“Can we go inside?”
Mo looked at him awkwardly.
“I gotta get back—I wasn’t staying here long, just come to drop this off and pick up some papers—” Mo said unapologetically.
“It’ll be just a minute.”
“Can’t we have a minute out here?”
“You always did that. Just when the conversation was about to get normal, Mo, you always have a way of keeping it on a level of discomfort that makes everyone you talk to squirm.”
“You come out here to insult me? I got business to take care of Howie; I don’t have a movie waiting for me out in Hollywood.”
“Oh, is that it?”
“Yeah, that’s it.”
“All these years you never come see me because I work my ass off and go and get famous?”
“Who is this guy. Are you kidding? Come visit you? What planet you been living on all these years? Are you even Howie Kessler underneath all that?”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. But I waited for years to hear from one of you guys and you all failed. We were buddies—we were friends—”
“And you up and left us all. You left us to die here in Brooklyn. You just left!” Mo shouted, at least to put a damper on the direction of the argument.
Howie did take a minute; but not to cool off.
“You and Frank just didn’t know how to end it, did you? I mean, we were having a nice time together and you couldn’t leave it alone. It wasn’t his fault, you know.”
“And where the fuck were you during all of this? Hanging out with DeNiro or Stallone? What the fuck do you know about Frank, the testimony, or the 2 fucking years I wasted up in Ossining?”
“You know, Mo, you were the smartest one of all of us. It kills me that you’re still hustling, and that you never did a goddamned thing with your life except continue your games and petty crimes. You grew up to be a loser, Mo—”
“Fuck you,” Mo said as he stepped onto his boat and closed the door behind him, appearing unfazed by his oldest friend in the world.
Howard was in a state of confusion and self-reflection that could have sent him right to a heroin dealer; so he took a few breaths and stepped back off the dock and into his car. He turned on the heat, put his head in his hands, and tried to think of what to do next.
** *
Howard headed to New Jersey where he thought he might find some empathy from Punch. He wasn’t even sure that’s what he was looking for, though. He felt compelled to talk to the rest of the guys and get some thoughts off his chest, now that he realized what had been bothering him for so long.
All those years seeing the shrinks, and no one was able to put a finger on his discomfort with relationships.
In ten minutes on the dock, I figured out that I never really shut the door after I left Brooklyn. The temptation to return all these years was fought by the rational decision to stay and advance my career and seek happiness. But the unhappiness, struggle, and disappointment I felt as a kid re-emerged now. If I could just close the book on that part of my life, maybe I could move on. I just need to tell Punch that he should have stayed in touch. He should have reached out to me. What kind of a friend just lets someone JESSleave, and never even tries to write or call?
He pulled into Punch’s driveway and sat for a moment. How was he going to approach him—the man who opened his home to Howie for over a month and orchestrated the reunion? Who tracked him down after Howie couldn’t complete the calls to him? Who helped get him out of trouble countless times as a kid? Howie needed to end all the relationships on his own terms, and that was that.
I walked in through the back door after knocking a little, hoping Adele would come over and let me in. The door was open. I had all the energy I needed to get this conversation over and done with. I walked through the kitchen into the dining room, the dreaded mausoleum of tacky china. I heard the clocks ticking. It let me know that the world was still moving and I wasn’t stuck in between floors. Soothing and disconcerting at the same time, the different ticks. No one appeared to be home, which was odd. It was coffee and strudel time, 4pm. And after that they would turn on the local news on television. And then dinner. And then reading.
I sat at the dining room table for a while listening to the ticking clocks and staring at the photos on the wall. Decades of memories locked in faux-wood frames. The phone rang 5 times. I thought the message machine might pick it up. Then the phone rang again, as many times. A few minutes later it happened again. I left the house and sat in the car. I put my head back and waited, dozing off for a while.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.
JESSICA
Wake up. Wake up Howard!
HOWIE
I’m up! I’m up. Yeah. Gimme a sec.
JESSICA
What are you doing here?
HOWIE
Is your father around?
Long PAUSE.
JESSICA
He’s dead. We buried him yesterday. He’s gone.
HOWIE
Jeeeezus—Jess, Honey, I’m sorry.
JESSICA
What do you want from us? Why are you here?
HOWIE
Listen don’t get upset—I mean, I know you’re upset. I’m not here for anything. I just wanted to say hello. I’ll get going. Anything I can do? You’re sitting shiva, right? Where is your mother?
JESSICA
I’m going inside. I can’t have this conversation with you. You make me so angry; I want to blame this all on you.
Howard drove away from the house in total disarray. He was lost. Though he went there to end the relationship, he wanted to do it on his own terms. This was not his own terms. He lost one of his oldest friends who knew him better than anyone; even though he didn’t know him at all.
Days went by and he didn’t speak to anyone. Of all the memories flooding over the past couple of months, Howie really concentrated and focused on the ones that were most compelling with Punch. He was really like a brother, as cliché as he thought it sounded. Though Howie had more brothers and cousins than he cared about, Punch was always there for him as a kid. When they got older and Howie started to get into more trouble, Punch was the one to give him the guidance and self-conscious grounding that he needed. Punch was the reason why Howie left Brooklyn—to get out and do something with his life rather than get sucked in to the pattern of failure into which so many of their friends had fallen.
