Glamorama

22

After the shower, I'm led downstairs at gunpoint (which Bobby thought was excessive, needless, but not Bruce Rhinebeck) to a room hidden within a room in what I assume is some kind of basement in the house in the 8th or the 16th. This is where the French premier's son, chained to a chair, is slowly being poisoned. He's naked, gleaming with sweat, confetti floats on a puddle of blood congealing on the floor beneath him. His chest is almost completely blackened, both nipples are missing, and because of the poison Bruce keeps administering he's having trouble breathing. Four teeth have been removed and wires are stretching his face apart, some strung through broken lips, causing him to look as if he's grinning at me. Another wire is inserted into a wound on his stomach, attaching itself to his liver, lashing it with electricity. He keeps fainting, is revived, faints again. He's fed more poison, then morphine, as Bentley videotapes.

It smells sweet in the room underground and I'm trying to avert my eyes from a torture saw that sits on top of a Louis Vuitton trunk but there's really nowhere else to focus and music piped into the room comes from one of two radio stations (NOVA or NRJ). Bruce keeps yelling questions at the actor, in French, from a list of 320, all of them printed out in a thick stack of computer paper, many of them repeated in specific patterns, while Bobby stares levelly from a chair out of camera range, his mouth downturned. The French premier's son is shown photographs, glares wildly at them. He has no idea how to respond.

"Ask him 278 through 291 again," Bobby mutters at one point. "At first in the same sequence. Then repeat them in C sequence." He directs Bruce to relax the mouth wires, to administer another dose of morphine.

I'm slouching vacantly against a wall and my leg has fallen asleep because of how long I've been stuck in this particular position. Sweat pours down the sides of Bentley's face as he's camcording and Bobby's concerned about camera angles but Bentley assures him Bruce's head isn't in the frame. The French premier's son, momentarily lucid, starts shouting out obscenities. Bobby's frustration is palpable. Bruce takes a break, wiping his forehead with a Calvin Klein towel, sips a warm, flat Beck's. Bobby lights a cigarette, motions for Bruce to remove another tooth. Bobby keeps folding his arms, frowning, staring up at the ceiling. "Go back to section four, ask it in B sequence." Again, nothing happens. The actor doesn't know anything. He memorized a different script. He's not delivering the performance that Bobby wants. He was miscast. He was wrong for this part. It's all over. Bobby instructs Bruce to pour acid on the actor's hands. Pain floods his face as he gazes at me, crying uselessly, and then his leg is sawed off.

21

The actor playing the French premier's son realizes it doesn't matter anymore how life should be—he's past that point now in the underground room in the house in the 8th or the 16th. He was on the Italian Riviera now, driving a Mercedes convertible, he was at a casino in Monte Carlo, he was in Aspen on a sunny patio dotted with snow, and a girl who had just won the silver medal in the Model Olympics is on her tiptoes, kissing him jealously. He was outside a club in New York called Spy and fleeing into a misty night. He was meeting famous black comedians and stumbling out of limousines. He was on a Ferris wheel, talking into a cell phone, a stupefied date next to him, eavesdropping. He was in his pajamas watching his mother sip a martini, and through a window lightning was flickering and he had just finished printing his initials on a picture of a polar bear he'd drawn for her. He was kicking a soccer ball across a vast green field. He was experiencing his father's hard stare. He lived in a palace. Blackness, its hue, curves toward him, luminous and dancing. It was all so arbitrary: promises, pain, desire, glory, acceptance. There was the sound of camera shutters clicking, there was something collapsing toward him, a hooded figure, and as it fell onto him it looked up and he saw the head of a monster with the face of a fly.

20

We're at a dinner party in an apartment on Rue Paul Valéry between Avenue Foch and Avenue Victor Hugo and it's all rather subdued since a small percentage of the invited guests were blown up in the Ritz yesterday. For comfort people went shopping, which is understandable even if they bought things a little too enthusiastically. Tonight it's just wildflowers and white lilies, just Ws Paris bureau chief, Donna Karan, Aerin Lauder, Inès de la Fressange and Christian Louboutin, who thinks I snubbed him and maybe I did but mavbe I'm past the point of caring. Just Annette Bening and Michael Stipe in a tomato-red wig. Just Tammy on heroin, serene and glassy-eyed, her lips swollen from collagen injections, beeswax balm spread over'her mouth, gliding through the party, stopping to listen to Kate Winslet, to jean Reno, to Polly Walker, to Jacques Grange. just the smell of shit, floating, its fumes spreading everywhere. just another conversation with a chic sadist obsessed with origami. Just another armless man waving a stump and whispering excitedly, "Natasha's coming!" just people tan and back from the Ariel Sands Beach Club in Bermuda, some of them looking reskinned. just me, making connections based on fear, experiencing vertigo, drinking a Woo-Woo.

Jamie walks over to me after Bobby's cell phone rings and he exits the room, puffing suavely on a cigar gripped in the hand holding the phone, the other hand held up to his ear to block the din of the party.

"He's certainly in hair heaven," Jamie says, pointing out Dominique Sirop. Jamie's looking svelte in a teensy skirt and a pair of $1,500 shoes, nibbling an Italian cookie. "You're looking good tonight."

"The better you look," I murmur, "the more you see."

"I'll remember that."

"No you won't. But for now I'll believe you."

"I'm serious." She waves a fly away from her face. "You're looking very spiffy. You have the knack."

"What do you want?" I ask, recoiling from her presence.

Behind her Bobby walks quickly back into the room. He grimly holds hands with our hostess, she starts nodding sympathetically at whatever lie he's spinning and she's already a little upset that people in the lobby are dancing but she's being brave and then Bobby spots Jamie and starts moving through the crowd toward us though there are a lot of people to greet and say goodbye to.

"That's a loaded question," Jamie says glacially.

"Do you know how many people died at the Ritz yesterday?" I ask.

"I didn't keep track," she says, and then, "Don't be so corny."

"That was Bertrand," Bobby says to no one in particular. "I've gotta split."

"You look freaked," Jamie says slowly. "What happened?"

"I'll tell you later, back at the house," he says, taking her champagne glass, drinking half

"Why are you leaving, Bobby?" Jamie asks carefully. "Where are you going?"

"I guess my social life is much busier than yours," Bobby says, brushing her off.

"You brute." She grins. "You savage."

"Just stay for the dinner," Bobby says, checking his watch. "Then come back to the house. I'll be there by eleven."

Bobby kisses Jamie hard on the mouth and tries to act casual but something's wrong and he can barely control his panic. I try not to stare. He notices.

"Stop gawking," he says irritably. "I'll be back at the house by eleven. Maybe sooner."

On his way out Bobby stops behind Tammy who's swaying from side to side, listening rapturously to a drug dealer called the Kaiser, and Bobby motions from across the room to Jamie, mouthing, Watch her. Jamie nods.

"Is Bobby gone?" Jainie's asking.

"You're in fine form tonight," I spit out, glaring. "Do you know how many people died at the Ritz yesterday?"

"Victor, please," she says genuinely while trying to smile, in case anyone's watching. But the French film crew is surrounding a cluster of mourners laughing in the corner of the cavernous living room. Blenders are whirring at a bar, there's a fire raging in the fireplace, cell phones keep being answered.

"They killed the French premier's son yesterday too," I say calmly, for emphasis. "They cut off his leg. I watched him die. How can you wear that dress?" I ask, my face twisted with loathing.

"Is Bobby gone?" she asks again. "Just tell me if he's left yet."

"Yes," I say disgustedly. "He left."

Visibly, she relaxes. "I have to tell you something, Victor," she says, gazing over my shoulder, then glancing sideways.

"What?" I ask. "You're all grown up now?"

"No, not that," she says patiently. "You and I—we can't see each other anymore."

"Oh really?" I'm glancing around the room. "Why not?"

"It's too dangerous."

"Is it?" I ask, Smirking. "What a cliché."

"I'm serious."

"I don't want to talk to you anymore."

"I think this whole thing has gotten out of hand," Jamie says.

I start giggling uncontrollably until a sudden spasm of fear causes my eyes to water, my face to contort. "That's . . . all?" I cough, wiping my eyes, sniffling. "Just . . . out of hand?" My voice sounds high and my eyes, girlish.

"Victor—"

"You are not playing by the rules," I say, my chest tightening. "You are not following the script."

"There are no rules, Victor," she says. "What rules? That's all nonsense."

She pauses. "It's too dangerous," she says again.

"I'm feeling a lack of progress," I'm saying. "I think we're all living in a box."

"I assume you understand more about Bobby now," she says. "It's easier, isn't it? It's easier to gauge the fear factor now, isn't it?"

A long pause. "I suppose," I say, without looking at her.

"But you'll still be in my . . . periphery."

"I suppose," I say again. "How reassuring."

"You also need to stay away from Bertrand Ripleis."

"Why?" I'm barely listening.

"He hates you."

"I wondered why he was always snarling at me."

"I'm serious," she says, almost pleadingly. "He still holds a grudge," she says, trying to smile as she waves to someone. "From Camden."

"About what?" I ask, irritation and fear laced together.

"He was in love with Lauren Hynde," she says. "He thinks you treated her shittily." A pause. "This is on the record." Another pause. "Be careful."

"Is this a joke or like some kind of French thing?"

"Just stay away from him," she warns. "Don't provoke."

"How do you know this?"

"We're . . . incommunicado." She shrugs.

A pause. "What's the safety factor?" I ask.

"As long as you stay away from him?"

I nod.

A tear, one tiny drop, slips down her cheek, changes its mind and evaporates, while she tries to smile.

"So-so," she whispers.

Finally I say, "I'm leaving."

"Victor," Jamie says, touching my arm before I turn away.

"What?" I groan. "I'm leaving. I'm tired."

"Victor, wait," she says.

I stand there.

"In the computer," she says, breathing in. "In the computer. At the house. There's a file." She pauses, nods at a guest. "The file is called 'Wings."' Pause. As she turns away, she says, "You need to see it."

"Why do I need to see it?" I ask. "I don't care anymore."

"Victor," she starts. "I . . . think I . . . knew that girl you met on the QE2. . . ." Jamie swallows, doesn't know where to look, tries to compose herself, barely succeeds. "The girl who disappeared from the QE2 . . ."

I just stare at her blankly.

When Jamie grasps my reaction—its hatefulness—she just nods to herself, muttering, "Forget it, forget it."

"I'm leaving." I'm walking away as it starts raining confetti.

Because of how the apartment is lit, extras have to be careful not to trip over electric cables or the dolly tracks that line the center of the living room, and in the lobby the first AD from the French film crew hands me tomorrow's call sheet and Russell—the Christian Bale guy—is wearing little round sunglasses, smoking a joint, comparing shoe sizes with Dermot Mulroney, but then I realize that they're both on separate cell phones and not talking to each other and Russell pretends to recognize me and "drunkenly" shouts, "Hey, Victor!"

I pretend to smile. I reach out to shake his hand.

"Hey, come on, dude," he says, brushing the hand away. "We haven't seen each other in months." He hugs me tightly, dropping something in my jacket pocket. "How's the party?" he asks, stepping back, offering me the joint. I shake my head.

"Oh, it's great, it's cool," I'm saying, chewing my lips. "It's very cool." I start walking away. "Bye-bye."

"Great," Russell says, slapping my back, returning to his conversation on the cell phone as Dermot Mulroney opens a bottle of champagne gripped between his knees.

In the cab heading back to the house in the 8th or the 16th I find a card Russell slipped in my pocket.

A time. Tomorrow. An address. A corner I should stop at. Directions to that corner. Suggestions on how to behave. All of this in tiny print that I'm squinting at in the back of the cab until I'm nauseous I lean my head against the window. The cab swerves around a minor traffic accident, passing patrolmen carrying submachine guns patiently strolling the streets. My back aches. Impatiently I start wiping makeup applied earlier off my face with a cocktail napkin.

At the house, after paying the cab fare.

I press the code to deactivate the alarm. The door clicks open.

I tumble through the courtyard.

The living room is empty-just the furniture pushed aside earlier this afternoon by the French film crew.

Without taking off my overcoat I move over to the computer. It's already on. I tap a key. I enter a command.

I type in WINGS.

A pause. The screen flashes.

WINGS ASSGN#3764 appears.

Letters start appearing. A graph starts unfolding.

NOV 15

BAND ON THE RUN

Beneath that: 1985

And then: 511

I scroll down to another page. A map appears on the screen: a highway, a route. It leads to Charles de Gaulle airport. Below this the Trans World Airlines logo appears.

TWA.

Nothing else.

I start tapping keys so I can print out the file. Two pages.

Nothing happens. I'm breathing heavily, flushed with adrenaline. Then I hear four beeps in quick succession.

Someone is entering the courtyard.

I realize the printer's not switched on. When I switch it on, it makes a soft noise, then starts humming.

I press another key: a flash.

Voices from outside. Bobby, Bentley.

Page 1 of the WINGS file slowly prints out.

Keys are being entered into the various locks on the front door.

Page 2 of the WINGS file follows page 1, slightly overlapping it.

In the foyer, the door opens: footsteps, voices.

I pull the two pages out of the printer, shoving them inside my jacket, then flick off the computer and the printer. I lunge toward a chair.

But I'm realizing that the computer was on when I came in.

I fall toward the computer, flicking it back on, and lunge again toward the chair.

Bobby and Bentley walk into the living room, followed by members of the French film crew, including the director and the cameraman.

My head rests on my knees and I'm breathing hard.

A voice—I'm not sure which one—asks, "What are you doing here?"

I don't say anything. It's winter in here.

"Victor?" Bobby's asking, carefully. "What are you doing here?"

"I felt sick," I say, gasping, looking up, squinting. "I don't feel well." A pause. "I ran out of Xanax."

Bentley glances at Bobby and, while walking by me, mumbles disinterestedly, "Tough shit."

Bobby looks over at the director, who's studying me as if making a decision. The director finally nods at Bobby: a cue.

Bobby shrugs, flops onto a couch, unknots his tie, then takes off his jacket. The shoulder of his white Comme des Garçons shirt is lightly flecked with blood. Bobby sighs.

Bentley reappears and hands Bobby a drink.

"What happened?" I ask, needing to hear myself. "Why did you leave the party?"

"There was an accident," Bobby says. "Something . . . occurred."

He sips his drink.

"What?" I ask.

"Bruce Rhinebeck is dead," Bobby says, looking past me, taking another sip of his drink with a steady hand.

Bobby doesn't wait for me to ask how this happened but I wasn't going to ask anything anyway.

"He was defusing a bomb in an apartment on Quai de Béthune." Bobby sighs, doesn't elaborate. "For what it's worth."

I stay where I'm sitting for as long as I can without going totally insane, but then the director motions for me to stand, which I do, wobbling.

"I'm . . . going to bed," I say and then, pointing with my finger, add, Upstairs."

