Plus One (25 page)

“There you are.”

The TV was on, and Figgy was seated in the center of the couch, a wine glass balanced on her knee. She pressed a button on the remote, and Alex looked up at the screen, registering in a glance Albert Finney in a bubble bath, before looking back and seeing Sylvie curled up in Figgy's lap. Behind them, on the far side of the sofa, elbows on his knees and a big smile cutting across his square-jawed face, was Zev.

“Great to meet you!” Zev popped up from the couch. Before Alex knew what was happening, Zev had moved in for a man hug. “Sorry to bust in like this—school night, isn't it?”

Alex patted Zev a few times on the shoulder, then reared back. “Zev, right?”

“Yeah—hey, grab a glass from the kitchen and join us. We're just—”

Figgy called out from her spot on the couch. “Where've you been?” she asked. Her eyes were glassy and her voice was giddy. Was she drunk? “When I got home I went up to check on the kids and I woke up Sylvie so—”

“You weren't picking up your phone.” Alex said. “And Sylvie was coughing in her sleep—did you hear her
coughing
? I couldn't find the… cough stuff. So I just made a super-quick run to the CVS.”

Zev frowned and reached over the couch, giving Sylvie's back a quick rub. “She sounded fine when we carried her down from bed,” he said. “She's probably got a little bug, though. You poor
sweetie.”

Sylvie opened one eye and grunted.

Figgy hooked a strand of Sylvie's hair over her ear and shot Alex a look. “We've got a ton of medicine.” Figgy said. “In the kids' bathroom, under the—”

Alex took a step forward into the room, suddenly unsure how to respond to his wife and the large Israeli man soothing his daughter's fictitious cough. What was he even doing here? She never would've brought him home if she was fucking him, would she?

Figgy was telling Alex where to find the measuring caps when he cut in. “So you guys are just—what? Having a little movie party?”

Figgy swirled her glass and smiled. “Oh yeah—I was just telling Zev about the bathtub scene in
Two for the Road
—can you believe he's never seen it? We're doing something similar and I wanted to show him—”

Alex crossed his arms. “So this was over at Dani's?”

“Yeah, she had a bunch of us…” she said, then cocked her head curiously. “How'd you know I was at Dani's?”

Alex paused, then reached in his pants and pulled out his phone. “You weren't picking up—so I did that ZeroIn thing.”

Figgy narrowed her eyes, releasing a small exasperated cough. “What, you…
tracked
me?”

Next to her, Zev clapped his hands together. “I better get going. It's late and—”

Figgy motioned for Zev to stay and looked at Alex. “Why would you—”

“I was worried,” he said.

Figgy took a breath and paused, Alex waiting for a tirade about the pharmacy run or the secret surveillance. But she just shook her head and took a long draw on her wine glass. “Oh sweetie, I'm fine,” she said. “I just left my phone in the car and
didn't check it… were you really that worried?”

Alex shrugged. “You could've been anywhere and—”

“I so get it,” Zev said, crossing around the couch to sit. “One hundred percent. You've gotta keep a close eye on each other these days, don't you? The city's a scary place.”

Figgy giggled again and clapped Zev on the knee. She smiled and motioned to Alex. “So hey, how about you go into the kitchen and maybe find us another bottle. Have we got any cheese? I'm super hungry.”

Alex shook his head. “I'm going to bed,” he said, waiting a beat before turning to head up to their room, their laughter following him up the stairs.

Ten

A
lex raised his lounge chair a notch, stretched out his legs, and crossed one foot over the other. He tucked his hands in his armpits, wishing he'd brought something more substantial than a beach towel to keep warm. He'd been sitting here,
stationed
here really, since just after six. Three hours camped out by the pool at the Rutlidge Wailea, one of a scattering of nannies and personal assistants, the lot of them twitchy and territorial and ever watchful of one another; no way was Alex getting up now. He'd just watched a pool attendant swoop in, scoop up an unattended tote bag, and hand over a prime poolside cabana to a waiting nanny.

Lounge wars. That's what they called it yesterday, when Alex wandered out from the buffet at 10:30, looking for a place to plop and not finding a single available chaise within one hundred feet of the pool. Turns out the week around Christmas was the busiest week of the year at the Rutlidge, the enormous, objectively gorgeous, but aggressively beige hotel where half of Hollywood was
spending the holiday break. Demand for prime pool space was so intense that the hotel had implemented a strict occupancy policy, the specifics of which were explained to Alex by a buff Polynesian woman in a Santa hat and an orange polo shirt whose nametag read GLADYS.

“Guests must be physically present at all times,” said Gladys. “Unattended personal belongings will be collected and held at the concierge desk.”

Alex had laughed at her spiel, proudly declaring himself a conscientious objector in lounge wars and laying out four towels on a far-off stretch of sand by the Aloha Snack Stand. “It's
better
over here!” he said when Figgy came down from breakfast. “We can spread out and relax, nobody up in our business. I think I saw David Spade by the pool yesterday—you really think we're gonna be able to relax next to
Spade
? Besides—how great is this view?”

“Great,” she said, pulling out the bag of pineapple spears she'd smuggled from the buffet. She'd completed production the night before their flight from LAX, skipping the wrap party and leaving behind a clusterfuck of unresolved issues. Standing in the sand in a pair of linen shorts and an Indian-print top, shoulders slumped and eyes bloodshot, she looked like a person who'd witnessed a violent crime, the insanity of production intensified by the prospect of her fortieth birthday, which was just three weeks away. She was weirdly testy when he brought it up on the plane ride over, saying only that she felt like it was “an expiration date.”

