Without exaggeration the suit could be termed a violent assault on the
senses. It was plaid but not just any plaid -- orange and purple stripes
clashed agonizingly on a field of yellow, the open necked light pink shirt
only contributing to the visual horror. The man wearing the improbable
ensemble was stooped and nearly bald, his pencil thin brown mustache
bristling over fine drawn lips. His features might have been termed
handsome had they worn any expression but the blank fatuousness that
adorned them. At first glance this man would have been dismissed on the
street as one more harmless stumble bum, a character offering neither
advantage nor threat to the street denizens of the city. It would only
have been on second glance that one would have noticed the intelligence in
those sea green eyes, or the wiry strength in the lean form that had held
its own in a hundred bar fights in a hundred bars across the country. A
third hard look might have revealed the familial resemblance between this
man and the Ghostbuster psychologist-parapsychologist known the world over
as Dr. Peter C. Venkman.
Peter Venkman stood a long moment on the threshold to the living area staring with blank incomprehension at the visitor, who was riffling through the CD collection on the shelf -- the suit had that effect on everyone at first contact. It was only when the man turned toward him that Peter shook himself out of his daze and continued his journey across the room. "Hello, Dad." Peter's greeting was warm and genuine; he held out his hand and it was immediately engulfed in a powerful returning grip. "Thanks for coming."
Charles Venkman, known to his friends as Charlie, pumped his son's hand once with real enthusiasm, then released it. "I get a message like that and I'm supposed to NOT come?" he asked rhetorically. He dug into a pocket, extracting a crumpled slip of paper bearing the Western Union logo at the top. "Dad, stop" he read, smoothing it out. "I need you. Stop. Peter." He waved it in the air, a puzzled frown marring his high forehead. "How you knew I was visiting my brother Alf, I'll never know, but you caught me just as I was getting ready to go back to L.A."
Peter seated himself on one corner of the long couch facing the entertainment center, and patted the cushion next to him, inviting the older man to sit. "I didn't know you were at Uncle Alf's. I sent copies of that telegram to a dozen places -- anywhere you might be this time of year. I figured sooner or later one of them would find you." He moved over another inch when his father sat down, tilting his head to see the suit from head to foot. "You ... uh ... haven't been seen in public in that thing, have you?"
Charlie's mustache twitched humorously, the fatuous expression slipping a bit to reveal the intelligent humor beneath. "Don't you make fun of this suit, son; it's pretty bad but it serves its purpose, believe you me." He struck a pose, lifting his nose in the air without losing his slumped posture. "You are looking at the invisible man, here."
Peter frankly gaped. "In that thing?"
Charlie leaned back against the thick cushions and crossed his legs, his slightly nasal, stereotypical New York Jewish accent thickened as he got farther into his role. "Oh, people see -- in this suit, how could they not? Then they dismiss it -- and me -- as a silly old man as harmless as they come. Not even worth a thought. A snigger, maybe, but not a thought." He chuckled. "Trust me, this suit has seen me through many a scam-- uh, business dealing. Well worth the five bucks that Salvation Army story soaked me for."
Beyond a knowing nod there was very little remark to be made on that point, and no argument, for whatever else Charlie Venkman might be, he was an acknowledged master chameleon; if he said the suit helped him vanish, Peter was loathe to contradict him. Peter dismissed the subject and the suit with a flip of the hand. "I'm pretty sure I don't want to know what you're using it for now," he said dryly. "Ignorance is bliss, right?"
"And why should you lay awake worrying all night?" the older man returned with humor. Then the humor faded and he regarded his only son seriously. "But you didn't send me a telegram like this to talk about my wardrobe."
Peter too sobered, his dark lashes veiling his eyes. "No, I didn't."
He hesitated so long that alarm flooded the elder Venkman's lined face. "Nothing happened to your friends, did it?" he demanded, uncrossing his legs and sitting up straight. "The boy, Ray, let me in, but I didn't see the other two. Or that slimy green pet you keep around, either. Are they...?
Peter raised a hand, cutting off the worried interrogation. "They're fine, Dad. Egon and Winston are downstairs working on the containment unit. Ray said it was time to add a new klein bottle and Winston volunteered to help Egon with the preliminary stuff. Ray'll fine tune the installation before we put it online." He stared at a green spot on the carpet, then rubbed at it with the toe of his sneaker. "Slimer must be helping them."
"Klein bottles, containment units...." Charlie waggled his fingers. "All that technical stuff is beyond me, Son. I never got that nice college education like you." He tapped his own temple and winked. "Got me some street smarts though that even beat out yours. Man can make a living on his wits. That's what they're there for."
"Wits and a loud suit," Peter jeered back amiably. Again a shadow passed across his face, banishing the amiable humor between them. "It's not the guys, Dad. It's ... Mom."
"Maggie?" Charlie Venkman straightened, his head coming up. Startled out of his height diminishing slump it became apparent that he was more nearly Peter's six foot than the ineffectual five-foot-nine inch oldster he'd aspired toward. "What happened?"