Bobby says nothing, just glances at me indifferently.

"I'm . . . exhausted." I start walking away. "I'm fading."

"Victor?" Bobby asks suddenly.

"Yeah?" I stop, casually turn around, relax my face.

"What's that?" Bobby asks.

I'm suddenly aware that my body is covered with damp sweat and my stomach keeps unspooling reams of acid. "What?" I ask.

"Sticking out of that pocket?" He points at my jacket.

I look down innocently. "What's what?"

Bobby gets off the couch and walks over so quickly he almost collides into me. He rips the piece of paper that's bothering him out of my jacket.

He inspects it, turning it over, and then stares back at me.

He holds the page out, his mouth turned downward, sweat sprinkled across his temples, the bridge of his nose, the skin under his eyes. He grins horribly: a rictus.

I take the page from him, my hand moist and trembling.

"What is it?" I ask.

"Go to bed," he says, turning away.

I look down at the page.

It's the call sheet for tomorrow that the first AD handed out as I left the party on Rue Paul Valéry.

"I'm sorry about Bruce," I say hesitantly, because I don't mean it.

Upstairs. I'm freezing in bed, my door locked. I devour Xanax but still can't sleep. I start masturbating a dozen times but always stop when I realize that it's getting me nowhere. I try to block out the screaming from downstairs with my Walkman but someone from the French film crew has slipped in a ninety-minute cassette composed entirely of David Bowie singing "Heroes" over and over in an endless loop, another crime with its own logic. I start counting the deaths I haven't taken part in: postage stamps with toxin in the glue, the pages of books lined with chemicals that once touched can kill within hours, the Armani suits saturated with so much poison that the victim who wears it can absorb it through the skin by the end of a day.

At 11:00 Tammy finally twirls into the room, holding a bunch of white lilies, her arms dotted with sores, most of them concentrated in a patch in the crook of her elbow. Jamie trails behind her. I've read the scene and know how it's supposed to play. When Jamie is told of Bruce's death she simply says "Good" (but Jamie knew what was going to happen to Bruce Rhinebeck, she knew in London, she knew when we arrived in Paris, she knew the first afternoon she played tennis with Bruce, she knew from the beginning).

When Tammy is told she gazes at Bobby vapidly, puzzled. On cue Jamie takes the lilies out of Tammy's hand as it relaxes, losing its grip. "Liar," Tammy whispers and then she whispers "Liar" again and after she's able to process Bobby's weak smile, the French crew standing behind him, the camera filming her reaction, she feels like she's dropping and in a rush she starts screaming, wailing interminably, and she's not even wondering anymore why Bobby walked into her life and she's told to go to sleep, she's told to forget Bruce Rhinebeck immediately, she's told that he murdered the French premier's son, she's told that she should be grateful that she's unharmed, while Bentley (I swear to god) starts making a salad.

19

Preoccupation with the fallout from Bruce's death reverberates mildly throughout the house in the 8th or the 16th and because of this there are no errands to complete and everyone seems sufficiently distracted for me to slip away. Endless conversations concern title changes, budget reductions, the leasing of an eighty-foot-tall tower crane, roving release dates, a volatile producer in L.A. seething over a rewrite. Before leaving I shoot a scene with Tammy concerning our characters' reactions toward Bruce's death (motorcycle accident, a truck carrying watermelons, Athens, a curve misjudged) but since she's not even capable of forming sentences let alone mimicking movements I shoot my lines standing in a hallway while a PA feeds me Tammy’s lines far more convincingly than Tammy ever did (cutaways to Tammy will presumably be inserted at a later date). For the scene to end, a wig is placed on another PA's head and the giant Panaflex dollies in on my saddened yet hopeful" face while we hug.

Jamie is either pretending to ignore me or just doesn't register my presence while she's sitting at the computer in the living room—vacantly scanning diagrams, decoding E-malls—as I try to walk casually past her.

Outside, the sky is gray, overcast.

An apartment building on Quai de Béthune.

I'm turning the corner at Pont de Sully.

A black Citroën sits parked at the curb on Rue Saint-Louis-en-l'Isle and seeing the car causes me to walk faster toward it.

Russell drives us to an apartment building on Avenue Verdier in the Montrouge section of the city.

I'm carrying a .25-caliber Walther automatic.

I'm carrying the WINGS file printouts, folded in the pocket of my black leather Prada jacket.

I swallow a Xanax the wrong way then chew a Mentos to get the taste off my tongue.

Russell and I run up three flights of stairs.

On the fourth floor is an apartment devoid of furniture except for six white folding chairs. The walls are painted crimson and black, and cardboard storage boxes sit stacked on top of one another in towering columns. A small TV set is hooked up to a VCR that rests on top of a crate. Darkness is occasionally broken by lamps situated throughout the apartment. It's so cold that the floor is slippery with ice.

F. Fred Palakon sits in one of the white folding chairs next to two of his associates—introduced to me as David Crater and Laurence Delta—and everyone's in a black suit, everyone just slightly older than me. Cigarettes are lit, files are opened, Starbucks coffee is offered, passed around, sipped.

Facing them, I sit in one of the white folding chairs, just now noticing in a shadowy corner the Japanese man sitting in a white folding chair next to a window draped with crushed-velvet curtains. He's definitely older than the other men—flabbier, more listless—but his age is indeterminate. He slouches back into the shadows, his eyes fixed on me.

Russell keeps pacing, talking quietly into a cell phone. Finally he clicks off and leans in to Palakon, whispering something displeasing.

"Are you certain?" Palakon asks.

Russell closes his eyes, sighs while nodding.

"Okay," Palakon says. "We don't have much time, then."

Russell brushes past, taking his stance at the door behind me, and I turn around to make sure he's not leaving.

"Thank you for coming, Mr. Ward," Palakon says. "You followed directions splendidly."

"You're . . . welcome."

"This needs to be brief," Palakon says. "We don't have much time here today. I simply wanted to introduce my associates"—Palakon nods at Delta and Crater—"and have a preliminary meeting. We just need you to verify some things. Look at a few photographs, that's all."

"Wait. So, like, the problem, like, hasn't been solved?" I ask, my voice squeaking.

"Well, no, not yet. . . ." Palakon falters. "David and Laurence have been briefed on what you told me two days ago and we're going to figure out a way to extract you from this . . ." Palakon can't find a word. I'm waiting. "This ... situation," he says.

"Cool, cool," I'm saying nervously, crossing my legs, then changing my mind. "Just some facts? Cool. Some photos? Okay. That's cool. I can do that."

A pause.

"Um, Mr. Ward?" Palakon asks gingerly.

"Uh, yeah?"

"Could you please"—Palakon clears his throat—"remove your sunglasses."

A longer pause, followed by a realization. "Oh. Sorry."

"Mr. Ward," Palakon starts, "how long have you been living in that house?"

"I . . . don't know," I say, trying to remember. "Since we came to Paris?"

"When was that?" Palakon asks. "Exactly."

"Maybe two weeks . . ." Pause. "Maybe . . . it could be four?"

Crater and Delta glance at each other.

"I guess, maybe . . . I don't really know . . . I'm just not sure. . . . I'm not good with dates."

I try to smile, which just causes the men in the room to flinch, obviously unimpressed with the performance so far.

"I'm sorry. . . ," I mutter. "I'm sorry. . . .”

Somewhere a fly buzzes loudly. I try to relax but it's not happening.

"We want you to verify who lives in the house with you," Palakon says.

"It's a . . . set," I'm saying. "It's a set."

Palakon, Delta, Crater—they all stare at me blankly.

"Yes. Okay." I keep crossing then recrossing my legs, shivering. "Yes. The house. Yes."

Palakon reads from a page in his folder. "Jamie Fields, Bobby Hughes, Tammy Devol, Bentley Harrolds, Bruce Rhinebeck—”

I cut him off. "Bruce Rhinebeck is dead."

A professional silence. Crater looks over at Delta, and Delta, without returning eye contact and staring straight ahead, just nods.

Palakon finally asks, "You can verify this?"

"Yes, yes," I mutter. "He's dead."

Palakon turns a page over, makes a note with his pen, then asks, "Is Bertrand Ripleis also staying with you?"

"Bertrand?" I ask. "No, he's not staying in the house. No."

"Are you sure of this?" Palakon asks.

"Yes, yes," I'm saying. "I'm sure. I went to Camden with him, so I know who he is. I'd know if he was staying in the house." I'm realizing at the instant I say this that I probably would not know, that it would be easy not to know if Bertrand Ripleis was living in the house in the 5th or the 16th with us, because of how vast it is and how it keeps changing and how it seems new rooms are being built every day.

Palakon leans in and hands me a photograph.

"Is this Bertrand Ripleis?" he asks.

It could be an Armani ad shot by Herb Ritts—a desert landscape, Bertrand's handsome face scowling seductively, jaw clenched and lips casually pursed, small sunglasses giving off a skull effect. But he's exiting a van, he doesn't realize this picture is being shot from a vantage point far away, he's holding a Skorpion machine pistol, he's wearing a Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt.

"Yeah, that's him," I say blankly, handing Palakon back the photo. "But he doesn't live in the house."

"Does anyone in the house have contact with Bertrand Ripleis?" Crater asks.

"Yes," I say. "I think they all do."

"Do you, Mr. Ward?" Palakon asks.

"Yes . . . I said I think they all do."

"No," Palakon says. "Do you have contact with Bertrand?"

"Oh," I say. "No, no. I don't."

Scribbling, a long silence, more scribbling.

I glance over at the Japanese man, staring at me, motionless.

Palakon leans in and hands over another photo, startling me.

It's a head shot of Sam Ho, with Asian script running along the bottom of the photograph.

"Do you recognize this person?" Palakon asks.

"Yeah, that's Sam Ho," I say, starting to cry. My head drops forward and I'm looking at my feet, convulsing, gasping out sobs.

Papers are shuffled, extraneous sound caused by embarrassment.

I take in a deep breath and try to pull myself together, but after I say "Bruce Rhinebeck and Bobby Hughes tortured and killed him in London a month ago" I start crying again. At least a minute passes before the crying subsides. I swallow, clearing my throat. Russell leans over, offers a Kleenex. I blow my nose, mumble, "I'm sorry."

"Believe me, Mr. Ward, we don't like to see you this distraught," Palakon says. "Are you okay? Can you continue?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," I say, clearing my throat again, wiping my face.

Palakon leans in and hands me another photo.

Sam Ho is standing on a wide expanse of sand, what looks like South Beach stretching out behind him, and he's with Mariah Carey and Dave Grohl and they're listening intently to something k.d. lang is telling them. In the background people set up lights, hold plates of food, seem posed, talk guardedly into cell phones.

"Yeah, yeah, that's him too," I say, blowing my nose again.

Crater, Delta and Palakon all share contemplative glances, then fix their attention back on me.

I'm staring over at the Japanese man when Palakon says, "This picture of Sam Ho was taken in Miami." He pauses.

"Yeah?" I ask.

"Last week," Palakon says.

Trying not to appear surprised, I quickly recover from the words "last week" and say, coolly, "Well, then, that's not him. That's not Sam Ho."

Delta looks back at the Japanese man.

Crater leans in to Palakon and with his pen points out something in the folder Palakon has resting on his lap.

Palakon nods irritably.

I start freaking out, writhing in my chair.

"They can alter photos," I'm saying. "I saw Bentley Harrolds do it yesterday. They're constantly altering—"

"Mr. Ward, these photographs have been thoroughly checked out by a very competent lab and they have not been altered in any way."

"How do you know?" I'm calling out.

"We have the negatives," Palakon says tightly.

Pause. "Can the negatives be altered?" I ask.

"The negatives were not altered, Mr. Ward."

"But then . . . who the hell is that guy?" I ask, writhing in the chair, gripping my hands together, forcing them apart.

"Hey, wait a minute," I'm saying, holding my hands up. "Guys, guys, wait a minute."

"Yes, Mr. Ward?" Palakon asks.

"Is this . . . is this for real?" I'm scanning the room, looking for signs of a camera, lights, some hidden evidence that a film crew was here earlier or is right now maybe in the apartment next door, shooting me through holes strategically cut into the crimson and black walls.

"What do you mean, Mr. Ward?" Palakon asks. "'Real'?"

"I mean, is this like a movie?" I'm asking, shifting around in my chair. "Is this being filmed?"

"No, Mr. Ward," Palakon says politely. "This is not like a movie and you are not being filmed."

Crater and Delta are staring at me, uncomprehending.

The Japanese man leans forward but not long enough to let me see his face clearly.

"But . . . I. . ." I'm looking down at the photo of Sam Ho. "I . . . don't . . ." I start breathing hard, and since the air is so cold and thick in this room it burns my lungs. "They . . . listen, they . . . I think they double people. I mean, I don't know how, but I think they have. doubles. That's not Sam Ho ... that's someone else. . . . I mean, I think they have doubles, Palakon."

"Palakon," Crater says. The tone in his voice suggests a warning. Palakon stares at me, mystified.

I'm fumbling in my pocket for another Xanax and I keep trying to reposition myself to keep my arms and legs from falling asleep. I let Russell light a cigarette somcone's handed me but it tastes bad and I'm not capable of holding it and when I drop it on the floor it lands hissing in a puddle of melting ice.

Delta reaches down for his Starbucks cup.

Another photo is handed to me.

Marina Gibson. A simple color head shot, unevenly reproduced on an 8 x 10.

"That's the girl I met on the QE2," I say. "Where is she? What happened to her? When was this taken?" And then, less excited, "Is she . . . okay?"

Palakon pauses briefly before saying, "We think she's dead."

My voice is cracking when I ask, "How? How do you know this?"

"Mr. Johnson," Crater says, leaning in. "We think this woman was sent to warn you."

"Wait," I say, unable to hold the photo any longer. "Sent to warn me? Warn me about what? Wait a minute. Jesus, wait—"

"That's what we're trying to piece together, Mr. Johnson," Delta says.

Palakon has leaned toward the VCR and presses Play on the console. Camcorder footage, surprisingly professional. It's the QE2. For an instant, the actress playing Lorrie Wallace leans against a railing, demurely, her head tilted, and she's alternating staring at the ocean with smiling at the person behind the camera, who quickly pans over to where Marina lies on a chaise longue, wearing leopard-print Capri pants, a white gauzy half-shirt, giant black tortoiseshell sunglasses that cover almost half her face.

"That's her," I say. "That's the girl I met on the QE2. How did you get this tape? That's the girl I was going to go to Paris with."

Palakon pauses, pretending to consult his file, and finally, hopelessly, again says, "We think she's dead."

"As I was saying, Mr. Johnson," Crater says, leaning toward me a little too aggressively, "we think that Marina Cannon was sent to warn—”

"No, wait, guys, wait," I'm saying. "It was Gibson. Her name was Gibson."

