The house, it doesn’t seem all that impressive inside, not that much bigger than the Lair — the light is dim as though to hide
any sequence that makes sense in space, rather it’s a sequence of time,
general dilapidation. The grime of the walls, the carpets. It must be seventy, eighty years old, from the middle of the last century, the left wall of the open living room lined with bookshelves with latticed doors but no books, and in the right wall of the living room a hearth that’s not burned a fire in years though some wood is stacked on one side of the fireplace and on the other side is a poker and instruments for stirring embers, cleaning ashes. ’Cross the room from where I stand windows run from the ceiling to the floor and past those I can make out in the moonlight a pool no one has swum in a long time because in the moonlight I can see the surface of the pool covered with leaves, and past the pool is a mega view of the lake and all L.A.’s islands, not that you can really see the lake itself in the dark. But in a way that’s the impressive thing, the panorama of islands all glittery in a way I’ve never seen L.A. You can almost get a sense of the whole of the thing, of the city and lagoon, the way you never do in L.A.
Inside the house there are about a dozen guests not including the gorillas hired to stand in front of the doors with their arms crossed, like the ones in the powerboat who came to see me that afternoon. Of the dozen there are three men and the rest are women, and I’m relieved to see other women here but they all look at me with bored suspicion. By now naturally I know this is some sort of mistake and the only question is how big it is and how I’m going to get myself out of it. One of the men comes up to me, this fiftyish Eurotrash sort who’s apparently the host, not bad looking but not pleasant either. “You’re the one from the Chateau,” he says.
“That’s right,” I murmur.
He turns to the others, the men and all the women reclining on sofas, and says, “This is the one from the Chateau,” and it’s hard to tell just how interesting they find this. There’s almost no conversation between anyone, music in the background so faint
structures numbered by their age and memories, and commuters ride the
it’s as though no one really wants to hear it but someone thinks it’s obligatory, everyone is drinking and I can see on the table disheveled traces of a white powder that got used up hours ago. If they all got stuck in this moment forty years ago, no one has had the desire or energy to get out of it. “Have a drink,” says the host, and one of the women appears at his side with a drink for me.
“No, thank you,” I say — another rule. Believe me I’m as happy as anyone to have a bit of wine or whisky now and then and I could use one given the situation, but it’s a rule, you don’t drink on the job especially given the situation. You just lose control of things which naturally is exactly why the man is trying to get you to have a drink. “Have one,” he demands.
“Not,” I say, “when I’m working.”
“Who says you’re working.”
“You did. You paid me, remember?”
“Exactly. I’m paying you and now I want you to drink.” He shoves the drink at me and I take it with the hand that’s not holding my bag of playthings. The gorgeous woman next to him, she watches me, half smiles, raises an eyebrow, she’s tall — though every woman seems tall to me — five-eight, five-nine, long and sleek looking, her hair black and there’s something exotic about her eyes, some mega-combination of Scandinavian and Mediterranean. Her name is Monica. “Mmmmmmmm she’s delightful isn’t she,” purrs Monica running her eyes up and down me as though the long green coat conceals nothing, “boobalicious little pixie,” she says, “are they real?”
“They’re the realest thing in this room,” I say looking ’round me, and she laughs and takes me by the arm that’s holding the bag and leads me to the sofa. Truth be told, at this moment I’m happy enough to go with her, because the host he gives me the creeps and now watching us walk away he has this slightly
subways in a neverending loop and cabbies wander pell-mell spiraling
flummoxed look like I’ve just slipped from his clutches for the moment and that’s bought me some time. Also, well, truth be told again Monica is as close to being my fantasy woman as I’ve met, she looks exactly like I would want to look if I could look anyway I wanted to, long and dark and sleek like a sexy cat. We sit on the sofa awhile and Monica asks me this and that about who I am and where I’ve come from and about my past, and when I don’t know the answer I make up something. Sometimes she puts her hand on my thigh. Taking a whiff of my drink to make sure it’s not ’sinthe, pretty soon I’m aware of having drunk a bit more Scotch than I planned, but I’m still sober enough to know it’s time to slow down, and Monica puts her hand under my long green cloak and runs it over my breast in this lazy sort of way like it’s no more or less diverting than anything else and I have the feeling she could be as much into me as she’s ever been into anything if she ever saw the point of having to decide one way or the other. Every so often I think she’s going to fall asleep. “I would offer you some candy,” she nods at the white residue on the coffee table in front of us, “but they’ve used it all. The pigs.” She talks in this slow sensual way like she might be drunk or drugged except that she doesn’t otherwise act drunk or drugged. Depravity becomes her.
This goes on at least a good hour perhaps longer, nothing much changing in the room or the cast of characters except when someone disappears a while and then returns. At one point one of the men takes one of the women, a Persian, by the hand and leads her off though it must not be that far away, anyone can hear it going on on the other side of the wall, anyone can hear her crying, then he comes back in alone and when she returns, a few minutes after him, her eyes look deader than they did before. I’ve stopped drinking, just raising the Scotch to my lips now and then to make a show of it. My hope is the whole evening will eventually just get mired in its own ennui long enough for me to slip away, though
boulevards and people drive freeways in search of phantom exits and where in
I have no idea how I’m going to get down the mountain or back to the Chateau. I’m very aware the host is looking at me and I’m trying not to look back. Finally he’s standing in front of us. He waits for Monica and me to look up at him and when we don’t he gives out with this hoarse bark. “Dance.”
“Sorry?” I say.
“Get up and dance.”
“I’m not a dancer.”