American psycho: a novel

April Fools

Abandon all hope ye who enter here is scrawled in blood red lettering on the side of the Chemical Bank near the corner of Eleventh and First and is in print large enough to be seen from the backseat of the cab as it lurches forward in the traffic leaving Wall Street and just as Timothy Price notices the words a bus pulls up, the advertisement for Les Misérables on its side blocking his view, but Price who is with Pierce & Pierce and twenty-six doesn't seem to care because he tells the driver he will give him five dollars to turn up the radio, "Be My Baby" on WYNN, and the driver, black, not American, does so.

"I'm resourceful," Price is saying. "I'm creative, I'm young, unscrupulous, highly motivated, highly skilled. In essence what I'm saying is that society cannot afford to lose me. I'm an asset." Price calms down, continues to stare out the cab's dirty window, probably at the word FEAR sprayed in red graffiti on the side of a McDonald's on Fourth and Seventh. "I mean the fact remains that no one gives a shit about their work, everybody hates their job, I hate my job, you've told me you hate yours. What do I do? Go back to Los Angeles? Not an alternative. I didn't transfer from UCLA to Stanford to put up with this. I mean am I alone in thinking we're not making enough money?" Like in a movie another bus appears, another poster for Les Misérables replaces the word – not the same bus because someone has written the word DYKE over Eponine's face. Tim blurts out, "I have a co-op here. I have a place in the Hamptons, for Christ sakes."

"Parents', guy. It's the parents'."

"I'm buying it from them. Will you fucking turn this up?" he snaps but distractedly at the driver, the Crystals still blaring from the radio.

"It don't go up no higher," maybe the driver says.

Timothy ignores him and irritably continues. "I could stay living in this city if they just installed Blaupunkts in the cabs. Maybe the ODM III or ORC II dynamic tuning systems?" His voice softens here. "Either one. Hip my friend, very hip."

He takes off the expensive-looking Walkman from around his neck, still complaining. "I hate to complain – I really do – about the trash, the garbage, the disease, about how filthy this city really is and you know and I know that it is a sty…" He continues talking as he opens his new Tumi calfskin attaché case he bought at D. F. Sanders. He places the Walkman in the case alongside a Panasonic wallet-size cordless portable folding Easa-phone (he used to own the NEC 9000 Porta portable) and pulls out today's newspaper. "In one issue – in one issue – let's see here… strangled models, babies thrown from tenement rooftops, kids killed in the subway, a Communist rally, Mafia boss wiped out, Nazis" – he flips through the pages excitedly – "baseball players with AIDS, more Mafia shit, gridlock, the homeless, various maniacs, faggots dropping like flies in the streets, surrogate mothers, the cancellation of a soap opera, kids who broke into a zoo and tortured and burned various animals alive, more Nazis… and the joke is, the punch line is, it's all in this city – nowhere else, just here, it sucks, whoa wait, more Nazis, gridlock, gridlock, baby-sellers, black-market babies, AIDS babies, baby junkies, building collapses on baby, maniac baby, gridlock, bridge collapses–" His voice stops, he takes in a breath and then quietly says, his eyes fixed on a beggar at the corner of Second and Fifth, "That's the twenty-fourth one I've seen today. I've kept count." Then asks without looking over, "Why aren't you wearing the worsted navy blue blazer with the gray pants?" Price is wearing a six-button wool and silk suit by Ermenegildo Zegna, a cotton shirt with French cuffs by Ike Behar, a Ralph Lauren silk tie and leather wing tips by Fratelli Rossetti. Pan down to the Post. There is a moderately interesting story concerning two people who disappeared at a party aboard the yacht of a semi-noted New York socialite while the boat was circling the island. A residue of spattered blood and three smashed champagne glasses are the only clues. Foul play is suspected and police think that perhaps a machete was the killer's weapon because of certain grooves and indentations found on the deck. No bodies have been found. There are no suspects. Price began his spiel today over lunch and then brought it up again during the squash game and continued ranting over drinks at Harry's where he had gone on, over three J&Bs and water, much more interestingly about the Fisher account that Paul Owen is handling. Price will not shut up.

"Diseases!" he exclaims, his face tense with pain. "There's this theory out now that if you can catch the AIDS virus through having sex with someone who is infected then you can also catch anything, whether it's a virus per se or not – Alzheimer's, muscular dystrophy, hemophilia, leukemia, anorexia, diabetes, cancer, multiple sclerosis, cystic fibrosis, cerebral palsy, dyslexia, for Christ sakes – you can get dyslexia from pussy–"

"I'm not sure, guy, but I don't think dyslexia is a virus."

"Oh, who knows? They don't know that. Prove it."

Outside this cab, on the sidewalks, black and bloated pigeons fight over scraps of hot dogs in front of a Gray's Papaya while transvestites idly look on and a police car cruises silently the wrong way down a one-way street and the sky is low and gray and in a cab that's stopped in traffic across from this one, a guy who looks a lot like Luis Carruthers waves over at Timothy and when Timothy doesn't return the wave the guy – slicked-back hair, suspenders, horn-rimmed glasses – realizes it's not who he thought it was and looks back at his copy of USA Today. Panning down to the sidewalk there's an ugly old homeless bag lady holding a whip and she cracks it at the pigeons who ignore it as they continue to peck and fight hungrily over the remains of the hot dogs and the police car disappears into an underground parking lot.

"But then, when you've just come to the point when your reaction to the times is one of total and sheer acceptance, when your body has become somehow tuned into the insanity and you reach that point where it all makes sense, when it clicks, we get some crazy fucking homeless nigger who actually wants – listen to me, Bateman – wants to be out on the streets, this, those streets, see, those" – he points – "and we have a mayor who won't listen to her, a mayor who won't let the bitch have her way – Holy Christ – let the fucking bitch freeze to death, put her out of her own goddamn self-made misery, and look, you're back where you started, confused, fucked… Number twenty-four, nope, twenty-five… Who's going to be at Evelyn's? Wait, let me guess." He holds up a hand attached to an impeccable manicure. "Ashley, Courtney, Muldwyn, Marina, Charles – am I right so far? Maybe one of Evelyn's 'artiste' friends from ohmygod the 'East' Village. You know the type – the ones who ask Evelyn if she has a nice dry white chardonnay–" He slaps a hand over his forehead and shuts his eyes and now he mutters, jaw clenched, "I'm leaving. I'm dumping Meredith. She's essentially daring me to like her. I'm gone. Why did it take me so long to realize that she has all the personality of a goddamn game-show host?… Twenty-six, twenty-seven… I mean I tell her I'm sensitive. I told her I was freaked out by the Challenger accident – what more does she want? I'm ethical, tolerant, I mean I'm extremely satisfied with my life, I'm optimistic about the future – I mean, aren't you?"

"Sure, but–"

"And all I get is shit from her… Twenty-eight, twenty-nine, holy shit it's a goddamn cluster of bums. I tell you–" He stops suddenly, as if exhausted, and turning away from another advertisement for Les Misérables, remembering something important, asks, "Did you read about the host from that game show on TV? He killed two teenage boys? Depraved faggot. Droll, really droll." Price waits for a reaction. There is none. Suddenly: Upper West Side.

He tells the driver to stop on the corner of Eighty-first and Riverside since the street doesn't go the right way.

"Don't bother going arou–" Price begins.

"Maybe I go other way around," the cabdriver says.

"Do not bother." Then barely an aside, teeth gritted, unsmiling: "Fucking nitwit."

The driver brings the cab to a stop. Two cabs behind this cab both blare their horns then move on.

"Should we bring flowers?"

"Nah. Hell, you're banging her, Bateman. Why should we get Evelyn flowers? You better have change for a fifty," he warns the driver, squinting at the red numbers on the meter. "Damnit. Steroids. Sorry I'm tense."

"Thought you were off them."

"I was getting acne on my legs and arms and the UVA bath wasn't fixing it, so I started going to a tanning salon instead and got rid of it. Jesus, Bateman, you should see how ripped my stomach is. The definition. Completely buffed out…," he says in a distant, odd way, while waiting for the driver to hand him the change. "Ripped." He stiffs the driver on the tip but the driver is genuinely thankful anyway. "So long, Shlomo," Price winks.

"Damn, damn, damned," Price says as he opens the door. Coming out of the cab he eyes a beggar on the street – "Bingo: thirty" – wearing some sort of weird, tacky, filthy green jump suit, unshaven, dirty hair greased back, and jokingly Price holds the cab's door open for him. The bum, confused and mumbling, eyes locked shamefully on the pavement, holds an empty Styrofoam coffee cup out to us, clutched in a tentative hand.

"I suppose he doesn't want the cab," Price snickers, slamming the cab door. "Ask him if he takes American Express."

"Do you take Am Ex?"

The bum nods yes and moves away, shuffling slowly.

It's cold for April and Price walks briskly down the street toward Evelyn's brownstone, whistling "If I Were a Rich Man," the heat from his mouth creating smoky plumes of steam, and swinging his Tumi leather attaché case. A figure with slicked-back hair and horn-rimmed glasses approaches in the distance, wearing a beige double-breasted wool-gabardine Cerruti 1881 suit and carrying the same Tumi leather attaché case from D. F. Sanders that Price has, and Timothy wonders aloud, "Is it Victor Powell? It can't be."

The man passes under the fluorescent glare of a streetlamp with a troubled look on his face that momentarily curls his lips into a slight smile and he glances at Price almost as if they were acquainted but just as quickly he realizes that he doesn't know Price and just as quickly Price realizes it's not Victor Powell and the man moves on.

"Thank god," Price mutters as he nears Evelyn's.

"It looked a lot like him."

"Powell and dinner at Evelyn's? These two go together about as well as paisley and plaid." Price rethinks this. "White socks with gray trousers."

A slow dissolve and Price is bounding up the steps outside the brownstone Evelyn's father bought her, grumbling about how he forgot to return the tapes he rented last night to Video Haven. He rings the bell. At the brownstone next to Evelyn's, a woman – high heels, great ass – leaves without locking her door. Price follows her with his gaze and when he hears footsteps from inside coming down the hallway toward us he turns around and straightens his Versace tie ready to face whoever. Courtney opens the door and she's wearing a Krizia cream silk blouse, a Krizia rust tweed skirt and silk-satin d'Orsay pumps from Manolo Blahnik.

I shiver and hand her my black wool Giorgio Armani overcoat and she takes it from me, carefully airkissing my right cheek, then she performs the same exact movements on Price while taking his Armani overcoat. The new Talking Heads on CD plays softly in the living room.

"A bit late, aren't we, boys?" Courtney asks, smiling naughtily.

"Inept Haitian cabbie," Price mutters, airkissing Courtney back. "Do we have reservations somewhere and please don't tell me Pastels at nine."

Courtney smiles, hanging up both coats in the hall closet. "Eating in tonight, darlings. I'm sorry, I know, I know, I tried to talk Evelyn out of it but we're having… sushi."

Tim moves past her and down the foyer toward the kitchen. "Evelyn? Where are you, Evelyn?" he calls out in a singsong voice. "We have to talk."

"It's good to see you," I tell Courtney. "You look very pretty tonight. Your face has a… youthful glow."

"You really know how to charm the ladies, Bateman." There is no sarcasm in Courtney's voice. "Should I tell Evelyn you feel this way?" she asks flirtatiously.

"No," I say. "But I bet you'd like to."

"Come on," she says, taking my hands off her waist and placing her hands on my shoulders, steering me down the hall in the direction of the kitchen. "We have to save Evelyn. She's been rearranging the sushi for the past hour. She's trying to spell your initials – the P in yellowtail, the B in tuna – but she thinks the tuna looks too pale–"

"How romantic."

"–and she doesn't have enough yellowtail to finish the B" – Courtney breathes in – "and so I think she's going to spell Tim's initials instead. Do you mind?" she asks, only a bit worried. Courtney is Luis Carruthers' girlfriend.

"I'm terribly jealous and I think I better talk to Evelyn," I say, letting Courtney gently push me into the kitchen.

Evelyn stands by a blond wood counter wearing a Krizia cream silk blouse, a Krizia rust tweed skirt and the same pair of silk-satin d'Orsay pumps Courtney has on. Her long blond hair is pinned back into a rather severe-looking bun and she acknowledges me without looking up from the oval Wilton stainless-steel platter on which she has artfully arranged the sushi. "Oh honey, I'm sorry. I wanted to go to this darling little new Salvadorian bistro on the Lower East Side–'

Price groans audibly.

"–but we couldn't get reservations. Timothy, don't groan." She picks up a piece of the yellowtail and places it cautiously near the top of the platter, completing what looks like a capital T. She stands back from the platter and inspects it. "I don't know. Oh, I'm so unsure."

"I told you to keep Finlandia in this place," Tim mutters, looking through the bottles – most of them magnums – at the bar. "She never has Finlandia," he says to no one, to all of us.

"Oh god, Timothy. Can't handle Absolut?" Evelyn asks and then contemplatively to Courtney, "The California roll should circle the rim of the plate, no?"

"Bateman. Drink?" Price sighs.

"J&B rocks," I tell him, suddenly thinking it's strange that Meredith wasn't invited.

"Oh god. It's a mess," Evelyn gasps. "I swear I'm going to cry."

'The sushi looks marvelous," I tell her soothingly.

"Oh it's a mess," she wails. "It's a mess."

"No, no, the sushi looks marvelous," I tell her and in an attempt to be as consoling as possible I pick up a piece of the fluke and pop it in my mouth, groaning with inward pleasure, and hug Evelyn from behind; my mouth still full, I manage to say "Delicious."

She slaps at me in a playful way, obviously pleased with my reaction, and finally, carefully, airkisses my cheek and then turns back to Courtney. Price hands me a drink and walks toward the living room while trying to remove something invisible from his blazer. "Evelyn, do you have a lint brush?"

I would rather have watched the baseball game or gone to the gym and worked out or tried that Salvadorian restaurant that got a couple of pretty good reviews, one in New York magazine, the other in the Times, than have dinner here but there is one good thing about dinner at Evelyn's: it's close to my place.

"Is it okay if the soy sauce isn't exactly at room temperature?" Courtney is asking. "I think there's ice in one of the dishes."

Evelyn is placing strips of pale orange ginger delicately in a pile next to a small porcelain dish filled with soy sauce. "No, it's not okay. Now Patrick, could you be a dear and get the Kirin out of the refrigerator?" Then, seemingly harassed by the ginger, she throws the clump down on the platter. "Oh forget it. I'll do it."

I move toward the refrigerator anyway. Staring darkly, Price reenters the kitchen and says, "Who in the hell is in the living room?"

Evelyn feigns ignorance. "Oh who is that?"

Courtney warns, "Ev-el-yn. You did tell them, I hope."

"Who is it?" I ask, suddenly scared. "Victor Powell?"

"No, it's not Victor Powell, Patrick," Evelyn says casually. "It's an artist friend of mine, Stash. And Vanden, his girlfriend."

"Oh so that was a girl in there," Price says. "Go take a look, Bateman," he dares. "Let me guess. The East Village?"

"Oh Price," she says flirtatiously, opening beer bottles. "Why no. Vanden goes to Camden and Stash lives in SoHo, so there."

I move out of the kitchen, past the dining room, where the table has been set, the beeswax candles from Zona lit in their sterling silver candleholders from Fortunoff, and into the living room. I can't tell what Stash is wearing since it's all black. Vanden has green streaks in her hair. She stares at a heavy-metal video playing on MTV while smoking a cigarette.

"Ahem," I cough.

Vanden looks over warily, probably drugged to the eyeballs. Stash doesn't move.

"Hi. Pat Bateman," I say, offering my hand, noticing my reflection in a mirror hung on the wall – and smiling at how good I look.

She takes it; says nothing. Stash starts smelling his fingers.

Smash cut and I'm back in the kitchen.

"Just get her out of there." Price is seething. "She's doped up watching MTV and I want to watch the goddamn MacNeil/Lehrer report."

Evelyn is still opening large bottles of imported beer and absently mentions, "We've got to eat this stuff soon or else we're all going to be poisoned."

"She's got a green streak in her hair," I tell them. "And she's smoking."

"Bateman," Tim says, still glaring at Evelyn.

"Yes?" I say. "Timothy?"

"You're a dufus."

"Oh leave Patrick alone," Evelyn says. "He's the boy next door. That's Patrick. You're not a dufus, are you, honey?" Evelyn is on Mars and I move toward the bar to make myself another drink.

"Boy next door." Tim smirks and nods, then reverses his expression and hostilely asks Evelyn again if she has a lint brush.

Evelyn finishes opening the Japanese beer bottles and tells Courtney to fetch Stash and Vanden. "We have to eat this now or else we're going to be poisoned," she murmurs, slowly moving her head, taking in the kitchen, making sure she hasn't forgotten anything.

"If I can tear them away from the latest Megadeth video," Courtney says before exiting.

"I have to talk to you," Evelyn says.

"What about?" I come up to her.

"No," she says and then pointing at Tim, "to Price."

Tim still glares at her fiercely. I say nothing and stare at Tim's drink.

"Be a hon," she tells me, "and place the sushi on the table. Tempura is in the microwave and the sake is just about done boiling…" Her voice trails off as she leads Price out of the kitchen.

I am wondering where Evelyn got the sushi – the tuna, yellowtail, mackerel, shrimp, eel, even bonito, all seem so fresh and there are piles of wasabi and clumps of ginger placed strategically around the Wilton platter – but I also like the idea that I don't know, will never know, will never ask where it came from and that the sushi will sit there in the middle of the glass table from Zona that Evelyn's father bought her like some mysterious apparition from the Orient and as I set the platter down I catch a glimpse of my reflection on the surface of the table. My skin seems darker because of the candlelight and I notice how good the haircut I got at Gio's last Wednesday looks. I make myself another drink. I worry about the sodium level in the soy sauce.

Four of us sit around the table waiting for Evelyn and Timothy to return from getting Price a lint brush. I sit at the head taking large swallows of J&B. Vanden sits at the other end reading disinterestedly from some East Village rag called Deception, its glaring headline THE DEATH OF DOWNTOWN. Stash has pushed a chopstick into a lone piece of yellowtail that lies on the middle of his plate like some shiny impaled insect and the chopstick stands straight up. Stash occasionally moves the piece of sushi around the plate with the chopstick but never looks up toward either myself or Vanden or Courtney, who sits next to me sipping plum wine from a champagne glass.

Evelyn and Timothy come back perhaps twenty minutes after we've seated ourselves and Evelyn looks only slightly flushed. Tim glares at me as he takes the seat next to mine, a fresh drink in hand, and he leans over toward me, about to say, to admit something, when suddenly Evelyn interrupts, "Not there, Timothy," then, barely a whisper, "Boy girl, boy girl." She gestures toward the empty chair next to Vanden. Timothy shifts his glare to Evelyn and hesitantly takes the seat next to Vanden, who yawns and turns a page of her magazine.

"Well, everybody," Evelyn says, smiling, pleased with the meal she has presented, "dig in," and then after noticing the piece of sushi that Stash has pinned – he's now bent low over the plate, whispering at it – her composure falters but she smiles bravely and chirps, "Plum wine anyone?"

No one says anything until Courtney, who is staring at Stash's plate, lifts her glass uncertainly and says, trying to smile, "It's… delicious, Evelyn."

Stash doesn't speak. Even though he is probably uncomfortable at the table with us since he looks nothing like the other men in the room – his hair isn't slicked back, no suspenders, no horn-rimmed glasses, the clothes black and ill-fitting, no urge to light and suck on a cigar, probably unable to secure a table at Camols, his net worth a pittance – still, his behavior lacks warrant and he sits there as if hypnotized by the glistening piece of sushi and just as the table is about to finally ignore him, to look away and start eating, he sits up and loudly says, pointing an accusing finger at his plate, "It moved!"

Timothy glares at him with a contempt so total that I can't fully equal it but I muster enough energy to come close. Vanden seems amused and so now, unfortunately, does Courtney, who I'm beginning to think finds this monkey attractive but I suppose if I were dating Luis Carruthers I might too. Evelyn laughs good-naturedly and says, "Oh Stash, you are a riot," and then asks worriedly, "Tempura?" Evelyn is an executive at a financial services company, FYI.

"I'll have some," I tell her and I lift a piece of eggplant off the platter, though I won't eat it because it's fried.

The table begins to serve themselves, successfully ignoring Stash. I stare at Courtney as she chews and swallows.

Evelyn, in an attempt to start a conversation, says, after what seems like a long, thoughtful silence, "Vanden goes to Camden."

"Oh really?" Timothy asks icily. "Where is that?"

"Vermont," Vanden answers without looking up from her paper.

I look over at Stash to see if he's pleased with Vanden's casually blatant lie but he acts as if he wasn't listening, as if he were in some other room or some punk rock club in the bowels of the city, but so does the rest of the table, which bothers me since I am fairly sure we all know it's located in New Hampshire.

"Where did you go?" Vanden sighs after it finally becomes clear to her that no one is interested in Camden.

"Well, I went to Le Rosay," Evelyn starts, "and then to business school in Switzerland."

"I also survived business school in Switzerland," Courtney says. "But I was in Geneva. Evelyn was in Lausanne."

