I Am Charlotte Simmons (52 page)
Read I Am Charlotte Simmons Online
Authors: Tom Wolfe
Fear and desire reigned here in the line: the desire to be
where things are happening,
on the one hand, and fear of what would happen if the gatekeepers caught you using a fake ID, which was illegal, on the other. At least three quarters of the line was underage. As usual, their nervousness took the form of the Fuck Patois, which they thought gave them a front of cool and confident twenty-one-year-old moxie.
where things are happening,
on the one hand, and fear of what would happen if the gatekeepers caught you using a fake ID, which was illegal, on the other. At least three quarters of the line was underage. As usual, their nervousness took the form of the Fuck Patois, which they thought gave them a front of cool and confident twenty-one-year-old moxie.
SOME GUY: “ ⦠because she was wearing a miniskirt with nothing on underneath it and doing fucking keg-stands, that's why.”
ANOTHER GUY: “The beaver smiles! That's her best fucking feature. Don't look at her face in the morning or you'll get awfuck's disease.”
SOME GIRL: “Oh shit, this ID says I'm thirty-fucking-one!”
GUY: “ â¦won't give me
skull?
Shit, she won't give me her fucking digits.”
skull?
Shit, she won't give me her fucking digits.”
GIRL: “ â¦yeah, and all he'll fucking ever be is an ass-wipe.”
GUY: “ â¦one dodgy fucking be-atch, if you ask me, yo.”
GUY: “ â¦so why the fuck not? ⦔
GUY: “ â¦don't give a rat fuck, personally ⦔
GIRL: “ â¦dis the fucker hard-core ⦔
GIRL: “The
fuck
she's keeping it real!”
fuck
she's keeping it real!”
GIRL: “ â¦can just go fuck himself ⦔
CHORUS: “I say fuck that!”
“I say fuck this!”
“I say fuck all.”
“Fuck off!”
“Oh, fuck.”
Momma. If Momma showed up right now and saw her, thought Charlotte, saw her in a line full of people talking Fuck Patois, about to sneak into a
bar
with a
fake ID
⦠Everybody does it, Momma â¦
Everybody?
The
contempt
Momma had for that creature of the herd, “everybody”! Everybody and their everybody-does-it violations of Christian teachings and the law! But Momma, I'm not going into the bar to
enjoy
it ⦠An exploration is all it is ⦠It was important that she see this legendary I.M. place for herself and find out what people got so excited about. Besides, it wasn't
her
idea. It was Mimi's. Mimi still played the role of the sophisticate among the three of them, but she was no longer patronizing. She no longer treated Charlotte as the clueless mountain girl. The status of Charlotte Simmons had risen another gradation after the two lacrosse players fought over her at the tailgate. Mimi had been more the benevolent mentor this time, as she told Charlotte and Bettina how they could fake their way into the bar. Mimi had had her own ID manufacturedâshe mysteriously declined to say howâand she could probably pass for twenty-one anyway. Once inside, she would find girls with real IDs, drivers' licenses most likely, who looked more or less like Bettina and Charlotte. The pictures on drivers' licenses were always distorted anyway. Then she would come back out and slip the bogus IDs to them. Yes, she said, since Charlotte wanted to know, fake IDs were technically illegal, but everybody uses them. If they went after everybody who used a fake ID, everybody at Dupont would have a record.
bar
with a
fake ID
⦠Everybody does it, Momma â¦
Everybody?
The
contempt
Momma had for that creature of the herd, “everybody”! Everybody and their everybody-does-it violations of Christian teachings and the law! But Momma, I'm not going into the bar to
enjoy
it ⦠An exploration is all it is ⦠It was important that she see this legendary I.M. place for herself and find out what people got so excited about. Besides, it wasn't
her
idea. It was Mimi's. Mimi still played the role of the sophisticate among the three of them, but she was no longer patronizing. She no longer treated Charlotte as the clueless mountain girl. The status of Charlotte Simmons had risen another gradation after the two lacrosse players fought over her at the tailgate. Mimi had been more the benevolent mentor this time, as she told Charlotte and Bettina how they could fake their way into the bar. Mimi had had her own ID manufacturedâshe mysteriously declined to say howâand she could probably pass for twenty-one anyway. Once inside, she would find girls with real IDs, drivers' licenses most likely, who looked more or less like Bettina and Charlotte. The pictures on drivers' licenses were always distorted anyway. Then she would come back out and slip the bogus IDs to them. Yes, she said, since Charlotte wanted to know, fake IDs were technically illegal, but everybody uses them. If they went after everybody who used a fake ID, everybody at Dupont would have a record.
