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Hey, Simon thought with a sly grin, poker night entertainment at Ellison's expense. Serve the man right for cleaning him out in the first thirty minutes. He popped the tape into the VCR and turned the television volume up. He smirked at the laughing Jim and turned it up more.
"All right, let's shake our butts! And one and two and three and four! Oooh, Shirley, shake it don't break it!" Richard Simmons cheerfully bellowed out over someone wailing As the choir sang "I Surrender All" the squirrel ran up Harv Newlan's coveralls, Harv leaped to his feet and said, "Somethin's got a hold on me", Yeow! to a country rockish backbeat.
All the heads around the dining cum poker table popped up and stared at the television in varying degrees of horror and hysterical laughter. H's grin couldn't have gotten wider. "It was a gag gift, babe, why'd you keep it?"
"Mme lmks mkmi sman-burg," Jim said.
Megan elbowed Jim in the ribs. "What'd you say?"
The door to the loft swung open, admitting a cheerful Blair and a smiling Naomi just as Jim waved his hand toward the TV and yelled, "I said he looks like Sandburg, okay?"
"One and two and Donnie, you swing it! and four!" Richard Simmons shouted cheerfully above a man just as cheerfully belting out, She told of gossip and church dissension but the thing that got the most attention was when she talked about her love life and then she started naming names.
Blair scowled. "I so do not look like him, man."
Naomi turned sheet white, horrified eyes moving from the television to Jim's face. "How did you know? It's impossible! You couldn't, it...no!" Tears dripped down her cheeks.
Blair gawped at Jim, then the television, then at Naomi. "Naomi?"
Jim's eyes narrowed at the bouncing man on television then to Blair.
Simon fell onto the couch, mouth dropping open. "He's not. No. It's not possible."
Blair's eyes looked a little white around the edges. "Naomi?!"
"I, I'm sorry, Sweetie," Naomi said, sniffling. "It was a bad time in my life and I never wanted you to know. I'm so ashamed."
Rafe frowned. "Wasn't he a fat back then? You know, before Sandburg was, uh...." Rafe waved a hand toward the television.
Naomi wrung her hands. "It was so much worse. He was in advertising! And we were at a corporate party! Thrown by those evil animal-testing cosmetics people. I never touched marijuana again after that night. As spiritually cleansing as peyote might have been, the consequences are just too—" She broke off, shaking her head.
Simon's mouth shut with a snap, then opened, then shut. He scratched his head. "Let me get this straight. You're saying that Richard Simmons," he pointed at the bouncing man on the screen, "is," he pointed to the currently unbouncy Sandburg, "Blair's father?"
Naomi turned to Blair, eyes wide and full of sorrow. She nodded. "Yes, I'm sorry sweetie, but Richard Simmons is your father. I could never tell you. His line of fitness clothing. Sweat shops. Guatemala. The keychains and dolls. Indonesia. Child workers. He appeared on Howard Stern's program and you know how much of a misanthrope Stern is. Oh, sweetie. I'm so sorry. I didn't want you to have to deal with his negative energy."
"Come on, you out there, you can do it! That's right, move! It feels great!" Richard Simmons called out over the man singing, it was a fight for survival that broke out in revival, they was jumpin' pews and shoutin' Hallelujah!
"Oh. My. God." Blair whispered.