Vagablonde

by Anna Dorn

  Beau looks at me blankly.

  Forget it. “I have a girlfriend,” I say.

  He leans over and picks up a glass of dark liquor with a melting ice cube, then scoots over closer to me. “Is your girlfriend as hot as you?” he asks.

  This is the nice thing about having two X chromosomes. The ability to turn men into drooling animals, utterly immobilized and at our mercy.

  I sip my Tecate, then lick my lips a little. “Hotter,” I say.

  Beau quickly ditches me for a girl with come on my face face, as Jake Perez and I call it, and I don’t think it needs much explanation, but Audrina Patridge is a perfect example. I talk to a guy named Tony, who tells me that he has an unusually large penis, to which I respond that I have an abnormally beautiful vagina. Then I notice Jax under a disco ball on the dance floor and I practically run to meet him. Tamia’s “So Into You” is playing, which reminds me of Ellie—we both love ‘90s slow jams. I consider texting her, then decide to do it after I dance a bit.

  Jax grabs my hand and I’m transported to that night at the Mirror Box. “We need to play Kanye,” I whisper in his ear.

  “Duh,” he says. He twirls me in a circle. “Dina?” he whispers in my ear.

  I pause. “Sure,” I say. I’m lit enough to break my own rules.

  He hands me the bag. I dip my hips, then dip my finger in the bag. I rub the residue on my gums and it tastes like gasoline. My mouth feels numb and the lights seem brighter, sharper. The sound, crisper. “So Into You” ends and I recognize a familiar beat. DJ Mustard, for sure. Rihanna’s voice comes in and Jax and I begin to dance in sync.

  “If we record our single tonight,” he says, “I’m going to put it on a zip drive and take it to DJ Mustard’s house. Or Metro Boomin.” His eyes are really big and I feel like mine are too. “Yeah, Metro Boomin. I’ll just go to his house and drop off our track like in the olden days of hip-hop.”

  “How are you going to get his address?” I ask like a fucking idiot.

  Jax ignores me, as he should, and starts belting Rihanna. “Youuu neeeeeeeeeeeded me.”

  By the time we’re recording, the light outside the windows is periwinkle. I’m normally not awake at this time and now I’m mad about that. It’s gorgeous and Zen. I should always create at this hour.

  Jax and I are behind the shoji panels, joints lit, periwinkle everywhere. Tonight’s beat reminds me of Yeezus-era Kanye. I record some bars about my cats.

  Missy, Ennui

  I smoke, you pee

  You paw, my face

  I want, to kill you.

  It doesn’t really rhyme and feels objectively stupid but also right somehow.

  “I like how you resist a traditional rhyme structure,” says a female voice. I thought it was just Jax and me, but Nina is sitting on a pillow on the floor, writing in her Moleskine. How long has she been sitting there?

  I take a sip of my Tecate. “Thank you.”

  I peek around the shoji panels to see if anyone else is still here. The disco ball is spinning and Pilar is dancing with a woman who is nearly as glamorous and beautiful as she is.

  “I love your dress,” the beautiful girl says to Pilar, who is wearing a blue sequined cocktail dress that makes her look like a mermaid. “Shiny af.”

  I start laughing and so does Jax.

  “You heard that?” he asks.

  “Shiny af,” I say.

  Nina lets out a tiny laugh and then puts her hand over her mouth, like she’s embarrassed, which is adorable.

  “I think that’s what we should call ourselves,” Jax says.

  “Perfect,” I say. The first hint of pink appears in the sky. “Shiny AF.”

  I wake up in Jax’s bed, basically falling off the side. As I get up, I realize there are three people in this bed with me, none of whom is Jax. I scan the room for my belongings. I spot my purse and grab it, slide my feet into my Sambas. One of the figures in the bed rolls over and sighs. I spot Nina’s bridge of freckles, then Pilar’s blue sequins peek out from the white comforter. The light outside the window is yellow and harsh. I’m guessing it’s about 8:30 A.M. In the main room, Jax is still behind the shoji panels. The bass shakes the tin ceilings. I guess he never went to bed.

  “Heading out, Vaga?” he calls.