Had he not returned, he never would have known about Punch’s death, or his daughter, son, wheelchair, his life.
He found a voice and wrote his story. Over the course of just a few days, Howard wrote a script that he felt encapsulated the gritty, sad, isolated world he grew up in. It was finished.
He rewarded himself with a trip to the track, his only true joy. He sat quietly in his spot at Belmont with his hat pulled down low and his DRF in his hands. He shuffled over to the Paddock for a bite to eat.
This guy walks up to me and holds a ticket in his hand and says I dropped it. Well of course I dropped it, you fucking ass, it’s a losing ticket. Oh, he says. I realized at that point he’d never been to a track. Here in the dining room there’s not a lot of tickets on the floor, I guess they sweep them up. But in the Grandstand the floor is littered with losing tickets. I explained that to him and he was grateful and apologized for bothering me. I could tell he felt really stupid. I asked him what he’s doing here. It was at that point he recognized me. I tried to walk away but he was a big fan. We talked for a while and he joined me for lunch. He’s an off-Broadway producer. I told him about my script.
The producer, Brad Siegel, had been a big fan of Howard’s and was interested in his disappearance. He noted that there had been several media reports of “sightings” of Howard Kessler throughout the tri-state area, and there was even a blog now devoted to marking the spot where he was seen.
Brad asked to see Howie’s script. Howie was a little hesitant a
t first, knowing that this guy could be a stalker. But they got along well and he seemed genuinely interested in the story, and not the star appeal of Howie himself. Howie excused himself from the conversation, citing Punch’s recent death as a source of his anxiety, but gave his number to Siegel to contact him to discuss the script. He meant it.
They went back and forth over the course of the next week or so on variations of the plotline, then Siegel called a writer he knew in Brooklyn to go help Howie out in polishing the script and adapting a stage version. Siegel and Howie went to one of the Russian nightclubs and bonded over vodka, dancing, and a Neil Diamond cover singer who sang only in Ukrainian. They had a lot in common, but not really. They did share a common interest, in seeing success and exposure come from the script.
Siegel sold Howard on the idea of running his script as a play right after the new year. A contract he had signed months ago had fallen through and he had open dates for the theater that he would love to fill. He could pull together the financing, find a director, and get a cast together. He owned his own theater on Greene Street in Soho. Howard was elated that he could do something without Alan, finally.
Howard got up the next morning and before he went on his jog, he left a voicemail for Alan stating that he’d no longer be needing his services as his agent. He would fax a letter later that day to confirm the end of their engagement.
He felt energized, independent, and confident. This was his work and he alone would see to its success.
Chapter 27
Jessica
It was awful. It couldn’t have been a worse, horrible, tragic way to die. We still don’t know what killed him, or if he killed himself. My mother won’t hear me say that. But I think my dad might have at least contemplated it. The official story is that he fell into a coma brought on by the blood sugar thing and then suffered a stroke. That’s all fine. But we found him face down in the toilet bowl. He had to have crawled from his chair, which was not even outside the door. I’m sick to my stomach just thinking about it.
The past few weeks my dad was depressed. I can’t say that the whole reunion was a trigger, I just can’t say it for sure. But the timing is awfully coincidental.
“I disagree. It gave him something to do. He was calling restaurants, writing emails, keeping active, and really looked forward to staying in touch with the others,” my mother said as her voice still quivered when she talks about him.
“Well, Ma, it did bring back rough memories, right? I mean, he said some pretty provocative things that I’m not sure he’s thought about in years.”
“Provocative? What? Your father? Come on.”
“No, Ma, really, you should hear the interviews.”
“What, hear what interviews?”
“The ones I did for the article. I taped many of them, so I could go back and listen.”
“You did what?”
“Mom, for the 99th time, I recorded the conversations I had—with consent—to piece together Howard Kessler’s childhood through his friends’ eyes. And that included Dad. He didn’t just point me in the direction, he’s a part of the story, too.”
She looked at me funny. I don’t know if she didn’t understand or if she misunderstood. But she was clearly not comfortable with this.
“How much did you and your father talk about this thing you’re doing?”
“Ok, Ma, first, it’s an article. It’s an essay about Howard Kessler, Dad, Frank Russo, Mo Buchwald, and Art Raimi. We’ve talked about this.”
“Don’t you realize what a painful childhood your father had? How he had to get out of that place before it destroyed him? Why do you think all these years we’ve—I’ve—kept him the hell away from those animals?”
I was a little shocked. I was a lot shocked. I’d never heard my mother—the queen of deference—assert such a strong opinion about something other than a handbag or kugel.
“I didn’t know you—I didn’t know. You should have told me, Ma, before I started—”
“So what, you’d stop? Or you’d skip your father and write the story without him?”
“No, I don’t know—”
Is she saying it’s my fault he’s dead because I asked too many questions about his childhood?
