CHAPTER 28
I RAN OUT, rushed down the stairs, followed the noise.
The living room. Figures in black.
Two figures, crouched combatively.
Richard shouted, 'What the fuck have you done?' and advanced on his son.
Eric waved a baseball bat.
Behind the boy stood what remained of the display cases. Ravaged, the brass dented, glass doors splintered and ragged. Glass spikes and shards on the carpet, glittery dust like raw diamonds. Broken pottery within the cases and on the floor. Horses and camels and little human figurines turned to rubble.
Richard got closer. His mouth was open. His breath rasped.
Eric panted also. He gripped the bat with both hands. 'Don't even think about it.'
'Put it down!' Richard commanded.
Eric didn't move.
'Put it the fuck down!'
Eric laughed and took another swing at the porcelain. Richard rushed forward, threw himself at the bat, managed to get hold of it as Eric grunted and struggled to wrestle control.
The two of them fell to the floor, entwined black clothes coating with glass and dust. I dived in, mindful of the bat, aiming for the bat. Reaching it, feeling hardwood, sweaty and gritty, the crunch underneath as fragments bit into my knees. I tugged at the bat. Some give, then resistance. A fist landed on my jaw but I kept my grip.
Eric and Richard kept growling and spitting, flailing at each other, me, anyone, anything.
Another pair of hands entered the fray.
'Stop!'
I extricated myself. Joe Safer stood there, hands pressed to his cheeks, eyes aflame. Eric and Richard were concentrating on ownership of the bat. 'Stop, you idiots, or I'm walking out permanently and leaving you all to your misery!'
Richard stopped first. Eric kept growling but his hands loosened, and Safer and I both rushed forward and pulled the bat away from him.
Richard sat down on the floor, letting the ruins of his collection fall through his fingers. He looked stunned- anesthetized. Tiny cuts flecked his face and his hands, one eye was swollen. A few feet away, Eric was down on his knees, looking out at nothing. Other than a split lip, he showed no obvious injury. My jaw was throbbing and I touched it. Hot, starting to swell, but I could move it, nothing broken.
'For God's sake,' said Safer. 'Look what you've done to the doctor. What's the matter with you people? Are you savages?'
Eric smiled. 'We're the elite. Pathetic, huh?'
Safer pointed a finger at him. 'You be quiet, my friend. You keep that mouth of yours shut-don't you dare interrupt me-'
'Why should-'
'Eh-eh, don't test me, young man. One more problem and I'm calling the police and having you hauled into jail. And I can keep you there, you'd better believe I can.'
'Who ca- '
'You'll care. Within an hour you'll be anally raped and worse. Now zip the lip!'
Eric's hands began to shake. He glanced at the havoc he'd created. Smiled. Started to cry.
No one talked. Safer took in the ruin and shook his head.
'I'm so sorry,' he said to me. 'Are you all right?'
'I'll be fine.'
'Eric,' Richard pleaded. 'Why? What have I done to you?'
Eric looked at Safer, requesting permission to talk. Safer said, 'Why, indeed, Eric?'
Eric faced Richard. Mumbled something.
'What? 'said Richard.
'Sorry.'
'Sorry,' Richard echoed. 'That's it?'
Louder mumble.
'Speak up, for God's sake,' said Richard. 'What the hell led you to…' He shook his head, let it drop.
'Sorry, Daddy,' said Eric. 'Sorry, sorry, sorry.'
Eric began to sob. Richard moved to comfort him, thought better of it, plopped back down.
'Why, son?' he said.
'Forgiveness,' said Eric. 'Forgiveness is all.'
Richard had turned pale again. A bad-looking pale, green around the edges. He picked up a pottery fragment. Green and blue and chartreuse. Part of a horse's face.
'Oh my God,' said a voice from behind us.
Stacy stood at the entrance to the living room. Hands at her side, eyes so bugged they seemed ready to take off in orbit.
Just moments ago, hearing talk about finding her own way, I'd allowed myself a small hit of self-congratulation. Now, any victory was a joke, demolished as surely as thousand-year-old pottery drawn from the grave.
'No,' said Stacy.
'Dear?' said Safer.
When she didn't answer, he said, 'No what?'
She didn't seem to hear him, had turned to me.
'No,' she said. 'I don't want any more of this.'
'And you don't have to take any more, dear,' said Safer. 'You're certain that jaw's okay, Doctor?'
'I'll survive.'
'Richard,' he said, 'is your maid in the house?'
'No,' muttered Richard. 'Night off.'
'Stacy, please get the doctor an ice pack.'
Stacy said, 'Absolutely,' and left.
Safer faced Richard and Eric: 'Now the two of you will clean up this terrible mess and I'll figure out if you deserve my further involvement in your case, Richard.'
'Please,' said Richard.
'Just clean it up,' ordered Safer. 'Do something useful. Do something together.'
He shepherded me out of the room, through the dining room and into the kitchen. One of those vast white lacquer and black granite setups-what realtors call catering kitchens. Another L.A. pretense: upscale isolates staking claim to sociability.
Stacy was wrapping ice cubes in a towel. 'One second.'
'Thank you, dear,' said Safer, as she brought it over. I pressed the cloth to my face.
'I'm so sorry,' she told me. 'So, so sorry.'
'No big deal,' I said. 'It's really nothing.'
The three of us stood there. Listening. No sound through the kitchen door.
Safer said, 'Please go up to your room, Stacy. I need to confer with the doctor.'
She complied.
Safer said, 'At least one of them seems normal.'
He pushed back his yarmulke, removed his suit jacket and folded it over a chair, sat down at the kitchen table.
'What just happened out there?' he said.
'I wouldn't even guess.'
'Not that that's going to change my strategy vis-a-vis Richard. I'll get him past the immediate threat… but that boy. He's seriously disturbed, isn't he?'
'Very angry,' I said. You'd be angry, too, if you'd helped your mother die, couldn't talk about it to anyone.
