A young girl who looks like Heather Graham. The concerned expression on her face melds oddly into relief. She’s panting, smiling uneasily now.
“You left this at the phone booth,” she says.
She’s holding out the Prada backpack.
I stare at the backpack.
“Victor?” she says, glancing first at the French crew and then back at me. “They’re ready for you. I think Tammy’s, um, recovered.”
Total silence.
“Victor?” she asks. “Here.” She hands me the Prada bag.
“Oh … yeah?” I take the bag from her.
I immediately hand the bag to a PA on the French crew.
Trembling, the PA takes the bag and hands it to the director.
The director looks at the Prada bag and then immediately hands it back to the PA, who winces.
“Who are these people?” the girls asks, grinning, waiting for an introduction.
“What?” I hear myself asking.
“What’s going on?” she asks a little more insistently, still grinning.
The director snaps his fingers and is quickly handed a cell phone. He flicks open the mouthpiece, presses buttons and, turning away, whispers something urgently in French.
“Who?” I ask lamely. “What do you mean?”
10:09.
“That crew,” she says, and then, leaning in, whispering, “The crew, like, behind you?”
“Them?” I turn around. “Oh, they just started following me around,” I say. “I don’t know who they are.”
The French PA’s breathing is actually audible, his eyes keep widening helplessly.
“Bolero” keeps rising.
An infinite number of possibilities appear.
I’m taking the slightest breaths.
The girl says, “Victor, come on, I think we should go.” She touches my arm with a small hand.
I look over at the director. He nods curtly.
On the escalator, I turn around.
The French crew has already disappeared.
“Why did they take your bag, Victor?” the girl is asking. “Do you know them?”
“Hey baby,” I say tiredly. “Hey, mellow out. Be quiet.”
“But Victor, why did those people take your bag?” she asks.
“Bolero” ends.
The tape in the Walkman automatically clicks off.
I don’t bother checking my watch.
At the pyramid Tammy stares at me quizzically, casually checking her watch, seemingly recovered.
“I got lost,” I say, shrugging.
In the hazy distance, from where I’m slouching, the PA who looks like Heather Graham is already talking with the director and Felix, and both of them keep glancing over at me—suspicion, whispers, a general aura of cold worry—and confetti is scattered all around, some of it simply falling from somewhere above us, but I’m barely aware of anything. I could be in Malibu lying on a beach towel. It could be 1978 or 1983. The sky could be black with spaceships. I could be a lonely girl draping scarves over a dorm room lamp. All week I’ve been having dreams made up entirely of helicopter pull-away shots, revealing a giant metallic space, the word “beyond” floating above that space in white and gold letters. Someone from the crew hands me a tambourine.
29
Tonight everyone is packed into the first-floor Windsor Suite at the Ritz. Among the minglers: Kristen McMenamy, Sting and Trudie Styler, Kate Moss, Jennifer Saunders, Bryan Ferry, Tina Turner, Donatella Versace, Jon Bon Jovi, Susie Bick, Nadja Auermann in a bubble-lace cocktail dress, Marie-Sophie Wilson in Inca pink, a handful of newly rich Russians, a famous producer just out of prison or rehab, does it matter? A large pug waddles throughout the room, desperately trying to avoid being stepped on. I have no idea what this party is about though it could be for the new fragrance Pandemonium. I feel pinned together, on the verge of collapse, my mouth dry from too much Xanax. We spent the day on a yacht, nodding sympathetically at one another. Oribe dropped in and did everyone’s hair. Someone standing in the corner faints, I notice idly while lighting a cigarette. Disco classics blare.
Jamie’s wearing—under protest—the bright-yellow leopard-silk crinoline Bobby insisted upon and she’s talking to Shalom Harlow and Cecilia Chancellor, the three of them giggling tiredly, and in a black polo neck and hip-hugger pants, Cecilia’s a little deaf right now because her boyfriend spent the day following her around lighting firecrackers.
When Jamie glances over at me it’s with a look that reminds me: You. Are. Alone.
Someone with blond dreadlocks and a chin spike is behind me, demanding a beer.
