Hank has been a real pleasure to work with. He’s absolutely right. He just minds his own business. He’s a little shy, which I think the impenetrably ignorant Charlene takes for arrogance, but I’m sure she’ll come around eventually. Hank doesn’t even mind that I never have anything for him to do. He just sits there all day, with only the occasional coffee break. I suspect that he isn’t even eating on his lunch breaks. I want to offer him something, like some leftovers of one of my swank hybrid meals, but I know better. Don’t pry. I’ll just leave him alone.
It’s
That’s why I love Pinky MacDonald’s show. She’s number one in the ratings, and, ironically on network television. I’m shelling out 70 bucks a month and I’m watching free TV. Whatever. Pinky is always up on the latest gossip - like today she’s going on about the latest news: Prad Bitt and Breezy Callahan are getting married. Women all across the country are both devastated and deeply envious of sexy Breezy Callahan. They’ve been weeping in public. One has even proclaimed her undying love for Prad in the nude, with her breasts pressed against the windows of the observation lounge at the
Now Pinky is interviewing guests who have had the fortune of meeting Prad and Breezy in the last few days. The first guy is a baker. Pinky asks him:
“So, Mr Shingle, can you tell us what it was like to meet Prad and Breezy in person? In the flesh?”
The camera cuts to Mr Shingle, an older man with a choppy bowl of gray hair and perplexed, darting eyes. He is silent, gap mouthed. The camera zooms in on his face. Pinky asks again:
“Mr Shingle, I know it was a timeless moment, difficult to put to words, but could you, please, for the sake of our audience, try to describe it? Take your time Mr Shingle.”
Some girls scream in the audience. The camera cuts back to Mr Shingle.
“I... I was just standing there. This lady came in and ordered a birthday cake for her daughter. One with Eyewanna Lopez drawn on it. I asked her what kind. She said ice cream. I asked her what kind. She said mint...”
“Mr Shingle. Please. Tell us about Prad and Breezy. Is this when they came in?”
A girl in the audience yells “Yeah!!!”. Mr Shingle continues:
“I was just getting to that part. The moment I said, `Mint? Will that be all mam?´ Prad and Breezy come walking in.”
“How did that make you feel, Mr Shingle?”
“I didn’t feel anything, Ms MacDonald. I just thought, oh, I better take care of this lady quick cause I hate it when customers cram up the shop.”
“But these were very special customers, Mr Shingle.”
“Oh yeah. I knew. My daughter has her room covered with Prad’s posters...”
A girl screams in the audience. The camera cuts, zooms in on her. Can’t be more than fourteen or fifteen. Back to Mr Shingle.
“That’s my little Cindy!”
“Please. Mr Shingle, tell me what happened next.”
“So they come to the counter, and Prad looks me straight in the eyes like and says, `do you sell sunflower-raisin-sun-dried-tomato bread with soy cheese swirls?´. Then...”
“Wait! Mr Shingle. The director says that he has a re-enactment of the scene with Prad and Breezy!”
“That’s fantastic! How’d you do that?”
The screen cuts to a shaky, hand held video camera, reminiscent of mid-nineties Dogme films. Mr Shingle is played by a man I seem to recognize from other reenactments on Pinky’s show. Prad and Breezy are both wearing sunglasses and baseball caps, so it’s difficult to tell whether or not they’re good doubles. Mr Shingle’s double goes:
“You’re in luck. A fresh batch of sunflower-raisin-sun-dried-tomato bread with soy cheese swirls just came out of the oven.”
Prad says, “Really?”
Mr Shingle responds, “Yes. Really.”
Breezy says, “That’s awesome.”
Mr Shingle says, “How many loaves do you want?”
Prad says, “One.”
Breezy says, “Two.”
Mr Shingle says, “Two coming up.”
Mr Shingle hands them to steaming loaves and the camera swish pans to Prad taking them, leaving change on the counter, leaving with Breezy. Then a swish pan to Mr Shingle. He says:
“Thank you. Have a nice day.”
