Famous (11 page)

I don’t waste one more second standing in
this ridiculous line. Instead, I go and find the valet and ask him
if he wants to make $200? Sure he does. He follows me into the
parking lot, and I tell him to get into the driver’s seat, which he
does.

“Look, I don’t have any X on me, man,” he
says once we’re in.

“I don’t want any X. Here,” I pull two
hundreds from my wallet and hand them over. He’s young,
early-twenties perhaps, with long, stringy hair. I wonder if he’s
in a rock band, trying to make it, like everyone else. “Drive me up
to the curb and let me out in front of the crowd.”

“They won’t let you in if they don’t know
you, man. Doesn’t matter how you arrive.”

“I’m James Jansen. They’ll let me in. Now
drive.”

He cranks the Hummer and we roll back out
onto Hollywood, do a u-turn at the next light, and head back toward
La Casa, my heart bumping as we pull up beside the crowd to the
front of the line where the white limo stopped just ten minutes
ago.

The crowd parts. I take a breath, slip on my
shades.

Then I open the door and step out of the
Hummer, as nervous as I’ve ever been in my entire life. I muster
this sort of irritated scowl on my face, keep my head slightly
down, and walk quickly toward the doormen.

Let me tell you, the eyes are all on me.
First, because I stepped out of this huge fucking Hummer like I
owned the place, and second, because I think everyone starts to
realize who I am.

“James!”

“JJ!”

“I love you, James Jansen!”

I try not to smile, but it’s pretty hard when
cute women scream that they love you.

But I don’t acknowledge them. Sure, if this
were a movie premier, I’d stop and sign autographs and wave and
blow kisses and be altogether charming as hell. But I’m here to
have a good time. I’m taking a chance coming out and mingling with
the commoners, so it’s imperative that I maintain this
nobody-better-fuck-with-me iciness in my face.

I reach the velvet ropeline, and much to my
dismay, it has not yet been unhooked.

The three sentinels have turned their
collective attention to me.

I remove my sunglasses.

One of the doormen lifts a black notebook off
a podium and beings scanning a page of names.

I feel hot in my face.

Cameras are beginning to flash all around
me—paparazzi.

“Don’t waste your time. I didn’t get on the
list,” I say.

“Well, that’s a problem,” the doorman with
the book says.

I look dead into the eyes of the doorman
standing in front of me.

“You know who I am?”

He nods. “Yeah, your last movie was a piece
of shit.”

“Unhook that motherfucking rope.”

This is one tough, jaded fellow, but fear
flickers in his eyes when I say this. I guess it’s sort of an
unwritten rule that you should never piss off powerful people.

The doorman with the book comes over to me,
says, “Look, if you aren’t in the book—”

“I don’t give a shit about your goddamn book.
Bill Flanagan, the owner of La Casa, has been a guest in my home
for numerous parties. I can’t tell you how angry he’d be to find
out I’ve been treated this way.”

I have no idea who the owner is. First name
that came to mind.

The rope is unhooked, and I’m ushered,
apologetically, toward the open door. It sort of scares me, because
I don’t know what I would’ve done had that last bit not worked.

I stop in the threshold and turn back to the
three doormen.

“Gentlemen,” I say. “You will all be fired
before the end of the night. I promise you that.”

Then I put on my shades and enter the mayhem
of La Casa.

Chapter 13

pink purple neon madness * DJ SuperCasanova *
gets a table * observes bodyshots * surveys the joint and expounds
on the philosophy of the hollow generation * walks into the center
of the dance floor * looks up an Asian woman’s dress * the
bachelorette party * Kara * Richard Haneline * gets invited to a
premier party * slow dances to a fast song

La Casa. Wow. I’ve never seen anything like
this. I’m as over-stimulated as I’ve ever been—lights flashing,
spinning, flickering in pink purple neon. It’s all light and motion
and sound.

I’m standing just inside the doors taking
everything in like I’ve stepped out of a spacecraft onto a new
planet. What strange creatures these are.