Bertrand Ripleis joins Jamie, kisses Shalom, wraps an arm around Cecilia’s waist, glares at me occasionally.
But I’m distracted by the fly that keeps hovering over a giant silver bowl piled high with Beluga, by the faint but noticeable smell of shit filling the room—“Do you smell that?” I keep asking people; “Oh yes,” they keep replying knowingly—and by the guy lolling about in a white lab coat, by the diagrams of rockets and the files stamped with security classifications I saw scattered on a table in an upstairs bedroom in the house in the 8th or the 16th, and by the girl slouching next to me holding a parasol, moaning “How démodé” and then “So last season.”
“It’s all pretty dim,” I concur, shivering.
“Oh, you’re so ruthless,” she sighs, twirling the parasol, dancing away, stranding me. I have been standing in the same position for so long that my leg has fallen asleep.
A trimmer Edgar Cameron—a minor, fleeting acquaintance from New York I haven’t seen since last Christmas and whose girlfriend, Julia, is a reasonably fashionable vacuum I fucked after I first started dating Chloe—has nodded at me several times since he entered the party and now, since I’m standing alone, holding a glass of champagne, trying not to seem too bereft, I am a prime candidate for a visit. Julia told me that Edgar owns a hairless cat and is such a drunk that he once ate a squirrel he found in an alley off Mercer Street “on a dare.” I used to kiss Julia like I really cared, like I was going to stick around.
“I owe you money, Victor,” Edgar says apologetically, once he makes his way over. “I know, I know. I owe you—what? Oh let’s just make it an even two hundred.” He pauses worriedly. “Will you take francs?”
“Edgar, you don’t owe me any money,” I say softly, staring over at Jamie posing for a photographer.
“Victor, that’s very cool of you but I would’ve picked up my part of the tab at Balthazar the other night if only I’d—”
“Edgar, what are you talking about?” I sigh, interrupting him.
“Last week?” Edgar says, vaguely waving to someone. “At Balthazar. In New York. When you picked up the check. You put it on your card.”
Pause. “I wasn’t at Balthazar last week, Edgar,” I say carefully. “I haven’t been in New York in …” My voice trails off, something tiny and hard in me starts unfolding.
But Edgar’s laughing. “You seemed to be in a much better mood the other night. Paris bumming you out? Oh look, there’s Mouna Al-Rashid.”
“You could say that,” I whisper. “Edgar … when did we have dinner?”
“Last Tuesday,” Edgar says, not laughing anymore, his smile fading. “At Balthazar. A whole bunch of us. You put it on your card. Everyone gave you cash .…” Pause. Edgar stares at me as if I’d suddenly fallen asleep. “Except me. I offered to go to a cash machine but—”
“I wasn’t there, Edgar,” I say softly, my eyes watering. “That wasn’t me.”
“But we went dancing afterwards, Vic,” Edgar says. “You were celebrating.” He pantomimes someone having a good time. “B-list models all night, a booth at Cheetah, the works.”
I wipe away a tear that spills out of one eye, trying to smile. “Oh man.”
“Victor, I mean, I don’t …” He tries to laugh. “I mean, I called you at your apartment the next day. I left a message. I offered to take you to lunch.”
?
??I don’t remember any of this, Edgar,” I choke.
“Well, you seemed very upbeat,” he says, trying to convince me. “You were talking about going back to school, to Columbia or NYU.” Pause. “You weren’t smashed, Victor. In fact I don’t even think you were drinking.” Another pause. “Are you … okay?” Again, a pause. “Do you have any pot?”
“Are you okay, Edgar?” I ask back. “Maybe you were really drunk, maybe—”
“Victor, my girlfriend, you know, Julia? Well—”
“No, not really.”
“Well, she said she ran into you at the Gap the next day,” Edgar says, frowning. “The one on Fifth Avenue? Downtown?” Pause. “She said you were buying sunscreen and looked, um, fairly cheerful.”
“Wait—who else was with us?” I ask. “At Balthazar?”
“Well, it was me and Julia and—oh god, Victor, is this a joke?”
“Just tell me,” I say, wiping another tear that races down my cheek. “Please?”
