Glamorama (66 page)

Afterwards, back in the shower by myself, water spraying over me, I’m delicately touching my asshole, which seems distended, tender, slick with lotion and Bobby’s semen, the flesh feeling pierced. Stepping out of the shower, I dry off, avoiding my reflection in a giant mirror, afraid of what I might see in it. I scan the counter for a comb, deodorant, aspirin. I peer into a medicine cabinet but it’s empty. I start opening drawers: a Breitling watch, two Cartier tank rings (one citrine, one amethyst), a pair of diamond-studded sunglasses, a bottle of cologne called Ambush, a container of Shiseido moisturizer. In another drawer: dozens of Chanel lipsticks, an issue of
Harper’s Bazaar
with Tammy on the cover, a few dried roses and—in a clear plastic bag in the bottom drawer of the bathroom Jamie and Bobby share—a large black hat, folded over.

I hesitate before taking the bag out of the drawer, because something in me says not to. Instinct says not to.

I’m holding the bag up in front of my face, averting my eyes.

The sound of a fly whirring around my head causes me to look at the bag.

In the bag is the hat Lauren Hynde gave me in New York.

The hat Palakon told me to bring with me on the
QE2
.

Its entire inner flap has been removed.

A large, gaping hole exists where the small red rose was.

One side of the hat is dotted with pink and green confetti.

I can’t even touch the bag anymore. I just keep swallowing involuntarily until I carefully place it back in the drawer and then I slowly close the drawer. But this is a dream, this is a movie—repeating that calms me down but in the back of my mind, faintly, darkly, is the sound of laughter and it’s coming from a grave and it’s whispery, blaming.

Naked, clutching a towel, I slowly move into the bedroom where Jamie and Bobby are sleeping deeply, gracefully, on a flat sheet soaked with our sweat even though it’s so cold in this room

the room is a trap. The question about the hat will never be asked. The question about the hat is a big black mountain and the room is a trap. A photo of your expressionless face is on the cover of a magazine, a gun lies on top of an icy nightstand. It’s winter in this room and this room is a trap

that my breath is steaming as I keep staring down at Jamie and Bobby sleeping on the bed.

On Bobby’s shoulder is a tattoo, black and shapeless, I never noticed before.

A
QE2
flashback, a montage with strobe lights.

The smell of the sea, an October afternoon, the Atlantic moving slowly below us, midnight, meeting Marina outside Club Lido, her voice raspy from crying, the fog machines, Marina backlit in front of a bathroom drawer, how shy she seemed at the railing, how purposefully she moved around my cabin, the hooded parka.

There was the hair hanging over Marina’s face. And there was the hooded parka.

There was the tattoo, black and shapeless, on her right shoulder blade.

This tattoo did not exist the afternoon we first met.

You never saw Marina’s face that night.

“You have to go to London,” a voice whispered.

That night, you never touched her body.

You understand that something incomplete is being revealed.

An unscheduled stop mid-crossing.

Someone climbs aboard a ship.

A girl you didn’t save was doomed.

It’s all very clear but you have to keep guessing.

It’s what you don’t know that matters most
. This is what the director told you.

I dress, then stagger outside.

When I look back up at the house he’s standing in a bedroom window. He’s looking down at me. He’s holding a finger to his lips. He’s saying “Shhh.”

26

Because métro service doesn’t begin until 5:30 I’m walking aimlessly through a dark early-morning fog, staggering for long stretches, until automatic timers turn the streetlights off and clubs are just closing and a figure, a specter, strolling by smiles venomously at me and in the fog the outlines of glass and concrete towers keep shifting shapes and without thinking about direction I find myself walking toward the Eiffel Tower, through the Parc du Champ de Mars and then across the Seine on the Pont d’Iéna and then past the Palais de Chaillot. A pigeon bursts out of the fog, leaving a swirling trail behind. Without warning, leaning against a black Citroën, in the fog, is the Christian Bale look-alike.

“Victor?” he asks, rock-faced, subdued. He’s wearing a black cardigan, ankle boots, a Prada overcoat.