We cut back to Pinky. She is smiling, shaking her head.
“Thank you so much for sharing that with us, Mr Shingle! Now, for our next guest. Mrs Hutchins here tells us she took the same flight to
The buzzer rings and I walk to the door.
“Yeah?”
“Mr Gomez? Your car’s here.”
“All right. I’ll be right down.”
I shut the TV off and check myself in the bathroom mirror. My special overnight skin toner seems to be working. Not a pimple. Also, I’m cutting down on coffee, trying to stick to my fruit smoothies.
I settle into the plush interior of the Town Car, enveloped by a rich leathery smell. I ask if I can roll down the window and the driver responds with a nod. I say, go ahead turn it up, in reference to his radio. He obliges, but soon I realize it’s a CD, some R&B hits I recognize from the music videos.
The traffic is backed up for three or four blocks. We’ve been inching forward for about fifteen minutes now and I tell the driver I’ll get out here. I can walk the rest of the way in a couple minutes, and besides, there’s a Starjack’s across the street, and for some reason I’m craving one of their chai chai grandisimos.
Up ahead, yellow blinking light is washing over a rainbow of cars and trucks. There’s an officer directing traffic around some paramedics loading a limp body into an ambulance. There’s a bicycle mangled and useless looking, still lying on the street, shattered plastic, and a taxi with blood whorls on its side, a couple feet further up. The police are prying the driver with questions, he is shaking his head, looking at the mauled messenger clinging to his life in the ambulance. I wonder if I know that kid. It seems like so long ago, that part of my life. The weekend warriors, bridge and tunnel kids, suits, and tourists are honking all around me. It’s tense out here, the energy that pushes us forward, past the carnage, the mishaps. I walk on by, duck into Starjack’s for my chai chai grandisimo.
I go straight through the hotel lobby, past reception to the glass encased elevator. Buzz Kowalski’s lounge is on a floor all its own, 14 flights up. I press my forehead against the glass as I shoot up, the squeaky, hushed lobby ever more minuscule until the elevator slows to a stop. Bing, the doors open, and there it is - Buzz Kowalski’s swank Starlight Lounge. A slick, brilliantined maitre’d is exchanging lascivious looks and trite small talk with a waitress. When he sees me he turns with affected casualness and asks, “Yes?”
“I’m here for the Sealed ASS party.”
“Name please.”
“Eric... I mean, Miguel Gomez.”
He scans the VIP list in front of him, raises his eyebrows. “OK Miguel, come on in.” He flashes straight white teeth and waves me in. The place is dimly lit and tonight there seems to be a kind of tropical theme. Fake palm trees and electric tiki torches adorn the place. People are walking around with Mai-tais. On a small stage to my right are three women in sequin mini-dresses and a short guy with a blond pony-tail, wearing crimson crooner regalia. Behind them the band, dressed in similar attire. They’re going through a rendition of Sugarhill Gang’s ubiquitous rap classic, with the pony-tail guy rapping. There’s a group of guys, all wearing light blue shirts tucked into beige Dockers dancing up near the lip of the stage. I walk through scattered, similarly dressed people on the dance floor and end up at the bar. The bartender comes over with her patent leather pants and tight halter top and takes my order for a Gibson. I turn around and lean against the bar, watching the people file in, expecting Sternislouse any minute. I try to imagine Charlene here with her three buddies, hunting for rich, cheesy guys. The band switches now to a rendition of ME2’s “Wild Fly”. Somehow, I find myself at the bottom of my Gibson by the time that song is over and order another one, not the least hesitant to take advantage of the open bar.
Talking to one of the lawyers at our site about a new contract we’re trying to bring in - some eccentric French porn producer who wants to invest in Sealed product. I couldn’t give a shit, but the inertia of the conversation and the necessity of being sociable keep me afloat. He keeps picking at his nose, grinding his teeth, and I half expect him to sniff the dandruff off the guy standing next to him.
