Right now she’s wearing a black Prada halter gown with black patent-leather sandals and metallic-green wraparound sunglasses she takes off as soon as she sees me approaching.
“Sorry, baby, I got lost,” I say, sliding into the booth.
“My savior,” Chloe says, smiling tightly.
Roy, Quentin, Kato and Eric split, all severely disappointed, muttering hey mans to me and that they’ll be at the opening tomorrow night, but Baxter Priestly stays seated—one collar point sticking in, the other sticking out, from under a Pepto-Bismol-pink vest—sucking on a peppermint. NYU film grad, rich and twenty-five, part-time model (so far only group shots in Guess?, Banana Republic and Tommy Hilfiger ads), blond with a pageboy haircut, dated Elizabeth Saltzman like I did, wow.
“Hey man,” I sigh while reaching over the table to kiss Chloe on the mouth, dreading the upcoming exchange of pleasantries.
“Hey Victor.” Baxter shakes my hand. “How’s the club going? Ready for tomorrow?”
“Do you have the time to listen to me whine?”
We sit there sort of looking out over the rest of the room, my eyes fixed on the big table in the center, beneath a chandelier made of toilet floats and recycled refrigerator wire, where Eric Bogosian, Jim Jarmusch, Larry Gagosian, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, and oddly enough, Ricki Lake are all having salads, which touches something in me, a reminder to deal with the crouton situation before it gets totally out of hand.
Finally sensing my vibe, Baxter gets up, pockets his Audiovox MVX cell phone, which is sitting next to Chloe’s Ericsson DF, and clumsily shakes my hand again.
“I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” He lingers, removes the peppermint from full pink lips. “Until then, um, I guess.”
“Bye, Baxter,” Chloe says, tired but sweet, as usual.
“Yeah, bye, man,” I mutter, a well-practiced dismissal, and once he’s barely out of earshot I delicately ask, “What’s the story, baby? Who was that?”
She doesn’t answer, just glares at me.
Pause. “Hey, honey, you’re looking at me like I’m at a Hootie and the Blowfish concert. Chill.”
“Baxter Priestly?” she says-asks morosely, picking at a plate of cilantro.
“Who’s Baxter Priestly?” I pull out some excellent weed and a package of rolling papers. “Who the fuck is Baxter Priestly?”
“He’s in the new Darren Star show and plays bass in the band Hey That’s My Shoe,” she says, lighting another cigarette.
“Baxter Priestly? What the fuck kind of name is that?” I mutter, spotting seeds that cry out for removal.
“You’re complaining about someone’s name? You hang out with Plez and Fetish and a person whose parents actually named him Tomato—”
“They conceded it might have been a mistake.”
“—and you do business with people named Benny Benny and Damien Nutchs Ross? And you haven’t apologized for being an hour late? I had to wait upstairs in Eric’s office.”
“Oh god, I bet he loved that,” I moan, concentrating on the pot. “Hell, baby, I thought I’d let you entertain the paparazzi.” Pause. “And that’s Kenny Kenny, honey.”
“I did that all day,” she sighs.
“Baxter Priestly? Why am I drawing a blank?” I ask earnestly, waving down Cliff the maître d’ for a drink but it’s too late: Eric has already sent over a complimentary bottle of Cristal 1985.
“I guess I’m used to your oblivion, Victor,” she says.
“Chloe. You do fur ads and donate money to Greenpeace. You’re what’s known as a bundle of contradictions, baby, not this guy.”
“Baxter used to date Lauren Hynde.” She stubs her cigarette out, smiles thankfully at the very good-looking busboy pouring the champagne into flutes.
“Baxter used to date Lauren Hynde?”
“Right.”
“Who’s Lauren Hynde?”
“Lauren Hynde, Victor,” she stresses as if the name means something. “You dated her.”
“I did? I did? Yeah? Hmm.”
“Good night, Victor.”
“I just don’t remember Lauren Hynde, baby. Solly Cholly.”
“Lauren Hynde?” she asks in disbelief. “You don’t remember dating her? My god, what are you going to say about me?”