Peter swallowed hard, lifting his own head and turning until green eye met green. "She's dead."
This was obviously not what Charlie had expected. He stared, shocked for a long moment, his jaw dropping open. He blinked and closed his mouth with a click of teeth, incomprehension wiping away the assumed lines in his face and leaving him looking ten years younger. "Maggie?" he repeated blankly. "Maggie is--?"
"Yes." Peter looked away, ducking his head to hide the hurt in his expression, his gaze settling on the digital clock inherent in the VCR; it read 2:45pm. "One week ago today."
"But-but how?" As the information finally sank in, more and more of the assumed persona Charlie Venkman donned as regularly as he did the plaid suit began to drop away. Besides the additional height, there was a subtle but definite change in the man himself. Barriers and concealment dropped away allowing the sharp awareness of the man to show through. An uninformed impartial observer might have seen another man altogether and it was this inner man that Peter addressed.
"She'd been having some problems for awhile," he said quietly, laying a hand on his father's knee. "She was at home with her family around her, and...." He gulped, swallowing the lump that hoarsened his voice. "It was sudden. She didn't suffer."
Charlie covered his son's hand with his own, fingers twining and holding tight. "I'm truly sorry to hear that. Maggie was a fine woman."
"Maggie." Peter's fingers tightened until the knuckles were white. His grip might have been painful though Charlie made no protest. "You're the only one in the world who called her Maggie. Everyone else called her Margaret."
"I'm not everyone else," Charlie retorted, then he sighed. "A fine woman. The time we were together was the happiest of my life."
"All eight years worth." The psychologist spoke the words frankly, without rancor. "Although the way Mom explained it, you and she were married eight years; you only spent a total of about two together. Nine months out of every twelve you were on the road."
Charlie opened his free hand in a curiously appealing if unapologetic gesture. "I was a salesman; it was my job to travel. I didn't have any choice."
"It wouldn't have made any difference, would it?" the younger man responded, still lacking in accusation; this was a subject that had been settled between them many years before. "You had trouble sticking around for as long as you did."
"Wondering feet." The older man raised one brown oxford, making a weak attempt at humor. "That's why your Mom and me couldn't stay married."
Peter shot his father an amused look, using the opportunity to undo the top button of his light shirt against the slight heat of the room. "Not quite. Mom understood that part of it. It was Lorna she didn't get too well. And Annette. And Magda. And...."
"Ah, Magda." Charlie twisted his mustache self-consciously, though his face took on that particularly blissful look it always did whenever he reminisced about one of his lady friends. "Wish you could'a met her, Son. She was really something -- a real lady."
"She was a stripper, Dad," the younger man retorted, freeing his hand to scrub again at the stain on his jeans. "Out, damn spot!"
Charlie drew himself up. "She was a lady, Son, just not the same ... quality lady as Maggie." Green eyes dulled and the look he turned on Peter was sad. "Did I ever tell you how your mom and me met?" He had but Peter cocked his head attentively, anyway. "She had only been in New York a few months, trying to break into show business. You know the routine -- make the circuit of the stage doors during the day, earn a living any way you can at night."
"She took me by the diner she was waitressing at the evening you met." Peter abandoned his stained jeans to lounge in the corner of the couch. He stretched his legs out straight in front of him and crossed his ankles. "It's a real dive now; not a bad place thirty-odd years ago." He glanced across at his father, who also had assumed a more comfortable posture though not resuming his slumped one of before. "Good bet you weren't wearing that suit when you met her; she'd've run screaming rather than go out with you on the spot."
Charlie chuckled, one hand smoothing back his thinning brown hair. "I was doing my New York, New York routine that night. If you want to attract a blooming showgirl, you can't do better. We were married two weeks later." He opened his jacket and extracted a battered wallet. He flipped it open and rummaged in a small pocket, then pulled out a folded piece of cardboard. It opened to reveal itself as an old black and white glossy photograph, creased in a dozen places and faded with age. "You never saw this, did you."
Peter accepted the photo, holding it higher to see it better in the light. It showed a man and a woman, their clothes indicating a time period sometime in the early 1950's. The man was medium-height and slim, with wavy dark hair and merry eyes. The woman was petite and pretty, shoulder length blonde hair permed in the frizzy styles of the era, her shirtwaist dress caught mid-swirl around shapely legs. "That's you and Mom!"
Charlie used his thumbnail to indicate a third figure nearly obscured by the first two. "Look a little closer. Who's that about ground level?"
Peter squinted. "Is that ... me?"
"That's you. That was taken at one of the apartments in Brooklyn about a year after you were born." Charlie waited quietly while Peter stared at the old picture, then he plucked it back, holding it between thumb and forefinger and examining it himself. "Wasn't gone nine months out of twelve back then. Not until you were three or so. That's when I started traveling." He paused, scratching at his smooth shaven chin. "Maggie an' me, we wuz havin' some problems around then."
"Magda?" Peter asked, and this time the accusation was there.
