Authors: Hank Moody,Jonathan Grotenstein
Each workday I make two calls to the Pontiff’s toll-free customer line. At first, I use a different accent each time: Park Avenue, Puerto Rico, Staten Island, and one that starts Haitian but rapidly deteriorates into
Diff’rent Strokes
: “Whatchoo talkin’ ’bout, Mister D.?” Luckily, Billy’s years of taking calls from the highly stoned means that it’s pretty much impossible to sound too weird. But I’m no Rich Little: Impersonations have never been my thing. I max out at six, maybe seven voices that sound remotely convincing. So I transform them into regular customers, requiring the purchase of a small black notebook at Duane Reade to keep track of my polyethnic cast of characters and their imaginary smoking habits. I don’t want to fuck up. While I’m not exactly scamming the Pontiff—if anything, I’m generating more business—delivering two pounds to Danny each week certainly exposes me to risks outside the operation’s comfort zone, something Rico, during my audition, impressed upon me
never
to do.
Friday night, my third week of moonlighting for Danny, I return to my room at the hotel after making my last legitimate
delivery. I load my shirt with the bags. “That’s quite a potbelly,” I say to the cracked mirror. I open the door before the mirror can reply, jogging down the stairs toward the subway and Danny’s office. Only this time I nearly steamroll K. as she’s walking into the elevator.
“Hey, you,” she says. She’s freshly showered, hasn’t bothered with makeup, and isn’t suffering for it in the slightest. My heart’s beating like a jackhammer, but I’ve never been more lucid. I finally have an honest answer to the question of why I chose to live at the Chelsea.
“I’ve been looking for you,” I say. “About that second date.”
She smiles. “It’s going to have to be a quickie. I’ve got to get back to Nate. They’re flying to Chicago tonight and they’ll never make it to the airport without me.”
“I can work fast when I have to.”
“A fast worker, huh?”
“Don’t get me wrong. I prefer to take my time.”
“You know, I’m not that easy.”
“Me neither,” I fire back. “But I’m open to rehabilitation.”
She smiles again. Could my rap actually be working? Her eyes dart back and forth, signaling an internal debate. “I’ve got a show tomorrow night,” she finally says. “Versace.”
“Congratulations.”
“Thank you, thank you,” she says with a curtsy. “But would you believe that I still get nervous up there? Lame, I know, but I could really use a rooting section and with Nate out of town …”
“I’m there!” I say, grinning a little too much.
“Don’t get any ideas: I’m a good girl. But I can’t say the same for all of my friends. A roomful of beautiful, insecure women of questionable character. A guy like you might do all right.”
“‘A guy like me’? I believe I’ve just been insulted.”
She gently slaps my cheek. “Poor baby. There’ll be a pass for you at the door, if you can get over the hurt. Ray’s going too. Maybe you guys can share a cab.” She struts past me into the elevator. She’s smiling as the doors close shut.
“You shud write a pome abut hah,” Herman chimes in, having caught the scene from his perch behind the desk.
“I just might,” I reply, scurrying out into the street to avoid further interrogation. I let my momentum carry me to Seventh Avenue, where I catch the train downtown.
DESPITE K.’S SUGGESTION, WE DON’T need a cab—it’s only a ten-block walk to the show, a former slaughterhouse in the Meatpacking District that’s been reclaimed as an “art space.” Like a true Dixie gentleman, Ray brings along a flask of Southern Comfort to warm us along the way, leaving us nicely lacquered by the time we take our seats. We hoot and holler when K. struts out for the first time, decked in a fluo-rescent green smock I couldn’t imagine ever seeing on a civilian. Like the true professional she is, she ignores us completely.
A half hour later—about twenty-five minutes after the
novelty of seeing so many imperious beauties march in, spin, and march out again has run its course—I wake to the sound of applause. The fashion designer rides a supermodel stampede to the stage.
“Lucky dude,” I say.
“Tell that to his boyfriend,” Ray replies. “Now let’s have some fun.”
Which is when I begin striking out, and Ray starts yawning. He’s all the way up to seven before K. appears, having completed her circuit of the industry types Ray calls Big Swinging Dicks: “Especially the women!” She’s still made up but dressed for downtown, having shed the Day-Glo smock in favor of a one-piece black velvet minidress and her 18-eye Docs.
