Excerpt of A Playdate with Death by Ayelet Waldman

Chapter One

Isaac shot me two times in the chest. With his toast.

"You're dead," my two-and-a-half-year-old son said, biting off a chunk of his Glock 9mm semiautomatic pistol.

"Mama doesn't like that game, Isaac. You know that. Mama doesn't like guns." I ruffled his hair with my hand. I planted a kiss on the top of his older sister's head and turned to my husband. "Don't cut his bread on the diagonal anymore."

"Why not?" Peter asked over the top of his coffee mug. His hair stuck out in wiry spikes and his gray eyes were bleary with exhaustion.

"Because he chews out the middle and turns the crust into a gun."

"Maybe if he had a toy gun, he wouldn't need to fashion weapons out of his breakfast."

I gave my husband a baleful glare and poured my own coffee. I leaned against the kitchen table and slurped. Ruby turned to me with a conspiratorial air made only slightly ridiculous by the fact that her uncombed curls stood up all over her head. She looked like a dandelion puff.

"Isaac has been playing guns all morning, Mama. And Daddy let him."

"Oh really?" I said.

"Don't be a tattletale, Ruby," Peter said.

He was right. Telling tales is a dreadful habit. Nonetheless I was glad of an ally. I was becoming heartily sick of the never-ending game of 'bang bang you're dead.' Honestly, what is it with boys? Before I had one of my own, I would have sworn up and down that gender differences were cultural constructs and that it was possible to raise a boy who defied stereotypes by being more interested in dolls than trucks and in arts and crafts than weapons. Then Isaac was born. And he was interested in dolls: Superman dolls. Batman dolls. And he loved painting and sculpture; they were wonderful tools with which to make the weapons I wouldn't buy for him.

I took away the Play Doh, the modeling clay, and all cylindrical objects. We stopped eating food that could be easily chewed into the shape of artillery. I banned all remotely aggressive videos and television, including most of the Disney movies the kids liked; Peter Pan spends way too much time sword-fighting and that Sea Witch would inspire anyone to violence. I refused to be swayed by the fact that the Isaac was chafing under a diet of Teletubbies and Barney. Mindless pap was better than warfare any day. I bought him an endless succession of gender-neutral toys and videos, played house with him, changed his dolls' diapers and taught him every single Pete Seeger song I could remember. So far my efforts had borne exactly no fruit.

My mother attributed Isaac's gun obsession to the fact that I'd been shot the day I gave birth to him, but that's just blaming the victim, as far as I'm concerned.

"What fabulous thing are you guys going to do today?" I asked. I'm afraid I didn't do a terribly good job of concealing my glee at the thought of being excluded from my family's plans for the morning. Peter, a screenwriter, had just finished two long months of shooting on his latest work of art, The Cannibal's Vacation. The director had demanded his presence on the set, apparently worried that without Peter there to rewrite various exclamations of horror, the film would never wrap. To compensate me for having been alone with the kids while he lounged away the days and nights on Lomboc, a lesser-known tropical island in Indonesia, my husband had been doing solo kid duty for a week or so.

"We're going fishing for dinosaurs," Isaac announced.

"Really?" I asked.

"We are not going fishing." Ruby reached across the table and pinched her brother who squealed in protest. I inserted myself between them and frowned at her.

"Ruby, watch it, or you won't be going anywhere," I said.

"Yes I will. Because Daddy promised to take us to the La Brea tar pits, and you're going to the gym, so I am, too, going."

The mouth on that kid. But you couldn't argue with her logic.

I didn't bother answering her, just picked Isaac up and buzzed him with my lips. "I'm going to miss you guys today," I lied.

"You could come if you want." Peter's voice was a hopeful squawk.

"No thanks. Ruby's right, I'm going to the gym."

I plopped Isaac on the floor and finished my coffee with a gulp. I took a Powerbar out of my stash hidden in the back of the pantry, waved gaily at my family, and headed out the door.