“Well, it was me and Julia and Rande Gerber, Mira Sorvino, someone from Demi Moore’s production company, Ronnie Newhouse, someone from the Cardigans, and of course Damien and Lauren Hynde.”
Very carefully I hand the champagne glass I’m holding to Edgar, who tentatively takes it from me, mystified.
“Victor, you were actually quite enchanting that night,” Edgar says. “Really. There’s no need to cry. My god, you and Damien patched things up, the club’s a resounding success and—”
“Edgar, please don’t.” Adrenaline rushing through me, I fumble around in my jacket pocket, find two Xanax, throw them in my mouth, toss my head back. I take the glass of champagne out of Edgar’s hand and down it so quickly I start coughing.
“You and Damien were talking about opening another place,” Edgar says. “In TriBeCa, I believe.”
“Edgar,” I say, leaning into him, breathing heavily. “I don’t think that was me.”
“Well, whoever it was, he was …” Edgar flinches, moves away slightly. “He was extremely, um, well-behaved and … I actually must be off. Later, Victor.” He disappears into the nothingness of the party.
I’m hot even though steam keeps pouring from my mouth with every exhale and “Beyond”—the word that shows up in my dreams—keeps flashing over the party, buzzing electric near the ceiling. It seems that everyone in this room has been here for ten hours.
“It’s not fun to scare people away, is it, Victor?” Felix, the cinematographer, suddenly appears, wearing a chartreuse jacket with little epaulets on the shoulders. His subsequent wink is some kind of cue. I’m trying to recover and failing.
“I suppose,” I manage.
The director, whom I didn’t notice, makes himself more apparent by standing in front of me and staring grimly.
“A stellar evening,” he says.
“What?” I ask, and then, “Oh. I suppose.”
“Is something wrong?” the director asks. “Is something troubling you, Victor?”
“No, um, I’m just overwhelmed.”
“Well, you have a lot to live up to, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.” I’m nodding. “And I’m freaking out because of it.”
“Victor,” he starts.
“Yes?”
“Who have you been holding court with recently?” the director asks. “I mean, besides the people in the house.”
“Oh … no one.” I shrug. “Just … me.”
“What was going on in the Louvre this morning?” Felix suddenly asks. “Dimity, the PA, mentioned you were being followed around by a camera crew.”
“Dimity has no idea what she’s talking about,” I say, finding my voice. “Even though she is, in her own … way, quite, um, a wonderful”—I gulp—“person.”
“We would also like to know what happened to the actor playing Sam Ho,” the director says without warning. “Do you have any idea concerning his whereabouts?”
The name—Sam Ho—resonates dully, and briefly I’m transported back to the gym in the basement of that house in London, Jamie screaming, Bobby in a ski mask, Bruce holding a knife, the blood and wires, the flickering lights, the gutted mannequin, the party we went to the next night and the girl who ignored me there.
“I don’t want to talk about … the past,” I manage to say. “Let’s concentrate on the pr-pr-present.”
“You were the last one with the actor after you left Pylos,” Felix says. “You were supposed to stay with the limo once you exited the club.”
Pause. “Well … ,” I start. “Have you talked to the … driver?”
“We’ve been unable to locate him as well,” the director says. “What happened that night, Victor?”
“Victor, did Sam Ho come back to the house with you that night?” Felix asks. “This is very important, so think carefully.”
“No, he did not,” I say, straining, flushed.
“You’re lying,” the director snaps.
“I’m profoundly insulted by that remark.”
“Oh Jesus,” he sneers.
“Victor,” Felix says calmly, though his attitude seems menacing. “What happened to Sam Ho that night? After the two of you left Pylos?”
“He … started coming on to me—”
“But where were you going?” the director asks, advancing closer. “Why didn’t you stay outside the club? The crew was outside. They said they saw you run to the limousine. They said it took off screeching.”
“Do you really think I’m going to make some kind of—I don’t know—surprise announcement concerning where … I mean, Jesus …”
“Where did the two of you go?”
“I don’t know,” I say, crumpling. “We … went for a ride … at Sam’s request … and we … were going for a ride … to another club, I think.”