Charlie shot him a glare, brows low. "I never cheated on her back then, boy. Not then. Not 'til later. Magda came later." But if he was looking for an apology he was doomed to disappointment. After a moment he returned his attention to the photo, mouth drawn in a tight line. "She was beautiful, wasn't she? Any man would have been proud to have married her. I was."
There was another pause which neither man seemed inclined to break. Peter rose, crossing to the CD collection and extracting the disk his father had been looking at a few minutes before. "the Best of Slim Whitman?" he puzzled aloud.
There was no reply to that from the other man. Charlie continued to examine the picture of his ex-wife, fingering it with some tenderness. "Was there a funeral?" he murmured after a long time. "Did you go?"
Peter glanced back at him, then replaced the CD and absently picked up another photo, a framed one that sat on the topmost shelf above the VCR. He held it in both hands though did not look at it. "Funeral was Saturday," he said quietly. "In a little church on the outskirts of Chicago, not far from where Mom and Roger were living. The whole family was there -- Roger's three kids, Aunt Ruthie and Aunt Mildred, even Donald."
"Yer cousin Donald? Mildred's son?" Sadness left Charlie's face briefly replaced by distaste. "That's a weird one, Son. Forty year old man that still lives home and spends all his time watching old cartoons?" He shook his head. "Not a good sign."
Peter shrugged. "What can I say? The sixties were very good to Donald. It was nice of him to go to the funeral, anyway."
"Yeah. Nice." Charlie carefully folded the old photo and restored it to the rear of his wallet, then he replaced the wallet in his pocket and stood, approaching his son from behind. "I wish I'd known sooner. I would have liked to be there. You didn't go alone?"
Peter ducked his head, only then becoming aware of the photo he clasped in both hands. It showed five figures, Peter and three other men, and a floating green mass whose skinny arms were draped around Peter's neck. Peter regarded the images fondly. "No, I didn't go alone. Winston went with me." He grinned to himself, affection lighting the shadows in his eyes. "We were on the plane before he told me that they all wanted to go but decided four men and a drippy Class 5 nether-entity would be a bit much to impose on even my family, so they drew straws. Winston won ... or lost, as the case may be."
"Knowing your friends," Venkman pere remarked, taking the photo out of Peter's hands and restoring it to its shelf, "I'm sure he'd say he won." He rested his hands on Peter's shoulders, using his grip to turn the younger man around until they were facing. "I'm sorry about your ma, Peter. You must miss her bad. Are you okay?"
The sympathy was sincere and Peter accepted it as such though he accepted very little else from his conman father at face value. He nodded, slapping the older man on the arm. "I'm fine, Dad. Really. It's ... not like I expected it to be." At the other's grunted interrogative, he continued, "I always thought that when Mom died I'd be all broken up, but I'm handling things real well -- a lot better than I thought I would. Maybe because we've spent so many years apart. She moved to Chicago right after she married Roger ... what is it? Twelve years ago? Thirteen? Something like that. We went separate ways when I hit college. I...." His voice caught briefly; he wiped his palm across his eyes and resumed calmly. "I wish I'd had a chance to spend more time with her. We did nothing but clash when I was growing up."
"You had too much'a me in you," the older man interjected with an apologetic look.
Peter shrugged. "Could be. Then I hit college and she got married and moved away."
"I'm sure she understood how you felt, Peter," Charlie said, giving his son a little shake. "Maggie would have known. She was that kind of woman."
"I like to think so," Peter replied softly. "I hope so." He pulled back and made his way to a shelved sideboard upon which sat an assortment of glasses and tumblers. He selected two, then reached down to one of the shelves and pulled out a litre bottle. "It's not quite real somehow," he said, pouring a generous dollop of amber fluid into both glasses. "Even after the funeral I feel like she's still there in Chicago, only a phone call away." He grinned mirthlessly, offering one glass to his father. "That's the denial stage, prolonged by the activity surrounding the services. I'll be hitting acceptance and depression in another day or two."
"You sound like some kind'a college professor," the older man joked, accepting the glass and sniffing appreciatively at its contents. "Who'd'a thought any son of mine ..." He brushed at the horrendous suit with his free hand. "... would grow up to sound like a straight-edged college professor? I thought by now you'd be running the Atlantic City three-card Monte concession."
Peter shuddered delicately. "Or selling ghost repelling ponchos on 32nd Street?"
Charlie took a sip of his drink, his little shrug sheepish. "Hey! I made two hundred bucks that morning! Could'a made a bigger score if you boys had endorsed me!"
"Not even enough to cover our bail," Peter grumbled, playfully tugging at the purple bow tie around the other's neck. "No thanks."
He made to say more, then broke off at the sound of footsteps from the stairway leading up from the garage. A moment later two men appeared, bypassing the kitchen for a direct route to the livingroom. The leader was about three inches taller than Peter, wearing a blue jumpsuit, his blond hair coiffured in an intricate curl across his cranium that seemed to defy gravity itself. The second man was a powerfully built negro in a similar, blue-gray outfit; he held a sheaf of papers in one large hand, a mug of coffee in the other.