"I'm taking your car!" I shouted, all too happy to leave Peter with the station wagon that was bursting with car- seats, baby wipes, and haunted by a mysterious odor whose origin lay in some long-lost tube of fluorescent yogurt. I slipped into his pristine, orange vintage BMW 2002, popped the car into gear, and zipped off down the street, reveling in my hard-won freedom.

I'm the first to admit that I'm a somewhat unwilling stay-at-home mom. Not that I didn't choose that role. I did. Before I'd had my kids, I'd been a public defender representing indigent criminals in federal court. My particular specialties had been drug dealers and bank robbers, but I'd happily handled white-collar cases and even the odd assault on a national park ranger. I had never expected to leave work. I'd planned for a three-month maternity leave, imagining that I'd toss Peter the baby to take care of while I happily continued my twelve-hour-a- day schedule. I even tried it after Ruby was born. I went back to work when she was four months old, skipping off with my breast pump in one hand and my briefcase in the other. Ten months later, I was back home. I couldn't stand being away from her for so much of the time. By the time I realized that I wasn't any happier at home all day than I'd been at work all day, I was already pregnant with Isaac. That pretty much put the nails into my professional coffin. The past couple of years had passed in something of a blur, punctuated by carpool, endless loads of very small laundry, and the occasional murder.

I pulled into the parking lot of my gym and slipped into a spot. For my last birthday, Peter had given me a series of training sessions at a glitzy Hollywood health club. I had decided to view the gift not as a passive-aggressive comment on the magnitude of my ass, but rather as the expression of a good-hearted wish to see me fit and healthy. I'd been having a terrific time, despite my usual loathing of all things physically active. There is something remarkably pleasurable about having your very own personal trainer hovering over you, expressing apparently sincere interest in your food intake and exercise concerns. I, like the majority of women I know, am certain that the rest of the world finds every detail of my calorie neuroses and body image obsession as scintillating as I do myself. I skipped into the gym, ready to confess to Bobby Katz the grim tale of the four Girl Scout cookies and half pound of salt water taffy I'd eaten the night before.

Instead of the collection of almost familiar Hollywood faces in brightly colored Lycra, straining under Cybex machines and hefting free weights, I found an empty gym. There were no trainers shouting encouragement, no beautifully sculpted and perfectly made-up starlets grunting and groaning. The machines glinted forlornly in the sun shining through the windows, and the place echoed with a silence made all the eerier because I'd never before walked in without being subject to a blaring retro-disco beat.

It took me a few minutes to track down the denizens of my snazzy work-out studio. They were huddled around the juice bar behind the locker rooms. The trainers, deltoids shining with carefully applied moisturizer and abdominal six-packs peeking from skin-tight tops cropped at the midriff, wept noisily. The clientele, a bit more concerned with the exigencies of eye makeup and foundation, dabbed their eyes with Kleenex. The owner of the gym, an over- sized Vietnamese bodybuilder named Laurence, opened his arms to me and pressed me to his sweaty chest.

"Oh darling. You poor darling. You don't even know, do you? You just came here to see him, and you don't even know," he wailed.

"Laurence, calm down. Tell me what's happened," I said as I attempted to extricate myself from his damp embrace. His nipple ring was poking me in the cheek.

"It's Bobby. He's dead. They found him this morning in his car. He shot himself."

I gasped and now leaned against Laurence despite myself. "What? What are you talking about?"

"Betsy just called. He didn't come home last night, so she called the cops. They found his car parked on the PCH, just north of Santa Monica. Bobby was inside. Dead. He shot himself in the head."

I led Laurence over to a chair and sat him down. Then I asked him, "How's Betsy?"

"She's a mess, of course. Oh my God, I can't stand this, I can't stand this," Laurence wailed, burying his face in his hands.

