PIT#45: In Threes 3
Points In Time
Westlake Village, California
Tuesday June 17, 1986
10:02 p.m.
Lita knowing what she must do.
As though a mental pain within their chests, both having a deeply felt sense of forthcoming sadness.
Shortly before sleep coming…
“Know what I’d like to do, baby?”
Turning onto my side now. My left arm across Lita’s chest.
Lita’s left arm onto my outer thigh.
“Whatever you want to do, honey, It’s okay with me.”
Her hand cupping my thoroughly flaccid dick.
“I’d like to hold ‘you’ tonight.”
“And if I get horny”
“It’ll be okay.”
My hand holding Lita’s soft breast…
We both slept.
Wednesday , June 18, 1986
5:55 a.m.
Sunlight and cool morning air flowing through the open slider, Lita awaking first, her back to Mitchell, pulled the light weight blanket to cover her bare shoulders as she turned to look at — also covered by the light weight blanket, Lita looked at his back, shoulders and head.
Knowing the moving van would be at the house in Woodland Hills to remove whatever furniture Marsha had not wanted that Mitchell did want between seven and seven-thirty and, sensing the mental pain of the rapidly approaching time when she ‘must’ say goodbye to this man… To this white man that she had against all odds — disbelievingly, fallen in love with.
Feeling Lita’s movement, I turned to face her. Now the first time and, sad to say, the last time Lita and I would sleep together, and all I wanted to do was to look at her… To see Lita.
Lita and me, we’re both naked lying inches apart — though morning coolness felt upon our early morning flesh, sensing the radiating warmth from the body of Lita, sex the furthest thing from my mind.
‘Oh, God’! How I did not want to say goodbye to this beautiful woman.
We two studied the face of the other… Black eyes upon green eyes… green eyes upon black eyes.
My arms about her. Lita’s breasts soft upon my chest. Sex not an issue.
‘Oh, God’!
“Mitchie…” her hand caressing my cheek “...we’d better get going.”
Holding her head in both hands, our lips lightly coming together. “Yes.”
Woodland Hills, California
6:52 a.m.
Lita in the driver seat. Me outside. The window open. Our hands held tightly as though not wanting to let go — which we certainly did not.
“You going to call ‘Howard’ and tell him ‘you will’?”
“Yes, soon as I get home.”
Fighting to hold tears back. My finger twining a tight curl that had fallen upon her forehead.“Probably for this best, I guess.”
Lita’s eyes watering. “Maybe in ten, fifteen years things will be different.”
Saying it. Saying it because the words would no longer make a difference. “I love you, Lita.”
Lita’s eyes no longer watering as tears came. “I love you, too, Mitchie.” Moving the lever to ‘D’ , the car moving from the curb… “Goodbye.” she gasped from behind the open window…
At just about the exact time the moving van backed onto my driveway.
Going from room to room, showing the man what was to be taken and what was to be left, I then waited in the Ford until— for what seemed a very short time for all to be loaded into the van.
Locking the door and lowering the garage door, I drove to my new home.
Westlake Village, California
11:4o a.m.
“ ‘Morning, Mitch.”
“ ‘Morning, Milt.” I said to my next door neighbour while looking over the top of their old Lincoln… “No worries, Harriet…” I snarled to his wife “... my girlfriend... Lita is ‘gone’ thanks in part to you.”
Whatever was to heavy for me to handle on my own, I had the movers locate in the approximate place I thought they should go, and what I could handle myself, I had the movers leave in the garage.
12:50 p.m.
Strange, ‘2821 Waterview Lane’ seemed so much larger and — even with whatever furniture was carried in on this day; on this day ‘2821 Waterview Lane’ appeared to be so much larger and so much emptier than it had just the day before.
Other than Morgan’s silver flask at Elysium, never much of a drinker, ‘What the hell!’ Pouting a stiff Scotch over ice, going outside I stood at the rail in the spot Lita had stood only yesterday and let my mind wander and my mind did wander... to the only other time a girl, and now a woman had left me...
Within the fifty-two years of my life there had been but one other time that I had felt so sad and so lonely….
This time, now, today it had not been the fault of ‘anything’ I had done or said, more so the fault of a preconceived prejudicial condition.
But then! Back then it ‘had’ been my fault. But I had no choice and ‘had’ to do it! What else could I have done but lie to Susan and Susan’s parents? I ‘had’ to!
Wandering, Remembering:
It had been on, thinking, It had been early in December in nineteen-fifty-one and I’d been with my parents in Evanston when we went into Walgreen’s for…
“My dad wanted coffee and me a hot fudge sundae when Susan and her mother came in and sat kitty-corner from us and, Oh, my, God! Susan was beautiful, reminding me of a young Elizabeth Taylor and feeling the absolute ‘need’, I somehow worked up the courage to walk over to meet her and…
From that moment… from that very moment truly feeling that Susan and myself meeting as we had, and instantly mutually falling in love was ‘God given’.
“Later that same evening…With her mother’s permission, while at Walgreen’s that afternoon Susan had been allowed to give me her telephone number, and when I called early that evening, with her mother’s permission, giving me her address, I was allowed to drive —in a snow storm, by the way — to their apartment, about a half hour away from my parent’s home in Skokie when, after meeting Susan’s father I was..”
Oh, my God! “In my version of ‘the Spanish Inquisition’, I was grilled about my present school grades and my scholastic average and my aspirations for ongoing future education…” As though it were a forgone conclusion that this seventeen year old boy that had met their fifteen year old daughter on this very same day would be their, far in the future, son-in-law which, with ‘God’s’ help, I would be their, far in the future, son-in-law.
