West of Paradise

by Gwen Davis

  “Who?” Chen asked. Her hairdresser had come to the house, and was washing her hair in the special basin she’d had installed, like the one in beauty parlors.

  “Nobody you know,” he said.

  “Why don’t you just send your limo?”

  “I want to make personally sure she gets on the plane.”

  “She?” Chen said, as her hairdresser shampooed. “Are you seeing another woman?”

  “I’d have to be crazy,” he said, and kissed her lightly, while the hairdresser momentarily suspended his activities.

  * * *

  There was a wheelchair waiting for Lila at curbside, and two special attendants. Victor was having her flown to New York on the company jet.

  “You’re certainly going to a lot of trouble,” Lila said, as the car pulled into the loading zone and he signaled the attendant.

  “It’s the least I can do,” he said. “You’re a most unusual woman.”

  “A lot of wives are unusual. It just takes a smart man to notice. And, of course, he has to see beyond the end of his member.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind,” Victor said.

  * * *

  Well, two million dollars. That should allow for some needle-pointed pillows. Everywhere she’d gone in her life at the height of her success, Sarah had noted the subtle little comforts of the very rich. Fine clocks on mantelpieces, fine wines on tables, Matisse and Renoirs on silk fabric walls. The countless extras you could live without, but why should you have to? The first thing she intended to do the minute she signed the contract and got her first payment was track down her old “secretary.” She wanted to find the thin little guy who’d always done the shit work for her, run errands, rounded up boys from the beach, gotten the coke, kept the bulb bottom clean, and lit it.

  Even as she went to light it now, she was angry at the indignity she was subjected to, forced to do all this by herself, aristocrat that she had become, a regular literary blueblood. After all, she had pulled herself out of this swamp by her own intellectual bootstraps. She’d only hurt people who had hurt her, and that had been almost everybody.

  Two million, plus whatever she’d get from foreign sales. No movie, of course. But there was always merchandising. Maybe she could do a little Paulo/Carina doll, with genitals that tucked in.

  Thinking about all that, she lit the torch and aimed it at the pipe, leaning in eagerly for a pull at the smoke that wasn’t even there yet. Her hand was shaking in her eagerness and impatience. She hadn’t slept all night, and her focus was off. The tip of the flame caught the spike at the front of her Mohawk, and with the aggregation of glue, it ignited. Before she could fully register what was happening, her head was on fire.

  Screaming, she looked for something to put out the blaze. But the pain was so severe she could hardly see. She ran towards the sliding doors to the pool. They were latched. In agony, she crashed through them. As the glass shards pierced arms, legs, face, and throat, she fell, sizzling, into the water. Her blood fanned out dark red on the surface of the pool.

  * * *

  The music for the wedding started long before the first guests arrived. The small combo that played behind the gazebo, though they would switch into classical with flute, viola, violin, and cello for the actual ceremony, were now noodling some light, spontaneous jazz. The musicians had themselves elected to begin early, since chances were there would be moguls from the music business, and it was still the land of You Never Knew.

  For the cocktail hour after the couple was joined, the combo would move underneath the porte cochere by the reception on the lawn, where they would be joined by another member of their group for incidental music. Then, when the party moved inside for the dinner, they’d be joined by four more members, giving it a big band sound. Norman had told them to keep it low volume, since most of the guests liked to talk.

  The threat of rain had definitely passed. The sky was slightly overcast, but the clouds were wispy, the dark ones having moved out to sea.

  “Thank God,” said the caterer, looking up at the sky as she stood by the table at the entrance to the garden, setting out calligraphied name cards.

  “You really think there is one?” asked one of the bartenders, who was also an actor, and had been admonished under no circumstances to give any of those present his card.

  “Well, just look at the sky,” said the caterer. “How can you doubt?”

  * * *

  Victor Lippton, crossing over the covered bridge leading to the entrance, overheard the above exchange. His wife was already inside, having come early to be with the women and get into her gown. And (deep exhale) Lila Darshowitz was in the air.

