As it turned out I did not really care what happened in the end, because there we were with the Beatles and Bon Jovi and Prince in a table in the back near the pool tables. Paul and John were both paying attention to Valka, who was pinching and looping the end of her wig around her fingers. I was drinking, drinking, drinking. Prince kept going up to the bar and bringing back rounds. Bon Jovi—whose real name was Hugh, and who was from Philadelphia and not New Jersey, but that was close enough for him to be authentic, he guaranteed it—was hitting on me, but only sort of. He had his eye out all over the bar. The girls must go crazy for him. He had the most gorgeous blond hair. Those highlights must have cost a fortune, and I told him so.
“Half highlights, half extensions,” he said. “I get it free from work. There’s a stylist with the show that used to do movies. He has all these great stories about actresses on crack setting their hair on fire and him having to come in and give them all new hair at five A.M. Guy’s a riot.” Bon Jovi took a swig of water from a gigantic bottle he had brought in with him. I stared numbly at him.
“You’ll never catch me setting my hair on fire,” said Bon Jovi. “I’m a professional.”
“Do not do it,” I said. “That hair is magical.”
“I don’t do any drugs at all,” said Bon Jovi. “Everyone in Vegas is on something though. I hate drugs. Do you do drugs?”
“No,” I said.
Bon Jovi put the water bottle to his mouth. It was half full. He drained it. I watched him. It took him a minute, but he did it. Little pearls of water dripped down the side of his face and down his neck.
“Drugs are for losers,” he said.
He started to get up, and then he sat down again. He ran his hands through his hair lightly and then scratched the scalp.
“Are you okay?” I said.
“I just need a vacation,” he said. He got up again. “I’m gonna hit the head.” He walked off into the crowd, pushing his chair over as he left. Everyone at the table looked at me, and I felt all hot.
Prince stood, righted the chair, and then sat down in it.
“Ignore him,” said Prince. Prince had a really high voice and cocoa-colored skin and a penciled-in beauty mark that was starting to smear. Still, he held himself like a proud man, sitting up straight, pushing his chest forward like he was tough or something.
“What’s his problem?” I said.
“Oh, no one told you?”
I shook my head.
“He’s an asshole.”
I laughed and Prince laughed. There we all were, having a good time.
If you could see me now, Thomas. I can have fun, too.
I missed everyone all of a sudden. I was in a room full of strangers on New Year’s Eve. As much as I liked Valka, I was missing all kinds of people. If I were at home I would be . . . what would I be doing?
“Have another shot,” said Prince, and he pushed one toward me. I took it and downed it. “By the way, I really it like your shoes,” he said.
I would be hanging out with my sister and my mother, I bet. First my mom till midnight, then Jenny would come straggling in late, stinking of the beer we would all pretend she had not been drinking all night. There would be an argument, and then my mom would make us all eggs. Later I would pass out on the couch, feeling together and apart at the same time.
“And another,” said Prince, and he slid me another drink. I did the shot. I was feeling it in my gut, forget about my head, that was gone.
“I hate my husband,” I said.
“What, honey?” said Prince. He put his hand around my neck. I looked at Prince. He was so handsome. But also something felt different to me. I stared at him, nodding a bit. Once I started looking I could not stop. He was more beautiful than handsome.
“I hate my husband,” I said. “And I took all his money.”
“Then I hate him, too,” said Prince. “And if you’ve got all his money, then you’re the kind of girl I want to know.”
Prince laughed high and squirrelly. I looked at Prince again, at the face and the cheekbones and the little bow on his top lip where the two parts came together. I was not so sure all of a sudden. What he was. If he was a she.
“What are you?” I said.
“What do you mean?” said Prince. Playing dumb. Like my sister when she did something wrong, but she was always doing something wrong so it stopped working. It was not working for Prince either.
“You know what I mean,” I said. “Girl or boy? I don’t care. It does not matter to me one way or another.”
