by Ken O'Steen
I was napping, stretched on a bench beneath a palm tree on the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, protected from the elements, and from the aimless voyeurism and petty hectoring of visiting and indigenous mall walkers of Greater Los Angeles by the armor of the LA Times spread across my face. Rain, as any outdoors enthusiast knows, beats paper. After the first few drops punched me in the face I rose up like the gargoyle of egregious underachievement I was and scampered past Banana Republic and Tower Records searching for shelter. As the bottom fell out of an overripe California sky, I clung to the window of the Midnight Special Bookstore, gazing upon a promised land of time suitably passed in dryness. A placard propped up on an easel just inside the door announced: A Reading by Francine Erricson, from her memoir, “Daddy’s Kiss.”
I breached the castle doors, finding myself smothered by people browsing, as well as elevated conversation from the superbly read, milling about. But near the back there was an opening among the shelves, in which chairs, some of them already filled, and a podium had been situated for something obviously auspicious. I wanted to be a part of it, though for non-literary reasons all my own, and only from the last row. A man in wire-rimmed glasses was standing at the end of the row, in such a way that passage into the row, and to a seat was blocked.
“What’s the password?” I asked.
“Excuse me?”
“What’s the password?” I repeated.
He chuckled nervously. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“What’s…the…password?”
“The password?” he spat out querulously.
“Yeah, the password.”
“I don’t know what kind of password you’re talking about.”
“Oh. Is there one?”
“One…password? A password?”
“Yes, I believe that’s what I’ve been asking, repeatedly.”
“A password for what?”
“Do I need a password to get into this?”
The man trod agitatedly away, opening a passage for me to enter as yet unknown realms of literate pleasure. I was in a kind of stupor that had the restful bodily effect of dozing, when Francine Ericcson finally was introduced. A poster from the cover of “Daddy’s Kiss” was plastered to the front of the podium. When the author began to read I felt receptive, as well as warm and dry. What I heard was this:
"I looked up. The sun had suddenly disappeared, the dazzling sunshine replaced by a gauzy grayish, light, so little different from the day we went outside to see the solar eclipse, after finishing an early lunch...olive and cream cheese sandwiches, as I remembered it, maybe just because I was hungry. I looked up, and his face was inches away from me, kneeling down, putting one hand on the handlebar of my bicycle and tugging at my hair with the other. 'Time for dinner, darling.' Oh, I squiggled back and forth on the bicycle seat, responding to…did I know at all what I was doing?...intensifying that peculiar, inexplicable rush of blood causing me to tingle in such an obviously, obliviously pleasurable way, which even then I sensed, wasn't entirely innocent."
If observers had offered me descriptions of my facial expression, “blank stare,” I imagine would have been the one most accurate. But I wasn’t a quitter when it came to hanging onto sheltered resting places. Francine was reading:
"You may not believe me. I don't know why it happened...there was nothing precocious about it, but the phrase...meaningless, absolutely without connotation of any kind to me then...'bad girl' ...floated, as though it were weightlessly adrift, exactly like some object outside one of those shuttles made for space you see on television from time to time, into that girlish filigree of my forming consciousness."
I was aware of being slumped down in my chair, but of course unaware whether I was snoring or not. But what I witnessed was exceptionally vivid: a television screen. On it, men in suits were sitting in chairs around the set of a television news show. "It isn’t about sex,” Christopher Hitchens was insisting, “It's about lying. It's about perjury. I don't need to tell you that."
Beside him, was the goat-faced Mephistopheles Patrick Caddell, asking, "What is it, in all due respect, that gives you people the chutzpah to come over here from the White House with these preposterous rationalizations of sleazy, abominable behavior, which, when made public, would cause any other politician to act out of principle and a sense of decency, any politician other than Bill Clinton apparently, to resign, even if the behavior didn't technically rise to the level of an impeachable offense?"
A seat down the dais was Rahm Emmanuel, answering, “The truth gives me the chutzpah, Mr Caddell. The desire to defend a president who has done an excellent job for citizens of this county, which is what is most important to him, and to the majority of the American people I might add, if every single poll I've seen since this story has been the media's focus is accurate. Perhaps you should explain to me why it is necessary, with all the challenges we as a nation face as we approach the turn of the century, for people like myself to have to spend so much of our time defending our president from a partisan inquisition, so obviously contrived by the president's political enemies…it's amazing how these folks in the media can peddle the story so aggressively as a serious story with a straight face. Honestly, in some cases it’s astonishing how much what appears to be petty feelings toward the president are allowed to cloud objectivity, and affect news judgment."