"No, it was Cannon," Delta says. "Her name was Marina Cannon.”

"Wait, wait, guys," I'm saying. "Sent to warn me by who? About what?"

"That's what we're trying to piece together," Palakon says, overly patient.

"We think that whoever sent her didn't want you making contact with Jamie Fields, and by extension Bobby Hughes, once you arrived in London," Crater says. "We think she was provided as a distraction. As an alternative."

"Provided?" I'm asking. "Provided? What in the fuck does that mean?"

"Mr. Ward—" Palakon starts.

"Jamie told me she knows her," I say suddenly. "That she knew her. Why would Marina want me to stay away from Jamie if they knew each other?"

"Did Jamie Fields say how she knew her? Or in what context she knew her?" Palakon asks. "Did Jamie Fields let you know what their connection was?"

"No . . . ," I'm murmuring. "No . . .”

"Didn't you ask?" Crater and Delta exclaim at the same time.

"No," I say, dazed, murmuring. "No . . . I'm sorry . . . no . . .”

From behind me Russell says, "Palakon."

"Yes, yes," Palakon says.

On the TV screen the camera keeps panning across the length of the deck and, whenever Marina glances at it, always back to Lorrie Wallace. But once it stays for several moments on Marina, who gazes at it almost as if the camera were daring her.

"Where did you get this?" I'm asking.

"It's not an original," Delta says. "It's a copy."

"That's an answer?" I ask, jaw clenched.

"It doesn't matter how we got it," Delta snaps.

"The Wallaces took that," I say, staring at the screen. "Turn it off.”

"The Wallaces?" I hear someone ask.

"Yeah." I'm nodding. "The Wallaces. They were this couple from England. This English couple. I forget what they do. What they told me. I think she opens restaurants. Whatever. Turn it off, just turn it off."

"How did you meet them?" Palakon asks, pressing a button, causing the TV to flash black.

"I don't know. They were just on the ship. They introduced themselves to me. We had dinner." I'm moaning, rubbing my hands over my face. "They said they knew my father—"

Some kind of connection is automatically made and resonates among the three men sitting across from me.

"Oh shit," Delta says.

Immediately Crater mutters, "Jesus, Jesus, Jesus."

Palakon keeps nodding involuntarily, his mouth opening slightly so he can take in more air.

Delta furiously writes down something on the folder resting in his lap.

"Jesus, Jesus, Jesus," Crater keeps muttering.

The Japanese man lights a cigarette, his face illuminated briefly by the match. Something's wrong. He's scowling.

"Palakon?" Russell calls out behind me.

Palakon looks up, knocked out of his concentration.

I turn around.

Russell taps his watch. Palakon nods irritably.

"Did Marina Cannon ask you anything?" Delta asks hurriedly, leaning in.

"Oh shit," I mutter. "I don't know. Like what?"

"Did she ask you if—" Crater starts.

I suddenly remember and, interrupting Crater, I murmur, "She wanted to know if anyone gave me anything to bring with me to England."

her departure from the Queen's Grill, the desperate phone call she made later that night, and I was drunk and grinning at myself in a mirror in my cabin, giggling, and there was blood in her bathroom and who else except Bobby Hughes knew she was on that ship and you were heading toward another country and there was a tattoo, black and shapeless, on her shoulder

I'm wiping sweat off my forehead and the room starts slanting, then t catches itself

“Such as?" Palakon asks.

I'm grasping at something, and finally realize what it is.

"I think she meant"—I look up at Palakon—"the hat."

Everyone starts writing something. They wait for me to continue, to elaborate, but since I can't, Palakon coaxes me by asking, "But the hat disappeared from the QE2, right?"

I nod slowly. "But maybe . . . I'm thinking . . . maybe she took it and . . . and gave it . . . to someone.”

"No," Delta mutters. "Our sources say she didn't."

"Your sources?" I'm asking. "Who in the fuck are your sources?"

"Mr. Ward," Palakon starts. "This will all be explained to you at a later date, so please—"

"What was in the hat?" I'm asking, cutting him off. "Why did you tell me to bring that hat? Why was it torn apart when I found it? What was in the hat, Palakon?"

"Mr. Ward, Victor, I promise you that at our next meeting I'll explain," Palakon says. "But we simply don't have time now—"

"What do you mean?" I'm asking, panicking. "You have more important things to do? I mean, holy shit, Palakon. I have no idea what's going on and—"

"We have other photos to show you," Palakon interrupts, handing three glossy 8 x 10s to me.

Two people dressed in tropical clothing on a foamy shore. Yards and yards of wet sand. The sea rests behind them. White sunlight, purple at the edges, hangs above the couple. Because of their hair you can tell it's windy. He's sipping a drink from a coconut shell. She's smelling a purple lei hanging from her neck. In another photo she's (improbably) petting a swan. Bobby Hughes stands behind her, smiling (also improbably) in a kind way. In the last photo Bobby Hughes is kneeling behind the girl, helping her pick a tulip.

The girl in all three photos is Lauren Hynde.

I start weeping again.

"That's . . . Lauren Hynde."

A long pause, and then I hear someone ask, "When did you last have contact with Lauren Hynde, Victor?"

I keep weeping, unable to hold it to ether.

"Victor?" Palakon asks.

"What is she doing with him?" I sob.

"Victor met her while they were students at Camden, I believe," Palakon says softly to his colleagues, an explanation that doesn't accomplish anything, but I nod silently to myself, unable to look up.

"And after that?" someone asks. "When did you last have contact with Lauren Hynde?"

Still weeping, I manage, "I met her last month . . . in Manhattan . . . at a Tower Records."

Russell's cell phone rings, jarring all of us.

"Okay," I hear him say.

After clicking off he implores Palakon to start moving.

"We've got to go," Russell says. "It's time."

"Mr. Johnson, we'll be in touch," Delta says.

I'm reaching into my jacket pocket while wiping my face.

"Yes, this was . . . illuminating," Crater says, not at all sincerely.

"Here." Ignoring Crater, I hand Palakon the printout of the WINGS file. "This is something I found in the computer in the house. I don't know what it means."

Palakon takes it from me. "Thank you, Victor,” he says genuinely, slipping it into his folder without even looking at it. "Victor, I want you to calm down. We will be in touch. It might even be tomorrow—"

"But since I last saw you, Palakon, they blew up a fucking hotel," I shout. "They killed the French premier's son."

"Mr. Ward," Palakon says gently, "other factions have already taken blame for the bombing at the Ritz."

"What other factions?" I'm shouting. "They did it. Bruce Rhinebeck left a bomb at the fucking Ritz. There are no other factions. They are the faction."

"Mr. Ward, we really—"

"I just don't feel you're concerned about my welfare, Palakon," I say, choking.

"Mr. Ward, that's simply not true," Palakon says, standing, which causes me to stand as well.

"Why did you send me to find her?" I'm shouting. "Why did you send me to find Jamie Fields?" I'm about to grab Palakon but Russell pulls me back.

"Mr. Ward, please," Palakon says. "You must go. We'll be in touch." I fall into Russell, who keeps propping me up.

"I don't care anymore, Palakon. I don't care." "I think you do, Mr. Ward."

"Why is that?" I ask, bewildered, staring at him. "Why do you think that?"

"Because if you didn't care, you wouldn't be here."

I take this in.

"Hey, Palakon," I say, stunned. "I didn't say I wasn't scared shitless."

18

Russell races down the stairs in the building on Avenue Verdier two steps at a time and I'm tumbling behind him, for support grabbing on to a marble banister that's so encased with ice it burns my hand, and outside on the street I hold that hand up, panting, telling Russell to slow down.

"We can't," Russell savs. "We have to go. Now."

"Why?" I'm asking uselessly, bent over. "Why?"

I brace myself to be pulled along toward the black Citroën but Russell suddenly stops moving and he's breathing in, composing himself.

Disoriented, I stand up straight. Russell casually nudges me.

I'm looking over at him, confused. He's pretending to smile at someone.

Jamie Fields is walking uncertainly toward us, clutching a small white paper bag—no makeup, sweatpants, hair pulled back with a scrunchie, Gucci sunglasses.

Behind her the French film crew is piling equipment into a blue van that's double-parked on Avenue Verdier.

"What are you doing here?" she asks, lowering her sunglasses.

"Hey," I'm saying, gesturing mindlessly.

"What's going on?" she asks, a little mystified. "Victor?"

"Oh yeah, y'know, just hanging," I'm saying vacantly, semi-stunned. "I'm just . . . hanging, um, baby."

Pause. "What?" she asks, laughing, as if she hasn't heard me. "Hanging?" She pauses. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, baby, I'm fine, I'm cool," I'm saying, gesturing mindlessly. "It looks like rain, huh, baby?"

"You're white," she says. "You look like you've been . . . crying." She reaches out a hand to touch my face. Instinctively I pull away.

"No, no, no," I'm saying. "No, I haven't been crying. I'm cool. I was just yawning. Things are cool."

"Oh," she says, followed by a long pause.

"Whoa," I add to it.

"What are you doing here?" she asks.

"Well, baby, I'm here with"—I glance at Russell—"my friend and we're . . ." I land on, "Well, I'm taking French lessons from him."

She just stares at me. Silence.

"You know, baby, I can't speak a word of it. So." I shrug.

She's still staring at me. More silence.

"Not—one—word," I say stiffly.

"Right," she says, but now she's staring at Russell. "You look totally familiar. Have we met?"

"I don't think so," Russell says. "But maybe."

"I'm Jamie Fields," she says, holding out a hand.

"I'm Christian Bale," Russell says, taking it.

"Oh right," she says. "Yeah, I thought I recognized you. You're the actor."

"Yeah, yeah." He's nodding boyishly. "I recognized you too."

"Hey, looks like we're all famous, huh?" I chuckle dreadfully. "How about that, huh?"

"I really liked you in Newsies and Swing Kids," Jamie says, not at all facetiously.

"Thanks, thanks." Russell keeps nodding.

"And also Hooked," Jamie says. "You were great in Hooked."

"Oh thanks," Russell says, blushing, smiling on cue. "That's so nice. That's so cool."

"Yeah, Hooked," Jamie murmurs, staring thoughtfully into Russell's face.

A long pause follows. I concentrate on the film crew lifting a camera into the back of the van. The director nods at me. I don't nod back.

From inside the van ABBA's "Knowing Me, Knowing You" keeps playing, a reminder of something. I'm squinting, trying to remember. The director starts moving toward us.

"So what are you doing in Paris?" Jamie asks Russell.

"Oh, just hanging," Russell says confidently.

"And . . . teaching French?" Jamie laughs, confused.

"Oh it's just a favor," I'm saying, laughing with her. "He's owing me a favor."

Behind us, walking out of the front entrance of the apartment building on Avenue Verdier, are Palakon, Delta, Crater—all in overcoats and sunglasses—without the Japanese man. They maneuver past us, walking purposefully down the block, conferring with one another. Jamie barely notices them since she's preoccupied with staring at Russell. But the director stops walking toward me and stares at Palakon as he passes by, and something in the director's face tightens and he worriedly glances back at me and then once more at Palakon.

"It's a favor," Russell says, putting on Diesel sunglasses. "I'm between roles. So it's cool."

"He's between roles," I'm saying. "He's waiting for a good part. One worthy of his skills."

"Listen, I gotta split," Russell says. "I'll talk to you later, man. Nice meeting you, Jamie."

"Yeah," Jamie says tentatively. "You too, Christian."

"Peace," he says, moving off. "Victor, I'll be in touch. Au revoir."

"Yeah man," I say shakily. "Bonjour, dude," I'm saying. "Oui, monsieur.”

Jamie stands in front of me, arms folded. The crew waits, slouching by the van, its engine running. I'm focusing on slowing down my heartbeat. The director starts walking toward us again. My vision keeps blurring over, getting wavy. It starts drizzling.

"What are you doing here?" I ask, trying not to whimper.

"I'm picking up a prescription for Tammy," she says.

"Uh-huh. Because she's, like, very sick, right?"

"Yeah, she's very upset," Jamie says coolly.

"Well, right, because she should be."

I'm wetting my lips, panic coursing through the muscles in my legs, my arms, my face—all tingling. Jamie keeps staring, appraising me. A longer pause. The director is jogging up the street, grimly advancing toward us, toward me.

"So let me get this straight," Jamie starts.

"Uh-huh."

"You're taking French lessons."

"Uh-huh."

"From Christian Bale?"

"No, we're having an affair," I blurt out. "I didn't want to bring him to the house."

"I don't necessarily find that unbelievable."

"No, no, it's French lessons," I'm saying. "Merci beaucoup, bon soir, je comprends, oui, mademoiselle, bonjour, mademoiselle—"

"All right, all right," she mutters, giving up.

The director is getting closer.

"Send them away," I whisper. "Please, just send them away, send them the fuck away," I say, putting my sunglasses on.

Jamie sighs and walks over to the director. He's on a cell phone and he snaps the mouthpiece closed as she approaches. He listens to her, adjusting a red bandanna knotted around his neck. I'm crying silently to myself and as Jamie walks back to me I start shivering. I rub a hand across my forehead, a headache's building.

"Are you okay?" she asks.

I try to speak but can't. I'm only vaguely aware that it's starting to rain.

In a cab heading back to the house she asks me, "So where did you take your French lessons?"

I can't say anything.

"How did you and Christian Bale meet?" she asks.

The cab lurches forward in traffic, its windows streaked with rain. The air inside the cab is heavy with invisible things. I'm slouching in the back of the cab. My foot has fallen asleep.

"What is this?" she asks. "Are you doing your big deaf routine?"

"What's in the bag?" I ask, nodding at the white shape in Jamie's lap. "Tammy's prescription," she says.

"For what? Methadone?"

"Halcion."

"I hope you got her a lot," I say, and then, "Can I have some?"

"No," Jamie says. "What were you really doing with that guy?"

I blurt out, "How did you know Marina Gibson?"

"Oh god," she groans. "Are we back to that?"

"Jamie," I warn, then relent. "Please."

"I don't know," she says irritably. "I knew her in New York. Modeling. Whatever. Nightlife."

I start giggling. "You're lying."

"Oh shit."

I ask softly, "Could this have all been prevented?"

Finally she answers flatly, "That's speculative."

"Who else is involved with this?" I ask.

She sighs. "It's all very small." Pause. "The larger the group, the greater the danger of detection. You know."

"I'm sure that works well on paper."

"Did you look at the file?" she asks.

"Yes," I murmur.

"Good," she says, relaxing, and then, "I think Christian Bale's cool." She checks her fingernails. "In a fairly obvious way."

I turn to look at her. "What does that mean?"

"Christian Bale wasn't in Hooked, Victor," Jamie says. "He wasn't in that movie."

I stall, then move into, "Maybe he was just being . . . polite."

