October 4, 1983 (Encino, CA)
A short story
Jacob met Rollie Prader two weeks after Lee Blockman’s death. He stumbled on the older man’s card (and the fragment of Penny’s dress) and gave him a call. They met at the International House of Pancakes in Encino.
Prader entered, looking dapper in that senior citizen way. He scanned the restaurant and waved when he saw Jacob. He walked to the booth with spry surety and sat. “How are you, young fella?”
Jacob smiled. “I won’t lie, Mr. Prader. It’s been an odd month. My dad died, my uncle had a stealth nervous breakdown and fled to France, and a girl I thought I’d lost suddenly reappeared.”
Rollie nodded. “Sounds like a lot to ingest.”
Blockman’s eyes widened. “Ingest. That’s a great word.” He paused, considering. “That’s exactly where I am. Ingesting. Trying to make sense of it.”
“Ah ha,” Prader said, raising a finger. “Let me save you some time: It never makes sense. Any of it.”
The teenager, resting on his elbows, deflated. “Well, shit…” he said.
“The sooner you let go of the notion of sense, the happier you’ll be. Sense is a human invention. It doesn’t map onto life. It’s a storytelling device. Beginning, Middle, and End. Life doesn’t give a shit about any of that.”
“Huh,” Jacob said, mulling over Prader’s words. He was impressed with the older man’s ability to quickly cut through the bullshit—although, like everyone else, he would have preferred easy answers. “You’re like Yoda or something.”
Prader grinned. “Yippee. Sixty-some-odd years on this planet and I’m reduced to a green muppet.”
Jacob returned the smile, seeing his remark was taken in the spirit intended. “No offense.”
“None taken, I’m sure. That green muppet’s got a good head on his shoulders.”
“He does, he does,” Jacob replied. “Right off the bat, you’re not what I expected, Mr. Prader.”
Rollie shrugged. “I am what I am. What I am not is ‘Mr. Prader.”
Blockman looked down at the card Prader had given him. It was next to his left hand. “‘Rolland,’ was it?”
“Rollie. ‘Rolland’ sounds like a race car driver. Or a pimp. ‘Rollie’ suits me better, me being a professional cartoonist and ne’er-do-well.” The older man looked around and noticed Jacob was the only person under the age of fifty in the place. “On the inside,” he said. “I’m probably less grown-up than you.”
“That’s a good thing, isn’t it?”
Rollie shrugged. “I think it’s a good thing, you think it’s a good thing… My late wife not so much. There’s another tip for you… Women in general have a low tolerance for male shenanigans. Anyway, it’s not like I have a choice.”
The waitress arrived, and Prader asked for a full breakfast while Jacob ordered coffee.
“Coffee?” Rollie said. “What are you, a Jersey dock worker? Order some food. A man needs fuel for his day.”
Jacob smirked. “Big he-man woman hater, are you?”
Prader laughed loud. “I love women,” he said. “Women are awesome. As for the he-man part…look at me. It’s like I was built out of sticks.”
Jacob shook his head. “Fair enough, but no breakfast for me. Intermittent diarrhea. It comes and goes.”
Rollie made an “oof” noise. “If it comes, there’s a bathroom behind you. Don’t be a hero.”
“Count on it.” The waitress gave them place settings, and Blockman spoke over her chubby arms. “It was kind of you to come to my dad’s funeral.”
Rollie’s voice was laced with regret. “Was it? It would have been better if I’d tracked him down when he was alive. Instead, I wait for him to show up in the obits. Typical Prader.”
“Better late than never.”
The older man grinned. “Bullshit. Tell that to the guy waiting for an organ transplant.”
Jacob laughed. “I like you, Rollie. You’re all like hardened cynicism laced with whimsy.”
Prader perked up at the description, delighted. “Very astute,” he said. “No one’s ever summed me up so succinctly.”
“Still,” Blockman said. “‘Nothing ever makes sense’? Did you come here on the occasion of my father’s death to cheer me up?”
Rollie nodded. “I did. Or to at least buy you some eggs. Which you’re not having.”
Jacob got a twinkle in his eye. “Makes no sense, does it?”
“Of course not,” Rollie said. “Why would it?” The waitress returned to dispense two coffees. Rollie waited for her to finish and leave. “You know, I was going to remark how like your father you are, but I see that’d be an oversimplification. Apart from your hair, you’re the spitting image of the young Lee, but you’re not a match otherwise.”