"Oh for God's sake, Laurence. Quit crying. This is not your opera, girlfriend." I turned to Jamal Watson, one of the other trainers. He was dressed, as usual, in a vibrant shade of pink. His dark brown leg muscles strained at his micro-mini shorts, and his top stopped a good six inches above his bellybutton. He looked back at me and said somewhat abashedly, "I mean, really, Bobby was my friend, too. Laurence here is acting like he's the only one who's devastated. We all are."

I turned back to the weeping gym owner, "Laurence, honey. You're upset. You should close up shop for the day." The other trainers and clients began to protest. They were sad, very sad, but not quite sad enough to sacrifice a morning's worth of crunches and leg lifts.

"No. No." Laurence heaved himself off his stool with a sigh. "The show must go on. Back to work, all of you. Back to work. That's what Bobby would have wanted." He waved everyone on to the gym floor and turned back to me, "Shall I give you a referral? Luzette's got some free slots, I think."

"No, no, that's okay. Maybe later. Can you give me Betsy's number? I want to see if she needs some help or if she could use a shoulder to cry on."

I could have used one myself. I'd been working out with Bobby Katz only for about six months, but in that short period of time, we'd gotten strangely close. Or maybe it wasn't so strange, considering the fact that we spent three hours a week together, most of that time filled with intimate conversations about our lives, loves, and the shape of my thighs. As a teenager, Bobby had made the thirty-mile leap from Thousand Oaks in the Valley to Hollywood, convinced that his sparkling azure eyes, flaxen hair, and laser-whitened teeth would garner him instant fame. It hadn't taken him long to realize that there were at least 7,200 other kids who looked just like him auditioning for all the same parts. He'd had some success. He'd gotten a couple of fast-food commercials and even a role in an Andrew Dice Clay movie. Unfortunately, his part in that work of cinematic genius was so small it could only be appreciated using the frame-by-frame viewing option of a VCR.

He'd become a personal trainer as a way to supplement his acting income; it had soon become his career. And if I'm anything to go by, Bobby was good at what he did. I'd gained over sixty pounds with my second pregnancy, and despite the fact that Isaac was now well over two years old, before I met Bobby, I hadn't managed to lose more than half of it. He'd put me on a kooky diet that involved eating a lot of egg-white omelets and set me on a workout program that was having remarkable results. I could actually see my feet if I looked down. And craned my neck. And leaned a bit forward. Anyway, it was working for me. But that's not why I kept coming back. Before Bobby, I'd quit every exercise regime I'd ever begun, despite the fact that they all showed at least some results. I kept seeing Bobby because I liked him. He was a sweet, gentle man with a ready hug and an arsenal of delightfully dishy Hollywood gossip. He remembered everything I told him and seemed to genuinely care about what I'd done over the weekend or how Isaac's potty training was progressing. He was interested and attentive without being remotely on the make. He gave me utterly platonic and absolutely focused male attention.

A few months before that horrible morning, Bobby had asked for my advice as a criminal defense lawyer. Bobby was a recovered drug user and an active member of Narcotics Anonymous, where he'd met his fiancée Betsy , and he'd asked me for help on her behalf. She'd fallen off the wagon and tried to make a buy from an undercover cop. The good news was she never actually got the drugs. The bad news was that she found herself in county jail. I was thrilled at the opportunity to help Bobby after all he'd done for me, and I'd gotten them in touch with a good friend of mine from the federal public defender's office who had recently hung out her own shingle. Last I'd heard, Betsy's case had been referred to the diversion program. If she remained clean for a year and kept up with NA, it would disappear from her record.

Betsy and Bobby¹s place was in Hollywood, not too far from my own duplex in Hancock Park. I gave a little shudder as I climbed the rickety outdoor staircase up to their apartment. The building was made of crumbling stucco held together with rotted metal braces. The doors of each unit were dented metal, spray painted puce. The floor tile in the hallway was cracked, and large chunks were missing. Given the Los Angeles real estate market, they probably paid at least fifteen hundred a month to live in this dump.