"Don't bother," she mutters.

And outside the house in the 8th or the 16th patches of sunlight start streaming through the dissolving clouds and Jamie and I open the gate and move together silently through the courtyard. Inside, with Bruce Rhinebeck gone the house seems less heavy, better, emptier, even with the second unit setting up. Bobby sits at the computer while talking on a cell phone, smoking a cigarette, tapping ashes into a Diet Coke can, stacks of spiral notebooks piled high on the desk in front of him, lounge music playing in the background. A pool table has been delivered, another BMW is read y to be picked up, new wallpaper has been ordered, there's a party somewhere tonight. "It's all confirmed," Bobby says simply. Inside the house it's twenty degrees. Inside the house, shit, its fragrance, churns everywhere, muddy and billowing. Inside the house there's a lot of "intense activity" and everything's quickly being lit.

I'm just trying not to cry again while standing behind Bobby. On the computer screen: designs for a device, a breakdown of the components that make up the plastic explosive Remform, prospective targets. Jamie's in the kitchen, carefully reading Tammy's prescription while pulling a bottle of Evian out of the refrigerator.

"How's she doing?" Jamie asks Bobbv.

"If it's any consolation?" he asks back. "Better."

Jamie walks past me blindly and moves slowly up the spiral staircase, maneuvering around crew members, thinking maybe she should feel more for me than she really does but my fear doesn't move her, it's isolated, it's not hip, it doesn't sing.

I'm touching Bobby's shoulders because I need to.

He stretches away from me, mutters "Don't" and then, "That's not a possibility anymore."

A long silence, during which I try to learn something.

"You look thin," Bobby says. "When's the last time you worked out? You're looking too skinny. Slightly whitish too."

"I just need some sleep, man."

"That's not an explanation," Bobby says. "You need a motivational workshop."

"I don't think so," I say, my voice cracking.

But Bobby might as well be submerged in a pool. We might as well be having a conversation underneath a waterfall. He doesn't even need to be in this room. He's just a voice. I might as well be talking on the phone with someone. I could be viewing this through a telescope. I might as well be dreaming this. Something hits me: but isn't that the point?

Bobby walks silently into the kitchen.

"Things are, um, falling apart," I'm saying. "And no one's acting like they are."

"What's falling apart?" Bobby says, walking back up to me. "I think things are right on schedule."

Pause.

"What . . . schedule?" I'm asking. "What . . . things?" Pause. "Bobby?"

"What things?"

"Yeah . . . what things?"

"Just things." Bobby shrugs. "Just things. Things about to happen."

Pause.

"And . . . then?"

"And then?"

"Yeah . . . and then?"

"And then?"

I'm nodding, tears spilling down my face.

"And then? Boom," he says serenely, lightly slapping my face, his hand the temperature of an icicle.

On cue from upstairs: Jamie starts screaming.

Even within the artfully lit shadows of the bathroom Tammy Devol and Bruce Rhinebeck shared, you can easily make out the bathtub overflowing with dark-red water, Tammy's floating face, its shade a light blue, her eyes open and yellowish. Our attention is also supposed to be drawn to the broken Amstel Light bottle that sits on the tub's edge and the groovy patterns her blood made on the tiled walls as it shot out of her veins. Tammy's slashed wrists have been cut to the bone-but even that wasn't "enough," because somehow she managed to slice her throat open very deeply

(but you know it's too deep, you know she couldn't have done this, though you can't say anything because you know that scenes are filmed without you and you know that a different script exists in which you are not a character and you know it's too deep) and because it smells so much like what I imagined a room covered in blood would smell like and Jamie's screaming so loudly, it's hard to start piecing things together, make the appropriate connections, hit that mark, and I can't stop gasping.

It's the things you don't know that matter most.

Two propmen, both wearing dust masks, swiftly force themselves past us and lift Tammy nude from the tub, her wrists and neck looking like they burst open outward, and a large purple dildo slides out of her cunt, splashing back into the bloody bathwater. My eyes are homing in on her navel ring.

Jamie has backed out of the bathroom and into Bentley's arms. She struggles, hugs him, pulls away again. She holds a hand to her mouth. Her face is red, like it's burning.

In a corner of the bedroom Bobby is talking to the director, both of them motionless except for an occasional nod.

Jamie tries to get away from Bentley and shambles madly toward Tammy's bedroom but she's blocked because another propman, also wearing a dust mask, is hauling a mattress soaked with blood down the hallway, to be burned in the courtyard.

Jamie stares at the stained mattress in horror—at its truth—and Bentley holds on to her as she flings herself at Tammy's bed, Bentley falling with her, and screaming, she lunges for the script on Tammy's nightstand and hurls it at Bobby and the director. She struggles with a pillow, absurdly. Her screaming intensifies, is a variation on the earlier screaming.

Bobby glances over at Jamie, distracted. He watches passively, trying to listen to something the director is telling him while Jamie scratches at her face, makes gurgling noises, pleads with anyone who will listen.

I can't form a sentence, all reflexes zapped. I'm feebly reaching out a hand to steady myself, cameras swinging around us, capturing reactions.

Bobby slaps Jamie across the face while Bentley continues holding on to her.

"No one cares," Bobby's saying. "I thought we agreed on that."

Jamie makes noises no one can translate.

"I thought we agreed on that," Bobby's saying. "You understand me? No one cares." He slaps her across the face, harder. This time it gets her attention. She stares at him. "This reaction of yours is useless. It carries no meaning with anyone here and it's useless. We agreed that no one would care."

Jamie nods mutely and just as it seems she's going to relax into the moment, she suddenly freaks out. Bentley is panting with exertion, trying to wrestle her down, but he's laughing because he's so stressed out, and someone from the crew keeps rationalizing, frivolously, "No one could have saved her." I'm trying to move the other way, gracefully aiming for the door. I'm trying to wake up momentarily by turning away from this scene, by becoming transparent, but also realizing that the Halcion prescription Jamie picked up was meant not for Tammy but only for herself

17

Midnight and I'm drinking Absolut from a plastic cup, overdressed in a black Prada suit with Gucci boots and eating Xanax, a cigarette burning between my fingers. A party at a massive new Virgin megastore that maybe Tommy Hilfiger has something to do with sponsoring; there's a stage, there's supposed to be bands, there's an Amnesty International banner, there's supposed to be the ubiquitous benefit concert (though right now the Bangles' "Hazy Shade of Winter" is blasting over the sound system), there's loads of negativity. There's the lead singer from the Verve, there are two members from Blur wearing vintage sneakers, there's Andre Agassi and William Hurt and three Spice Girls and people milling around holding guitars, there are the first black people I've seen since I've been in France, there're a lot of major dudes from Hollywood (or not enough, depending on who you ask), there are trays of ostrich on tiny crackers, opossum on bamboo skewers, shrimp heads tied up in vines, huge plates of tentacles draped over clumps of parsley, but I really can't keep anything down and I'm looking for a leather sofa to fall into because I can't tell if people are really as disinterested as they appear or just extremely bored. Whatever—it's infectious. People keep swatting away flies when they aren't busy whispering or lurking. I'm just saying "Hi." I'm just following directions. It's really an alarming party and everyone is a monster. It's also a mirror.

And then a giant intake of breath. Uncertain of what I'm seeing.

On the edge of the crowd, beyond the crowd, perfectly ]it, cameras flashing around her, surrounded by playboys, her hair sleek and dark gold, is a girl.

Chloe.

Everything rushes back and it knocks me forward, stunned, and I start pushing through the crowd dumbly, adrenaline washing through me, my breath exhaling so hard I'm making noises and Elle Macpherson glimpses me and tries reaching over to say "Hi" but when she sees how freaked out I look—face twisted, gasping—something dawns on her and she decides to ignore me.

At the precise moment Elle turns away I see Bertrand Ripleis across the record store, his eyes focused as if on a target, grimly advancing toward Chloe.

Frantic, I start making swimming motions, butterfly strokes, to facilitate my way through the crowd, knocking into people, but it's so packed in the Virgin megastore that it's like moving upward and sideways across a slope and Chloe seems miles away.

It's shocking how fast Bertrand Ripleis is moving toward her and he's practicing smiles, rehearsing an intro, a way to kiss her.

"No, no, no," I'm muttering, pushing forward, the party roaring around me.

Bertrand suddenly gets stuck, first by a waiter holding a tray of hors d'oeuvres, who

Bertrand angrily knocks away, and then by an unusually insistent Isabelle Adjani, straining to keep up his side of the conversation. When he glances over, sees how much ground I've covered, he pushes her aside and starts cutting across to Chloe laterally.

And then I'm reaching out, my hand falling on Chloe's shoulder, and before even looking at her—because there's so much anxiety coursing through me-I glance over in time to see Bertrand suddenly stop, staring at me blank-faced until he retreats.

"Chloe," I say, my voice hoarse.

She turns around, ready to smile at whoever just said her name, but when she sees it's me she seems confused and she doesn't say anything.

People are swarming around us and I start crying, wrapping my arms around her, and in a haze I realize she's hugging me back.

"I thought you were in New York," she's saying.

"Oh baby, no, no," I'm saying. "I'm here. I've been here. Why did you think that?"

"Victor?" she asks, pulling back. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, baby, I'm cool," I say, still crying, trying not to.

Upstairs, at Chloe's request a PR person maneuvers us to a bench in the VIP section, which looks out over the rest of the party. Chloe's chewing Nicorette, carefully blotting her lipstick, and gold and taupe brow color has been applied to the outer corners of her eyes and I keep grabbing her hand, clutching it, and sometimes she squeezes back.

"How are you?" she asks.

"Oh great, great." Pause. "Not so great." Another pause. "I think I need some help, baby." I try to smile.

"It's not drugs . . . is it?" she asks. "We're not being bad . . . are we?"

"No, no, no, not that, I just—" I smile tightly, reach out again to rub her hand. "I just missed you so much and I'm just so glad you're here and I'm just so sorry for everything," I say in a rush, breaking down again.

"Hey, shhh, what's bringing this on?" she asks.

I can't talk. My head slips from my hands and I'm just sobbing, tears pouring out.

"Victor? Is everything okay?" she asks softly. "What's going on?"

I take in a giant breath, then sob again.

"Victor, what's wrong?" I hear her ask. "Do you need any money? Is that it?"

I keep shaking my head, unable to speak. "Are you in trouble?" she asks. "Victor?" "No, no, baby, no," I say, wiping my face.

"Victor, you're scaring me."

"It's just, it's just, this is my worst suit," I say, trying to laugh.

"Wardrobe dressed me. The director insisted. But it's just not fitting right."

"You look nice," she says, relaxing a little. "You look tired but you look nice." She pauses, then adds sweetly, "I've missed you."

"Oh baby . . ."

"I know I shouldn't but I do."

"Hey, hey. . ."

"I left about a dozen messages on your machine in New York last week," she says. "I guess you never got them."

"No." I clear my throat, keep sniffling. "No, I guess I didn't."

"Victor-"

"So are you seeing anyone?" I ask, hope cracking my voice apart. "Did you come here with anyone?"

"Please. No unpleasant questions. Okay?"

"Hey, come on, Chloe, just let me know."

"Victor, Jesus," she says, pulling back. "We already talked about that. I'm not seeing anyone."

"What happened to Baxter?" I ask, coughing.

"Baxter Priestly?" she asks. "Victor—"

"Yeah, Baxter." I wipe my face with my hand, then wipe my hand on my pants, still sniffling.

"Nothing. Why?" Chloe pauses, chewing tensely. "Victor, I'm suddenly really, really worried about you."

"I thought he was in the same movie," I blurt out. "I thought his part got bigger."

"He's been written out," she says. "Not like that should mean anything to you."

"Baby, listen, I'm just so happy to see you."

"You're shaking," she says. "You're really shaking."

"I'm just . . . so cold," I say. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, the shows," she says, staring at me strangely.

"Yeah, yeah." I reach for her hand again. "What else?"

"I'm also narrating a documentary on the history of the negligee."

"That's so cool, baby."

"Some might say," she concedes. "And yourself? What are you doing in Paris?"

"I'm just, um, moving on to the next project, y'know?" I say.

"That's . . . constructive."

"Yeah. Go figure," I say. "I don't have a master plan yet."

At the entrance of the VIP section, at the top of the steel staircase, Bobby is conferring with Bertrand, who is jabbing his finger at where Chloe and I are sitting while he angrily leans into Bobby and Bobby just nods "understandingly" and makes a calming motion with his hand, which Bertrand pushes away disgustedly. Bobby sighs visibly and as he starts making his way over to us, he's joined by Bentley.

With maximum effort I light a cigarette. Exhaling, I make a face and hand the cigarette to Chloe.

"No, I'm not smoking anymore," she says, smiling, taking the cigarette from me and dropping it into a nearby beer bottle. "I shouldn't even be chewing this stuff," she says, making a face.

Bobby and Bentley get closer, casually determined. "We can't talk here," I'm saying. "I can't talk here." "It's really loud," she says, nodding.

"Listen." I breathe in. "Where are you staying?"

"At Costes," she says. "Where are you staying?"

"I'm just, um, just staying with some people."

"Who?"

"Bobby Hughes," I say because I can't get away with a lie.

"Oh really?" she says. "I didn't know you knew him."

"And Jamie Fields. I went to Camden with her. But they're a couple. Bobby and Jamie are a couple."

"You don't need to explain, Victor."

"No, no, no, it's not like that," I keep insisting. "They're together. I'm just staying at their place."

A careful pause. "But didn't you use to date her?" Chloe asks.

"Yeah, yeah, but she's with Bobby Hughes now," I say.

"What's he like?" Chloe asks, and then, "Victor, you've got to calm down, you're freaking me out."

"I'm not seeing Jamie Fields," I say. "I have no interest whatsoever in Jamie Fields anymore."

"Victor, you don't need to explain," Chloe says. "I said it's okay."

"I know, I know." My eyes are wet and blinking.

"So what's the address?" she asks. "Where you are?"

I'm too afraid to give it out so I just tell her the name of a street in the 8th.

"Posh," she says, and then, uneasily, "People live there?"

"So I'll call you, okay?"

Suddenly Chloe looks up at someone behind me and, smiling widely, jumps off the bench and shouts,

"Oh my god—Bentley!"

"Chloe baby," Bentley cries out, swingerish, as he grabs her in a giant hug.

She's squealing happily, spinning around, Bobby silently waiting on the sidelines, listening patiently to their requisite small talk. I force myself to acknowledge Bobby's presence as he continues to stare at Chloe, his eyes black and waxy, but then Chloe's smiling at him and suddenly cameras are flashing all around us and as the four of us stand together, pretending we're not posing casually for the paparazzi, Bobby lifts Chloe's hand up.

