Yes, When

An old friend contacted me from out of the blue to tell me she had something she wanted to talk about. She said she was going to be in LA for a couple of days, would I be able to meet her. I read the message twice and sat there. I was pretty sure I knew what she wanted to tell me. I had heard that her ex-husband Ray had killed himself. He was a well-known artist, so word was out. But I hadn’t seen her in 25 years, I hadn’t even met her husband before he was an ex. We hadn’t talked on the phone or texted, I didn’t know her family or her kids. Why was she contacting me? So I emailed her back, Yes, when?

Leah Geller. We had met through a mutual friend, Nick, and hadn’t hung out much, but we connected. That’s how it is sometimes. You ask yourself why am I close to this person, and the only answer that makes sense is: you just are. If you want to know the truth, I think every person I am closest to in my life is like that.

I met her at a diner near the airport the day after she arrived, an old 60s style place with plastic wood paneling and a couple squares of red jello in a rotating glass display. She was in a booth, and I stared for a minute to make sure it was her, both the menu and her glasses were comically large, but she was serious and focused.

“Lee?”

She looked up, and her face opened. She slid out of the booth and walked towards me, her arms out. We hugged, and she said, Oh my god over and over. Her Philly accent always made me happy. It’s the kind of voice that only makes sense when you’re calling someone a fucking idiot from across the street.

“How’re you doing,” I said.

She didn’t say anything but just looked at me nodding behind her enormous glasses. I don’t know what I expected her to look like, but not relaxed. Yet here she was, and with just a little—I don’t know—shrug. She told me she was getting through it.

“You look beautiful,” I said.

“I do?”

She had never been aware of her face, even when it was 22-year-old perfect. She never wore make-up, always glowed rose through her skin. It was still the same. Like an old time movie star.

“Yeah,” I said. We both slid in opposite each other.

“It’s so nice here,” she said.

That made me laugh, “Lee, we’re next to the airport. At a diner. You haven’t even seen anything yet.”

“I just meant the sky and the palm trees.”

“Those are two things I never notice,” I said.

“You should,” she said.

I don’t know why I said that. I noticed both of those things every day, was constantly taking photos of the crazy blue and the ridiculous Dr. Seuss trees, but I was trying to behave like a person who could receive disturbing news and remain calm and helpful.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

I paused for a little too long and tears rose up, “Oh my god,” I said, “Jesus.” I sniffed. She reached for my hand and we sat that way for a minute. I started laughing, “I’m…wow…I’m not supposed to be the one…” I sniffed again. “I hate that question,” I said.

She laughed too, “It’s the only question.”

The waitress came and we ordered coffee and Leah told me about Ray. They had been separated for a few years and he lived in his studio. He had been using again, so their communication was minimal. They spoke about the kids and other official business but not much and sometimes not for a few months at a time. The kids were old enough to get themselves between the two houses. But then she went by his studio one day because she had an odd feeling, and found his body as soon as she opened the door.

While she was talking, she tore little thumb-nail pieces of her napkin and piled them one on top of the other, but otherwise the tone of her voice was steady and calm, like she was telling a story that had happened to someone else. We sat silently after that, I could hear the cash register and the soft mumble of voices. She looked up and stared across the room. “Oh my god there’s Pedro!” she stood and waved, “Pedro!” Her whole demeanor changed in an instant.

“What?” I turned and watched a middle-aged Mexican guy across the room smile and wave back to her.

“Hola mama,” he said.

“I can’t believe you’re here at this diner,” she said. They were both yelling like 12-year- olds across a cafeteria. Back and forth it went and then she said “I’ll see you later,” and sat back, “He’s nice.”

“How do you know that guy?”

“I met him last night when I went dancing”.

“Dancing?” I asked. “In LA?…You did not go dancing last night.”

“Yes, I did,” her mouth was open, smiling.

“Your flight got in at 11 o’clock at night”

“I absolutely went.” She started laughing.

“Hold on, hold on,” I said. “You arrived at 11 pm, wheeled your little bag through the airport, shuttled yourself over to Hertz, got your car and just headed straight for the nearest dance club?”

“Yes.”

“But you know that’s what the character does in the scary movie just before she gets kidnapped in the parking lot and taken to a dungeon in someone’s basement—

“A dungeon!”

“—Yes, and then hacked into pieces and fed to a billy goat tied to a tree in the back yard.”

She screamed, “Oh my God!” at each violation I described. We were having fun.

“You can’t do that.” I said, “No one does that.”

She shrugged, “I have to,” and then looked down, “I’m, you know…I’m working it out.”

“You’re crazy,” I shook my head, “but that’s amazing”.

“You should try it.”

“No,” I said, though the idea thrilled me a little. “Nope.”

“You never know.”

“Oh, I know,” I said, and we stared at each other some more. “ I mean, I love dancing but I would never go by myself to some random place near the airport in a city I’ve never visited.”

“What do you mean? That’s the perfect place to go,” she said.

“I guess,” The idea made me so uncomfortable I wanted to try it.

We ended up going to the Getty Museum after that. Leah was a painter and I was excited to show it to her. It was a beautiful place. There were views where you could just see blue sky in between columns of travertine. While we walked around, Leah talked more about Ray, first how they met, then as a couple, then as divorced parents who rarely saw each other. What it was like to stand next to him at their wedding, looking out at all their friends and family, and then years later see him across a parking lot wheeling a grocery cart to his car. “No one knew me the way he did,” she said. She stopped walking for a moment, and looked around like she wasn’t sure where she was.

“Do you want to sit down?” I asked her. We walked to the grass under the huge sky. It was beautiful, sunny and blue, with perfect fluffy clouds. LA was doing her thing. She said she wanted to call her daughter so I went back inside and looked at a few more paintings. One was a giant black and white drawing of a parade of people in a long line that snaked down a hill, called Cortege Infernal by James Ensor. It was a rough and dirty gang on an endless march: peasants, warriors, skeletons, maidens with long black hair. Most of them looked disturbed, bereft. But then smack in the middle was a little guy with bulging eyes who was smiling. He was taking it in, living life. I stared at him long enough that he did a slow head turn to look directly at me and give me a saucy old stage wink. I turned to look out into the courtyard to see if Leah was still on the phone, but she was sitting in the grass with her eyes closed.

“You okay?” I said. She nodded and reached her hands for me to pull her up and gave a little hop at the end.

In the car, we sat in traffic but she was looking all around, up at the hills, pointing out the different plants and trees and passing cars and people in the cars and then to the mountains far away. “Girl,” I said. “You need to calm down.”

She laughed joyfully like I had said the most absurd thing, a long laugh that ended with a sigh. “Why though?”

We drove quietly after that, listening to music, the way it is so often on the freeway in LA, when you’re alone inside your head, inside your car, inside a lane of traffic. How many times had I driven on that road without seeing the mountains, or the plants, or the people all around, and what is it that makes you notice on some days but not on others? What is it that makes you fall in love with someone you cross paths with? Is it just coincidence or is it the same thing that makes you go dancing in the middle of the night, alone, in a bar, near an airport, in a place you’ve never been?