"Oh please, Rahm,” interrupted Hitchens. “Bill Clinton, and nobody but Bill Clinton is responsible for the mess he finds himself in. This virtuoso of prevarication has skated unharmed away from culpability in one scandal after another during the course of his administration, and persons such as yourself, his enablers if you will, give us these same old vast right-wing conspiracy excuses. What is it about this man's character, what is it about Mr. Clinton's integrity, or lack of it I should say, that makes it impossible for him to come out and look us in the eye and admit to us he lied directly to our faces; and admit he lied under oath during a deposition after swearing on the bible to tell the truth? What is it about Bill Clinton...Bill Clinton...B-Bill…Clin-ton-ton." The words had begun to reverberate, the reverberations gradually slowing and deepening. “Bill Clin-in-in-ton… B-b-ill Cli-Cli-Clinton…ton-ton.” Traces of smoke could be seen seeping up from under the seats, repetition of the name Bill Clinton continuing to slowly reverberate until the dais perceptibly began to shake. Flames rose from behind the seats, and slowly enveloped the three in reddish orange. The set began to crease and crinkle, and the television picture started to curl up like a burning photograph. The flesh melted, until nothing was left but charred skulls, eye sockets glowing with embers.
It must have been me yelling out loud, or perhaps making some yelp of amusement that woke me up. I stood, still hyperventilating, and jostled my way to the end of the row, crossed the store and made a run for freedom in the plaza. Rain was still falling, if only lightly, yet enough to require evasive action on my part to avoid puncture wounds by recklessly wielded umbrellas as I stamped through the promenade. All of the sudden I felt it would be nice to talk with Lila. Before calling her, I took refuge on a bench next to an ashtray under a restaurant awning. None of the diners were taking smoke breaks at that very moment, so I took a few slugs of the cut-rate vodka I was hauling in my pack. The vodka warmed and soothed me. Upon recollection, the dream, if not the experience of having it, or where I’d had it, brought a soothing sensation and a feeling of relief; then after I sat longer even a feeling of well being. I left the bench and rambled through the promenade in search of a phone. Lila’s host picked up on the other end.
“Yeah?”
“Could I speak with Lila?”
“Who’s calling please?”
“Her significant lover.”
“Ha. So where are you at the moment, Donovan?”
“Doing a little shopping at the mall.”
“Oh really. I thou
ght money was kind of tight for the time being.”
“I turned a few tricks.”
“Oh, well I’m glad to hear things are back to normal.”
“Good one Cynthia.”
“Alright, I’ll get her.” The phone was silent for nearly three minutes.
“Hi you.”
“Hey baby.”
“You calling from the hotel or from somewhere else?”
“A payphone. Decided to get out for a while.”
“I don’t blame you. It’s kind of cramped in that one room I bet.”
“A little. I’m stretching my legs…taking…a long, real long walk.”
“Good.”
“How are things there?”
“Pretty good. Fucking Burbank cops gave me a jaywalking ticket yesterday.”
“Burbank? Cynthia’s in North Hollywood.”
“I was at the hardware store on Olive, crossing the street going back to the car. I had to get some things…I’ve got my jars and watercolors and stuff all over the room. I needed to get supplies so I could do some organization. This bastard Burbank cop…they’re the worst, fucking Nazi Barney Fifes…shakes me down. Jaywalking. Jesus H. I told him my parents gave me permission to cross the street all by my lonesome.”
“That’s my girl.”
“Didn’t do any good. The cocksucker shook me down anyway. I swear, it’s like there’s a giant vacuum machine in the sky that pulls the bills out of your wallet a second after they get there. Course, there’s so goddamned much money around it’s hard to believe. Every nimrod…I don’t know where all of ‘em get it. Seems like everybody else is just suffocating in the stuff. Anyhow, I got the room fixed up nice.
“Settling in, huh?”
“Well…only for the time being. You know that.”
“Oh, I know.”
“I’m grateful to have a reasonably quiet place to work when I get home, and a room to myself to sleep in. “
After we finished talking, I walked slowly away. Standing in the open so long had dampened and chilled me. The more I walked, the more I didn’t feel so well. The rain was reduced to a mist by now. A girl around twenty, with long, blonde hair stuck a piece of paper in my hand as I walked past. It was a pass to join one of the studio’s movie preview audiences at the Laemmle’s nearby. Normally I refused them, or threw them in the trash. Now, using one of them seemed like a grand idea.