"How gallant," Chloe whispers mock-seriously as Bobby kisses her hand and when he lifts that hand to kiss it the urge to knock his face away almost destroys me and I fall back on the bench, defeated.

Bobby's saying, "We're sorry we have to take him away from you." He gestures vaguely at me.

This moves me to say, "I think I'm being accosted."

"It's okay," Chloe says. "I have a show tomorrow morning."

"Let's leave, Victor," Bentley says. "Come on, guy."

"Leave for what?" I ask, refusing to get up from the bench. "It's midnight."

"No it's not," Bobby says, checking his watch.

"Leave for what?" I ask again.

"We have a dinner party we're late for," Bobby explains to Chloe. "Plus a really shitty band's about to play. It's a good opportunity to split."

"Baby." Bentley's kissing Chloe again. "We are definitely partying while you're here. That is a promise.”

"It's great to see you again, Bentley," Chloe says, and then to Bobby, "And it's nice to finally meet you."

Bobby blushes on cue. "And you," is all he says but it's so loaded with references that I start shaking uncontrollably.

"Let's go," Bentley's saying to me. "Get up."

"Maybe you should just leave without me," I tell him. "It's too late to eat."

"I have a remarkable metabolism," Bobby says. "It'll be okay."

"Chloe," I say. "Do you want to have a drink with me?"

"Victor," Bobby says, hurt.

Chloe gauges Bobby's reaction. "Listen, I have to unpack. I'm jetlagged," Chloe says. "We have a press conference tomorrow morning. I have a photo shoot with Gilles Bensimon at twelve, so . . . not tonight, sorry.

"Let's cancel," I tell Bobby.

"That's impossible," Bobby says crisply. "I'm starving."

"Victor, it's really okay," Chloe says. "I have to go anyway. I'm totally jet-lagged. I came straight here from the airport."

"Can I see you tomorrow?" I ask.

A pause. For some reason she glances over at Bobby. "Sure," Chloe says. "Call me."

"Okay." I glance nervously at Bobby. "I will."

Chloe reaches over and wipes a smudge of lipstick off my cheek. She kisses me, she disappears.

The three of us look on as the party swallows her up.

"Come on, Victor," Bobby says.

"No," I say, not getting up from the bench.

"Ooh, he's being a little skittish," Bentley says.

Bobby tugs "playfully" at my sleeve.

"Come on. It's time to revel."

I slowly raise myself but it's really Bobby lifting up my entire weight with just one arm, pulling me off the bench. It's slippery walking down the staircase because the record store is encased in ice, and gold confetti streams down over us hideously, flies swarming everywhere.

16

Outside the Virgin megastore a limousine is waiting, an immense carnival surrounds us, bouncers fend off people way too hopeful of getting in. Tormented, I throw up twice beside the limo while Bobby lights a cigar.

"Time to depart, Victor," Bentley says grimly. "Get your ass up."

"And do what?" I croak. "Stick it in your face?"

"Promises, promises," Bentley sighs, mock-wearily. "Just get the fuck up. That's a boy."

"You're just making noise," I say, standing up.

On the sidewalk Bertrand stares at me and I'm staring back hatefully and then I break away from Bentley and Bobby and rush toward him, my fist raised high above my head, but Bobby ends up holding me back. Bertrand just smiles smugly, within inches of my reach. Slouching away, Bertrand curses in French, something I can't understand.

15

In the limousine moving back to the house I'm sitting between Bentley and Bobby.

"Chloe Byrnes," Bobby's saying. "How . . . intriguing."

My head is resting on my knees and I'm swallowing back dry heaves, breathing deeply.

"I like Chloe Byrnes," Bobby says. "She's not afraid to embrace her sensuality," he murmurs. "Amazing body." Pause. "Quite . . . distracting." He laughs darkly.

"If you ever touch her, Bobby, I swear to god I will fucking kill you, I swear to god," I say, enunciating each word.

"Ooh, how confrontational," Bentley giggles.

"Shut up, you faggot," I mutter.

"That's the pot calling the kettle black," Bentley says. "Or so I hear."

Bobby starts giggling too. "Boys, boys."

"Did you hear me, Bobby?" I ask.

Bobby keeps giggling and then, in a very tight voice, squeezing my thigh, says, "You have neither the clout nor the experience to make a threat like that, Victor."

14

In my bedroom at the house in the 8th or the 16th, sleeplessness is interrupted by the occasional unbearable dream—chased by raptors down hotel corridors, the word "beyond" appearing repeatedly, something wet keeps flying across the upper corner of the frame, making slapping noises, I'm always brushing my hair, trying to find the most accurate way possible to create a part, and I'm canceling dream appointments, keeping things loose, tumbling down steep flights of stairs that are too narrow to navigate and I'm always over water and everyone I run across has a face resembling mine. Waking up, I realize: you're just someone waiting casually in the dark for a rustling outside your door and there's a shadow in the hall.

I open the door. The director from the French film crew is waiting.

He seems nervous. He's holding a videotape, expectantly. He's wearing an expensive parka.

Without being invited in, he slips past me, closes the door. Then he locks it.

"What do you want?" I ask, moving back to the bed.

"I know we haven't talked much during the shoot, Victor," he starts apologetically, without the accent I expected.

"I have nothing to say to you," I mutter.

"And I understand," he says. "In fact I think I understand why even more now."

"That's okay because I don't care, I have my own problems," I say, and then, yawning, "What time is it?"

"It's light out," he offers.

I reach over to the nightstand and swallow two Xanax. I tip a bottle of Evian to my mouth. I stare at the director hatefully.

"What's that?" I ask, motioning to the tape in his hand. "Dailies?"

"Not exactly," he says.

I realize something. "Does Bobby know you're here?"

He looks away apprehensively.

"I think you should leave," I'm saying. "If Bobby doesn't know you're here I think you should leave."

"Victor," the director says. "I've debated showing you this." He pauses briefly. He decides something and shuffles toward a large-screen TV that's ensconced in a white-oak armoire across from the bed I'm shivering in. "But in light of what's about to happen, I think it's probably imperative that you view this."

"Hey, hey, wait," I'm saying. "No, please, don't—"

"I really think you should see this, Victor."

"Why?" I'm pleading, afraid. "Why?"

"This isn't for you," he says. "This is for someone else's benefit."

He blows confetti off the tape before slipping it into the VCR below the TV. "We think that Bobby Hughes is getting out of hand."

I'm wrapping myself in a comforter, freezing, steam pouring from my mouth because of how cold it is in the house.

"I think things need to be reduced for you," the director says. "In order for you to . . . see things clearly." He pauses, checks something on the VCR's console. "Otherwise we'll be shooting this all year."

"I don't think I have the energy to watch this."

"It's short," the director says. "You still have some semblance of an attention span left. I checked."

"But I might get confused," I say, pleading. "I might get thrown off—"

"Thrown off what?" the director snaps. "You're not even on anything to get thrown off of."

He presses Play on the console. I motion for him to sit next to me on the bed because I'm getting so tense I need to hold his hand even though he's wearing leather gloves, and he lets me.

Blackness on the screen blooms into random footage of Bobby.

Bobby on Boulevard du Montparnasse. Bobby sitting in La Coupole. Bobby heading down the Champs Élyssées. Bobby taking notes while waiting for the Vivienne Westwood show to begin, sitting in a giant room in the basement of the Louvre. Bobby crossing Rue de Rivoli. Bobby crossing Quai des Celestins. He's turning down Rue de l'Hôtel-de-Ville. He enters the métro station at Pont Marie. He's on a train, grabbing an overhead handrail as the train slowly enters the Sully-Morland station. A shot of Bobby on an Air Inter flight from Paris to Marseilles, reading a copy of Le Figaro. Bobby's picking up a rental car at the Provence airport.

"What are these? Highlights?" I'm asking, relaxing a little.

"Shh. Just watch," the director says.

"Bobby doesn't know you're showing me this," I ask again. "Does he?"

Bobby gets off a plane that just landed at Le Bourget airport.

Bobby walks along the Place des Voyages and into a restaurant called Benoit.

Bobby in the tunnel on the Place de l'Alma, near its east end, crouching by the concrete divider that separates the eastbound and westbound lanes.

Suddenly a scene I don't remember shooting. Café Flore. It's only me in the shot and I'm tan, wearing white, my hair slicked back, and I'm looking for a waitress.

"This cappuccino sucks, dude," I'm muttering. "Where's the froth?" A boom mike is visible above my head.

A voice—Bobby's—says, "We're not here for the cappuccino, Victor."

"Maybe you're not, baby, but I want some froth."

A shot of a line of schoolgirls singing as they walk along Rue Saint-Honoré.

Then static.

And then a close-up: airplane tickets to Tel Aviv.

Bobby's outside Dschungel, a club in Berlin, calling a girl a slut. A famous American football player is idling behind him.

Bobby in front of a Jewish synagogue in Istanbul.

Bobby wearing a skullcap. Bobby praying in Hebrew.

Bobby at the Saudi embassy in Bangkok.

Bobby drifting out of a bungalow in Tripoli, walking past a discarded radio antenna, an expensive Nikon camera swinging around his neck. A group of men follow him, wearing head scarves, holding Samsonite briefcases.

Someone singing a love song in Arabic plays over the sound track.

Bobby hops into a battered Mercedes 450SEL. A Toyota bus with bulletproof windows trails the Mercedes as it heads into a dark, vast desert.

The camera pans to a bulldozer scooping out a giant pit.

More static.

And then a black Citroën heads down Route Nationale through southern Normandy outside a farm village called Male.

The handheld camera shakes as it follows Bobby walking through what looks like a Ralph Lauren advertisement—an intensely green landscape, a gray overcast sky—and Bobby's so well-groomed it's astonishing; he's wearing a black wool blazer, a black cashmere turtleneck, Gucci boots, his hair's impeccable, he's holding a large bottle of Evian water. He's following a path.

Two golden retrievers bound into the frame, greeting Bobby as he nears what looks like a converted barn. He's passing under a proscenium. He's passing a catering truck. The barn is made of limestone and chicly shaped logs. As he approaches the front door Bobby turns his head toward the camera and grins, saying something the viewer can't hear while pointing at an antique bird feeder that hangs next to the front door of the converted barn.

Bobby knocks on that door. He leans down to pet the dogs. The dogs are photogenic, relaxed. Suddenly both their heads snap up and, bounding out of frame, they immediately run to whoever's behind the camera.

The door opens. A figure, mostly obscure in the shadowy doorway, shakes Bobby's hand. The figure notices the camera, gestures toward it, annoyed. The figure motions Bobby inside.

And then F. Fred Palakon, his face clearly visible, looks outside before closing the door.

The director leans over, letting go of my hand, and rewinds the tape to the moment F. Fred Palakon's face emerges from the shadows of the converted barn.

Once again F. Fred Palakon shakes Bobby's hand.

Once again F. Fred Palakon gestures toward the camera.

The director presses Pause on the VCR's console, freezing on Palakon's face the instant Palakon notices the camera, and right now Palakon's staring into the bedroom I'm occupying in the house in either the 8th or the 16th.

"I know this isn't exactly reassuring," the director says.

I'm cowering on the other side of the bed, delusional, backed up against the wall, floundering.

"Just consider what it means," he says. "Reflect."

I start crying. "I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, they're gonna kill me—”

"Victor—"

"No, no, no," I'm groaning, thrashing around on the bed.

"At any rate," the director says, ejecting the tape from the VCR, “this is not a fantasy."

I lie on the bed, finally motionless, my hands over my face.

"What is it, then?" I groan mindlessly. "Punishment?"

"No." Before slipping out, the director says, "It's an instruction."

13

An hour later I'm vaguely aware of brushing my teeth in the shower. I barely dry myself off—the towel keeps dropping from my hands. I get dressed. Numb, giggling to myself in the darkness of my bedroom, I accidentally start forming a plan.

12

Walking slowly down the circular staircase into the living room, fear grafted onto my face, I can't stop shaking. A cameraman is gloomily sipping a cup of watery coffee while leaning against the big Panaflex camera that takes up so much space in the foyer and the director's sitting in the director's chair, staring at a video console, preparing a scene I will not be appearing in. The crew mills around. Someone actually says to someone else, "It scarcely matters." There's a lot of shrugging and slinking off.

I'm promising myself that this will be the last time I see any of these people.

Bentley has spent all morning being prepped for a segment on MTV's "House of Style—Dubai!" and right now he's facing a mirror in the corner of the living room as a stylist blow-dries his hair and Bentley, shouting over the noise, explains to an interviewer, "It's the classic bistro look in what's basically a modern kitchen." The interviewer wants to touch on eyeball fashion, what country has the sexiest soldiers, and then, "Ooh, can I have a pretzel?" I'm trying to block a tear with my finger. My heart feels sore, on the verge of bursting. I manage a wave, a small acknowledgment, to Bentley. The interviewer whispers something to Bentley while gawking at me and Bentley mutters "I already did" and they scream hysterically while giving each other high fives.

Jamie's lying on a couch, a pink face mask over her eyes, recovering from the abortion she had yesterday afternoon, hungover from the Planet Hollywood opening she had to attend last night, and she's talking sullenly into a cell phone. A book, an astrological forecast for Aquarians, lies on her chest and she looks like someone dropped her, picked her up, then laid her across the couch. She's pressing a flower into her face, fingers stained from newspaper ink. She holds up a hand warily as I pass and mouths Shhh—it's my manager and someone with a handheld camera crouches low, capturing Jamie's blank face on super-8.

Bobby sits at the computer wearing Helmut Lang jeans and a Helmut Lang moleskin jacket, a rusted-green Comme des Garçons sweater underneath. On the computer screen are the words BRINK OF DESTRUCTION and automatically I'm thinking, Who's Brink? and I've never heard of that band, and Bobby, in one of his "barely tolerant" moods, asks me, "Where are you going?"

"To see Chloe," I say, stiffly walking past him to the kitchen. I force myself to peer into the refrigerator, struggling to be casual, a very hard moment. Outside, lightning flickers and then, on cue, thunder sounds.

Bobby's considering what I just said.

"Are you trying to rescue her?" he muses. "Or are you trying to rescue yourself?" He pauses. "That's not really a solution," he says, and then, less sweetly, "Is it?"

"I'm just going to make sure everything's okay with her."

"I think that's another movie," Bobby says. "And I think you're confused."

"So you have a problem?" I ask, walking back into the living room.

"No," he says. "I just don't think that's all you're going to do." He shrugs. "It's just a . . . quandary."

"Do I really need to make arrangements with you in order to visit my ex-girlfriend?" I ask. "It's pretty fucking simple—”

"Hey, don't talk that way to me." He scowls.

"—to grasp, Bobby. I'm going to see Chloe. Bye-bye."

Bobby's expression subtly changes, becoming bored, almost trusting.

"Don't act so wounded," he finally says, flashing a warning look. "You're not very good at it."

