Billy

The lyrics came to me the moment I opened the loft door. "Billy." Then: "No." Then: "Oh, God." That was the entire song. I sang it loud enough to wake the neighbors. The second I walked into the room, I knew. I dropped to my knees beside the couch and gathered him into my arms. He was cold. His body rocked back and forth with mine like a mannequin's. His skin had turned a shade of white that didn't belong to the living. I picked up the phone and dialed 911. The woman who answ

The autopsy took a week. During that week, I imagined all sorts of terrible things. I still do, sometimes. While strangers were busy determining how Billy died, I was handed a task that seemed both ridiculous and impossible. I had to pick out his clothes. Once the county released him to the funeral home, someone asked what he would be wearing. Billy always had more clothes than any man had a right to own. I used to tell him he had the wardrobe of a supermodel, which was funny

The office of our friend Jimmey sat in one of the old writers' bungalows tucked deep in the back of the Fox lot, beyond the prop warehouses and soundstages, past the famous New York street. Pee-wee Herman had occupied it years earlier. He left behind a couch. It was impossible to ignore. Each cushion was upholstered in a different pastel color, turquoise next to salmon next to butter yellow, all outlined with black piping. It looked like something a child would design. It loo

We met Bob Slobbers at an adoption fair held in a pet store a few miles from our house. The dogs sat in a semi-circle, almost like a therapy group, in front of their individual crates. Billy and I split up, wandering around and reading the little biographies taped to each one. I found a scruffy mutt that seemed pretty cute. I turned to find Billy so I could show him and saw him sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of a hefty black Lab mix. They were locked in a stare-do

Before the term “photobomb” was coined, Billy and I were invited to a post-Grammy party at the Four Seasons Restaurant in NYC. We lived there then–me at APA and Billy at Goldman-Sachs–on the 33rd floor in an apartment building with an unobstructed view of the World Trade Center. The place was packed, we were drunk, and I spotted Patti LaBelle and Meatloaf coming toward this narrow passageway between two party rooms. Photographers converged. “Billy, go get in the shot!” Withou

Billy would’ve turned forty-four today. I’d have booked a dinner for us at a restaurant that he’d think was too expensive, and I’d cajole him into ordering the New York strip despite his protests that it cost too much. Before dinner, though, back home in our living room, I’d have already arranged a row of presents that would’ve included a new cell phone, and Sirius for his car because he would’ve been whining about not having one since Mickey gave me mine at Christmas. There’

I went to my first estate sale on Saturday, and I discovered they’re sad; someone’s life with dangling white price tags. In this modest Glendale house lived an elderly woman, a fire-and-brimstone Baptist from what I saw on her bookshelf, who’d been moved recently to assisted care. I bought one of those fussy old Art Deco vanities with the over-sized mirror and Bakelite pulls, a place where perfume bottles once held court to the doilies. Also purchased was a 1932 set of encycl

They’ve called Ludlow a ghost town ever since Interstate-40 came along and destroyed its once-needed Route 66 businesses. Sitting in the middle of the Mojave desert, sped past by most except those riding on the fumes of an empty tank, the only thing in Ludlow besides the abandoned diner are a gas station––a sign warns that the next fuel is eighty miles up the road––and the Ludlow Motel with its Vacancy sign always lit. In our house, though, the very mention of the name of tha

Thirty years, with and without Thirty years ago today, I met Bill Ledbetter at a "party." Within five minutes, we'd found each other. After I left, I couldn't stop thinking about him, which was unusual for someone whose motto was always, "In bed by midnight, home by three." The next day, I called him. I was thirty-something and had almost no experience asking anyone out. "Would you want to go to dinner tonight?" "Sure!" That single word felt like winning the lottery. We met a