“Thing is, Sternislouse said we need to rope him in, show him the statistics for the last couple years and guarantee him a profit,” he says, mandibles sliding left and right.
“That’s easy, but the tough part is when the client starts asking questions...”
“It’s easy to circumvent those. I just worked out this amazing legal contract. It swings everything in our favor. The shmuck’ll be so confounded by the thing that he won’t realize what he’s signing. Sternislouse will become the sole proprietor of his investments. And you and I’ll rake in the commissions.”
“Sounds brilliant,” I say, staring absent mindedly at some slinky ladies in front of us. Buzz’s Starlight Lounge may be tacky, but the kind of women that come here live to be looked at, spend entire days in salons getting primped, cut, dyed and dried for events like this. One can’t help but admire such singular, narrow-minded precision.
As the lawyer and I sit, trying to find common ground and a socially acceptable exit to another conversation, I see Sternislouse enter. Though I can’t make him out completely in the deceiving dimness of the club, the casual indifference in his gait is unmistakable. I see that quif of silver hair, his face with those tinted lenses, and a certain air of assuredness that only a pimp or a player can have; at his side is a stunningly cliché blonde. I’d heard comments in passing about Sylvia, his bombshell wife. They had painted a blurry picture, but one I could imagine based on the archetypes I carried with me. I’d even heard she used to be a porn actress; that she was a countess; that she lived a life separate from his; that they had a tacit understanding for the pursuit of individual gratification. But, much like Sternislouse, she was shrouded in an air of mystery; her image was on the other end of that line every time I closed a deal for Sternislouse, those waves crashing in the background.
She is upon me. Sternislouse had picked me out immediately and introduced the two of us, the lawyer and I, to Sylvia. She has a long angular face, straight whiter than white teeth and swollen, lascivious lips. She’s wearing pointed, low-heeled shoes and a loose, yet snug dress that grips her curves. The cover band kicks into a version of “Living la vida Loca” and she says to me, her boozy cigarette breath washing over me, “So you’re Miguel. Clement has told me so much about you.”
Her self-assurance and vacuous blue stare remind me of any number of
“Sylvia, right? A pleasure to finally meet you.”
Sternislouse shakes my hand and falls into conversation with the lawyer. I’m down near the bottom of my Gibson and tell Silvia I’ll accompany her to the bar.
“So, how long have you been working with Clement?”
Her use of his first name disarms me. With Sternislouse, that surname, I had built a secret mythology. “Clement?” I ask dumbly, to fill the pause. “Oh, maybe half a year. I mean, in all. I started out as an assistant, under Pepe.”
“Oh, poor Pepe. Had a beautiful wife. Clement was crazy about her.”
“That’s funny. Sternislouse, I mean Clement, never mentioned anything about her.”
“No, she’s not important I guess. He just wasn’t happy with his work. But he speaks very highly of you, Miguel. You can be a rich man if you play your cards right.”
Sylvia turns and orders a Kosmopolitan and another Gibson for me. Sternislouse has joined us in the interval carrying a double whiskey.
“Miguel, I’m so glad you made it. Did Vargo treat you right?”
“Oh, you mean the driver? Yeah, he was great.”
Sternislouse mugs us with a smile reminiscent of Bob Willis’ smirk, and says, “Carpe diem.”
We raise our glasses, Sylvia and I, and make a toast. Sternislouse excuses himself, saying something about making the rounds, then “C’est la vie... c’est la vie.”
Two hours later, Sternislouse has just given a brief speech on the stage. He was amazingly curt, much to the pleasure of the rest of the Sealed ASS team. We were loose, unable to maintain rigid posturing in front of Sternislouse. I’m off, by one of the windows, looking down at the city. The band has launched into a cover of “The Girl is Mine”. Somehow, Sylvia has found me, over here by myself, and she leans against the window. Her perfume is overwhelming, though I don’t no if it’s in a good way.
“Hi, Miguel.”
“Hi.”
“What’s the matter? Getting bored?”
“No. Just needed a break from all that,” I say, thumbing behind me. “What about you?”