  “Yeah,” I say softly. I’m shy in the harsh brights of the morning. “Still working?” I ask as I peek awkwardly around the shoji panel. There is a violent-looking video game on his largest monitor. I remember he produces for Grand Theft Auto.

  “Yup,” he says. “Gotta pay the bills.” He spreads out his arms to signify his sprawling apartment. He’s wearing a floral silk kimono and, it seems, nothing underneath. Curly black chest hair pours out of the collar.

  “Ah,” I say. “Cool.”

  “Not really.” He laughs. “But it’s fine for now.” That’s exactly how I feel about my legal career.

  “Well, good luck with it,” I say as I back out toward the door.

  “Hey,” he says, rising from his leather chair. He reaches out his arms and pulls me into a warm embrace. Again, I’m less uncomfortable than I would expect given my immense fear of physical contact. “You spit fire last night.”

  “Did I?” I can’t help but crack a smile. “My memory is pretty fuzzy, to be honest.”

  “Well, let’s keep it fuzzy then,” he says. An ambient scream from the street floats in the open window. We both ignore it. “Because you were golden.”

  In my Lyft on the way home, my phone lights up. It’s my dad. He calls me, like, once a month to “check in.” Our conversations are very forced. We don’t really “connect.” I mostly feel like I’m talking to a distant uncle rather than the man who provided half my genetic code and, according to him, “raised me.” Let’s be honest, I raised myself.

  “Hello?” I say. I don’t know why I still answer my phone like it’s the landline era, when people truly didn’t know who was calling.

  “Prue,” he says in a serious voice. “It’s your father.” My dad always greets me as though he’s about to deliver terrible news.

  “Hi,” I say, and wait for him to tell me someone has died.

  “Your mother and I are in Los Angeles,” he says. My heartbeat quickens. “We had an unexpected layover on our way to Phuket. We’ve booked a room at this funky place called the Chateau Marmont that I think you might enjoy.”

  “Oh yeah,” I say. “The Chateau. I’m familiar.” I swallow. “Very funky.”

  “Wonderful,” he says. “I know it’s short notice, but I was hoping you could meet your mother and me for lunch.”

  I check the clock in the front of the Lyft. It’s 9:01. I can shower and get presentable in time.

  “Of course!” I say. I don’t think my parents have ever come to LA before. They certainly haven’t seen my apartment, and I’m happy they don’t seem to want to.

  Before lunch I go to Ellie’s. I completely forgot to tell her where I went last night so she’s mad at me, all sulky and cute. She’s puttering around her apartment in a floral silk robe, totally sheer, rearranging candles and crystals. She refuses to talk to me for the first fifteen minutes, so I pick up a book and pretend to read it. After flipping through a few pages, she snatches it from my hands.

  “I leave in two days, you know,” Ellie says. The light from the window hits her curls and creates a halo effect.

  “Are you going to leave me for a man?” I try hard to make my face all pouty, then put my hair up in a bun slowly and artfully. I know she loves to watch my hairography. Everyone does. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from Wyatt Walcott, it’s the power of hairography.

  But this time it fails, because she just frowns at me.

  “Or a butch woman?” I ask. “Like that girl from Nora’s. The one that made you get all weird.”

  “I wasn’t weird,” she says. Her cheeks redden a little, just like they did that night.

  I look out at the Citibank building sparkling gold outside her window.

 
“It’s not important!” Ellie pulls on one of her curls—my favorite of her mannerisms. There’s a lot of great hairography in this relationship.

  Maybe I don’t want to know about this mysterious butch.

  “I’m sorry. I’m a piece of shit.” I walk over and kiss her, grab the small of her back. She’s stiff, so I back off. I’d rather die than have to convince someone to hook up with me. I turn around and walk back over to the bed.

  As soon as I lie down, she pounces on top of me.

  I spot my parents at a table under a leafy fern as soon as I enter the courtyard. I weave through tables of men with slicked-back hair and expensive-looking watches. I’ve never been to the Chateau during the day. It seems less chic, somehow, but it might just be the presence of my parents.

  I feel very aware of my bones as I walk toward the table. I’m wearing my most parent-friendly outfit, a black DVF shift dress I found at a vintage store and camel-colored quilted flats.