“Do you want me to be defensive? Because I’m kind of spent right now, Ma, and I can’t get my head around what I think you might be inferring,” I said quietly.
“I don’t know what you just said.”
“Don’t play stupid with me. Don’t do it anymore. You got away with doing that with Dad, but I can’t stand it. Just say what you mean, please, and have some respect for my intelligence.” I had my head in my hands, gripping my hair, feeling the blood rush to my face, and the tears streak down my cheeks.
“Aren’t you feisty today. What gives you so much confidence?”
“Where are you going with this? Why are you fighting with me?”
We both went silent and sat there at the breakfast table over tepid, over-sweetened Lipton tea and white toast, with the AM news radio humming as our soundtrack.
“I didn’t make Dad depressed,” I said and I got up to leave.
My mother grabbed my hand to sit me down again.
“I’m sure that after all these years he told you about his youth. But maybe he left out some details.”
“I know he was poor, really poor. I knew that before the interviews—”
“Honey, he went hungry. And you know why? His father was a dope addict.”
I couldn’t speak at that moment. I didn’t know whether to laugh because the accusation was so ridiculous that a Polish immigrant escaping the Pogroms in the 1920s would do that. Jews aren’t heroin addicts.
My mother continued, “His father took what little there was, and, well, he was an addict. That’s how he died. Well, he got hit by a trolley car, but really he wasn’t right at that time.”
I still couldn’t speak. Even if I could get words out of my throat, I wouldn’t even know where to begin to ask the questions. So my mother continued.
“Your grandmother was saddled with debt, and she was ostracized by her family and Mordechai’s family. Mordechai was your grandfather’s name. After he died, your father was about 7 years old then, there was no contact with family so your grandmother had no support. God only knows how she survived. All those years you wondered why she was so grumpy? That’s why. That’s the reason why. Because she had a terrible life with a terrible man. And your father—your wonderful, sweet, father—”
Mom couldn’t go on after that. Neither could I.
Still in shock, I pieced together some fragmented stories mostly from my dad’s interviews and realized there was a sub-text to much of what he was saying. That sub-text—his aversion to drugs and alcohol, his obsession with promises and responsibility—underscored so much of why he worked tirelessly to provide stability to us, at the expense of his own explorations in life. I re-read some of the passages in the article referencing my dad’s experience, and I plugged in a few details learned from my mom. It gave him more depth and added even more compelling angles to the story—which started to look more and more like a tale of desperation for all involved, rather than a pin-the-tail-on-Howie piece. That worked fine with me.
I felt a strong desire to call Howie, since the two of them were closest friends and had known one another since they were in grade school. I wanted to talk with him about my dad now, though I realize I was a little gruff with him a few weeks ago. He’s no dummy, I know I didn’t like him. But I feel like now it’s different; Punch isn’t here anymore.
“Hi, um, this is Jessica Plotkin—I just wanted—”
“Oh, Jess, hiya, how are you doing? How’s your mother?”
He was surprisingly calm and solemn.
“I’m, uh, we’re ok. It’s hard. It’s just really hard now, for my mom. For me. Everybody, my niece and nephew, my brother, it’s just been hard—” I trailed off and mumbled a few more details to fill in the space of the phone call
. “I was hoping you could fill in some details about my dad, his life, as a kid, you know, um, I just don’t know where to start, really—”
“Oh, sure, wow, that’s a long way back. What do you want to know?”
“I don’t know, that’s just it. He never really talked much about his upbringing. I know he was poor—”
“Poor? You don’t know what poor is. No offense, honey, but your father didn’t eat sometimes. Not that we had much, I lived in a tenement with 40 relatives, but there was always bread. I would bring him bread. We were kids, 6 years old maybe. Most of the games we played was running around trying to steal food.”
I stopped him right there, because I wanted him to know I learned about my dad’s father. At least it would help Howie talk about what he really knew, rather than hold back.
“I know about his father. I know about it—”
I heard him sigh, and then take a deep breath. I can’t get over how much is communicated non-verbally, and without even seeing someone. Hearing them breathe can explain more than words ever can.
“When did you find out? Recently?”
“Like an hour ago.”
“You’re still in shock, why don’t we talk about this another time? Nothing is going to make sense to you now.”
“When the fuck is a heroin addict grandfather ever going to make sense?”
“Well, hon, it is what it is. Listen, why don’t you and I grab a bite to eat? You ever been to Brooklyn?”
Have I ever, I wanted to say. But I remembered at that point not to let on to the fact that I’ve been digging around for months. At the same time I didn’t want to play stupid, because I really wanted his help is piecing together my father’s life, and in understanding more about who I am as a result of how he lived as a child.
“A couple times—Williamsburg and Park Slope, mostly. Dad took us out to Coney Island once when we were young, and we had dinner at Carolina’s on Mermaid Avenue. Is that place still there?”
“Ah, I don’t know—I’ve only been back here a couple of months, one of which I spent in West Orange at your folks’ place. I’m still getting a feel for it now. I’m staying in Brighton Beach. There’s a nice Ukrainian café downstairs. Give me a call whenever you want to come by. I’m here for a while and I don’t really go anywhere far.”