“Tell me more…” Jacob said, sipping his black coffee.
Rollie shrugged. “Lee was a nice kid. Nice to a fault, even. I worried for him. I thought life might bulldoze him.”
The teenager considered. “I see what you’re saying, but ‘bulldoze’ would be too strong a word.”
“Good,” Prader replied. “Happy to hear it.” He looked away, and Jacob could tell he was reminiscing. “Speaking of women… He was impossible with them. He loved and respected them, but he was afraid of them. So much so, I’m surprised you’re here.”
Jacob nodded. “The child gives birth to the man. He was at forty-six pretty much as you describe him at seventeen.”
“You, on the other hand… You seem to have some confidence, at least. I mean, you appear functional. You mentioned a young lady…”
Blockman smiled at the way he’d been reduced to a single word. Functional. It’s not the one he would have picked. “Penny’s her name.”
“Cute. Good. Did you get your bravado from your mother?”
Jacob laughed a dark laugh. “Christ, no. I hope I didn’t get anythingfrom my mother. The woman’s an emotional vampire. A recluse.”
“I’ve met the type,” Rollie said over the lip of his cup. “I was raised by one. It’s a wonder we turn out as well as we do.”
The younger man stirred one packet of sugar into his beverage. “You’re a real ray of sunshine, Rollie.”
Prader raised his cup, and the two men clinked over the table. “You’re catching me in a philosophical mood. Let’s change the subject. I brought you something.” He produced a manila envelope and handed it to Jacob.
Jacob opened it to find an old drawing of Mickey Mouse. It had three punched holes on its bottom edge. “What is it?” he said.
“It’s a drawing of Mickey Mouse. Duh.”
Blockman ran a finger over the crumpled, yellowed paper. “That much I gleaned.”
“Lee drew it. Somewhere around 1958 or 1959.”
“It’s awful,” Jacob replied.
Both men laughed heartily. “It is, isn’t it?” Rollie said. “He couldn’t draw worth a shit.”
Blockman was confused. “Then what was he doing at Disney?”
“He desperately wanted to be an animator. He never told you?”
Jacob shook his head.
“He was diligent and sincere as all get-out. But he didn’t have the talent. He started at the studio as a traffic boy. A gopher. For years, he lobbied to get into the animation department. I took a shine to him and helped him as much as I could. I finally got him to the point where he could kinda sorta inbetween.”
The younger man cocked his head. “Inbetween?”
“Forgive the jargon,” Rollie said. “I’m the animator, right? It’s my job to draw Mickey in all of his extreme poses. Then my assistant—my inbetweener—fills in all the frames between my extremes. If you’ve seen any Disney movies from the ‘50s and early 60s, you might’ve seen your dad’s handiwork without knowing.”
The waitress returned, putting a plate of sunny-side-up eggs, hash browns, and toast in front of Prader. She also left a smaller plate with three strips of bacon. Rollie dug in.
“Never once did my dad mention any of this…” Jacob said, bemused.
“Bacon?” Rollie asked, holding up the small plate. Blockman took one slice. “Adults are weird.”
Jacob bit and chewed. “My dad doubly so. I’d call him young when he died, but compared to you, he was a thousand years old.”
Prader sopped up egg yolk with a triangle of toast. “What’d he end up doing? Profession-wise?”
“He was an entertainment lawyer.”
Rollie recoiled, crossing himself. “He threw in his lot with Satan.”
Blockman smiled. “Jews don’t believe in Satan.”
“Oh, me neither, but lawyers are scarier than Satan.”
“Now… Don’t rush to judgment. My dad did Olivia Newton-John’s deal on Xanadu.”
Prader crossed himself again. “Then I hope he’s roasting in hell.”
“Jews don’t believe in hell either.”
Prader shook his head. “You guys are no fun.”
“It’s been remarked.”
Rollie paused, chewing and swallowing egg and toast. “What’s in the cards for you, Jacob? College?”
Jacob shrugged. “I guess.”
“You guess? What does that mean, you guess? Have you applied anywhere?”
Blockman folded his arms in front of his chest. “No. I’m going to take a little me time first.”
Rollie rolled his eyes. “Listen to you. ‘Me time.’”
“Did you go to college?”
Prader shook his head. “No, but there were extenuating circumstances. I had things I needed to escape.”
“Do you have any kids?”
Rollie nodded. “A daughter. Grown now, of course.”
“Did she go to college?”