Vanden tosses the copy of Deception next to Timothy and smirks in a wan, bitchy way and though I am pissed off a little that Evelyn doesn't take in Vanden's condescension and hurl it back at her, the J&B has relieved my stress to a point where I don't care enough to say anything. Evelyn probably thinks Vanden is sweet, lost, confused, an artist. Price isn't eating and neither is Evelyn; I suspect cocaine but it's doubtful. While taking a large gulp from his drink Timothy holds up the copy of Deception and chuckles to himself.

'"The Death of Downtown," he says; then, pointing at each word in the headline, "Who-gives-a-rat's-ass?"

I automatically expect Stash to look up from his plate but he still stares at the lone piece of sushi, smiling to himself and nodding.

"Hey," Vanden says, as if she was insulted. "That affects us."

"Oh ho ho," Tim says warningly. "That affects us? What about the massacres in Sri Lanka, honey? Doesn't that affect us too? What about Sri Lanka?"

"Well, that's a cool club in the Village." Vanden shrugs. "Yeah, that affects us too."

Suddenly Stash speaks without looking up. "That's called The Tonka." He sounds pissed but his voice is even and low, his eyes still on the sushi. "It's called The Tonka, not Sri Lanka. Got it? The Tonka."

Vanden looks down, then meekly says, "Oh."

"I mean don't you know anything about Sri Lanka? About how the Sikhs are killing like tons of Israelis there?" Timothy goads her. "Doesn't that affect us?"

"Kappamaki roll anyone?" Evelyn cuts in cheerfully, holding up a plate.

"Oh come on, Price," I say. "There are more important problems than Sri Lanka to worry about. Sure our foreign policy is important, but there are more pressing problems at hand."

"Like what?" he asks without looking away from Vanden. "By the way, why is there an ice cube in my soy sauce?"

"No," I start, hesitantly. "Well, we have to end apartheid for one. And slow down the nuclear arms race, stop terrorism and world hunger. Ensure a strong national defense, prevent the spread of communism in Central America, work for a Middle East peace settlement, prevent U.S. military involvement overseas. We have to ensure that America is a respected world power. Now that's not to belittle our domestic problems, which are equally important, if not more. Better and more affordable long-term care for the elderly, control and find a cure for the AIDS epidemic, clean up environmental damage from toxic waste and pollution, improve the quality of primary and secondary education, strengthen laws to crack down on crime and illegal drugs. We also have to ensure that college education is affordable for the middle class and protect Social Security for senior citizens plus conserve natural resources and wilderness areas and reduce the influence of political action committees."

The table stares at me uncomfortably, even Stash, but I'm on a roll.

"But economically we're still a mess. We have to find a way to hold down the inflation rate and reduce the deficit. We also need to provide training and jobs for the unemployed as well as protect existing American jobs from unfair foreign imports. We have to make America the leader in new technology. At the same time we need to promote economic growth and business expansion and hold the line against federal income taxes and hold down interest rates while promoting opportunities for small businesses and controlling mergers and big corporate takeovers."

Price nearly spits up his Absolut after this comment but I try to make eye contact with each one of them, especially Vanden, who if she got rid of the green streak and the leather and got some color – maybe joined an aerobics class, slipped on a blouse, something by Laura Ashley – might be pretty. But why does she sleep with Stash? He's lumpy and pale and has a bad cropped haircut and is at least ten pounds overweight; there's no muscle tone beneath the black T-shirt.

"But we can't ignore our social needs either. We have to stop people from abusing the welfare system. We have to provide food and shelter for the homeless and oppose racial discrimination and promote civil rights while also promoting equal rights for women but change the abortion laws to protect the right to life yet still somehow maintain women's freedom of choice. We also have to control the influx of illegal immigrants. We have to encourage a return to traditional moral values and curb graphic sex and violence on TV, in movies, in popular music, everywhere. Most importantly we have to promote general social concern and less materialism in young people."

I finish my drink. The table sits facing me in total silence. Courtney's smiling and seems pleased. Timothy just shakes his head in bemused disbelief. Evelyn is completely mystified by the turn the conversation has taken and she stands, unsteadily, and asks if anyone would like dessert.

"I have… sorbet," she says as if in a daze. "Kiwi, carambola, cherimoya, cactus fruit and oh… what is that…" She stops her zombie monotone and tries to remember the last flavor. "Oh yes, Japanese pear."

Everyone stays silent. Tim quickly looks over at me. I glance at Courtney, then back at Tim, then at Evelyn. Evelyn meets my glance, then worriedly looks over at Tim. I also look over at Tim, then at Courtney and then at Tim again, who looks at me once more before answering slowly, unsurely, "Cactus pear."

"Cactus fruit," Evelyn corrects.

I look suspiciously over at Courtney and after she says "Cherimoya" I say "Kiwi" and then Vanden says "Kiwi" also and Stash says quietly, but enunciating each syllable very clearly, "Chocolate chip."

The worry that flickers across Evelyn's face when she hears this is instantaneously replaced by a smiling and remarkably good-natured mask and she says, "Oh Stash, you know I don't have chocolate chip, though admittedly that's pretty exotic for a sorbet. I told you I have cherimoya, cactus pear, carambola, I mean cactus fruit–"

"I know. I heard you, I heard you," he says, waving her off. "Surprise me."

"Okay," Evelyn says. "Courtney? Would you like to help?"

"Of course." Courtney gets up and I watch as her shoes click away into the kitchen.

"No cigars, boys," Evelyn calls out.

"Wouldn't dream of it," Price says, putting a cigar back into his coat pocket.

Stash is still staring at the sushi with an intensity that troubles me and I have to ask him, hoping he will catch my sarcasm, "Did it, uh, move again or something?"

Vanden has made a smiley face out of all the disks of California roll she piled onto her plate and she holds it up for Stash's inspection and asks, "Rex?"

"Cool," Stash grunts.

Evelyn comes back with the sorbet in Odeon margarita glasses and an unopened bottle of Glenfiddich, which remains unopened while we eat the sorbet.

Courtney has to leave early to meet Luis at a company party at Bedlam, a new club in midtown. Stash and Vanden depart soon after to go "score" something somewhere in SoHo. I am the only one who saw Stash take the piece of sushi from his plate and slip it into the pocket of his olive green leather bomber jacket. When I mention this to Evelyn, while she loads the dishwasher, she gives me a look so hateful that it seems doubtful we will have sex later on tonight. But I stick around anyway. So does Price. He is now lying on a late-eighteenth-century Aubusson carpet drinking espresso from a Ceralene coffee cup on the floor of Evelyn's room. I'm lying on Evelyn's bed holding a tapestry pillow from Jenny B. Goode, nursing a cranberry and Absolut. Evelyn sits at her dressing table brushing her hair, a Ralph Lauren green and white striped silk robe draped over a very nice body, and she is gazing at her reflection in the vanity mirror.

"Am I the only one who grasped the fact that Stash assumed his piece of sushi was" – I cough, then resume – "a pet?"

"Please stop inviting your 'artiste' friends over," Tim says tiredly. "I'm sick of being the only one at dinner who hasn't talked to an extraterrestrial."

"It was only that once," Evelyn says, inspecting a lip, lost is her own placid beauty.

"And at Odeon, no less," Price mutters.

I vaguely wonder why I wasn't invited to Odeon for the artists dinner. Had Evelyn picked up the tab? Probably. And I suddenly picture a smiling Evelyn, secretly morose, sitting at a whole table of Stash's friends – all of them constructing little log cabins with their french fries or pretending their grilled salmon was alive and moving the piece of fish around the table, the fish conversing with each other about the "art scene," new galleries; maybe even trying to fit the fish into the log cabin made of french fries…

"If you remember well enough, I hadn't seen one either," Evelyn says.

"No, but Bateman's your boyfriend, so that counted." Price guffaws and I toss the pillow at him. He catches it then throws it back at me.

"Leave Patrick alone. He's the boy next door," Evelyn says, rubbing some kind of cream into her face. "You're not an extraterrestrial, are you honey?"

"Should I even dignify that question with an answer?" I sigh.

"Oh baby." She pouts into the mirror, looking at me in its reflection. "I know you're not an extraterrestrial."

"Relief," I mutter to myself.

"No, but Stash was there at Odeon that night," Price continues, and then, looking over at me, "At Odeon. Are you listening, Bateman?"

"No he wasn't," Evelyn says.

"Oh yes he was, but his name wasn't Stash last time. It was Horseshoe or Magnet or Lego or something equally adult," Price sneers. "I forget."

"Timothy, what are you going on about?" Evelyn asks tiredly. "I'm not even listening to you." She wets a cotton ball, wipes it across her forehead.

"No, we were at Odeon." Price sits up with some effort. "And don't ask me why, but I distinctly remember him ordering the tuna cappuccino."

"Carpaccio," Evelyn corrects.

"No, Evelyn dear, love of my life. I distinctly remember him ordering the tuna cappuccino," Price says, staring up at the ceiling.

"He said carpaccio," she counters, running the cotton ball over her eyelids.

"Cappuccino," Price insists. "Until you corrected him."

"You didn't even recognize him earlier tonight," she says.

"Oh but I do remember him," Price says, turning to me. "Evelyn described him as 'the good-natured body builder.' That's how she introduced him. I swear."

"Oh shut up," she says, annoyed, but she looks over at Timothy in the mirror and smiles flirtatiously.

"I mean I doubt Stash makes the society pages of W, which I thought was your criterion for choosing friends," Price says, staring back, grinning at her in his wolfish, lewd way. I concentrate on the Absolut and cranberry I'm holding and it looks like a glassful of thin, watery blood with ice and a lemon wedge in it.

"What's going on with Courtney and Luis?" I ask, hoping to break their gaze.

"Oh god," Evelyn moans, turning back to the mirror. "The really dreadful thing about Courtney is not that she doesn't like Luis anymore. It's that–"

"They canceled her charge at Bergdorf's?" Price asks. I laugh. We slap each other high-five.

"No," Evelyn continues, also amused. "It's that she's really in love with her real estate broker. Some little twerp over at The Feathered Nest."

"Courtney might have her problems," Tim says, inspecting his recent manicure, "but my god, what is a… Vanden?"

"Oh don't bring this up," Evelyn whines and starts brushing her hair.

"Vanden is a cross between… The Limited and… used Benetton," Price says, holding up his hands, his eyes closed.

"No." I smile, trying to integrate myself into the conversation. "Used Fiorucci."

"Yeah," Tim says. "I guess." His eyes, now open, zone in on Evelyn.

"Timothy, lay off," Evelyn says. "She's a Camden girl. What do you expect?"

"Oh god," Timothy moans. "I am so sick of hearing Camden-girl problems. Oh my boyfriend, I love him but he loves someone else and oh how I longed for him and he ignored me and blahblah blahblahblah – god, how boring. College kids. It matters, you know? It's sad, right Bateman?"

"Yeah. Matters. Sad."

"See, Bateman agrees with me," Price says smugly.

"Oh he does not." With a Kleenex Evelyn wipes off whatever she rubbed on. "Patrick is not a cynic, Timothy. He's the boy next door, aren't you honey?"

"No I'm not," I whisper to myself. "I'm a fucking evil psychopath."

"Oh so what," Evelyn sighs. "She's not the brightest girl in the world."

"Hah! Understatement of the century!" Price cries out. "But Stash isn't the brightest guy either. Perfect couple. Did they meet on Love Connection or something?"

"Leave them alone," Evelyn says. "Stash is talented and I'm sure we're underestimating Vanden."

"This is a girl…" Price turns to me. "Listen, Bateman, this is a girl – Evelyn told me this – this is a girl who rented High Noon because she thought it was a movie about" – he gulps – "marijuana farmers."

"It just hit me," I say. "But have we deciphered what Stash – I assume he has a last name but don't tell me, I don't want to know, Evelyn – does for a living?"

"First of all he's perfectly decent and nice," Evelyn says in his defense.

"The man asked for chocolate chip sorbet for Christ sakes!" Timothy wails, disbelieving. "What are you talking about?"

Evelyn ignores this, pulls off her Tina Chow earrings. "He's a sculptor," she says tersely.

"Oh bullshit," Timothy says. "I remember talking to him at Odeon." He turns to me again. "This was when he ordered the tuna cappuccino and I'm sure if left unattended would have ordered the salmon au lait, and he told me he did parties, so that technically makes him – I don't know, correct me if I'm wrong, Evelyn – a caterer. He's a caterer!" Price cries out. "Not a fucking sculptor!"

"Oh gosh calm down," Evelyn says, rubbing more cream into her face.

"That's like saying you're a poet." Timothy is drunk and I'm beginning to wonder when he will vacate the premises.

"Well," Evelyn begins, "I've been known to–"

"You're a fucking word processor!" Tim blurts out. He walks over to Evelyn and bows next to her, checking out his reflection in the mirror.

"Have you been gaining weight, Tim?" Evelyn asks thoughtfully. She studies Tim's head in the mirror and says, "Your face looks… rounder."

Timothy, in retaliation, smells Evelyn's neck and says, "What is that fascinating… odor?"

"Obsession." Evelyn smiles flirtatiously, gently pushing Timothy away. "It's Obsession. Patrick, get your friend away from me."

"No, no, wait," Timothy says, sniffing loudly. "It's not Obsession. It's… it's…" and then, with a face twisted in mock horror, "It's… Oh my god, it's Q.T. Instatan!"

Evelyn pauses and considers her options. She inspects Price's head one more time. "Are you losing your hair?"

"Evelyn," Tim says. "Don't change the subject but…" And then, genuinely worried, "Now that you mention it… too much gel?" Concerned, he runs a hand over it.

"Maybe," Evelyn says. "Now make yourself useful and do sit down."

"Well, at least it's not green and I haven't tried to cut it with a butter knife," Tim says, referring to Vanden's dye job and Stash's admittedly cheap, bad haircut. A haircut that's bad because it's cheap.

"Are you gaining weight?" Evelyn asks, more seriously this time.

"Jesus," Tim says, about to turn away, offended. "No, Evelyn."

"Your face definitely looks… rounder," Evelyn says. "Less… chiseled."

"I don't believe this." Tim again.

He looks deep into the mirror. She continues brushing her hair but the strokes are less definite because she's looking at Tim. He notices this and then smells her neck and I think he licks at it quickly and grins.

"Is that Q.T.?" he asks. "Come on, you can tell me. I smell it."

"No," Evelyn says, unsmiling. "You use that."

"No. As a matter of fact I don't. I go to a tanning salon. I'm quite honest about that," he says. "You're using Q.T."

"You're projecting," she says lamely.

"I told you," Tim says. "I go to a tanning salon. I mean I know it's expensive but…" Price blanches. "Still, Q.T.?"

"Oh how brave to admit you go to a tanning salon," she says.

"Q.T." He chuckles.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Evelyn says and resumes brushing her hair. "Patrick, escort your friend out of here."

Now Price is on his knees and he smells and sniffs at Evelyn's bare legs and she's laughing. I tense up.

"Oh god," she moans loudly. "Get out of here."

"You are orange." He laughs, on his knees, his head in her lap. "You look orange."

"I am not," she says, her voice a low prolonged growl of pain, ecstasy. "Jerk."

I lie on the bed watching the two of them. Timothy is in her lap trying to push his head under the Ralph Lauren robe. Evelyn's head is thrown back with pleasure and she is trying to push him away, but playfully, and hitting him only lightly on his back with her Jan Hové brush. I am fairly sure that Timothy and Evelyn are having an affair. Timothy is the only interesting person I know.

"You should go," she says finally, panting. She has stopped struggling with him.

He looks up at her, flashing a toothy, good-looking smile, and says, "Anything the lady requests."

"Thank you," she says in a voice that sounds to me tinged with disappointment.

He stands up. "Dinner? Tomorrow?"

"I'll have to ask my boyfriend," she says, smiling at me in the mirror.

"Will you wear that sexy black Anne Klein dress?" he asks, his hands on her shoulders, whispering this into her ear, as he smells it. "Bateman's not welcome."

I laugh good-naturedly while getting up from the bed, escorting him out of the room.

"Wait! My espresso!" he calls out.

Evelyn laughs, then claps as if delighted by Timothy's reluctance to vacate.

"Come on fella," I say as I push him roughly out of the bedroom. "Beddy-bye time."

He still manages to blow her a kiss before I get him out and away. He is completely silent as I walk him out of the brownstone.

After he leaves I pour myself a brandy and drink it from a checkered Italian tumbler and when I come back to the bedroom I find Evelyn lying in bed watching the Home Shopping Club. I lie down next to her and loosen my Armani tie. Finally I ask something without looking at her.

"Why don't you just go for Price?"

"Oh god, Patrick," she says, her eyes shut. "Why Price? Price?" And she says this in a way that makes me think she has had sex with him.

"He's rich," I say.

"Everybody's rich," she says, concentrating on the TV screen.

"He's good-looking," I tell her.

"Everybody's good-looking, Patrick," she says remotely.

"He has a great body," I say.

"Everybody has a great body now," she says.

I place the tumbler on the nightstand and roll over on top of her. While I kiss and lick her neck she stares passionlessly at the wide-screen Panasonic remote-control television set and lowers the volume. I pull my Armani shirt up and place her hand on my torso, wanting her to feel how rock-hard, how halved my stomach is, and I flex the muscles, grateful it's light in the room so she can see how bronzed and defined my abdomen has become.

"You know," she says clearly, "Stash tested positive for the AIDS virus. And…" She pauses, something on the screen catching her interest; the volume goes slightly up and then is lowered. "And… I think he will probably sleep with Vanden tonight."

"Good," I say, biting lightly at her neck, one of my hands on a firm, cold breast.

"You're evil," she says, slightly excited, running her hands along my broad, hard shoulder.

"No," I sigh. "Just your fiancé."

After attempting to have sex with her for around fifteen minutes, I decide not to continue trying.

She says, "You know, you can always be in better shape."

I reach for the tumbler of brandy. I finish it. Evelyn is addicted to Parnate, an antidepressant. I lie there beside her watching the Home Shopping Club – at glass dolls, embroidered throw pillows, lamps shaped like footballs, Lady Zirconia – with the sound turned off. Evelyn starts drifting.

"Are you using minoxidil?" she asks, after a long time.

"No. I'm not," I say. "Why should I?"

"Your hairline looks like it's receding," she murmurs.

"It's not," I find myself saying. It's hard to tell. My hair is very thick and I can't tell if I'm losing it. I really doubt it.

I walk back to my place and say good night to a doorman I don't recognize (he could be anybody) and then dissolve into my living room high above the city, the sounds of the Tokens singing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" coming from the glow of the Wurlitzer 1015 jukebox (which is not as good as the hard-to-find Wurlitzer 850) that stands in the comer of the living room. I masturbate, thinking about first Evelyn, then Courtney, then Vanden and then Evelyn again, but right before I come – a weak orgasm – about a near-naked model in a halter top I saw today in a Calvin Klein advertisement.