"Boys!" Charlie called cheerfully. He glanced beyond them toward the stair. "Where's your little green friend?"
"He heard an ice cream truck go by," the negro told him, "and off he went. I still don't know how he heard it through two walls and several feet of concrete."
"Mr. Venkman," the blond greeted the newcomer politely, offering his hand as soon as he was in range. "I'd like to extend my condolences on your loss."
Charlie transferred his glass into his left hand, accepting the grip briefly, then nodding at Winston. "Thank you. More Peter's loss than mine, but I appreciate the sentiment." The heavy accent had faded as it nearly always did when Charlie was around the cultured Egon Spengler; Peter shot him an amused glance but made no mention of the fact. "Good to see you again, Winston. You're looking well. Dusty but well."
Winston Zeddemore placed his mug carefully on the coffee table, then arranged the stack of papers beside it. Hands now free, he pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at the chalk and sawdust on his dark skin. "I've been a bit cleaner," the black man admitted wryly. "But we got the braces set up for the new equipment, anyway. That's half the battle right there."
"We'll have the additional energy field available for melding with the main containment unit in two days maximum," Egon added, adjusting his red rimmed glasses higher on his long, slightly hooked nose. They promptly slid back down; Egon sighed and ignored them. "We should be able to extend storage volume by thirty percent when we're done."
Charlie shook his head. "Boys, boys," he chided. "All this techie talk -- containments, schmidt bottles ..."
"Klein bottles," Egon corrected before he could stop himself.
"... whatever." Charlie gulped his scotch and placed the glass down on the shelf beside the television. "All this stuff means nothing to me. Better we should talk about the lovely young clients you boys meet in your travels -- them I know about! Or maybe you want I should tell you my ideas on how to spruce up your business a bit. You guys do good work but you got no style!" He punched the air with a closed fist to emphasize the point. "Style is what it's all about." It took a moment for him to become aware of the direction of their disbelieving stares. He followed their gaze down to his loud plaid suit and even the unflappable Charlie Venkman's cheeks flushed at the sight. "Okay, okay, so the suit isn't my best example. It's got a purpose, though."
"Not again," Peter groaned. "We'll take your word for it." He placed a hand on his Charlie's shoulder and donned a brighter countenance, the effort palpable but seeming to relax at the contact with his father. "What say we do something tonight. Ball game at the Garden?" He stopped at the dismayed expressions on his teammates' faces. "What?"
Zeddemore jerked his thumb toward the spiral staircase that led to the bunkroom, dropping his voice conspiratorially. "Ray decided you were depressed and needed cheering up."
"What's he doing?" Peter asked, green eyes narrowing suspiciously. "He didn't, like, hire a pony or anything, did he? He did that before," he told Charlie as an aside. "It took us weeks to get the carpet completely clean again."
"Worse than the pony." Egon's long face assumed somber lines, his expression the same as the last time he'd informed the team that the world was about to end. "Ray is ... cooking. A new dish. It was supposed to be a surprise."
All four men froze, then Peter gulped. "Guys, if I have to go through one of Ray's fiesta stages tonight I really will be depressed."
"I'm depressed already." Charlie looked thoughtful, then slapped his son on the arm. "Let me handle this."
"Don't hurt his feelings, Dad," Peter said quickly. "He means well, he just has trouble boiling water, is all."
Charlie grinned. "Trust me, Peter!" He crossed to the staircase, calling up it, "Ray! You up there, boy?"
Stantz' light voice answered immediately, pounding feet heralding his approach. He slid down the firepole with a squeal of flesh on metal, hopping lightly off at the second floor level. "Right here, Mr. Venkman! Did you want me for something?"
Charlie rested a friendly hand on his shoulder. "Just wanted to invite you and the rest along with Peter and me. We're going out to dinner."
Ray looked dismayed. "But I was going to ... I mean, tonight?"
Charlie nodded, his face taking on long doleful lines indicative of deep sorrow. "It's-it's the shock, you know," he said in a choked voice. "I just feel like I must get out of here for awhile. Too many memories."
Ray looked puzzled. "But you were never here with...." Charlie emitted a heartfelt sigh and Ray trailed off, ready sympathy overriding his logic for the moment. "Sure. I understand. How about Florio's? They'll take everyone without a reservation." Charlie felt meaningfully in his pocket and Ray added quickly, "I'll even buy."
Charlie brightened. "You're a good boy, Ray. Uh, maybe I ought to change my suit first? I got my overnighter downstairs by your secretary's desk."
"Thank you," Peter breathed, though whether he was grateful for the dinner diversion or the change in attire was never made clear. He raised his hand, stopping the older man before he could head for the stair. "Aren't you forgetting something, Dad?"
Charlie hesitated, then nodded. Asking no leave, he headed to the small bar and poured three more drinks which he handed around to Egon, Winston and Ray. Then he refilled his own glass, while Peter took up his own untouched one. "A toast," he said, raising his glass high. "To Margaret O'Brian Venkman Pulanski. To a fine lady and the mother of a fine man."