  So he really did have to go along with the thought that there was a God, after all. He’d never given much credence to religion, although he’d followed its tenets, observed what he had to so as to please his family. But looking down now on the mirrored surface of the pond, seeing how serene it all was, how beautiful the setting, how relieved his heart was now that the little pull was gone from his soul, along with the duplicity, Victor did have to acknowledge that in all probability a Divine Intelligence was at work, no matter how bizarre its messengers. Lila Darshowitz. God worked in mysterious ways.

  * * *

  The O.J. tour bus started just down the street from Mezzaluna, where Nicole had eaten her last meal and Ron had waited his last table. People were still coming, although in reduced droves, many of them wearing the hats and T-shirts they’d bought in Disneyland, their previous stop. Lunch was a separate item from the tour itself, which drove past the now out-of-business restaurant, went down to Bundy and the actual murder scene. The chicken-wire fence that had been put up by police to keep the huge numbers of gawkers in line had been taken down, and those selling strawberries and oranges on neighboring corners had moved their hawking elsewhere with the thinning of the crowds. But there were still enough who came to see and relive or redie that evening to have the company run a profit.

  From Bundy, the bus went to Rockingham to circle O.J.’s mansion, the very house in which the former football player, television pitchman, B-movie actor and one-shot Oxford lecturer had held a fundraiser, attended by two of the jurors who had freed him, including the one who had said that domestic violence had nothing to do with murder. The route the bus took was via Bristol Court, where a woman lived who had known O.J. and once thought him incapable of murder, but changed her mind and joined the group who wanted him out of Brentwood, and was trying to ban the bus in the neighborhood.

  The bus tour had run into a little trouble with the lessening of heat around and interest in the story. Those who went on the tour were no longer content to stand outside Nicole’s condo for considerable periods of time, just taking pictures and exchanging opinions about the logistics of how who got killed, in what order, why there were no screams, what would happen if dogs could talk. Nor did they linger anymore outside Rockingham, hoping for a glimpse of O.J., since everyone in the country, and, indeed, around the world, had had more than enough glimpses of O.J.

  For a while, when the restaurant was still open, the bus owner had considered having the tour include a lunch at Mezzaluna, but the restaurateurs had not been interested in making it an official tourist attraction, nor could the bus company get them to agree to a cheapie meal. As a desperate measure, they had the driver double back to the Ben and Jerry’s where Nicole bought her last ice cream, the one that was found half-melted by police. Nobody could remember the exact flavor she’d had, so they’d let the people on the tour order whichever one they wanted, and included the single scoop cone or cup in the price of the tour.

  Still, the whole excursion lasted less than forty minutes, and even with melting ice cream people were dissatisfied. So the company decided to take the bus on an extended tour to include other famous homes, feeding on the general hunger for inside information about stars, which people imagined they could get from seeing the outside of their houses. Outsight, it might be called, supposedly providing a gli
mpse into what made celebrities tick—or, in O.J.’s case, ticked off.

  Thus it was that the O.J. tour bus, following the route of the Movie Stars Homes’ map, toodled this balmy Saturday on St. Cloud Road in Bel-Air. And thus it was that Arthur Finster, happy as an outcast lark, careering around curves on his way to crash Norman Jessup’s wedding to Carina, instead crashed head-on into the O.J. tour.

  * * *

  Seating was free, there being no bride’s side or groom’s side since Carina had no family, Norman had only his mother, and everyone in attendance was presumed to be a friend and supporter of both. So except for the elder Mrs. Jessup, who was ushered to a seat down front by one of the groom’s men, Bunyan Reis, people could sit where they wanted to, depending on when they arrived.

  Rodney Sameth arrived early, as he was leaving right after the ceremony for the Isle of Wight, and wanted to show respect for the proceedings. He’d had no choice but to agree to attend once his cover had been blown and it was printed that he was in Hollywood. “Rodney!” Perry Zemmis said. “I didn’t know you were still in town.”

