by Trevor Eve
Life, she had determined for herself, had not treated her well.
She was in psychological terms a narcissist. Through and through. Indeed, if a conversation did not interest her, in that it wasn’t about her, she would, without compunction, tell the person to shut up. Pure and simple, and in a way, honestly direct.
Ever had an admiration for her, as you never knew where you were with her, her unpredictability meant that you also did. She was like the sea. Just be careful. Check the weather report. Or better still the shipping forecast.
Ever loved the shipping forecast.
Viking, Tyne, Dogger, Fisher, German Bight.
What were all those places?
But didn’t it sound importantly international?
Chapter Twelve
This was the day for the visit.
Reluctant as he was to make it, to a gallery in the newly developed downtown district where one named Ingmar Lorken had his Frank Gehry-designed art temple.
The man, he knew, would not be there, and if he was, Ever would not have known what to do.
Ever hadn’t seen the man for twelve years, since the time when he was a collector, well, a buyer, of his father’s work. The man who finally would give this wonderful artist the recognition he deserved. Those were his words at the time. Their clichéd cloyingness ran cold in repetition, summoning up the memory of his father’s enthusiasm at receiving a massive cheque for having sold all his work; purchased by Mr Lorken himself. Ever’s father had been given the promise of an exhibition housed in the yet-to-be-completed gallery.
Ingmar Lorkenau, Austrian father, Swedish mother.
Ingmar himself removed the ‘au’ from his name. Easier life, spelling-wise, in the new-found land of America, and the numerological conclusion of the remaining twelve letters added up to three. The trinity in the Torah, body, soul, and spirit. Believe it or not.
Elohim made man composed in his image, and it had worked for Mr Lorken.
He was doing very well indeed.
*
Ever stood outside the metal curved signature of Gehry’s three-dimensional piece.
He was sad at the thought that it never happened for his father. The exhibition did happen, not there, but in an inauspicious place off Venice Boulevard by Ocean Avenue, unpublicised, with the works remaining unsold.
With the advance cheque, he tried to buy all his work back, but Mr Lorken refused, deciding to hedge his bets on the possibility that one day Ever’s father’s work would be of value. But that was the destruct button, and further attempts at creation were met with increasing dissatisfaction of nuclear proportion.
He became destructive towards his work and depression led to breakdown and breakdown to an inability to paint anything at all. The money ran out, the ability to soften Mr Lorken’s resolve went with it, and death was the ultimate release. The fallout cloud had spilt its pollution.
The destruction of his father, albeit not self-inflicted, was as a result of losing ten years of his work to the depths of a warehouse. This was the thing that consumed Ever more than his own life, and he too lost motivation to do anything, and became obsessed with the futility of it all.
The lack of point.
Of purpose.
A nihilism.
*
John Everett Millen was an abstract expressionist in his later years, having started life as a figurative portrait painter, painting to commission with diminishing enthusiasm. His later work, though, had an energy and physicality that poured emotion onto the canvas. It was visceral, massive, a true joy to witness, to watch, for hours, day after day, always seeing the fresh and finding the spirit anew each time. He was a talent, with the value of Roman coinage.
At least that was Ever’s opinion.
And what did Ever know?
*
To purchase the gun.
It was a handgun he wanted; Ever was going to require a California driving licence, which he had always kept up, a copy of his residential lease and, as he was born in the US, he had the passport as well, should it be needed. Although strangely the valid driving licence was the more official requirement. The supposal being that if you were capable of driving a car you would be capable of firing a weapon. Interesting correlation. He could get the FSC, the firearm safety certificate, at the LA Gun Store for twenty-five dollars with a brief written test and practical proof of his ability to use and understand the weapon.
He wanted a SilencerCo Maxim 9, a 9 mm gun with an integral silencer that looked like something out of Blade Runner and used Glock magazines, so ammunition was easy to source, therefore hard to trace to a specific weapon; accurate at short range, and although he didn’t have a plan, he knew he didn’t want to make a noise.
A phone call to the store confirmed they carried that particular weapon. He gave no further information and asked for none, beyond the fact they had four in stock.
The gun would cost him about $1,450, and the store he’d called was in Van Nuys on Cohasset Street, and Kate, his friend on Waze, would be able to take him straight there. Kate was wonderful; he imagined her to be dark-haired and efficiently attractive, a great companion, and many a conversation had been struck up between the two of them, particularly when Ever thought he knew best. He very rarely did, but he liked the challenge.
The day for the purchase was not decided but at least he was fully prepared. The one decision he had made was to make a return visit to see Lomita Nairn.
He would do that before purchasing his firearm. He did not know why that was his choice, but it was.
*
It was five o’clock and he guessed Lomita would have had tea.
Possibly sitting outside under the shade on the terrace, as the late afternoon presented a warmth that had not much decreased since noon.
This time he was driving; his Discovery pulled up outside the house and rested on the brow of the semicircular drive that summited its gentle incline.
