Fletch’s Moxie

sweat, too.

Mrs Lopez was in the diningroom door. “He’s got my knife,” she said to Fletch.

“Say man, Sy. Go ahead. Say man. Say boy.”

“I never called you boy in my life. I never would.”

Gerry lunged again. Roller stepped sideways on the stair.

“You’re insulting me,” said Roller.

“I’m a twenty-seven-year-old professional actor!” Gerry screamed.

“Good one, too,” Roller said mildly.

“I’m a man!”

“Gerry, that’s obvious. If you’d just put down the knife. Give it to Fletcher…”

“Gerry,” Fletch said quietly. “This is not a good day for you to be threatening someone with a knife. It doesn’t look good. You know what I mean?”

Gerry pivoted on the stair to look down at Fletch fully.

“Don’t call me boy.”

“Who called you boy?”

Mrs Lopez said, “That’s my good knife.”

Sy Koller laughed. “Come on, Gerry. You can’t expect to be asked to play Robin Hood of Sherwood Forest.”

“Everyone’s always beatin’ up on me,” Gerry said.

“That’s in the movies, Gerry,” Sy Koller said. “You’re a well-paid professional actor. At home you drive a Porsche. No one beats you up.”

“Goddamn it!” He slashed at Sy Koller’s legs.

Koller jumped back, up another stair. His green T-shirt flapped.

Fletch heard Moxie walk along the upper corridor. She, or something like her, appeared at the top of the stairs. They were her legs between white shorts and white sneakers. The torso was her’s, in a light blue sport shirt. The head was wrapped in a red kerchief. The face was matted with rouge and powder. Bright red lipstick enlarged her mouth ridiculously. The eyes were covered by giant sunglasses in white plastic frames.

Koller said, as if threatening, “Gerry, I’m not going to jump another stair.”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake.” Moxie started down the stairs.

“Be careful,” Fletch said.

She passed Koller and stood on the stair with Gerry. She ignored the knife. She took his erect penis in her hand and shook it as if she were shaking hands. “You need something else to think about, boy.”

“You called him boy,” Koller said. “She called him boy.”

“I should call him girl?” asked Moxie. “With his prick in my hand?”

Mrs Lopez climbed the steps, reached around Gerry, and took the knife from his hand. “My good knife,” she said. She started back to the kitchen.

“Get Mrs Littleford, will you?” Fletch asked Mrs Lopez.

“They’re all against me.” Gerry confided to Moxie. “You should see what they’re doin’ to me.”

Moxie put her hands on his wet, shining shoulders. “It’s just the coke, honey. No one’s doing anything to you. Everything’s fine. You’re fine. It’s a nice day.”

“It’s not the coke. It’s what they’re doin’ to me.”

“It’s that little white powder you keep puttin’ up your nose, sweetheart,” Moxie said. “Drugs do funny things to your mind. Have you heard that?”

Gerry was studying Sy Koller’s legs. They were unscratched.

Stella came into the front hall. She had a bath towel in her hands.

“Gerry needs an airing,” Fletch said to her. “Why don’t you walk him any direction from here until you come to water. And throw him in. He needs a swim.” Her eyes had heavy lids. “You need a swim, too.”

“I’m the one who needs the airing,” Moxie said to Fletch. “Get me out of here.”

“Dressed like that? You’ll attract flies.”

“No one will look at me,” Moxie said.

“You’re kidding.”

On the stairs Stella was wiping down Gerry’s whole body with the towel.

Looking at them, Fletch said, “Maybe a swim isn’t a good idea.”

“Who cares?” Moxie took Fletch by the hand.

“Don’t swim out too far,” Fletch said to Stella and Gerry.

He pulled Moxie sideways a moment and looked into the living room.

Edith Howell and Frederick Mooney were together on a Victorian loveseat. She had a gin and tonic in hand. His drink was in a short brandy glass.

“Revivals,” Mooney was opining, “are anti-progress. Been far too many of ’em, lately. We must get ourselves out of the way, and let the young people create anew.”

“But, Freddy,” Edith said, “Time, Gentleman, Time was a great musical. It still is.”

“Come on.” Fletch tugged Moxie’s hand. “We’ll go see the sunset. Out the back way. Through the Lopezes’ yard.”

17

“So,” Fletch said. They were walking along Whitehead Street. Moxie’s beautified head made Fletch feel he was walking along with a gift-wrapped package on a stick. “Gerry Littleford’s mind runs to stabbing people with knives.”

“That was nothing,” Moxie said. “Forget about it.”

“Your usual domestic incident? I thought things were getting rather serious there.”

“You should never believe an actor,” Moxie said. “It’s not what’s said that counts. It’s the delivery.”

“Including what you just said.”

“I am lying, the liar said,” Moxie said. “I wish he wouldn’t use that stuff all the time.”

“You mean you wish he would use it some of the time?”

“Sure. When he has an angry scene to play. He can become really frightening on the stuff.”

“I saw that. But that’s not acting, is it? I mean, it’s just reacting to a drug.”

“Acting is a drug, Fletcher. All art is. A distortion of perspective. A heightening of concentration. But when Gerry’s just doing an ordinary hard scene the stuff works against him. Sets his timing off. Makes him overact.”

“Do you use that stuff, Moxie? Like, for an ‘angry scene’?”

“’Course not. I’m a better actor than Gerry.” She looked across the street, at the big sign on the brick wall. “Wish I could go in there,” she said. “I’d love to see Hemingway’s bedroom. Also the room where he wrote. That was cute, what we did when we were playing pool. You have a good enough memory to be an actor.”

“Moxie, do you think there are different rules for creative people?”

“Sure. There have to be special rules for being that alone.”

“Something your father said this afternoon. Something about the obligations of talent being primary. We were talking about his relationship with you, and your mother, I guess. He said: ‘Many men can love a woman and have a child; only a few can love the world and create miracles’.”

“Dear O.L. Always the pretty turn of phrase.” She walked in silence a moment. “I guess he’s right.”

“How can there be different rules for different people?”

“You just said it yourself, Fletch. I just said it. At the house you just said I couldn’t go out—it wouldn’t be safe. I just said I wished I could tour Hemingway’s house. I wish I would be one hundred percent efficient as a creative person and one hundred percent efficient as a business person. I wish I didn’t have to have a Steve Peterman living many of the normal aspects of my life for me.” She turned him sideways on the sidewalk. “Look at me.”

“I can’t.” He put his free hand over his eyes to shield himself from the sight of the kilograms of rouge,