“Oh, you know. I’ve been to several of these with Clement. It’s the same thing every time.”
“I love this part of town from up here,” I say, pointing down to the miniature of the city, its flashing lights, little, perfect people.
She turns around and looks down at my view. “You’re different from the other guys Clement has hired. Different from Pepe, at least.”
“I’m trying... I wanted to give the impression that I’m integrated...”
“Clement has no clue when it comes to things like that. He just sees everything in terms of results. And with you he’s content.”
I’m not sure, because of the music and her hushed tone, but I think she said, ‘and he should be.’ I always get nervous when I feel a vibe coming from a woman, no matter who it is, and instinctually look for a diversion, anything to keep me form doing what is natural. Maybe I’ll suggest going back to the bar for a drink. Before I get a chance, she says:
“So, Miguel. Where are you from, originally?”
“Here.
“No,” she turns her head to me. “It’s just your look.”
“What?”
“I just thought that you might have family from down south, you know,
“Excuse me, I’ll be right back,” I say, walking towards the bathroom. Once inside I piss out all the booze over fresh ice, go back to the mirror next to the valet and ask for a face towel. In the well-lit bathroom, alone, I look at myself in the mirror. Another one of those weird modern mixes. Half Asian, half white, not enough for either side. Most people think I look latino, others think I look Arabic, one guy even thought I might be Brazilian. Depending on what neighborhood I’m in, or in what store, people sometimes follow me, expecting me to to bad. Asians look at me like I’m some sort of novelty - but not one of them. I guess the easiest is just to let people believe what they want to believe. You know, let them have their cookie cutter world, their pre-defined notions. You start messing with their base and their world crumbles around them like a house of cards.
I remember the time, walking through my neighborhood, when an old woman stopped me, said something in what I now recognize as Spanish, ayudame,
I walk to the bar for one last drink and Sylvia, by the window still, sees me. She leaves whoever it was that she was talking to and sashays through the throngs and approaches me at the bar. Her eyes are like unsteady beads that finally, with effort, settle onto me. What does a high class woman like her want with me? I’m hypnotized by the thought of being with her.
“Tell me something,” she says.
“What?”
“Tell me something in Spanish. I just love the way Spanish sounds.”
I search through my Spanish phrases, which aren’t many, and pull one up that seems appropriate. I’m about to say El diablo está en mis pantalones, the devil is in my pants, something Alvaro taught me back when we had more time to talk, but instead I say, “La vida es un sueño.” Something I got off some CD liner notes. After all, this is the boss’s wife. Gotta be tactful.
“Here,” she says, handing me a cocktail napkin with lipstick traces.
“What is it?”
She grabs it and turns it over, revealing a hastily written phone number.
“You’re crazy! What if Sternislouse sees?”
“Clement. It’s not his business anyway.”
I take the number and stuff it in my pocket.
“I have a separate line,” she says. “You don’t have to worry, if that’s what you’re thinking about.”
“I don’t know...” I nod towards the bar. “Do you want something else to drink?”
“No Miguel, that’s not what I want. Clement’s already called me a car. I gotta go.” She stands back, eyes, dress scintillating. “See you soon, Miguel.”
One more drink will probably put me under, yet I turn around and order it anyway.
I let a week pass before I called Sylvia. It was a moderate week at work, with no more deals than usual. I found myself, after reading the newspaper, surfing the internet, staring at the track lighting and mottled ceiling. I thought about Gina, about calling her, but let my pride call the shots. I felt the vague desire to act the wounded one, to let her be the one who broke down first. I still had the cocktail napkin with Sylvia’s number. I pulled it out of my wallet one day and set it in front of me on the desk. I thought about the implications of calling Sternislouse’s wife. I thought how wrong it would be to two-time with the boss’s wife. Then I thought, well hell, it was she who gave it to me, and what was wrong with calling her? “Wife” held too much moral weight for me, now that I’ve decided to shed all non self-serving philosophies. The napkin still had her lip paint, was crinkled and pathetic looking in front of me. I turned it over and saw her scribbles, and thought, well that is the beginning of something. If I don’t finish it, then this will be a story without conclusion, could haunt me for the rest of my days.
