Dear Cary - Dyan Cannon [60]
“So how did it really go?” Cary asked when we got to the car.
“Not great. I don’t think she likes me.”
“Oh, she likes you,” he said. “She has never once asked to spend any time alone with any woman I’ve ever brought to meet her.”
If I were the only one of Cary’s women Elsie had liked enough to be alone with, I hated to imagine what she’d have done with the others.
I’ve never thought of it before, but since that time I’ve never liked the sight of red nail polish.
“You could have told me you’d arranged this,” I told Cary.
“It’s like leaping off the high dive, Dyan,” he said. “If you take too much time to think about it, you’ll back out.”
I let out a long sigh. I’d been ambushed, and I didn’t like it. It was our second day back in London from Bristol, and now I sat in the living room with Cary and his acid guru, Dr. Mortimer Hartman, the man who’d launched Cary’s previous wife, Betsy Drake, into cosmic exploration, who then in turn got Cary involved. I was next in line.
“Cary, can I have a moment with you? Excuse us, Dr. Hartman.”
Cary and I stepped into the hall. “This isn’t fair, Cary. This really upsets me. It’s an obvious setup. I told you how I felt about this drug a long time ago. You know how sensitive I am. I can’t even take an aspirin without feeling weird.” That was true. I hadn’t even had a cup of coffee since I was in Portugal. One sip and I was like a Mexican jumping bean.
“Dyan, do you trust me the way I trust you?” he asked.
Bull’s-eye.
“Do you think I would have asked Dr. Hartman to fly all the way to London if I didn’t think this was important?”
“You shouldn’t have asked him before you asked me. That’s the point.”
“Dyan, if it weren’t for LSD, you wouldn’t be in my life,” he said. “Bottom line, I wouldn’t have found the courage to open my heart to you and let you in.”
“That doesn’t make sense, Cary.”
“Why?”
“You did LSD with Betsy for years and the two of you split. That’s not a very good recruitment ad.”
“Betsy and I both evolved from the experience,” Cary said. “Unfortunately, it was in different directions.”
“Why would this be any different?”
“Because the first time I laid eyes on you, I felt a connection I have never felt before at any time in my life. Please trust me on this, Dyan. Please.”
I stopped. I looked at him. I said, “You don’t play fair, Cary.”
I turned on my heel and went back to the living room. Cary followed. I looked at Dr. Hartman. With a silver fringe of hair circling his shiny pate, and horn-rimmed glasses, he was anything but a poster child for the counterculture.
“I’m not eager to do this, Dr. Hartman.”
“Talk to her, my wise mahatma.”
My wise mahatma. I’d heard Cary refer to Dr. Hartman that way before. In Cary’s eyes, the doctor was some sort of shaman.
“Cary has been a true pioneer in the uncharted territories of the psyche,” he said. He spoke softly, thoughtfully, and reassuringly. Soothingly. “I’ve learned much more from him than he’s learned from me. He knows the particularities of the experience, Miss Cannon, and he believes you can reap huge rewards from it. That can’t be said about everyone. I trust his judgment completely.”
I looked at Cary. Cary was looking at me . . . and beaming. Beaming with love, I thought. He leaned forward and took my hand. “Dear girl, if you had found the key to ultimate peace of mind, wouldn’t you do anything to share it with me? I know you would. I know you want to get closer to God. This will do that.”
Dr. Hartman continued. “The drug has a dismantling effect. It can tear down our inner walls and help us look at the world, and ourselves, through new eyes. And everything you sense and see is a hundred times more vivid than usual.”
“But what is it about me you want to change?” I asked Cary.
“It’s not about change. It’s about growth, and living a fully realized life,” he answered.
“But I don’t believe you have to take a drug to