It seems impossible that I will ever get out of this house. Under my breath I'm telling myself, It's just another scene, it's just another phase, like it's a lyric from a song that means something.

"Do you think I'm lying?" I ask.

"No, no," Bobby says. "I just think there's a hole in your truth."

"Well, what do you want to hear?" I ask, daring him.

He ponders this, then simply turns back to the computer screen. "I think I've decided to listen to something else."

"What does that mean?" I ask.

"You want it translated?" he mutters. "Sober up. Learn your ABCs."

"I'm just trying to have a so-called normal conversation," I say.

"I don't think you're being particularly successful," he says.

"I'm not going to be put off by your negativity," I'm saying, teeth clenched. "Later, dude."

The director glances up at me and nods, once.

"Okay, we need some spontaneous sound bites," the interviewer from "House of Style" says.

I'm walking by Bentley as he shows off a stack of 1960s movie magazines, a book of photographs featuring dismembered dolls, a new tattoo in the shape of a demon laced across his bicep.

"We'll miss you," Bentley says, batting his eyes at me.

Outside, it's raining lightly. A bearded man worriedly walks a dog. A girl glides by holding a dozen sunflowers. I break down again, tears spilling out of my eyes. I hail a cab. Inside the cab, I'm trying not to shriek. A moment of doubt rises, but I blame it on the rain and then I tell the driver, "The American embassy."

11

I'm sufficiently calm to minimize crying, to curb the hyperventilating. But I'm also on so much Xanax that the following is merely a dark blur and the only thing keeping this scene from being totally black is the mid-level panic that still beats through me, acting as a dull light.

I'm just assuming we're on Avenue Gabriel as the taxi stops in front of what I'm just assuming is the American embassy. I give the driver whatever bills I have left in my wallet—250, maybe 300 francs. I don't care, I tell myself as I stumble from the cab.

I'm vaguely aware of walking up steps past a sentry box into the building. I'm glancing sideways at members of the Police Urbaine, at a machine gun, at a security camera, at a guard who responds only slightly with bland suspicion when I move by, serenely smiling.

In the lobby I'm allowed to walk through a metal detector without incident. I'm allowed to step up to a plexiglass window.

I tell the woman sitting behind the plexiglass window that I need to speak to an official. "Un officiale . . . ?"

In English, she asks if I have an appointment with anyone.

"No," I say.

She asks me my name.

I tell her, "Victor Johnson."

She asks me what this concerns.

I tell her, "A bomb." I tell her, "It concerns a bomb."

She picks up a phone, utters words into it I can't hear. She continues to explain something that I'm too numb to decipher.

Two policemen carrying machine guns suddenly move into my line of vision, guarding me, not saying a word, standing at attention, waiting.

A young man, familiar-looking and nondescript, vaguely European, vaguely not, wearing a gray Prada suit with a stylish green tie, moves quickly down a corridor to where I'm standing.

The young man asks, "How can I help you, Mr. Johnson?"

"We need to talk elsewhere," I'm saying.

"What is this about?" he asks carefully.

"I know the people who planted the bomb at the Ritz," I say. "I know where they live. I know their names. I know who they are."

The official just stares at me, unsure of how to respond. "You do?"

"Yes," I say solemnly. "I do."

"And?" he asks, waiting.

"They blew up the Institute of Political Studies," I say. "They're also responsible for the bombing at Café Flore." Breaking down, I tell him, "They're responsible for the bomb that went off in the m6tro last week." Confidence collapses and I start crying.

The official seems to take this in stride. He makes a decision.

"If you would please wait here," he says to me. He leans and says something in French to the two guards, who because of this command nod, relax a little, even as they move in closer.

"No," I'm saying. "I don't want to wait here."

"Please, let me get someone in Security to talk with you," the official says politely.

"Let me please come with you," I'm saying. "They might have followed me—"

"Just calm down, Mr. Ward—I'll be right back," he says, walking away.

A third guard has joined the other two and I'm in the middle of a triangle, surrounded, and then something black explodes in my stomach.

"Hey," I'm saying. "How did you know my name was Ward?" And then I start shouting, "How did you know my name? I didn't give you that name. How did you know my name was Ward?"

But he's just a silhouette in the corridor, and then even his shadow disappears.

The guards move in closer and I'm sighing urgently to get across to them how distressed I am, fear speeding out of control, the smell of shit suffocating me, and I'm making gestures that don't mean anything to them, there's no reaction on the guards' impassive faces, nothing. Movement, people, sounds start curving toward me and new silhouettes are gliding down a hallway in my direction. Two more guards, the young official, another figure. And I'm breathing louder as the shadows get closer, progressing toward me, and I'm wiping my hands over my face, glancing behind the plexiglass window, but the woman's not there anymore, and then I hear a voice.

"Mr. Ward?" it asks.

Slowly, dumbly, I turn around.

F. Fred Palakon stands in front of me, dramatically backlit from the light at the end of the hallway.

I try to run.

10

An interrogation room. It's freezing. There's a ventilator in the ceiling and confetti's everywhere, pasted onto the walls, the floor, the chairs we're sitting on, scattered in piles across the table Palakon and David Crater and Laurence Delta and Russell and the Japanese man from the apartment on Avenue Verdier are all sitting behind. There's also an inspector lieutenant of the First Section of the Paris Prefecture of Police taking notes and someone who came in from Lyons for Interpol. This man is so familiar-looking it becomes distracting. Smoke has been produced for added atmosphere.

"You never wanted me to find Jamie Fields," I'm saying, unable to contain myself "This was never about her, Palakon."

Palakon sighs. "Mr. Ward, the fact remains—"

"Palakon," I'm warning, my heart speeding up. "I swear to god, unless you tell me what this is all about I'm not saying another fucking word."

"Mr. Ward, please -

"No, Palakon—fuck you." I stand up, kicking the chair away.

"Mr. Ward, please sit down."

"Not until you tell me what the fuck's going on, Palakon."

"We're here to help you, Mr. Ward," Palakon says gently.

"Oh fucking stop it," I spit out. "Just tell me what the fuck's happening. Jesus Christ, you have fucking offices in the fucking embassy? What—you're all having brunch together?"

Palakon glances at Crater, then at Delta, at the Japanese man, who scowls impatiently and gives Palakon a hesitant nod.

Calmly, deliberately, Palakon asks, "Well, Victor, what would you like to know?"

"Who do you work for?" I ask.

Palakon considers this, doesn't know where to go.

"Oh shit, Palakon."

I glance over at the inspector from Interpol, who seems to just be taking up space, barely paying attention to the proceedings. But those cheekbones, that jawline—I've seen them before and I'm trying to place where I met him.

"I'm just figuring out the best way to explain—"

"Fuck the best way," I shout. "Just fucking say it. Who do you work for?"

"I'm an independent contractor, Mr. Ward—”

I cut him off. "I'm not saying anything else until you tell me who you work for."

A long pause, during which Delta sighs heavily, then nods at Palakon.

"Who in the fuck do you work for?" I ask. "Because Jamie Fields has nothing to do with any of this, right?"

"Not . . . exactly." Palakon tilts his head.

"Goddamnit, Palakon, I'm so fucking sick of your bullshit," I scream.

"Mr. Ward—”

"They killed Tammy Devol," I'm screaming. "They fucking raped her and cut her throat open. Bobby Hughes ordered it done."

Everyone just stares at me blankly from across the table like I've lost it or as if losing it isn't understandable.

"Mr. Ward—" Palakon starts, his patience dropping.

"Fuck you, Palakon!" I'm screaming. "Who in the fuck do you work for?" I'm at the table now, gripping its edges, glaring into Palakon's face. "Fucking tell me who you work for," I'm screaming at maximum volume, my face twisted into a grimace.

Palakon draws in a breath and stares icily at me.

He says, simply, "I work for your father."

Palakon pauses, looks away, sighing, then back at me.

"I work for your father, Mr. Ward."

This is uttered so matter-of-factly, delivered so deadpan, that its existence opens a door and if you looked through that door you would see me moving above a winter road then descending rapidly and no one's there to catch me and I'm hitting pavement. What this implies simply is that truth equals chaos and that this is a regression. A physical sensation causes me to ignore everything in this room—to turn away from Russell running his hand through his hair, turn away from the Japanese man lighting another cigarette, turn away from the fly buzzing around my head. These men are perpetrators and the table they're sitting behind suddenly seems vaster and they're making plans, they're jotting memoranda, they're casting motives, they're plotting itineraries. Something invisible is forming itself in the cold air in the interrogation room and it's directed at me, wheeling forward. But the familiarity of the inspector from Interpol interrupts everything, makes me remember an earlier scene, and something emerges, obliterates the fuzz.

"What do you mean?" I ask quietly.

"I was hired by your father," Palakon says. "He came to me."

I slowly move away from the table, my hand on my mouth, and I'm sitting back down in the chair I'd kicked away.

"Mr. Ward," the Japanese man starts, with a thick accent. "Your father is leaving the U.S. Senate quite soon. Is this correct?"

I stare blankly at him. "I . . . don't know."

The Japanese man continues. "Your father will be making a bid for the—"

"Wait," I say, cutting him off. "What does this have to do with anything?"

"Victor," Palakon starts, "your father—”

The Japanese man interrupts. "Mr. Palakon, please. May I speak?"

Palakon nods uncertainly.

"We have not been formally introduced," the Japanese man says.

"Who are you?" I ask.

He hesitates. "And for reasons owing to our mutual personal safety, Mr. Johnson, we will not be."

"Oh shit," I'm muttering, clenching up. "Oh shit oh shit—"

"Mr. Johnson, your father is leaving the United States Senate." The Japanese man pauses. "He is interested in moving on, shall we say?" The Japanese man gestures with his hands, tries to smile kindly but is incapable. "To a higher place. He is planning to announce his bid for a higher office, for—"

"Oh shit oh shit oh shit." My moaning cuts him off, distracting the Japanese man.

"Mr. Ward," Crater starts, "when your father came to us, he was concerned about certain . . . well, proclivities you had toward—"

"What he's trying to say, Victor," Palakon interrupts, "is that you're not exactly an unknown quantity."

"I'm not a what?" I'm asking.

"In certain circles, in certain media circles, people know who you are." Delta this time. "You're a target."

Palakon and Crater nod subtly.

"There were certain aspects of your life that your father felt were affecting"—Delta pauses—"certain . . . possibilities from forming."

"Listen, Victor," Crater says impatiently. "Your dad basically wanted you to take a vacation."

"Why did he want that?" I ask slowly, in a very restrained voice.

"He felt that some of your . . . antics, let's say . . ." Palakon has trouble completing this sentence. He checks a file resting on the table, as the room seems to grow smaller. "Well, they were distracting." Palakon pauses. "They were . . . unnecessary. There was the possibility of bad publicity," he delicately adds.

"There was a concern that things might not fall into place properly," the Japanese man says. "There were worries that things might not work out in New Hampshire since you—"

"We don't need to go there quite yet;” Palakon says, cutting him off.

"Yes, of course," the Japanese man says. "You're quite right."

"Victor, your father didn't want you harmed in any way," Palakon says. "He simply wanted you to, well, take a break for a little while. He wanted you . . . preoccupied. He didn't want you in the States." Palakon pauses. "So he came to us. Things were discussed. Arrangements were made."

Silence, empty and graceless. I'm just staring at them, unable to take all this in because of certain details my mind cannot accept, and that lack of acceptance keeps spreading and I'm looking at this through a window and it's being boarded up and it's night and no one has said or is going to say who they really are.

We'll slide down the surface of things.

It's what you don't know that matters most.

The room slopes, then rights itself.

Outside, thunder.

You are beyond uneasiness. You force yourself to look at them. You stop yourself from falling over. You try to care. But you can't. Even if you wanted to, you can't. And now, in this room, it occurs to you that they know this too. Confusion and hopelessness don't necessarily cause a person to act. Someone from my first publicist's office told me this a long time ago. Only now does it resurface. Only now does it mean anything to me.

"Why did you use Jamie Fields as an excuse?" I hear myself ask.

"We delved into your past," Palakon says. "Interviews were done. There were discussions. Choices were made."

"We did not know, however, about Jamie Fields' connection with Bobby Hughes," Delta says, scratching the cleft in his chin.

"That was a mistake," Palakon concedes lamely.

"We assumed she was in Europe shooting a movie," Delta says. "That's all."

"Oh shit, that's a lie," I moan. "That is a fucking out-and-out lie. You knew more than that. Jesus Christ."

"Mr. Ward—" Palakon starts.

"You asked me to bring that hat with me and give it to Jamie Fields."

"Yes," Palakon says. "This is true. But we still had no idea she was involved with Bobby Hughes. We didn't even know of Bobby Hughes' existence until . . . it was too late."

"So does Bobby Hughes know who you are?" I ask, flashing on the videotape the director showed me.

"Yes," Palakon says. "Not personally. But we're fairly certain he knows of us."

"Do they know you sent me? That you're the reason I'm here?" I'm asking, trying to piece things together.

"It appears that way," Palakon says. "We don't think Jamie Fields told him."

"When did they find out?"

"It could have been as early as when you and I first met," Palakon says. "We're not sure."

"And what do they want?"

Palakon breathes in. "They want us to fail," Palakon says. "Obviously they are trying their best to ensure that this happens."

"Fail what?" I'm asking. "Who's they?" I'm asking.

"Well, who they are exactly is impossible to answer," Palakon says. "Actually there are many answers. But they obviously have decided to use you—your presence—to their advantage."

"Mr. Ward," Delta says, "we learned at a late date that Jamie Fields has connections with a faction that works in opposition to the faction Bobby Hughes belongs to. Once we found this out we discussed the possibilities of how this could affect the outcome of the situation, of your situation. We decided that any problems arising from that connection—in relation to harming you—were remote. And if you were placed in any danger we would step in and remove you from the situation."

Crater speaks. "Jamie Fields, at that point, had no immediate contact with Bobby Hughes. At that juncture we thought you were safe."

"Jamie Fields works for a counterintelligence organization that has infiltrated Mr. Hughes' organization," Palakon says. "At the time you were sent, we had no idea this was happening. We didn't know until you disappeared from London what the situation was." He pauses. "Until it was too late."

"But they met a long time ago," I mutter. "Jamie told me she'd met Bobby years ago, that they were hanging out for years."

"They had met, this was confirmed," Palakon allows, nodding. "But Bobby Hughes meets a lot of people. Not all of them tend to work for him. Not all of them end up being recruited."

Pause. "What about the hat you asked me to bring?" I ask.

Palakon sighs. "The hat I asked you to bring was intended for the group that Jamie Fields works for." A long pause suggests that this is an answer.

"So . . . Jamie Fields doesn't work for Bobby Hughes?" I ask.

"No, she doesn't, Mr. Ward," Palakon says. "Jamie Fields works for the United States government."