Morning

In the early light of a May dawn this is what the living room of my apartment looks like: Over the white marble and granite gas-log fireplace hangs an original David Onica. It's a six-foot-by-four-foot portrait of a naked woman, mostly done in muted grays and olives, sitting on a chaise longue watching MTV, the backdrop a Martian landscape, a gleaming mauve desert scattered with dead, gutted fish, smashed plates rising like a sunburst above the woman's yellow head, and the whole thing is framed in black aluminum steel. The painting overlooks a long white down-filled sofa and a thirty-inch digital TV set from Toshiba; it's a high-contrast highly defined model plus it has a four-corner video stand with a high-tech tube combination from NEC with a picture-in-picture digital effects system (plus freeze-frame); the audio includes built-in MTS and a five-watt-per-channel on-board amp. A Toshiba VCR sits in a glass case beneath the TV set; it's a super-high-band Beta unit and has built-in editing function including a character generator with eight-page memory, a high-band record and playback, and three-week, eight-event timer. A hurricane halogen lamp is placed in each corner of the living room. Thin white venetian blinds cover all eight floor-to-ceiling windows. A glass-top coffee table with oak legs by Turchin sits in front of the sofa, with Steuben glass animals placed strategically around expensive crystal ashtrays from Fortunoff, though I don't smoke. Next to the Wurlitzer jukebox is a black ebony Baldwin concert grand piano. A polished white oak floor runs throughout the apartment. On the other side of the room, next to a desk and a magazine rack by Gio Ponti, is a complete stereo system (CD player, tape deck, tuner, amplifier) by Sansui with six-foot Duntech Sovereign 2001 speakers in Brazilian rosewood. A downfilled futon lies on an oakwood frame in the center of the bedroom. Against the wall is a Panasonic thirty-one-inch set with a direct-view screen and stereo sound and beneath it in a glass case is a Toshiba VCR. I'm not sure if the time on the Sony digital alarm clock is correct so I have to sit up then look down at the time flashing on and off on the VCR, then pick up the Ettore Sottsass push-button phone that rests on the steel and glass nightstand next to the bed and dial the time number. A cream leather, steel and wood chair designed by Eric Marcus is in one corner of the room, a molded plywood chair in the other. A black-dotted beige and white Maud Sienna carpet covers most of the floor. One wall is hidden by four chests of immense bleached mahogany drawers. In bed I'm wearing Ralph Lauren silk pajamas and when I get up I slip on a paisley ancient madder robe and walk to the bathroom. I urinate while trying to make out the puffiness of my reflection in the glass that encases a baseball poster hung above the toilet. After I change into Ralph Lauren monogrammed boxer shorts and a Fair Isle sweater and slide into silk polka-dot Enrico Hidolin slippers I tie a plastic ice pack around my face and commence with the morning's stretching exercises. Afterwards I stand in front of a chrome and acrylic Washmobile bathroom sink – with soap dish, cup holder, and railings that serve as towel bars, which I bought at Hastings Tile to use while the marble sinks I ordered from Finland are being sanded – and stare at my reflection with the ice pack still on. I pour some Plax antiplaque formula into a stainless-steel tumbler and swish it around my mouth for thirty seconds. Then I squeeze Rembrandt onto a faux-tortoiseshell toothbrush and start brushing my teeth (too hung over to floss properly – but maybe I flossed before bed last night?) and rinse with Listerine. Then I inspect my hands and use a nailbrush. I take the ice-pack mask off and use a deep-pore cleanser lotion, then an herb-mint facial masque which I leave on for ten minutes while I check my toenails. Then I use the Probright tooth polisher and next the Interplak tooth polisher (this in addition to the toothbrush) which has a speed of 4200 rpm and reverses direction forty-six times per second; the larger tufts clean between teeth and massage the gums while the short ones scrub the tooth surfaces. I rinse again, with Cepacol. I wash the facial massage off with a spearmint face scrub. The shower has a universal all-directional shower head that adjusts within a thirty-inch vertical range. It's made from Australian gold-black brass and covered with a white enamel finish. In the shower I use first a water-activated gel cleanser, then a honey-almond body scrub, and on the face an exfoliating gel scrub. Vidal Sassoon shampoo is especially good at getting rid of the coating of dried perspiration, salts, oils, airborne pollutants and dirt that can weigh down hair and flatten it to the scalp which can make you look older. The conditioner is also good – silicone technology permits conditioning benefits without weighing down the hair which can also make you look older. On weekends or before a date I prefer to use the Greune Natural Revitalizing Shampoo, the conditioner and the Nutrient Complex. These are formulas that contain D-panthenol, a vitamin-B-complex factor; polysorbate 80, a cleansing agent for the scalp; and natural herbs. Over the weekend I plan to go to Bloomingdale's or Bergdorf's and on Evelyn's advice pick up a Foltene European Supplement and Shampoo for thinning hair which contains complex carbohydrates that penetrate the hair shafts for improved strength and shine. Also the Vivagen Hair Enrichment Treatment, a new Redken product that prevents mineral deposits and prolongs the life cycle of hair. Luis Carruthers recommended the Aramis Nutriplexx system, a nutrient complex that helps increase circulation. Once out of the shower and toweled dry I put the Ralph Lauren boxers back on and before applying the Mousse A Raiser, a shaving cream by Pour Hommes, I press a hot towel against my face for two minutes to soften abrasive beard hair. Then I always slather on a moisturizer (to my taste, Clinique) and let it soak in for a minute. You can rinse it off or keep it on and apply a shaving cream over it – preferably with a brush, which softens the beard as it lifts the whiskers – which I've found makes removing the hair easier. It also helps prevent water from evaporating and reduces friction between your skin and the blade. Always wet the razor with warm water before shaving and shave in the direction the beard grows, pressing gently on the skin. Leave the sideburns and chin for last, since these whiskers are tougher and need more time to soften. Rinse the razor and shake off any excess water before starting. Afterwards splash cool water on the face to remove any trace of lather. You should use an aftershave lotion with little or no alcohol. Never use cologne on your face, since the high alcohol content dries your face out and makes you look older. One should use an alcohol-free antibacterial toner with a water-moistened cotton ball to normalize the skin. Applying a moisturizer is the final step. Splash on water before applying an emollient lotion to soften the skin and seal in the moisture. Next apply Gel Appaisant, also made by Pour Hommes, which is an excellent, soothing skin lotion. If the face seems dry and flaky – which makes it look dull and older – use a clarifying lotion that removes flakes and uncovers fine skin (it can also make your tan look darker). Then apply an anti-aging eye balm (Baume Des Yeux) followed by a final moisturizing "protective" lotion. A scalp-programming lotion is used after I towel my hair dry. I also lightly blow-dry the hair to give it body and control (but without stickiness) and then add more of the lotion, shaping it with a Kent natural-bristle brush, and finally slick it back with a wide-tooth comb. I pull the Fair Isle sweater back on and reslip my feet into the polka-dot silk slippers, then head into the living room and put the new Talking Heads in the CD player, but it starts to digitally skip so I take it out and put in a CD laser lens cleaner. The laser lens is very sensitive, and subject to interference from dust or dirt or smoke or pollutants or moisture, and a dirty one can inaccurately read CDs, making for false starts, inaudible passages, digital skipping, speed changes and general distortion; the lens cleaner has a cleaning brush that automatically aligns with the lens then the disk spins to remove residue and particles. When I put the Talking Heads CD back in it plays smoothly. I retrieve the copy of USA Today that lies in front of my door in the hallway and bring it with me into the kitchen where I take two Advil, a multivitamin and a potassium tablet, washing them down with a large bottle of Evian water since the maid, an elderly Chinese woman, forgot to turn the dishwasher on when she left yesterday, and then I have to pour the grapefruit-lemon juice into a St. Rémy wineglass I got from Baccarat. I check the neon clock that hangs over the refrigerator to make sure I have enough time to eat breakfast unhurriedly. Standing at the island in the kitchen I eat kiwifruit and a sliced Japanese apple-pear (they cost four dollars each at Gristede's) out of aluminum storage boxes that were designed in West Germany. I take a bran muffin, a decaffeinated herbal tea bag and a box of oat-bran cereal from one of the large glass-front cabinets that make up most of an entire wall in the kitchen; complete with stainless-steel shelves and sandblasted wire glass, it is framed in a metallic dark gray-blue. I eat half of the bran muffin after it's been microwaved and lightly covered with a small helping of apple butter. A bowl of oat-bran cereal with wheat germ and soy milk follows; another bottle of Evian water and a small cup of decaf tea after that. Next to the Panasonic bread baker and the Salton Pop-Up coffee maker is the Cremina sterling silver espresso maker (which is, oddly, still warm) that I got at Hammacher Schlemmer (the thermal-insulated stainless-steel espresso cup and the saucer and spoon are sitting by the sink, stained) and the Sharp Model R-1810A Carousel II microwave oven with revolving turntable which I use when I heat up the other half of the bran muffin. Next to the Salton Sonata toaster and the Cuisinart Little Pro food processor and the Acme Supreme Juicerator and the Cordially Yours liqueur maker stands the heavy-gauge stainless-steel two-and-one-half-quart teakettle, which whistles "Tea for Two" when the water is boiling, and with it I make another small cup of the decaffeinated apple-cinnamon tea. For what seems like a long time I stare at the Black & Decker Handy Knife that lies on the counter next to the sink, plugged into the wall: it's a sliver/peeler with several attachments, a serrated blade, a scalloped blade and a rechargeable handle. The suit I wear today is from Alan Flusser. It's an eighties drape suit, which is an updated version of the thirties style. The favored version has extended natural shoulders, a full chest and a bladed back. The soft-rolled lapels should be about four inches wide with the peak finishing three quarters of the way across the shoulders. Properly used on double-breasted suits, peaked lapels are considered more elegant than notched ones. Low-slung pockets have a flapped double-besom design – above the flap there's a slit trimmed on either side with a flat narrow strip of cloth. Four buttons form a low-slung square; above it, about where the lapels cross, there are two more buttons. The trousers are deeply pleated and cut full in order to continue the flow of the wide jacket. An extended waist is cut slightly higher in the front. Tabs make the suspenders fit well at the center back. The tie is a dotted silk design by Valentino Couture. The shoes are crocodile loafers by A. Testoni. While I'm dressing the TV is kept on to The Patty Winters Show. Today's guests are women with multiple personalities. A nondescript overweight older woman is on the screen and Patty's voice is heard asking, "Well, is it schizophrenia or what's the deal? Tell us."

"No, oh no. Multiple personalities are not schizophrenics," the woman says, shaking her head. "We are not dangerous."

"Well," Patty starts, standing in the middle of the audience, microphone in hand. "Who were you last month?"

"Last month it seemed to be mostly Polly," the woman says.

A cut to the audience – a housewife's worried face; before she notices herself on the monitor, it cuts back to the multiple-personality woman.

"Well," Patty continues, "now who are you?"

"Well…," the woman begins tiredly, as if she was sick of being asked this question, as if she had answered it over and over again and still no one believed it. "Well, this month I'm… Lambchop. Mostly… Lambchop."

A long pause. The camera cuts to a close-up of a stunned housewife shaking her head, another housewife whispering something to her.

The shoes I'm wearing are crocodile loafers by A. Testoni.

Grabbing my raincoat out of the closet in the entranceway I find a Burberry scarf and matching coat with a whale embroidered on it (something a little kid might wear) and it's covered with what looks like dried chocolate syrup crisscrossed over the front, darkening the lapels. I take the elevator downstairs to the lobby, rewinding my Rolex by gently shaking my wrist. I say good morning to the doorman, step outside and hail a cab, heading downtown toward Wall Street.

Harry's

Price and I walk down Hanover Street in the darkest moments of twilight and as if guided by radar move silently toward Harry's. Timothy hasn't said anything since we left P & P. He doesn't even comment on the ugly bum that crouches beneath a Dumpster off Stone Street, though he does manage a grim wolf whistle toward a woman – big tits, blonde, great ass, high heels – heading toward Water Street. Price seems nervous and edgy and I have no desire to ask him what's wrong. He's wearing a linen suit by Canali Milano, a cotton shirt by Ike Behar, a silk tie by Bill Blass and cap-toed leather lace-ups from Brooks Brothers. I'm wearing a lightweight linen suit with pleated trousers, a cotton shirt, a dotted silk tie, all by Valentino Couture, and perforated cap-toe leather shoes by Allen-Edmonds. Once inside Harry's we spot David Van Patten and Craig McDermott at a table up front. Van Patten is wearing a double-breasted wool and silk sport coat, button-fly wool and silk trousers with inverted pleats by Mario Valentino, a cotton shirt by Gitman Brothers, a polka-dot silk tie by Bill Blass and leather shoes from Brooks Brothers. McDermott is wearing a woven-linen suit with pleated trousers, a button-down cotton and linen shirt by Basile, a silk tie by Joseph Abboud and ostrich loafers from Susan Bennis Warren Edwards.

The two are hunched over the table, writing on the backs of paper napkins, a Scotch and a martini placed respectively in front of them. They wave us over. Price throws his Tumi leather attaché case on an empty chair and heads toward the bar. I call out to him for a J&B on the rocks, then sit down with Van Patten and McDermott.

"Hey Bateman," Craig says in a voice that suggests this is not his first martini. "Is it proper to wear tasseled loafers with a business suit or not? Don't look at me like I'm insane."

"Oh shit, don't ask Bateman," Van Patten moans, waving a gold Cross pen in front of his face, absently sipping from the martini glass.

"Van Patten?" Craig says.

"Yeah?"

McDermott hesitates, then says "Shut up" in a flat voice.

"What are you screwballs up to?" I spot Luis Carruthers standing at the bar next to Price, who ignores him utterly. Carruthers is not dressed well: a four-button double-breasted wool suit, I think by Chaps, a striped cotton shirt and a silk bow tie plus horn-rimmed eyeglasses by Oliver Peoples.

"Bateman: we're sending these questions in to GQ," Van Patten begins.

Luis spots me, smiles weakly, then, if I'm not mistaken, blushes and turns back to the bar. Bartenders always ignore Luis for some reason.

"We have this bet to see which one of us will get in the Question and Answer column first, and so now I expect an answer. What do you think?" McDermott demands.

"About what?" I ask irritably.

"Tasseled loafers, jerk-off," he says.

"Well, guys…" I measure my words carefully. "The tasseled loafer is traditionally a casual shoe…" I glance back at Price, wanting the drink badly. He brushes past Luis, who offers his hand. Price smiles, says something, moves on, strides over to our table. Luis, once more, tries to catch the bartender's attention and once more fails.

"But it's become acceptable just because it's so popular, right?" Craig asks eagerly.

"Yeah." I nod. "As long as it's either black or cordovan it's okay."

"What about brown?" Van Patten asks suspiciously.

I think about this then say, "Too sporty for a business suit."

"What are you fags talking about?" Price asks. He hands me the drink then sits down, crossing his legs.

"Okay, okay, okay," Van Patten says. "This is my question. A two-parter…" He pauses dramatically. "Now are rounded collars too dressy or too casual? Part two, which tie knot looks best with them?"

A distracted Price, his voice still tense, answers quickly with an exact, clear enunciation that can be heard over the din in Harry's. "It's a very versatile look and it can go with both suits and sport coats. It should be starched for dressy occasions and a collar pin should be worn if it's particularly formal." He pauses, sighs; it looks as if he's spotted somebody. I turn around to see who it is. Price continues, "If it's worn with a blazer then the collar should look soft and it can be worn either pinned or unpinned. Since it's a traditional, preppy look it's best if balanced by a relatively small four-in-hand knot." He sips his martini, recrossing his legs. "Next question?"

"Buy the man a drink," McDermott says, obviously impressed.

"Price?" Van Patten says.

"Yes?" Price says, casing the room.

"You're priceless."

"Listen," I ask, "where are we having dinner?"

"I brought the trusty Mr. Zagat," Van Patten says, pulling the long crimson booklet out of his pocket and waving it at Timothy.

"Hoo-ray," Price says dryly.

"What do we want to eat?" Me.

"Something blond with big tits." Price.

"How about that Salvadorian bistro?" McDermott.

"Listen, we're stopping by Tunnel afterwards so somewhere near there." Van Patten.

"Oh shit," McDermott begins. "We're going to Tunnel? Last week I picked up this Vassar chick–"

"Oh god, not again," Van Patten groans.

"What's your problem?" McDermott snaps back.

"I was there. I don't need to hear this story again," Van Patten says.

"But I never told you what happened afterwards, " McDermott says, arching his eyebrows.

"Hey, when were you guys there?" I ask. "Why wasn't I invited?"

"You were on that fucking cruise thing. Now shut up and listen. So okay I picked up this Vassar chick at Tunnel – hot number, big tits, great legs, this chick was a little hardbody – and so I buy her a couple of champagne kirs and she's in the city on spring break and she's practically blowing me in the Chandelier Room and so I take her back to my place–"

"Whoa, wait," I interrupt. "May I ask where Pamela is during all of this?"

Craig winces. "Oh fuck you. I want a blow job, Bateman. I want a chick who's gonna let me–"

"I don't want to hear this," Van Patten says, clamping his hands over his ears. "He's going to say something disgusting."

"You prude," McDermott sneers. "Listen, we're not gonna invest in a co-op together or jet down to Saint Bart's. I just want some chick whose face I can sit on for thirty, forty minutes."

I throw my swizzle stick at him.

"Anyway, so we're back at my place and listen to this." He moves in closer to the table. "She's had enough champagne by now to get a fucking rhino tipsy, and get this–"

"She let you fuck her without a condom?" one of us asks.

McDermott rolls his eyes up. "This is a Vassar girl. She's not from Queens."

Price taps me on the shoulder. "What does that mean?"

"Anyway, listen," McDermott says. "She would… are you ready?" He pauses dramatically. "She would only give me a hand job, and get this… she kept her glove on." He sits back in his chair and sips his drink in a smug, satisfied sort of way.

We all take this in solemnly. No one makes fun of McDermott's revelatory statement or of his inability to react more aggressively with this chick. No one says anything but we are all thinking the same thought: Never pick up a Vassar girl.

"What you need is a chick from Camden," Van Patten says, after recovering from McDermott's statement.

"Oh great," I say. "Some chick who thinks it's okay to fuck her brother."

"Yeah, but they think AIDS is a new band from England," Price points out.

"Where's dinner?" Van Patten asks, absently studying the question scrawled on his napkin. "Where the fuck are we going?"

"It's really funny that girls think guys are concerned with that, with diseases and stuff," Van Patten says, shaking his head.

"I'm not gonna wear a fucking condom," McDermott announces.

"I have read this article I've Xeroxed," Van Patten says, "and it says our chances of catching that are like zero zero zero zero point half a decimal percentage or something, and this no matter what kind of scumbag, slutbucket, horndog chick we end up boffing."

"Guys just cannot get it."

"Well, not white guys."

"This girl was wearing a fucking glove?" Price asks, still shocked. "A glove? Jesus, why didn't you just jerk off instead?"

"Listen, the dick also rises," Van Patten says. "Faulkner."

"Where did you go to college?" Price asks. "Pine Manor?"

"Men," I announce: "Look who approaches."

"Who?" Price won't turn his head.

"Hint," I say. "Biggest weasel at Drexel Burnham Lambert."

"Connolly?" Price guesses.

"Hello, Preston," I say, shaking Preston's hand.

"Fellows," Preston says, standing over the table, nodding to everyone. "I'm sorry about not making dinner with you guys tonight." Preston is wearing a double-breasted wool suit by Alexander Julian, a cotton shirt and a silk Perry Ellis tie. He bends down, balancing himself by putting a hand on the back of my chair. "I feel really bad about canceling, but commitments, you know."

Price gives me an accusatory look and mouths "Was he invited?"

I shrug and finish what's left of the J&B.

"What did you do last night?" McDermott asks, and then, "Nice threads."

"Who did he do last night?" Van Patten corrects.

"No, no," Preston says. "Very respectable, decent evening. No babes, no blow, no brew. Went to The Russian Tea Room with Alexandra and her parents. She calls her father – get this – Billy. But I'm so fucking tired and only one Stoli." He takes off his glasses (Oliver Peoples, of course) and yawns, wiping them clean with an Armani handkerchief. "I'm not sure, but I think our like weird Orthodox waiter dropped some acid in the borscht. I'm so fucking tired."

"What are you doing instead?" Price asks, clearly uninterested.

"Have to return these videos, Vietnamese with Alexandra, a musical, Broadway, something British," Preston says, scanning the room.

"Hey Preston," Van Patten says. "We're gonna send in the GQ questions. You got one?"

"Oh yeah, I've got one," Preston says. "Okay, so when wearing a tuxedo how do you keep the front of your shirt from riding up?"

Van Patten and McDermott sit silently for a minute before Craig, concerned and his brow creased in thought, says, 'That's a good one."

"Hey Price," Preston says. "Do you have one?"

"Yeah," Price sighs. "If all of your friends are morons is it a felony, a misdemeanor or an act of God if you blow their fucking heads off with a thirty-eight magnum?"

"Not GQ material," McDermott says. "Try Soldier of Fortune."

"Or Vanity Fair." Van Patten.

"Who is that?" Price asks, staring over at the bar. "Is that Reed Robison? And by the way, Preston, you simply have a tab with a buttonhole sewn into the front of the shirt, which can then be attached by a button to your trousers; and make sure that the stiff pleated front of the shirt doesn't extend below the waistband of your trousers or it will rise up when you sit down now is that jerk Reed Robison? It looks a helluva lot like him."

Stunned by Price's remarks, Preston slowly turns around, still on his haunches, and after he puts his glasses back on, squints over at the bar. "No, that's Nigel Morrison."

"Ah," Price exclaims. "One of those young British faggots serving internship at…?"

"How do you know he's a faggot?" I ask him.

"They're all faggots." Price shrugs. "The British."

"How would you know, Timothy?" Van Patten grins.

"I saw him fuck Bateman up the ass in the men's room at Morgan Stanley," Price says.

I sigh and ask Preston, "Where is Morrison interning?"

"I forget," Preston says, scratching his head. "Lazard?"

"Where?" McDermott presses. "First Boston? Goldman?"

"I'm not sure," Preston says. "Maybe Drexel? Listen, he's just an assistant corporate finance analyst and his ugly, blacktooth girlfriend is in some dinky rathole doing leveraged buyouts."

.'Where are we eating?" I ask, my patience at an all-time low. "We need to make a reservation. I'm not standing at some fucking bar."

"What in the fuck is Morrison wearing?" Preston asks himself. "Is that really a glen-plaid suit with a checkered shirt?"

"That's not Morrison," Price says.

"Who is it then?" Preston asks, taking his glasses off again.

"That's Paul Owen," Price says.

"That's not Paul Owen," I say. "Paul Owen's on the other side of the bar. Over there."

Owen stands at the bar wearing a double-breasted wool suit.

"He's handling the Fisher account," someone says.

"Lucky bastard," someone else murmurs.

"Lucky Jew bastard," Preston says.

"Oh Jesus, Preston," I say. "What does that have to do with anything?"

"Listen, I've seen the bastard sitting in his office on the phone with CEOs, spinning a fucking menorah. The bastard brought a Hanukkah bush into the office last December," Preston says suddenly, peculiarly animated.

"You spin a dreidel, Preston," I say calmly, "not a menorah. You spin a dreidel."

"Oh my god, Bateman, do you want me to go over to the bar and ask Freddy to fry you up some fucking potato pancakes?" Preston asks, truly alarmed. "Some… latkes?"