“Yow!” Ray howls at her, pulling his hand back as if he’s been scorched. “You owned it, lady!” K. accepts the compliment with a curtsy and a smile. “But I don’t know what they were thinking putting you in that rig with the Mork from Ork suspenders,” he continues. “You need tits for that one.”
“You’re an asshole,” K. says, but she’s laughing. She looks to me for my reaction, which right now is to smile like a moron. When I fail to reply within a socially acceptable time frame, she throws me a lifeline. “A few of us are headed down to the Western.”
“The Western Diner,” Ray says. “Most ironically named restaurant in the world.”
It doesn’t take long to figure out what he means. I’d noticed the Western Diner during my transactions with Union
Square Charlie and, having seen the place only in daylight, been fooled by the name. Nobody’s dining; in fact, most of the patrons—models, club kids, and a smattering of minor celebrities with rapidly swiveling heads—are poster children for eating disorders. We skip through the velvet ropes, our entrance blazed by K. and two femmes with the faces of angels but names too important to share with me, landing us in a coveted corner booth. The ladies order something called mojitos and excuse themselves to go to the bathroom. “Riding the rails,” Ray says as they leave. “At least they’ll be horny. Which one do you want?”
“I guess K.’s out of bounds,” I venture.
“Waste of time. Nate doesn’t deserve her, but he’s got the whole rock star thing working for him.” Ray wiggles his fingers in the air. “Chick voodoo. He’s got his teeth in her like fucking Dracula.”
“I must have missed the fang marks.”
“They’re everywhere. Blood, heart, soul, and pussy. Whatever it is you want, you ain’t getting it from her.”
“In that case,” I suggest, “I’ll let you choose first.”
Ray shrugs. “I don’t even like white women. I need a little T’ang in my ’tang,” he says, stretching his eyes into slants to make his point. “But I don’t like going to bed hungry, either. Let’s just lay ’em as they play.”
Twenty minutes later, I’m locked into conversation with one of K.’s friends, a brunette who finally introduces herself as Stella. She’s locked into whatever’s going on behind me. After a few more swings and misses, I scan the crowd for Ray. He’s
on the dance floor, taking advantage of the current disco revival to spin K.’s other friend around his shoulders like he’s John Travolta. Stella uses the brief distraction to slink over to a guy I recognize from the local news.
“So,” says K., returning from a buzz-maintenance session in the bathroom. “Looks like you and Stella are hitting it off.”
“A little too well. We’ve moved right through the passion and the hot sex into the long, awkward silences.”
“You
said
you worked fast.”
“Touché,” I say, lifting a glass to toast her.
“Speaking of work … you don’t happen to be holding, do you?”
“Oh, I see,” I reply, my insult half-feigned. “I’m like your drug Sherpa.”
“It’s not like that. I just need something to take the edge off the blow. I can’t stand cocaine.”
“That hasn’t stopped you from Hoovering the stuff,” I say. My goal is to approximate one of Ray’s playful insults. What comes out, judging by K.’s reaction, is more like a slap in the face.
I backpedal as fast as my feet will take me. “Hell, no, lady. I’m just trying to alienate as many people as I can tonight with my piss-poor conversational skills. Congratulations. You’re my thousandth customer.”
Her smile returns. “You’re way too cute to be a drug dealer.”
“I really wish you’d stop calling me that.”
“Drug dealer?”
“Cute. ‘Cute’ is the kiss of death.”
Her eyes are suddenly full of what I hope I’m reading correctly as mischief. “My kisses haven’t killed anybody yet,” she says, sipping her mojito through a straw.
Are we flirting? My heart seems to think so, working double time to keep the blood flowing to my brain. “I guess I’ll have to take your word for it. Though to be honest, I’d like a little bit more to
go
on.”
Ray sweeps back into the scene, K.’s other friend still in tow. “Tenth yawn,” he says. “I’ve got to get this lady home before I turn into a pumpkin.”
The two women exchange air kisses and K. slides the rest of the blow into the pocket of her friend’s jeans. Ray pulls me close with a smooth combination of handshake and man-hug. “Yeah, boy!” he whispers—loud enough, I’m sure, for K. to hear. But she doesn’t show it.
“So,” she says when they’re gone. “Where were we?”
“I might have been misreading the tea leaves,” I reply, “but it seemed to me like we were negotiating.”
“Negotiating? What were we negotiating?”
“What else? Our first kiss.”
And then it happens—resting one hand against my cheek, she touches her lips to mine. Softly, gently swiping her tongue over mine. ‘See?” she says. “You’re still alive.”