“You know I've got my laptop, right?” she said now. “I've got notes due on the last two episodes. I'm not even sure I can get a WiFi signal out here. And all this sand? How am I going to keep it off the keyboard?”

Alex scanned the beach. “I'll find a table,” he said. “I'll borrow one from over by the snack stand—they've gotta have a little table over there. And I'll bring you mai tais and those amazing taro chips and it'll be great, I promise—”

He stopped short. No way was he going to talk Figgy into being okay with this spot. Sticking up for it would only reinforce her sense that three days in, the Sherman-Zicklin holiday vacation, their first big fancy family trip, was not going well at all. The rental van stunk of cigarette smoke. They got stuck behind a bulldozer on the drive from the airport. Their room looked over a parking lot, and when they'd checked in, Alex didn't have cash to tip the bellboy. Then there'd been some pointed discussion of Alex's packing and the fact that he'd brought a single bathing suit for each kid. “Who packs
one
bathing suit for a week on the beach?” she asked. “Not a Jew—that's who.”

This morning, Alex had set the alarm for 6:30 and headed down to the pool, determined to claim the primest cabaña he could find. It was ludicrous, sure, but if waging lounge wars meant making Figgy happy—or at least a little less miserable—it was worth it. It was like his book—he needed to start
pretending
. He'd pretend to be a man who took care of business, one of those guys he saw in the hotel lobby with the barrel chests and commanding baritones, men who knew how to arrange for a suite upgrade and an 8 p.m. dinner reservation for twelve. Alex wasn't that guy, but he sure as hell could fake it.

He was rolling his head around trying to work out a kink when a familiar voice sounded out.

“Hey,” said Sam, plopping down in the lounger next to him and madly strumming the screen on Alex's iPhone. “Mom's sleeping in. Getting room service. Said she'd meet us later. Sylvie's in the Jacuzzi with that girl from Tucson.”

Sam gave him an appraising look. “Aren't you freezing?”

“I am, but I can't go get my sweatshirt,” said Alex. “Hotel policy—super strict. One guest can reserve a maximum of three loungers. Minute you step away, you're out. Doesn't matter who you are. Kind of democratic, really. And would you look at the spot I got for us? Best seat in the house.”

“It's okay,” Sam sighed. “The ones by the grotto are shadier. Closer to the Jacuzzi, too.”

“Those don't count,” Alex said, squinting across the pool at the row of cabañas roped off for guests staying in the so-called supersuites. “Do you have any idea what those cost? They're like a grand a day. How crazy is that?”

“I heard the supersuites have a private buffet open all day on their floor. Eugene Bamper had like twenty-seven mango slushies yesterday.”

“Good for Eugene,” Alex said. He regarded his boy. Sam's hair was poofy and uncombed. His left knee bounced lazily up and down, two enormous warts clinging tenaciously to the kneecap. Something about the way his mouth hung open, the way his fingers twitched frantically against the iPhone—Alex suddenly felt an incredible urge to swat his son upside the head.

“Gimme my phone,” Alex said. “I didn't haul myself out here this morning so you could waste my battery on Pastry King. Go jump in the pool.”

Sam sighed. “Let me finish this profiterole first.”

“Come on, Sam—go swim. Now.”

“There's nothing to
do
in the pool.”

“Get wet. Splash around.
Go
.”

He sighed heavily and handed over the phone. “
God
, Dad—would you relax? We're on vacation.”

“I am completely relaxed,” he said, a little louder than he meant to. “I am
Mister
Vacation. Go on.”

Sam stood his ground and tugged at his swim trunks, his posture a full-body gesture of disgust.

Alex sat up and stabbed his finger forward. “You wanna know where
I
went on Christmas vacation when I was eleven years old? Iowa. To visit my grandpa in a nursing home. Big highlight of that trip was a visit to the John Deere factory—dirty snow and tractors behind glass. So, just do me a favor, okay? Look around and try to
at least pretend to enjoy yourself.”

“So we're not in Iowa,” Sam said. “Hoo-ray.”

Sam turned and took two steps toward the lip of the pool, then dropped into the water and began dog paddling into the deep end. Craning his neck to keep his head dry—he'd complained yesterday about what the saline was doing to his hair—he was cut off midway by a giant splash and a hysterical boyish whoop.

The three sons of Cary and Helen Bamper had a thing for entrances—last night out on the beach, they'd charged into the surf in a great bellowing herd, on their way demolishing a drip castle Alex and Sylvie had built. Today the first Bamper to hit the water was Eugene, a broad-shouldered thirteen-year-old, followed closely by the twins, black haired, squinty eyed, and vaguely vulpine. The three of them were constantly punching, swatting, and otherwise assaulting each other; they fascinated Alex as much as they terrified Sam, who now madly paddled back toward the shallow end.

“Leo!” called Helen, crouching down on the lip of the pool. “Constantine! Eugene! Here! Sunscreen!”

Helen dabbed sunscreen on Constantine's face while Cary paced the concrete behind her. Really, Alex thought: Who names their kids after Roman emperors? Even from this distance, he could see Helen's amused frown as she wrangled her squirming child. Her expression never wavered; she seemed endlessly entertained by the mini riots her boys were constantly initiating. Cary, meanwhile, hung back, oblivious, his attention focused on his Blackberry, which he held out in front of him like a dictaphone. With his Bermuda shorts, Hawaiian shirt, and broad, thick shoulders, Cary looked every bit like the nickname Figgy had for him: Big Daddy. It fit—besides his three boys, Big Daddy Bamper oversaw two crazy-successful network shows and was possibly the most confident human Alex had ever encountered.