“I’m whatever you want me to be,” said Prince. Suddenly Prince had shrunk down. There was no puffed-out chest, just a bunch of delicate limbs arranged together. “But let me guess. You want a boy. It’ll be another eighteen months before that’s official.”
I opened my mouth, but there was no way anything was coming out of it. But I did not really care what he was. I thought about me and Thomas, all of our problems. I could not say anything about anyone else’s sex or choices when my own sex life was so messed up. And with my sister knocking around town like she did. Or my mother and father, and the frozen divide between them. At least Prince was interested in figuring out who she really was.
“Have another shot,” said Prince.
“I think you should have it,” I said. “You’re the one who needs it.”
“So are you still interested?”
“Interested in what?” I said.
“In, you know, me.”
I leaned in close to Prince. “I don’t know if there is much inside of me worth anything. I might be broken. I can’t feel anything at all.” It felt so good to say something so sad. What a relief. This is why people come here, I thought. To tell their secrets to strangers.
“You look like you work just fine to me,” said Prince. “You’re lovely.”
“You’re prettier than me,” I said. It was true. Prince was prettier than anyone in the room. “It doesn’t matter what I look like. Everything is still all messed up in there.”
“You know maybe . . .” Prince started stacking all the empty shot glasses on top of each other. Real careful and slow. “Maybe I know things other people don’t know. How to make you feel something.”
“I’m not that kind of girl,” I said. “I’m just, you know, normal.”
“How do you know?” said Prince.
I had no good answer one way or the other. But I still was not going home with Prince on New Year’s Eve. Bon Jovi came back and sat with us. He had a fresh bottle of water. Prince got us all glasses of champagne. It was getting closer to midnight. The whole bar was excited about it. Paul and John were both angling to kiss Valka at midnight. I noticed Paul was much younger than John. I was rooting for Paul. He was a real Beatle, being British and all. John was from Chicago. When he spoke he sounded flat, like me. He was still wearing the round glasses he had worn onstage. I wondered who would win out: the sound-alike or the look-alike. Midnight came and I hugged and kissed Prince and Bon Jovi, but just quick pecks on the mouth. I appreciated the way Prince held on to my hair. I let him do it. I let him hold on to me for too long. I did not care what he was. I did not care what I was. I did not care about anything except that Valka had a Beatle for a night. I looked over, and there she was kissing Paul. Her mouth was wide open, almost like she was a fish gasping for air. Every part of her body was attached to his. He had his hands on her breasts, and her back was arched in extreme pleasure. She was feeling all of him and he was feeling all of her. To feel, I thought. To feel deep down. I dug for a second in myself, I imagined my hands reaching inside me, scraping around, but nothing came back up.
We ended up back in my hotel room, the Beatles, Prince, some girls Bon Jovi had picked up, including one of the Mariah Careys. There were a few bottles of champagne. I did not know where they came from. Everyone was talking so much. Bon Jovi and Mariah Carey danced in the corner slowly and licked each other’s tongues. There was a knock at the door and there was one of the Britney Spearses, with a bottle of vodka in each hand. “The party’s just getting started,” she said.
I went into the bedroom and closed the doors. I kicked off my fuck-me shoes and got under the covers, still in my vixen dress. Prince came in to talk to me and sat on the edge of the bed.
“That’s a big bed,” said Prince. “You got some room for me under those covers?” He crawled on the bed toward me.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“You’re not going to know until you try,” he said. He was trying his tricky tricks on me. “I love you, baby,” he said. “You know I do.” His voice was husky.
He could be anything. He could be anyone. I could be the perfect girl for him. I would never know. Unless I tried.
Right before I closed my eyes I thought of Jenny. It had been a few hours since I had heard from her, but it felt like a very long time.
WHEN I WOKE UP I was alone in bed. My head hurt, but not as bad as I thought it would. I went out into the living room. There was a porn movie playing on the flat-screen TV. That is bad, I thought. Why was that bad? It was registering an alarm in my head. Valka and Paul were asleep on the couch, arms and legs wrapped all around each other. They were mostly clothed. I did not think anything dirty had happened. It did not matter either way. It was her night. The porn, though, that was bad. I could not deal with it then.