"No," I say. "Just cool it with the anti-Semitic remarks."

"The voice of reason." Price leans forward to pat me on the back. "The boy next door."

"Yeah, a boy next door who according to you let a British corporate finance analyst intern sodomize him up the ass," I say ironically.

"I said you were the voice of reason," Price says. "I didn't say you weren't a homosexual."

"Or redundant," Preston adds.

"Yeah," I say, staring directly at Price. "Ask Meredith if I'm a homosexual. That is, if she'll take the time to pull my dick out of her mouth."

"Meredith's a fag hag," Price explains, unfazed, "that's why I'm dumping her."

"Oh wait, guys, listen, I got a joke." Preston rubs his hands together.

"Preston," Price says, "you are a joke. You do know you weren't invited to dinner. By the way, nice jacket; nonmatching but complementary."

"Price, you are a bastard, you are so fucking mean to me it hurts," Preston says, laughing. "Anyway, so JFK and Pearl Bailey meet at this party and they go back to the Oval Office to have sex and so they fuck and then JFK goes to sleep and…" Preston stops. "Oh gosh, now what happens… Oh yeah, so Pearl Bailey says Mr. President I wanna fuck you again and so he says I'm going to sleep now and in… thirty-no, wait…" Preston pauses again, confused. "Now… no, sixty minutes… no… okay, thirty minutes I'll wake up and we'll do it again but you've got to keep one hand on my cock and the other on my balls and she says okay but why do I have to keep one hand on your dick and one… one hand on your balls… and…" He notices that Van Patten is idly doodling something on the back of a napkin. "Hey Van Patten – are you listening to me?"

"I'm listening," Van Patten says, irritated. "Go ahead. Finish it. One hand on my cock, one hand on my balls, go on."

Luis Carruthers is still standing at the bar waiting for a drink. Now it looks to me like his silk bow tie is by Agnes B. It's all unclear.

"I'm not," Price says.

"And he says because. . ." Again Preston falters. There's a long silence. Preston looks at me.

"Don't look at me," I say. "It's not my joke."

"And he says… My mind's a blank."

"Is that the punch line – My mind's a blank?" McDermott asks.

"He says, um, because…" Preston puts a hand over his eyes and thinks about it. "Oh gosh, I can't believe I forgot this…"

"Oh great, Preston." Price sighs. "You are one unfunny bastard."

"My mind's a blank?" Craig asks me. "I don't get it."

"Oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah," Preston says. "Listen, I remember. Because the last time I fucked a nigger she stole my wallet." He starts chuckling immediately. And after a short moment of silence, the table cracks up too, except for me.

"That's it, that's the punch line," Preston says proudly, relieved.

Van Patten gives him high-five. Even Price laughs.

"Oh Christ," I say. "That's awful."

..Why?.. won says. "It's funny. It's humor."

"Yeah, Bateman," McDermott says. "Cheer up."

"Oh I forgot. Bateman's dating someone from the ACLU," Price says. "What bothers you about that?"

"It's not funny," I say. "It's racist."

"Bateman, you are some kind of morose bastard," Preston says. "You should stop reading all those Ted Bundy biographies." Preston stands up and checks his Rolex. "Listen men, I'm off. Will see you tomorrow."

"Yeah. Same Bat Time, same Bat Channel," Van Patten says, nudging me.

Preston leans forward before leaving. "Because the last time I fucked a nigger she stole my wallet."

"I get it. I get it," I say, pushing him away.

"Remember this, guys: Few things perform in life as well as a Kenwood." He exits.

"Yabba-dabba-do," Van Patten says.

"Hey, did anyone know cavemen got more fiber than we get?" McDermott asks.

Pastels

I'm on the verge of tears by the time we arrive at Pastels since I'm positive we won't get seated but the table is good, and relief that is almost tidal in scope washes over me in an awesome wave. At Pastels McDermott knows the maître d' and though we made our reservations from a cab only minutes ago we're immediately led past the overcrowded bar into the pink, brightly lit main dining room and seated at an excellent booth for four, up front. It's really impossible to get a reservation at Pastels and I think Van Patter, myself, even Price, are impressed by, maybe even envious of, McDermott's prowess in securing a table. After we piled into a cab on Water Street we realized that no one had made reservations anywhere and while debating the merits of a new Californian-Sicilian bistro on the Upper East Side – my panic so great I almost ripped Zagat in two – the consensus seemed to emerge. Price had the only dissenting voice but he finally shrugged and said, "I don't give a shit," and we used his portaphone to make the reservation. He slipped his Walkman on and turned the volume up so loud that the sound of Vivaldi was audible even with the windows halfway open and the noise of the uptown traffic blasting into the taxi. Van Patter and McDermott made rude jokes about the size of Tim's dick and I did too. Outside Pastels Tim grabbed the napkin with Van Patter's final version of his carefully phrased question for GQ on it and tossed it at a bum huddling outside the restaurant feebly holding up a sloppy cardboard sign: I AM HUNGRY AND HOMELESS PLEASE HELP ME.

Things seem to be going smoothly. The maître d' has sent over four complimentary Bellinis but we order drinks anyway. The Ronettes are singing "Then He Kissed Me," our waitress is a little hardbody and even Price seems relaxed though he hates the place. Plus there are four women at the table opposite ours, all great-looking – blond, big tits: one is wearing a chemise dress in double-faced wool by Calvin Klein, another is wearing a wool knit dress and jacket with silk faille bonding by Geoffrey Beene, another is wearing a symmetrical skirt of pleated tulle and an embroidered velvet bustier by, I think, Christian Lacroix plus high-heeled shoes by Sidonie Larizzi, and the last one is wearing a black strapless sequined gown under a wool crepe tailored jacket by Bill Blass. Now the Shirelles are coming out of the speakers, "Dancing in the Street," and the sound system plus the acoustics, because of the restaurant's high ceiling, are so loud that we have to practically scream out our order to the hardbody waitress – who is wearing a bicolored suit of wool grain with passementerie trim by Myrone de Prémonville and velvet ankle boots and who, I'm fairly sure, is flirting with me: laughs sexily when I order, as an appetizer, the monkfish and squid ceviche with golden caviar; gives me a stare so steamy, so penetrating when I order the gravlax potpie with green tomatillo sauce I have to look back at the pink Bellini in the tall champagne flute with a concerned, deadly serious expression so as not to let her think I'm too interested. Price orders the tapas and then the venison with yogurt sauce and fiddlehead ferns with mango slices. McDermott orders the sashimi with goat cheese and then the smoked duck with endive and maple syrup. Van Patten has the scallop sausage and the grilled salmon with raspberry vinegar and guacamole. The air-conditioning in the restaurant is on full blast and I'm beginning to feel bad that I'm not wearing the new Versace pullover I bought last week at Bergdorfs. It would look good with the suit I'm wearing.

"Could you please get rid of these things," Price tells the busboy as he gestures toward the Bellinis.

"Wait, Tim," Van Patten says. "Cool out. I'll drink them."

"Eurotrash, David," Price explains. "Eurotrash."

"You can have mine, Van Patten," I say.

"Wait," McDermott says, holding the busboy back. "I'm keeping mine too."

"Why?" Price asks. "Are you trying to entice that Armenian chick over by the bar?"

"What Armenian chick?" Van Patten is suddenly craning his neck, interested.

"Just take them all," Price says, practically seething.

The busboy humbly removes the glasses, nodding to no one as he walks away.

"Who made you boss?" McDermott whines.

"Look, guys. Look who just came in." Van Patten whistles. "Oh boy."

"Oh for Christ sakes, not fucking Preston," Price sighs.

"No. Oh no," Van Patten says ominously. "He hasn't spotted us yet."

"Victor Powell? Paul Owen?" I say, suddenly scared.

"He's twenty-four and worth, oh, let's say, a repulsive amount of dough," Van Patten hints, grinning. He has obviously been spotted by the person and flashes a bright, toothy smile. "A veritable shitload."

I crane my neck but can't figure out who's doing anything.

"It's Scott Montgomery," Price says. "Isn't it? It's Scott Montgomery."

"Perhaps," Van Patten teases.

"It's that dwarf Scott Montgomery," says Price.

"Price," Van Patten says. "You're priceless."

"Watch me act thrilled," Price says, turning around. "Well, as thrilled as I can get meeting someone from Georgia."

"Whoa," McDermott says. "And he's dressed to impress."

"Hey," Price says. "I'm depressed, I mean impressed."

"Wow," I say, spotting Montgomery. "Elegant navies."

"Subtle plaids," Van Patten whispers.

"Lotsa beige," Price says. "You know."

"Here he comes," I say, bracing myself.

Scott Montgomery walks over to our booth wearing a double-breasted navy blue blazer with mock-tortoiseshell buttons, a prewashed wrinkled-cotton striped dress shirt with red accent stitching, a red, white and blue fireworks-print silk tie by Hugo Boss and plum washed-wool trousers with a quadruple-pleated front and slashed pockets by Lazo. He's holding a glass of champagne and hands it to the girl he's with – definite model type, thin, okay tits, no ass, high heels – and she's wearing a wool-crepe skirt and a wool and cashmere velour jacket and draped over her arm is a wool and cashmere velour coat, all by Louis Dell'OliO. High-heeled shoes by Susan Bennis Warren Edwards. Sunglasses by Alain Mikli. Pressed-leather bag from Hermès.

"Hey fellas. How y'all doin?" Montgomery speaks in a thick Georgia twang. "This is Nicki. Nicki, this is McDonald, Van Buren, Bateman – nice tan – and Mr. Price." He shakes only Timothy's hand and then takes the champagne glass from Nicki. Nicki smiles, politely, like a robot, probably doesn't speak English.

"Montgomery," Price says in a kindly, conversational tone, staring at Nicki. "How have things been?"

"Well, fellas," Montgomery says. "See y'all got the primo table. Get the check yet? Just kidding."

"Listen, Montgomery," Price says, staring at Nicki but still being unusually kind to someone I thought was a stranger. "Squash?"

"Call me," Montgomery says absently, looking over the room. "Is that Tyson? Here's my card."

"Great," Price says, pocketing it. "Thursday?"

"Can't. Going to Dallas tomorrow but…" Montgomery is already moving away from the table, hurrying toward someone else, snapping for Nicki. "Yeah, next week."

Nicki smiles at me, then looks at the floor – pink, blue, lime green tiles crisscrossing each other in triangular patterns – as if it had some kind of answer, held some sort of clue, offered a coherent reason as to why she was stuck with Montgomery. Idly I wonder if she's older than him, and then if she's flirting with me.

"Later," Price is saying.

"Later, fellas…" Montgomery is already about halfway across the room. Nicki slinks behind him. I was wrong: she does have an ass.

"Eight hundred million." McDermott whistles, shaking his head.

"College?" I ask.

"A joke," Price hints.

"Rollins?" I guess.

"Get this," McDermott says. "Hampden-Sydney."

"He's a parasite, a loser, a weasel," Van Patten concludes.

"But he's worth eight hundred million," McDermott repeats emphatically.

"Go over and give the dwarf head – will that shut you'up?" Price says. "I mean how impressed can you get, McDermott?"

"Anyway," I mention, "nice babe."

"That girl is hot," McDermott agrees.

"Affirmative." Price nods, but grudgingly.

"Oh man," Van Patten says, distressed. "I know that chick."

"Oh bullshit," we all moan.

"Let me guess," I say. "Picked her up at Tunnel, right?"

"No," he says, then after sipping his drink, "She's a model. Anorexic, alcoholic, uptight bitch. Totally French."

"What a joke you are," I say, unsure if he's lying.

"Wanna bet?"

"So what?" McDermott shrugs. "I'd fuck her."

"She drinks a liter of Stoli a day then throws it up and redrinks it, McDermott," Van Patten explains. "Total alkie."

"Total cheap alkie," Price murmurs.

"I don't care," McDermott says bravely. "She is beautiful. I want to fuck her. I want to marry her. I want her to have my children."

"Oh Jesus," Van Patten says, practically gagging. "Who wants to marry a chick who's gonna give birth to a jug of vodka and cranberry juice?"

"He has a point," I say.

"Yeah. He also wants to shack up with the Armenian chick at the bar," Price sneers. "What'll she give birth to – a bottle of Korbel and a pint of peach juice?"

"What Armenian chick?" McDermott asks, exasperated, craning his neck.

"Oh Jesus. Fuck off, you faggots." Van Patten sighs.

The maître d' stops by to say hello to McDermott, then notices we don't have our complimentary Bellinis, and runs off before any of us can stop him. I'm not sure how McDermott knows Alain so well – maybe Cecelia? – and it slightly pisses me off but I decide to even up the score a little bit by showing everyone my new business card. I pull it out of my gazelleskin wallet (Barney's, $850) and slap it on the table, waiting for reactions.

"What's that, a gram?" Price says, not apathetically.

"New card." I try to act casual about it but I'm smiling proudly. "What do you think?"

"Whoa," McDermott says, lifting it up, fingering the card, genuinely impressed. "Very nice. Take a look." He hands it to Van Patten.

"Picked them up from the printer's yesterday," I mention.

"Cool coloring," Van Patten says, studying the card closely.

"That's bone," I point out. "And the lettering is something called Silian Rail."

"Silian Rail?" McDermott asks.

"Yeah. Not bad, huh?"

"It is very cool, Bateman," Van Patten says guardedly, the jealous bastard, "but that's nothing… ." He pulls out his wallet and slaps a card next to an ashtray. "Look at this."

We all lean over and inspect David's card and Price quietly says, "That's really nice." A brief spasm of jealousy courses through me when I notice the elegance of the color and the classy type. I clench my fist as Van Patten says, smugly, "Eggshell with Romalian type…" He turns to me. "What do you think?"

"Nice," I croak, but manage to nod, as the busboy brings four fresh Bellinis.

"Jesus," Price says, holding the card up to the light, ignoring the new drinks. "This is really super. How'd a nitwit like you get so tasteful?"

I'm looking at Van Patten's card and then at mine and cannot believe that Price actually likes Van Patten's better.

Dizzy, I sip my drink then take a deep breath.

"But wait," Price says. "You ain't seen nothin' yet…" He pulls his out of an inside coat pocket and slowly, dramatically turns it over for our inspection and says, "Mine."

Even I have to admit it's magnificent.

Suddenly the restaurant seems far away, hushed, the noise distant, a meaningless hum, compared to this card, and we all hear Price's words: "Raised lettering, pale nimbus white…"

"Holy shit," Van Patten exclaims. "I've never seen…"

"Nice, very nice," I have to admit. "But wait. Let's see Montgomery's."

Price pulls it out and though he's acting nonchalant, I don't see how he can ignore its subtle off-white coloring, its tasteful thickness. I am unexpectedly depressed that I started this.

"Pizza. Let's order a pizza," McDermott says. "Doesn't anyone want to split a pizza? Red snapper? Mmmmm. Bateman wants that," he says, rubbing his hands eagerly together.

I pick up Montgomery's card and actually finger it, for the sensation the card gives off to the pads of my fingers.

"Nice, huh?" Price's tone suggests he realizes I'm jealous.

"Yeah," I say offhandedly, giving Price the card like I don't give a shit, but I'm finding it hard to swallow.

"Red snapper pizza," McDermott reminds me. "I'm fucking starving."

"No pizza," I murmur, relieved when Montgomery's card is placed away, out of sight, back in Timothy's pocket.

"Come on," McDermott says, whining. "Let's order the red upper pizza."

"Shut up, Craig," Van Patten says, eyeing a waitress taking a booth's order. "But call that hardbody over."

"But she's not ours," McDermott says, fidgeting with the menu he's yanked from a passing busboy.

"Call her over anyway," Van Patten insists. "Ask her for water or a Corona or something."

"Why her?" I'm asking no one in particular. My card lies on the table, ignored next to an orchid in a blue glass vase. Gently I pick it up and slip it, folded, back into my wallet.

"She looks exactly like this girl who works in the Georgette Klinger section of Bloomingdale's," Van Patten says. "Call her over."

"Does anyone want the pizza or not?" McDermott's getting testy.

"How would you know?" I ask Van Patten.

"I buy Kate's perfume there," he answers.

Price's gestures gather the table's attention. "Did I forget to tell everyone that Montgomery's a dwarf?"

"Who's Kate?" I say.

"Kate is the chick who Van Patter's having the affair with," Price explains, staring back at Montgomery's table.

"What happened to Miss Kittridge?" I ask.

"Yeah," Price smiles. "What about Amanda?"

"Oh god, guys, lighten up. Fidelity? Right."

"Aren't you afraid of diseases?" Price asks.

"From who, Amanda or Kate?" I ask.

"I thought we agreed that we can't get it." Van Patten's voice rises. "So-o-o-o… shithead. Shut up."

"Didn't I tell you–"

Four more Bellinis arrive. There are now eight Bellinis on the table.

"Oh my god," Price moans, trying to grab at the busboy before he scampers off.

"Red snapper pizza… red snapper pizza…" McDermott has found a mantra for the evening.

"We'll soon become targets for horny Iranian chicks," Price drones.

"It's like zero zero zero percentage whatever, you know – are you listening?" Van Patten asks.

"…snapper pizza… red snapper pizza…" Then McDermott slams his hand on the table, rocking it. "Goddamnit, isn't anybody listening to me?"

I'm still tranced out on Montgomery's card – the classy coloring, the thickness, the lettering, the print – and I suddenly raise a fist as if to strike out at Craig and scream, my voice booming, "No one wants the fucking red snapper pizza! A pizza should be yeasty and slightly bready and have a cheesy crust! The crusts here are too fucking thin because the shithead chef who cooks here overbakes everything! The pizza is dried out and brittle!" Red-faced, I slam my Bellini down on the table and when I look up our appetizers have arrived. A hardbody waitress stands looking down at me with this strange, glazed expression. I wipe a hand over my face, genially smiling up at her. She stands there looking at me as if I were some kind of monster – she actually looks scared – and I glance over at Price – for what? guidance? – and he mouths "Cigars" and pats his coat pocket.

McDermott quietly says, "I don't think they're brittle."

"Honey," I say, ignoring McDermott, taking an arm and pulling her toward me. She flinches but I smile and she lets me pull her closer. "Now we're all going to eat a nice big meal here–" I start to explain.

"But this isn't what I ordered," Van Patten says, looking at his plate. "I wanted the mussel sausage."

"Shut up." I shoot him a glance then calmly turn toward the hardbody, grinning like an idiot, but a handsome idiot. "Now listen, we are good customers here and we're probably going to order some fine brandy, cognac, who knows, and we want to relax and bask in this" – I gesture with my arm – "atmosphere. Now" – with the other hand I pull out my gazelleskin wallet – "we would like to enjoy some fine Cuban cigars afterwards and we don't want to be bothered by some loutish–"

"Loutish." McDermott nods to Van Patten and Price.

"Loutish and inconsiderate patrons or tourists who are inevitably going to complain about our innocuous little habit… So" – I press what I hope is fifty into a small-boned hand – "if you could make sure we aren't bothered while we do, we would gratefully appreciate it." I rub the hand, closing it into a fist over the bill. "And if anyone complains, well…" I pause, then warn menacingly, "Kick 'em out."

She nods mutely and backs away with this dazed, confused look on her face.

"And," Price adds, smiling, "if another round of Bellinis comes within a twenty-foot radius of this table we are going to set the maître d' on fire. So, you know, warn him."

After a long silence during which we contemplate our appetizers, Van Patten speaks up. "Bateman?"

"Yes?" I fork a piece of monkfish, push it into some of the golden caviar, then place the fork back down.

"You are pure prep perfection," he purrs.

Price spots another waitress approaching with a tray of four champagne flutes filled with pale pinkish liquid and says, "Oh for Christ sakes, this is getting ridiculous…" She sets them down, however, at the table next to us, for the four babes.

"She is hot, " Van Patten says, ignoring his scallop sausage.

"Hardbody." McDermott nods in agreement. "Definitely."

"I'm not impressed," Price sniffs. "Look at her knees."

While the hardbody stands there we check her out, and though her knees do support long, tan legs, I can't help noticing that one knee is, admittedly, bigger than the other one. The left knee is knobbier, almost imperceptibly thicker than the right knee and this unnoticeable flaw now seems overwhelming and we all lose interest. Van Patten is looking at his appetizer, stunned, and then he looks at McDermott and says, "That isn't what you ordered either. That's sushi, not sashimi."

"Jesus," McDermott sighs. "You don't come here for the food anyway."

Some guy who looks exactly like Christopher Lauder comes over to the table and says, patting me on the shoulder, "Hey Hamilton, nice tan," before walking into the men's room.

"Nice tan, Hamilton," Price mimics, tossing tapas onto my bread plate.

"Oh gosh," I say, "hope I'm not blushin'."

"Actually, where do you go, Bateman?" Van Patten asks. "For a tan."

"Yeah, Bateman. Where do you go?" McDermott seems genuinely intrigued.

"Read my lips," I say, "a tanning salon," then irritably, "like everyone else."

"I have," Van Patten says, pausing for maximum impact, "a tanning bed at… home," and then he takes a large bite out of his scallop sausage.

"Oh bullshit," I say, cringing.

