to her. She shook her head, saying, “Hang on to it.”
He did so, without a word, for almost a minute, while Michael Jackson minced down a make-believe street protesting that “the kid is not my son.” It wasn’t all that hard to believe him, Brian decided.
“The thing is,” he said at last, “I was going to talk to her about something.”
“Ah.”
“I was going to buy her dinner at Ciao and take her to Gandhi and talk to her about Topic A one more time.”
She was