"Hear! Hear!" Egon said.
"Amen." That was Winston.
Peter said nothing as he sipped the toast but his eyes met those of his father's warmly. "Thanks, Dad," he said softly. "Thanks for coming."
"Whenever you need me, Son," Charlie returned, sliding his arm around Peter's shoulders and giving him a squeeze. "Whenever you really need me."
end
Peter Venkman stood a long moment on the threshold to the living area staring with blank incomprehension at the visitor, who was riffling through the CD collection on the shelf -- the suit had that effect on everyone at first contact. It was only when the man turned toward him that Peter shook himself out of his daze and continued his journey across the room. "Hello, Dad." Peter's greeting was warm and genuine; he held out his hand and it was immediately engulfed in a powerful returning grip. "Thanks for coming."
Charles Venkman, known to his friends as Charlie, pumped his son's hand once with real enthusiasm, then released it. "I get a message like that and I'm supposed to NOT come?" he asked rhetorically. He dug into a pocket, extracting a crumpled slip of paper bearing the Western Union logo at the top. "Dad, stop" he read, smoothing it out. "I need you. Stop. Peter." He waved it in the air, a puzzled frown marring his high forehead. "How you knew I was visiting my brother Alf, I'll never know, but you caught me just as I was getting ready to go back to L.A."
Peter seated himself on one corner of the long couch facing the entertainment center, and patted the cushion next to him, inviting the older man to sit. "I didn't know you were at Uncle Alf's. I sent copies of that telegram to a dozen places -- anywhere you might be this time of year. I figured sooner or later one of them would find you." He moved over another inch when his father sat down, tilting his head to see the suit from head to foot. "You ... uh ... haven't been seen in public in that thing, have you?"
Charlie's mustache twitched humorously, the fatuous expression slipping a bit to reveal the intelligent humor beneath. "Don't you make fun of this suit, son; it's pretty bad but it serves its purpose, believe you me." He struck a pose, lifting his nose in the air without losing his slumped posture. "You are looking at the invisible man, here."
Peter frankly gaped. "In that thing?"
Charlie leaned back against the thick cushions and crossed his legs, his slightly nasal, stereotypical New York Jewish accent thickened as he got farther into his role. "Oh, people see -- in this suit, how could they not? Then they dismiss it -- and me -- as a silly old man as harmless as they come. Not even worth a thought. A snigger, maybe, but not a thought." He chuckled. "Trust me, this suit has seen me through many a scam-- uh, business dealing. Well worth the five bucks that Salvation Army story soaked me for."
Beyond a knowing nod there was very little remark to be made on that point, and no argument, for whatever else Charlie Venkman might be, he was an acknowledged master chameleon; if he said the suit helped him vanish, Peter was loathe to contradict him. Peter dismissed the subject and the suit with a flip of the hand. "I'm pretty sure I don't want to know what you're using it for now," he said dryly. "Ignorance is bliss, right?"
"And why should you lay awake worrying all night?" the older man returned with humor. Then the humor faded and he regarded his only son seriously. "But you didn't send me a telegram like this to talk about my wardrobe."
Peter too sobered, his dark lashes veiling his eyes. "No, I didn't."
He hesitated so long that alarm flooded the elder Venkman's lined face. "Nothing happened to your friends, did it?" he demanded, uncrossing his legs and sitting up straight. "The boy, Ray, let me in, but I didn't see the other two. Or that slimy green pet you keep around, either. Are they...?
Peter raised a hand, cutting off the worried interrogation. "They're fine, Dad. Egon and Winston are downstairs working on the containment unit. Ray said it was time to add a new klein bottle and Winston volunteered to help Egon with the preliminary stuff. Ray'll fine tune the installation before we put it online." He stared at a green spot on the carpet, then rubbed at it with the toe of his sneaker. "Slimer must be helping them."
"Klein bottles, containment units...." Charlie waggled his fingers. "All that technical stuff is beyond me, Son. I never got that nice college education like you." He tapped his own temple and winked. "Got me some street smarts though that even beat out yours. Man can make a living on his wits. That's what they're there for."
"Wits and a loud suit," Peter jeered back amiably. Again a shadow passed across his face, banishing the amiable humor between them. "It's not the guys, Dad. It's ... Mom."
"Maggie?" Charlie Venkman straightened, his head coming up. Startled out of his height diminishing slump it became apparent that he was more nearly Peter's six foot than the ineffectual five-foot-nine inch oldster he'd aspired toward. "What happened?"
Peter swallowed hard, lifting his own head and turning until green eye met green. "She's dead."
This was obviously not what Charlie had expected. He stared, shocked for a long moment, his jaw dropping open. He blinked and closed his mouth with a click of teeth, incomprehension wiping away the assumed lines in his face and leaving him looking ten years younger. "Maggie?" he repeated blankly. "Maggie is--?"