"What was . . . in the hat?" I ask tentatively.

All around: heavy sighs, a smattering of flinches, men repositioning themselves. Palakon glances over at Crater, who nods, resigned. I'm on the verge of placing where I first met the Interpol inspector but Russell distracts me by lighting a cigarette. There's no relief in knowing Jamie doesn't work for Bobby, because I don't believe it.

"In the seams of the hat," Palakon starts, "was a prototype for a new form of plastic explosive."

I turn ice cold, chills wash over my body in one enormous wave and veins freeze up, start tingling. I'm writhing in my chair, unable to sit still.

"We were uncertain of how detectable it was," Palakon says. "We needed a carrier. We needed someone no one would suspect. Someone who could transfer this sample to Europe."

"But once you boarded the QE2, Victor, you had obviously been spotted," Crater says. "Something got leaked. We're not sure how."

"I'm not . . . really clear on this," I manage to say.

"I agreed to get you out of the country for your father and I did," Palakon says. "I also agreed to something else." He pauses. "I owed . . . a favor. To another party." Another pause. "I agreed to bring this other party the prototype for Remform. But the two things—you heading to Europe and the delivery of the plastique—were not related. Your father knew nothing of that. This was my mistake and I take full responsibility. But things were urgent and moving fast and I needed to find a carrier immediately. You were available."

"What exactly is Remform?" I'm asking.

"It's a plastic explosive that escapes detection from, well, just about anything," Palakon says. "Metal detectors, x-ray machines, trace detectors, electron-capture vapor detectors, tagging, trained dogs." Palakon shrugs. "It's highly efficient."

"Who was the Remform . . . for?" I ask.

"It doesn't matter. It's not something you need to know, Victor, but it definitely was not intended for Bobby Hughes. In fact, quite the opposite. It slipped into the wrong hands." Palakon pauses gravely. "I thought you would be protected. You weren't. I'm sorry. The Remform was stolen—we now realize—during your voyage on the QE2. And we did not—I swear to you, Victor—understand the situation until we met last week at the hotel."

"We didn't realize any of this until Palakon made contact with you last week," Delta confirms.

"I didn't realize where the Remform was located until you told me," Palakon says.

"Why don't you guys just tell Jamie what's going on?" I ask.

"That would be far too dangerous for her," Palakon says. "If we attempted any kind of contact and she was found out, an enormous amount of time and effort would have been wasted. We cannot risk that."

"Does my father know any of this?" I ask.

"No."

I'm stuck, can't form a sentence.

"The fact remains that Bobby Hughes has the Remform and obviously has plans to manufacture and use it," Palakon says. "That was not supposed.to happen. That was definitely not supposed to happen."

"But. . . . I start.

"Yes?"

The room waits.

"But you know Bobby Hughes," I say.

"Pardon?" Palakon asks. "I know of him."

"No, Palakon," I say. "You know him."

"Mr. Ward, what are you talking about?"

"Palakon," I shout. "I saw you in a videotape shaking Bobby Hughes' hand, you fucking bastard, I saw you shake that asshole's hand. Don't tell me you don't know him."

Palakon flinches. "Mr. Ward, I'm not sure what you're talking about. But I have never met Bobby Hughes face-to-face."

"You're lying, you're fucking lying," I shout. "Why are you lying, Palakon? I saw a videotape. You were shaking his hand." I'm out of the chair again, stomping toward him.

Palakon swallows grimly, then launches into, "Mr. Ward, as you well know, they are quite sophisticated at altering photographs and videotapes." Palakon stops, starts again. "What you probably saw was just a movie. A special effect. just a strip of film that was digitally altered. Why they showed this to you I don't know. But I have never met Bobby Hughes before—"

"Blah blah blah," I'm screaming. "What a load of shit. No way, man." There's so much adrenaline rushing through me that I'm shaking violently.

"Mr. Ward, I think you have been a victim of this as well," Palakon adds.

"So you're telling me we can't believe anything we're shown any more?" I'm asking. "That everything is altered? That everything's a lie? That everyone will believe this?"

"That's a fact," Palakon says.

"So what's true, then?" I cry out.

"Nothing, Victor," Palakon says. "There are different truths."

"Then what happens to us?"

"We change." He shrugs. "We adapt."

"To what? Better? Worse?"

"I'm not sure those terms are applicable anymore."

"Why not?" I shout. "Why aren't they?"

"Because no one cares about 'better.' No one cares about 'worse,"' Palakon says. "Not anymore. It's different now."

Someone clears his throat as tears pour down my face.

"Mr. Ward, please, you've helped us enormously," Crater says.

"How?" I sob.

"Because of that printout you gave to Palakon, we believe that Bobby Hughes is using the Remform in a bombing this week," Crater explains. "A bombing that we now have the power to stop."

I mumble something, looking away.

"We think this has to do with a bombing scheduled for Friday," Palakon says matter-of-factly. "That date is November 15. We think '1985' is actually a misprint. We think the 8 is actually an O."

"Why?"

"We think 1985 is actually 1905," Crater says. "In military parlance that's 7:05 p.m."

"Yeah?" I mutter. "So?"

"There's a TWA flight leaving Charles de Gaulle this Friday, November 15, at 7:05," Palakon says.

"So what?" I'm asking. "Aren't there a lot of flights leaving on that date, near that time?"

"Its flight number is 511," Palakon says.

9

I'm told to stay calm.

I'm told they will contact me tomorrow.

I'm told to return to the house in the 8th or the 16th and pretend nothing has happened.

I'm told that I can be placed, eventually, in a witness protection program. (I'm told this after I have collapsed on the floor, sobbing hysterically.)

I'm told again to stay calm.

On the verge of trust, I realize that the inspector from Interpol is the actor who played the clerk at the security office on the QE2.

I'm told, "We'll be in touch, Mr. Ward."

I'm told, "You'll be watched."

"I know," I say hollowly.

Since I have no more Xanax left and it's starting to rain I head over to Hôtel Costes, where I wait in the café pretending to be pensive, drinking tea, smoking Camel Lights out of a pack someone left discarded at the table next to mine, until Chloe walks in with a famous ballerina, a well-known former junkie just out of rehab and Aphex Twin, and they all start chatting pleasantly with Griffin Dunne, who's standing at the front desk, and then everyone but Chloe walks away and in a trance I move forward while she checks her messages and I grab her, embracing her fearfully while glancing around the hushed lobby and then I'm kissing her lips, entering her life again, and we're both crying. The concierge turns his head away.

I start relaxing but a film crew has followed Chloe into the lobby and a camera starts panning around us and we're asked to "do that" once more. Someone yells "Action." Someone yells "Cut." I stop crying and we do it again.

8

Afternoon and outside silvery clouds glide through the sky as a soft rain keeps drifting over a steel-gray Paris. There were two shows today—one at the Conciergerie, one in the gardens of the Musée Rodin—and she was being paid a zillion francs, naysayers abounded, the catwalks seemed longer, the paparazzi were both more and less frantic, girls were wearing bones, bird skulls, human teeth, bloody smocks, they held fluorescent water pistols, there was serious buzz, there was zero buzz, it was the epitome of hype, it was wildly trivial.

From room service we order a pot of coffee that she doesn't drink, a bottle of red wine of which she has only half a glass, a pack of cigarettes but she's not smoking. An hour passes, then another. Flowers sent by various designers fill the suite, arc of colors and shapes conspicuous enough so that we can easily concentrate on them when we're not talking to each other. A pigeon sits nestled on the ledge outside the window, humming. At first we keep saying "What does it matter?" to each other, ad-libbing like we have secrets we don't care about revealing, but then we have to stick to the script and I'm sucking on her pussy causing her to climax repeatedly and we arrange ourselves into a position where I'm lying on my side, my cock slowly pumping in and out of her mouth, arching my back with each movement, her hands on my ass, and I don't relax until I come twice, my face pressed against her vagina, and later she's crying, she can't trust me, it's all impossible and I'm pacing the suite looking for another box of tissues to hand her and she keeps getting up and washing her face and then we attempt to have sex again. Her head leans against a pillow. "Tell me," she's saying. "Possibly," she's saying. "It's not beyond you," she's saying. We're watching MTV with the sound off and then she tells me I need to shave and I tell her that I want to grow a beard and then, while forcing a smile, that I need a disguise and she thinks I'm serious and when she says "No, don't" something gets mended, hope rises up in me and I can envision a future.

After trying to sleep but kept awake by remembering how I got here I reposition myself on the bed next to Chloe, trying to hold her face in my bands.

"I thought it would solve everything if I . . . just left," I tell her. "I was just . . . directionless, y'know, baby?"

She smiles unhappily.

"I had to get my priorities straightened out," I'm whispering. "I needed to clear my head."

"Because?"

A sigh. "Because where I was going . . ." I stop, my throat tightens.

"Yeah?" she whispers. "Because where you were going . . . ,” she coaxes.

I breathe in and then I'm reduced.

"There was no one there," I whisper back.

"You needed to clear your head?"

"Yeah."

"So you came to Paris?"

"Yeah."

"Victor, there are parks in New York she says. "You could have gone to a library. You could have taken a walk." Casually she reveals more than she intended. I wake up a little.

"The impression I got before I left was that you and Baxter—"

"No," she says, cutting me off.

But that's all she says.

"You could be lying to me, right?" I ask shakily.

"Why would I bother?" She reaches toward the nightstand for a copy of the script.

"It's okay, though," I'm saying. "It's okay."

"Victor," she sighs.

"I was so afraid for you, Chloe."

"Why?"

"I thought you'd gotten back on drugs," I say. "I thought I saw something in your bathroom, back in New York . . . and then I saw that guy Tristan—that dealer?—in your lobby and oh Jesus . . . I just lost it."

"Victor—"

"No, really, that morning, baby, after the opening—"

"It was just that night, Victor," she says, stroking the side of my face.

"Really."

"Baby, I freaked—"

"No, no, shhh," she says. "It was just some dope I got for the weekend. It was just for that weekend. I bought it. I did a little of it. I threw the rest away."

"Put that down—please, baby," I tell her, motioning at the script she's holding, curled in her other hand.

Later.

"There were so many relatively simple things you couldn't do, Victor," she says. "I always felt like you were playing jokes on me. Even though I knew you weren't. It just felt that way. I always felt like a guest in your life. Like I was someone on a list."

"Oh baby. . ."

"You were so nice to me, Victor, when we first met," she says. "And then you changed." She pauses. "You started treating me like shit."

I'm crying, my face pressed into a pillow, and when I lift my head up I fell her, "But baby, I'm very together now."

"No, you're freaking me out now," she says. "What are you talking about? You're a mess."

"I'm just . . . I'm just so afraid," I sob. "I'm afraid of losing you again . . . and I want to make you understand that ... I want to fix things. . . .”

Her sadness creases the features of her face, making it look as if she's concentrating on something.

"We can't go back," she says. "Really, Victor."

"I don't want to go back," I'm saying.

"A smart suit," she sighs. "Being buff. A cool haircut. Worrying about whether people think you're famous enough or cool enough or in good enough shape or ... or whatever." She sighs, gives up, stares at the ceiling. "These are not signs of wisdom, Victor," she says. "This is the bad planet."

"Yeah," I say. "Yeah, baby ... I think I was paying too much attention to the way things looked, right? I know, baby, I know."

"It happens." She shrugs. "You have the standard regrets."

I start crying again. Chloe's asking "Why?" She touches my arm. She's asking "Why?" again.

"But I can't find anything else ... to put in its place," I say, choking.

"Baby—"

"Why didn't you just dump me?" I sob.

"Because I'd fallen in love with you," she says.

My eyes are closed and I can hear her turning pages and Chloe breathes in as she delivers the following line ("warmly w/affection"): "Because I still am in love with you."

I pull away, wiping my face blindly.

"There are so many things I want to tell you."

"You can," she says. "I'll listen. You can."

My eyes fill up with tears again and this time I want her to see them.

"Victor," she says. "Oh baby. Don't cry or you're gonna make me cry.

"Baby," I start. "Things aren't the way . . . you might think they are. . . .”

"Shhh, it's okay," she says.

"But it's not," I say. "It's so not okay, it's not."

"Victor, come on—"

"But I plan to stick around a little while," I say in a rush before bursting into tears again.

I'm closing my eyes and she stirs lightly on the bed, turning pages in the script, and she keeps pausing, deciding whether to say something or not, and I'm saying, clearing my throat, my nose hopelessly stuffed, "Don't, baby, don't, just put it away," and Chloe sighs and I hear her drop the script onto the floor next to the bed we're lying on and then she's holding my face in her hands and I'm opening my eyes.

"Victor," she says.

"What?" I'm asking. "What is it, baby?"

"Victor?"

"Yeah?"

Finally she says, "I'm pregnant."

A problem. Things get sketchy. We skipped a stage. I missed a lesson, we moved backward, we disappeared into a valley, a place where it's always January, where the air is thin and I'm pulling a Coca-Cola out of a bucket of ice. The words "I'm pregnant" sounded harsh to me but in an obscure way. I'm in the center of the room, flattened out by this information and what it demands from me. I keep trying to form a sentence, make a promise, not wander away. She's asking are you coming in? I'm telling myself you always took more than you gave, Victor. I keep trying to postpone the next moment but she's staring at me attentively, almost impatient.

"And yes, it's yours," she says.

Because of how startled I am, all I can ask is, "Can you, like, afford to do this now?" My voice sounds falsetto.

"It's not like I've been underpaid," she says, gesturing around the suite. "It's lot like I can't retire. That's not an issue."

"What is?" I ask, swallowing.

"Where you're going to be," she says quietly. "What role you're going to take in this."

"How do you . . . know it's mine?" I ask.

She sighs. "Because the only person I've been with since we broke up"—she laughs derisively—"is you."

"What do you mean?" I ask. "What about Baxter?"

"I never slept with Baxter Priestly, Victor," she shouts.

"Okay, okay," I'm saying.

"Oh Jesus, Victor," she says, turning away.

"Hey baby, what is it?"

"Four weeks ago? Remember? That day you came over?"

"What?" I'm asking, thinking, four weeks ago? "Yeah?"

Silence.

"That day you called me out of the blue?" she asks. "It was a Sunday and you called me, Victor. I'd just gotten back from Canyon Ranch. I met you at Jerry's? Remember? In SoHo? We sat in a booth in the back? You talked about going to NYU?" She pauses, staring at me wide-eyed. "Then we went back to my place. . . ." She looks away. She softly says, "We had sex, then you left, whatever." She pauses again. "You were having dinner that night with Viggo Mortensen and Jude Law and one of the producers of Flatliners II and Sean MacPherson was in town with Gina and I didn't really want to go and you didn't invite me—and then you never called. . . . That week I read that you had dinner at Diablo's—maybe it was a Buddy Seagull column—and you and Damien had patched things up and then I ran into Edgar Cameron who said he had had dinner with you at Balthazar and you guys had all gone to Cheetah afterwards and ... you just never called me again and . . . oh forget it, Victor—it's all in the past, right? I mean, isn't it?"