While the lights were still up I filled in some of the information, not necessarily accurately, but filled it in nevertheless on the sheet they give you; then feeling too weak to do more rested the clipboard on my lap. The theater darkened, and the screen quickly brightened with a montage of Mercedes Benzes roaring in Dolby sound through what appeared to be Malibu Canyon. After Mercedes, Dell Computers advanced its cause with a commercial in the form of a mini-sitcom that either instigated laughter from a member of the audience or coincided with his hacking cough. During the ad for Coca-Cola which followed, my mind wandered back to the halcyon minutes of reading the promotional material regarding the film, remembering, or imagining that its plot involved Nazis, hockey players, and cops; or perhaps, revolved around a central character who was a hockey playing Nazi policeman. Bruce Willis might have been included in the cast. As the fifth or sixth advertisement invaded the premises, I took stock of my comparative good fortune, consoling myself with the comforting thought that paying customers regularly paid for the privilege of the same ads. None too fit when I entered the theater, by the seventh or eighth pitch from the screen I was genuinely ill. I checked my previewer’s paraphernalia back in with the proper personnel in the lobby, and left.
Reeling out of the promenade, off into the dark, I immediately began the hunt for as undiscoverable a hideaway as I could find, possessing two amenities at least: dryness and warmth. Seeming to grow more unwell with every block I walked, I conceded the priority of concealment and settled for an unlocked postal branch, where at least I would be cozy for a while. Bunching my jacket into a makeshift futon, I claimed the warmest space of floor, the plot right in front of the stamp machines, which hummed, and were a little toasty near the bottom. At first, shivering and sweating, I flipped back and forth with a touch of fever. Pretty soon, my head heavy as a sock filled with ball bearings and my body covered in aches, I slipped down into the deep, deep end of sleep.
What only could have been a spray of gunfire shattered the glass in the post office window sending a massive chunk of it sailing into the meat just below my shoulder blade. I squinted to see the sidewalk better, my first glance revealing what may have been a wounded person lying there in a heap. The hand reflexively pressing against my wound was dripping blood. Acutely aware that strength was seeping out of me I used every bit at my disposal to rise from the wounded crouch against the wall and gradually to slide my way to the phone on the wall. Pulling the hand out of my pocket with a scoop of change, I dropped everything but the quarters I would need to make the call. When I’d finally managed to dial the digits: 9-1-1, I was surprised to hear a recorded voice on the other end:
This emergency service is provided by AOL/TIME WARNER. If you’re bleeding, press 1; if metastasizing cells have resulted in dysfunction of a vital organ, press 2; if you’ve had a stroke or heart attack, press 3; if you don’t expect to live until help arrives, press 4.
Quite uncertain of the amount of time left to me, I pressed 4.
If you would like to hear music while you expire, press 1.
Without waiting to hear any other options I pressed 1.
If you would like to expire to classical music, press 1; if you would like to expire to punk, press 2; if you would like to expire to hip hop, press 3; if you would like to expire to rap-metal, press 4; if you would like to expire to indie rock, alternative or jazz, press 5; if you wish to expire to country and western music or to classic rock you have previously expired, and are requested to press six, in order to make arrangements with the funeral home or mortuary of your choice.
Before I could press a number, an EMR unit arrived in front. The driver came inside and introduced himself as a representative of the publishing company, Conde Nast. He told me that in order to be driven to a hospital I would be required to purchase a subscription to Vanity Fair. He added that it would be necessary for me to pay with a credit card. Informed that I had no valid credit card, he accompanied me to the street, and loaded me into the rear of the unit. As the ambulance passed through the empty streets, I lay in back, while the men up front remained attentive to the radio. The audience was being persuaded to the position of the speaker, on a subject I had arrived too tardily to the oratory to be aware of. In service of persuading to his point of view, Mr. Limbaugh was advising his listeners: “Fact number one: Jupiter is the planet closest to Earth. Fact number two: An isosceles triangle is a triangle with all three sides of equal length. Fact number three: Abraham Lincoln, 27th president of the United States, was by far, without question, the handsomest figure in Greek Mythology.” After a pause he added, “Case closed.” The two men in the front of the ambulance nodded their heads emphatically up and down. The driver twisted his neck around and said to me, “For your information, the alchemists at the American Enterprise Institute have created gold, utilizing a process which mixes the DNA of President William Jefferson Clinton with the DNA of an audience member of Premiere Radio Networks selected at random.” I grimaced, from the pain caused by the enormous shard of glass in my back.