Silently I walk up to him, the streets littered with confetti, the fog locking in on us.

“Someone wants to see you,” he says simply.

I just nod and without any prodding get into the back of the Citroën, lying flat across the seat, then curling up once the car starts moving, and I’m making noises in the backseat, sometimes weeping. He tells me not to crack up. He remarks delicately about an opening in my destiny. But I’m paying minimal attention, listening to him as closely as I would listen to a brick, a tree, a pile of sand. Finally, absurdly, I ask, “Do you know who I am?” On the radio: something emblematic of where I’m at in this moment, something like “Don’t Fear the Reaper” or “I’m a Believer.”

A hotel on Avenue Kléber.

Following the Christian Bale guy down a hallway lined with photos of mostly dead celebrities, I’m so drowsy I can barely keep up with him and the lights above us keep flickering chicly and at the far end we arrive at a door covered with a thin sheet of frost.

Inside the room all the lights are dimmed, and sitting at a desk, Sky-TV glowing soundlessly on a large-screen television behind him, legs primly crossed, smoking a cigarette, is F. Fred Palakon.

I appear seemingly nonplussed.

“Hello, Victor,” Palakon says. “How
are
things?” he asks menacingly. “Remember me?”

The Christian Bale guy closes the door behind us, then locks it.

Palakon gestures toward the edge of the bed. After I sit down, facing him, he recrosses his legs, regarding me unfavorably. It’s freezing in the hotel room and I rub my hands together to keep them warm.

“I got … lost,” is all I say, shamefully.

“Well, not really,” Palakon says. “Not what you’d technically call ‘lost,’ but I suppose there’s some truth in your statement.”

I’m staring at the carpet, at the patterns revealing themselves in the carpet, and I keep rubbing my hands together to keep them warm.

“I see you’ve taken up with quite a crowd,” Palakon says. “I shouldn’t be surprised. A hip, happening, gorgeous young thing like yourself, all alone in Paris.” He says this with such harsh articulation that I have to flinch and look away. “I see you have a tan.”

“Palakon, I—”

“Mr. Ward, please don’t say anything,” Palakon warns. “Not yet.”

“Palakon, you never called me in England,” I say in a rush. “What was I supposed to do?”

“That is because I was informed you never checked into the Four Seasons,” Palakon says sharply. “How were we supposed to call you when we had no idea where you were?”

“But … that’s not true,” I say, sitting up. “Who told you that? I mean, what are you talking about, Palakon?”

“It means that there are no records of you ever staying at the Four Seasons,” Palakon says. “It means that if someone tried to contact you at the Four Seasons we were simply told that neither a Mr. Victor Ward nor a Mr. Victor Johnson was staying there.” An icy pause. “What happened to you, Victor?”

“But I checked in,” I’m protesting. “The driver who picked me up in Southampton saw me check in.”

“No, Victor,” Palakon says. “The driver saw you
walk
in. He did not see you check in.”

“This is wrong,” I’m muttering.

“All attempts to get in touch with you at the Four Seasons proved fruitless,” Palakon says, glaring. “When we finally tried to make actual
physical
contact, as in
searching
the hotel for you, we came up with nothing.”

“Ask him,” I say, pointing at the Christian Bale guy, standing behind me. “He’s been following me ever since I got to London.”

“Not really,” Palakon says. “He lost you that night after you were at Pylos and didn’t find you again until the other night, when he spotted you at the opera.” Pause. “With Jamie Fields.”

I don’t say anything.

“But because of your actions let’s just say his part has been beefed up considerably.”

“Palakon,” I start. “I don’t care about the money anymore. I just want to get the hell out of here.”

“That’s very noble, Mr. Ward, but you were supposed to get Jamie Fields out of London and back to the States,” Palakon says. “Not traipse off to Paris. So the money—as of now—is beside the point.”

Looking down again, I mutter, “I traipsed, I traipsed, I admit it, I traipsed …”

“Why are you …” Palakon sighs, looks up at the ceiling, curved and stained, and then, thoroughly annoyed, back at me. “Why are you in Paris, Mr. Ward?”

