by Jarett Kobek
Hard to see what the hell was happening. People doing an awkward dance to the drone. Some people can dance to anything. The song ended. People cheered.
—Wedding song! Wedding song!
—The wedding song? asked the vocalist, speaking with an accent.
—Yes! shouted a guy from the audience.
—The wedding song.
—What’s the wedding song? asked the bassist, also in an accent.
—The generic wedding song. Just any wedding song will do. White wedding, perhaps? Would anyone care for that? Rock and roll.
—Rock and roll wedding, said the bassist.
—Okay, uh, this is uh, said the vocalist.
—Can I have some more bass in my monitor? Please?
—This is our theme tune.
Slow gloomy guitar. Drums wild. Bass. Keyboard hard to hear. More and more people dancing. This sexy guy next to me, dusky, tight white shirt, ripped-up old jeans, longish hair, wool knitted hat on his head. He moved with ease, in his own world. And I flashed on him, quick. Us naked, us fucking, my cock in his hands, his cock in my mouth, both of us coming every which way, the tips of our cocks pressed together, sweat rolling down his chest into my mouth, grunting.
—Okay, uh, said the vocalist, this is “Marry Me.” The wedding song. As it, as it, the generic wedding song. By properly request.
Faster than the last. The sexy guy danced, doing this thing with his arms that should have looked idiotic. But he waved with grace. Perfect.
—“Some Velvet Morning,” said the vocalist.
I moved close. The sexy guy didn’t see me, still dancing, faster during the verses. Slow during the chorus: Learn from us, very much, look at us, but do not touch, Phaedra is my name.
The song ended. I took my chance.
—What’s this band called? I asked.
—These Immortal Souls, he said. That guy used to be in The Birthday Party.
—The Birthday Party? I asked, but another song started and he started dancing.
A natural drift, the crowd pushing us apart. I wandered back into the lobby. Even more people on the steps, ashing their cigarettes into the rug, grinding their heels against the fabric. A goth couple on the bottom steps, making out, wet tongues visible in open mouths, her sucking on his, his licking hers. I watched, rushed with embarrassment, and went in the other direction toward a different kind of music, entering another dark room.
Projections on the walls. Violence, malice, hatred, death. All very cartoony, detached from the actuality of suffering. So many skulls. The DJ was spinning “Just Like Heaven” and the crowd sang along, a great writhing mass. What the hell, why not? I danced into them, sticking out eleven more songs, none that I recognized, one of which had a mad man for a vocalist. How about a nice cold hug before mommy comes home?
I broke from dancing and went to a corner. Hoping to catch my breath. Adeline, standing alone, smoking a clove cigarette.
—Baby, said Adeline.
—I’m exhausted, I said. Where’s Stacie?
—Out on the dance floor.
—What about you?
—O, Baby, she said in the old voice, you’d as soon catch me jumping over the moon with a pack of cats in tow than you would find me dancing to Bauhaus. Not amongst this ragtag pack of hooligans.
—I need to use the bathroom, I said. Should we leave soon?
—Whatever, she said. It doesn’t matter.
Back in the lobby, looking for the bathroom, the goth couple still at it. I stopped again, similar to Variety Photoplays, abstractly fascinated. Human sexuality could manifest so publicly. I couldn’t imagine.
A hand touched my back. I turned, expecting one of the girls, but finding that sexy guy. He looked even better in the light.
—Hey, he said, you fucking split. We were still talking.
—Sorry, I said.
—Why’d you do that?
—I’m not sure, I said.
He smiled at me, big teeth, parted lips.
—My name’s Jaime.
The DJ played “Ballroom Blitz” and the lights came on, revealing the filth accumulated through the night, the debris of deranged rockin’ rollers loitering in a Jazz Age ballroom. Stacie didn’t want to sleep, and I’d promised Jaime a ride, and I hadn’t seen Hollywood. Arguing, drunken, babbling stoned nonsense.
I agreed to drive to Santa Monica, to the beach. We took the 10 the whole way, the freeway empty of traffic. I pushed 100 miles an hour, crazy from Jaime’s scent filling the car, too insane to care about the police or my fucked-up license or my fucked-up brain.
—Do you know this song? asked Jaime, singing the lyrics, rich, clear, beautiful voiced: I would go out tonight, but I haven’t got a stitch to wear.
No one answered. Jaime didn’t notice.