“Yes. That was never in doubt. She was a scary genius. Finished high school early. Finished college early. Did I mention she’s a scary genius?”
“You did,” Jacob replied.
Prader pressed on, a little too aggressively, Jacob thought. “Tell me about your skills… Your interests…”
Blockman cocked his head and looked at his table mate suspiciously. “Were you a high school guidance counselor in a former life?”
Rollie smiled. “By the mid-sixties, I was in charge of training at Disney. I was a mentor. Forgive my predilections.”
Jacob thought for a moment. “What are my skills? What are my interests? I’m a smartass. And I’m always in my own way. Those are my defining characteristics. If I ever take a wife, I’m afraid I won’t be able to support her in whatever manner she is accustomed to.”
“There’s a surefire workaround for that…”
“Yes?”
“Have a foot of cock.”
Jacob laughed. “That reminds me of my friends. My teenage friends.”
“Good. Tell me something… Do you read? You seem like a reader to me.”
“I read, sure,” Blockman replied, reconciling himself to more questioning.
“I could tell. What’re your best subjects in school?”
“English. History, I guess.”
Rollie sat back and slammed his hand on the table. “There it is then,” he said as though he’d just solved a riddle.
“There what is then?” Jacob replied, confused.
Prader leaned in again. “I’ve been talking to you for ten minutes, and my observation is you’re unusually articulate. I asked you if you read, and you said, ‘Yes.’ I asked you your best subjects and you said, ‘English and History’—two fields steeped in narrative. You also said you A: crack wise and B: get in your own way—two traits of the classic neurotic. What do you get when you throw together a way with words, reading, narrative, and neuroses?”
Jacob shook his head.
“You get a professional writer.” The older man took a moment to bask in the glory of his own genius. “You’re welcome.”
Blockman was dumbfounded, impressed. “Wow,” he said. “That was like a magic trick.” He mulled over the suggestion. “A professional writer. What would I write about?”
Rollie threw up his hands in mock frustration. “What do I look like? A swami? Do some of the heavy lifting yourself.”
Jacob leaned back in again. “Would you mind if I pointed out a glaring irony in what you just said?”
“I won’t be able to live another minute if you don’t.”
“You told me nothing ever makes sense, yet there you go, trying to impose sense onto the next forty years of my life.”
Prader shook his head. “I wasn’t trying to impose sense onto your life. I was trying to impose a livelihood. You like to eat, don’t you?”
“I do like to eat,” Blockman answered, swiping another slice of beacon from Rollie’s plate.
Prader broke into a toothy grin. “I saw what you were trying to do there, though. You—the wily Jew—were trying to put one over on the hapless gentile. Meaning me. Well, it won’t work.”
“Still… I think I’ll celebrate by drinking the blood of a Christian babe.”
Prader raised his cup, and the two of them clinked again. “Louie,” he said. “I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
After saying goodbye to Rollie, Jacob decided to hoof it back to Tarzana. He’d only walked a block when two people fell in step just behind him. He was too lost in thought to notice.
“Whatcha thinking about?” one of the people said.
“Oh, shit!” Jacob clutched his chest and nearly fell over. “Shit! Don’t fucking sneak up on me!”
Todd Zinnemann and Barry Squint laughed at their friend. They’d genuinely scared the hell out of him. When he could breathe again, Todd said, “Jesus, Blockman. You’ve got the reflexes of a cinder block.”
“That was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen,” Barry enthused.
Jacob was still annoyed, but he started walking again. “You need to get out more, Barry.”
Zinnemann straightened, adopting a mock seriousness. “Jakey’s right. You do need to get out more, Barry.”
Giving his annoyance an unearned target, Blockman took Todd’s ball and ran with it. “Have you even kissed a girl, Bair? You’re nearly eighteen.”
“Yeah, Barry! Eighteen!” Zinnemann said, continuing the abuse.
Squint didn’t appreciate the tables being turned. “Hey! Why is this suddenly about me?”
Todd and Jacob laughed.
“Fuck you guys,” Barry mumbled.
“So…” Todd said, turning his attention back to Jacob and adopting a sing-songy tone. “Where are you going?”
“Home.”
Zinnemann nodded, his face full of affected sweetness. “What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours?”
“My feelings,” Blockman replied, adopting the same cadence.
“That’s good,” Todd replied. “We’re here to help you with your grief.”
“Really,” Jacob said, not buying it for one second. “That’s so nice!”