I’m still muttering, “I traipsed, I traipsed …”

“Mr. Ward,” Palakon snaps.
“Please.”

“What else do you know?” I ask. “How did you find me?”

Palakon sighs again, puts his cigarette out, runs his hands over the jacket of a very natty suit.

“Since you had mentioned that you were going to follow that girl you met on the ship to Paris, we simply pursued a few theories.”

“Who is ‘we,’ Palakon?” I ask hesitantly.

“Does the third person alarm you?”

“Who’s … the third person?”

“Mr. Ward, what is the situation as of now?”

“The … situation is … the situation is …” Grasping, unable to figure it out, I just give up. “The situation is out of my control.”

Palakon takes this in. “That’s too bad.” After a thoughtful pause, he asks, gently, “Can it be remedied?”

“What does that … mean?” I ask. “Remedied? I told you—it’s out of my control.”

Palakon runs a hand along the desk he’s sitting at and then, after a long pause, asks, “Are you in any position to fix things?”

“I don’t know.” I’m vaguely aware of my feet and arms slowly falling asleep as I sit slumped on the edge of the bed. “I’m not sure.”

“Well, let’s start with does she trust you?” he asks. “Is she willing to leave? Is she coming back to the States?” Another pause. “Is she in love with you?”

“We’ve … been intimate,” I say hollowly. “I’m not sure—”

“Congratulations,” Palakon says. “So you’ve become a duo. How cute. How”—he tilts his head—“apropos.”

“Palakon, I don’t think you know what’s going on.” I swallow. “I don’t think you’re in the same movie,” I say carefully.

“Just get Jamie Fields out of Paris,” Palakon says. “Just get her back to New York. I don’t care how you do it. Promise her things, marry her, perform a kidnapping, whatever.”

I’m exhaling steam. “She has … a boyfriend.”

“That has never been an impediment for you before, Mr. Ward,” Palakon says. “Who is it? Who’s she seeing? Someone in that house? Not Bruce Rhinebeck. And it can’t be Bentley Harrolds.”

“It’s Bobby Hughes,” I say hollowly.

“Ah, of course,” Palakon says. “I’d forgotten about him.”

“How’s that possible?” I ask, confused.

“Depending on what planet you live on, Victor, it’s not so hard.”

A long patch of silence.

“There’s a small problem, Palakon.”

“If it’s small it’s not a problem, Mr. Ward.”

“Oh, I think this is,” I say, my voice getting tiny.

“Just take Jamie Fields back to the United States,” Palakon says. “That’s all you need to do.”

“There’s a small problem,” I repeat.

“My patience ran out the minute we met, Mr. Ward. What is it?”

“Well, you see,” I say, leaning in for emphasis, smiling involuntarily, my heart tightening, whispering loudly, “They’re all murderers.”

Palakon sighs wearily. “Excuses, excuses. Oh Mr. Ward, you can do better than that. You’re not
that
lazy.”

In a calm and purposeful fashion I try to express everything that has been happening: how they memorize maps, passwords, warning signals, airline timetables, how they learn to strip, assemble and load an array of light machine guns—M16s, Brownings, Scorpions, RPGs. Kalashnikovs—to throw off tails, how one day they had to eliminate everything in our computer system that connected them to Libya. I tell Palakon about the detailed maps of various American and Israeli embassies scattered throughout the house, that at any given time three million dollars in cash is hidden in a closet downstairs next to the gym, that we know certain people only by code names, that intermediaries lunch frequently in the house and there are so many parties. I tell Palakon about how fake passports are arranged and how those passports are constantly being shredded and burned, how Bobby is always traveling to Belgrade or to Zagreb and visas are applied for in Vienna and there are anxious consultations and trips to villas in outlying suburbs. How I am constantly being introduced to just another young Palestinian with a “troubled past” or to someone who was partially blinded by an Israeli letter bomb, patriots who had strayed from the path, people offering pretexts for refusing to negotiate, beautiful men boasting of secret alliances.