When Love finishes up with her mother, she zips into the valet at Hollywood & Highland. “Will you think I’m a horrible princess if I say I can’t deal with this traffic and I’m dying for a drink and I would rather just get you a jacket somewhere here?”
I don’t think Love is a horrible princess and I don’t let her pay for my clothes at Lucky or the Gap.
“Almost ready?” Love asks.
“Almost,” I say.
When I emerge from the dressing room, Love is wearing new clothes too, a tiny little white dress with slits on both sides. “Wow,” she says. “I can’t believe that jacket’s from the Gap.”
I can’t believe she’s wearing a nightie to dinner, but I rip off the tag like she asks. My mom always said, the rich are different.
18
I live here now, at this particular table, on this particular night, at Chateau with these particular people, my people, the Quinns. I am born again a Quinn, unofficial son-in-law of Dottie and Ray—the Dottie and Ray who send me their love at the Pantry!—and they know how to hug, how to talk. They are round, happy people and we talk current events and they don’t understand the hoopla about Henderson. “I’m old school,” Love’s father declares. “Give me Johnny Carson or Jay Leno at his desk. Hell, I’ll take Jimmy Fallon because the kid dresses well but don’t give me this punk on his couch.”
“Dad, don’t be so harsh,” Love admonishes.
“No,” I say. “I see where he’s coming from. I think Henderson was poisoning us all. There’s honor in asking people questions. There’s honesty in it. Curiosity. It’s intellectual. Earlier generations, they were more comfortable as listeners and Henderson promoted an idea that we could all be the center of attention all the time. But if everyone is onstage, who’s in the audience?”
Everyone stares at me, and this has happened a couple of times tonight, when I questioned the value of organic vegetables and expressed my opinion on kale. But I own them and I win again when Ray claps. “You are a breath of fresh air, Joe.”
Dottie beams. “So smart.”
Love rubs my thigh. And she is right; Ray and Dottie do seem in love and they love me. Ray wants to know if I like boats and Cabo because he’s got a new Donzi he’s dying to get in the water and a place in Cabo. “La Groceria,” he says, enthralled with his terrible accent. “The neighbors, they thought we were nuts, but I like a good name. Why shouldn’t I call it La Groceria? Everything sounds better in Spanish.”
I Google Donzi. It costs around $500,000.
Ray and Dottie insist I eat and drink whatever I want. “Your first time at Chateau is a special thing,” according to Ray. “Lives are made here, Joe. This is the mother ship. This is our family tradition and when you’re with us, you’re family. You understand?”
Love laughs him off but he is right. Chateau Marmont is a country that doesn’t allow extradition, a safe zone, a haven, and everybody cares about me. Is my chair soft enough? Is my drink to my liking? Is it too hot? Too cold? Do I need a heat lamp? Do I eat shellfish? I have never been so nurtured and Love whispers—my parents, not so bad, right?—and I have a new respect for aspirations because this is a great way of life.
Forty breezes in and hugs me like we’re best friends. Ray huffs. “You see all those girls today for your audition but somehow your sister is the one who comes away with a new fella.”
Forty brushes it off. “She’s got the love, Pops.”
“Your father and I just want to see you happy,” Dottie adds.
“I know, Mom,” Forty says. “And I assure you, when I finish casting and finalize the rewrites and get my agent the bio he needs for that pilot shooting in Sedona and get him the rewrites he needs for that other pilot shooting in Culver, I assure you, dearest parents, I will meet a very nice girl and get married and pop out two perfect children. Maybe even twins.”
Love laughs. “You’re horrible.”
But Forty’s not done. “Because it’s very easy to meet available beautiful babes while I’m heading up five projects at once.” He knocks back a shot of tequila. “But tonight, to Mom and Dad, on Dad’s half birthday.”
In my navy blazer over a plain T-shirt, I pass as one of these people at Chateau. Ray tells stories about the good old days, running around the first Pantry, working doubles for pennies—his parents gave him nothing, that was a different time—and Dottie says the past is the past. She says you can’t pretend you have nothing when you have so much. She squeezes my arm. “See, his father was the owner and my dad was the butcher so it’s only because of me that he knows what it was to be poor.”
“I understand,” I say.
“Of course you do,” she says. “You’re from New York.”
Love keeps her hand on my inner thigh. This is a family and Ray and Dottie like me because I work for a living. I could live like this but Westward Ho! is, by definition, about expansion and our party is larger all the time. Friends come by this half-birthday party and Love has to go be nice. Forty slaps an arm on my back.
“You don’t work in the business, right?” he asks.
“No,” I confirm. “I get a kick out of it though.”
“Your notes were of value,” he says. He tears into three packets of artificial sweetener. “Which is precisely what this business needs.”
He wants a high five and I’m there and he’s talking about Almost Famous and he vents. “People here don’t like to think. They’re afraid of it, like if they do it there’s no turning back. But you’re a thinker. You’re like that statue. I can tell. I see that.”
“Thanks,” I say.
Ray leans in. “He’s a professor.”
Forty nods. And this is a nickname I can handle, The Professor, and Love returns, dangles her arms over me, and whispers in my ear, Professor.
“No,” I say. “It’s The Professor.”
Ray claps and here comes our unofficial guest of honor, producer Barry Stein. Everyone rises for Barry Stein, and then Bradley Fucking Cooper—Chateau!—is hugging him, inviting him to sit. And now, Barry is coming for us. He’s so West Coast that he could have been in Ocean’s Eleven. He wants us to sit. He doesn’t smile. He’s too cool to smile. Dottie is devastated that he’s come on his own.
“The wife and nanny are in the dumps over Henny,” he says, and that’s a new one, Henny. He switches gears, not unlike Delilah, and slings an arm around Love. “But Dottie, if it pains you to see me all alone, I’ll gladly take this one right here.”
Fucking pig but Love’s father laughs and Love excuses herself for the ladies’ room with a kiss on my cheek. Stein sighs. “All the good ones are taken.”
Dottie smiles. “This is Lovey’s new friend Joe. He’s brilliant.”
Ray endorses me too. “This kid’s got the goods, Barry.”
Barry says it’s nice to meet me and I don’t like him and I don’t like the rich, blond motherfucker approaching this table. His hat says VINEYARD VINES and his T-shirt says FOUR SEAS ICE CREAM and when I wanted to come here in a T-shirt and jeans, we had to go shopping. Love returns from the restroom and hugs this man. “Milo, it’s so good to see you.”