A spectacular redhead charges me $30 and
stamps the back of my hand and I walk into the crowd. From where I
stand, I can see four bars, mirrors behind each one, reflecting the
crowd. I count five spinning disco balls.

On the second level, it’s more of the same—a
crowd moving together in waves like a field of wheat. More bars.
More light. And this constant thumping…boom, boom, boom, boom.

At last, I see the music source. Atop a large
column in the center of the dance floor, DJ SuperCasanova stands
behind a shelf of keyboards and turntables and ear-shattering
speakers. He’s this white guy sporting a sequin suit and a sequin
top hat, and you can tell he loves his job.

I push my way through the crowd and claim one
of the few vacant tables.

I sit there, taking it all in. On the table
beside me, a woman has stretched herself out flat on her back and
pulled her shirt up over her bra, to expose her bellybutton. One of
the men lifts two shotglasses from the table and holds them up.

“Tequila or tequila?” he asks and bursts into
laughter.

He straddles the woman, pours a shot very
slowly onto her sternum and watches ravenously as the liquor trails
into her bellybutton.

“Oh yeah!” the woman cries out. “Suck it!
Suck it!”

So he sucks the tequila from her naval and
runs his tongue up and down the tats on her stomach, lapping up the
liquor and making her belly glisten—much to the delight of their
company.

When he finishes, the woman climbs off the
table and another girl assumes the position.

More drinking of liquor from orifices ensues,
nipples are exposed, and I’ve got to tell you, it’s all fairly
entertaining to behold.

When I tire of watching the youngfolk beside
me, I walk to the nearest bar, order an Absolut, one ice cube, no
lime, and return to my table.

I sit there sipping my drink and watching the
multitude of dancers. People in LA certainly know how to look good.
Nearly all of the men are tall, tan, muscular, possess perfect
hair, and have this superficial charisma down cold. For instance, I
watch this guy talking to this girl on the outskirts of the dancing
mob, and even though I can’t hear what they’re saying, I can read
in his face that the only thing he cares about is the possibility
of fucking her brains out a little later. I mean, she’s chattering
away, and he just keeps nodding and flashing these smiles that
aren’t really smiles, and looking around every now and then to make
sure something more fuckable isn’t in the vicinity. Real gentlemen,
these LA guys.

And the women. Jeez. Every pair of knockers
in the place would win the blue ribbon where I come from. There’s
just a bunch of beautiful people in this room, and what I’m
realizing now is that’s what it takes not to be lonely out here.
You must have the right clothes, body, hair, smell, accessories,
and personality. Oh, but when I say personality, I don’t mean you
have to be genuinely interesting or original. Personality in the LA
sense means you must be able to maintain a conversation which
suggests you’re worth hooking up with because you possess all of
the required embellishments.

I saw a television program once about the
whole dilemma of attracting a mate. And there were these pitifully
normal-looking people who kept saying things like, “eventually,
beauty gets old and people are going to want someone who’s actually
intelligent and unique and has more to offer than a hard body and
nice boobs.” I hear those lonely people talking while I watch this
crowd of vibrant people, and I’m thinking yeah, hold your breath.
People may tolerate friendship with plain, interesting people, but
they certainly don’t want to fuck them, and believe me, fucking is
the end result of all this light and makeup and music and alcohol
and drugs and dancing. This is all about finding someone to fuck.
It has to be. I mean, the group at the table beside me is only a
few millimeters of fabric away from doing it. And the
dancing—grinding, rather—is pretty much dry humping. I really feel
sorry for those bland people, sitting at home, angry and jilted,
waiting for all these beauties to come around and realize how
interesting
they are.

After I finish my drink, I walk into the
crowd. I am in no way a dancer. Not even remotely. I reach the
center of the dance floor. It’s ridiculously loud and hot. People
move together all around me—sexually, robotically, gracefully, all
uninhibited. There are several columns six or seven feet high, and
people dance solo on top of these. I stand at the base of one and
look up at this Asian woman who is “lost in the music,” as they
say. I can see up her dress. She’s not a big fan of underwear.