Betsy opened the door and fell into my arms, a somewhat awkward endeavor since she was at least six inches taller than I. I led her inside and found myself face-to-face with two police officers. The cops took up much more space than it seemed they should have. The instruments hooked on to their black leather belt‹the guns, billy clubs, radios, and other accoutrements of the LAPD‹seemed to blow them up all out of human proportion. They were planted on the electric green carpet like a couple of bulls in a too-small pasture. I squeezed by one of the pneumatically enlarged officers and lowered Betsy on the light beige leather couch, where she folded in on herself like a crumpled tissue.

I turned back to the men. "I'm Juliet Applebaum. I'm a friend of Betsy and Bobby's."

One of the officers, a man in his late twenties with a buzz cut so short and so new that his ears and neck looked raw, nodded curtly. "We're here to escort Betsy on down to the station so she can give a statement."

I turned to the weeping girl. "Betsy, honey? Do you want to go with the officers?"

She shook her head, buried her face in her hands, and slumped over on the couch.

"I don't think Betsy's quite ready for that," I said in a firm voice.

The officer shook his head and, ignoring me, leaned over Betsy's prone form. "It'll just take a few minutes. The detectives are waiting for you." He managed to sound both menacing and polite at the same time.

Betsy just cried harder and jerked her arm away from the officer's extended hand. I sat down next to her and slipped an arm around her shoulders.

"Officer, why don't you let the detectives know that Betsy's just too distraught right now." The cop started to shake his head, but I interrupted him, "Am I to understand that you are placing her under arrest?" I asked. I felt Betsy quiver under my arm, and I gave her back a reassuring pat.

"No, no, nothing like that," the other officer spoke up. He looked a bit older than the one trying to get Betsy up off the couch. "We just need her to give a statement to the detectives."

"Unless you're planning on arresting her, Betsy's going to stay home for now. You can let the detectives know that they can contact her here. And if there's nothing further, I think Betsy would like to be left alone."

The police officers looked at each other for a moment, and then the older one shrugged his shoulders. They walked out the door, leaving behind a room that suddenly seemed to quadruple in size.

I patted Betsy on the back for a while, and then got up to make some tea. Bobby had introduced me to the wonders of green tea, and I could think of no time when I'd needed a restorative cup of Silver Needle Jasmine more than at this moment. I opened the fridge in the little galley kitchen off the living room and sorted through the jars of protein powder and murky green bottles of wheat grass juice until I found a little black canister of tea. I dug up a teapot and ran the faucet until it was hot. I poured some water over the leaves and let them steep for a moment. By the time I came back out to the living room holding two small cups of tea, Betsy had gathered herself together and was wiping her eyes and blowing her nose.

"Thanks," she said. "You still know how to be a lawyer."

"What? Making tea?"

"No, no." She smiled through her tears. "Getting rid of the cops."

"Don't mention it. Pissing off cops is my specialty. Are Bobby's parents on their way?"

Betsy shook her head.

"Do they know?"

She nodded and said, "The police called them this morning and told them. I tried to call, too, but they aren't answering the phone. I just keep getting the machine."

That surprised me. "You mean you haven't talked to them at all?"

"I haven't talked to them in months. Ever since...ever since that whole thing happened. When they found out about it, they tried to get Bobby to break up with me. They told him that I was a bad influence and that I'd drag him down. Which I guess I did." The last was said in a sort of moan, and more tears dripped down her cheeks.

I wrapped my arm around her and handed her a tissue and the cup of tea. "Drink," I said. "It'll make you feel better." She took a few sips and then blew her nose loudly.