  “I’m not,” he said. “I’m gone.”

  “We’re all so excited about your new movie. It’s been too long since we’ve seen a Sameth original. How do you make them so good?”

  “Because I do them with integrity,” Rodney said. “And because I don’t live here.”

  Wendy did not intend to get there the same time as Samantha Chatsworth. But she had lived in this New Age world of California long enough to understand there was “Meant to Be,” or “Beshert,” as Mortimer Schein, on whose arm she was, called it.

  “Such a lovely day,” Wendy greeted Samantha, in her best we-British-don’t-say-what’s-on-our-minds manner. “Such a pretty dress.”

  “It’s Lacroix,” said Samantha. “He’s doing the clothes for the wedding.”

  “Mine is Schein. I believe you know Morty.” They moved down the stairs together. “Oh, but of course. You brought us together.”

  “It was only for the clothes line,” Samantha said, her voice strained.

  “Well, as they say in California, sometimes you think you’re doing something for one reason, and it turns out to be totally for something else. Oh, Morty, look at the gazebo. What beautiful flowers.”

  “Sterling silver roses,” said Mortimer Schein. “My favorite. I’d like to cover you with them.”

  “Well, then you will,” said Wendy.

  “Excuse me,” said Samantha, trying to hurry.

  “Isn’t the gazebo gorgeous,” mused Wendy. “Can you imagine a lovelier setting for a wedding?”

  “No,” said Samantha, caught in a slow-moving, very polite crush down the stairs.

  “What a shame we can’t get married here, isn’t it, Morty?”

  “Not really,” he said. “You’re going to love our temple.”

  “We’re marrying in his family’s temple. That way we can be underneath his mother’s chuppah. They brought it all the way from Poland. They’re Holocaust survivors.”

  “I see,” said Samantha.

  “I certainly hope so,” said Wendy. “Are you alright?”

  “I’m fine,” Samantha said.

  “Morty, do you have a quarter?”

  He reached into the pocket of his pants and handed one to her. “Here,” Wendy said, and gave it to Samantha, smiling sweetly.

  “What’s this for?”

  “You might want to make a call.”

  * * *

  Kate had come with Jake Alonzo. She had finally returned his call, gotten him past his irritation that it had taken her so long, explained that she had been involved with a story. Soothed and more eager than he probably would have been had she responded to his interest sooner, he had invited her to be his date for the wedding.

  “They should have gotten married months ago,” he said, moving her down the aisle. “That way you wouldn’t have taken so long to go out with me.”

  “That isn’t the reason I waited.”

  “No? You weren’t holding out for a big event?”

  “I’m not that kind of girl,” she said, and smiled, and pressed the tip of her right index finger into her cheek, forcing a dimple, so he’d know the words were a jest.

  “What kind of girl are you?”

  “I was working that out. That’s why I waited.”

  “What conclusion did you come to?”

  She looked at him carefully. “I can be had.”

  “What a relief,” he said, and putting his arm around her, pressed her close, moved her face against the hollow of his throat.

  “Hard to believe you came with him when you could have married me,” said Linus Archer, from behind them.

  “I’m not ready for marriage,” said Kate. “I have things to do.”

  “I liked it better when you were all in the kitchen,” Linus said. “Barefoot and pregnant.”

  “How about tied to a tree?” asked Jake.

  “That’s a dirty lie,” said Linus. “We’re going to get that Finster fuck. How come you didn’t come in on the class action suit with us, Jake?”

  “People like Arthur take care of themselves,” Jake said, and taking Kate’s hand, pulled her into one of the rows.

  “What did they say about you in the book?”

  “You’ll find out for yourself.” He took her arm, and they sat. “So what’s with the unpublished manuscript your grandfather left you?”