  “Prue,” my father says when he spots me, rising. My mom remains seated. My dad gives me a stiff hug.

  “Prue,” my mom says, taking my clammy hand in her icy, bony one as though we’re just meeting for the first time. My hands are always sweaty, but they seem worse recently. I wonder if it’s Celexa withdrawal.

  “Hi, Mom,” I say, then sit down.

  “Your dress…” she says, voice trailing off midsentence as it always does. “It looks… old.”

  “It’s vintage,” I say.

  My mom says nothing, just purses her lips together. She’s wearing a navy pantsuit and an expensive-looking crystal necklace.

  My mom always dresses like she’s running for office, even though as far as I know she’s never had a job.

  “I’m glad we are getting to see you,” my dad says.

  “How is work going?” my mom asks. My heartbeat quickens. Work is one of many subjects that is tense with my parents. See also: my sexuality, my politics, my opinion on essentially anything. I prefer neutral and unemotional topics, like blockbuster movies or the weather.

  “It’s good!” I overcompensate. Like Jake Perez, my parents don’t understand why I would represent criminals for a living. But more than that, they don’t understand why I make so little money. “How are you all? I didn’t realize you were going to Phuket.”

  “It wasn’t really our choice,” my mom says. She takes a sip of white wine. God bless. We’re drinking.

  “Kip’s daughter is getting married,” my dad says. My dad is from the South, so all his friends have crazy names like Kip and Granger and Buck.

  “Nice,” I say. I have no idea who Kip is.

  “We’re living vicariously through him,” my mom says. The implication is obviously that she wishes I were getting married, as if that would make her happy, as if anything would make her happy. I scan the garden for the waitress. I need an IPA. My hangover is starting to kick in.

  The waitress comes over and my dad orders a Manhattan and my mom orders another glass of sauvignon blanc, yet when I order an IPA they both look at me like I’m a degenerate.

  “What are you all thinking of eating?” I ask.

  “I’m not hungry,” my mom says. She doesn’t eat.

  “How is the law practice, Prue?” my dad asks, ignoring me.

  The waitress brings our drinks, and I take a big gulp of my IPA and my mom looks at me like I just committed a felony.

  “I’ll have the steak-frites,” my dad says. “Hold the frites.” He laughs but the waitress doesn’t. We’re in the land of movie and television writers, and my dad’s stale frat-boy humor just doesn’t cut it.

  “I’ll have the Niçoise salad,” I say.

  The waitress looks at my mom and she just closes her lips. For a second I’m reminded of Pilar. I wonder if my mom ever did cocaine in her thirties, got chatty and effusive. The waitress takes the hint and leaves our table.

  “The law practice is good,” I lie. “Fine” would be more accurate, but I tend to play a character with my parents—with everyone, really, but especially with them. I’m their only child and was once very good at being exactly who they wanted me to be. I got good grades, excelled at sports, had lots of friends. I was thin and blonde and unobtrusive. I went to an elite law school and dated a guy in the top of my class, now a corporate lawyer in New York. But in recent years, I’ve become increasingly disappointing in their eyes. I took a job with the government instead of big law. I moved to LA and started dressing “peculiar” and dabbling in “the arts.” That side of me was always there, but I used to do a better job of hiding it.

  “I have a pretty strong Fourth Amendment argument on my latest case,” I say, and my mom looks up, mildly interested. I can still charm my parents with legalese. My dad sips his Manhattan as I go into the nitty gritty, failing to mention that I plan for it to be my last case, that I’m fully preparing to embark on my “artist life” and the daughter they once loved will be gone.

  “Hey, Prue,” my dad says when I finish my monologue. I hate how he says my name so much. He used to get mad at me for this when I was a kid, for not adequately addressing people by their names. He thinks it is polite; I find it oppressive. “Did you ever call up my friend Dick Caldwell at Latham & Watkins?”

  I take a cool sip of my beer. The fern above my head sways in the wind and a beam of light hits my shoulders. I find strength in the warmth of the Los Angeles sun and think about my other life, the one with Shiny AF, in which I’ll soon be a star. “Not yet,” I say. “I will first thing Monday morning.” My dad is always trying to “connect” me with his friends at big law firms. My dad works at a law firm called Gibson Dunn, which has questionable politics (they notoriously convinced the Supreme Court that corporations are constitutionally entitled to give unlimited contributions to political campaigns). I’m convinced he’s never used his connections to get me a job there because I embarrass him. And I guess he embarrasses me too.

