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Chapter One
Harry Green was on his deathbed in Cedars-Sinai hospital, which to him was no reason to stop being funny. Every day Lily and the other writers came to his room at Cedars, which Harry joked was "a kidney stone's throw away from CBS," and there they stayed all day to write Angel's Devils, a sitcom whose prognosis was nearly as bad as Harry's. Though the doctors were sure this was his final hospital stay and that it would be only a matter of days until he died from the cancer that was invading what was left of him, Harry was determined to hang on until the end of the season.
So every morning he pushed the button that made the head of the bed deliver his cadaverous body into a sitting position. Then he welcomed the writers with his skin-and-bones arms open wide and a whole slew of thoughts he'd had in his drugged haze of the night before.
"A rabbi, a priest, and a Buddhist monk walked into chemotherapy," Harry offered as the writers looked askance. Then he shrugged. "Hey, they say you should write what you know."
"That's funny," Marty said, and with his foot he positioned Lily's chair closest to the bed since she was the only woman on the staffand a hot-looking one-and Harry was not dead yet.
The daily pilgrimage of the Angel's Devils writing staff to the hospital had become a natural part of their lives since Harry had announced to them one dreary, rainy morning, in the middle of a pitch meeting, that he was too cancer-ridden to come into the office anymore. When the bozos at the network got the news of Harry's illness, they wanted to replace him immediately, but Marty went to their offices and swore to them that "even while he'scroaking, Harry Green is funnier than anyone else out there." And incredibly, they bought it.
So Harry stayed on the Angel's Devils payroll, continuing to be a beneficiary of ongoing Writer's Guild health insurance, and instead of working in the bleak little offices at CBS, the writers wrote the show crowded into a circle around his hospital bed. All of them were oblivious to the monitors and the TVs and the visits from the nurses who wound their way through the group to provide Harry with his pain medication. And they all rose obediently whenever the nurses came to shoo them out when Harry needed some procedure that required privacy.
Even Dorie, the show's typist, came to the hospital every day, plugged in her laptop, and clickity-clacked away, taking notes on all the story ideas and keeping track of the jokes that were flying around the room. And from time to time, Harry's wife, Rosie, peeked in and smiled, because she knew this was the way Harry wanted to go out-doing shtick.
When the workday was over and the other writers left, Lily made a point of staying for a while to be alone with Harry. Not to talk or joke anymore, just to let him know she loved him. Most of the time he had already fallen asleep from exhaustion; but now and then his eyelids would flutter, and he would see her there and manage a smile.
"Is it too late to take herbal remedies?" he asked.
"Never too late," she said, moving closer to hold his bony, veiny hand.
I guess I shoulda listened to all that shit you told me about nutrition. When you warned me that guacamole wasn't a vegetable."
"Harry, get some sleep," she said, not wanting to leave but knowing it was time.
"Don't stay on this shlocky show after this season's over," he said. "Next year you get on a classy sitcom."
"No such animal," she said, using one of Harry's own expressions. Even though his eyes were closed, a smile fluttered across Harry's lips.
She didn't say what everyone knew, which was that after Harry was gone there would be no more Angel's Devils. Harry Green was the King of jokes, and he kept the ideas coming and the show treading water.
"I'll think about changing," she promised, not even sure that any other show would want her.
It must be late, Lily realized. The black night had turned the hospital room window into a mirror, and she wondered as she caught a glimpse of herself in it how Mark could love her as much as he said he did. Her fine, dark, straight hair lay lifeless against her head. Her heavy-lidded eyes looked sleepy. She was tired and looking more haggard than a thirty-eightyear-old woman was supposed to, and she was overwhelmed with sadness.
As soon as it was clear by Harry's breathing that he was asleep for the night, Lily gathered her legal pad and purse and headed for the door, looking back at him, her beloved mentor...