This enormous, beefy black man bumps into me.
He holds glow sticks and dances with his eyes closed. Another
woman, very tall, is garbed in a wedding dress. She just stands in
one place, nothing moving but her head, side to side with the
beat.

The disco balls come to life and spit their
bursting light all over the walls.

I plow on through the crowd to the other side
of the room where a beer bar and more tables line the wall.

I sit down beside a table of five lovely
women, and after listening to them gab, I discover they’re a
bachelorette party. All late twenty-somethings. You can tell they
don’t come out to places like this very often. I wonder how they
got into La Casa anyway. They’re all drinking highly colorful
drinks garnished with slices of tropical fruit. I imagine that once
they’re sufficiently liquored up, they’ll be stumbling out onto the
dance floor with everyone else.

One of them catches me staring.

“Hello.” I smile that winning smile.

“Hi.”

The other four women now look at me.

“Let me guess,” I say, very charmingly,
“bachelorette party?”

They smile politely, let out some nervous
laughter, and confirm that I’m correct.

“Who’s the bride-to-be? No. Let me
guess.”

I lean back and squint and take them in.

Facing me, they occupy one half of a circular
table.

From left to right: (i) a redhead, oldest of
the bunch, cute, but the glitter on her cheeks is a little
disturbing;

(ii) one of those tiny little blonds that
probably have to shop for clothes in the children’s department.
Short hair and twinkly eyes that shine with something none of her
friends possess (hope she’s not the bride);

(iii) another blond, more regular-size, who’s
athlete-pretty but might be stronger than me (yikes);

(iv) a factory-issue brunette who looks as
though she’s been smiling since Christmas;

(v) another brunette, who, because of the
disinterested way she’s staring back at me, I surmise is a lesbian.
Quite beautiful though.

I point at the smiley brunette.

“I’ve got to go with you. You look very
bridey.”

Incomprehensibly, her smile widens, until I
think her face is going to split apart.

“Yep. It’s me.” They all laugh, and I laugh,
too.

“Well, good luck to you and your fiancé. I
wish you all the best.”

A waitress passes near our tables, and I lift
my hand, snag her attention.

“Another round for the ladies please, and an
Absolut for me, one ice cube, no lime.”

“Certainly.”

The ladies all thank me and make excuses
about how they’d better not drink too much since their partying
days are long since gone. But boy when their fruity drinks are
replenished, and I’ve suavely toasted the bride-to-be, they suck
them down like you wouldn’t believe.

The glittery redhead suddenly lights up and
exclaims how rude we all are because we don’t even know each
other’s names.

“This is…” She proceeds to name all five
women in about three nanoseconds. I’m awful with names, so the only
one I remember is the marvelous blond. Kara.

“I’m Jim,” I say and I reach across and shake
everyone’s hand very delicately.

The lesbian cocks her head.

“What’s your last name?” she asks.

I can’t tell you how happy that makes me, but
I play it very cool. Hesitating. Like I don’t want to say.

“Jansen,” I say, extremely
understated-like.

The athletic blonde says, “
Down From the
Sleeping Trees
Jansen?” Her eyes are about to pop out of her
head. I’m serious.

But I just nod and look away like they’re
making me feel uncomfortable. They’re not, incidentally. I’m loving
every minute of it.

One of them says holy shit. I hear more
nervous giggling.

I kind of don’t know what to say to them now.
I mean, unless they start asking me questions, I’ve got
nothing.

When I turn back to face them, you wouldn’t
believe the shock on their faces. All except for Kara. She’s just
staring at me with her calm, sweet eyes.

A hand squeezes my shoulder.

“Jim?”

Richard Haneline is standing above me. He’s a
Star. A medium Star. Very recognizable. He isn’t handsome in the
Hollywood sense. Just distinctive-looking. A long, pointy nose and
piercing eyes. He always stars in these Vietnam flicks, playing the
renegade solider or the bad guy. Some people just look like the bad
guy, I guess. He’s always blowing shit up and going off the deep
end.

I stand up and smile and shake his hand,
wondering if I call him Rich or Richard or some nickname. I didn’t
even know I knew the guy.

“Great to see you out, Jim. You get my
message?”