It was right after this that the ambulance pulled into the entrance to the parking structure beneath an extraordinary complex of buildings. The sign up above, which continued across the fronts of many buildings, the complex itself going on for as many city blocks as I could see, read: Jerry Bruckheimer and Cardinal Mahoney Presents: Fox-Fargo Accidental Petroleum and Telecommunications Solutions. Riding up in the elevator, blood dripped from my wound down to the floor, my shirt already completely soaked. The EMR driver took me into a tiny waiting room and lef
t me there. When the woman behind the glass, a female police officer from the Los Angeles Police Department turned around, she explained to me that due to the bankruptcy of all of the major insurance companies, “as the result of insufficient profits,” my health insurance was now invalid. I told her I had no health insurance. She answered, “Never mind,” and asked me to take a seat.
A man I had barely noticed when I came into the waiting room, stuck out his hand to me once I had sat down. He introduced himself as Ralph Nader, and told me, “The revolution is near at hand.”
“You don’t say, “ I answered.
“Yes. I do.” Then he asked, “Are you hungry by any chance?”
“I could eat,” I told him.
He took something out of a brown paper bag and handed it to me. “Try this,” he said. “It’s a non-genetically engineered corn-on-the cob.”
I accepted it. It was the size of a pinky finger, and tasted like turnips, but I swallowed it nevertheless.
“Do you feel better?” he asked.
“What I really want is to get out of here.” He reached into a briefcase, first pulling out and handing me, “a slug for the Blue Line,” then reached back in, and retrieved what he told me was a lifetime supply of Advil “for the troubles ahead.”
At this point, the woman behind the glass called out to me, “The doctor will be with you in just a moment.”
When the six hours had passed I was led into an elaborate and expensively appointed office. A man rose from behind the desk in order to greet me. Stepping around it, he came and shook my hand.
“I’m the manager,” he told me. “I’m the highest authority here. I wish to express my deepest sympathy, bordering on suicidal depression for the extent of your injury.”
“I believe you,” I said.
He gestured toward the expansive window behind us, and I followed him as he walked toward it. There was a magnificent view of city and sky. I noticed the cloud cover had sunk quite low, and a strong wind was swirling the darkest clouds. The Manager informed me I had been “invited in” in order to undergo “the routine physical examination required for verification that you remain attractive enough to qualify for registration renewal of City of Los Angeles citizenship.”
“Oh. I understand.” Still, I beseeched him to hear me out, telling him it would take only a few minutes of his time. He acceded. So I proceeded to explain, that though I felt quite confident of the caliber of my attractiveness, nevertheless, I believed strongly that he should take into consideration my salutary habits, and reliably consistent practices, which included my thoughtful, even informative contributions to conversation in social settings; my thorough reading of a number of daily newspapers from across the land; my love for and devotion to books, particularly a superior kind of literary writing, with the attendant hours of time spent reading each and every day; the degree to which I treasured silence, and my customary adherence to it for a portion of the day; yielding the time and lack of distraction necessary for engaging in significant periods of undisturbed thought; thus, making me an asset to my fellow Angelinos since it guaranteed I would seldom be intrusive or cause disturbance; and that for the sum of this evidence of my contribution to a higher quality of living in our beloved Los Angeles, I should be spared the requirement of taking the test, and of meeting current minimum standards for attractive appearance.
The Manager gave me no answer immediately. He gazed for some time out of the window, looked down at the floor, as though exhaustively engaged in a process of deliberation. In the silence, thunder could be heard rumbling across the city, while flashes of light suffused the clouds in the western sky. When he finally spoke, he launched into a profuse, and effusive monologue of praise for me and for my “laudatory habits,” applauding my “taste in literature,” my “diligent attention to current events and public affairs,” the “civilizing nature” of my “interactions,” as well as the “neighborly deportment” of my “daily life,” finally agreeing that, “you should retain your citizenship based on these qualities and these qualities alone, those of physical attractiveness being of secondary importance by far.” As soon as he’d said it there was a searing flash of light, then almost instantaneously a shuddering clap of thunder. At the same time we realized the place we were in had been struck with a bolt of lightning, things inside began to fall, until, in a burst of noise and chaos the building imploded. The blast sent me cascading through the air. For one split second, from an all-encompassing vantage point, I witnessed the entire complex crashing down and the city itself, quaking. Then I landed.
I woke up hollering at the top of my lungs. Quickly, I sat up shivering from fever, or from the chill in my blood put there by the dream. I sat paralyzed against the wall of the post office until I heard a truck pull up outside, and soon after, men’s voices. I was standing by the time the two men came inside. As one of them unlocked a door into the working area in back, the other said to me that unless I had a letter to mail, or stamps to buy, I should be on my way. I complied, lugging my benumbed limbs, and dream-shocked mind, out into the faintest imaginable shroud of drizzle.
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