"It's true," McDermott confirms, his mouth full. "I've seen it."

"That is fucking outrageous," I say.

"Why the hell is it fucking outrageous?" Price asks, pushing tapas around his plate with a fork.

"Do you know how expensive a fucking tanning salon membership is?" Van Patten asks me. "A membership for a year?"

"You're crazy," I mutter.

"Look, guys," Van Patten says. "Bateman's indignant."

Suddenly a busboy appears at our table and without asking if we're finished removes our mostly uneaten appetizers. None of us complain except for McDermott, who asks, "Did he just take our appetizers away?" and then laughs uncomprehendingly. But when he sees no one else laughing he stops.

"He took them away because the portions are so small he probably thought we were finished," Price says tiredly.

"I just think that's crazy about the tanning bed," I tell Van Patten, though secretly I think it would be a hip luxury except I really have no room for one in my apartment. There are things one could do with it besides getting a tan.

"Who is Paul Owen with?" I hear McDermott asking Price.

"Some weasel from Kicker Peabody," Price says distractedly. "He knew McCoy."

"Then why is he sitting with those dweebs from Drexel?" McDermott asks. "Isn't that Spencer Wynn?"

"Are you freebasing or what?" Price asks. "'That's not Spencer Wynn."

I look over at Paul Owen, sitting in a booth with three other guys – one of whom could be Jeff Duvall, suspenders, slicked-back hair, horn-rimmed glasses, all of them drinking champagne – and I lazily wonder about how Owen got the Fisher account. It makes me not hungry but our meals arrive almost immediately after our appetizers are taken away and we begin to eat. McDermott undoes his suspenders. Price calls him a slob. I feel paralyzed but manage to turn away from Owen and stare at my plate (the potpie a yellow hexagon, strips of smoked salmon circling it, squiggles of pea-green tomatillo sauce artfully surrounding the dish) and then I gaze at the waiting crowd. They seem hostile, drunk on complimentary Bellinis perhaps, tired of waiting hours for shitty tables near the open kitchen even though they had reservations. Van Patten interrupts the silence at our table by slamming his fork down and pushing his chair back.

"What's wrong?" I say, looking up from my plate, a fork poised over it, but my hand will not move; it's as if it appreciated the plate's setup too much, as if my hand had a mind of its own and refused to break up its design. I sigh and put the fork down, hopeless.

"Shit. I have to tape this movie on cable for Mandy." He wipes his mouth with a napkin, stands up. "I'll be back."

"Have her do it, idiot," Price says. "What are you, demented?"

"She's in Boston, seeing her dentist." Van Patten shrugs, pussywhipped.

"What in the hell are you going to do?" My voice wavers. I'm still thinking about Van Patten's card. "Call up HBO?"

"No;" he says. "I have a touch-tone phone hooked up to program a Videonics VCR programmer I bought at Hammacher Schlemmer." He walks away pulling his suspenders up.

"How hip," I say tonelessly.

"Hey, what do you want for dessert?" McDermott calls out.

"Something chocolate and flourless," he shouts back.

"Has Van Patten stopped working out?" I ask. "He looks puffy."

"It looks that way, doesn't it," Price says.

"Doesn't he have a membership at the Vertical Club?" I ask.

"I don't know," Price murmurs, studying his plate, then sitting up he pushes it away and motions to the waitress for another Finlandia on the rocks.

Another hardbody waitress approaches us tentatively, bringing over a bottle of champagne, Perrier-Jouët, nonvintage, and tells us it's complimentary from Scott Montgomery.

"Nonvintage, that weasel," Price hisses, craning his neck to find Montgomery's table. "Loser." He gives him a thumbs-up sign from across the room. "The fucker's so short I could barely see him. I think I gave thumbs-up to Conrad. I can't be sure."

"Where's Conrad?" I ask. "I should say hello to him."

"The dude who called you Hamilton," Price says.

"That wasn't Conrad," I say.

"Are you sure? It looked a helluva lot like him," he says but he's not really listening; he blatantly stares at the hardbody waitress, at exposed cleavage as she leans down to get a firmer grip on the bottle's cork.

"No. That wasn't Conrad," I say, surprised at Price's inability to recognize co-workers. "That guy had a better haircut."

We sit in silence while the hardbody pours the champagne. Once she leaves, McDermott asks if we liked the food. I tell him the potpie was fine but there was way too much tomatillo sauce. McDermott nods, says, "That's what I've heard."

Van Patten returns, mumbling, "They don't have a good bathroom to do coke in."

"Dessert?" McDermott suggests.

"Only if I can order the Bellini sorbet," Price says, yawning.

"How about just the check," Van Patten says.

"Time to go bird-dogging, gentlemen," I say.

The hardbody brings the check over. The total is $475, much less than we expected. We split it but I need the cash so I put it on my platinum AmEx and collect their bills, mostly fresh fifties. McDermott demands ten dollars back since his scallop sausage appetizer was only sixteen bucks. Montgomery's bottle of champagne is left at the table, undrunk. Outside Pastels a different bum sits in the street, with a sign that says something completely illegible. He gently asks us for some change and then, more hopefully, for some food.

'"That dude needs a facial real bad," I say.

"Hey McDermott," Price cackles. "Throw him your tie."

"Oh shit. What's that gonna get him?" I ask, staring at the bum.

"Appetizers at Jams." Van Patten laughs. He gives me high-five.

"Dude," McDermott says, inspecting his tie, clearly offended.

"Oh, sorry… cab," Price says, waving down a cab. "… and a beverage."

"Off to Tunnel," McDermott tells the driver.

"Great, McDermott," Price says, getting in the front seat. "You sound really excited."

"So what if I'm not some burned-out decadent faggot like yourself," McDermott says, getting in ahead of me.

"Did anyone know cavemen got more fiber than we do?" Price asks the cabdriver.

"Hey, I heard that too," McDermott says.

"Van Patten," I say. "Did you see the comp bottle of champagne Montgomery sent over?"

"Really?" Van Patten asks, leaning over McDermott. "Let me guess. Perrier-Jouët?"

"Bingo," Price says. "Nonvintage."

"Fucking weasel," Van Patten says.

Tunnel

All of the men outside Tunnel tonight are for some reason wearing tuxedos, except for a middle-aged homeless bum who sits by a Dumpster, only a few feet away from the ropes, holding out to anyone who pays attention a Styrofoam coffee cup, begging for change, and as Price leads us around the crowd up to the ropes, motioning to one of the doormen, Van Patten waves a crisp one-dollar bill in front of the homeless bum's face, which momentarily lights up, then Van Patten pockets it as we're whisked into the club, handed a dozen drink tickets and two VIP Basement passes. Once inside we're vaguely hassled by two more doormen – long wool coats, ponytails, probably German – who demand to know why we're not wearing tuxedos. Price handles this all suavely, somehow, either by tipping the dorks or by persuading them with his clout (probably the former). I stay uninvolved and with my back to him try to listen as McDermott complains to Van Patten about how crazy I am for putting down the pizzas made at Pastels, but it's hard to hear anything with Belinda Carlisle's version of "I Feel Free" blasting over the sound system. I have a knife with a serrated blade in the pocket of my Valentino jacket and I'm tempted to gut McDermott with it right here in the entranceway, maybe slice his face open, sever his spine; but Price finally waves us in and the temptation to kill McDermott is replaced by this strange anticipation to have a good time, drink some champagne, flirt with a hardbody, find some blow, maybe even dance to some oldies or that new Janet Jackson song I like.

It gets quieter as we move into the front hallway, heading toward the actual entrance, and we pass by three hardbodies. One is wearing a black side-buttoned notched-collar wool jacket, wool-crepe trousers and a fitted cashmere turtleneck, all by Oscar de la Renta; another is wearing a double-breasted coat of wool, mohair and nylon tweed, matching jeans-style pants and a man's cotton dress shirt, all by Stephen Sprouse; the best-looking one is wearing a checked wool jacket and high-waisted wool skirt, both from Barney's, and a silk blouse by Andra Gabrielle. They're definitely paying attention to the four of us and we repay the compliment, turning our heads – except for Price, who ignores them and says something rude.

"Jesus Christ, Price, lighten up," McDermott whines. "What's your problem? Those girls were very hot."

"Yeah, if you speak Farsi," Price says, handing McDermott a couple of drink tickets as if to placate him.

"What?" Van Patten says. "They didn't look Spanish to me."

"You know, Price, you're going to have to change your attitude if you want to get laid," McDermott says.

"You're telling me about getting laid?" Price asks Craig. "You, who scored with a hand job the other night?"

"Your outlook sucks, Price," Craig says.

"Listen, you think I act like I do around you guys when I want some pussy?" Price challenges.

"Yeah, I do," McDermott and Van Patten say at the same time.

"You know," I say, "it's possible to act differently from how one actually feels to get sex, guys. I hope I'm not causing you to relose your innocence, McDermott." I start walking faster, trying to keep up with Tim.

"No, but that doesn't explain why Tim acts like such a major asshole," McDermott says, trying to catch up with me.

"Like these girls care," Price snorts. "When I tell them what my annual income is, believe me, my behavior couldn't matter less."

"And how do you drop this little tidbit of info?" Van Patten asks. "Do you say, Here's a Corona and by the way I pull in a hundred eighty thou a year and what's your sign?"

"One ninety," Price corrects him, and then, "Yeah, I do. Subtlety is not what these girls are after."

"And what are these girls after, O knowledgeable one?" McDermott asks, bowing slightly as he walks.

Van Patten laughs and still in motion they give each other high-five.

"Hey," I laugh, "you wouldn't ask if you knew."

'They want a hardbody who can take them to Le Cirque twice a week, get them into Nell's on a regular basis. Or maybe a close personal acquaintance of Donald Trump," Price says flatly.

We hand our tickets to an okay-looking girl wearing a wool-melton duffel coat and a silk scarf from Hermès. As she lets us in, Price winks at her and McDermott is saying, "I worry about disease just walking into this place. These are some skanky chicks. I can just feel it."

"I told you, dude," Van Patten says and then patiently restates his facts. "We can't get that. It's like zero zero zero point oh one percentage–"

Luckily, the long version of "New Sensation" by INXS drowns out his voice. The music is so loud that conversation is possible only by screaming. The club is fairly packed; the only real light coming in flashes off the dance floor. Everyone is wearing a tuxedo. Everyone is drinking champagne. Since we only have two VIP Basement passes Price shoves them at McDermott and Van Patten and they eagerly wave the cards at the guy guarding the top of the stairs. The guy who lets them pass is wearing a double-breasted wool tuxedo, a cotton wing-collar shirt by Cerruti 1881 and a black and white checkered silk bow tie from Martin Dingman Neckwear.

"Hey," I shout to Price. "Why didn't we use those?"

"Because," he screams over the music, grabbing me by the collar, "we need some Bolivian Marching Powder…"

I follow him as he rushes through the narrow corridor that runs parallel to the dance floor, then into the bar and finally into the Chandelier Room, which is jammed with guys from Drexel, from Lehman's, from Kidder Peabody, from First Boston, from Morgan Stanley, from Rothschild, from Goldman, even from Citibank for Christ sakes, all of them wearing tuxedos, holding champagne flutes, and effortlessly, almost as if it were the same song, "New Sensation" segues into "The Devil Inside" and Price spots Ted Madison leaning against the railing in the back of the room, wearing a double-breasted wool tuxedo, a wing-collar cotton shirt from Paul Smith, a bow tie and cummerbund from Rainbow Neckwear, diamond studs from Trianon, patent-leather and grosgrain pumps by Ferragamo and an antique Hamilton watch from Saks; and past Madison, disappearing into darkness, are the twin train tracks which tonight are lit garishly in preppy greens and pinks and Price suddenly stops walking, stares past Ted, who smiles knowingly when he spots Timothy, and Price gazes longingly at the tracks as if they suggest some kind of freedom, embody an escape that Price has been searching for, but I shout out to him, "Hey, there's Teddy," and this breaks his gaze and he shakes his head as if to clear it, refocuses his gaze on Madison and shouts decisively, "No, that's not Madison for Christ sakes, that's Turnball," and the guy who I thought was Madison is greeted by two other guys in tuxedos and he turns his back to us and suddenly, behind Price, Ebersol wraps an arm around Timothy's neck and laughingly pretends to strangle him, then Price pushes the arm away, shakes Ebersol's hand and says, "Hey Madison."

Madison, who I thought was Ebersol, is wearing a splendid double-breasted white linen jacket by Hackett of London from Bergdorf Goodman. He has a cigar that hasn't been lit in one hand and a champagne glass, half full, in the other.

"Mr. Price," shouts Madison. "Very good to see you, sir."

"Madison," Price cries back. "We need your services."

"Looking for trouble?" Madison smiles.

"Something more immediate," Price shouts back.

"Of course," Madison shouts and then, coolly for some reason, nods at me, shouting, I think, "Bateman," and then, "Nice tan."

A guy standing behind Madison who looks a lot like Ted Dreyer is wearing a double-breasted shawl-collared tuxedo, a cotton shirt and a silk tartan bow tie, all of it, I'm fairly sure, from Polo by Ralph Lauren. Madison stands around, nodding to various people who pass by in the crush.

Finally Price loses his cool. "Listen. We need drugs," I think I hear him shout.

"Patience, Price, patience," Madison shouts. "I'll talk to Ricardo."

But he still stands there, nodding to people who push past

"Like what about now?" Price screams.

"Why aren't you wearing a tux?" Madison shouts.

"How much do we want?" Price asks me, looking desperate.

"A gram is fine," I shout. "I have to be at the office early tomorrow."

"Do you have cash?"

I can't lie, nod, hand him forty.

"A gram," Price shouts to Ted

"Hey," Madison says, introducing his friend, "this is You."

"A gram." Price presses cash into Madison s hand. "You? What?"

This guy and Madison both smile and Ted shakes his head and shouts a name I can't hear.

"No," Madison shouts, "Hugh." I think.

"Yeah. Great to meet you, Hugh." Price holds up his wrist and taps the gold Rolex with his index finger.

"I'll be right back," Madison shouts. "Keep my friend company. Use your drink tickets." He disappears. You, Hugh, Who, fades into the crowd. I follow Price over to the railings.

I want to light my cigar but don't have any matches; yet just holding it, catching some of its aroma along with the knowledge that drugs are incoming, comforts me and I take two of the drink tickets from Price and try to get him a Finlandia on the rocks which they don't have, the hardbody behind the bar informs me bitchily, but she's got a rad body and is so hot-looking that I will leave her a big tip because of this. I settle on an Absolut for Price and order a J&B on the rocks for myself. As a joke I almost bring Tim a Bellini but he seems far too edgy tonight to appreciate this so I wade back through the crowd to where he stands and hand him the Absolut and he takes it thanklessly and finishes it with one gulp, looks at the glass and grimaces, giving me an accusatory look. I shrug helplessly. He resumes staring at the train tracks as if possessed. There are very few chicks in Tunnel tonight.

"Hey, I'm going out with Courtney tomorrow night."

"Her?" he shouts back, staring at the tracks. "Great." Even with the noise I catch the sarcasm.

"Well, why not? Carruthers is out of town."

"Might as well hire someone from an escort service," he shouts bitterly, almost without thinking.

"Why?" I shout.

"Because she's gonna cost you a lot more to get laid."

"No way," I scream.

"Listen, I put up with it too," Price shouts, lightly shaking his glass. Ice cubes clank loudly, surprising me. "Meredith's the same way. She expects to be paid. They all do."

"Price?" I take a large gulp of Scotch. "You're priceless…"

He points behind him. "Where do those tracks go?" Laser lights start flashing.

"I don't know," I say after a long time, I don't even know how long.

I get bored watching Price, who is neither moving nor speaking. The only reason he occasionally turns away from the train tracks is to look for Madison or Ricardo. No women anywhere, just an army of professionals from Wall Street in tuxedos. The one female spotted is dancing alone in a corner to some song I think is called "Love Triangle." She's wearing what looks like a sequined tank top by Ronaldus Shamask and I concentrate on that but I'm in an edgy pre-coke state and I start chewing nervously on a drink ticket and some Wall Street guy who looks like Boris Cunningham blocks my view of the girl. I'm about to head off to the bar when Madison comes back – it's been twenty minutes – and he sniffs loudly, a big plastered jittery grin on his face as he shakes hands with a sweaty stern-looking Price who moves away so quickly that when Ted tries to slap him in a friendly sort of way on his back he just hits air.

I follow Price back past the bar and the dance floor, past the basement, and upstairs, past the long line for the women's room which is strange since there seem to be no women at the club tonight, and then we're in the men's room, which is empty, and Price and I slip into one of the stalls together and he bolts the door.

"I'm shaking," Price says, handing me the small envelope. "You open it."

I take it from him, carefully unfolding the edges of the tiny white package, exposing the supposed gram – it looks like less to the dim fluorescent light of the men's room.

"Jeez," Price whispers in a surprisingly gentle way. "That's not a helluva lot, is it?" He leans forward to inspect it.

"Maybe it's just the light," I mention.

"What the fuck is Ricardo's problem?" Price asks, gaping at the coke.

"Shhh," I whisper, taking out my platinum American Express card. "Let's just do it."

"Is he fucking selling it by the milligram?" Price asks. He sticks his own platinum American Express card into the powder, bringing it up to his nose to inhale it. He stands there silently for a moment, and then gasps "Oh my god" in a low, throaty voice.

"What?" I ask.

"It's a fucking milligram of… Sweet'n Low," he chokes.

I do some of it and come to the same conclusion. "It's definitely weak but I have a feeling if we do enough of it we'll be okay–" But Price is furious, red-faced and sweating; he screams at me as if this was my fault, as if buying the gram from Madison was my idea.

"I want to get high off this, Bateman," Price says slowly, his voice rising. "Not sprinkle it on my fucking All-Bran!"

"You can always put it in your café au lait," this prissy voice in the next stall cries out.

Price stares at me, eyes widening in disbelief, then flies into a rage and whirls around, pounding his fist against the side of the stall.

"Calm down," I tell him. "Let's do it anyway."

Price turns back to me and, after running a hand over his stiff, slicked-back hair, seems to relent. "I guess you're right," and then he raises his voice, "that is, if the faggot in the next stall thinks it's okay."

We wait for a sign and then the voice in the next stall finally lisps, "It's okay with me…"

"Fuck yourself!" Price roars.

"Fuck yourself," the voice mimics.

"No, fuck yourself," Price screams back, trying to scramble over the aluminum divider, but I pull him down with one hand and in the next stall the toilet flushes and the unidentified person, obviously unnerved, scampers out of the men's room. Price leans against the door of our stall and stares at me in this hopeless way. He rubs a trembling hand over his still-crimson face and shuts his eyes tightly, lips white, slight residue of cocaine under one nostril – and then quietly he says, without opening his eyes, "Okay. Let's do it."

"That's the spirit," I say. We take turns digging our respective cards into the envelope until what we can't get with the cards we press our fingers into and snort or lick off the tips then rub into our gums. I'm not anywhere near high but another J&B might give the body a false enough impression to kick in some kind of rush no matter how weak.

Stepping out of the stall we wash our hands, inspecting our reflections in the mirror, and, once satisfied, head back to the Chandelier Room. I'm beginning to wish I'd checked my overcoat (Armani) but no matter what Price says I feel kind of high and minutes later as I wait at the bar trying to get this hardbody's attention it starts not to matter. I finally have to lay a twenty on the counter to get her attention, even though I have plenty of drink tickets left. It works. Taking advantage of the drink tickets, I order two double Stolis on the rocks. She pours the drinks in front of me.

I'm feeling good and I shout out to her, "Hey, don't you go to NYU?"

She shakes her head, unsmiling.

"Hunter?" I shout.

She shakes her head again. Not Hunter.

"Columbia?" I shout – though that's a joke.

She continues to concentrate on the bottle of Stoli. I decide not to continue the conversation and just slap the drink tickets on the bar as she places the two glasses in front of me. But she shakes her head and shouts, "It's after eleven. Those aren't good anymore. It's a cash bar. That'll be twenty-five dollars," and without complaining, playing it totally cool, I pull out my gazelleskin wallet and hand her a fifty which she eyes, I swear, contemptuously and, sighing, turns to the cash register and finds my change and I say, staring at her, quite clearly but muffed by "Pump Up the Volume" and the crowd, "You are a fucking ugly bitch I want to stab to death and play around with your blood," but I'm smiling. I leave the cunt no tip and find Price who is standing again, morosely, by the railings, his hands gripping the steel bars. Paul Owen, who is handling the Fisher account, is wearing a six-button double-breasted wool tuxedo and he stands next to Price screaming something like "Ran five hundred iterations of discounted cash flow minus on an ICM PC took company cab to Smith and Wollensky."

I hand the drink to Price, while nodding to Paul. Price says nothing, not even thanks. He just holds the drink and mournfully stares at the tracks and then he squints and bends his head down to the glass and when the strobe lights start flashing, he stands up straight and murmurs something to himself.

"Aren't you high?" I ask him.

"How are you?" Owen shouts.

"Very happy," I say.

