Bentley Little: The House

So, in a way, her hippie parents were responsible for her becoming the business executive she was today.

She had the feeling they'd be proud of her, though.

A half hour later, Hoffman finally finished talking, the meeting finally ended, and the various department heads went back to their offices. Tom Jenson, the division development coordinator, asked her if she wanted to go out for drinks after work, but she begged off, saying that she wanted to get a head start on the weekend.

"I don't blame you," he said. "It's been a crappy week."

Laurie smiled. "See you Monday."

She left work an hour early, walking downtown. A

cable car filled with Japanese tourists clattered past her, and she waved at one man who snapped her picture.

As she did each Friday, she stopped off to see her brother at The Shire. He'd been managing the bookstore for three years now, and it was nice to see him finally find a job that he liked, but recently he'd been delving a little too deeply into Eastern religion and philosophy books.

An interest he'd inherited from their mom.

It was one of the reasons she liked to check up on him.

Josh was helping a customer when she walked into the shop, and she waved at him and busied herself with the magazines while he talked with the customer about the works of Carlos Casteneda .

The customer finally bought a book and left, and Laurie walked over to the counter. "How goes it?" she asked.

He looked at her. "I was about to ask you the same question."

"That bad, huh?"

He nodded.

She placed her purse down on the counter and sighed.

"It's been a long week."

"Tell me about it."

She described the petty infighting and office politics that had been indulged in since the division's recent restructuring, moved on to the boring meetings and endless memos, and finished with a lawsuit being filed against the company by an ex-clerk whom she had hired.

"Sounds like a party."

"Yeah. Right."

"How are things with you and Matt?"

"Fine. No problems there."

"You could always get another job."

"No. It's not the work, it's . . . it's the position. Ever since I took that promotion, I've had to spend all my time dealing with human resources rather than what's important."

He smiled. " 'Human resources'?"

"I admit it. I've been corrupted. I'm a corporate shill."

"Like I said, you could find another job."

She shook her head.

"You're under a lot of stress. That's your main problem. I have this book--"

"Josh."

"I'm serious. It's about spiritual awareness and energy management. There's a lack of spirituality in your life.

That's at the root of your problems. It's what's at the root of most of the world's problems."

"I really don't want to hear it right now."

"Laurie--"

"Look, I'm glad you have a hobby, and it's really interesting and everything, but I just don't believe that I

can walk into your store and buy a five-dollar vanity press book and find out answers to questions that the greatest minds in the history of the world couldn't solve."

"You don't have to be hostile."

"Yes, Josh, I do. I do because every time I come in here, you're trying to shove some new religion down my throat. I just want you to be my brother and give me a shoulder to cry on and not try to convert me all the time."

"You're just too closed-minded."

"If Albert Einstein didn't know the meaning of life, then neither do you."

He turned away, and she reached out and grabbed his arm, sighing. "I'm sorry. It's been a boring day and a long week, and I didn't mean to take it out on you."

He turned, smiled wryly. "What are brothers for?"

She hugged him. "I just need to go home, take a hot bath, relax with Matt, and watch a crummy movie." She picked up her purse from the counter. "I'll call you later, okay?"

He nodded.

"And next time we'll discuss your wacky religions."

He laughed. "Deal."

She waved good-bye and walked outside onto the crowded sidewalk. She'd taken BART to work this morning but decided to walk home. It wasn't that far, and she needed the exercise. She also wanted some time to think.

At the corner, at the stoplight, a convertible pulled next to her, its driver idly flipping through stations on a radio loud enough to be heard halfway down the block:

rap, dance, metal, alternative. The light changed, the convertible took off, and as she walked across the street she heard the fading drone of a currently hot rock band.

She missed the music of the seventies. To the mainstream public, it was the decade of disco, but she'd been into fusion and progressive rock, movements on the edge of the mainstream that took chances, expanded boundaries, celebrated artistic ambition and musical ability.

Everyone now had been ground down into mediocrity, afraid to shoot too high, afraid of being ridiculed as pretentious, and the result was a music scene that was terminally banal.

Art.

That's what she respected.

Which was why she was so happy with Matt.

They'd been going together for a year, living together for the past four months, and while the situation at work had been up and down, she'd never been happier at home.

Matt, she thought, was a true artist. He created his work not for money, not for fame, not for recognition by his peers.

He did it because he had to.

He didn't look or dress the part either, and that's what had sold her on his integrity. There were two looks for artists in San Francisco: designer duds and an up-to-the minute coif, or thrift-store clothes and uncombed hair.

Matt looked more like a sales clerk or a civil servant-- average--and the fact that he didn't feel obligated to play into the media's conception of an artiste made her think he was the real thing.

In actuality, he did work as a sales clerk. At Montgomery Ward's. Cameras and Luggage. He used the money he earned at his nine-to-five to fund his art: films he shot in and around Golden Gate Park with "found"

actors--people he picked off the street to read his scripts. When he completed a film, he copied it onto videotape, passed the tapes out to friends and coworkers, and told them to copy the film and pass it on as well. Most of the people who watched his work, she knew, were not even aware that he was the filmmaker.

He always acted as though this were just some low-budget movie he'd discovered and wanted to share with them.

She found that charming.

Matt's Mustang was in the driveway when she arrived home, and her spirits lifted as she hurried across the small yard and up the porch steps. The front door was unlocked--as usual--and she opened the door and went inside. She was about to pull her Ricky Ricardo routine and yell "Honey, I'm home!" but instead she decided to surprise him, and she moved quietly through the living room.

There was the sound of someone peeing in the bathroom, and she walked over to the open door --where a nude blond woman was sitting on the toilet, legs spread.

Matt, her artist, was kneeling before the toilet, his head in the woman's lap.

There was no silent second of shock, no delay of any kind. She ran instantly into the bathroom and yanked Matt up by his hair. "Get out!" she screamed. "Get the hell out of my house!"

His erect penis was bouncing around comically and the woman was frantically trying to recover her clothes, but Laurie did not let up. She dug her fingers into Matt's upper arm and shoved him as hard as she could into the hall, picking his clothes up from the floor next to the tub and throwing them after him. She did not touch the woman but continued screaming all the while, anguished, angry invectives that included both of them.

The woman, pants and T-shirt now on, ran past her out of the bathroom clutching panties, bra, nylons, shoes.