Everybody!
A rush of guilt ⦠Momma had not merely told her to obey every law, every rule, every regulationâshe had
conditioned
her. Obedience in all things great and small was next to godliness. Sparta had three stoplights, all on Main. One Saturday when she was twelve, Charlotte was walking with Laurie, and Regina happened along. Without thinking twice about it, Regina crossed the street against the light. So Charlotte and Laurie did, too. Charlotte hated herself for days. She hadn't had the courage to say, “You do what you want. I'm waiting for the light to change.”
A rush of guilt ⦠Momma had not merely told her to obey every law, every rule, every regulationâshe had
conditioned
her. Obedience in all things great and small was next to godliness. Sparta had three stoplights, all on Main. One Saturday when she was twelve, Charlotte was walking with Laurie, and Regina happened along. Without thinking twice about it, Regina crossed the street against the light. So Charlotte and Laurie did, too. Charlotte hated herself for days. She hadn't had the courage to say, “You do what you want. I'm waiting for the light to change.”
By now Mimi, Bettina, and Charlotte were only nine or ten places back in line. Charlotte's heart began banging away. She could see the gatekeepers, two men, standing out in front of the glass door. The one actually scrutinizing the IDs was short, wiry, swarthy, thirtyish, hawk faced, wearing a black turtleneck sweater and black pants. The other was a young giantâearly twenties?âwith closely cut, curly sandy-colored hair atop a great melon of a head supported by an even thicker neck ⦠curiously tiny eyes and mouth. Charlotte knew that face ⦠from where? The Saint Ray house! He had been the bouncer guarding the door to the stairway that led down to the so-called secret room! Now he was guarding the portal of the I.M., arms folded across his vast chest, expressionless as a mountain, towering over his little hawk-eyed colleague.
A piercing whine at the head of the line. “Whattaya mean? I've been in here a hundred times!”
It was a tall boy wearing a quilted vest and a T-shirt with the arms cut offâthe better to reveal his Cybex-maxed upper arms. He thrust his head down belligerently toward the lithe hawk of a gatekeeper. The hawk's mountain of a sidekick unfolded his armsâjust that, unfolded themâand the protest was over. The tall guy with the Cybexed biceps left the line, he and two pals, muttering imprecations and threatening retribution.
So the guardians of the gate meant business! And the humiliated boy looked a lot older than Charlotte. A chill of fright and chagrin; she felt guilty, humiliatedârevealed before all the worldâand her time hadn't even come yet.
But for the guilty, time speeds up. Now Mimi was before the hawk and the giant. Charlotte held her breath, hoping he would turn Mimi back, since that would bring their entire scheme to an end. But Mimi breezed on in, as she had predicted.
Charlotte and Bettina hung back to wait for her return. It seemed like
no time before Mimi emerged, faking a jolly laugh as she slipped Bettina and Charlotte bootlegged IDs and hurried back in. Charlotte studied hers ⦠a driver's license, New York State, in the name of Carla Phillips, 500 West End Avenue, New York, New York, 10024. The picture didn't look like Charlotte Simmons at all! ⦠Well, maybe vaguely ⦠Why don't I just leave while there's still time! I'm about to break the law! A grim Momma was eyeing her.
no time before Mimi emerged, faking a jolly laugh as she slipped Bettina and Charlotte bootlegged IDs and hurried back in. Charlotte studied hers ⦠a driver's license, New York State, in the name of Carla Phillips, 500 West End Avenue, New York, New York, 10024. The picture didn't look like Charlotte Simmons at all! ⦠Well, maybe vaguely ⦠Why don't I just leave while there's still time! I'm about to break the law! A grim Momma was eyeing her.
All too soon they were at the head of the line, approaching the hawk. Bettina went first. Charlotte's face was already on fire. The man studied Bettina's ID and then Bettina, the ID, and then Bettina again, oh so dubiously! âCharlotte's heart was a panicked bird trapped in her rib cageâbefore waving Bettina through.
