Chapter Twenty-Six
-- May, 2002
Don Henley – “Dirty Laundry”
By the time Junior year ended and I had no concrete plans for college, Uncle Kevin’s suggestion that I meet with Lynn’s photographer friend became a requirement. I don’t think I even tried to fight it. All I knew was I didn’t want to end up like Uncle Bill, too afraid to even take a risk. With Mom swamped at work, I ended up taking the cheap-o Chinatown bus that Kev had recommended. The ticket was cheap – only $15. But you got what you paid for...
The Fung-Wah Express broke down several times along the way and smelled a bit like miso soup. A woman sat near me holding a live chicken. When I got off in Boston, the chicken was nowhere to be seen. Only the cage remained. That meant that somewhere during our four-hour plus journey, this woman had slaughtered, drawn and quartered an adult rooster without taking up the bathroom. Where did the feathers go?! What of the blood?!
As I walked through South Street station, I realized I had no idea how I was supposed to spot this guy in the crowd. But it turned out that that wouldn’t be a problem whatsoever. He was the only person holding a sign. It read quite appropriately: Professor Dildo.
Todd Hyde insisted on carrying my backpack and led the way to his ride (a handicapped van) which he had left double parked by a hydrant and somehow, not gotten a ticket. He had a shock of white hair like Doc Brown, a pair of lips like Al Jolson, and absolutely no filter whatsoever. Five minutes into the ride he was asking me if I had ever fooled around with Cousin Kady. He was a degenerate and a wild card and quickly becoming one of my favorite people ever. “Lynn tells me you’re a photographer?”
“Just a hobby now, but yes there was a time when I could have made a run at it, really had a career. I had a few gallery shows in the village. Probably late seventies, early eighties. Met your uncle out there, what’s his name, the one who died of AIDS?”
“Oh, you mean Nick. Yeah, it was lung cancer.”
“Potato-tomato. He was really talented. Could have gone far, but I think he liked the perks and the awards more than actually being an artist. Listen to me, said the man who went nowhere!”
I laughed. “You used to live in L.A., right?”
“Yeah, what a shithole...”
“Everyone tells me to move out there after college if I want any kind of job in the movie business.”
“If you want to be really bold, you’ll skip college altogether, head out there straight after high school and get the lean years over with. People will tell you success is about talent or lacking ethics, but it really just comes down to who can stand being poor the longest. Because you willbe broke out there. Mark my words.”
“Hey, I’ve been broke my whole life. I still haven’t made it.”
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Todd shrugged. “See, just wait longer.”
I was getting serious “Good Will Hunting” vibes as we cruised through Cambridge, which was fitting seeing as Damon and Affleck grew up around there. I had so internalized their success story that I wanted to go to Harvard like Matt, but I definitely didn’t have the grades.
Todd drove us back to his apartment. It was a sparsely furnished bachelor pad, just enough utensils for one person. Clearly this was how a life-long pursuer of the arts was supposed to live.
Todd cracked open a beer and didn’t bat an eyelash when I asked for one too. “Don’t get addicted to these things,” he teased. “You’ll end up just like your Aunt Broomhilda.”
“Oh, I heard about the ear rub!”
“Worst fifteen minutes of my life.”
“It went on that long?!”
He stared off, haunted. “Some of the things she cooed to me, I can’t unhear.”
“Please don’t judge our entire family by her.”
**
The next day, I took the “T-line” down Commonwealth Ave. to tour Boston University. I was unable to differentiate B.U. from the surrounding city, but somehow found the admissions office. A Senior named Ted showed around the dozen or so prospective students who had shown up. Most of them had their parents with them. By the end of the tour, I was unimpressed, especially since the place had a staggering 40k a semester price tag.
I got back on the “T” and headed over to Emerson College. Unlike B.U., Emerson at least had a view of the picturesque Boston Commons. The students there were a strange mix of nerdy boys and girls with big hair who looked like they reported on the weather somewhere down in Miami. The tour started promptly at 2 p.m. Our guide eagerly showed us the expensive, state of the art editing bays they had. They also made sure to emphasize that unlike other schools, at Emerson -- freshmen were allowed to check out film cameras.
When Todd picked me up afterwards, he asked what the verdict was. I honestly didn’t have an answer for him. Both schools had strong film programs and talked a lot of shit about NYU. But I thought that the tours would have given me a clearer idea. Instead, I just felt more unsure than ever. When I told Todd that, he knew just what to say. “Let’s get drunk.”
By about the third round of beers back at Todd’s, something occurred to me. “You got any other Nick stories?” I asked.
“You ever hear about what happened when Dean was born?”
I shook my head and Todd settled into the kitchen chair across from me to tell his yarn. “Well, Lynn’s in labor for... something ridiculous, like thirty-six hours or something. So, of course, Nicky shows up looking to pass the time by doing some blow in the bathroom...”
I loved where this story was going.
“Only he loses his vial of coke down the hospital sink--”
I struggled to stop laughing.
“What’s he gonna do? He can’t leave it – it’s worth like $400! And he can’t trust just anybody to help him. So, what ends up happening is during the birth of his first child, Kevin’s enlisted to drive all the way back home to get his toolbox! When he finally got back, they ended up having to dismantle the sink. The kicker was: when they finally found the vial, it had turned upside down and all the coke had been washed away down the pipes!”
My face hurt from cackling.
Todd looked up at the clock. “Eh, it’s getting late. You’ve got an early bus tomorrow. We should hit the hay.”
He set me up with bedding for the couch and went to brush his teeth. I stretched out to go to sleep, thinking about the day.
When Todd emerged from the bathroom, he was wearing nothing but a pair of tightie-whities. He stretched languorously in the doorway, asking if I “needed anything” before bed.
I was on the six a.m. bus back to Jersey the next morning.