Jens Lapidus - Easy Money

A small kitchen, a living room, and two bedrooms-one with a queen-size bed, the other with a twin. It was cold. He turned on the radiator. Kept his jacket on.

He unpacked his food. The fridge and the freezer were turned off-a good sign that the house was closed for the winter. Fried two eggs. Cut thick slices off the loaf of bread. Put the eggs on top. Checked the pantry. Almost empty: an old box of chocolates, two cans of crushed tomatoes, and beans. Worthless.

Sat down in the living room. Opened the door of a corner cupboard that was painted with florid designs in red and blue: crammed with bottles of booze. Jackpot. City’s sickest juice-juju.

Screw safety. Jorge-boy was gonna have a niiiiice night.

No mixers. No ice. No fruit or drinks to blend it with. Fuck that. Real men take it straight. Jorge did a whiskey tasting all by his lonesome. Lined up five glasses on the living room table. Poured out five different brands. Picked the ones with the weirdest names: Laphroaig, Aberlour, Isle of Jura, Mortlach, Strathisla.

Munched on stale chocolate. Turned on the radio on a huge Sharp stereo. A display with blinking yellow stripes and patterns began to glow to the beat of the music. Felt very 1991.

Mortlach was the best. He poured himself another glass. Sang along to the songs from the radio. Tried to wail like Mariah Carey.

Poured water into a glass and more whiskey into another. Not his thing to drink straight, but what the hell. He drained the glass.

The house was spinning. Poorly built. Crooked corners. Tilting windows. He laughed at himself-the countryside’s new urban architect. The buzz washed over him.

Joy. At the same time: little Jorgelito, so alone.

Drunken rush. At the same time: He had to be vigilant.

He sat down on the floor to steady himself.

Suddenly, he remembered something he hadn’t thought about in a very long time. How he and Mama’d been walking together from the grocery store. He might’ve been six or seven. Paola was already at home, waiting for them. Preparing dinner. Everything but the rice-they’d run out and so Jorge and Mama’d had to go buy some. Rodriguez’d refused to help out, and Jorge’d been scared to go alone. He saw his mother’s face now, clearly: the dark furrows under her eyes and the lines in her forehead that made her look like she was always wondering about something but never could find the answer. He’d asked, “Mama, are you tired?” She’d set the bag of rice down on the sidewalk. Lifted him up into her arms. Smoothed back his hair and said, “No, Jorgelito. If we sleep well tonight, I’m going to be wide-awake tomorrow. That’ll be nice.”

Jorge reached for the bottle. Poured out more Mortlach.

The living room was spinning like crazy.

He stood up.

Lost control.

Passed out on the floor.

Three days later. Jorge had some serious problems. He’d been out of food for twenty-four hours already and he had only four hundred kronor left. Couldn’t even muster sit-ups. Too tired to go to a new cottage. Unfortunately, you couldn’t live on whiskey and water.

He needed to get to a store and buy food.

He needed to get cash. The question: Would Radovan agree to his proposition? If not, his need for cheddar would grow even more.

But worst of all: He felt so alone.

He needed to talk to someone-meet some old friend or relative. Human contact.

Was he already fried?

He had to get to the city. Eat. Scrape up some extra dough while he waited to call the Yugos. That’s just the way it was.

Jorge checked out map books in the bookcase. The scale was too bad. He checked the back pages of the phone book-he wanted to know how to get back to this cottage when he’d completed his mission in the city. Looked for Dyvik.

Considered boosting a car.

It was, without a doubt, the bash to break all bashes-the year’s most prestigious, profligate private party.

JW lived off the hype several days beforehand. It was high-gear, high-class, high-line. Most of all, it was so goddamn jet set.

Carl Malmer, alias Jet Set Carl, alias the Prince of Stureplan, was turning twenty-five and was having a courtly revelry in his four-room, sixteen-hundred-square-foot apartment. The apartment was on Skeppargatan and the rooftop terrace’d been booked for months.

The hottest chicks were booked; the kids from the best families were invited; the bottles and models set would naturally be featured at the party.

JW arrived with Fredrik and Nippe. They’d pregamed at Fredrik’s. It was eleven-thirty. Overflowing coatracks stood in the foyer, as did an enormous black dude without bouncer tag but sporting a spot-on style: black leather jacket, turtleneck, dark jeans. Fredrik grinned. “A bouncer at a private party?”

The bouncer checked them off a list and waved them through.

They hung up their coats and walked in.

Heat, perfume, party din, and the smell of eau de cash hit them as richly as at the velvet-roped entrances of Stureplan’s best clubs. They made their way through a crowd of underage girls who seemed to have just arrived-they were fixing their faces in front of the mirror in the hall. Nippe was drooling, couldn’t help himself; started flirt-chatting with one of the girls. Fredrik asked where Carl was. Someone pointed toward the kitchen. They pulled Nippe with them.

The kitchen was nearly six hundred square feet. An island remade as a bar filled the middle of the room. Two guys in bandannas mixed drinks. The place was packed. The music from the speakers: the Sounds. In the middle of it all was Jet Set Carl himself, wearing a white tux and a blinding smile.

“Hey, boys.” Carl hugged and welcomed them. Introduced them to the two chicks he was talking to. Top-tier superbimbettes. Fredrik made conversation and Nippe pulled his telltale tail tales. JW looked around with a bored expression. Had to keep the surface ripple-free, couldn’t show how impressed he was.

He thought, Carl must make a killing on his parties and club gigs, almost better than you make on C. The kitchen area was redone. Boffi, Italian design for people with black cards. Corian countertops. Slim, discreet cabinet handles. Oven in brushed stainless steel, Gaggenau-four gas burners and a built-in grill. Tap and levers in stylish chrome floated like a swan’s neck over the sink. The fridge and freezer were of stainless steel, American extra-wide size, with round, wide handles. To the left of the fridge was a wine cooler with a transparent door, filled with bottles. Having a kitchen like that scored more adult points than having kids.

Right mix of A-, B-, and C-list celebs in the crowd. Bloggers, actors, models. Scenesters and artists. Princess Madeleine plus entourage. He glimpsed former Social Democratic minister Leif Pagrotsky smack in the middle.

Nippe was swallowed up, disappeared on a mingle crusade. Fredrik lit a cigarette.

Jet Set Carl turned to JW. “Good to see you. You haven’t been here before, have you?”

“No, but it’s a damn nice apartment you’ve got.”

“Thanks. I like it myself.”

“How many people did you invite tonight?”

“Many. I’ve booked the rooftop terrace, too. Probably hundred and fifty people up there already. Gonna be wild. You’ve got to go up and check it out; that’s where the food is. There’ll be some stuff happening on the roof later, too.”

“What about your neighbors?”

“I booked rooms at the Grand for the families next door and below me. They were happy as hell.”

“Who wouldn’t be for a free night at the Grand Hôtel? Everything cool with the stuff?”

“Sure thing. Sweet that you could get it on such short notice. It’s in the bedroom.”

“Sophie here?”

“Yup, check the terrace.”