I start squinting, pretending to think. “I don’t really remember …. I think Bobby told me to bring him back to the house but—”
Felix and the director shoot glances at each other.
“Wait,” the director says. “Bobby told you to bring Sam back?”
“Yeah,” I say. Following Felix’s gaze, I see Bobby across the room.
Bobby’s looking fresh and relaxed and lights a cigarette Cameron Diaz is holding and he glances over at me and, when he sees who I’m talking to, does a very casual double take and excuses himself from the group he’s standing with, people I can’t even recognize because of how blurry my vision has rapidly become.
“But that wasn’t in the script,” Felix says. “That was most definitely not in the script.”
“Why did Bobby want Sam Ho back at the house, Victor?” the director asks very quietly.
I shrug helplessly, notice the confetti dotting the sleeve of the black jacket I’m wearing.
Bobby’s hand lands on that arm, and smiling widely for Felix and the director, he says, “I need to talk to our boy here—can I please have him?” But it’s not really a question because it’s shaped in the form of a demand.
“No,” the director says. “You can’t.”
“Am I interrupting something?” Bobby asks boyishly, tightening his grip on my arm.
“Yes,” the director says. “We were having a conversation about inconsistencies.”
“Hey man, I’m not the script supervisor, dude,” Bobby says. “Take it up with someone else.”
Felix and the director don’t say anything. It’s almost as if they’re obeying a silent vibe Bobby’s sending out: I’m beautiful, I have a purpose, go back to your dream.
We brush past extras, Bobby’s arm around my neck, and he’s patting my shoulder, maneuvering me to where Jamie’s waiting by the exit, laughing fakely at what someone she doesn’t really know says, and then Bobby asks me, “What would you think if all these people were to die and this entire hotel came crashing down?” He’s grinning, serious.
“Oh dude,” I whisper, breaking up. “Oh man.”
“Here—take this,” Bobby says, slipping a tablet into my mouth, offering me
his glass of champagne while caressing the back of my neck. “It’s like a rainbow.”
28
In the shower in the bathroom Jamie and Bobby share Bobby’s admiring the tans we acquired on the yacht today, at the shocking whiteness where our boxer-briefs blocked out the sun, at the white imprints Jamie’s bikini left behind, the paleness almost glowing in the semi-darkness of the bathroom, the water from the massive chrome head smashing down on us and both our cocks are sticking up at sharp angles and Bobby’s pulling on his prick, stiff and thick, his balls hanging tightly beneath it, the muscles in his shoulders flexing as he strokes himself off and he’s looking at me, our eyes meeting, and in a thick voice he grunts, “Look at your dick, man,” and I look down at the cock I’m jerking off and past that, at my thickly muscled legs ….
In the shower Bobby lets me make out with Jamie and Bobby’s head is between her legs and Jamie’s knees buckle a couple of times and Bobby keeps propping her up with an arm and his face is pushed up into her cunt and she’s arching her back, pushing herself onto his tongue, and one of his hands is gripping my cock, soaping it up, and then Bobby starts sucking it and it gets so hard I can feel the pulse in it and then it gets even harder, the shaft keeps thickening and Bobby pulls it out of his mouth and studies it, squeezing it, and then he flicks his tongue over the head and then he lifts it up by the tip and starts flicking his tongue in brief, precise movements over the place where the head meets the shaft as Jamie hungrily moans “do it do it” while fingering herself in the semi-darkness and then Bobby places the entire shaft into his mouth, taking as much of my cock as he comfortably can, sucking eagerly, wetly, while crouching down on his haunches, still stroking his own prick, and below it the curves of his thighs keep swelling as he repositions himself. I’m bending my neck back, letting the water stream down my chest, and when I look back down Bobby’s looking up at me and grinning, his hair wet and pressed down on his forehead, his tongue extended, pink against his face. Then Bobby motions for me to turn around so that he can spread the cheeks of my ass and I can feel him extending his tongue up in it and then he removes his tongue and sticks his index finger halfway up my asshole and keeps fingerfucking me until he’s pushed the entire finger as far as it can go, causing my cock to keep twitching uncontrollably .…