Bret Ellis: Less than zero

"Do you want your subscription to Variety renewed?"

"It already is."

Another pause.

"Do you need money?"

"No," I tell him, knowing that he'll slip me some later on, outside Ma Maison maybe, or on the way back to his office.

"You look thin," he says.

"Hmmm."

"And pale."

"It's the drugs," I mumble.

"I didn't quite hear that."

I look at him and say, "I've gained five pounds since I've been back home."

"Oh," he says, and pours himself a glass of white wine. Some other business guy drops by. After he leaves, my father turns to me and asks. "Do you want to go to Palm Springs for Christmas?"

During the end of my senior year one day, I didn't go to school. Instead I drove out to Palm Springs alone and listened to a lot of old tapes I used to like but didn't much anymore, and I stopped at a McDonald's in Sunland for a Coke and then drove out to the desert and parked in front of the old house. I didn't like the new one that the family had bought; well, it was okay, but it wasn't like the old house. The old house was empty and the outside looked really scummy and unkempt and there were weeds and a television aerial that had fallen off the roof and empty trash cans were lying on what used to be the front lawn. The pool was drained and all these memories rushed back to me and I had to sit down in my school uniform on the steps of the empty pool and cry. I remembered all the Friday nights driving in and the Sunday nights leaving and afternoons spent playing cards on the chaise longues out by the pool with my grandmother. But those memories seemed faded compared to empty beer cans that were scattered all over the dead lawn and the windows that were all smashed and broken. My aunt had tried to sell the house, but I guess she got sentimental and no longer wanted to. My father had wanted to sell it and was really bitter that no one had done so. But they stopped talking about it and the house lay between them and was never brought up anymore. I didn't go out to Palm Springs that day to look around or see the house and I didn't go because I wanted to miss school or anything. I guess I went out there because I wanted to remember the way things were. I don't know.

On the way home from lunch, I stop by Cedars-Sinai to visit Muriel, since Blair told me that she really wanted to see me. She's really pale and so totally thin that I can make out the veins in her neck too clearly. She also has dark circles under her eyes and the pink lipstick she's put on clashes badly with the pale white skin on her face. She's watching some exercise show on TV and all these issues of Glamour and Vogue and Interview lie by her bed. The curtains are closed and she asks me to open them. After I do, she puts her sunglasses on and tells me that she's having a nicotine fit and that she's "absolutely dying" for a cigarette. I tell her I don't have any. She shrugs and turns the volume up on the television and laughs at the people doing the exercises. She doesn't say that much, which is just as well since I don't say much either.

I leave the parking lot of Cedars-Sinai and make a couple of wrong turns and end up on Santa Monica. I sigh, turn up the radio, some little girls are singing about an earthquake in L.A. "My surfboard's ready for the tidal wave." A car pulls up next to mine at the next light and I turn my head to see who's in it. Two young guys in a Fiat and both have short hair and bushy mustaches and are wearing plaid short-sleeve shirts and ski vests and one looks at me, with this total look of surprise and disbelief and he tells his friend something and now both of them are looking at me. "Smack, smack, I fell in a crack." The driver rolls down his window and I tense up and he asks me something, but my window's rolled up and the top isn't down and so I don't answer his question. But the driver asks me again, positive that I'm this certain actor. "Now I'm part of the debris," the girls are squealing. The light turns green and I drive away, but I'm in the left-hand lane and it's a Friday afternoon nearing five and the traffic's bad, and when I come to another red light, the Fiat's next to me again, and these two insane fags are laughing and pointing and asking me the same fucking question over and over. I finally make an illegal left turn and come to a side street, where I park for a minute and turn the radio off, light a cigarette.

Rip's supposed to meet me at Cafe Casino in Westwood, and he hasn't shown up yet. There's nothing to do in Westwood. It's too hot to walk around and I've seen all the movies, some even twice, and so I sit under the umbrellas at Cafe Casino and drink Perrier and grapefruit juice and watch the cars roll by in the heat. Light a cigarette and stare at the Perrier bottle. Two girls, sixteen, seventeen, both with short hair, sit at the table next to mine and I keep looking over at both of them and they both flirt back; one's peeling an orange and the other's sipping an espresso. The one who's peeling an orange asks the other if she should put a maroon streak through her hair. The girl with the espresso takes a sip and tells her no. The other girl asks about other colors, about anthracite. The girl with the espresso takes another sip and thinks about this for a minute and then tells her no, that it should be red, and if not red, then violet, but definitely not maroon or anthracite. I look over at her and she looks at me and then I look at the Perrier bottle. The girl with the espresso pauses a couple of seconds and then asks, "What's anthracite?"

A black Porsche with tinted windows pulls up in front of Cafe Casino and Julian gets out. He sees me and, though it looks like he doesn't want to, comes over. His hand falls on my shoulder and I shake his other hand.

"Julian," I say. "How've you been?"

"Hey, Clay," he says. "What's going on? How long have you been back?"

"Just like five days," I say. Just five days.

"What are you doing?" he asks. "What's going on?"

"I'm waiting for Rip."

Julian looks really tired and kind of weak, but I tell him he looks great and he says that I do too, even though I need to get a tan.

"Hey, listen," he starts. "I'm sorry about not meeting you and Trent at Carney's that night and freaking out at the party. It's just like, I've been strung out for like the past four days, and I just, like, forgot... I haven't even been home...." He slaps his forehead. "Oh man, my mother must be freaking out." He pauses, doesn't smile. "I'm just so sick of dealing with people." He looks past me. "Oh shit, I don't know."

I look over at the black Porsche and try to see past the tinted windows and begin to wonder if there's anyone else in the car. Julian starts playing with his keys.

"Do you want something, man?" he asks. "I mean, I like you and if you need anything, just come see me, okay?"

"Thanks. I don't need anything, not really." I stop and feel kind of sad. "Jesus, Julian, how have you been? We've got to get together or something. I haven't seen you in a long time." I stop. "I've missed you."

Julian stops playing with his keys and looks away from me. "I've been all right. How was... oh shit, where were you, Vermont?"

"No, New Hampshire."

"Oh yeah. How was it?"

"Okay. Heard you dropped out of U.S.C."

"Oh yeah. Couldn't deal with it. It's so totally bogus. Maybe next year, you know?"

"Yeah..." I say. "Have you talked to Trent?"

"Oh man, if I want to see him, I'll see him."

There's another pause, this time longer.

"What have you been doing?" I finally ask.

"What?"

"Where have you been? What've you been doing?"

"Oh, I don't know. I've been around. Went to that Tom Petty concert at the... Forum. He sang that song, oh, you know, that song we always used to listen to...." Julian closes his eyes and tries to remember the song. "Oh, shit, you know...." He begins to hum and then sing the words. "Straight into darkness, we went straight into darkness, out over that line, yeah straight into darkness, straight into night...."