  “I’ve been trying to work out what to do about that, too.” All around her were notable people, literally aglow in the late afternoon sunlight, the women glittering with beads, well-sewn sequins, and jewels, the men haloed with the subtle radiance of power. Many of them nodded their heads in greeting to her now. Some of them smiled. Wendy leaned in to kiss her. Darcy Linette, whom Kate had never actually met, raised her hand in greeting, and put it to her ear, as though it were a phone, and mouthed “Call me.”

  “What’s to work out,” said Jake. “It’s a lost Fitzgerald. You owe it to the world to make it available.”

  * * *

  Helen Manning was wearing green, a gown made from three sarongs she’d bought on the beach in Bali with golden threads woven subtly through the fabric that matched her hair. Tyler, holding her arm as they made their way down the stairs, held it very protectively, at the same time being careful not to grasp.

  “You’re the most beautiful woman here,” Tyler said, softly, not quite in her ear.

  “I’d rather be in Bali.”

  “Let it go.”

  “It, or you?”

  “Both,” he said. “You promised you wouldn’t do this if I came with you. No whining.”

  “I didn’t mean to whine. But why can’t you be with me?”

  “This path…” He indicated the rose-petal-strewn walkway, but his eyes looked far off, mystically taking in the entire arena that was Hollywood. “If I stay on this path, I’ll never reach my perfect goal.”

  “And that is?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “Maybe you never will,” Helen said. “Maybe it’s only because it’s unattainable that you think it’s perfect.”

  “Could be. But we’re talking about you.”

  “Right,” said Helen, brightening.

  “You’re a great woman. And you’re ready now for the person who really deserves you. The one who’s smart enough, and successful enough, and rich enough, and funny enough, and famous enough, and deep enough.”

  “And where am I supposed to find this paragon?” she asked.

  He looked at her for a moment with everything he felt. “It’s you.”

  * * *

  The musical group behind the gazebo segued into traditional wedding music. The gentle lull of Pachelbel rolled across the lawn and the people sitting there like an affable wave.

  Above the sound, beyond it, Fletcher McCallum thought he could hear the wail of a siren, and tried to close it out. He remembered the moment when he was still in law school and there’d been an accident
ahead of him and how, as he ran to the mangled cars in the road ahead, his first thought had been not “Is anyone dead?” or “Is anyone hurt?” but “Who’s liable?” And he’d understood in that moment that he’d made the transition from human being to lawyer.

  It was a transformation he did not judge in himself, but simply acknowledged as part of his road. For all he tried to pass on to his sons of integrity and caring and compassion, he understood he was not there for justice or right, but for his clients. It helped, of course, when their cause was just, because for all his composure, he was a passionate man when it came to an issue. And it was really much more civilized to string a man up by his thumbs in a court of law than to kill him.

  Still, it was a flaw in him, he considered, that even at a moment like this, with the glory of the greenery, the beauty of the crowd, the flowered crown on the white gazebo, the serenity of the setting, the peaceful glide of the swans, the grandeur of the music, his attention should be caught by a siren. He wondered whether it was fire, emergency illness, or accident. But then the groom’s men began to assemble in front of the gazebo, and he brought his attention back to the proceedings.

  * * *

  “So what’s the story?” Jake asked Kate.

  “The story?”

  “Your grandfather’s story.”

  “Well,” she began. “It’s about this Hollywood producer. And he cheats, and lies, and even steals, but all through his life, there’s this one faithful woman who loves him and never forgets him. She’s there for him. And he always comes back to her.”

  “I love it,” said Jake. “I absolutely love it. What’s it called?”

  “West of Paradise,” Kate said, capitalizing it with her breath.

  “A real Fitzgerald title,” he said.

  “I thought so, too,” said Kate.

  “So what happens?”

  “Well … he does everything imaginable that’s amoral and terrible, but he always survives. And then he does a kindness for a friend, and that’s the thing that finally destroys him.”

  “That’s pretty cynical,” Jake said. “Fitzgerald was a romantic.”