She didn’t sound surprised at all to hear from me. The tone in her voice suggested that she expected me to call, and her nonchalant manner assured me. We arranged to meet that very evening, after I got off work, at a bar downtown called the Blue Room. I’d never been there, but had passed by it many times, often with leering glances at the deep blue interior, lined with bottles from floor to ceiling. It seemed like the type of place she’d choose: discreet, yet fashionable.
The night in Buzz’s lounge I’d never taken a meaningful look at her, perhaps out of respect for Sternislouse. But when she came in, I was stunned. She was made-up, confident, and immediately I could see why so much fuss was made over her. She inspired respect. At first she seemed distant, and I was beginning to wonder if we’d crossed signals somehow, if the purpose of our meeting was misunderstood.
“Clement is off now with his latest paramour. He could care less about us,” she said.
Finally, she’d made it clear for me. Revenge scheme or no, she had her manicured hand on my thigh, her Cosmo to her lips, and continued:
“But I’m always careful. He’d never set foot in a place like this. Not enough class. If he did find out, you’d end up like Pepe.”
“What about Pepe? What happened to him?”
“You probably know better than I.”
“The day Stern... Clement came into the office and fired him he walked, never showed his face since.”
We were sitting in a booth in the corner, with a vantage of the whole place. Above the bar was a giant martini glass, slowly swaying from side to side. She was looking at me, with glistening eyes, and as we talked her tongue darted out of her mouth inadvertently.
“You live in The City?,” I asked her.
Her eyes rolled to the bar, and, ignoring me, she said, “Can you get me another drink? A mojito this time.”
I stood up, without thinking, and ordered the drink for her. I felt like her puppet, her plaything. When I came back she asked:
“Where do you live?”
“Near here, actually. About ten minutes walking.”
“And you’ve never been here?”
“I haven’t really gone out that much in this part of the city.”
She took a drag on her cigarette, mashed it out, then moved her head closer, her eyes half-way lidded. Then we kissed, tongues lashing, tasting like cinnamon gum, cigarettes, grapefruit.
“I’m so glad you came Miguel.”
I felt like throwing up. I wanted to ditch her then and there, give up the whole lousy farce, but I almost felt sorry for her as she clenched harder on my thigh. I saw through her thin fantasies, her designs. I barely conquered the sadist in me, deciding finally to ingratiate Sylvia.
She insists on taking a cab to my place, even though it’s only a few blocks away. She’s up against me, sitting in the middle of the back seat, her hand greedy and clumsy down below. With the first opportunity I turn and look out the window. We’re at a stoplight, and in front of us groups of kids, junkies and whores straggle across. Then we take off. I’m not sure, but I think I saw Gina through my alcoholic blur.
Sylvia pulls out a wad of cash in front of my place and hands the driver a ten for a five dollar cab ride, and tells him to keep the change. He says good night to us, then winks and nods at Sylvia. I take her waist, her blonde hair spills over my right shoulder and we walk into the dilapidated lobby. I’m praying to the god of crappy apartment buildings that my elevator is working, not so sure anymore that I’ll be able to steer Sylvia up those four flights, not so sure if I can do that myself. When I press the button I can hear the pulley groaning, the elevator coming down, and to my relief the door opens. We tumble inside and Sylvia takes me to the corner and I have to snake my hand out from our tangle of clothes and flesh to press the sixth floor button. I see the light switch and the STOP button and consider fucking her in the elevator, between floors, with the lights out. I see the scenario, neighbors pressed up against the elevator shaft, listening, the box itself swinging precariously on the rusty cables, the difficulty I’d be in for, holding her by her straddling legs, me pressing her up against the chipped and etched metal siding... The door slides open on the fourth and we tumble out, laughing like fools, staggering to my apartment. I open the door.
“Welcome to my castle...”