“To be honest, though, I was a really shitty student getting by by the skin of my teeth and had absolutely no ‘aspirations of ongoing future education’ — and most certainly not at any ‘high class’ ivy walled university.”
So here is where the huge facade of untruths… Shit! I was lying through me teeth! “But you can understand why I had to!”
If I wanted a life with Susan, I ‘had’ to have a college education and as my father was a commercial photographer and had at one time told me: ‘if you can pass the entrance examination, the studio will pay for ‘RIT’.
“So I told Susan and the Friedmann's that I was an ‘A’ minus student…”
“But seeing the look on Mister Friedmans face, I quickly added, ‘I was working hard to bring my average back up’ and of course the reason my A plus average had dropped to an A minus was because we had recently moved from Chicago to Skokie’.
“And with Gods help! And why would God not, as he’d brought Susan and me together. And from that time on, for the next five months I crammed! I had a tutor! I worked my ass off..”
Having confidence that I would pass the ‘RIT’ exam, on Thursday, the twenty-nineth of May, hating the lie, I told Susan that I was going for a required orientation and to find living quarters. I boarded a train in Union Station bound for Rochester, New York.
On June twelve the envelope came.
“Sue…” I said “... I’ve got to see you today, as soon as possible.”
“I don’t understand. “ Susan had said. “What happened?”
God, how do I tell her?
“I lied.”
“Lied? You lied? About what?”
“Tell me, Sue, what should I have done? Should I have told your mother and father that their A-plus daughter was about to start dating a dummy?”
I loved her so much I didn’t know how I’d be able to live without her, if Susan and I weren’t together.
“I just don’t know what I’m going to tell my parents.”
Assuring me that she loved me and that we would work ‘thing’s out.
“On June nineteen, on commencement day Susan attended my graduation, sitting with my mother and father…”
All is well with the world! I thought
Two days later was a beautiful Saturday — on our way to the beach Susan was sitting on the stoop waiting for me and as I pulled to the curb, standing, she walked slowly to the car. Her skin sallow, the flesh around her eyes puffy as though she’d been crying and her eyes glassy and bloodshot.
“Susan, what’s wrong?” I asked.
Staring through the window, she didn’t answer… Opening her hand, she looked down.
“On her palm there was a gold ring. A gold ring with adhesive tape wrapped around the shank.
Oh, God! Susan, no! “I remembered as the memory of that old sadness returned to my mind to mingle with today’s sadness at the loss of Lita.
Finishing the last of my scotch’n’rocks, swiping my arm across my eyes, I went into my empty new home..
Topagana Canyon, California
Sunday June 22, 1986
10:50 a.m.
Stretched from tree to tree on either side of the Elysium driveway was a heavy steel chain with a hand painted sign hanging in the middle reading: ‘CLOSED’.
Pulling to the side of the road I waited to see if any other of the group would show up.
A few minutes later, Morgan’s old Cadillac pulling up behind me. Evie and Morgan stepping out. “So the fuckers ‘really’ did it!”
“Yeah…” I said “...what now?”
“Well I suppose there’s always the beach.” Evie said.
Feeling at a loss for the loss of — Let’s face it, Elysium had become our escape from the realities of the real world… The natural beauty of Elysium and of the people of Elysium had become our way of life.
“Don’t feel like the beach just now.” Morgan said as Sandy’s Chevrolet, with
Ken inside stopped behind the old Cadillac.
Standing, looking at the chain, neither Ken nor Sandy said a thing.
“Oh, well.” Morgan said sadly, adding, “You know how to reach me at the store, Mitch, so how’s about giving me your number so we might be able to get together now and then.”
“Yeah...”Sandy said “...and don’t forget us.”
Reaching into the Ford’s glove-box, writing my home number on three of my business cards, I handed one to Morgan, Evie and Sandy.
“You talk to Janice lately?”
“Yeah…” Evie said “... yesterday, to see if she was up to coming…” motioning to the secured Elysium road “...here today, but she said she wasn’t feeling very well and passed.”
Standing in silence a few seconds, hesitating to say ‘goodbye’, Morgan and Evie got into the old Cadillac, Ken and Sandy into her Chevrolet and myself into my Ford station wagon.
With me in the lead, we drove from the fields of Elysium.
Westlake Village, California
Wednesday June 25, 1986
5:30 p.m.
“Evie?’
Sobbing coming through the phone in long, hard gasps.
“Evie, is that you?”
“Mitch, she’s...Oh, God!”
“Evie, What’s wrong?”
“I’m… “ attempting to catch her breath “...I couldn’t drive … so Morgan’s here with me.”
Catching the panic in Evie’s gasping voice. “Where are you?”
“At Janice’s.”
“At Janice’s home?”
“Yeah. She called me about an hour ago and told me to say… Oh, God! Janice called me about an hour ago and told me to say goodbye to everyone.”
“Why? Where’s she going?”
“Mitch…” taking the phone from Evie “...Janice…” sighing deeply “...she’s dead.” Morgan said.
“ ‘What’!?”
“She called Evie and told her that she loved all of us, and for her to say goodbye because they’d found a lump in her other breast and were going to remove it… the breast. And Janice said she couldn’t stand it! So she told Evie she was going to kill herself...”
“My God!”
“...and by the time…” sobs coming from the old Venom vet . “...by the time Evie and me got here, Janice was gone.”
“Morgan, thank you for calling.” Hardly able to speak myself. “Tell Evie that I said thanks for letting me know and that I’ll be in touch.”
Breaking the connection.
Outside, at the rail where Lita had stood. My head cradled by my crossed arms… I cried.
So ends the PIT: ‘Points in Time’ series.
Thank you for sticking with the group.
However, Mitchell’s story continues.
GON #1: The Writer & Poet