I went back to sleep for a few more hours. Then Valka crawled into bed with me and woke me up. She curled up next to me and whispered “Thank you” in my ear.
“You’re welcome,” I said.
“You know what?” she said.
“What?” I said.
“I never wanted kids anyway. I don’t like babies.” She slipped my phone around the front of me. “It’s been ringing off the hook.” I took a look. Ten calls from my mother. It rang again, and it was her. Blinking and ringing.
But then Valka snuggled up next to me and said, “You should just tell her you’re alive.” Like everything that came out of Valka’s mouth, it was the truth. So I hit “talk” on the phone, and let my mother do just that. She had been saving up all her words for a whole week since I’d been gone so they came out in one long line at once, with a little bit of slur around the edges.
It’s a little early to be drunk, Mom
, I thought.
“I do not have to tell anyone anything,” I said. I rolled over onto my stomach and put my head in the pillow. Valka rubbed my back for me. “I am a single, independent lady,” I said.
“Right, a single, independent lady burning up her husband’s credit cards at the Luxor Hotel in Las Vegas,” she snapped.
Christ almighty, I thought. The porn. It had triggered my credit card. I covered the phone with my hand. “The jig is up,” I said to Valka.
“What jig?” said Valka.
Another call was coming in on my phone. It was Thomas.
Finally
.
8.
B
een waiting for you to fuck up, little girl,” said Thomas straightaway. “And now you done it.”
“You are the fuckup,” I whispered.
“Having fun?” said Thomas. “Spending my money?”
“Oh, the money,” I said. “It is going to be about that. Huh.”
“One hundred and seventy-eight thousand dollars is a lot to run off with, Moonie,” he said.
Moonie
, oh. I had not heard that in so long. It was so nice to hear it. I hoped he said it some more.
“You got a lot more than that,” I said. “Or are you going to hide it under your mattress like your dad did?”
We had never fought very much but we knew how to wind each other up when we did. We were getting ready for something fierce.
“Don’t bring my dead father into this.”
I apologized, my voice cracking. It was mean. He was dead after all.
“I would have given you money for the rest of your life,” he said.
He still loved me. I knew it. I knew he could not let me go.
“But you can’t clean me out like that. That is not happening. Not on my watch.”
I sank down to the ground. Underneath me someone was getting lucky at a slot machine. Underneath me someone was losing it all at a poker table. Underneath me the casino breathed fake air.
“You’re watching porn in
Las Vegas, Nevada,
for Chrissakes. You don’t even like porn. Moonie Madison, have you lost your mind?”
I could not argue with him. But I felt the hate burning in me that he was saying it.
“I don’t know what you’re planning to do but you better stop now. Everyone knows you’re crazy. The whole town is talking about you. Stop right now and turn around and come back here with my money and I won’t call the cops. It might even be a federal case, Moonie.”
I bet he would enjoy that. Men in dark suits driving down dirty back roads to the farm. Maybe they would stop and ask for directions. More tongues wagging. Bet he had been saying “the feds” over and over to anyone who would listen.
He was rambling now, pissed off and out of control. “Just after Christmas, and the bank’s calling me all freaked out. I’m just trying to relax with my fiancée during the holidays and now I got this to worry about.”
Fiancée. What a joke. He was telling a joke.
I had only been gone a few months. How could he be getting married again? A girlfriend, sure. He did not know how to be alone. He cried when he got lonely. My crybaby husband.
“Everyone knows about you,” he said. “Everyone knows you’re nutballs. And I am just trying to live my life. Moving on. Like you should be, Moonie.”
There is not a single person on the planet who can drive me nuts like my husband. I was hating him and loving him at the same time. We had clawed at each other that last day. The blood and the cruelty, those were the only things left.
“You’re getting married?” I said.
“That was fast,” said Valka. She sat up.
“That was fast,” I said.
“I found a woman to love, and who would love me back one hundred percent and then some.”