He felt a little presumptuous and was not without a coating of sweat under his arms that he felt stick to his shirt, grateful it was navy blue.
The car was doing its ticking, creaking, cool down. He walked up the three shallow steps, formed by red brick in herringbone pattern, and stood in front of the large brown door.
He turned around, watched a hummingbird with wings a blur fly off the bougainvillea on his step-noise arrival and his casting shadow.
There was a dulled brass button that was, he hoped, a working bell and without allowing nerves to alter his intention, he offered the middle finger of his right hand to the rounded and smoothed surface. He pressed and heard nothing, so pressed again, the same absence of noise, so thought he should wait.
And wait he did.
He assumed that the bell didn’t work. He was preparing to knock or leave, he wasn’t quite sure which action to take, but in that moment of pondering, the door opened and Manita stood with an unsurprising absence of expression but with a greeting of,
‘Hello’ –
that carried a degree of pleasantry.
‘Is Miss Nairn in? I mean available to see me. That is if she wants to see…’
Before he could finish his meandering explanation, which by the fact he was standing at the door, made his intention obvious, Manita disappeared and in the action of turning around, closed the door. Safety of course, he thought, she wouldn’t leave it open while checking.
Don’t lose confidence. Of course, totally understandable, and before his jumbling thoughts were allowed completion, Lomita Nairn opened the door and was standing before him.
Backlit from the low lantern sun that hung at the back of her garden and invaded through the large window.
She looked like an exercise in perspective.
And dramatic.
They both smiled.
His followed hers, which had been there as she was opening the door. But she was first. He consoled himself, she must have been the first to smile.
‘Hello. I sincerely hope you don’t mind me cal
ling around unannounced, it’s just I had no way of announcing. I mean—’
‘Not at all. Please come in. It is truly lovely to see you. And thank God tea is over and it’s time for a drink. Give me ten minutes, I will change and you can do something for me…’
A pause.
‘…that I would dearly love.’
‘Of course, I would be delighted.’
There was no pause before his reply.
‘Take me out for a goddam cocktail. Somewhere glamorous and it’s on me. I’ll be back.’
Not what he expected, but his mind was already doing a tour of potential sophisticated cocktail establishments. He didn’t want to let her down on choices, he wanted to be the initiator, the all-knowing male. He wanted to be in command of the situation. He wanted to be in control of this element, at least, of his life.
He presumed he could sit down in the big brown room but didn’t: the cushions were immaculate and perfectly plumped, having received attention, he guessed, from Manita. His nervous observations, this time, which he just did to occupy his thoughts, revealed there were no books in the room. No television and nothing as far as he could see that supplied music, except the piano. He had got that far in his assessment when the door to the left of the room opened and there stood Lomita.
She was wearing a black trouser suit with the material on the legs flowing softly; they were wide, like a forties shape, the jacket nipped to the waist, her hair up, and with the turn of her head he could see it was in a French pleat, beloved of his mother.
She wore only, as far as he could tell, the red lipstick, although the shade was gentler in tone, and didn’t form such a contrast to the delicacy of her face. She did, he thought, look so elegant, and light, and floating as she walked tentatively towards him, on shoes with only the slightest of a heel.
‘The Polo Lounge, haven’t been there in twenty years.’
The decision was taken from him already, with the realisation: I am not in control. I am out of control. He now was aware, as he opened the car door for her, momentarily releasing her arm from his, that a cream blouse nestled around her neck underneath the tightness of her jacket. And indeed, she did have the gentlest suggestion of blue eye shadow on her upper lid, bringing out the fierce blue of her eyes. The dropping sun hit them and made her tense the muscles around them, ever so slightly, in defence.
He drove.
She spoke.
‘I can only walk short distances without a wheelchair, it’s nothing serious, just my hip. But with a man I can hold his arm, it’s just that with Manita I feel wrong, clutching on to her. But with you, I don’t mind, if you don’t mind me clutching, and if we walk slowly I’m fine. I should have the surgery, but the doctor is worried my heart wouldn’t take it. Why my heart shouldn’t take it I don’t know, I feel strong, but I have a murmur or something. Oh God, too boring, I refuse to talk about my health. It is so not the thing to do, to talk about one’s health, everyone has a something-or-other and to be quite honest who wants to hear it? Just get on with it all. Don’t you think? And my past, I don’t want to talk about that either, just want to go on, keep going on, although I will tell you my husband died thirty years ago and I used to come here, you know, to the Polo Lounge, with him. I went a bit after he died, with my bridge friends, for a while, but then I stopped playing, so I guess it must be about twenty years or so since I’ve been here. That house on the right, that is now a monstrosity, that used to be owned by some man from the Middle East, years ago that is, and when they wouldn’t give him the planning permission he wanted, he didn’t build a thing, just put statues of naked women all along the front and painted them with pubic hair. Hilarious don’t you think? I never knew him but kind of liked him for that, made me laugh every time I passed, all gone now. He sold it. But hey. You just seem like the right one to take me. I hope you don’t mind cos I didn’t really give you a choice but actually if you do mind I don’t really want to hear it. So please don’t mind, I have to tell you I’m excited and thrilled that you came round, I was hoping you would. I don’t see that many people now, really, I don’t know why. That is all right, it is really all right with me, I don’t know why, just, I suppose, I don’t know, I get into my own head and somehow… you know. Oh well, tonight is just the perfect evening and it has been quite a boring day so… My goodness, here we are already. Don’t forget to give me your arm wherever we go, look on me as something that will fall over if you don’t hold it upright.’