This pointless risk of her entire moral self ⦠and she was standing before the Man. He was not as young as she had first thought. The pupils of his eyes were BBs deep within lids thick and wrinkled as walnut shells. His head was no bigger than a cantaloupe. The turtleneck of his sweater seemed about to swallow the head whole. But above all there was his mustache, a bushy thing curled upward at either end. There was a minute orange crumbânachos?âlodged in it. He looked up from “Charlotte's” driver's license with an insinuating twist of his lips that caused the mustache and its tiny orange crumb to swing an inch or so. He held the laminated card in one hand and gave it a contemptuous flick with the other.
“This your driver's license?”
Her throat had gone dry. She was afraid to try speaking. So she nodded yes. Unspokenâbut nevertheless a lie.
“Where's home for you, âCarla'?”
She was sure the way he had pronounced
Carla
was sarcastic and as much as said, “You liar.” She croaked out, “I'm from New York City?” Fear had thrown her right back into Down Home locution. The question-mark rise at the end made it sound like this lie was one she had tried to swallow but couldn't keep down.
Carla
was sarcastic and as much as said, “You liar.” She croaked out, “I'm from New York City?” Fear had thrown her right back into Down Home locution. The question-mark rise at the end made it sound like this lie was one she had tried to swallow but couldn't keep down.
“I can't make out this address, Carla.”
Thank God she had memorized it, but she was so hoarse. “Five hundred West End Avenue.”
The little inquisitor gave her a hideous wink and said, “That's a helluva Brooklyn accent you got there, âcarla.'”
“We just moved to New York?” A lie, uttered so faintly it was obvious she was just lobbing it and ducking.
“Hey, Carla, I know you. You're Hoyt's friend, right? Remember me?”
It was the big Saint Ray bouncer. He had an oddly high-pitched voice. Smiling like this, he looked like a different person, not rough and tough at all.
Charlotte said, “Sure do”â
sher doâ
jumping at a chance to ingratiate herself. “You wereâ” She didn't know how quite to put it. “âat the Saint Ray house?”
sher doâ
jumping at a chance to ingratiate herself. “You wereâ” She didn't know how quite to put it. “âat the Saint Ray house?”
“Awright
!” the bouncer said, as if he had just been paid a great compliment. Then he leaned over and whispered something to his colleague.
!” the bouncer said, as if he had just been paid a great compliment. Then he leaned over and whispered something to his colleague.
The little hawk let a big sigh out through his teeth, which gave it a whistling sound, and looked into the distance. “Okay, Miss New York, go on in.” He motioned toward the plate-glass door. Sardonically: “If you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere.”
Charlotte hadn't the faintest idea what he was talking about. She hurried toward the door for fear he'd change his mind.
The front door of the I.M. led into a small vestibule with a plate-glass inner door, through which Charlotte could make out a nightclub dusk with just enough light to reflect off the white faces of a mob of students. She could hear a low, numb thundering of sound and the muted percussion of drums and an electric bass. She pushed the door open, andâ
bang!â
squalls of noise and waves of noxious odors engulfed her, the sweet, rotting smell of beer, huge tides of it faintly laced with the putrid smell of vomit amid a bilious nightclubbed gloom, the bangs and wails of a band, and the victorious roar of students ecstatic over having made it into the right place. The mob of students looked like a single drunken beast with a thousand heads and two thousand arms, scratching and itching and itching and scratching at the pustules of a fiery pox, which turned out to be the tips of all the cigarettes. The whole place looked ⦠itchy ⦠filthy ⦠infested ⦠the floor, the walls, which were covered in wide, rough planks painted purplish black, even the splintery rip-cut edges. Deep within the gloom, two gashes of light, two long, glowing troughs, were just bright enough to reveal all the smoke in the air and throw the beast into silhouette. The nearer one must be a bar; the one in the back the bandstand. As Charlotte's eyes adjusted, the beast began to resolve into individuals packed shank to flank, from here to all the way back ⦠there. One of the first fine details she noticed was the perfect white crescents of the teeth of girls in jeansâprayers answered by the goddess Orthodontiaâas they looked up into the faces of boys in jeans, eyes glistening,
lips smiling, as if never in their lives had they heard such mesmerizing wit or wisdom.