"Yes." Peter looked away, ducking his head to hide the hurt in his expression, his gaze settling on the digital clock inherent in the VCR; it read 2:45pm. "One week ago today."
"But-but how?" As the information finally sank in, more and more of the assumed persona Charlie Venkman donned as regularly as he did the plaid suit began to drop away. Besides the additional height, there was a subtle but definite change in the man himself. Barriers and concealment dropped away allowing the sharp awareness of the man to show through. An uninformed impartial observer might have seen another man altogether and it was this inner man that Peter addressed.
"She'd been having some problems for awhile," he said quietly, laying a hand on his father's knee. "She was at home with her family around her, and...." He gulped, swallowing the lump that hoarsened his voice. "It was sudden. She didn't suffer."
Charlie covered his son's hand with his own, fingers twining and holding tight. "I'm truly sorry to hear that. Maggie was a fine woman."
"Maggie." Peter's fingers tightened until the knuckles were white. His grip might have been painful though Charlie made no protest. "You're the only one in the world who called her Maggie. Everyone else called her Margaret."
"I'm not everyone else," Charlie retorted, then he sighed. "A fine woman. The time we were together was the happiest of my life."
"All eight years worth." The psychologist spoke the words frankly, without rancor. "Although the way Mom explained it, you and she were married eight years; you only spent a total of about two together. Nine months out of every twelve you were on the road."
Charlie opened his free hand in a curiously appealing if unapologetic gesture. "I was a salesman; it was my job to travel. I didn't have any choice."
"It wouldn't have made any difference, would it?" the younger man responded, still lacking in accusation; this was a subject that had been settled between them many years before. "You had trouble sticking around for as long as you did."
"Wondering feet." The older man raised one brown oxford, making a weak attempt at humor. "That's why your Mom and me couldn't stay married."
Peter shot his father an amused look, using the opportunity to undo the top button of his light shirt against the slight heat of the room. "Not quite. Mom understood that part of it. It was Lorna she didn't get too well. And Annette. And Magda. And...."
"Ah, Magda." Charlie twisted his mustache self-consciously, though his face took on that particularly blissful look it always did whenever he reminisced about one of his lady friends. "Wish you could'a met her, Son. She was really something -- a real lady."
"She was a stripper, Dad," the younger man retorted, freeing his hand to scrub again at the stain on his jeans. "Out, damn spot!"
Charlie drew himself up. "She was a lady, Son, just not the same ... quality lady as Maggie." Green eyes dulled and the look he turned on Peter was sad. "Did I ever tell you how your mom and me met?" He had but Peter cocked his head attentively, anyway. "She had only been in New York a few months, trying to break into show business. You know the routine -- make the circuit of the stage doors during the day, earn a living any way you can at night."
"She took me by the diner she was waitressing at the evening you met." Peter abandoned his stained jeans to lounge in the corner of the couch. He stretched his legs out straight in front of him and crossed his ankles. "It's a real dive now; not a bad place thirty-odd years ago." He glanced across at his father, who also had assumed a more comfortable posture though not resuming his slumped one of before. "Good bet you weren't wearing that suit when you met her; she'd've run screaming rather than go out with you on the spot."
Charlie chuckled, one hand smoothing back his thinning brown hair. "I was doing my New York, New York routine that night. If you want to attract a blooming showgirl, you can't do better. We were married two weeks later." He opened his jacket and extracted a battered wallet. He flipped it open and rummaged in a small pocket, then pulled out a folded piece of cardboard. It opened to reveal itself as an old black and white glossy photograph, creased in a dozen places and faded with age. "You never saw this, did you."
Peter accepted the photo, holding it higher to see it better in the light. It showed a man and a woman, their clothes indicating a time period sometime in the early 1950's. The man was medium-height and slim, with wavy dark hair and merry eyes. The woman was petite and pretty, shoulder length blonde hair permed in the frizzy styles of the era, her shirtwaist dress caught mid-swirl around shapely legs. "That's you and Mom!"
Charlie used his thumbnail to indicate a third figure nearly obscured by the first two. "Look a little closer. Who's that about ground level?"
Peter squinted. "Is that ... me?"
"That's you. That was taken at one of the apartments in Brooklyn about a year after you were born." Charlie waited quietly while Peter stared at the old picture, then he plucked it back, holding it between thumb and forefinger and examining it himself. "Wasn't gone nine months out of twelve back then. Not until you were three or so. That's when I started traveling." He paused, scratching at his smooth shaven chin. "Maggie an' me, we wuz havin' some problems around then."
"Magda?" Peter asked, and this time the accusation was there.
Charlie shot him a glare, brows low. "I never cheated on her back then, boy. Not then. Not 'til later. Magda came later." But if he was looking for an apology he was doomed to disappointment. After a moment he returned his attention to the photo, mouth drawn in a tight line. "She was beautiful, wasn't she? Any man would have been proud to have married her. I was."
There was another pause which neither man seemed inclined to break. Peter rose, crossing to the CD collection and extracting the disk his father had been looking at a few minutes before. "the Best of Slim Whitman?" he puzzled aloud.
