Get Holly

I didn’t see Marilyn or hear from her all day Wednesday. I expected her down to eat sometime during the day, so I made a pot of slow simmered marinara sauce with turkey sausage and a can of rolled anchovies with capers. The anchovies meld with the sauce after an hour or so into a pungent slurry that would taste good over cardboard. But, as I say, of Marilyn there was none. So I had a plate of pasta and sauce by myself, with a small green salad smothered in croutons, and spent a restful day writing bad poetry and reading good books on Kindle. I also made a date with my old pal Phil Hinckley, who I call ‘Skipper,’ for senior lunch today at the Rec Center -- since I had a 12:30 appointment down there to have AARP volunteers do my taxes as well. To be on the safe side I put Marilyn down as my guest for lunch. The Skipper would pick us up at 11:30.

This morning Marilyn taps on my door at ten, dressed to kill with a sexy twinkle in her eye. No explanation of where she was yesterday. When I asked “Wadjado yesterday?” she shrugged and replied “I dunno; stayed in bed I guess.”

Then she was off and running about her daughter Ashley.

“She called me a witch when I texted her happy birthday today” she said. “I wish she’d stop being so retarded. That’s no way to treat me, her mother!”

I clucked my tongue and shook my head in sympathetic disbelief, then offered her some milk and a Hostess cupcake. Which she proceeded to demolish by picking it apart bit by bit, dropping gooey crumbs all over my one good chair. Because of her bad dentures she picks most of her food apart with her fingers. She then wiped her fingers on the embroidered satin pillow that goes with my one good chair and launched into her main theme of the day: the traitor Holly must die.

“That (expletive deleted) thinks I don’t know what she’s up to? Selling pills and smoking pot with her boyfriend until she can’t see straight. She says she tried to call me all day Tuesday and I didn’t answer. (Expletive deleted), that girl never tried to call -- I was with you and you know my phone never rang, did it?”

Not giving me time to reply she continued “I’m gonna call her right now, right now, and have you get on and tell her you were with me the whole time and she never called. I can’t stand a liar. I’m gonna do it, call her and expose her lying pill popping lie!” She fumbled her phone out of her purse, then changed her mind and instead texted her son Michael in Arizona to wish him a beautiful day.

Having dodged that bullet, I sat serenely by as she dilated on the sins and omissions of Holly, wishing on her incarceration or death by narc gunfire. So what if she shared her store of miracle pills once in a while? Did that justify her abominations? Did that excuse her from being a lying (a string of powerful Anglo-Saxon descriptions ensued.) Holly’s mind was gone; she was snorting pain pills -- snorting them, not swallowing them. Sick, just sick. Marilyn predicted her death within a year, which would be a shame for her 12 year boy -- he deserves a mother better than that monster . . .

Her language and tone were getting to be a bit much for me -- and I’ve spent a lifetime listening to the ripe musings of hungover circus clowns -- so I asked her mildly to take it down a notch. I phrased it diplomatically as “You’ll get yourself too upset and won’t be able to charm the Skipper like you did last time.” That settled her hash. For she would dearly like to wed Phil as soon as his invalid wife passes away. The Skipper is a substantial property owner in and around Provo.  

I also gave her another cupcake to dissect, against my better judgement. I should have gotten the two-year care and cleaning warranty on my one good chair.

Then the Skipper pulled up in his powerful diesel truck and we were at the Rec Center five minutes later. Marilyn tried to simper on the way over, but her overriding thirst for retribution got the better of her; she told the Skipper over and over again that she had no friends, no friends at all, since moving to Utah. She tried to make friends, but they were all a sad disappointment -- drug fiends and drunks, the lot of them. With me sitting right next to her.

She was a stunning sight as she walked into the Senior Lunch Center this afternoon, in her fawn colored leather hip boots. Sadly, being a Thursday, when the dinner crowd is thin and notably anemic, there were very few functioning males to startle and dazzle with her Helen of Troy act -- and that did not improve her temper in the least.

Inevitably, she lost her yellow lunch ticket before we even sat down at a table. A look of wild panic crossed her face and I prepared myself for some powerful emoting, but the Skipper, always the gentleman, gave her his ticket and went out to buy another one.

Today’s repast consisted of chicken with thick gravy over biscuits and some blue jello with fruit cocktail wavering in it. Adequate fodder, if you had skipped breakfast -- which I had. These meals are prepared at a central kitchen and then distributed to local senior centers and lockups.  

During the meal Marilyn decided that everyone at our table had to know, in detail, how much she needed a car. Without one she was a prisoner to the whims and inquisitions of others. Those who gave her a ride were forever changing their schedules to accommodate such paltry issues as work or family emergencies. And they were so nosy -- asking her impertinent questions such as why she wanted to go to the store or needed to pickup up earrings at Nordstrom’s Rack. And taking the bus? It didn’t go anywhere except in circles around industrial parks and half deserted and seedy shopping malls.

Since the other occupants of our table, outside of the Skipper and myself, were from a local nursing home, having been bussed in for a meal and Bingo, she did not receive a sympathetic hearing -- in fact, I don’t believe anyone paid attention to her but me and the Skipper. And this time I noticed that the Skipper did not bother to put in his hearing aid.

I then excused myself to go have my taxes done, telling the Skipper I would walk home in the bracing fresh air. Which I did. The Skipper squired Marilyn around on some shopping errands, so I was home, half asleep in my recliner, before she knocked on my door later on.

Setting her shopping bag down on the floor, she plumped into my one good chair and declared she would kill for a white russian.

“Wazzat?” I asked drowsily, trying to fully wake up.

She explained the alcoholic content and blissful results of a white russian. Then asked me to walk over to the liquor store to get the fixin’s.

Now I was wide awake.

“No” was all I said.

“Aw, c’mon, sweetie. It’ll be fun -- I can get really loose after a couple of those.” Her eyes were alight with the promise of sin and debauchery.

I decided against a temperance lecture and instead played Mr. Cheapskate.

“I’m not buyin’ all that stuff for you. Go get it yourself.”

As I had hoped, this rubbed her the wrong way.

“You’re such a meanie. You’re no fun anymore. Why can’t you be fun? You’re just another one of these damn Mormon hypocrites. I’m going up to my place. Who needs you? Maybe I’ll walk down there myself!”

“Be my guest” I replied frostily.

She arose, grabbed her shopping bag, and majestically sailed out the door -- a battle cruiser ready for combat. If she actually does walk that far, it’ll be the most exercise she’s had in several years. Might do her some good, out in the fresh air. But I’m not holding my breath.

I expect her back around six, for some marinara sauce over noodles, with a side salad. I told her I had a can of black olives for the salad. She loves black olives.