"You weren't a bad influence on Bobby," I said, although I have to admit that at the time of her arrest, I'd taken the same line as Bobby's parents, albeit a bit more delicately. I'd just suggested to Bobby that since he had worked so hard to kick his addiction, he might want to put a little distance between himself and Betsy, just until she got her act together. Bobby had thanked me for my advice and gently informed me that he loved Betsy and planned to stand by her. I'd been chastened and never mentioned my reservations again. I had still had them, though. Bobby was the poster-child for twelve-step programs. He'd stopped using methamphetamine five years before and hadn't missed a weekly meeting since. Before he'd gotten sober, his addiction was so bad that it was costing him hundreds of dollars a week, just to stay awake. He'd turned his athlete¹s body into a husk of its former self. The damage he'd caused to his heart from years of drug abuse was permanent. Despite the great shape he'd managed to return himself to, he still had an enlarged heart and a severe arrhythmia. Bobby had once told me that methamphetamine was so toxic to him nowadays that even holding the stuff and having it absorb through his fingers could trigger a heart attack. The risks to him of falling off the wagon were astronomical. I'd been terribly worried that Betsy's weakness would be contagious. But, in the end, he'd proved me wrong. He'd gotten her back on the program and never fallen off himself. So I had believed, until that morning.

"Betsy, why were the police here? Did they tell you why they needed you to make a statement?"

"No. They just said I have to."

"But it's a suicide, right? Bobby killed himself?"

"I don't know. I mean, that's what they told me this morning. They said they found him in the car with a gun in his hand, and that he'd shot himself in the head."

"Was it his gun?"

She shook her head. "I don't think so. I mean, he doesn't have a gun. At least I don't think he does."

"And just now, when the cops were here, did they tell you they were considering other things? Like maybe that someone had killed him?"

She sniffed loudly and wiped her nose on her sleeve. "They didn't tell me anything."

"Betsy, do you think Bobby killed himself?" I asked, flat out.

She shook her head and wailed, "I don't know. I mean, none of this makes any sense. I mean, why would he kill himself?"

"I don't know," I said. "But then, I don't know him as well as you do. Had anything happened between you two? Had you guys been getting along?" The truth was, I didn't expect Betsy to confide in me. I didn't know her that well, and for all I knew, Bobby had told her that, like his parents, I'd encouraged him to break up with her.

"Things were great. Great," she said, firmly, rubbing the tears away from her eyes. "We'd set a date for the wedding; we'd even picked a rabbi."

"A rabbi? But you're not Jewish, are you?"

"Bobby's parents really wanted us to have a rabbi. Their guy said that he'd do it, if we went to premarital counseling and if Bobby did all the tests and stuff."

"Tests?"

"Yeah, you know. Genetic testing for Tay-Sachs. The rabbi says he makes all Jews who he marries get Tay-Sachs testing. Just in case."

Tay-Sachs disease is a birth defect that is carried by something like one in thirty Jews of European descent. If two carriers have children together, they have a one in four chance of giving birth to a baby who will die of Tay- Sachs. Tay-Sachs is always fatal; generally children die by age five after being desperately ill for most of their lives. Nowadays, there's a simple blood test to determine if you are a carrier. Most Jewish couples automatically get tested, but Peter and I hadn't bothered, since Peter wasn't Jewish. Since both of us would have had to be carriers for there to be any danger, we'd never even considered it.

"Bobby had it," Betsy said.

"Had it? You mean Tay-Sachs? He was a carrier?"

"Yeah. We found out a few months ago ’ right before my...my arrest. I mean, it's no big deal that he had it, because of course I don't have it since I'm not Jewish. I mean, it wasn't a big deal." She sniffed. "I guess none of that matters anymore."

I didn't answer.

"What am I going to do?" she asked, turning to me and peering into my eyes.

I shook my head helplessly. "I don't know, Betsy. Get through every day, one day at a time, I guess."

"One day at a time? You sound like my goddamn sponsor," she said. "You sound like Bobby."

I sat with Betsy for a while longer, leaving only when her Narcotics Anonymous sponsor and a few other friends from the group arrived.

© Ayelet Waldman