“Nothing, baby,” I tell her, finally done deseeding. “We’re gonna get married and grow old together. How did the shows go? Look—there’s Scott Bakula. Hey, peace, man. Richard’s looking for you, bud.”
“Lauren Hynde, Victor.”
“That’s so cool. Hey Alfonse—great tattoo, guy.” I turn back to Chloe. “Did you know Damien wears a hairpiece? He’s some kind of demented wig addict.”
“Who told you this?”
“One of the guys at the club,” I say without pausing.
“Lauren Hynde, Victor. Lauren Hynde.”
“Who’s dat?” I say, making a crazy face, leaning over, kissing her neck noisily. Suddenly Patrick McMullan glides by, politely asks for a photo, complimenting Chloe on the shows today. We move in close together, look up, smile, the flash goes off. “Hey, crop the pot,” I warn as he spots Patrick Kelly and scampers off.
“Do you think he heard me?”
“Lauren Hynde’s one of my best friends, Victor.”
“I don’t know her, but hey, if she’s a friend of yours, well, need I say anything but automatically?” I start rolling the joint.
“Victor, you went to school with her.”
“I didn’t go to school with her, baby,” I murmur, waving over at Ross Bleckner and his new boyfriend, Mrs. Ross Bleckner, a guy who used to work at a club in Amagansett called Salamanders and was recently profiled in Bikini.
“Forgive me if I’m mistaken, but you went to Camden with Lauren Hynde.” She lights another cigarette, finally sips the champagne.
“Of course. I did,” I say, trying to calm her. “Oh. Yeah.”
“Did you go to college, Victor?”
“Literally or figuratively?”
“Is there a difference with you?” she asks. “How can you be so dense?”
“I don’t know, baby. It’s some kind of gene displacement.”
“I can’t listen to this. You complain about Baxter Priestly’s name and yet you know people named Huggy and Pidgeon and Na Na.”
“Hey,” I finally snap, “and you slept with Charlie Sheen. We all have our little faults.”
“I should’ve just had dinner with Baxter,” she mutters.
“Baby, come on, a little champagne, a little sorbet. I’m rolling a joint so we can calm down. Now, who is this Baxter?”
“You met him at a Knicks game.”
“Oh my god that’s right—the new male waif, underfed, wild-haired, major rehab victim.” I immediately shut up, glance nervously over at Chloe, then segue beautifully into: “The whole grunge aesthetic has ruined the look of the American male, baby. It makes you long for the ’80s.”
“Only you would say that, Victor.”
“Anyway, I’m always watching you flirt with John-John at Knicks games.”
“Like you wouldn’t dump me for Daryl Hannah.”
“Baby, I’d dump you for John-John if I really wanted the publicity.” Pause, mid-lick, looking up. “That’s not, um, a possibility … is it?”
She just stares at me.
I grab her. “Come here, baby.” I kiss her again, my cheek now damp because Chloe’s hair is always wet and slicked back with coconut oil. “Baby? Why isn’t your hair ever dry?”
Video cameras from Fashion TV sweep the room and I have to get Cliff to tell Eric to make sure they come nowhere near Chloe. M People turns into mid-period Elvis Costello which turns into new Better Than Ezra. I order a bowl of raspberry sorbet and try to cheer Chloe up by turning it into a Prince song: “She ate a raspberry sorbet … The kind you find at the Bowery Bar …”
Chloe just stares glumly at her plate.
“Honey, that’s a plate of cilantro. What’s the story?”
“I’v
e been up since five and I want to cry.”
“Hey, how was the big lunch at Fashion Café?”
“I had to sit there and watch James Truman eat a giant truffle and it really really bothered me.”
“Because … you wanted a truffle too?”
“No, Victor. Oh god, you don’t get anything.”
“Jesus, baby, spare me. What do you want me to do? Hang around Florence for a year studying Renaissance pottery? You get your legs waxed at Elizabeth Arden ten times a month.”
“You sit around plotting seating arrangements.”
“Baby baby baby.” I light up the joint, whining. “Come on, my DJ’s missing, the club’s opening tomorrow, I have a photo shoot, a fucking show and lunch with my father tomorrow.” Pause. “Oh shit—band practice.”
