Bret Ellis: Less than zero

"What is this? You can't eat a Fatburger without chili."

I roll my eyes up at him and light a cigarette.

"Jesus, you're weird. Been up in fucking New Hampshire too long," he mutters. "No fucking chili."

I don't say anything and notice that the walls have been painted a very bright, almost painful yellow and under the glare of the fluorescent lights, they seem to glow. Joan Jett and the Blackhearts are on the jukebox singing "Crimson and Clover." I stare at the walls and listen to the words. "Crimson and clover, over and over and over and over..." I suddenly get thirsty, but I don't want to go up to the counter and order anything because there's this fat, sad-faced Japanese girl taking orders and this security guard leaning against another yellow wall in back, eyeing everyone suspiciously, and Trent is still staring at my Fatburger with this amazed look on his face and there's this guy in a red shirt with long stringy hair, pretending to be playing the guitar and mouthing the words to the song in the booth next to ours and he starts to shake his head and his mouth opens. "Crimson and clover, over and over and over... Crimson and clo-oh-ver..."

It's two in the morning and hot and we're at the Edge in the back room and Trent is trying on my sunglasses and I tell him that I want to leave. Trent tells me that we'll leave soon, a couple of minutes maybe. The music from the dance floor seems too loud and I tense up every time the music stops and another song comes on. I lean back against the brick wall and notice that there are two boys embracing in a darkened corner. Trent senses I'm tense and says, "What do you want me to do? You wanna lude, is that it?" He pulls out a Pez dispenser and pulls Daffy Duck's head back. I don't say anything, just keep staring at the Pez dispenser and then he puts it away and cranes his neck. "Is that Muriel?"

"No, that girl's black."

"Oh... you're right."

Pause.

"It's not a girl."

I wonder how Trent can mistake a black teenage boy, not anorexic, for Muriel, but then I see that the black boy is wearing a dress. I look at Trent and tell him again that I have to leave.

"Yeah, we all have to leave," he says. "You said that already."

And so I stare at my shoes and Trent finds something to say. "You're too much." I keep staring at my shoes, tempted to ask him to let me see the Pez dispenser.

Trent says, "Oh shit, find Blair, let's go, let's leave."

I don't want to go back into the main room, but I realize you have to go through the main room to get back to the outside. I spot Daniel, who's talking to this really pretty tan girl who's wearing a Heaven cut-off T-shirt and a black-and-white miniskirt and I whisper to him that we're leaving and he gives me this look and says, "Don't give me any shit." I finally yank his arm and tell him he's really drunk and he says no kidding. He kisses the girl on the cheek and follows us toward the door, where Blair's standing, talking to some guy from U.S.C.

"Are we leaving?" she asks.

"Yeah," I say, wondering where she's been.

We walk out into the hot night and Blair asks, "Well, did we have a good time?" and nobody answers and she looks down.

Trent and Daniel are standing by Trent's BMW and Trent's pulling the Cliff Notes to As I Lay Dying out of his glove compartment and hands them to Blair. We say goodbye and make sure Daniel can get into his car. Trent says that maybe one of us should drive Daniel home but then agrees that it would be too much of a hassle to drive him home and then drive him back tomorrow. And I drive Blair back to her house in Beverly Hills and she fingers the Cliff Notes but doesn't say anything except when she tries to rub the stamp off her hand and she says, "Fuck it. I wish they didn't have to stamp my hand in black. It never comes off." And then she mentions that even though I was gone for four months, I never called her. I tell her I'm sorry and turn off Hollywood Boulevard because it's too brightly lit and take Sunset and then drive onto her street and then to her driveway. We kiss and she notices that I've been gripping the steering wheel too hard and she looks at my fists and says, "Your hands are red," then gets out of the car.

We have been in Beverly Hills shopping most of the late morning and early afternoon. My mother and my two sisters and me. My mother has spent most of this time probably at Neiman-Marcus, and my sisters have gone to Jerry Magnin and have used our father's charge account to buy him and me something and then to MGA and Camp Beverly Hills and Privilege to buy themselves something. I sit at the bar at La Scala Boutique for most of this time, bored out of my mind, smoking, drinking red wine. Finally, my mother drives up in her Mercedes and parks the car in front of La Scala and waits for me. I get up and leave some money on the counter and get in the car and lean my head up against the headrest.

"She's going out with the biggest babe," one of my sisters is saying.

"Where does he go to school?" the other one asks, interested.

"Harvard."

"What grade is he in?"

"Ninth. One year above her."

"I heard their house is for sale," my mother says.

"I wonder if he's for sale," the older of my two sisters, who I think is fifteen, mumbles, and both of them giggle from the backseat.

A truck with video games strapped in the back passes by and my sisters are driven into some sort of frenzy.

"Follow that video game!" one of them commands.

"Mom, do you think if I asked Dad he'd get me Galaga for Christmas?" the other one asks, brushing her short blond hair. I think she's thirteen, maybe.

"What is a Galaga?" my mother asks.

"A video game," one of them says.

"You have Atari though," my mother says.

"Atari's cheap," she says, handing the brush to my other sister, who also has blond hair.

"I don't know," my mother says, adjusting her sunglasses, opening the sunroof. "I'm having dinner with him tonight."

"That's encouraging," the older sister says sarcastically.

"Where would we put it though?" one of them asks.

"Put what?" my mother asks back.

"Galaga! Galaga!" my sisters scream.

"In Clay's room, I suppose," my mother says.

I shake my head.

"Bullshit! No way," one of them yells. "Clay can't have Galaga in his room. He always locks his door."

"Yeah, Clay, that really pisses me off," one of them says, a real edge in her voice.

"Why do you lock your door anyway, Clay?"

I don't say anything.

"Why do you lock your door, Clay?" one of them, I don't know which one, asks again.

I still don't say anything. I consider grabbing one of the bags from MGA or Camp Beverly Hills or a box of shoes from Privilege and flinging them out the window.

"Mom, tell him to answer me. Why do you lock your door, Clay?"

I turn around. "Because you both stole a quarter gram of cocaine from me the last time I left my door open. That's why."

My sisters don't say anything. "Teenage Enema Nurses in Bondage" by a group called Killer Pussy comes on the radio, and my mother asks if we have to listen to this and my sisters tell her to turn it up, and no one says anything else until the song's over. When we get home, my younger sister finally tells me, out by the pool, "That's bullshit. I can get my own cocaine."

The psychiatrist I see during the four weeks I'm back is young and has a beard and drives a 450 SL and has a house in Malibu. I'll sit in his office in Westwood with the shades drawn and my sunglasses on, smoking a cigarette, sometimes cloves, just to irritate him, sometimes crying. Sometimes I'll yell at him and he'll yell back. I tell him that I have these bizarre sexual fantasies and his interest will increase noticeably. I'll start to laugh for no reason and then feel sick. I lie to him sometimes. He'll tell me about his mistress and the repairs being done on the house in Tahoe and I'll shut my eyes and light another cigarette, gritting my teeth. Sometimes I just get up and leave.