Bret Ellis - Less than zero

"Yeah, I'm just nervous." Julian's voice trails off. He's about to say something, mouth opens. I can hear a plane passing by, overhead. Then an ambulance.

"What is it, babe? Hey, you can tell me." Finn seems understanding and walks over to Julian and puts his arm around him.

I think Julian's crying.

"Will you excuse us, please?" Finn asks me politely.

I walk out of the room and close the door behind me, but I can still hear the voices.

"I think that tonight will be my last... my last night. Okay, Finn? I don't think I can do this anymore. I'm just so sick of feeling so... sad all the time and I can't... Can't I do something else for you? Just till I pay you back?" Julian's voice is all shaky and then it cracks.

"Hey, hey, hey, baby," Finn croons. "Baby, it's okay."

I could leave the penthouse now. Even though Julian drove, I could leave the penthouse. I could call someone to pick me up.

"No, Finn, no, it's not."

"Here..."

"Ho, Finn. No way. I don't want that. I'm through with that."

"Of course, you are."

There's a really long silence and I can only hear a couple of matches being lit and this slapping sound, and after a while, Finn finally speaks up. "Now, you know that you're my best boy and you know that I care for you. Just like my own kid. Just like my own son..." There's a pause and then Finn says, "You look thin."

The surfer brushes past me and enters the room and tells Finn that someone named Manuel is on the phone. The surfer leaves. Julian gets up from Finn's desk, buttoning his sleeve, and says goodbye to Finn.

"Hey, keep up the Nautilus. Keep up the bod." Finn winks.

"Sure."

"See ya later tonight, right, Clay?"

I want to say no, but I have the feeling somehow that I will be seeing him later tonight and I nod and say, "Yeah" and try to sound convincing, like I mean it.

"You're terrific, you kids. Just fab," Finn tells us.

I follow Julian across the hallway and as I cross the living room to get to the door, I see the surfer lying in the living room on the floor, his right hand down his pants, eating a bowl of Captain Crunch. He's alternating between reading the back of the cereal box and watching "The Twilight Zone" on the huge TV screen in the middle of the living room and Rod Serling's staring at us and tells us that we have just entered The Twilight Zone and though I don't want to believe it, it's just so surreal that I know it's true and I stare at the boy on the living room rug for one last time and then slowly turn away and follow Julian out the door and into the darkness of Finn's hall. And in the elevator on the way down to Julian's car, I say, "Why didn't you tell me the money was for this?" and Julian, his eyes all glassy, sad grin on his face, says, "Who cares? Do you? Do you really care?" and I don't say anything and realize that I really don't care and suddenly feel foolish, stupid. I also realize that I'll go with Julian to the Saint Marquis. That I want to see if things like this can actually happen. And as the elevator descends, passing the second floor, and the first floor, going even farther down, I realize that the money doesn't matter. That all that does is that I want to see the worst.

The Saint Marquis. Four o'clock. Sunset Boulevard. The sun is huge and burning, an orange monster, as Julian pulls into the parking lot and for some reason he's passed the hotel twice and I keep asking him why and he keeps asking me if I really want to go through with this and I keep telling him that I do. As soon as I step out of the car, I look at the pool and wonder if anybody has drowned in the pool. The Saint Marquis is a hollow hotel; it has a swimming pool in a courtyard surrounded by rooms. There's a fat man in a lounge chair, his body shining, suntan oil slathered onto it. He stares at the two of us as we walk toward the room Finn told Julian to go to. The man's staying in room 001. Julian walks up to the door and knocks. The curtains are closed and a face, a shadow, peers out. The door's opened by a man, forty, forty-five, wearing slacks and a shirt and a tie, who asks, "Yes... what may I do for you?"

"You're Mr. Erickson, right?"

"Yes... Oh, you must be..." His voice trails off as he looks Julian and me over.

"Is something wrong?" Julian asks.

"No, not at all. Why don't you two come in?"

"Thanks," Julian says.

I follow Julian into the room and become unnerved. I hate hotel rooms. My great-grandfather died in one. At the Stardust in Las Vegas. He had been dead two days before anybody found him.

"Would you boys like a drink?" the man asks.

I have a feeling that these men always ask this and though I want one, badly, I look at Julian, who shakes his head and says, "No, thank you, sir." And I also say, "No, thank you, sir."

"Why don't you two boys make yourself comfortable and sit down."

"Can I take my jacket off?" Julian asks.

"Yes. By all means, son."

The man begins to make himself a drink.

"Are you in L.A. for long?" Julian asks.

"No, no, just a week, for business." The man sips his drink.

"What do you do?"

"I'm into real estate, son."

I look over at Julian and wonder if this man knows my father. I look down and realize that I don't have anything to say, but I try to think of something; the need to hear my own voice begins to get more intense and I keep wondering if my father knows this guy. I try to shake the thought from my head, the idea of this guy maybe coming up to my father at Ma Maison or Trumps, but it stays there, stuck.

Julian speaks up. "Where are you from?"

"Indiana."

"Oh, really? Where in Indiana?"

"Muncie."

"Oh. Muncie, Indiana."

"That's right."

There's a pause and the man shifts his eyes from Julian to me and then back to Julian. He sips his drink.

"Well, which of you young men would like to get up?" The man from Indiana is gripping his glass too tightly and he sets his drink on the bar. Julian stands up.

The man nods, and asks, "Why don't you take off your tie?"

Julian does.

The man shifts his gaze from Julian over to me, to make sure that I'm watching.

"And your shoes and socks."

Julian does this also and then looks down.

"And... uh, the rest."

Julian slips out of his shirt and pants and the man peels back the window shade and looks out onto Sunset Boulevard and then back at Julian.

"Do you like living in L.A.?"

"Yeah. I love L.A.," Julian says, folding his pants.

The man looks over at me and then says, "Oh no, this won't do. Why don't you sit over there, near the window. That's better." The man sits me down in an easy chair and positions me nearer the bed and then, satisfied, walks up to Julian and places his hand on Julian's bare shoulder. His hand drops down to Julian's jockey shorts and Julian closes his eyes.

"You're a very nice young man."

An image of Julian in fifth grade, kicking a soccer ball across a green field.

"Yes, you're a very beautiful boy," the man from Indiana says, "and here, that's all that matters."

Julian opens his eyes and stares into mine and I turn away and notice a fly buzzing lazily over to the wall next to the bed. I wonder what the man and Julian are going to do. I tell myself I could leave. I could simply say to the man from Muncie and Julian that I want to leave. But, again, the words don't, can't, come out and I sit there and the need to see the worst washes over me, quickly, eagerly.

The man walks over to the bathroom and tells us both that he'll be out in a minute. He closes the bathroom door. I get up from the chair and walk over to the bar to look for something to drink. I notice the man's wallet which he left on the bar and I look through it. I'm so nervous I don't care, don't even know why I'm doing it. There are a lot of business cards in it but I don't look at any, not wanting to see my father's. There are some credit cards and the usual amount of cash someone from out of town might carry when coming into the city. There are also pictures of a very tired, pretty woman, the man's wife probably, and two pictures of his children, all boys, straight-limbed, and with short blond hair and striped shirts, looking full of confidence. The pictures depress me and I put the wallet back down on the bar and wonder if the man took the pictures. I look over at Julian, who's sitting on the edge of the bed, head down. I sit down and then lean over and turn the stereo on.