Notes from the Upper West Side. A novel by Dan Rench. Chapter 10 is Trump's Ex Hooker. The wife said something about going out for dinner.
I said, I don't wanna. The boy laughed. The wife said, okay, I'll change my clothes in order in some Chinese pizza, which is just Chinese food piled on pizza. Harry was out of school for two weeks with pneumonia last year and he invented Chinese pizza one night while I was trying to explain the ex-files to him.
The only problem with CP is it's two deliveries, which means two tips. But what the heck? A little tiny splurge now and then wasn't going to drain our shallow pockets. So Junior put on jeans and a pink t-shirt with a huge indelible hair dye stain on it.
And the three of us heaped the pork fried rice on a cheese pizza and divvied it up. Tasty. The wife seemed happy, just chirping along. We were all gnashing away, not talking about day jobs.
That's the rule. No talking about day jobs at the table. That night I kind of wanted it not to be the rule though because I knew that the rule meant that there could be no more talking about head in the mohyoom gang. It meant I couldn't talk about Kenny the Beartard, who was this incompetent so-called bartender I sometimes had to share a shift with.
It meant Junior's head would be ranging around for crap to kill the silence with. So what did you and Park talk about? Same old Park shit, I said. Same old Park shit.
Sam said. Sam. Junior said. Daddy said it.
Daddy said it's a lot of things. Junior said. I do not want you to repeat words you know are bad. Sorry Sam.
I said I shouldn't have said it either. You shouldn't have said it either. Sam said. I thought Park had a project he wanted to talk about.
Junior said. I forgot I told her that. Yeah, some Park thing going on. Nothing much.
I picked up this tall glass of daikola and stared at me over the rim and across the table. A shark's eye stare. A stare that wanted to know if I had blood in me? Or if I was just some trash floating in the surf?
I knew exactly what she was thinking. Do I nail in now for what he's hiding about the conversation he had with Park or do I wait until the boy is in the sack? Just something he's got going I said. Like nothing to worry about.
Give me some credit for protecting your brain from the musings of the human turd. So we talked about other stuff and it was deadly trivial. Every time Junior opened her mouth to talk about Obama or her big fat mother or the movies. It was about some molecular detail.
A neuron killer. Like she wanted me to know we would be talking baby talk until I agreed to tell her about whatever it was Park told me. She couldn't wait to climb up my colon. Right after the Chinese pizza she put the boy to bed.
It was like she ambushed him. No TV time. No chit chat. No listening to daddy's dillin with him for a little while first.
Even Sammy noticed. Why are we going so fast? He asked her at one point while they were in the bathroom. It's bedtime.
She said. Bedtime is like a deadline. You always race to meet a deadline. A lame crock of shit but kids are stupid so he bought it.
When she was finally done with him and turned out the light in the boy's bedroom and closed the door really gently so Sammy wouldn't be traumatized by the sound of a latch clicking. She turned around and looked at me. She stared at me for a sec. Then ducked her eyes away and went over to the sink in the kitchen area and picked up a dish rag.
The faucet. The suds. Now you single kids you listen up. This going over to do the dishes was not about Junior wanting to get tidy.
No sir. It was about giving me the assignment of starting a conversation she wanted to have. And something you should know about me from Chapter 1 is I don't like getting assignments. So fuck the presumptuous twat.
She wants to play games? Hey. Daddy loves a good game. Here hun.
I'll do those I said. Like I had no idea she'd given me the assignment. Daddy's a bartender after all. I kind of sang in my falsetto Daddy voice.
He swabs the deck for living while mommy argues about burgers with deep drilling head. I push my glasses up on my nose. She gave no sign of being entertained. She didn't say anything or look at me.
She just went into the living room area and sat on the sofa. Hey hun. I said. What?
She was getting pissed off. You know the way chicks get when you don't read their minds fast enough. Hey baby daddy's doing your dishes for ya. I giggled.
I think I mentioned I have a high giggle. A girlish giggle. Like a cross between a giggle and a tackle. Pa.
Are you going to tell me what's going on with Tony? She asked like making her start her own conversation was an act of misogyny. I was kind of waiting I said. Right now is pretty much the best time to talk don't you think?
Kids are snoozing mommy and daddy can do some serious stuff. I wriggled my eyes like groucho marks. Like I was telling her if she played her cards right she might get her content and extra deep later on. But that wasn't going to happen if she knew it.
And you know ya. I continued in my high tentative falsetto. In my head I was starting to sound like Jimmy Stewart with clothespins on his scrotum. I did want to mention something.
She sat there like a statue. Looks like parp together a crew and some actors for a music video and oh ya. And Bobby whispers is in on it. You know he's money with a day husband.
He said I may have mentioned Bobby to her a couple times before. She was sitting bolt upright perfect posture on the edge of the sofa. She had a school desk in front of her her little hands would have been folded on top of it. Yeah well looks like they um they the clothespins tightened on my balls.
Need another actor and they want yours truly. Then I gigcackled. It was a reflex. Oh my god.
