Malibu

"...And there's no way we're taking less than two-four on this.  We're talking ocean-side property.  I go any further down, and I may as well give up my license.  Shit!  My one o'clock is outside.  Jenna just sent me a text.  She doesn't know how to use the phone, so she just sends me text messages.  I'm not going to fire her for not knowing how to use a landline.  That'd be like firing her for not knowing Morse Code.  Besides, if people think I have an incompetent secretary who sits around texting then they don't blame me when I keep them in the waiting room for half an hour.  Okay, gotta go.  I just told her to let him in.  Remember, two-four, no less.  Hi, Mr.--holy shit."

"Candy?"
"Matt."
"Uh...hi."
"You're--you're Mr--"
"Lewis."
"I saw the name but it didn't--"
"It's okay."
"I'm lying.  I never looked at the name.  I don't look at names.  Sorry."
"It's okay."
"Sorry."
"No really it's--"
"Have a seat."
"Uh, sure."

. . . . .

"So you must be good."
"Um, yeah, I'm...good."
"You're in the market for a place in Malibu so you must be, right?"
"Yeah."
"You didn't know that I was--?"
"I was supposed to meet with a Karen Martin?"
"Yeah, that's--just a little name change.  No big deal."
"Oh."
"How many people do you think would take me seriously with the name Candy?"
"Yeah, I guess."
"Why are you looking at me like I'm a ghost?"
"It's been...awhile."
"Going on twenty years now."
"Not that--well, yeah, I guess--depending on how you round up."
"I always round up.  Nature of the business."
"Yeah."
"So you're here about--"
"Do you still talk to--"
"I don't talk to anybody.  I'm here.  All the time.  I talk to Jenna.  My secretary.  That's about it.  No dating.  No--oh sorry, I do have a kid."
"You do?"
"Adopted.  From Botswana.  She's a sweetheart.  I named her Katie.  She's with the nanny right now.  I have a fantastic nanny.  So yeah, Jenna, Katie, the nanny.  That's my life.  How are you?"
"I'm--"
"Oh, and I feel fine.  Thanks."
"Oh, I'm sorry I didn't--"
"No, you were going to, and I knew you were going to, so I thought I'd beat you to it and say 'I'm fine.'  Never better.  It's a miracle, right?  What they can do these days.  When I think of fifteen years ago, it's--"
"Yeah."
"But yeah, I'm great.  It did--the uh, my--healthy--it did make the adoption a little tricky, but I didn't exactly go about it the usual way."
"No?"
"No, I paid a little extra, cut a few lines, that kinda thing.  I mean, I don't want to be raising a two-year-old when I'm forty, you know?  Do you have kids?"
"No."
"Oh."
"I am married though."
"That's great!"
"To a guy."
"That's--wow."
"...Surprise."
"I kinda figured."
"You did?"
"Yeah, with the whole--you were just.  I mean, you were in love with Steve, so--"
"He was my friend."
"Is he--?"
"No, uh, I mean, I don't know.  I haven't talked to him in--"
"Oh."
"I haven't seen him."
"Oh."
"It's been...years."
"Yeah."
"Fuck."
"Yeah, well...let's talk about houses."
"That's it?"
"What?"
"'Let's talk about houses?'  Is that how you change the subject?"
"I'm at work, Matt, this is work."
"I know, but--"
"We had an appointment to talk about houses."
"I know."
"In Malibu."
"I know."
"So let's talk about that--those--whatever."
"When did you stop talking to him?"
"Right around the the time I got my shit together.  Cancer can be incredibly sobering."
"I thought you had a tumor?"
"Cancerous."
"Oh."
"You weren't really around for much of that."
"I moved.  I didn't disappear."
"It was 1996.  Moving was disappearing."
"I tried to stay in touch.  It was harder back then."
"1996 is 'back then.'  Isn't that insane?"
"What was I supposed to do?  Write letters?  Like Emily Dickinson?"
"They had e-mail, Matt."
"I'm an asshole.  Is that what--"
"I don't.  Nothing!  Never mind.  Houses, okay?  Houses?"
"So you just broke up with him?"
"I didn't--"
"So what--"
"He took off one day.  Okay?  That's it.  He took off.  He took off and I was better and it was like 'what the fuck,' you know?  I'm supposed to be happy, but my boyfriend's gone.  So I'm just--I have this image of me standing somewhere.  Like on one of those white planes where I'm small and lost just going 'Hello?' like calling out for someone and nobody's there.  I mean, I actually have this dream--all the time."
"He disappeared?"
"Yes."
"Did he know you were better?"
"I think maybe that's why--like, maybe he didn't want to leave when I was still sick.  Maybe he would have felt too guilty and then once I was better--"
"Oh."
"We both loved him, but you have to admit--"
"He scared easy."
"I think the fact that he was going to have to marry me scared him more than the thought of me dying did."
"That's not fair."
"Fair?  Matt, you were gone."
"He wouldn't--"
"You were gone and we were living in that shithole apartment."
"Yeah, I moved to a shithole in Chicago."
"They don't have shitholes in Chicago."
"Oh, don't they?"
"We were in a Boston shithole.  Boston shitholes are the epitome of shitholes.  I don't even know how we survived."
"You were tough."
"Do I not seem tough now?"
"You seem like a totally different person."
"Well thank God for that."

