Won't You Love Me?

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Names: Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis

Year: 1948

Ages: 31 and 22

The door opens and shuts, and footsteps echo through the room as Dean approaches Jerry, but Jerry refuses to look up from his script. He's got to memorize this. The performance is tomorrow, for heaven's sake! To be fair, Jerry's probably got it down a hundred times better than Dean, but that isn't good enough. He's got to be able to do this in his sleep, and then some.

He feels the couch shift from beneath him as Dean sits down beside him, but doesn't break his concentration from running his lines through his head.

"Jer, you don't want to read those lines, do you?" Dean says out of the blue, and Jerry blinks, looking at Dean over his script. Jerry went through all of the trouble to hire a writer, pay him $1,000, and spend every waking moment studying the material; and Dean's really going to ask him if he doesn't want to read the lines?

"No." He's a little surprised at how quickly the answer flies from his mouth, but when Jerry thinks about it, he really doesn't want to. It just feels wrong. After all, the magic between him and Dean didn't come about by prepared one-liners and gags. It just . . . happened.

"Then tear 'em up." A muscle in Dean's jaw jumps, and his eyes are narrowed slightly. He's serious! Heart doing somersaults in his chest, Jerry tears up his script, mixed feelings of panic and relief filling him.

###

Oh God. The eager smiles on Patti's, his mom and dad's faces refuse to leave Jerry's mind, and he wonders miserably what he's going to do. He has no material, and they're here. They're sitting just outside in the audience, and they're going to see him fail, and they'll stare up at him with those blank expressions—or worse, in disappointment.

He shudders and takes a deep drag of his cigarette with trembling fingers as he strides back and forth in the small dressing room. A passing glance at himself in the mirror produces a harsh, nervous laugh from Jerry. Here he is, chainsmoking and pacing in his dressing room in only a dress shirt and boxers. What is he doing? He's just going to psych himself out, worrying like this.

The muted sounds of the orchestra cease, and true silence fills his dressing room for a moment before thunderous applause can be heard even from where he is. His stomach flips as Jerry realizes what this means, and he thinks for one terrible moment he's going to be sick. When it passes, he hurriedly slips on his pants, and smushes the cigarette in an ashtray.

He meets Dean breathlessly half a minute later in the wings of the stage, and shoots a glance Dean's way. It doesn't give Jerry much solace that Dean looks as uncertain as he feels.

"Ya got a plan?" Dean whispers, eyes glued on the stage in front of them.

"Nope."

"Oy vey." The remark catches Jerry off guard, and he giggles, more out of nervousness than anything, and now it's time to go on stage.

Somehow Jerry makes his way to the mic, and risks a surveying glance of the audience. He recognizes Patti and his parents, Walter Winchell, and even Milton Berle, the latter two whose expressions don't exactly seem friendly. And why would they? It's not as if big shots like them came to see him and Dean!

Shutting his eyes for half a second, Jerry stops thinking. Stops worrying. Stops wondering. And just performs. When he opens his eyes and speaks, it comes out straight: "My father always said, 'When you play the Copa, son, you'll be playing to the cream of show business.'" He takes a moment to peer over the mic with squinted eyes, searching. Then, with Yiddish inflection, Jerry says, "Dis is krim?"

The laughter and applause that fills the room is to Jerry what water is to a man stranded in the Desert. It looked like this was going to be their ticket to the big times, after all.

###

Names: Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis

Year: 1948

Ages: 31 and 22

Dean gazes up at the ceiling through the dark, just thinking. Thinking about Jerry onstage by himself, more anxious than anyone would have thought possible, but still delivering a riotous show. Thinking about the anger—and fear— in Jerry's eyes as he yelled at Dean about Jeannie. She's with you all the time, Jerry argued. I don't like it, he said . . . then finally: Her or me, buddy. So, Jerry's on alone tonight.

He turns under the sheets onto his side, propping his head with his arm on his pillow. Jeanne is fast asleep facing him, her strikingly blond hair pinned up behind her head. With her perfect hourglass figure, elegant features, and lovely dovetail lips, Jeanne's like a doll. A cute, real-life doll. He thinks of Betty, and frowns in the dark. But he only thinks of Betty for a moment, because Jeanne dominates his thoughts.

The phone rings, startling him for a second, and he clicks on the lamp on his side of the bed. He knows who's calling. He doesn't want to answer it—he knows what's going to happen. But he answers it anyway.

"Hi, Jer." Defeat resounds in those words, and Dean runs a hand over his tired face.

"Please come back, Paul. It's awful lonesome without you." Jerry whines in his Idiot voice. Why can't he just be serious for once? But Dean knows deep down that's not the issue. Jerry uses the Idiot persona as a mask; a defense. He pretends to be someone else so nobody can reject the real Jerry. Dean doesn't say anything when he himself is hurting.

Dean exhales softly through gritted teeth. He's already in bed. He's with Jeanne. He's still mad at Jerry—ah, what's he kidding himself for. He can just imagine Jerry on the other end, hoping. Worrying so much he's forgotten to breathe. Always worrying something's going to go wrong, and if something's already wrong, he's worried he won't be able to fix it.

"Okay." When he hangs up and turns back to Jeanne, he finds she's sitting up in bed, gazing at him with a kind of sad expression on her perfect face. "Are you going back to him?" 

Dean nods, catching the disappointment that flickers through her eyes. For a moment Dean muses over how similar this feels to when he was with Betty. The only difference is, he tries harder with Jerry than he did when he was with Betty.

Is he gonna show up? Please, God, let Dean show up. Jerry tries to remind himself Dean said he would. But he wouldn't put it past Dean—the fella sure has a funny way of being mad. He'd sooner drop off the face of the planet where his offender is concerned than actually confront him.

He checks his watch. Only ten minutes until showtime. His heart does somersaults in his chest as the prospect of going on alone again. The audience didn't pay just to see Lewis. They wanted to see Martin and Lewis.

The dressing room door abruptly swings open, stopping Jerry in the tracks of his pacing.

"Hi, pallie. How'd you do without me?" Dean offers him a small smile of unspoken forgiveness. Telling him things are okay between them.

Jerry wants so badly to cross the room in two strides and bury his face in Dean's neck; to hide his shame and fear even from himself—all of which seem so silly now that Dean's here. But he settles for just returning Dean's smile and murmuring, "Not too good, Paul. I don't think the Jew's ready to be alone."