She said and she hooked her arms and started rocking back and forth on the round of her ass. You are not leaving me here alone for another week. So that's what she was worried about. The last time I had a project it was with Rob Christell and we spent three days not a week down in Fort Lauderdale Florida.
Most of the time I was up to my nuts in saltwater while me and another guy and a couple Cuban babes made funny for the cameras in a satire Rob was shooting. It was called Guys and Girls in Surf at the Beach. It won a couple prizes. It's great being the New York actor out of town.
The local actresses automatically want your cock except in this case Rob let them bring their boyfriends to the chaperone. What a fucking waste. Three days of blue balls while beer bellies walked off with the otherwise available ass. Anyway while I was gone Junior got to find out for his hand what it was like to be a single working mommy with two small boys.
I guess you could say she found it harrowing. Babe I said is that what you're thinking though it's one day of shooting here in Manhattan. I gave her my big sunny smile. She slumped then she smiled back.
Oh thank you. She said although now that she told me I couldn't go away I of course wanted her to know that if I had an offer to go away I would fucking go. So when are you shooting? She asked before I could make that point.
The after tomorrow. Saturday? Well yeah. Pause.
Is Mandy McDade in the video? I don't think so I think Parp would have said something. I don't know maybe as a cameo. Well Paul you can't do it Saturday I'm sorry but not this Saturday.
Huh? You know you promised the boys you were taking the chucky cheese this Saturday. Long pause I fumed. There was no fucking way I was going to be sitting in the middle of toddler screams under snot projectiles when I could be hanging with New York actress cunt.
I mean you want to know why I'm in New York as one of the world's best educated midtown bartenders? Because I didn't want the banker money or the broker money or the doctor money? Come on. The only reason we're living in this dump is because we came to New York to be in the biz.
The boys are going to understand that daddy needs to do some things to keep from blowing his fucking brains out. Shhh. She said. She jumped up and patted over to me at the sink.
Then this is not a dump. You take that back. It's not a dump I said. Another long pause.
I turned back to the dishes while she stared up at my left ear. You can't take the kids Saturday I asked. I've already scheduled a play date for Saturday and I've really been looking forward to it. She said.
A play date? I don't get it. I'm meeting Sue. Sue Gasparena.
Sue Gasparena was an ex-hugger junior med at one of those acting studios downtown. Junior was trying to hone her acting skills for re-entry into the biz and she hit it off with ex-hugger Sue. This is Sue. Long kinky black curls.
Big nose. Minimal rack. Firm ass with an exaggerated gape like she has a spring between her cheeks pushing them open. So one time I met her she was wearing really tight low rise jeans over a black leotard.
Her hair smelled like almond mint. I turned back to junior. So you're going to play with Sue Gasparena. We're going to a shopping.
She said and go out to a movie and baby eat lunch. But calling it a play date sounds like somebody plans to, you know, she stared at me. She was so convinced I wouldn't go there. Sounds like somebody's gonna suck mounds.
Her jaw dropped. Her face turned red. Paul. I'm going to get away with shucking your responsibilities by making me feel filthy.
You may have noticed that was not a denial. I didn't actually think junior had it in her to get slurped out by Sue Gasparena. Calling it a play date was probably just an example of Sue's ex-hooker sense of humor. But I was also pretty sure that if she was even slightly bicurious junior would spend the afternoon looking at Sue's mouth and imagining that ex-professional tongue butterflying her clit.
After all, my gothic chasm aversion means I pretty much only eat junior for her birthday in Christmas and I miss last Christmas. You know, it's a kid's insanity. Well, I said, do I have to bring up the rule? Are you making me play the rule card?
She looked blank. It was a studied look. Rule? What rule?
Biz, Trump's vacation? Biz, Trump's holidays? Biz, Trump's day job. I said, it was an old rule, but we always live by it.
If an opportunity comes up for us as actors, we have to take it. No excuses. She patted back to the sofa. She sat down for a second and thought about it, but I knew I had her in a corner.
You can't beat the damn rule. You can't get him to change the day? She asked. That took me off guard.
I think there are too many people involved. I said, I'll just use somebody else if I'm not there. Then it started to rile me. So you're saying you think if I'm involved in this, it must be such a small deal that I can just ask the producers to change the date so you can go shopping with white-gape suit?
What? Yeah, yeah, it's like when I made that short with Rock-Gristell. It won two festival prizes and still whenever you bring it up, it's to talk about how I stuck you with the kids for a week and it was really three days, by the way. Oh, Jesus Christ, Paul.
Well, this thing we're doing Saturday is a sag deal. Micro-budget, but it's a union deal when the guy shooting it as the husband of a bona fight rockstar. So, Biz Trump's a play date with Big Nose Soup, I said. She looked up at me grim.
Okay, Paul, I guess you win. She said. She stood up and walked over close so she could be extra sure Sammy wouldn't hear. But you can go fuck yourself anyway.
She said. Notes from the Upper West Side is a work of fiction. The people depicted in this work do not exist. Notes from the Upper West Side.
Copyright 2013 to 2014.