Todd leaped in the air and pointed at Blockman. “Just kidding. Fuck your grief. We’re going to the motel. To dumpster dive for porn mags. You wanna come?”
“I do not,” Blockman replied. “Used, greasy porn mags are not on my radar today.”
“Used? Greasy? How dare you, sir! Are you implying you’re better than us?”
“I’m not implying anything. I’m saying,” Jacob replied with mock haughtiness.
“Well, I never!” Todd said, clutching imaginary pearls.
“No, you have,” Jacob replied. “Barry hasn’t.”
“Fuck you guys,” Barry mumbled again, causing Blockman and Zinnemann to laugh again.
“Being better than you’s got nothing to do with my disinterest in porn mags,” Jacob said. “Penny’s back.”
Todd stopped, bent back at the waist, and sighed melodramatically. “Oh, Jacob, Jacob, Jacob. We’ve discussed this. That girl’s no good for you.”
“Penny’s no good for me?”
Zinnemann nodded sagely. “Not her specifically, but girls in general. You’re not built for regular sex. You’re at your best when you’re hollow-eyed and desperate. You need your edge. You need—“
“The eye of the tiger?”
Todd snapped his fingers and pointed at Jacob. “Yes! The eye of the tiger!”
Blockman grinned. “Not buying it. Besides, I wanna enjoy this while it lasts. I’ll have plenty of time for tiger eyes when I’m alone again.”
The two factions parted company, one bound for home, the other bound for discarded pornography. When there was space between them, Jacob looked over his shoulder and said, “You want my advice?”
“Always,” Zinnemann yelled back.
“Skip the stroke mags and do your damnedest to get Barry laid.”
“You might be on to something,” Zinnemann said, waving a finger.
“I fucking hate you guys,” Barry Squint said.
Later, Jacob walked up the gentle slope of the Krebs’ front lawn. Penny’s father, Walton, was there tending to a sapling. When he saw Blockman, he said, “She’s in the back.”
Jacob thanked the older man. Then he went to the rear gate. He found Penny at the round picnic table in the backyard. She had her head on the table’s top, and she was tracing the wood grain with her finger. When she saw Jacob, she sat upright and tried to look more alert.
“Is now a bad time?” Jacob said.
“A bad time for what?”
“Anything,” Jacob said lamely.
“No, it’s not a bad time for anything. It’s not a bad time for ham. It’s never a bad time for ham.”
Blockman sat across from the girl. “I left my ham in my other pants.”
Penny laughed. “Too bad.”
“What were you thinking about just now?”
She hesitated. “Nothing. It’s boring.”
“I like boring.”
Penny laughed again. “That checks out,” she said. “No, I was just thinking about something I had when I was a kid. Something I lost.”
“Your youthful idealism?”
The girl nodded. “Yes, that and my lust for Semitic cock.”
“I don’t believe you lost that.”
“Smart boy. Way to look out for your own selfish interests.”
“I am just a man, born to sin,” Jacob replied, putting a hand on his chest.
“Hold that thought,” Krebs replied. “No, what I lost was a top. A metal top.”
“A top? Like a bottle top?”
“No, dummy. A top. Like a top top. With the spinning and the turning.”
Jacob mimed spinning a top on the surface of the picnic table. “Oh. A toy top. You lost a top?”
“I did. It was a metal top. Pewter, I guess. I carried it with me everywhere, then, one day, poof! It was nowhere.”
Jacob pondered the mystery of the missing metal top. “I should have listened,” he said. “That was boring.”
Penny flushed, pretending to be angry. She pulled a sliver from the top of the table and flicked it at Jacob. “Oh, you!”
The two grew quiet for a moment. Even though it was October, it was still hot. California hot.
“You know,” Penny said. “You’ve made progress.”
“How so?”
“When I knew you before, if I’d told you I lost my top, you would’ve jumped to conclusions. Assumed I lost it when the aliens kidnapped me and probed me.”
“Hey, now,” Jacob replied. “I didn’t come here for character assassination.”
“Where do you usually go?” Penny asked, flicking another wood chip.
Again, they grew quiet.
The girl finally asked, “Now what’re you thinking about?”
Jacob grinned a devil’s grin. “I was thinking about kidnapping you and probing you.”
Penny stood and made for the gate. “Come on. There’s a four o’clock showing of The Osterman Weekend.”
This short story is part of an interconnected series forming one “meta story”. Eventually, almost all of those stories will be here on Substack. If you'd like to cut to the chase, please check out the book.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F8PC5SVD
