“So, let’s do the walk-through and then we’ll get to it!” Jane said brightly.
“You won’t get judgy on me, will you? Because I do have a tendency to... over-shop.”
“Don’t worry, we’ve seen some seriously messy homes, and we’re pros,” Jane reassured him.
“Yeah, I’ve watched more than one episode ofHoardersand I’m definitely not one of those types. I mean, not on a macro, pathological level—well, let me show you, and you decide. I’m a Libra through and through, so—you know, hard time making decisions sometimes.”
They stood in a room that had been converted into one big closet. The walls had built-in storage units, and one entire wallwas cubbyholes so crammed with shoes they looked on the verge of collapse.
“I like shoes,” he explained unnecessarily. “I have too many, I know, but I’m not sure I want to get rid of any of them. I mean—you organize, right? We don’t need to throw stuff out, do we?”
“We don’t have to throw anything out if you don’t want to!” Esmé proclaimed, shaking her head. Jane ducked to avoid the flick of her aggressive ponytail.
“But if you are open to culling, we can help with that.” Jane felt it was important to modulate.
“Yeah, tell us your boundaries and we’ll work around them! We understand your time is extremely valuable,” Esmé added, along with an ingratiating smile.
As he looked around the room, Eric’s eyes glazed over again. “To be honest, sometimes I buy stuff and forget I already have something exactly like it. That happens a lot in fact, and then I forget to return it. It’s a little embarrassing.”
This glimpse of vulnerability touched Jane.
Eric pushed a shock of hair off his forehead. “Maybe we should start with my office.”
Eric was a television writer, and the walls of his office were covered with posters of shows he had worked on. That was where Jane found herself face-to-face with a poster for Kelsey’s witch show,Spellbound. What a ridiculously small world she lived in. Jane studied the poster. A much younger Kelsey stared off into the distance with an alluring pout, surrounded by her costars, all similarly fetching.
“Oh that show was such a guilty pleasure,” Jane remarked. She couldn’t divulge that she actually knew Kelsey. She hadsigned the nondisclosure agreement her organizing company required of all employees.
“I had no guilt! I totally loved it!” Esmé exclaimed, ponytail bobbing for emphasis. Clever how subtly she was undermining Jane, who now realized that calling the show a “guilty pleasure” could seem like a backhanded compliment, or even insulting.
“That show was so stupid!” Eric laughed. “We had the best time when we worked on it, because it was so ludicrous! Those girls fighting demons and losing their virginity in the same episode. And sometimes, of course, it was the demon who took their virginity. And someone had decided that since they were witches, they could even lose their virginity three or four times, which I still can’t wrap my head around.”
Jane, relieved that he had taken no offense, remarked, “Well, it was nothing if not aspirational.”
Eric laughed heartily. “Yeah, everyone would re-virginize if they could! Some people latched on to it as this feminist empowerment thing but if it was, trust me—it was entirely accidental. It was my first gig as a writer, and I was so happy just to be working.”
Jane scanned the office. The desk was covered with stacks of papers. One wall was lined with rows of shelves filled with typewriters. She had never come across a typewriter collection, which was surprising, since she had organized at many film and TV writers’ homes. Another shelf bore a collection of lunchboxes themed to old television shows. She could imagine little Eric, so proud to bring his bologna sandwich and chips in his special lunchbox to school each day. She could see the sweet little boy he must have been. Unlike his closet, full of stuff you could find in any gay man’s closet in LA, these collections were interesting and unique—even if they were taking up way too much space.
“I love all these typewriters,” Jane said.
“They should be in a museum!” Esmé added.
“Thanks. I have even more in storage.”
“In storage?” Jane blanched. If a client had a storage space, that indicated an intractable attachment to objects and an inability to let go.
Despite his apparent spaciness, Eric didn’t miss a trick. “Yes, I know, it’s a littleHoardersto have a storage space, but... I love my typewriters!”
“Storage spaces are great!” Esmé offered. “It’s a really good way of not parting with things that you love while clearing your space at home.”
Jane vehemently disagreed but kept that to herself.
After working in Eric’s office for a few hours, Jane and Esmé still hadn’t touched the hallowed collections of typewriters and lunchboxes because there was so much paper to be sorted. Books, magazines, scripts, contracts. Eric told them he was going paperless, but the digitizing was a work in progress. She was hoping—while being chagrined by the desire—to find an old script or some other memento of Kelsey’s show. But she didn’t. It was years since that show had wrapped.
Eric kept popping in to check on their progress. Jane couldn’t tell if he was avoiding writing (in her experience, a very common occupational hazard), or if he was nervous about them going through his stuff, or if he was trying to be friendly.
“I promise you we will not throw away anything. Once it’s all sorted, you can go through it and discard whatever you want,” Jane reassured him.
“I can see so much crap to chuck. It’s overwhelming.”