With that the valet opened her door, there they were on their own red carpet walking up the entrance, the green and white striped awning running above them, into the Beverly Hills Hotel, past reception; granted a courteous nod from all three men behind the desk, but not the woman, who was buried in her computer, approaching the hostess on the right at her little, but all-important desk, to the entrance of the Polo Lounge.
Ever felt a sense of guilt going into this establishment, owned by the Sultan of Brunei, who, in his small, oil-rich kingdom, had imposed strict Sharia law, calling for the stoning of gays and lesbians, and understandably had received a boycott from the liberal Hollywood community.
Not that Ever was a member of the liberal Hollywood community, but he believed that anyone should be entitled to live how they want, hell, isn’t life hard enough?
Presumably the Sultan had deep enough pockets to withstand the boycott and probably couldn’t care less.
He hadn’t changed his laws anyway, in the end, but Ever’s concern at that moment was not for the Sultan, but Lomita, who he assumed was unaware of the situation.
There certainly was no need to have made a reservation and the first thing Lomita said was,
‘Why is it so empty?’
It seemed the explanation was going to be unavoidably forthcoming. The discussion of sexual behaviour seemed to close down her interest, her eyes no longer focused on his, and although he sensed a disapproval of the persecution of people with alternative sexual orientation, her concern wandered and she studied, with an over-forced intent, the cocktail menu. Something that a person familiar with the process of cocktail hour would not need to do.
It puzzled him, and he stored it, in some part of his brain, as to why this sophisticate would not wish to engage in one of the topics of the time. In response to his monologue she just said,
‘Let’s drink.’
The waiter arrived at the booth they had been escorted to, greeting them with the customary,
‘Welcome to the Beverly Hills Hotel.’
Although at that moment Ever questioned whether he wanted to be welcomed, felt that he was being congratulated on joining a union of fascists.
They both sat on the inside-iest bit of the booth, close to each other. Close so that he noticed the closeness. Lomita ordered first, with the command of a seasoned drinker.
‘Grey Goose martini, up with a twist. Dry.’
He ordered the same.
Her choice of a French vodka, with a comparatively recent commercial explosion onto the market, was the second noticeable and memory-banking thought for the evening. He would have expected the eighties favourite, Stoli.
But she was right there with the times. Right there in so many ways, smelling as she had, on both occasions, when proximity allowed, as this did, of Chanel and order; she exuded a sense of perfection, right down to her appreciation of the little details of the things of life. Something he so admired, and was determined to force into his life.
An adoption of a style.
Ever’s monologue about the Sultan had brought a silence to the proceedings which he regretted. The martinis arrived, the waiter with a real expertise had waited for this pause in the conversation to bring their drinks, and they requested a little more time to decide on the food. Ever’s need to impart his knowledge, to give himself a confidence by informing people of things they didn’t seem to know, was, he had always felt, a compulsive weakness.
Don’t give it all away, just let it dribble out.
In impressive
and unexpected moments of wow.
And then you can
wow.
Then it works.
‘It’s not that in any way I support anybody or any regime as horrible as this one that you are talking about, it’s just I find that if you cut those kind of people out of life, I mean certainly in my life, then really very little ever happens. Do you think all those Russians who own your football clubs, or soccer, or whatever you call it. Do you think their money is in any way honest, do you not think they’ve inflicted atrocities on human beings to get where they are?’
She took a large mouthful of the martini before continuing.
‘Banks, for Christ’s sake, hedge funders betting on the futures markets, crippling economies, shorting on food supplies, copper, gold. I am sorry to be supporting this shithead, but I want to eat. What do you want? I’m having the Caesar salad, what do you want?’
Ever was a little taken back, filled with a surprise at her knowledge, even though it suffered from a few inexactitudes clouded by emotion; he was reluctant to get into the specifics and defence of any of her general argument in detail, but she had more than a goddam point.
He wondered if he had made any mention of his job and found the coincidence of the subject a little disconcerting. He tried to move his thought on, so as not to hold up the evening, but got stuck in this reflection, for a second or two. Money is usually made by people capable of a ruthlessness towards both their own sensibilities and other people’s. They are made of different stuff, able to put themselves through a stress pattern that would finish the sensitive; his work as a lawyer in a hedge fund company, overseeing the legality of acquisition contracts, had indeed revealed many an asset bought and stripped and resold, and people, thousands of people, losing their jobs, all for the benefit of already unbelievably wealthy clients.