“Don’t sound so surprised.” He hugged her. “That thing with Zach was hard work.”
“That was so completely beautiful,” Rory said. “I knew it would be, but still. Worth the pain?”
“Every bit of it. But God, I never stopped eating. I haven’t weighed this much maybe ever. Victor was like, whoa.” Rory giggled. Andy stood back and showed off a little. He’d put on fifteen pounds of muscle for the performance. “He said, will your fishnets still fit, and I said, let’s find out.”
Rory laughed. “Anyway I’m sure it’ll come off fast, there’s no way I’m keeping up with that. I’d be back to my old ways already if it weren’t for that cameo.”
“Oh, you’re going to be the big tough grizzled boat captain, right.”
“Thanks,” he said with a hateful look for the ‘grizzled’ part. “I knew you were going to give me shit about that.”
“Well, you didn’t tell me you were growing a beard,” she pointed out.
“You’re lucky the critters still knew who you were.”
“They didn’t even notice I was here. Molly was like hi guys tell me what happened! And they were all oh my God let us tell you what happened!”
Rory laughed again. “Victor doesn’t know about the beard.” Andy made an
‘eek’ face.
“Please. I’m begging you. Be ready to take a picture of his face when he sees you.” Rory looked around for her phone. “Can I send one to Dana?”
“Sure, why not.” So they did that, and they laughed at the text Dana sent back, and they did a lot more laughing (even without wine) while Rory happily delegated operation of the grill to Andy. Then she started telling him about some of the submissions that had come in for the Cabaret’s June show.
“Is anyone actually doing ‘Rodeo’?” Andy asked. “And are you doing anything?”
“I am. I am breaking out the strip and the tease again for ‘I Cain’t Say No.’ There is a lot of business with petticoats.” Rory took the tongs out of his hand so he wouldn’t drop them. When he finally stopped laughing she said, looking satisfied, “This one may be the pinnacle of my achievements in striptease. Tomás and Vicky are doing ‘Don’t Fence Me In,’ the David Byrne one. There’s a ton of great shit going in. The A-team is doing the Hoe-down from ‘Rodeo.’ Zach, Hiro, Ricky, Willem, and Mike.”
“Fuck, I wish I could see that live.”
“Mike choreographed it since Zach was busy with you. He’s also doing
‘They Call the Wind Maria’ with Paula and the Kung Fu Flyers. Oh, and Sam and Mateo? They’re doing ‘The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.’”
“Fuck! God damn this movie!” Rory laughed. Andy attended to the grill for a minute. “Last month we got things pretty well organized for our two things later this year. That was fun. Dmitri hooked us up. And Victor took a few jazz classes so we put some of that flavor in.”
“Cool. Did he like it? Well, he likes dancing with you.”
Andy gave her a sideways smile. “Yes, he liked it. We haven’t even really started talking about what we might do for our Broadway thing.”
“Plenty of time,” Rory said, watching him, knowing there was so much subtext. She took another picture while he wasn’t paying attention.
Much later, when the dishes were done and the kitchen was clean, Andy turned around to look for Molly. “Oh.”
“Yeah.” Rory was leaning on the counter. Molly was on the big dog bed with Spike. The other dogs were on the small bed. All of them were snoring.
“It’s kind of a shame to wake her up.”
“She had all the fun today. So did I.”
“If we’d been drinking we’d have an excuse for me to say, crash here tonight.” She was watching him again. “Are you flying out tomorrow?”
“No, day after.”
“Then crash here tonight.”
It wasn’t that late. The two residences weren’t very far apart. Andy was coping pretty well with being alone at home. But not so well that the offer didn’t strike exactly the right chord. “Got a spare toothbrush?”
“Okay,” Rory said after a while, in the dark. “I have known you for, what, twelve years. I can’t believe this is the first time we’ve slept together.”
Andy cracked up. “Good job not braining yourself coming up the stairs.”
“It’s a good thing we weren’t drinking,” he said. “I might not have been so alert to the clearance deficit. Thanks for this, by the way. I’ve been hanging in, but it’s tough being home alone right now.”
“I figured. I’m guessing there’s no good news.”
He sighed. “Well, since at this point what Pop wants least out of life is to die in a nursing home, then the fact he’s not likely to is good news. It’s these
little strokes, though. Not enough to kill him, just enough to scare the hell out of Mom and fuck him up that little bit more. What he wants is the massive heart attack.”
Rory slid her hand down his arm to his hand. He gripped her fingers.
“I’ve always contended that a massive heart attack is the best way to go short of an actual nuclear bomb.”
“It does seem that way. A few minutes of pain and then you’re done.
None of this godawful years of torture bullshit.” After a moment he said, “It does make me think, what else do I want to do in life. If eighty is the outer limit for being able to really do stuff, I’ve still got almost twenty-eight years to get shit done. And Victor will be only seventy. That doesn’t sound so old now.”
“Seventy is the new fifty. Look at Clint Eastwood. Richard Gere. Patrick Stewart. You’re as fit as any of those guys were at your age, and better looking than all of them.”
“You’re biased.” His tone was amused.
“Well, sure, but you are objectively good-looking and you know it.
Remember when you were living with us and I was giving you shit about, well, everything. Did you know I took pictures when we were out on shoots?” She probably wouldn’t have said that
