middle of the night, but he did it. I don’t know what he had to say, or promise, to get that leave, but he got it. Next thing I know, we’re in midtown, and I’m throwing your suitcases in my old man’s car, getting ready to drive six hours, to a town I’ve never heard of, for what reason I don’t even know. I don’t even know who you are, but you’re the prettiest-looking girl I ever saw in my life.”
There was nothing flirtatious in the way he said this. He was just relaying the facts, cop that he was.
“Now we’re in the car, I’m driving, and then Walter starts giving you the fifth degree. I never heard anyone go at someone as hard as that. What am I supposed to do while he’s reaming you out? Where am I supposed to go? I can’t be hearing all this. I’ve never been in a situation like this. I’m from South Brooklyn, Vivian, and it can be a tough neighborhood, but you gotta understand—I’m a bookish kid, I’m a shy kid. I don’t get involved in fights. I’m the kind of kid who keeps his head down. Something goes on, people start yelling, I leave the scene. But I can’t leave this scene, ’cause I’m driving. And he wasn’t yelling—even though I think it might’ve been better if he was yelling. He was just taking you apart, so cold. Do you remember that?”
Oh, I remembered.
“Add to it all, I don’t know anything about women. The things he was talking about, the things he said you were up to? I don’t know anything about all that. And your picture is in the papers, he says—a picture of you messing around with two people? One of them is a movie star of some kind? Another one is a showgirl? I never heard of anything like that. But he just keeps going at you and going at you—and you’re just there in the backseat, smoking cigarettes and taking it. I look in the rearview mirror, you aren’t even blinking. It’s like water off a duck’s back, everything he’s saying to you. I could see it was making Walter crazy, that you weren’t responding. That was just firing him up more. But I swear to God, I never saw anyone looking so coolheaded as you.”
“I wasn’t coolheaded, Frank,” I said. “I was in shock.”
“Well, whatever it was, you kept your cool. Like you didn’t even care. Meanwhile, I’m sweating bullets, wondering, is this how you people talk all the time? Is this what rich people are like?”
Rich people, I thought. How had Frank been able to tell that Walter and I were rich people? And then I realized: Oh, yes, of course. The same way we’d been able to tell that he was a poor person. Someone not even worth acknowledging.
Frank kept going: “And I’m thinking, they don’t even know I’m here. I’m nothing to these people. Walter Morris isn’t my friend. He’s just using me. And you—you hadn’t even looked at me. Back at the theater, you told me, ‘Take down those two suitcases.’ Like I was a porter, or something. Walter, he didn’t even introduce me. I mean, I know you were all under duress, but it’s like, in his eyes, I’m nobody, you know? I’m just a tool that he needs—just somebody to drive the machine. And I’m trying to figure out how to stop being so invisible, you know? So then I think, Hey, I’ll jump on the bandwagon. Join the conversation. Try to act like him—talk the way he’s talking, the way he’s going after you. So that’s when I said it. That’s when I called you what I called you. Then I see how it lands. I look in the rearview mirror and I see your face. I see what my words just did to you. It was like I killed you. Then I see his face—it’s like he just got hit by a baseball bat. I thought it was gonna be nothing, me saying that. I thought it was gonna make me seem cool, too—but, no, it was like mustard gas. Because no matter how bad it was, the way your brother was reaming you out, he hadn’t used a word like that. I see him try to figure out what to do about it. Then I see him decide to do nothing. That was the worst part.”