bang!â
squalls of noise and waves of noxious odors engulfed her, the sweet, rotting smell of beer, huge tides of it faintly laced with the putrid smell of vomit amid a bilious nightclubbed gloom, the bangs and wails of a band, and the victorious roar of students ecstatic over having made it into the right place. The mob of students looked like a single drunken beast with a thousand heads and two thousand arms, scratching and itching and itching and scratching at the pustules of a fiery pox, which turned out to be the tips of all the cigarettes. The whole place looked ⦠itchy ⦠filthy ⦠infested ⦠the floor, the walls, which were covered in wide, rough planks painted purplish black, even the splintery rip-cut edges. Deep within the gloom, two gashes of light, two long, glowing troughs, were just bright enough to reveal all the smoke in the air and throw the beast into silhouette. The nearer one must be a bar; the one in the back the bandstand. As Charlotte's eyes adjusted, the beast began to resolve into individuals packed shank to flank, from here to all the way back ⦠there. One of the first fine details she noticed was the perfect white crescents of the teeth of girls in jeansâprayers answered by the goddess Orthodontiaâas they looked up into the faces of boys in jeans, eyes glistening,
lips smiling, as if never in their lives had they heard such mesmerizing wit or wisdom.
Charlotte's eyes were darting about, looking for Mimi and Bettina. They were standing off to one side, near the door. Charlotte hurried over to them, and they put their heads together and began laughing, all three of them.
“What happened?” said Mimi.
“You know the man with the face like a hawk? He didn't believe me!”
Great sieges of laughter, giddiness upon giddiness, as Charlotte regaled them with the story. She had seldom been so elated in her life. She had succeeded in a subterfuge! Cool! (No longer lying and cheating.) She had proved she was among the worldly ones who know how to handle things! (No longer committing an illegal act.) She had risked and dared ⦠pour
le
sport! (No longer the shameless waste of spirit of a Regina Cox.) She was the brave girl who had gone into battle, been shot atâand survived! (Without the bother of dwelling on the purpose.) She laughed and chattered more animatedly than at any time since she arrived at Dupont.
le
sport! (No longer the shameless waste of spirit of a Regina Cox.) She was the brave girl who had gone into battle, been shot atâand survived! (Without the bother of dwelling on the purpose.) She laughed and chattered more animatedly than at any time since she arrived at Dupont.
Mimi indicated that she wanted to go to the bar and get a drink. The roar, the shrieks, the wailing, pounding music were so overwhelming that if you weren't within a foot of one another you couldn't make yourself heard. The three girls slithered and squeezed through the crush of students. Charlotte brought up the rear. She had no intention of getting a drink, which might cost a dollar or more, but it seemed terribly important to stay in her little freshman herd and keep moving â¦
Nearing the bar, she became separated from them by an impenetrable knot of boys and girls. The girls were shriekingâthe usual shrieks to indicate excitement over the presence of guys. Charlotte couldn't get by them.
She felt a tug on her arm. It was Bettina, who had a bottle of beer in her hand. She motioned toward Mimi, who had a big glass of something. They headed toward the band, in the back. Charlotte followed as they made their way through a bewilderingly excited crowd. The odorsârotting malt, vomitus, cigarette smoke, bodiesâbecame worse and worse. The sheer mass of bodiesâit was so hot in here! Reminded her of the Saint Ray house that night ⦠the heat, the smoky nocturnal gloom, the yowling drunks, the music that never stopped, the putrid air, the drunken cries of the male animal on all sides.
“Kiss muh bigguh-fwy booty!”
Kiss my biggie-fry booty!
Kiss my biggie-fry booty!
“Luke, I am your father!”
“Sucka sucka! Who the fucka's gonna steal a Sonicare toothbrush?”
“They can take away our lives, but they can't take away our freedom!”
In the back, five musicians, glistening with sweat, were an apparition of highlights that were too bright and shadows that disappeared into a black wall behind the bandstand. They looked not so much like three-dimensional forms as twitching slicks of light. The drummer was fat and bald as a Buddha, banging away at an extraordinary battery of drums, cymbals, bells, blocks of wood, triangles. In front of the bandstand was a small dance floor. It was as itchy and beat-up as the bar area. Jammed in around the floor, in virtual darkness, was a gridlock of cocktail tablesâsmall, round, cheap, painted black, mobbed with white faces bawling as they sucked smoke down into their lungs. A young singer, caramel colored, fragile as a stalk, head shaved except for a pair of enormous sideburns, which created a poodle effect, was singing to a leisurely reggae beat.
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