While I'm Still Warm

I had risen at 6 that morning and went for a swim, enjoying the serenity of the cool water and its soothing effect on my back. Marjorie was still in bed; she hated getting out of bed before 8. She always watched the 7 o'clock news and afterwards would rise and put on a pot of coffee. While I was completing my 60th lap, I heard her scream. Within minutes she came running out barefoot of the house, frantic and still in her nightgown.

"Whitey, she's dead," my wife screamed, "Marilyn is dead!"

"No way, no damn way. I talked to her the day before yesterday and she was fine. What do you mean?"

"It was on the television, Whitey. They found her this morning, and oh God." She stopped at the edge of the pool and dropped to her knees, her words cut off by heaving sobs.

It was like she was speaking another language. I stood up in the pool and looked at my wife. "What did they say Margie? What happened?"

"She...she.."

"Damn it Margie, please. What did he say?" I spoke quickly, words rushing out of my mouth. My voice rose up at the end, squeaking like a goddamn teenager. I jumped out of the pool and ran over to her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Margie, what did they say? What happened to her?"

"Only that Eunice found her this morning. Dr. Greenson had gone over last night and they couldn't wake her and they saw there was a pill bottle on the floor..." With these words my wife buried her head into my dripping chest and sobbed, her wails ringing in my ears.

We stood there for a few minutes, her crying and me staring at her back and shoulders.

"I think we should go inside dear. I think I ought to lie down."

Marjorie lifted her head and caught her breath. "Of course. I should go in and start making some calls. Poor Marilyn. Poor Eunice, the dear. Oh, it's all just so awful."

I climbed the stairs to our bedroom, my hand tightly gripping the wrought iron railing. I went to the nightstand beside our bed and took out the gold Tiffany money clip that Marilyn had sent me a few weeks after we finished filming the Hawks' picture. It wasn't unusual for her to give me a gift after filming, but this was one was special. Dixie Lee, Bing Crosby's wife, had passed from cancer towards the end of the shoot. Dixie died on a Saturday but couldn't be interred until her family had arrived in Los Angeles from Tennessee. By the time they arrived on Monday morning, she had spent more than 30 hours in the morgue freezer. The idea terrified Marilyn, that Dixie laid untouched for so long. She said that it wasn't bad enough that Dixie died, but to "have lain there in the cold, alone" was an unbearable thought. At that moment she turned to me, and asked if I would do her makeup when she passed. I assured her that it would be a very long time and I would likely be dead before her. But she was serious and grabbed my hands and said "If something happens to me, promise you'll do my makeup so I look my best." It was a morbid thought, so I laughed it off saying, and said "Sure. Bring the body back while it's warm and I'll do it." When the money clip was delivered, there was no note, just the clip in the robin egg blue box. The engraving read "Whitey dear While I'm still warm Marilyn".