Four weeks ago I was on a ship in the middle of an ocean.

Four weeks ago on that ship there was blood pooled behind a toilet in the cabin of a doomed girl.

Four weeks ago I was in London at a party in Notting Hill.

Four weeks ago I was meeting Bobby Hughes. Jamie Fields hugged me while I stood screaming in a basement corridor.

Four weeks ago I was not in New York City.

Four weeks ago an impostor arrived in Chloe's apartment.

Four weeks ago on that Sunday he undressed her.

I'm saying nothing. Reams of acid start unspooling in my stomach and I'm vibrating with panic.

"Baby," I'm saying.

"Yeah?"

I start getting dressed. "I've gotta go."

"What?" she asks, sitting up.

"I've gotta get my stuff," I say in a controlled voice. "I'm moving out of the house. I'm coming back here."

"Victor," she starts, then reconsiders. "I don't know."

"I don't care," I say. "But I'm staying with you."

She smiles sadly, holds out a hand. "Really?"

"Yeah," I say. "Really. I'm totally, totally sure of it."

"Okay." She's nodding. "Okay."

I fall on the bed, wrapping my arms around her. I kiss her on the lips, stroking the side of her face.

"I'll be back in an hour," I say.

"Okay," she says. "Do you want me to come with you?"

"No, no," I'm saying. "Just wait here. I'll be right back."

At the door, something shifts in me and I turn around.

"Unless . . . you want to come with me?" I ask.

"How long will you be?" She's holding the script again, flipping through it.

"An hour. Probably less. Maybe forty minutes."

"Actually," she says, "I think I'm supposed to stay here." "Why?"

"I think I'm supposed to shoot a scene."

"What am I supposed to do?" I ask.

"I think"—Chloe squints at the script and then, looking up—you're supposed to go."

"And then?" I ask.

"And then?" Chloe says, smiling. "Yeah."

"You're supposed to come back."

7

There's no need to punch in the code to deactivate the alarm system in the house in the 8th or the 16th. The door leading into the courtyard just swings open.

Walking quickly through the courtyard, I grab my keys out of the Prada jacket I'm wearing but I don't need them because that door's open too. Outside, it's late afternoon but not dark yet and the wind's screaming is occasionally broken up by distant thunderclaps.

Inside, things feel wrong.

In the entranceway I lift a phone receiver, placing it next to my ear. The line is dead. I move toward the living room.

"Hello?" I'm calling out. "Hello? . . . It's me. . . . It's Victor. . . .”

I'm overly aware of how silent and dark it is in the house. I reach for a light switch. Nothing happens.

The house smells like shit, reeks of it—damp and wet and fetid—and I have to start breathing through my mouth. I pause in a doorway, bracing myself for a surprise, but the living room is totally empty.

"Bobby?" I call out. "Are you here? Where are you," and then, under my breath, "you fuck."

I'm just noticing that cell phones are scattered everywhere, across tables, under chairs, in piles on the floor, dozens of them smashed open, their antennas snapped off. Some of their transmission bars are lit but I can't get an outside line on any of them and then I

you are the sort of person who doesn't see well in the dark turn into the darkness of the kitchen. I open the refrigerator door and then the freezer and light from inside illuminates a section of the black, empty kitchen. I grab a bottle that lies on its side in the freezer and take a swig from a half-empty gallon of Stoli, barely tasting it. Outside, the wind is a hollow roaring sound.

In a drawer adjacent to the sink I find a flashlight and just as I turn toward another drawer something zooms past me. I whirl around.

A reflection in the gilt-edged mirror that hangs over the stove: my grave expression. Then I'm laughing nervously and I bring a hand to my forehead, leaving it there until I'm calm enough to find the .25-caliber Walther I hid last week in another drawer.

With the beam from the flashlight I'm noticing that the microwave's door is open and inside it's splattered with a dried brown mixture of twigs, branches, stones, leaves. And then I notice the cave drawings.

They're scrawled everywhere. Giant white spaces heavily decorated with stick figures of buffalos, crudely drawn horses, dragons, what looks like a serpent.

"Just be cool just be cool just be cool," I'm telling myself.

Suddenly, over the speaker system that runs throughout the house, a CD clicks on and covering the sound of wind roaring outside: water rushing, various whooshing noises, Paul Weller's guitar, Oasis, Liam Gallagher echoing out, singing the first verse from "Champagne Supernova," and it blasts through the darkness of the house.

"This is so fucked, this is so fucked," I'm muttering, on the edge of panic but not in it yet and the yellow fan of light washing across the walls keeps shaking as I move farther into the house and

where were you while we were getting hi-i-i-igh? the house smells so much like shit I keep gagging. One hand is holding the flashlight and I clamp the other, holding the gun, over my nose and mouth.

in the champagne supernova in the skyyyyyy

I bend down, pick up another cell phone. I pull up the antenna, flipping the phone open. No transmission bars.

I aim the flashlight down a hallway and then I shine its beam up into the circular staircase and I'm squinting, trying to make out the dim star shapes that seem to have appeared everywhere.

But then I see that those star shapes are actually pentagrams and they're drawn with red paint everywhere on the walls, on the ceiling, on the stairs leading to the second floor.

Something turns in the darkness behind me.

I whirl around.

Nothing.

I run up the stairs. Every five steps, I stop and look over my shoulder, waving the beam of the flashlight into the darkness floating below me.

in a champagne supernova, in a champagne supernova in the sk-k-yyyyyyyyy

I hesitate at the top of the staircase and then I'm drifting unsteadily along one side of the hallway and I'm feeling along the wall for light switches.

I turn hesitantly around another corner and—except for the pentagrams and the cell phones scattered everywhere—the set is immactilate, untouched, everything in its place.

I make it to the room I've been staying in, my shadow moving across its door as I walk toward it. My hand freezes, then I reach tentatively for the doorknob, thinking, Don't open it don't open it don't

After I open it I pocket the gun and shift the flashlight into my other hand. I reach out for a light switch but can't feel one.

I shine the flashlight across the room.

I open a drawer—it's empty. I open another drawer-also empty. All my clothes are gone. The passport I'd hidden, wedged beneath my mattress, isn't there.

In the bathroom -all my toiletries are gone.

A giant red pentagram is slashed across the mirror.

where were you while we were getting h-i-i-i-i-i-ighhhh

I move toward the closet, my heart pounding.

All my clothes have been removed.

And in their place, posted all over the walls of the small walk-in closet, are Polaroid shots of me and Sam Ho, naked, sweaty, delirious, having sex.

A larger photo rests in the middle of this collage.

I'm driving a butcher knife deep into Sam Ho's chest and I'm lost and grinning, my eyes red, caught in the flash, my expression addressing the camera, asking do you like this? are you pleased?

I pull away from the closet, slamming the door shut. On the door another giant pentagram, this one black and dripping, announces itself.

I shift the light over to another wall blighted with pentagrams and then focus the light on a series of letters spread high above me, floating against a huge expanse of pristine white wall over my bed, and I'm squinting, trying to focus, and I slowly fan the beam across the letters until I'm saying the words out loud.

Disappear

HeRE

The words cause me to sag against the wall and I'm gripping the gun so tightly I can barely feel it and the Oasis song is revolving into its climax and its endless soloing and as I stumble out of the room my shadow looms against another massive red pentagram.

The CD clicks off.

Silence.

And then my shoes are making noises moving down the hallway and they echo in the silence and suddenly lightning throws my silhouette against a wall and the wind outside keeps howling. I'm freezing. I pass another pentagram.

Within the silence of the house I suddenly hear one distinct sound.

Moaning.

Coming from down the hallway.

Keeping the gun held in an outstretched hand, I start moving down that hall, toward where the moaning is coming from.

Bentley's room.

Another pentagram looms over me. Outside, the wind keeps gusting and then there's a peal of thunder. A vague fear keeps growing but never really defines itself—it's just inevitable—and nearing panic, I bring a hand to my lips to keep my mouth from twitching and then I'm stepping forward, moving into the room.

I lower the flashlight's beam, running it across the terrazzo floor.

"Oh my god," I whisper to myself

A dark shape in the middle of the room, until I wave my flashlight over it. Bentley.

He's splayed out across the floor, his mouth gagged with a black handkerchief, taped over, and his arms are outstretched, pulled above his head, each one tied separately to bedposts, rope and chain intricately entwined and wrapped around each wrist. His legs are spread and more rope and chain is tied around his ankles and connected to the legs of a white-oak armoire.

He's signaling me with his eyes.

Attached to each thigh and bicep is some kind of device connected to its own timer-red digital numbers glowing in the dark and counting down.

Moving toward him, slipping on patches of ice, I notice another device strapped to his chest as I drop to my haunches and place the flashlight and the gun on the floor. Crouching beside Bentley, I pull the gag out of his mouth. He immediately starts panting.

"Help me, Victor, help me, Victor," he squeals, his voice cracking on my name, and he starts sobbing with relief, but my own voice is thick with panic as I tell him, "Calm down, it's okay, it's okay."

My legs start cramping up as I try to unlock the device connected above his right knee and Bentley starts babbling, "What did you tell him what did you tell him what did you tell him Victor oh god what did you tell Bobby?"

"I didn't tell him anything," I murmur, shining the flashlight over the device, trying to figure out the easiest way of removing it.

But I'm afraid to touch it.

"Who did this?" I'm asking.

"Bruce Rhinebeck," he screams.

"But Bruce is dead," I scream back. "Bruce died in that explosion

"Hurry, Victor, just hurry," Bentley moans in a voice that doesn't sound like him. "I don't want to die I don't want to die," he says, teeth clenched, and then he starts making shrill little screams.

"Shhh . . . ," I murmur. Wind is now throwing rain against the windows. I keep peering at the device on his leg, having no idea how to remove it, and I'm taking deep breaths that turn into short fast breaths, my mouth wide open.

"Okay," I say, simply gripping the device and tugging up on it, but it's strapped too tightly to his leg.

Suddenly—a sound.

A clicking noise.

It's coming from the device strapped to Bentley's right arm.

Bentley stiffens.

Silence.

Then another sound—tch tch tch tch.

Bentley makes eye contact with me, looking briefly as if I'd offended him in some way, but then his eyes come hideously alive and he starts opening and closing his fingers in anticipation.

Silence.

Bentley begins to weep.

Another clicking noise, followed by a whirring sound.

"Don't let me die," he's crying. "Please I don't want to die I don't want to die oh god no—"

Bentley suddenly realizes what's going to happen and starts snarling in anticipation.

There's a loud whoompf as the device goes off, the noise of its activation muffled by flesh.

A thick, ripping sound. A mist of blood.

Bentley's body jumps.

The arm skids along the floor, the hand still clenching and unclenching itself

And then he starts screaming, deafeningly.

Blood pours out of the stump at his shoulder like water gushing from a hose and it just keeps splashing out, fanning across the terrazzo floor and under the bed.

Bentley's mouth opens in a frozen scream and he starts gasping.

I'm grimacing, shouting out, "No no no no."

It's a special effect, I'm telling myself. It's makeup. Bentley is just a prop, something spasming wildly beneath me, his head whipping furiously from side to side, his eyes snapped open with pain, his voice just gurgling sounds now.

The sharp smell of gunpowder wraps around us.

I'm trying not to faint and I pull the gun up and, crouching down, hold it against the rope attached to his other arm.

"Shoot it," he gasps. "Shoot it."

I push it into the coil of rope and chain and pull the trigger.

Nothing.

Bentley's whining, pulling against his restraints.

I pull the trigger again.

Nothing.

The gun isn't loaded.

In the flashlight's glare the color of Bentley's face is gray verging on white as blood keeps draining out of him, and his mouth keeps opening, making wheezing sounds.

Forcing my hands to steady themselves I start uselessly tearing at the ropes and chain, trying to unknot them, and outside the wind keeps rising up, howling.

Another terrible moment.

Another clicking noise. This one at his left leg.

Silence.

tch tch tch tch

Then the whirring sound.

Bentley understands what is happening and starts shrieking even before the device goes off and I'm urinating in my pants and I whirl away, screaming with him, as the device makes its whoompf sound.

A horrible crunching noise.

The device shreds his leg at the knee and when I turn around I see his leg slide across the floor and watch it knock into a wall with a hard thud, splattering it with blood, and I'm crying out in revulsion.

Bentley starts going in and out of shock.

I close my eyes.

The device on the other leg goes off.

"Shoot me!" he's screaming, eyes bulging, swollen with pain, blood gushing out of him.

Desperately I try to unknot the rope wrapped around the device on his chest, my heartbeat thumping wildly in my ears.

"Shoot me!" he keeps screaming.

The timer makes its characteristic noises.

I uselessly hold the Walther against his head and keep pulling the trigger and it keeps snapping hollowly.

The other arm is blown off and blood splatters across the wall above the bed, splashing over another pentagram. Bentley's tongue is jutting out of his mouth and as he starts going into his death throes he bites it off.

The device on his chest makes a whirring noise.

It opens him up.

His chest isn't there anymore.

Intestines spiral up out of him. A giant splat of blood hits the ceiling and it smells like meat in this room—it's sweet and rank and horrible—and since it's so cold, steam pours out of his wounds, gusts of it rising over the blood and chunks of flesh scattered across the floor and my legs are stiff from crouching so long and I stagger away and outside the wind keeps moaning.

I'm backing into the hallway and there are dripping sounds as flesh slides down walls and bright lines of it are streaked across Bentley's twitching face, his mouth hanging open, and he's lying on a shiny mat of blood and clumps of flesh that covers the entire floor and I'm walking out of the' room, one hand gripping the flashlight, the other hand smearing blood on anything I touch, wherever I have to steady myself.

6

I race to a bathroom, panting, keeping my head down, eyes on the floor even as I'm turning corners, and in the bathroom mirror it looks like someone has painted my face red and the front of my shirt is matted thick with blood and flesh and I'm pulling my clothes off screaming and then I fall into the shower and I'm hitting my chest and pulling my hair, my eyes squeezed shut, tilting forward, falling against a tiled wall, my hands held out in front of me.

I find clothes in Bobby's room and dizzily just pull them on, dressing quickly, keeping my eyes on the bedroom door. Numb and singing softly to myself while crying, I quickly tie the laces on a pair of Sperry deck shoes I slipped on.

As I stagger through the upstairs hallway I run past Bentley's room because I can't bear to see what's in it and I'm sobbing but then I suddenly stop when I realize there's a new odor filling the house, overpowering the aroma of shit that hung in it before.

On my way out I place the smell. It's popcorn.