The music is one long, unending song that overlaps with other, separate songs connected only by a dull thumping beat and it obliterates all conversation which, while I'm talking to a weasel like Owen, is perfectly okay with me. There seem to be more girls in the Chandelier Room now and I try to make eye contact with one of them – model type with big tits. Price nudges me and I lean in to ask if we should perhaps get another am.

"Why aren't you wearing a tuxedo?" Owen asks, behind me.

"I'm leaving," Price shouts. "I'm getting out."

"Leaving what?" I shout back, confused.

"This," he shouts, referring to, I'm not sure but I think, his double Stoli.

"Don't," I tell him. "I'll drink it."

"Listen to me, Patrick," he screams. "I'm leaving."

"Where to?" I really am confused. "You want me to find Ricardo?"

"I'm leaving," he screams. "I… am… leaving!"

I start laughing, not knowing what he means. "Well, where are you going to go?"

"Away!" he shouts.

"Don't tell me," I shout back at him. "Merchant banking?"

"No, Bateman. I'm serious you dumb son-of-a-bitch. Leaving. Disappearing."

"Where to?" I'm still laughing, stilt confused, still shouting. "Morgan Stanley? Rehab?What?"

He looks away from me, doesn't answer, just keeps staring past the railings, trying to find the point where the tracks come to an end, find what lies behind the blackness. He's becoming a drag but Owen seems worse and I've already accidentally made eye contact with the weasel.

"Tell him don't worry, be happy," Owen shouts.

"Are you still handling the Fisher account?" What else can I say to him?

"What?" Owen asks. "Wait. Is that Conrad?"

He points at some guy wearing a shawl-collar, single-breasted wool tuxedo, a cotton shirt with a bow tie, all by Pierre Cardin, who stands near the bar, directly beneath the chandelier, holding a glass of champagne, inspecting his nails. Owen pulls out a cigar, then asks for a light. I'm bored so I go for the bar without excusing myself to ask the hardbody I want to cut up for some matches. The Chandelier Room is packed and everyone looks familiar, everyone looks the same. Cigar smoke hangs heavy, floating in midair, and the music, INXS again, is louder than ever, but building toward what? I touch my brow by mistake and my fingers come back wet. At the bar I pick up some matches. On my way back through the crowd I bump into McDermott and Van Patten, who start begging me for more drink tickets. I hand them the rest of the tickets knowing that they are no longer valid, but we're crushed together in the middle of the room and the drink tickets don't offer enough incentive for them to make the trek to the bar.

"Skanky chicks," Van Patten says. "Beware. No hardbodies."

"Basement sucks," McDermott shouts.

"Did you find drugs?" Van Patten shouts. "We saw Ricardo."

"No," I shout. "Negative. Madison couldn't find any."

"Service, damnit, service," the guy behind me shouts.

"It's useless," I shout. "I can't hear anything."

"What?" Van Patten shouts. "I can't hear anything."

Suddenly McDermott grabs my arm. "What the fuck is Price doing? Look."

As in a movie, I turn around with some difficulty, standing on my toes to see Price perched on the rails, trying to balance himself, and someone has handed him a champagne glass and drunk or wired he holds both arms out and closes his eyes, as if blessing the crowd. Behind him the strobe light continues to flash off and on and off and on and the smoke machine is going like crazy, gray mist billowing up, enveloping him. He's shouting something but I cant hear what – the room is jammed to overcapacity, the sound level an earsplitting combination of Eddie Murphy's "Party All the Time" and the constant din of businessmen – so I push my way forward, my eyes glued on Price, and manage to pass Madison and Hugh and Turnball and Cunningham and a few others. But the crowd is too densely packed and it's futile to even keep trying. Only a few of the faces are fixated on Tim, still balancing on the railing, eyes half closed, shouting something. Embarrassed, I'm suddenly glad I'm stuck in the crowd, unable to reach him, to save him from almost certain humiliation, and during a perfectly timed byte of silence I can hear Price shout, "Goodbye!" and then, the crowd finally paying attention, "Fuckheads!" Gracefully he twists his body around and hops over the railing and leaps onto the tracks and starts running, the champagne flute bobbing as he holds it out to his side. He stumbles once, twice, with the strobe light flashing, in what looks like slow motion, but he regains his composure before disappearing into blackness. A security guard sits idly by the railing as Price recedes into the tunnel. He just shakes his head, I think.

"Price! Come back!" I yell but the crowd is actually applauding his performance. "Price!" I yell once more, over the clapping. But he's gone and it's doubtful that if he did hear me he would do anything about it. Madison is standing nearby and sticks his hand out as if to congratulate me for something. "That guy's a riot."

McDermott appears behind me and pulls at my shoulder. "Does Price know about a VIP room that we don't?" He looks worried.

Outside Tunnel now, I'm high but really tired and my mouth tastes surprisingly like NutraSweet, even after drinking two more Stolis and half a J&B. Twelve-thirty and we watch limousines try to make left turns onto the West Side Highway. The three of us, Van Patten, McDermott and myself, discuss the possibilities of finding this new club called Nekenieh. I'm not really high, just sort of drunk.

"Lunch?" I ask them, yawning. "Tomorrow?"

"Can't," McDermott says. "Haircut at the Pierre."

"What about breakfast?" I suggest.

"Nope," Van Patten says. "Gio's. Manicure."

"That reminds me," I say, inspecting a hand. "I need one too."

"How about dinner?" McDermott asks me.

"I've got a date," I say. "Shit."

"What about you?" McDermott asks Van Patten.

"No can do," Van Patten says. "I've got to go to Sunmakers. Then private workout."

Office

In the elevator Frederick Dibble tells me about an item on Page Six, or some other gossip column, about Ivana Trump and then about this new Italian-Thai place on the Upper East Side that he went to last night with Family Hamilton and starts raving about this great fusilli shiitake dish. I have taken out a gold Cross pen to write down the name of the restaurant in my address book. Dibble is wearing a subtly striped double-breasted wool suit by Canali Milano, a cotton shirt by Bill Blass, a mini-glen-plaid woven silk tie by Bill Blass Signature and he's holding a Missoni Uomo raincoat. He has a good-looking, expensive haircut and I stare at it, admiringly, while he starts humming along to the Muzak station – a version of what could be "Sympathy for the Devil" – that plays throughout all the elevators in the building our offices are in. I'm about to ask Dibble if he watched The Patty Winters Show this morning – the topic was Autism – but he gets out on the floor before mine and repeats the name of the restaurant, "Thaidialano," and then "See you, Marcus" and steps out of the elevator. The doors shut. I am wearing a mini-houndstooth-check wool suit with pleated trousers by Hugo Boss, a silk tie, also by Hugo Boss, a cotton broadcloth shirt by Joseph Abboud and shoes from Brooks Brothers. I flossed too hard this morning and I can still taste the coppery residue of swallowed blood in the back of my throat. I used Listerine afterwards and my mouth feels like it's on fire but I manage a smile to no one as I step out of the elevator, brushing past a hung-over Wittenborn, swinging my new black leather attaché case from Bottega Veneta.

My secretary, Jean, who is in love with me and who I will probably end up marrying, sits at her desk and this morning, to get my attention as usual, is wearing something improbably expensive and completely inappropriate: a Chanel cashmere cardigan, a cashmere crewneck and a cashmere scarf, faux-pearl earrings, wool-crepe pants from Barney's. I pull my Walkman off from around my neck as I approach her desk. She looks up and smiles shyly.

"Late?" she asks.

"Aerobics class." I play it cool. "Sorry. Any messages?"

"Ricky Hendricks has to cancel today," she says. "He didn't say what it was he is canceling or why."

"I occasionally box with Ricky at the Harvard Club," I explain. "Anyone else?"

"And… Spencer wants to meet you for a drink at Fluties Pier 17," she says, smiling.

"When?" I ask.

"After six."

"Negative," I tell her as I walk into my office. "Cancel it."

She gets up from behind her desk and follows me in. "Oh? And what should I say?" she asks, amused.

"Just… say… no," I tell her, taking my Armani overcoat off and hanging it on the Alex Loeb coatrack I bought at Bloomingdate's.

"Just… say… no?" she repeats.

"Did you see The Patty Winters Show this morning?" I ask. ..On Autism?"

"No." She smiles as if somehow charmed by my addiction to The Patty Winters Show. "How was it?"

I pick up this morning's Wall Street Journal and scan the front page – all of it one ink-stained senseless typeset blur. "I think I was hallucinating while watching it. I don't know. I can't be sure. I don't remember," I murmur, placing the Journal back down and then, picking up today's Financial Times, "I really don't know." She just stands there waiting for instructions. I sigh and place my hands together, sitting down at the Palazzetti glass-top desk, the halogen lamps on both sides already burning. "Okay, Jean," I start. "I need reservations for three at Camols at twelve-thirty and if not there, try Crayons. All right?"

"Yes sir," she says in a joky tone and then turns to leave.

"Oh wait," I say, remembering something. "And I need reservations for two at Arcadia at eight tonight."

She turns around, her face falling slightly but still smiling. "Oh, something… romantic?"

"No, silly. Forget it," I tell her. "I'll make them. Thanks."

"I'll do it," she says.

"No. No," I say, waving her off. "Be a doll and just get me a Perrier, okay?"

"You look nice today," she says before leaving.

She's right, but I'm not saying anything – just staring across the office at the George Stubbs painting that hangs on the wall, wondering if I should move it, thinking maybe it's too close to the Aiwa AM/FM stereo receiver and the dual cassette recorder and the semiautomatic belt-drive turntable, the graphic equalizer, the matching bookshelf speakers, all in twilight blue to match the color scheme of the office. The Stubbs painting should probably go over the life-size Doberman that's in the corner ($700 at Beauty and the Beast in Trump Tower) or maybe it would look better over the Pacrizinni antique table that sits next to the Doberman. I get up and move all these sporting magazines from the forties – they cost me thirty bucks apiece – that I bought at Funchies, Bunkers, Gaks and Gleeks, and then I lift the Stubbs painting off the wall and balance it on the table then sit back at my desk and fiddle with the pencils I keep in a vintage German beer stein I got from Man-tiques. The Stubbs looks good in either place. A reproduction Black Forest umbrella stand ($675 at Hubert des Forges) sits in an other corner without, I'm just noticing, any umbrellas in it.

I put a Paul Butterfield tape in the cassette player, sit back at the desk and flip through last week's Sports Illustrated, but can't concentrate. I keep thinking about that damn tanning bed Van Patten has and I'm moved to pick up the phone and buzz jean.

"Yes?" she answers.

"Jean. Listen, keep your eyes open for a tanning bed, okay?"

"What?" she asks – incredulously, I'm sure, but she's still probably smiling.

"You know. A tanning bed," I repeat casually. "For a… tan."

"Okay…, " she says hesitantly. "Anything else?"

"And, oh shit, yeah. Remind me to return the videotapes I rented last night back to the store." I start to open and close the sterling silver cigar holder that sits by the phone.

"Anything else?" she asks, and then, flirtatiously, "How about that Perrier?"

"Yeah. That sounds good. And Jean?"

"Yes," she says, and I'm relieved by her patience.

"You don't think I'm crazy?" I ask. "I mean for wanting a tanning bed?"

There's a pause and then, "Well, it is a little unusual," she admits, and I can tell she is choosing her words very carefully. "But no, of course not. I mean how else are you going to keep up that devilishly handsome skin tone?"

"Good girl," I say before hanging up. I have a great secretary.

She comes into the office five minutes later with the Perrier, a wedge of lime and the Ransom file, which she did not need to bring, and I am vaguely touched by her almost total devotion to me. I can't help but be flattered.

"You have a table at Camols at twelve-thirty," she announces as she pours the Perrier into a glass tumbler. "Nonsmoking section."

"Don't wear that outfit again," I say, looking her over quickly. "Thanks for the Ransom file."

"Um…" She stalls, about to hand me the Perrier, and asks, "What? I didn't hear you," before setting the drink on my desk.

"I said," and I repeat myself calmly, grinning, "do not wear that outfit again. Wear a dress. A skirt or something."

She stands there only a little stunned, and after she looks down at herself, she smiles like some kind of cretin. "You don't like this, I take it," she says humbly.

"Come on," I say, sipping my Perrier. "You're prettier than that."

'Thanks, Patrick," she says sarcastically, though I bet tomorrow she'll be wearing a dress. The phone on her desk rings. I tell her I'm not here. She turns to leave.

"And high heels," I mention. "I like high heels."

She shakes her head good-naturedly as she exits, shutting my door behind her. I take out a Panasonic pocket watch with a three-inch diagonal color TV and an AM/FM radio and try to find something to watch, hopefully Jeopardy!, before turning to my computer terminal.

Health Club

The health club I belong to, Xclusive, is private and located four blocks from my apartment on the Upper West Side. In the two years since I signed up as a member, it has been remodeled three times and though they carry the latest weight machines (Nautilus, Universal, Keiser) they have a vast array of free weights which I like to use also. The club has ten courts for tennis and racquetball, aerobics classes, four aerobic dance studios, two swimming pools, Lifecycles, a Gravitron machine, rowing machines, treadmills, cross-country skiing machines, one-on-one training, cardiovascular evaluations, personalized programs, massage, sauna and steam rooms, a sun deck, tanning booths and a café with a juice bar, all of it designed by J. J. Vogel, who designed the new Norman Prager club, Petty's. Membership runs five thousand dollars annually.

It was cool this morning but seems warmer after I leave the office and I'm wearing a six-button double-breasted chalk-striped suit by Ralph Lauren with a spread-collar pencil-striped Sea Island cotton shirt with French cuffs, also by Polo, and I remove the clothes, gratefully, in the air-conditioned locker room, then slip into a pair of crow-black cotton and Lycra shorts with a white waistband and side stripes and a cotton and Lycra tank top, both by Wilkes, which can be folded so tightly that I can actually carry them in my briefcase. After getting dressed and putting my Walkman on, clipping its body to the Lycra shorts and placing the phones over my ears, a Stephen Bishop/Christopher Cross compilation tape Todd Hunter made for me, I check myself in the mirror before entering the gym and, dissatisfied, go back to my briefcase for some mousse to slick my hair back and then I use a moisturizer and, for a small blemish I notice under my lower lip, a dab of Clinique Touch-Stick. Satisfied, I turn the Walkman on, the volume up, and leave the locker room.

Cheryl, this dumpy chick who is in love with me, sits at her desk up front signing people in, reading one of the gossip columns in the Post, and she brightens up noticeably when she sees me approaching. She says hello but I move past her quickly, barely registering her presence since there's no line at the Stairmaster, for which usually one has to wait twenty minutes. With the Stairmaster you work the body's largest muscle group (between the pelvis and knees) and you can end up burning more calories per minute than by doing any other aerobic activity, except maybe Nordic skiing.

I should probably be stretching first but if I do that I'll have to wait in line – already some faggot is behind me, probably checking out my back, ass, leg muscles. No hardbodies at the gym today. Only faggots from the West Side, probably unemployed actors, waiters by night, and Muldwyn Butner of Sachs, who I went to Exeter with, over at the biceps curl machine. Butner is wearing a pair of knee-length nylon and Lycra shorts with checkerboard inserts and a cotton and Lycra tank top and leather Reeboks. I finish twenty minutes on the Stairmaster and let the overmuscled, bleached-blond, middle-aged faggot behind me use it and I commence with stretching exercises. While I stretch, The Patty Winters Show I watched this morning comes back to me. The topic was Big Breasts and there was a woman on it who had a breast reduction since she thought her tits were too big – the dumb bitch. I immediately called McDermott who was also watching it and we both ridiculed the woman through the rest of the segment. I do about fifteen minutes of stretching before heading off to the Nautilus machines.

I used to have a personal trainer whom Luis Carruthers had recommended but he came on to me last fall and I decided to develop my own fitness program which incorporates both aerobic exercises and training. With weights I alternate between free weights and weight machines that use hydraulic, pneumatic or electromechanical resistance. Most of the machines are very efficient since computerized keypads allow one to make adjustments in weight resistance without getting up. The positive aspects of the machines include minimizing muscle soreness and reducing any chance of injury. But I also like the versatility and freedom that free weights offer and the many variations in lifting that I can't get on the machines.

On the leg machines I do five sets of ten repetitions. For the back I also do five sets of ten repetitions. On the stomach crunch machine I've gotten so I can do six sets of fifteen and on the biceps curl machine I do seven sets of ten. Before moving to the free weights I spend twenty minutes on the exercise bike while reading the new issue of Money magazine. Over at the free weights I do three sets of fifteen repetitions of leg extensions, leg curls and leg presses, then three sets and twenty repetitions of barbell curls, then three sets and twenty repetitions of bentover lateral raises for the rear deltoids and three sets and twenty repetitions of latissimus pulldowns, pulley rows, dead lifts and bent-over barbell rows. For the chest I do three sets and twenty reps of incline-bench presses. For the front deltoids I also do three sets of lateral raises and seated dumbbell presses. Finally, for the triceps I do three sets and twenty reps of cable pushdowns and close-grip bench presses. After more stretching exercises to cool down I take a quick hot shower and then head to the video store where I return two tapes I rented on Monday, She-Male Reformatory and Body Double, but I rerent Body Double because I want to watch it again tonight even though I know I won't have enough time to masturbate over the scene where the woman is getting drilled to death by a power drill since I have a date with Courtney at seven-thirty at Café Luxembourg.

Date

Heading home from working out at Xclusive, and after an intense shiatsu massage, I stop at a newsstand near my building, scanning the Adults Only rack with my Walkman still on, the soothing strains of Pachelbel's Canon somehow complementing the harshly lit, laminated photographs in the magazines I flip through. I buy Lesbian Vibrator Bitches and Cunt on Cunt along with the current Sports Illustrated and the new issue of Esquire, even though I subscribe to them and both have already arrived in the mail. I wait until the stand is empty to make my purchase. The vendor says something, motions toward his hook nose, while handing me the magazines along with my change. I lower the volume and lift one of the Walkman's earphones up and ask, "What?" He touches his nose again and in a thick, nearly impenetrable accent says, I think, "Nose uise bleding." I put my Bottega Veneta briefcase down and lift a finger up to my face. It comes away red, wet with blood I reach into my Hugo Boss overcoat and bring out a Polo handkerchief and wipe the blood away, nod my thanks, slip my Wayfarer aviator sunglasses back on and leave. Fucking Iranian.

In the lobby of my building I stop at the front desk and try to get the attention of a black Hispanic doorman I don't recognize. He's on the phone to his wife or his dealer of some crack addict and stares at me as he nods, the phone cradled in the premature folds of his neck. When it dawns on him that I want to ask something, he sighs, rolls his eyes up and tells whoever is on the line to hold on. "Yeah whatchooneed?" he mumbles.

"Yes," I begin, my tone as gentle and polite as I can possibly muster. "Could you please tell the superintendent that I have a crack in my ceiling and…" I stop.

He's looking at me as if I have overstepped some kind of unspoken boundary and I'm beginning to wonder what word confused him: certainly not crack, so what was it? Superintendent? Ceiling? Maybe even please?

"Whatchoomean?" He sighs thickly, slumped back, still staring at me.

I look down at the marble floor and also sigh and tell him, "Look. I don't know. Just tell the superintendent it's Bateman… in Ten I." When I bring my head back up to see if any of this has registered I'm greeted by the expressionless mask of the doorman's heavy, stupid face. I am a ghost to this man, I'm thinking. I am something unreal, something not quite tangible, yet still an obstacle of sorts and he nods, gets back on the phone, resumes speaking in a dialect totally alien to me.

I collect my mail – Polo catalog, American Express bill, June Playboy, invitation to an office party at a new club called Bedlam – then walk to the elevator, step in while inspecting the Ralph Lauren brochure and press the button for my floor and then the Close Door button, but someone gets in right before the doors shut and instinctively I turn to say hello. It's the actor Tom Cruise, who lives in the penthouse, and as a courtesy, without asking him, I press the PH button and he nods thank you and keeps his eyes fixed on the numbers lighting up above the door in rapid succession. He is much shorter in person and he's wearing the same pair of black Wayfarers I have on. He's dressed in blue jeans, a white T-shirt, an Armani jacket.

To break the noticeably uncomfortable silence, I clear my throat and say, "I thought you were very fine in Bartender. I thought it was quite a good movie, and Top Gun too. I really thought that was good."

He looks away from the numbers and then straight at me. "It was called Cocktail," he says softly.

"Pardon?" I say, confused.

He clears his throat and says, "Cocktail. Not Bartender. The film was called Cocktail."

A long pause follows; just the sound of cables moving the elevator up higher into the building competes with the silence, obvious and heavy between us.

"Oh yeah… Right," I say, as if the title just dawned on me. "Cocktail. Oh yeah, that's right," I say. "Great, Bateman, what are you thinking about?" I shake my head as if to clear it and then, to patch things up, hold out my hand. "Hi. Pat Bateman."

Cruise tentatively shakes it.

"So," I go. "You like living in this building?"

He waits a long time before answering, "I guess."

"It's great," I say. "Isn't it?"

He nods, not looking at me, and I press the button for my floor again, an almost involuntary reaction. We stand there in silence.

"So… Cocktail," I say, after a while. "That's the name."

He doesn't say anything, doesn't even nod, but now he's looking at me strangely and he lowers his sunglasses and says, with a slight grimace, "Uh… your nose is bleeding."