“How is your father?” she asks disinterestedly.
“A contrivance,” I mutter. “A plot device.”
Peggy Siegal walks by in taffeta and I duck under the table with my head in Chloe’s lap, looking up into her face, grinning, while taking a deep toke. “Peggy wanted to handle the publicity,” I explain, sitting up.
Chloe just stares at me.
“So-o-o anyway,” I continue. “James Truman eating a giant truffle? The lunch? ‘Entertainment Tonight,’ yes—go on.”
“It was so hip I ate,” I hear her say.
“What did you eat?” I murmur indifferently, waving over at Frederique, who pouts her lips, eyes squinty, like she was cooing to a baby or a very large puppy.
“I ached, ached, Victor. Oh god, you never listen to me.”
“Joking, baby. I’m joking. I really see what you’re saying.”
She stares at me, waiting.
“Um, your hip ached and—have I got it?”
She just stares at me.
“Okay, okay, reality just zapped me .…” I take another toke, glance nervously at her. “So-o-o the video shoot tomorrow, um, what is it exactly?” Pause. “Are you, like, naked in it or anything?” Pause, another toke, then I cock my head to exhale smoke so it won’t hit her in the face. “Er … what’s the story?”
She continues to stare.
“You’re not naked … or … you are, um, naked?”
“Why?” she asks curtly. “Do you care?”
“Baby baby baby. Last time you did a video you were dancing on the hood of a car in your bra. Baby baby baby …” I’m shaking my head woefully. “Concern is causing me to like pant and sweat.”
“Victor, you did how many bathing suit ads? You were photographed for Madonna’s sex book. Jesus, you were in that Versace ad where—am I mistaken?—we did or did not see your pubic hair?”
“Yeah, but Madonna dropped those photos and let’s just say thank you to that and there’s a major difference between my pubic hair—which was lightened—and your tits, baby. Oh Christ, spare me, forget it, I don’t know what you call—”
“It’s called a double standard, Victor.”
“Double standard?” I take another hit without trying and say, feeling particularly mellow, “Well, I didn’t do Playgirl.”
“Congratulations. But that wasn’t for me. That was because of your father. Don’t pretend.”
“I like to pretend.” I offer an amazingly casual shrug.
“It’s fine when you’re seven, Victor, but add twenty years to that and you’re just retarded.”
“Honey, I’m just bummed. Mica the DJ has vanished, tomorrow is hell day and the Flatliners II thing is all blurry and watery—who knows what the fuck is happening there. Bill thinks I’m someone named Dagby and jeez, you know how much time I put into those notes to shape that script up and—”
“What about the potato chip commercial you were up for?”
“Baby baby baby. Jumping around a beach, putting a Pringle in my mouth and looking surprised because—why?—it’s spicy? Oh baby,” I groan, slouching into the booth. “Do you have any Visine?”
“It’s a job, Victor,” she says. “It’s money.”
“I think CAA’s a mistake. I mean, when I was talking to Bill I started remembering that really scary story you told me about Mike Ovitz.”
“What scary story?”
“Remember—you were invited to meet with all those CAA guys like Bob Bookman and Jay Mahoney at a screening on Wilshire and you went and the movie was a brand-new print of Tora! Tora! Tora! and during the entire movie they all laughed? You don’t remember telling me this?”
“Victor,” Chloe sighs, not listening. “I was in SoHo the other day with Lauren and we were having lunch at Zoë and somebody came up to me and said, ‘Oh, you look just like Chloe Byrnes.’”
“And you said, er, ‘How dare you!’?” I ask, glancing sideways at her.
“And I said, ‘Oh? Really?’”
“It sounds like you had a somewhat leisurely, um, afternoon,” I cough, downing smoke with a gulp of champagne. “Lauren who?”
“You’re not listening to me, Victor.”
“Oh come on, baby, when you were young and your heart was an open book you used to say live and let live.” I pause, take another hit on the joint. “You know you did. You know you did. You know you did.” I cough again, sputtering out smoke.
