Chapter Five “But, Great Gal.”

five

" But, Great Gal. "

Minutes later, I sit shell-shocked on the car ride home. Mom's driving her janky Toyota and I'm riding shotgun.

"They want Louis Jenkins to play Lear?" I ask, trying to wrap my mind around things. "I mean, isn't he a manager at a barbecue sauce factory?"

Mom gives a dismissive huff. "A damn good barbecue sauce and mostly because of Louis. He's in quality control. So obviously he knows a thing or two about subtlety and finesse of flavor."

"Subtlety and finesse of flavor? You've been watching too many Food Network shows."

"Oh, Noah, he has a beautiful singing voice! And now that his dreadlocks have gone gray, his look is perfect!"

Hmmm. The gray dreadlocks are pretty impressive. But I can't lose focus.

"And they want the McNew twins to play Goneril and Regan? Those two do know that they don't have to dress alike anymore, right? I mean, they're in their forties. They remind me of the twins from The Shining , except for the fact that they've clearly gone through menopause."

Mom shrugs. "What do you expect? This town is full of kooks. They found a human skull in the reservoir last year and nobody even blinked an eye."

"Sounds like the twins might fit their roles perfectly," Chase says. I turn to glare at him.

Chase gives me an exhausted look. "Listen, Noah. They told me it would only be a month-long commitment and they wanted it to be a surprise. They've already assigned all the roles and memorized the songs and dialogue. You basically just have to tell them where to stand and give encouraging notes. And now with your dad's health issues, wouldn't it make sense to be here for a bit? Your mother was very keen on the idea."

I turn to focus my wrath on Mom. "So you two have been in cahoots this whole time?"

"I emailed Chase the day after your show opened and closed, if that counts as being in cahoots. I told him that these are very sweet and caring people. You won't have to do much, just make them feel like stars, just like you used to back in high school. Be nice to them and don't expect too much, they're not professional performers."

"You don't say," I mumble.

"Mrs. Henson said she'd be your assistant, so she'll probably end up doing most of the work. It'll be easier than falling off a log."

Chase continues on. "And it might be good to take the time you need to lick your wounds after everything that's happened with the show. I'll change your return ticket. Just indulge the Plainview Players for four little weeks, then fly back to New York and start considering what's next writing-wise."

"Why are you so gung ho about this?"

"Because I know you, Noah. You dwell. You're the sensei master of dwelling. This will take your mind off things for a few weeks."

"And you'll get to be home tomorrow when your dad gets out of the hospital," Mom adds. "It'll mean a lot to him. He helped them build that set, you know. He volunteered himself. Well, him and Luke. They put a lot of hard work into it. So we can pick your father up tomorrow and the three of us can take him out to a nice dinner at Bumpkins."

"Bumpkins?" Chase asks, probably happy to change the subject.

"Country Bumpkins is the most offensively named restaurant in America. Well, right after Sambo's, I guess."

Chase asks incredulously, "There are restaurants named Sambo's? As in the very racist ‘Little Black Sambo'?"

"I think they're all closed now. Although I'm not sure. But if you ask me, the name Country Bumpkins is offensive to their very unsuspecting clientele. And they serve nothing but deep-fried atrocities."

Mom scoffs. "Oh, stop it, you two. They have great soups. It's no Cracker Barrel, but it does the trick."

"If the trick is offering food poisoning and sadness, then technically you're right, Mom."

"Noah prides himself on being finicky. He refuses to eat casseroles," Mom informs Chase.

"That's because casseroles are made out of whatever you find left over in the kitchen garbage disposal."

"Don't listen to him, Chase. I make a lovely casserole."

"The only things you make are deluded conclusions about your casserole-making capabilities."

"Jeepers McCreepers, someone's in a mood." She pauses, and then asks, "Where's my little sweet potato at?"

"He died in a fire." I sigh. "Back to the Plainview Players."

Mom pulls into the driveway as she makes one more pitch, "Have a heart, Noah! Honestly, you're so frosty sometimes it's like you were raised by Chechen wolves."

I consider asking her why these imaginary wolves have to be Chechen, but decide it's probably best not to pull at that thread.

Besides, I have bigger things to consider.

Like am I really going to stay in Plainview and direct a community theater production of my flop Broadway show? Couldn't I find something more pleasant to do? Maybe eat a box of X-Acto knives?

But then it all comes rushing back to me. The way they all looked so crushed when I said no. And I loved every last one of them when I was a kid. I also knew I had to fulfill a silent deal I had made with God back then. I had prayed every night, "Let me get to Broadway and I swear I will pay it back. Or pay it forward. I will contribute somehow." And God in all Her wisdom had finally sent me the bill for managing to get three professional shows produced in Manhattan.

So, maybe I was going to direct the Plainview Players production of Stage of Fools after all.

As we enter the house, Mom threatens to cook. "If you boys are hungry, I thought I could make us some Crock-Pot pizza."

I sigh and close my eyes. "What the hell is that?"

"Oh Noah, it's delicious. You just take some tomato sauce, some cheese and some biscuit dough and throw it in the Crock-Pot and serve it with a ladle and eat it."

"You know I love you, Mom, but I would rather be locked in a room with those Chechen wolves you speak of."

Mom brushes me off.

"You see, Chase? You see what I'm dealing with here?"

Chase concurs. "He's a terror."

"I've also got some cottage cheese you could eat with saltine crackers. And there's a Jell-O casserole."