I stand there rock still for a moment, before understanding that I have to do something about this, so I pretend to be suitably embarrassed, quizzically touch my nose then bring out my Polo handkerchief – already spotted brown – and wipe the blood away from my nostrils, overall handling it sort of well. "Must be the altitude." I laugh. "We're up so high."

He nods, says nothing, looks up at the numbers.

The elevator stops at my floor and when the doors open I tell Tom, "I'm a big fan. It's really good to finally meet you."

"Oh yeah, right." Cruise smiles that famous grin and jabs at the Close Door button.

The girl I'm going out with tonight, Patricia Worrell – blond, model, dropped out of Sweet Briar recently after only one semester – has left two messages on the answering machine, letting me know how incredibly important it is that I call her. While loosening my Matisse-inspired blue silk tie from Bill Robinson I dial her number and walk across the apartment, cordless phone in hand, to flip on the air-conditioning.

She answers on the third ring. "Hello?"

"Patricia. Hi. It's Pat Bateman."

"Oh hi," she says. "Listen, I'm on the other line. Can I call you back?"

"Well…," I say.

"Look, it's my health club," she says. "They've screwed up my account. I'll call you back in a sec."

"Yeah," I say and hang up.

I go into the bedroom and take off what I was wearing today: a herringbone wool suit with pleated trousers by Ciorgio Correggiari, a cotton oxford shirt by Ralph Lauren, a knit tie from Paul Stuart and suede shoes from Cole-Haan. I slip on a pair of sixty-dollar boxer shorts I bought at Barney's and do some stretching exercises, holding the phone, waiting for Patricia to call back. After ten minutes of stretching, the phone rings and I wait six rings to answer it.

"Hi," she says. "It's me, Patricia."

"Could you hold on? I've got another call."

"Oh sure," she says.

I put her on hold for two minutes, then get back on the line. "Hi," I say. "Sorry."

"That's okay."

"So. Dinner," I say. "Stop by my place around eight?"

"Well, that's what I wanted to talk to you about," she says slowly.

"Oh no," I moan. "What is it?"

"Well, see, it's like this," she begins. "There's this concert at Radio City and–"

"No, no, no," I tell her adamantly. "No music."

"But my ex-boyfriend, this keyboardist from Sarah Lawrence, he's in the backup band and–" She stops, as if she has already decided to protest my decision.

"No. Uh-uh, Patricia," I tell her firmly, thinking to myself: Damnit, why this problem, why tonight?

"Oh Patrick," she whines into the phone. "It'll be so much fun."

I am now fairly sure that the odds of having sex with Patricia this evening are quite good, but not if we attend a concert in which an ex-boyfriend (there is no such thing with Patricia) is in the backup band.

"I don't like concerts," I tell her, walking into the kitchen. I open the refrigerator and take out a liter of Evian. "I don't like concerts," I say again. "I don't like 'live' music."

"But this one isn't like the others." She lamely adds, "We have good seats."

"Listen. There's no need to argue," I say. "If you want to go, go."

"But I thought we were going to be together," she says, straining for emotion. "I thought we were going to have dinner," and then, almost definitely an afterthought, "Be together. The two of us."

"I know, I know," I say. "Listen, we should all be allowed to do exactly what we want to do. I want you to do what you want to do."

She pauses and tries a new angle. "Mis music is so beautiful, so… I know it sounds corny, but it's… glorious. The band is one of the best you'll ever see. They're funny and wonderful and the music is so great and, oh gosh, I just want you to see them so badly. We'll have a great time, I guarantee it," she says with dripping earnestness.

"No, no, you go," I say. "You have a good time."

"Patrick," she says. "I have two tickets."

"No. I don't like concerts," I say. "Live music bugs me."

"Well," she says and her voice sounds genuinely tinged with maybe real disappointment, "I'll feel bad that you're not there with me."

"I say go and have a good time." I unscrew the cap off the Evian bottle, timing my next move. "Don't worry. I'll just go to Dorsia alone then. It's okay."

There is a very long pause that I am able to translate into: Uh-huh, right, now see if you want to go to that lousy fucking concert. I take a large gulp of Evian, waiting for her to tell me what time she'll be over.

"Dorsia?" she asks and then, suspiciously, "You have reservations there? I mean for us?"

"Yes" I say, "Eight-thirty,"

"Well…" She emits a little laugh and then, faltering, "It was… well, what I mean is, I've seen them. I just wanted you to see them."

"Listen. What are you doing?" I ask. "If you're not coming I have to call someone else. Do you have Emily Hamilton's number?"

"Oh now now, Patrick, don't be… rash." She giggles nervously. "They are playing two more nights so I can see them tomorrow. Listen, calm down, okay?"

"Okay," I say. "I'm calm."

"Now what time should I be over?" Restaurant Whore asks.

"I said eight," I tell her, disgusted.

"'That's fine," she says and then in a seductive whisper, "See you at eight." She lingers on the phone as if she expects me to say something else, as if maybe I should congratulate her for making the correct decision, but I hardly have time to deal with this so I abruptly hang up.

The instant after I hang up on Patricia I dash across the room and grab the Zagat guide and flip through it until I find Dorsia. With trembling fingers I dial the number. Busy. Panicked, I put the phone on Constant Redial and for the next five minutes nothing but a busy signal, faithful and ominous, repeats itself across the line. Finally a ring and in the seconds before there's an answer I experience that rarest of occurrences – an adrenaline rush.

"Dorsia," someone answers, sex not easily identifiable, made androgynous by the wall-of-sound noise in the background. "Please hold."

It sounds slightly less noisy than a packed football stadium and it takes every ounce of courage I can muster to stay on the line and not hang up. I'm on hold for five minutes, my palm sweaty, sore from clenching the cordless phone so tightly, a fraction of me realizing the futility of this effort, another part hopeful, another fraction pissed off that I didn't make the reservations earlier or get Jean to. The voice comes back on the lire and says grufliy, "Dorsia."

I clear my throat. "Um, yes, I know it's a little late but is it possible to reserve a table for two at eight-thirty or nine perhaps?" I'm asking this with both eyes shut tight.

There is a pause – the crowd in the background a surging, deafening mass – and with real hope coursing through me I open my eyes, realizing that the maître d', god love him, is probably looking through the reservation book for a cancellation – but then he starts giggling, low at first but it builds to a high-pitched crescendo of laughter which is abruptly cut off when he slams down the receiver.

Stunned, feverish, feeling empty, I contemplate the next move, the only sound the dial tone buzzing noisily from the receiver. Gather my bearings, count to six, reopen the Zagat guide and steadily regain my concentration against the almost overwhelming panic about securing an eight-thirty reservation somewhere if not as trendy as Dorsia then at least in the next-best league. I eventually get a reservation at Barcadia for two at nine, and that only because of a cancellation, and though Patricia will probably be disappointed she might actually like Barcadia – the tables are well spaced, the lighting is dim and flattering, the food Nouvelle Southwestern – and if she doesn't, what is the bitch going to do, sue me?

I worked out heavily at the gym after leaving the office today but the tension has returned, so I do ninety abdominal crunches, a hundred and fifty push-ups, and then I run in place for twenty minutes while listening to the new Huey Lewis CD. I take a hot shower and afterwards use a new facial scrub by Caswell-Massey and a body wash by Greune, then a body moisturizer by Lubriderm and a Neutrogena facial cream. I debate between two outfits. One is a wool-crepe suit by Bill Robinson I bought at Saks with this cotton jacquard shirt from Charivari and an Armani tie. Or a wool and cashmere sport coat with blue plaid a cotton shirt and pleated wool trousers by Alexander Julian, with a polka-dot silk tie by Bill Blass. The Julian might be a little too warm for May but if Patricia's wearing this outfit by Karl Lagerfeld that I think she's going to, then maybe I will go with the Julian, because it would go well with her suit. The shoes are crocodile loafers by A. Testoni.

A bottle of Scharffenberger is on ice in a Spiros spun-aluminum bowl which is in a Christine Van der Hurd etched-glass champagne cooler which sits on a Cristofle silver-plated bar tray. The Scharffenberger isn't bad – it's not Cristal, but why waste Cristal on this bimbo? She probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway. I have a glass of it while waiting for her, occasionally rearranging the Steuben animals on the glasstop coffee table by Turchin, or sometimes I flip through the last hardcover book I bought, something by Garrison Keillor. Patricia is late.

While waiting on the couch in the living room, the Wurlitzer jukebox playing "Cherish" by the Lovin Spoonful, I come to the conclusion that Patricia is safe tonight, that I am not going to unexpectedly pull a knife out and use it on her just for the sake of doing so, that I am not going to get any pleasure watching her bleed from slits I've made by cutting her throat or slicing her neck open or gouging her eyes out. She's lucky, even though there is no real reasoning behind the luck. It could be that she's safe because her wealth, her family's wealth, protects her tonight, or it could be that it's simply my choice. Maybe the glass of Scharffenberger has deadened my impulse or maybe it's simply that I don't want to ruin this particular Alexander Julian suit by having the bitch spray her blood all over it. Whatever happens, the useless fact remains: Patricia will stay alive, and this victory requires no skill, no leaps of the imagination, no ingenuity on anyone's part. This is simply how the world, my world, moves.

She arrives thirty minutes late and I tell the doorman to let her up even though I meet her outside my door while I'm locking it. She isn't wearing the Karl Lagerfeld suit I expected, but she looks pretty decent anyway: a silk gazar blouse with rhinestone cuff links by Louis Dell'Olio and a pair of embroidered velvet pants from Saks, crystal earrings by Wendy Gell for Anne Klein and gold sling-back pumps. I wait until we're in the cab heading midtown to tell her about not going to Dorsia and then I apologize profusely, mention something about disconnected phone lines, a fire, a vengeful maître d'. She gives a little gasp when I drop the news, ignores the apologies and turns away from me to glare out the window. I try to placate her by describing how trendy, how luxurious the restaurant we're going to is, explaining its pasta with fennel and banana, its sorbets, but she only shakes her head and then I'm reduced to telling her, oh Christ, about how Barcadia has gotten much more expensive even than Dorsia, but she is relentless. Her eyes, I swear, intermittently tear.

She doesn't say anything until we're seated at a mediocre table near the back section of the main dining room and that's only to order a Bellini. For dinner I order the shad-roe ravioli with apple compote as an appetizer and the meat loaf with chèvre and quail-stock sauce for an entrée. She orders the red snapper with violets and pine nuts and for an appetizer a peanut butter soup with smoked duck and mashed squash which sounds strange but is actually quite good. New York magazine called it a "playful but mysterious little dish" and I repeat this to Patricia, who lights a cigarette while ignoring my lit match, sulkily slumped in her seat, exhaling smoke directly into my face, occasionally shooting furious looks at me which I politely ignore, being the gentleman that I can be. Once our plates arrive I just stare at my dinner – the meat loaf dark red triangles topped by chèvre which has been tinted pink by pomegranate juice, squiggles of thick tan quail stock circling the beef, and mango slices dotting the rim of the wide black plate – for a long time, a little confused, before deciding to eat it, hesitantly picking up my fork.

Even though dinner lasts only ninety minutes it feels as if we have been sitting in Barcadia for a week, and though I have no desire to visit Tunnel afterwards it seems appropriate punishment for Patricia's behavior. The bill comes to $320 – less than I expected, actually – and I put it on my platinum AmEx. In the cab heading downtown, my eyes locked on the meter, our driver tries to make conversation with Patricia who completely ignores him while checking her makeup in a Gucci compact, adding lipstick to an already heavily colored mouth. There was a baseball game on tonight that I think I forgot to videotape so I won't be able to watch it when I get home but I remember that I bought two magazines after work today and I can always spend an hour or so poring over those. I check my Rolex and realize that if we have one drink, maybe two, I'll get home in time for Late Night with David Letterman. Though physically Patricia is appealing and I wouldn't mind having sex with her body, the idea of treating her gently, of being a kind date, of apologizing for this evening, for not being able to get into Dorsia (even though Barcadia is twice as expensive for Christ sakes), rubs me the wrong way. The bitch is probably pissed we don't have a limo.

The cab stops outside Tunnel. I pay the fare and leave the driver a decent tip and hold the door open for Patricia who ignores my hand when I try to help her step out of the cab. No one stands outside the ropes tonight. In fact the only person on Twenty-fourth Street is a bum who sits by a Dumpster, writhing in pain, moaning for change or food, and we pass quickly by him as one of the three doormen who stand behind the ropes lets us in, another one patting me on the back saying, "How are you, Mr. McCullough?" I nod, opening the door for Patricia, and before following her in say, "Fine, uh, Jim," and I shake his hand.

Once inside, after paying fifty dollars for the two of us, I head immediately to the bar without really caring if Patricia follows. I order a J&B on the rocks. She wants a Perrier, no lime, and orders this herself. After I down half the drink, leaning against the bar and checking the hardbody waitress out, something suddenly seems out of place; it's not the lighting or INXS singing "New Sensation" or the hardbody behind the bar. It's something else. When I slowly turn around to take in the rest of the club I'm confronted by space that is completely deserted. Patricia and myself are the only two customers in the entire club. We are, except for the occasional hardbody, literally the only two people in Tunnel. "New Sensation" becomes "The Devil Inside" and the music is full blast but it feels less loud because there isn't a crowd reacting to it, and the dance floor looks vast when empty.

I move away from the bar and decide to check out the club's other areas, expecting Patricia to follow but she doesn't. No one guards the stairs that lead to the basement and as I step down them the music from upstairs changes, melds itself into Belinda Carlisle singing "I Feel Free." The basement has one couple in it who look like Sam and Ilene Sanford but it's darker down here, warmer, and I could be wrong. I move past them as they stand by the bar drinking champagne and head over toward this extremely well-dressed Mexican-looking guy sitting on a couch. He's wearing a double-breasted wool jacket and matching trousers by Mario Valentino, a cotton T-shirt by Agnes B. and leather slip-ons (no socks) by Susan Bennis Warren Edwards, and he's with a good-looking muscular Eurotrash chick – dirty blond, big tits, tan, no makeup, smoking Merit Ultra Lights – who has on a cotton gown with a zebra print by Patrick Kelly and silk and rhinestone high-heeled pumps.

I ask the guy if his name is Ricardo.

He nods. "Sure."

I ask for a gram, tell him Madison sent me. I pull my wallet out and hand over a fifty and two twenties. He asks the Eurotrash chick for her purse. She hands him a velvet bag by Anne Moore. Ricardo reaches in and hands me a tiny folded envelope. Before I leave, the Eurotrash girl tells me she likes my gazelleskin wallet. I tell her I would like to tit-fuck her and then maybe cut her arms off, but the music, George Michael singing "Faith," is too loud and she can't hear me.

Back upstairs I find Patricia where I left her, alone at the bar, nursing a Perrier.

"Listen, Patrick," she says, her attitude relenting. "I just want you to know that I'm–"

"A bitch? Listen, do you want to do some coke?" I shout, cutting her line off.

"Uh, yeah… Sure." She's wildly confused.

"Come on," I yell, taking her hand.

She puts her drink down on the bar and follows me through the deserted club, up the stairs toward the rest rooms. There's really no reason why we couldn't do it downstairs but that seems tacky and so we do most of it in one of the men's room stalls. Back outside the men's room I sit on a couch and smoke one of her cigarettes while she goes downstairs to get us drinks.

She comes back apologizing for her behavior earlier this evening. "I mean I loved Barcadia, the food was outstanding and that mango sorbet, ohmygod I was in heaven. Listen, it's okay that we didn't go to Dorsia. We can always go some other night and I know that you probably tried to get us in but it's just so hot right now. But, oh yeah, I really loved the food at Barcadia. How long has it been open? I think it's been three, four months. I read a great review in New York or maybe it was Gourmet… But anyway, do you want to come with me to this band tomorrow night, or maybe we can go to Dorsia and then see Wallace's band or maybe go to Dorsia after, but maybe it's not even open that late. Patrick, I'm serious: you should really see them. Avatar is such a great lead singer and I actually thought I was in love with him once – well, actually I was in lust, not love. I really liked Wallace then but he was into this whole investment banking thing and he couldn't handle the routine and he broke down, it was the acid not the cocaine that did it. I mean I know but so when that all fell apart I knew that it would be, like, best to just hang out and not deal with

J&B I am thinking. Glass of J&B in my right hand I am thinking. Hand I am thinking. Charivari. Shirt from Charivari. Fusilli I am thinking. Jami Gertz I am thinking. I would like to fuck Jami Gertz I am thinking. Porsche 911. A sharpei I am thinking. I would like to own a sharpei. I am twenty-six years old I am thinking. I will be twenty-seven next year. A Valium. I would like a Valium. No, two Valium I am thinking. Cellular phone I am thinking.

Dry Cleaners

The Chinese dry cleaners I usually send my bloody clothes to delivered back to me yesterday a Soprani jacket, two white Brooks Brothers shirts and a tie from Agnes B. still covered with flecks of someone's blood. I have a lunch appointment at noon – in forty minutes – and beforehand I decide to stop by the cleaners and complain. In addition to the Soprani jacket, the shirts and tie, I bring along a bag of bloodstained sheets that also need cleaning. The Chinese dry cleaners is located twenty blocks up from my apartment on the West Side, almost by Columbia, and since I've never actually been there before the distance shocks me (previously my clothes were always picked up after a phone call from my apartment and then were delivered back within twenty-four hours). Because of this excursion I have no time for a morning workout, and since I overslept, owing to a late-night–predawn coke binge with Charles Griffin and Hilton Ashbury that started innocently enough at a magazine party none of us were invited to at M.K. and ended at my automated teller sometime around five, I've missed The Patty Winters Show which actually was a repeat of an interview with the President, so it doesn't really matter, I guess.

I'm tense, my hair is slicked back, Wayfarers on, my skull is aching, I have a cigar – unlit – clenched between my teeth, am wearing a black Armani suit, a white cotton Armani shirt and a silk tie, also by Armani. I look sharp but my stomach is doing flip-flops, my brain is churning. On my way into the Chinese cleaners I brush past a crying bum, an old man, forty or fifty, fat and grizzled, and just as I'm opening the door I notice, to top it off, that he's also blind and I step on his foot, which is actually a stump, causing him to drop his cup, scattering change all over the sidewalk. Did I do this on purpose? What do you think? Or did I do this accidentally?

Then for ten minutes I point out the stains to the tiny old Chinese woman who, I'm supposing, runs the cleaners and she's even brought her husband out from the back of the shop since I can't understand a word she's saying. But the husband remains utterly mute and doesn't bother to translate. The old woman keeps jabbering in what I guess is Chinese and finally I have to interrupt.

"Listen, wait…" I hold up a hand with the cigar in it, the Soprani jacket draped over my other arm. "You're not… shhh, wait… shhh, you are not giving me valid reasons."

The Chinese woman keeps squealing something, grabbing at the arms of the jacket with a tiny fist. I brush her hand away and, leaning in, speak very slowly. "What are you trying to say to me?"

She keeps yipping, wild-eyed. The husband holds the two sheets he's taken out of the bag in front of him, both splattered with dried blood, and stares at them dumbly.

"Bleach-ee?" I ask her. "Are you trying to say bleach-ee?" I shake my head, disbelieving. "Bleach-ee? Oh my god."

She keeps pointing at the sleeves on the Soprani jacket and when she turns to the two sheets behind her, the yipping voice rises another octave.

"Two things," I say, talking over her. "One. You can't bleach a Soprani. Out of the question. Two" – and then louder, still over her – "two, I can only get these sheets in Santa Fe. These are very expensive sheets and I really need them clean… . " But she's still talking and I'm nodding as if I understand her gibberish, then I break into a smile and lean right into her face. "If-you-don't-shut-your-fucking-mouth-I-will-kill-you-are-you-understanding-me?"

The Chinese woman's panicked jabbering speeds up incoherently, her eyes still wide. Her face overall, maybe because of the wrinkles, seems oddly expressionless. Pathetically I point at the stains again, but then realize this is useless and lower my hand, straining to understand what she's saying. Then, casually, I cut her off, talking over her again.

"Now listen, I have a very important lunch meeting – I check my Rolex – "at Hubert's in thirty minutes" – then looking back at the woman's flat, slanty – eyed face-"and I need those… no, wait, twenty minutes. I have a lunch meeting at Hubert's in twenty minutes with Ronald Harrison and I need those sheets cleaned by this afternoon."

But she's not listening; she keeps blabbering something in the same spastic, foreign tongue. I have never firebombed anything and I start wondering how one goes about it – what materials are involved, gasoline, matches… or would it be lighter fluid?

"Listen." I snap out of it, and sincerely, in singsong, leaning into her face – her mouth moving chaotically, she turns to her husband, who nods during a rare, brief pause – I tell her, "I cannot understand you."

I'm laughing, appalled at how ridiculous this situation is, and slapping a hand on the counter look around the shop for someone else to talk to, but it's empty, and I mutter, "This is crazy." I sigh, rubbing a hand over my face, and then abruptly stop laughing, suddenly furious. I snarl at her, "You're a fool. I can't cope with this."

She jabbers something back at me.