  “How is work for you, Dad?” I ask.

  “Oh, it’s thrilling,” he says. My dad is one of those rare freaks who enjoys being a lawyer. I look up at the sky and think about how my parents are space aliens. I wish they would ask me about Ellie or my music career, but they never would.

  When our food comes, we all eat in silence and look at our phones. I first go to Wyatt Walcott’s Instagram feed, but I’m nervous my mom will see and judge me, so I switch to the New York Times homepage. About halfway through pretending to read an article on North Korea, I get a text from Jake. I’ll read it later.

  “Well, Prue,” my dad says when the check comes. “It’s been great seeing you.” He’s staring at his phone.

  “Yeah,” I say. “Thanks for taking the time to meet me. Enjoy Phuket, I’ve heard it’s beautiful.”

  “Thanks,” my dad says. My mom looks up at me as though she’s eaten something sour.

  We all exchange bony hugs, and in the car on the way back to the East Side I want to cry but nothing happens. Instead I stare out the window and swallow compulsively.

  The first thing I do when I get to Ellie’s is collapse onto her bed. She plants a kiss on my forehead and then returns to answering emails at her desk. SZA’s Ctrl plays from her Bluetooth speaker. Ellie makes her concentrating face while she types. It’s so cute. I can’t believe this perfect creature is leaving me for New York, where she might fall for a woman who wears a sports bra to the club.

  As SZA sings about wanting more attention from her lover, I pull out my cell phone and open the text from Jake.

  Why are u ignoring me cunt?

  Suddenly I miss him.

  Sorry my parents are in town, I say. I feel momentarily grateful for my parents’ visit, simply for the fact that I was able to use it as an excuse for being a bad friend.

  I hope you’re eating enough, he writes.

  Jake has always been very obsessed with my calorie intake and I assume it’s because he’s jealous of my discipline.

  I’m stuffing bread in my face as we speak, I lie, then throw my phon
e to the other side of the bed, but I overshoot and it hits the floor with a thud. Ellie looks over at me with a jokey, wide-eyed expression. Her glasses fall to the end of her nose and I have the sudden urge to kiss her. She must either notice that I want her on top of me or feel the same way, because she struts over and jumps on me. Her lips are soft and full and instantly make me feel safe.

  “Sorry I was in my work hole,” she says.

  “I love it,” I say. “Work, bitch!”

  She smiles and tugs a lock of my hair. “So are you going to tell me why you abused your phone?”

  “I saw it as a friendly toss,” I say, then kiss her.

  When I finally get back to my apartment, the sun is setting over the Chevron and my cats are screaming bloody murder. I lock them in the bathroom while I put some food in their bowls. They’re too annoying otherwise. I open the bathroom door and they charge into me. Once they get past me I go into the bathroom for my Celexa. It’s been a few days since I’ve taken it, I think. It’s hard to remember. Often I think I’ve just taken it and I can’t tell whether it actually happened or it’s déjà vu or some kind of weird memory inserting itself. On those occasions I decide not to take it because I feel like it’s better to take it not at all than take it twice. I open the cap, stare at the salmon-colored pills inside, and then throw away the bottle. I think I feel better without it. Nina gave me a handful of Adderall last night and I take one of those instead. The bright blue pill is sweet on my tongue. I swallow it down with metallic sink water.

  My phone buzzes in the other room. I skip over and pick it up. Jax is calling.

  “VAGA,” Jax basically screams before I say anything.

  “Speaking,” I say.

  “I just listened to what we recorded last night and it’s…” It sounds like his voice is shaking and the pause makes me nervous. “…flames.” He pauses again, and I realize he’s probably smoking a cigarette. I decide to go out on the balcony and light one myself. The cats follow me and I feel bad for shitting on them in my rhymes. They are annoying, though. One of them rubs up against my leg as I light up a Parliament from a pack I keep in a flowerpot.