"A Jell-O casserole?" I scoff. "Why do you only have nursing home food?"

"Don't be a snob, Noah. It's delicious and brightly colored."

I turn to Chase in defeat. "If you eat anything that this crazy crone offers you, you only have yourself to blame."

"I'm full of toasted ravioli," Chase answers.

"They were from St. Louis!" Mom enthuses.

I glare at her. "When did your brain break?"

Mom gives Chase a shrug. "He teases because he loves."

"Guilty as charged." I wrap Mom in a hug, and then grab a tub of ice cream from the freezer, settling at the dining table as she rattles on.

"Oh, get this! It turns out that Leila Loomis has been faking her diabetes. I mean, full-on faking it for attention, I guess. She had everyone at Bible study completely convinced that she was going to have her foot partially amputated and that she was going to have to wear a specially made shoe. And we believed her the whole time while she was lying right to our faces." And then Mom adds her standard guilty deflection. "But, great gal. Great gal. Bless her heart."

"Yes, Mom, bless her fake diabetic heart." Chase joins me at the table and I offer him a spoonful of ice cream. He immediately declines, because, you know, abs.

"And I don't mean to be blunt, and Chase, I am not a gossip, because everybody knows it. But our mail delivery guy's wife is a floozy. Her jean shorts leave nothing to the imagination. But, great gal. Great gal."

"Mom calls people ‘great gals' when she feels guilty about gossiping about them. As in, ‘Well, you know Dawn Fairchild and her family? She comes from a long line of whores dating back to Christopher Columbus times. I mean, she's the product of a long string of sweaty, toothless prostitutes. But, great gal!'?"

Mom swats the back of my head with a dish towel. "I should wash your mouth out with soap. And apparently you don't want anything to eat besides ice cream, so I'm going to bed." She stops in her tracks. "Make sure to lock the front door before you come up."

"Yes, Mom, this town is full of marauders."

"But it is ! Marauders and kooks!"

And with that, she's gone. I return the ice cream to the freezer and turn to Chase. He gets up from the table and slowly pulls me into a hug. It kills me every time how perfectly my chin fits on top of his sculpted shoulder. We softly click together like two human puzzle pieces. The heat from his neck makes my eyelids flutter and my muscles go slack.

"You looked adorable up on that stage. All cheekbones and confusion."

According to Chase, my cheekbones have Timothée Chalamet's beat. I highly doubt it, but Chase gets an A-plus for flattery. He exhales softly into my hair and I feel the last of my resolve draining into the hardwood floor. One of his hands slips under my shirt and over to my lower back. His fingers lightly trace up and down my spine. It's Chase's standard move when he wants something from me and it works like gangbusters.

I frantically start to fiddle with his belt and whisper, "We've got to get you out of those stupid pants immediately."

Chase grabs my wrists and tries to get me back on topic.

"Just say you'll do the show, Noah."

"Okay. But I'm going to miss you like crazy."

Chase takes my face in his hands and gazes into my eyes.

"It's just a month. And it's August. You know how nothing gets done in August. Everyone decamps to the Hamptons until the first Tuesday after Memorial Day. Manhattan is a ghost town until then. But sleep on it, if you like."

I give Chase a half-hearted nod and we climb the stairs and walk into my bedroom. I'm embarrassed at how stuck in time it is. And by the psychotic amount of Evita merchandise that's on display. Chase gives the room a once-over. "Hmm. Some little boy appears to have had a thing for singing, bloodthirsty Argentinian dictators."

"I'll never know if I really loved the show or just fantasized about getting to try on the ‘Don't Cry for Me Argentina' dress."

And like a quick-change artist, Chase is rapidly stripped of all of his clothes except for his magnificently tight boxer briefs. Does he know how my pulse skyrockets at the sight of his muscular thighs fighting against the fabric? He must, because I'm looking at him with unapologetic lust.

I start to reach for his bare, ridiculously toned chest, but he's too busy pulling on sweatpants to notice. I'm disgruntled and I let it be known. "Hey, why are you putting on sleepy time clothes?"

Chase looks confused. "Because it's time for sleep?"

"But I just thought…"

Chase looks around my childhood bedroom as if it's a backed-up sewer. "It's kind of creepy, isn't it? The thought of having sex in your parents' house? And with so many Eva Peróns watching us? I'm also just knackered, to be honest."

I nod, resigned.

I go to the bathroom to brush my teeth and call Kiara. I explain how I've been cajoled into mounting an amateur version of my show starring a barbecue factory worker and a pair of possibly deranged adult twins. To my surprise, she's not appalled.

"They sound like a sweet group of people. And Chase is right about getting your mind off things. So, you know, maybe don't look a gift horse in the mouth."

"I've never understood that phrase. Why is someone gifting me a horse? Are they assuming I have a place to keep the horse? Like I have that kind of storage space? Also, the last thing I would think to do when being gifted a horse is to check its teeth. I mean, with everything going on in my life, I now have to worry about horse dentistry?"

Kiara exhales. "Baby boy, I could explain it to you with historical references and all, but I think we'd both be bored to death, so we should just move on."

After hanging up with Kiara, I go back into the now dimly lit bedroom and see Chase lying on one side of the bed. He looks beyond irresistible. I snake my hand up his T-shirt and lightly graze his amazing collection of abs. I immediately get a raging hard-on and press it into his lower back. Chase answers me with a snore.