There was no reply to that from the other man. Charlie continued to examine the picture of his ex-wife, fingering it with some tenderness. "Was there a funeral?" he murmured after a long time. "Did you go?"
Peter glanced back at him, then replaced the CD and absently picked up another photo, a framed one that sat on the topmost shelf above the VCR. He held it in both hands though did not look at it. "Funeral was Saturday," he said quietly. "In a little church on the outskirts of Chicago, not far from where Mom and Roger were living. The whole family was there -- Roger's three kids, Aunt Ruthie and Aunt Mildred, even Donald."
"Yer cousin Donald? Mildred's son?" Sadness left Charlie's face briefly replaced by distaste. "That's a weird one, Son. Forty year old man that still lives home and spends all his time watching old cartoons?" He shook his head. "Not a good sign."
Peter shrugged. "What can I say? The sixties were very good to Donald. It was nice of him to go to the funeral, anyway."
"Yeah. Nice." Charlie carefully folded the old photo and restored it to the rear of his wallet, then he replaced the wallet in his pocket and stood, approaching his son from behind. "I wish I'd known sooner. I would have liked to be there. You didn't go alone?"
Peter ducked his head, only then becoming aware of the photo he clasped in both hands. It showed five figures, Peter and three other men, and a floating green mass whose skinny arms were draped around Peter's neck. Peter regarded the images fondly. "No, I didn't go alone. Winston went with me." He grinned to himself, affection lighting the shadows in his eyes. "We were on the plane before he told me that they all wanted to go but decided four men and a drippy Class 5 nether-entity would be a bit much to impose on even my family, so they drew straws. Winston won ... or lost, as the case may be."
"Knowing your friends," Venkman pere remarked, taking the photo out of Peter's hands and restoring it to its shelf, "I'm sure he'd say he won." He rested his hands on Peter's shoulders, using his grip to turn the younger man around until they were facing. "I'm sorry about your ma, Peter. You must miss her bad. Are you okay?"
The sympathy was sincere and Peter accepted it as such though he accepted very little else from his conman father at face value. He nodded, slapping the older man on the arm. "I'm fine, Dad. Really. It's ... not like I expected it to be." At the other's grunted interrogative, he continued, "I always thought that when Mom died I'd be all broken up, but I'm handling things real well -- a lot better than I thought I would. Maybe because we've spent so many years apart. She moved to Chicago right after she married Roger ... what is it? Twelve years ago? Thirteen? Something like that. We went separate ways when I hit college. I...." His voice caught briefly; he wiped his palm across his eyes and resumed calmly. "I wish I'd had a chance to spend more time with her. We did nothing but clash when I was growing up."
"You had too much'a me in you," the older man interjected with an apologetic look.
Peter shrugged. "Could be. Then I hit college and she got married and moved away."
"I'm sure she understood how you felt, Peter," Charlie said, giving his son a little shake. "Maggie would have known. She was that kind of woman."
"I like to think so," Peter replied softly. "I hope so." He pulled back and made his way to a shelved sideboard upon which sat an assortment of glasses and tumblers. He selected two, then reached down to one of the shelves and pulled out a litre bottle. "It's not quite real somehow," he said, pouring a generous dollop of amber fluid into both glasses. "Even after the funeral I feel like she's still there in Chicago, only a phone call away." He grinned mirthlessly, offering one glass to his father. "That's the denial stage, prolonged by the activity surrounding the services. I'll be hitting acceptance and depression in another day or two."
"You sound like some kind'a college professor," the older man joked, accepting the glass and sniffing appreciatively at its contents. "Who'd'a thought any son of mine ..." He brushed at the horrendous suit with his free hand. "... would grow up to sound like a straight-edged college professor? I thought by now you'd be running the Atlantic City three-card Monte concession."
Peter shuddered delicately. "Or selling ghost repelling ponchos on 32nd Street?"
Charlie took a sip of his drink, his little shrug sheepish. "Hey! I made two hundred bucks that morning! Could'a made a bigger score if you boys had endorsed me!"
"Not even enough to cover our bail," Peter grumbled, playfully tugging at the purple bow tie around the other's neck. "No thanks."
He made to say more, then broke off at the sound of footsteps from the stairway leading up from the garage. A moment later two men appeared, bypassing the kitchen for a direct route to the livingroom. The leader was about three inches taller than Peter, wearing a blue jumpsuit, his blond hair coiffured in an intricate curl across his cranium that seemed to defy gravity itself. The second man was a powerfully built negro in a similar, blue-gray outfit; he held a sheaf of papers in one large hand, a mug of coffee in the other.
"Boys!" Charlie called cheerfully. He glanced beyond them toward the stair. "Where's your little green friend?"
"He heard an ice cream truck go by," the negro told him, "and off he went. I still don't know how he heard it through two walls and several feet of concrete."
"Mr. Venkman," the blond greeted the newcomer politely, offering his hand as soon as he was in range. "I'd like to extend my condolences on your loss."