“You’re not talking to me,” Chloe says sternly, with too much emotion. “You’re looking at me but you’re not talking to me.”
“Baby, I’m your biggest fan,” I say. “And I’m admitting this only somewhat groggily.”
“Oh, how grown-up of you.”
The new It Girls flutter by our booth, nervously eyeing Chloe—one of them eating a stick of purple cotton candy—on their way to dance by the bathroom. I notice Chloe’s troubled glare, as if she just drank something black or ate a piece of bad sashimi.
“Oh come on, baby. You wanna end up living on a sheep farm in Australia milking fucking dingoes? You wanna spend the rest of your life on the Internet answering E-mail? Spare me. Lighten up.”
A long pause and then, “Milking … dingoes?”
“Most of those girls have an eighth-grade education.”
“You went to Camden College—same thing. Go talk to them.”
People keep stopping by, begging for invites to the opening, which I dole out accordingly, telling me they spotted my visage last week at the Marlin in Miami, at the Elite offices on the hotel’s first floor, then at the Strand, and by the time Michael Bergen tells me we shared an iced latte at the Bruce Weber/Ralph Lauren photo shoot in Key Biscayne I’m too tired to even deny I was in Miami last weekend and so I ask Michael if it was a good latte and he says so-so and it gets noticeably colder in the room. Chloe looks on, oblivious, meekly sips champagne. Patrick Bateman, who’s with a bunch of publicists and the three sons of a well-known movie producer, walks over, shakes my hand, eyes Chloe, asks how the club’s coming along, if tomorrow night’s happening, says Damien invited him, hands me a cigar, weird stains on the lapel of his Armani suit that costs as much as a car.
“The proverbial show is on the proverbial road, dude,” I assure him.
“I just like to keep—abreast,” he says, winking at Chloe.
After he leaves I finish the joint, then look at my watch but I’m not wearing one so I inspect my wrist instead.
“He’s strange,” Chloe says. “And I need some soup.”
“He’s a nice guy, babe.”
Chloe slouches in the booth, looks at me disgustedly.
“What? Hey, he has his own coat of arms.”
“Who told you that?”
“He did. He told me he has his own coat of arms.”
“Spare me,” Chloe says.
Chloe picks up the check and in order to downplay the situation I lean in to kiss her, the swarming paparazzi causing the kind of disturbance we’re used to.
28
Stills from Chloe’s loft in a space that looks like it was designed by Dan Flavin: two Toshiyuki Kita hop sofas, an expanse of white-maple floor, six Baccarat Tastevin wineglasses—a gift from Bruce and Nan Weber—doze
ns of white French tulips, a StairMaster and a free-weight set, photography books—Matthew Rolston, Annie Leibovitz, Herb Ritts—all signed, a Fabergé Imperial egg—a gift from Bruce Willis (pre-Demi)—a large plain portrait of Chloe by Richard Avedon, sunglasses scattered all over the place, a Helmut Newton photo of Chloe walking seminude through the lobby of the Malperisa in Milan while nobody notices, a large William Wegman and giant posters for the movies Butterfield 8, The Bachelor Party with Carolyn Jones, Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. A giant fax sheet taped above Chloe’s makeup table lists Monday 9am Byron Lars, 11am Mark Eisen, 2pm Nicole Miller, 6pm Ghost, Tuesday 10am Ralph Lauren, Wednesday 11am Anna Sui, 2pm Calvin Klein, 4pm Bill Blass, 7pm Isaac Mizrahi, Thursday 9am Donna Karan, 5pm Todd Oldham and on and on until Sunday. Piles of foreign currency and empty Glacier bottles litter tables and countertops everywhere. In her refrigerator the breakfast Luna has already prepared: ruby-red grapefruit, Evian, iced herbal tea, nonfat plain yogurt with blackberries, a quarter of a poppy-seed bagel, sometimes toasted, sometimes not, Beluga if it’s a “special day.” Gilles Bensimon, Juliette Lewis, Patrick Demarchelier, Ron Galotti, Peter Lindbergh and Baxter Priestly have all left messages.