“Could be a fluke. We’re going to have to try that again.” This time I pull her toward me. Our lips lock, then part, tentative tongue-swipes giving way to more enthusiastic exploration. I feel a deep stirring in my loins—the Motorola.
“I think you’re vibrating,” she says.
I pull the pager out of my pocket and put it on the table. Tana’s phone number glows from the alphanumeric display.
“Work?” asks K.
“Not tonight.” I move back in for another kiss.
The table rumbles as the pager vibrates again, startling K. Then she smiles.
“Girlfriend,” she says.
“Not that, either,” I insist, staring at the “911” Tana’s added to the display this time around. “Family. This will only take a minute.”
I sprint toward the bathrooms and find an available pay phone. I hadn’t bothered to equip myself with enough loose change to dial the Island, so I call collect.
“I hope somebody just died,” I say after Tana’s accepted the charges. “Because otherwise this is a cock block of epic proportions.”
“I’m not sure,” Tana says. “Your parents’ house almost burned down. Is that important enough for you?”
“What?!”
“Don’t worry. They’re okay.”
“Well, like I said, if they aren’t dead. What happened? Did Dad pass out with a lit cigarette? One of his whores knock over a lantern?”
“The police think it’s arson.”
“Arson?” I ask, my voice somewhere between anger and disbelief. “My parents tried to burn their own house down?”
“Not your parents. Daphne. That crazy bitch tried to torch your house.”
“ARE YOU TRYING TO FUCK MY GIRLFRIEND?”
When you’re confronted with a question from a person, a legitimately crazy person with a proven penchant for violence that is, in the deepest sense of the word,
irrational
, you really only have two options: engage and hope for the best, or go numb, aka the grizzy bear defense.
I opt for the latter. But the bear keeps pawing. “It’s you,” he says, “isn’t it?” His severe lazy eye makes it possible that he’s not addressing me at all, but a spot on the wall above and beyond my left shoulder. But I’m pretty sure he means me. I squirm in my chair and wait for Daphne to arrive.
“Leave him alone, Vincent,” she says as she drifts into the room.
I’m struck by the urge to laugh: It’s Daphne dressed for Halloween as a crazywoman. An inch of mousy brown hair
now separates her peroxide tips from her scalp. Her eyes are glazed. She’s even wearing the requisite puke green hospital gown and slide-on slippers. In a few seconds, she’s going to drop the façade and smile. We’ll smoke a joint and find a place to fuck.
A few seconds come and go. “I know,” Daphne says. “I look like shit.”
“I beg to differ,” I say. “It’s very punk rock.” Adding, when she looks like she’s about to cry, “The gown looks incredibly comfortable. You know where I can score one?”
She tries to laugh but comes up short. “I know a guy,” she says. “Hey, Vincent . . . a little privacy.” The bear runs anguished fingers through greasy Hitler hair and lopes off to a different area of the commons room.
Commons room. Daphne and I had one of our Top 5 Fights (Number 3, to be exact) in a room that looked a lot like this one. I’d blown off a catering gig for a party, or that’s what I told Daphne. The truth was that I’d gone out to dinner with an ex-girlfriend who was passing through Ithaca on her way to Toronto. We’d begun the night talking about how weird it was that we weren’t in high school anymore and ended it with her demonstrating her newfound maturity with a blow job in the front seat of her rental car. Daphne had friends at every restaurant and, once alerted, stormed directly to my dorm room. The floor’s residential adviser, clearly unhappy to be woken at three
A.M
. by a screaming match in the hallway, threatened to call Campus Security. I dragged Daphne into
the commons room, where the fight continued into daylight hours.
That was just over a year ago. It’s been a long year. Today’s Daphne hardly looks primed for a fight. The woman who just last week, according to the police report, splashed gasoline onto my parents’ home as she screamed my name now appears to be a candidate for the world’s longest nap. She’s here at Kings Park, undergoing psychiatric evaluation, thanks to the Herculean efforts of Larry Kirschenbaum, whose connections and savvy kept her out of the general population at Rikers Island when my father refused to drop the charges.
“How are your parents?” she asks.
“Mom’s a little ticked about her rosebushes.”
“I am so sorry.”
“Don’t be. Insurance will cover most of it. The rest can come out of Dad’s hooker fund. But hey … next time you want to get ahold of me?” I hold up the Motorola. “I’ve even got one of these now.”