Charlie transferred his glass into his left hand, accepting the grip briefly, then nodding at Winston. "Thank you. More Peter's loss than mine, but I appreciate the sentiment." The heavy accent had faded as it nearly always did when Charlie was around the cultured Egon Spengler; Peter shot him an amused glance but made no mention of the fact. "Good to see you again, Winston. You're looking well. Dusty but well."
Winston Zeddemore placed his mug carefully on the coffee table, then arranged the stack of papers beside it. Hands now free, he pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at the chalk and sawdust on his dark skin. "I've been a bit cleaner," the black man admitted wryly. "But we got the braces set up for the new equipment, anyway. That's half the battle right there."
"We'll have the additional energy field available for melding with the main containment unit in two days maximum," Egon added, adjusting his red rimmed glasses higher on his long, slightly hooked nose. They promptly slid back down; Egon sighed and ignored them. "We should be able to extend storage volume by thirty percent when we're done."
Charlie shook his head. "Boys, boys," he chided. "All this techie talk -- containments, schmidt bottles ..."
"Klein bottles," Egon corrected before he could stop himself.
"... whatever." Charlie gulped his scotch and placed the glass down on the shelf beside the television. "All this stuff means nothing to me. Better we should talk about the lovely young clients you boys meet in your travels -- them I know about! Or maybe you want I should tell you my ideas on how to spruce up your business a bit. You guys do good work but you got no style!" He punched the air with a closed fist to emphasize the point. "Style is what it's all about." It took a moment for him to become aware of the direction of their disbelieving stares. He followed their gaze down to his loud plaid suit and even the unflappable Charlie Venkman's cheeks flushed at the sight. "Okay, okay, so the suit isn't my best example. It's got a purpose, though."
"Not again," Peter groaned. "We'll take your word for it." He placed a hand on his Charlie's shoulder and donned a brighter countenance, the effort palpable but seeming to relax at the contact with his father. "What say we do something tonight. Ball game at the Garden?" He stopped at the dismayed expressions on his teammates' faces. "What?"
Zeddemore jerked his thumb toward the spiral staircase that led to the bunkroom, dropping his voice conspiratorially. "Ray decided you were depressed and needed cheering up."
"What's he doing?" Peter asked, green eyes narrowing suspiciously. "He didn't, like, hire a pony or anything, did he? He did that before," he told Charlie as an aside. "It took us weeks to get the carpet completely clean again."
"Worse than the pony." Egon's long face assumed somber lines, his expression the same as the last time he'd informed the team that the world was about to end. "Ray is ... cooking. A new dish. It was supposed to be a surprise."
All four men froze, then Peter gulped. "Guys, if I have to go through one of Ray's fiesta stages tonight I really will be depressed."
"I'm depressed already." Charlie looked thoughtful, then slapped his son on the arm. "Let me handle this."
"Don't hurt his feelings, Dad," Peter said quickly. "He means well, he just has trouble boiling water, is all."
Charlie grinned. "Trust me, Peter!" He crossed to the staircase, calling up it, "Ray! You up there, boy?"
Stantz' light voice answered immediately, pounding feet heralding his approach. He slid down the firepole with a squeal of flesh on metal, hopping lightly off at the second floor level. "Right here, Mr. Venkman! Did you want me for something?"
Charlie rested a friendly hand on his shoulder. "Just wanted to invite you and the rest along with Peter and me. We're going out to dinner."
Ray looked dismayed. "But I was going to ... I mean, tonight?"
Charlie nodded, his face taking on long doleful lines indicative of deep sorrow. "It's-it's the shock, you know," he said in a choked voice. "I just feel like I must get out of here for awhile. Too many memories."
Ray looked puzzled. "But you were never here with...." Charlie emitted a heartfelt sigh and Ray trailed off, ready sympathy overriding his logic for the moment. "Sure. I understand. How about Florio's? They'll take everyone without a reservation." Charlie felt meaningfully in his pocket and Ray added quickly, "I'll even buy."
Charlie brightened. "You're a good boy, Ray. Uh, maybe I ought to change my suit first? I got my overnighter downstairs by your secretary's desk."
"Thank you," Peter breathed, though whether he was grateful for the dinner diversion or the change in attire was never made clear. He raised his hand, stopping the older man before he could head for the stair. "Aren't you forgetting something, Dad?"
Charlie hesitated, then nodded. Asking no leave, he headed to the small bar and poured three more drinks which he handed around to Egon, Winston and Ray. Then he refilled his own glass, while Peter took up his own untouched one. "A toast," he said, raising his glass high. "To Margaret O'Brian Venkman Pulanski. To a fine lady and the mother of a fine man."
"Hear! Hear!" Egon said.
"Amen." That was Winston.
Peter said nothing as he sipped the toast but his eyes met those of his father's warmly. "Thanks, Dad," he said softly. "Thanks for coming."
"Whenever you need me, Son," Charlie returned, sliding his arm around Peter's shoulders and giving him a squeeze. "Whenever you really need me."
end