She walks ahead into a reasonably presentable squalor. Shoes and clothes are strewn about, coffee and water cups lying here and there... She laughs some more and takes off her coat, tosses it at a chair and misses. She walks to the window and looks out.
“This is so seedy,” she says looking across the street at the Asian massage parlor, the rundown buildings, the whores and Colombian crack dealers down below.
“I’m sorry, I should have warned you.”
“It’s so... ethnic. So... authentic.”
I walk over to my hi-fi, flip through my CDs. I pick one by Barry White and put it on low.
“You want something to drink? How bout a double whiskey?”
“Oooooh I love this place! It’s just like I always imagined. So sleazy, so charged with that undercurrent of violence. It’s so tangible.”
I pour myself and Sylvia a couple fingers of Scotch and walk to her silhouette by the window. I run my finger down her back, over her cheeks. She’s firm all over, her smell is an overwhelming mélange of beauty products, like the perfume section in a department store.
“My Baxter lives around here. I can almost see why he wants to live here.”
“I didn’t know you had a kid. I mean, you don’t look old at all.”
“Oh he’s the black sheep. He ran out on us years ago when he found out about Baxter Sr... his grandfather. Clement took everything from him,” she says, almost absent mindedly. I get the feeling she’s drunk enough not to care what family secrets she’s revealing to me. “He still calls, about once a year from different places. He’s a bum, Miguel. Clement bought out his own father and turned him into a bum. Baxter Sr is crazy, senile, and miserable... but Clement doesn’t give a damn. That’s why our son left us. Because of Clement’s callousness.”
“You seem to be OK.”
“You have no idea what I go through to preserve myself. Life... is so cruel.”
“Tell me about it,” I say, images of Gina, of Pepe, of crack whores, of junkies, then finally one long still of Sylvia’s wet, glistening mouth, opening.
We’re on the sofa now and I have her dress up, my head up between her legs. Amazingly, she’s not wearing panties. She’s smoother than any other woman I’ve been with, and her pussy has only a thin strip of hair above the clit. I lick at it and the taste is unpleasant: sour and biting, probably because of one her skin toners or something. Not like Gina or the others. Hers is strange. I try not to breathe through my nose and do an admirable job, working her clit, one then two then three fingers inside her. She’s moaning arching her back, thrusting herself up into my face. Her hands are gripping the cushions, then her dress. She pulls it up, her eyes are half-lidded, her whiskey soaked tongue darts out at me, implying fuck me Miguel, fuck me Miguel. I’m beginning to feel like an actor.
I have her dress all the way off now, and her breasts are heaving, large and tense with excitement. I explore her areola with my tongue. The archetypal Mrs Robinson, the blond bombshell, the boss’s nymphomaniac wife. She’s a stunner, and I’m afraid to call the old maxim: it’s too good to be true.
In the dim yellowish light of my living room I have my shirt off, then my pants. She sucks me off greedily, impatiently. Then she comes back up, hot for it. I cavalierly spin her around. Firm, yet gentle. A tactic I learned from Kosmo. I run my hand along her back, along something I hadn’t expected. In fact, it’s something I’d never even considered.
“What the hell is this?”
“It’s Picasso...”
“I know it’s Picasso. Just what the hell is it doing on your back?
“Just fuck me Miguel...”
I’m staring down at a miniature reproduction of
She called a cab a couple hours later, after we’d turned over the apartment, fucked in every single room, in practically every single position. I was a worn, wet rag, collapsed on her couch. She’d sucked all my vital energy, and was probably up for more.
“Let’s meet in few days,” she called from the bathroom, where she was washing herself.
“Whenever is fine for you. But you gotta give me some rest. I’m a mere shell of a man. You’ve sucked me dry!”
“My poor Miguel. I know. I’m very demanding.”
“Clement must get a workout... being married to you.”
“Are you kidding me?” she said, reclining on the sofa next to me, slowly blowing out her cigarette fumes. “We haven’t touched each other for years now.”
“Why are you together, then?”