. . . . .

"And you're obviously not a starving artist either, Matt, otherwise you wouldn't be sitting in front of me.  By the time you get to me, you are no longer able to stand in judgement.  Not when your file says you're looking for--" (Reads.) "--a kidney-shaped heated pool."
"I'm not embarrassed that I did well."
"Neither am I."
"But I'm mad that you..."
"That I what?"
"Changed."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Well...honestly.  Same here."
"I kinda thought maybe you were trapped back in 1996 waiting for me to show up and apologize for being such an asshole."
"You weren't an--"
"He called me."
"......."
"Asked me for money.  I, um, I..."
"Matt--"
"I said I didn't have it."
"Well..."
"I did.  Have it.  But...I thought..."
"You thought it was he going to use it for--"
"I mean, that was...that was common for him, for us, you know, me too, but...I was off it at that point, and I thought, well, no, I'm saving now.  I'm being responsible.  I can't afford to...but I could.  I could."
"Maybe you--"
"I didn't want to be tied to him.  In any way.  I wanted a...clean break, I guess.  So...I said...sorry.  I stopped taking his calls.  Then, like, a year ago, I see this article about this dead guy in the newspaper.  Some addict they found on the street.  It wasn't him, but it made me think, and I call him--number's disconnected, e-mail's are unanswered, even his mom hasn't seen him..."
"I'm not surprised.  He's the one who taught us how to disappear."
"How do you not feel guilty?  I don't mean you should, I just mean--how?  Like, really, how?  Because I feel so guilty."
"He left me; I didn't leave him."
"You going to tell me about the part where you got pregnant with one of your customer's kids?"
"...You..."
"It was a long conversation.  On the phone.  When he called me.  He told me about--"
"He was wrong."
"He said--"
"He was wrong.  I wasn't pregnant."
"With one of your--"
"I thought I was.  I took the test.  It said I was pregnant.  I was supposed to go to the doctor, and I miscarried that morning.  He found the test but I wasn't--"
"But it wouldn't have been his."
"I was seeing someone else.  I was going to break it off with Steve and just be with him--"
"Your customer."
"He came into the club once.  That doesn't make him a customer."
"You were basically a whore at that point."
"Fuck you, Matt."
"No wonder he was calling me for money looking for--"
"Oh, that's my fault?"
"Hadn't he been clean for six weeks?"
"What fairy tale did he tell you?  And did he suddenly turn into some award-winning actor when I wasn't looking because for you to believe that after knowing him for five years--"
"I--"
"Or was it just easier to make me the bad guy?  That was always the preferred game between the two of you."
"Whereas your favorite game was play the victim."
"I. Had. Cancer."
"What kind of cancer was it?"
"Breast cancer."
"Try again."
"What?"
"You know, I never met anybody who was as capable of holding the same amount of shame as you can."
"God, you're a loser, Matt.  You always were."
"Steve had it.  He told me."
"Wow, the conversations you two had--"
"You're saying you didn't have it?"
"Have what?"
"Probably the same thing that little baby from Botswana you adopted has."
"Fuck you."

. . . . .

"You should know, there are things I'm not afraid to say.  Maybe fifteen years ago I was, but not anymore.  I've got a backbone now.  I'm direct.  Some people might even call me cruel."
"You?  Cruel?  Oh Matty, you're not smart enough to be cruel."
"And for your information--the baby is fine.  And so am I.  And whatever I have is and never has been your business."
"We were best friends.  The three of us.  We were...inseparable.  We didn't have secrets from each other.  When did that start?  Why did any of us start keeping secrets?"
"You want to unload all the skeletons, Matt?  Tell me something.  How the hell can you afford a house in Malibu?"
"How else?  I married well.  A gay plastic surgeon.  You'd like him.  He doesn't talk."
"Ha."
"Did you ever think about all that?  All the..."
"Every day.  It seems weird, but...every day.  All the time.  How could I not?  I still have the battle wounds, right?"
"Yeah."
"How much did he ask you for?"
"What?"
"Steve.  When he called.  How much did he ask for?"
"...Two hundred.  That's it."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
"...He asked me for one-fifty."
"When?"
"Two years ago.  Called.  Asked how I was doing."
"How did he sound?"
"Not great."
"And you--"
"I sent him a thousand.  Wired it to him."
"That was--"
"Then I asked him not to call me again."
".........."
"Six of one, right?"
"Yeah."
"You still want to talk about Malibu?"
"That's what my husband sent me here for."
"Okay.  So let's talk."