"What?" I ask spitefully. "You didn't hear me? You want some ham? Is that what you just said? You want… some ham?"

She grabs at the arm of the Soprani jacket again. Her husband stands behind the counter, sullen and detached.

"You… are… a… fool!" I bellow.

She jabbers back, undaunted, pointing relentlessly at the stains on the sheets.

"Stupid bitch-ee? Understand?" I shout, red-faced, on the verge of tears. I'm shaking and I yank the jacket away from her, muttering "Oh Christ."

Behind me the door opens and a bell chimes and I compose myself. Close my eyes, breathe in deeply, remind myself about stopping in at the tanning salon after lunch, maybe Hermès or–

"Patrick?"

Jolted by the sound of a real voice, I turn around and it's someone I recognize from my building, someone I've seen a number of times lingering in the lobby, staring admiringly at me whenever I run into her. She's older than me, late twenties, okay-looking, a little overweight, wearing a jogging suit – from where, Bloomingdale's? I have no idea – and she's… beaming. Taking off her sunglasses she offers a wide smile. "Hi Patrick, I thought it was you."

Having no idea what her name is I sigh a muted "Hello" then very quickly mumble something that resembles a woman's name and then I just stare at her, stumped, drained, trying to control my viciousness, the Chinese woman still screeching behind me. Finally I clap my hands together and say, "Well."

She stands there, confused, until nervously moving toward the counter, ticket in hand. "Isn't it ridiculous? Coming all the way up here, but you know they really are the best."

'Then why can't they get these stains out?" I ask patiently, still smiling, both eyes closed until the Chinese woman has finally shut up and then I open them. "I mean can you talk to these people or something?" I delicately propose. "I'm not getting anywhere."

She moves toward the sheet the old man holds up. "Oh my, I see," she murmurs. The moment she tentatively touches the sheet the old lady starts jabbering away, and ignoring her, the girl asks me, "What are those?" She looks at the stains again and says, "Oh my."

"Um, well…" I look over at the sheets, which are really quite a mess. "It's, um, cranberry juice, cranapple juice."

She looks at me and nods, as if unsure, then timidly ventures, "It doesn't look like cranberry, I mean cranapple, to me."

I stare at the sheets for a long time before stammering, "Well, I mean, um, it's really… Bosco. You know, like…" I pause. "Like a Dove Bar. It's a Dove Bar… Hershey's Syrup?"

"Oh yeah." She nods, understanding, maybe a hint of skepticism. "Oh my."

"Listen, if you could talk to them" – I reach over, yanking the sheet out of the old man's hand – "I would really appreciate it." I fold the sheet and lay it gently on the counter, then, checking my Rolex again, explain, "I'm really late. I have a lunch appointment at Hubert's in fifteen minutes." I move toward the door of the dry cleaners and the Chinese woman starts yapping again, desperately, shaking a finger at me. I glare at her, forcing myself not to mimic the hand gestures.

"Hubert's? Oh really?" the girl asks, impressed. "It moved uptown, right?"

"Yeah, well, oh boy, listen, I've got to go." I pretend to spot an oncoming cab across the street through the glass door and, faking gratitude, tell her, "Thank you, uh… Samantha."

"It's Victoria."

"Oh right, Victoria." I pause. "Didn't I say that?"

"No. You said Samantha."

"'Well, I'm sorry." I smile. "I'm having problems."

"Maybe we could have lunch one day next week?" she suggests hopefully, moving toward me while I'm backing out of the store. "You know, I'm downtown near Wall Street quite often."

"Oh, I don't know, Victoria." I force an apologetic grin, avert my gaze from her thighs. "I'm at work all the time."

"Well, what about, oh, you know, maybe a Saturday?" Victoria asks, afraid she'll offend.

"Next Saturday?" I ask, checking my Rolex again.

"Yeah." She shrugs timidly.

"Oh. Can't, I'm afraid. Matinee of Les Misérables," I lie. "Listen. I've really got to go. I'll…" I run a hand over my hair and mutter "Oh Christ" before forcing myself to add, "I'll call you."

"Okay." She smiles, relieved. "Do."

I glare at the Chinese woman once more and rush the hell out of there, dashing after a nonexistent cab, and then I slow down a block or two up past the cleaners and-

. suddenly I find myself eyeing a very pretty homeless girl sitting on the steps of a brownstone on Amsterdam, a Styrofoam coffee cup resting on the step below her feet, and as if guided by radar I move toward her, smiling, fishing around in my pocket for change. Her face seems too young and fresh and tan for a homeless person's; it makes her plight all the more heartbreaking. I examine her carefully in the seconds it takes to move from the edge of the sidewalk to the steps leading up to the brownstone where she sits, her head bowed down, staring dumbly into her empty lap. She looks up, unsmiling, after she notices me standing over her. My nastiness vanishes and, wanting to offer something kind, something simple, I lean in, still staring, eyes radiating sympathy into her blank, grave face, and dropping a dollar into the Styrofoam cup I say, "Good luck."

Her expression changes and because of this I notice the book – Sartre – in her lap and then the Columbia book bag by her side and finally the tan-colored coffee in the cup and my dollar bill floating in it and though this all happens in a matter of seconds it's played out in slow motion and she looks at me, then at the cup, and shouts, "Hey, what's your goddamn problem?" and frozen, hunched over the cup, cringing, I stutter, "I didn't… I didn't know it was… full," and shaken, I walk away, hailing a taxi, and heading toward Hubert's in it I hallucinate the buildings into mountains, into volcanoes, the streets become jungles, the sky freezes into a backdrop, and before stepping out of the cab I have to cross my eyes in order to clear my vision. Lunch at Hubert's becomes a permanent hallucination in which I find myself dreaming while still awake.

Harry's

"You should match the socks with the trousers," Todd Hamlin tells Reeves, who is listening intently, stirring his Beefeater on the rocks with a swizzle stick.

"Who says?" George asks.

"Now listen," Hamlin patiently explains. "If you wear gray trousers, you wear gray socks. It's as simple as that."

"But wait," I interrupt. "What if the shoes are black?"

"That's okay," Hamlin says, sipping his martini. "But then the belt has to match the shoes."

"So what you're saying is that with a gray suit you can either wear gray or black socks," I ask.

"Er… yeah," Hamlin says, confused. "I guess. Did I say that?"

"See, Hamlin," I say, "I disagree about the belt since the shoes are so far away from the actual belt line. I think you should concentrate on wearing a belt that coordinates with the trousers."

"He has a point," Reeves says.

The three of us, Todd Hamlin and George Reeves and myself, are sitting in Harry's and it's a little after six. Hamlin is wearing a suit by Lubiam, a great-looking striped spread-collar cotton shirt from Burberry, a silk tie by Resikeio and a belt from Ralph Lauren. Reeves is wearing a six-button double-breasted suit by Christian Dior, a cotton shirt, a patterned silk tie by Claiborne, perforated cap-toe leather lace-ups by Allen-Edmonds, a cotton handkerchief in his pocket, probably from Brooks Brothers; sunglasses by Lafont Paris lie on a napkin by his drink and a fairly nice attaché case from T. Anthony rests on an empty chair by our table. I'm wearing a two-button single-breasted chalk-striped wool-flannel suit, a multicolored candy-striped cotton shirt and a silk pocket square, all by Patrick Aubert, a polka-dot silk tie by Bill Blass and clear prescription eyeglasses with frames by Lafont Paris. One of our CD Walkman headsets lies in the middle of the table surrounded by drinks and a calculator. Reeves and Hamlin left the office early today for facials somewhere and they both look good, faces pink but tan, hair short and slicked back. The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Real-Life Rambos.

"But what about vests?" Reeves asks Todd. "Aren't they… out?"

"No, George," Hamlin says. "Of course not."

"No," I agree. "Vests have never been out of fashion."

"Well, the question really is – how should they be worn?" Hamlin inquires.

"They should fit–" Reeves and I start simultaneously.

"Oh sorry," Reeves says. "Go ahead."

"No, it's okay," I say. "You go ahead."

"I insist," George says.

"Well, they should fit trimly around the body and cover the waistline," I say. "It should peek just above the waist button of the suit jacket. Now if too much of the vest appears, it'll give the suit a tight, constricted look that you don't want."

"Uh-huh," Reeves says, nearly mute, looking confused. "Right. I knew that."

"I need another J&B," I say, getting up. "Guys?"

"Beefeater on rocks with a twist." Reeves, pointing at me.

Hamlin. "Martini."

"Sure thing." I walk over toward the bar and while waiting for Freddy to pour the drinks I hear some guy, I think it's this Greek William Theodocropopolis, from First Boston, who's wearing a sort of tacky wool jacket in a houndstooth check and an okay-looking shirt, but he also has on a super-looking cashmere tie from Paul Stuart that makes the suit look better than it deserves to, and he's telling some guy, another Greek, drinking a Diet Coke, "So listen, Sting was at Chernoble – you know that place the guys who opened Tunnel opened – and so this was on Page Six and someone drives up in a Porsche 911 and in the car was Whitney and–"

Back at our table Reeves is telling Hamlin about how he taunts the homeless in the streets, about how he hands a dollar to them as he approaches and then yanks it away and pockets it right when he passes the bums.

"Listen, it works," he insists. "They're so shocked they shut up."

"Just… say… no," I tell him, setting the drinks on the table. "That's all you have to say."

"Just say no?" Hamlin smiles. "It works?"

"Well, actually only with pregnant homeless women," I admit.

"I take it you haven't tried the just-say-no approach with the seven-foot gorilla on Chambers Street?" Reeves asks. "The one with the crack pipe?"

"Listen, has anyone heard of this club called Nekenieh?" Reeves asks.

From my POV Paul Owen sits at a table across the room with someone who looks a lot like Trent Moore, or Roger Daley, and some other guy who looks like Frederick Connell. Moore's grandfather owns the company he works at. Trent is wearing a mini-houndstooth-check worsted wool suit with multicolored overplaid.

"Nekenieh?" Hamlin asks. "What's Nekenieh?"

"Guys, guys," I say. "Who's sitting with Paul Owen over there? Is that Trent Moore?"

"Where?" Reeves.

'They're getting up. That table," I say. "Those guys."

"Isn't that Madison? No, it's Dibble," Reeves says. He puts on his clear prescription eyeglasses just to make sure.

"No," Hamlin says. "It's Trent Moore."

"Are you sure?" Reeves asks.

Paul Owen stops by our table on his way out. He's wearing sunglasses by Persol and he's carrying a briefcase by Coach Leatherware.

"Hello, men," Owen says and he introduces the two guys he's with, Trent Moore and someone named Paul Denton.

Reeves and Hamlin and I shake their hands without standing up. George and Todd start talking to Trent, who is from Los Angeles and knows where Nekenieh is located. Owen turns his attention my way, which makes me slightly nervous.

"How have you been?" Owen asks.

"I've been great," I say. "And you?"

"Oh terrific," he says. "How's the Hawkins account going?"

"It's…" I stall and then continue, faltering momentarily, "It's… all right."

"Really?" he asks, vaguely concerned. "That's interesting," he says, smiling, hands clasped together behind his back. "Not great?"

"Oh well," I say. "You… know."

"And how's Marcia?" he asks, still smiling, looking over the room, not really listening to me. "She's a great girl."

"Oh yes," I say, shaken. "I'm… lucky."

Owen has mistaken me for Marcus Halberstam (even though Marcus is dating Cecelia Wagner) but for some reason it really doesn't matter and it seems a logical faux pas since Marcus works at P & P also, in fact does the same exact thing I do, and he also has a penchant for Valentino suits and clear prescription glasses and we share the same barber at the same place, the Pierre Hotel, so it seems understandable; it doesn't irk me. But Paul Denton keeps staring at me, or trying not to, as if he knows something, as if he's not quite sure if he recognizes me or not, and it makes me wonder if maybe he was on that cruise a long time ago, one night last March. If that's the case, I'm thinking, I should get his telephone number or, better yet, his address.

"Well, we should have drinks," I tell Owen.

"Great," he says. "Let's. Here's my card."

"Thanks," I say, looking at it closely, relieved by its crudeness, before slipping it into my jacket. "Maybe I'll bring…" I pause, then carefully say, "Marcia?"

"That would be great," he says. "Hey, have you been to that Salvadorian bistro on Eighty-third?" he asks. "We're eating there tonight."

"Yeah. I mean no," I say. "But I've heard it's quite good." I smile weakly and take a sip of my drink.

"Yes, so have I." He checks his Rolex. "Trent? Denton? Let's split. Reservation's in fifteen.minutes."

Goodbyes are said and on their way out of Harry's they stop by the table Dibble and Hamilton are sitting at, or at least I think it's Dibble and Hamilton. Before they leave, Denton looks over at our table, at me, one last time, and he seems panicked, convinced of something by my presence, as if he recognized me from somewhere, and this, in turn, freaks me out.

"The Fisher account," Reeves says.

"Oh shit," I say. "Don't remind us."

"Lucky bastard," Hamlin says.

"Has anyone seen his girlfriend?" Reeves asks. "Laurie Kennedy? Total hardbody."

"I know her," I say, admit, "I knew her."

"Why do you say it like that?" Hamlin asks, intrigued. "Why does he say it like that, Reeves?"

"Because he dated her," Reeves says casually.

"How did you know that?" I ask, smiling.

"Girls dig Bateman." Reeves sounds a little drunk. "He's GQ. You're total GQ, Bateman."

'"Thanks guy, but…" I can't tell if he's being sarcastic but it makes me feel proud in a way and I try to downplay my good looks by saying, "She's got a lousy personality."

"Oh Christ, Bateman," Hamlin groans. "What does that mean?"

"What?" I say. "She does."

"So what? It's all looks. Laurie Kennedy is a babe," Hamlin says, emphatically. "Don't even pretend you were interested for any other reason."

"If they have a good personality then… something is very wrong," Reeves says, somehow confused by his own statement.

"If they have a good personality and they are not great-looking" – Reeves holds his hands up, signifying something – "who fucking cares?"

"Well, let's just say hypothetically, okay? What if they have a good personality?" I ask, knowing full well what a hopeless, asinine question it is.

"Fine. Hypothetically even better but–" Hamlin says.

"I know, I know." I smile.

"There are no girls with good personalities," we all say in unison, laughing, giving each other high-five.

"A good personality," Reeves begins, "consists of a chick who has a little hardbody and who will satisfy all sexual demands without being too slutty about things and who will essentially keep her dumb fucking mouth shut."

"Listen," Hamlin says, nodding in agreement. "The only girls with good personalities who are smart or maybe funny or halfway intelligent or even talented – though god knows what the fuck that means – are ugly chicks."

"Absolutely." Reeves nods.

"And this is because they have to make up for how fucking unattractive they are," Hamlin says, sitting back in his chair.

"Well, my theory's always been," I start, "men are only here to procreate, to carry on the species, you know?"

They both nod.

"And so the only way to do that," I continue, choosing words carefully, "is… to get turned on by a little hardbody, but sometimes money or fame"

"No buts," Hamlin says, interrupting. "Bateman, are you telling me that you're gonna make it with Oprah Winfrey – hey, she's rich, she's powerful – or go down on Nell Carter – hey, she's got a show on Broadway, a great voice, residuals pouring in?"

"Wait," Reeves says. "Who is Nell Carter?"

"I don't know," I say, confused by the name. "She owns Nell's, I guess."

"Listen to me, Bateman," Hamlin says. "The only reason chicks exist is to get us turned on, like you said. Survival of the species, right? It's as simple" – he lifts an olive out of his drink and pops it into his mouth – "as that."

After a deliberate pause I say, "Do you know what Ed Gein said about women?"

"Ed Gein?" one of them asks. "Maître d' at Canal Bar?"

"No," I say, "Serial killer, Wisconsin in the fifties. He was an interesting guy."

"You've always been interested in stuff like that, Bateman," Reeves says, and then to Hamlin, "Bateman reads these biographies all the time: Ted Bundy and Son of Sam and Fatal Vision and Charlie Manson. All of them."

"So what did Ed say?" Hamlin asks, interested.

"He said," I begin, " 'When I see a pretty girl walking down the street I think two things. One part of me wants to take her out and talk to her and be real nice and sweet and treat her right.' " I stop, finish my J&B in one swallow.

"What does the other part of him think?" Hamlin asks tentatively.

"What her head would look like on a stick," I say.

Hamlin and Reeves look at each other and then back at me before I start laughing, and then the two of them uneasily join in.

"Listen, what about dinner?" I say, casually changing subjects.

"How about that Indian-Californian place on the Upper West Side?" Hamlin suggests.

"Fine with me," I say.

"Sounds good," Reeves says.

"Who'll make the rez?" Hamlin asks.

Deck Chairs

Courtney Lawrence invites me out to dinner on Monday night and the invitation seems vaguely sexual so I accept, but part of the catch is that we have to endure dinner with two Camden graduates, Scott and Anne Smiley, at a new restaurant they chose on Columbus called Deck Chairs, a place I had my secretary research so thoroughly that she presented me with three alternative menus of what I should order before I left the office today. The things that Courtney told me about Scott and Anne – he works at an advertising agency, she opens restaurants with her father's money, most recently 1968 on the Upper East Side – on the interminable cab ride uptown was only slightly less interesting than hearing about Courtney's day: facial at Elizabeth Arden, buying kitchen utensils at the Pottery Barn (all of this, by the way, on lithium) before coming down to Harry's where we had drinks with Charles Murphy and Rusty Webster, and where Courtney forgot the bag of Pottery Barn utensils she'd put underneath our table. The only detail of Scott and Anne's life that seems even remotely suggestive to me is that they adopted a Korean boy of thirteen the year after they married, named him Scott Jr. and sent him to Exeter, where Scott had gone to school four years before I attended.

"They better have reservations," I warn Courtney in the cab.

"Just don't smoke a cigar, Patrick," she says slowly.

"Is that Donald Trump's car?" I ask, looking over at the limousine stuck next to us in gridlock.

"Oh god, Patrick. Shut up," she says, her voice thick and drugged.

"You know, Courtney, I have a Walkman in my Bottega Veneta briefcase I could easily put on," I say. "You should take some more lithium. Or have a Diet Coke. Some caffeine might get you out of this slump."

"I just want to have a child," she says softly, staring out the window, to no one. "Just… two… perfect… children."

"Are you talking to me or Shlomo here?" I sigh, but loudly enough for the Israeli driver to hear me, and predictably Courtney doesn't say anything.

The Patty Winters Show this morning was about Perfumes and Lipsticks and Makeups. Luis Carruthers, Courtney's boyfriend, is out of town in Phoenix and will not be back in Manhattan until late Thursday. Courtney is wearing a wool jacket and vest, a wool jersey T-shirt and wool gabardine pants by Bill Blass, crystal, enamel and gold plated earrings by Gerard E. Yosca and silk-satin d'Orsay pumps from Manolo Blahnik. I am wearing a custom-made tweed jacket, pants and a cotton shirt from the Alan Flusser shop and a silk tie by Paul Stuart. There was a twenty-minute wait at the Stairmaster machine at my health club this morning. I wave to a beggar on the corner of Forty-ninth and Eighth, then give him the finger.

Tonight the talk centers around Elmore Leonard's new book – which I haven't read; certain restaurant critics – who I have; the British sound track from Les Misérables versus the American cast recording; that new Salvadorian bistro on Second and Eighty-third; and which gossip columns are better written – the Post's or the News's. It seems that Anne Smiley and I share a mutual acquaintance, a waitress from Abetone's in Aspen who I raped with a can of hairspray last Christmas when I was skiing there over the holidays. Deck Chairs is crowded, earsplitting, the acoustics lousy because of the high ceilings, and if I'm not mistaken, accompanying the din is a New Age version of "White Rabbit" blaring from speakers mounted in the ceiling corners. Someone who looks like Forrest Atwater – slicked-back blond hair, nonprescription redwood-framed glasses, Armani suit with suspenders – is sitting with Caroline Baker, an investment banker at Drexel, maybe, and she doesn't look too good. She needs more makeup, the Ralph Lauren tweed outfit is too severe. They're at a mediocre table up front by the bar.

"It's called California classic cuisine," Anne tells me, leaning in close, after we ordered. The statement deserves a reaction, I suppose, and since Scott and Courtney are discussing the merits of the Post's gossip column, it's up to me to reply.

"You mean compared to, say, California cuisine?" I ask carefully, measuring each word, then lamely add, "Or post-California cuisine?"

"I mean I know it sounds so trendy but there is a world of difference. It's subtle," she says, "but it's there."

"I've heard of post-California cuisine," I say, acutely aware of the design of the restaurant: the exposed pipe and the columns and the open pizza kitchen and the… deck chairs. "In fact I've even eaten it. No baby vegetables? Scallops in burritos? Wasabi crackers? Am I on the right track? And by the way, did anyone ever tell you that you look exactly like Garfield but run over and skinned and then someone threw an ugly Ferragamo sweater over you before they rushed you to the vet? Fusilli? Olive oil on Brie?"

"Exactly," Anne says, impressed. "Oh Courtney, where did you find Patrick? He's so knowledgeable about things. I mean Luis's idea of California cuisine is half an orange and some gelati," she gushes, then laughs, encouraging me to laugh with her, which I do, hesitantly.