“Convenience, I suppose. He needs me, in a way.”
“How’s that?”
“I’m the only person who really knows him.”
“Yeah. You know, Sternislouse is kind of a mystery to us all at Sealed ASS.”
“When I first met him I had such a stupid, childish vision of that man. He was like a prince. I’d never met anyone so handsome, so cultured, so refined. I was so young then, and it seemed that everything he said was so witty and clever. People clung too him, laughed at all his silly jokes, treated him with deference. He was a god to me.”
“He is a very wealthy man. I guess, to some extent, that can be awe-inspiring.”
“Well, let me tell you,” she said, stubbing out her cigarette, looking off into a corner of my ceiling. “Clement is a human being.”
“I know. People like him... they’re placed on a pedestal.”
“Many years ago we were on vacation in
“He had me put my hands on the railing, took my hair in one hand and took me from behind. He was a beast when he fucked. I loved it. He knew just the limit between pain and pleasure. When he was coming, however, he pulled out of me and stuck his dick out between the railing and shot out over the city. From way up there. Then he just stayed there with this supremely content look on his face. “Todo mio! C’est tout moi!” he screamed.
“Did he always do stuff like that?”
“Come to think of it, yes. I just never paid attention to it before. I was too dazzled by his yachts and private planes and seaside villas. I’d never seen him as he really was - I’d never really thought about the mirrors he had above our bed, about our one-sided conversations. That is, until the next morning. We woke up late and were supposed to drive out to the countryside for some horseback riding. Clement got dressed in his Jodhpurs, I in mine, and we had our chauffeur waiting out front for us already. We were walking through the lobby, which at that time of day was in full swing. Also, I think there must have been some kind of convention or tour group, because it was filled with Japanese tourists. Inside and out. We were walking through, when Clement was reminded of something he forgot to tell the receptionist. I think it was about dinner reservations for that night. Anyway, he had me go on ahead, through the hotel’s giant rotating doors. I was out front, waiting with the valets and the Japanese tourists when I saw Clement walking towards us. He walked straight into the rotating doors and was about to meet me on the outside when the door stopped. Whatever it was, the motor, the electricity, I don’t know. It just stopped. Clement walked into the glass. He grabbed his nose and scowled, then looked at the glass and pushed on it. But the door wouldn’t budge. He was trapped inside. He banged his fists on it, then stood back and smiled at me and shrugged his shoulders. The valets tried to move the door, but the thing wouldn’t budge, and after five minutes Clement began pacing around. Then he began shouting, and all we could hear were little yelps and fists pounding on glass. Like a frightened monkey in a cage. He jumped up and down, making a frightful scene and soon everybody, both inside and outside the hotel, were laughing at him. He just looked so pathetic, throwing his tantrum... there in the stuck door. Then he just sat down and pouted like a little kid that couldn’t get his way.”
“Since that day, you couldn’t see him the same way?”
“He became a laughable figure. I don’t think he could do a thing about it either. I can see through all his dazzling wealth and culture. It’s a mere facade.”
“It’s surprising. He always seems so on top of it. So sure of himself.”
“Yeah. But when he’s a man by himself, he is nothing. He’s never had to fight for anything in his life.”
The buzzer rang.
“That must be the taxi...” she said, and gathered her coat and purse and pecked me on the cheek and promised to call me within the next couple days.
I was exhausted and as soon as the door shut I dozed off.
Sylvia and I are in my Z3. For some reason she’s driving it and that seems OK to me. She’s laughing so hard that I’m almost afraid she’s gonna lose control. The car lurches a couple times and I try to tell her to cool it, but the whole situation seems ridiculous and I start laughing as well. We’re overtaking the cars ahead of us until we’re ahead of them all. The yellow dashes zoom by underneath us. Tears of laughter are streaming down my face as I reach for the handle and try to open the door. I pull at the lever but it is stuck. The window won’t roll down either. Sylvia has her foot mashed into the floorboard and we’re on a missile now, shooting into oblivion...