—So, like, said Stacie, the theory of forms is this idea that, like, in the, you know, higher realms, there’s this place called the plane of forms, and, like, everything we see in our mortal world are lesser copies of the idealized forms of things that are, like, on the plane of forms. So if you see, like, a table, it’s, like, you know, a lesser version of the form of the table, which, like, explains why some tables are really nice and others are so shitty. Because some tables are, like, better copies of the form of the table. So that means, I think, that somewhere there’s a Baby or a Jaime or a Stacie, a more perfect version of ourselves that are just there, like, in the world of forms. So you are just a terrible copy, like a counterfeit Gucci bag, of your higher, most perfect self.
Adeline navigated us toward a small park alongside the beach. Jaime ran ahead, running in the sand, taking off his shirt. Too dark to see his body, but I could feel it, pulsing, sending out radio signals to the antenna of my cock.
—Do you think he’s gay? I asked Adeline.
—A little bird once told me that everyone’s bisexual. There’s but one way to find out.
Jaime in the water, pants rolled up, shirtless. The shadow of the pier behind him. I kicked off my shoes and rolled up my own cuffs, the waves lapping against my ankles.
—It’s the first time, I said, that I’ve touched the Pacific Ocean.
—My family took us here all the time, he said. Me and my sister loved that Ferris wheel. I haven’t been here in, like, five years.
What did it matter? What the fuck did anything matter? All of us would die. There’d be no trace of me or Jaime or Adeline or Stacie or anyone we’d known, we’d be nothing but food for worms, piles of ashes. The human race would be gone, lost to the universe, the planet too. What would my shame mean then? What was the point of not doing what you wanted while you wanted?
—Can you see me? I asked.
—Not that good, said Jaime.
—It’s getting lighter, I said. The sun is rising.
I walked closer to him, trying not to shiver.
—What about now? Am I any clearer?
—A little, he said.
—And now?
—Yeah, he said.
I reached out, my rough palm on his cheek, my heavy fingers going below his chin, pulling his head toward mine, leaning into his mouth, our tongues against each other, soft parade of lemon of sapphire of stars of flesh of lust of sweat of honey of some velvet mornings. My hands on his body, his quivering skin, running up and down.
—Do you want to come home with me? I asked, after we pulled apart.
—Where’s home?
—Pasadena, I said.
He nodded. I nodded.
Stacie was on the hood, half asleep. Adeline was leaning against the trunk, smoking clove cigarettes, looking into the buildings on the other side of the street.
—It’s like watching ten televisions at the same time, she said. Really bad television. People are so boring.
—Let’s go, I said.
—Don’t you still want to see Hollywood? she asked. The sign is waiting for you.
—No, I said.
I recognized the way back, getting us from the 10 to the 11
0, which exploded into Pasadena, only needing directions to Adeline’s house. Pulling into the driveway, the world pink with the risen sun. Suzanne wasn’t home.
—You, like, live here? asked Jaime.
—For the time being, said Adeline.
Stacie crashed out on a couch. Jaime and I walked up to my room.
APRIL 1988
Suzanne Demonstrates the Pitfalls of Alcoholism
Adeline’s spring clean was as inevitable as a funeral. Down came the framed photo of Groucho Marx, down came the poster of Marlene Dietrich in Blonde Venus, down went all the books from their shelves. A mini-history of Hollywood boxed up and hidden away.
—I’m tired of it is all, Adeline said. Childish things.
—But there must be something you want to keep? I asked.
—A few books, maybe, but I don’t know, why bother? What’s the point of any of it?
—Tell me one thing, I said. What’s your favorite book?
She sat on the floor, back against her bed, and opened one of the boxes. Here we may consider the circular reality of the bibliophile, because as she dug through her books, I caught sight of a volume that, years later, I would purchase. Masters of Menace, a joint biography of Peter Lorre and Sydney Greenstreet. I still own it. I’ve yet to read it.
Adeline pulled out a garish, oversized paperback. Its purple cover comprised of crudely cut black-and-white publicity stills. In green letters read its title: Classics of the Horror Film. Authored by William K. Everson.
—This one, said Adeline. It meant a lot.
—Can I read it?
—I guess, she said. Do whatever you want. It’s all trash anyway.
In truth, I had no interest. I’d always found Adeline’s interest in the horror film to be the least interesting aspect of her personality. But the time would come when the enormity of what she was doing would overwhelm her, when she’d be struck with an insatiable nostalgia for her old possessions.
I brought the book into my room, thinking about Jaime, wondering if I should call him. We hadn’t seen each other in a few days. All my thoughts were of him, of the sweet way that he smiled, of his mewling as he slept, of his unnatural calm.
No one answered. I still didn’t know where he lived. Somewhere in Hollywood. I guessed that he lived alone. Or maybe had his own phone line.
Smelling him in my bedclothes, I considered beating off, but the night was early. I preferred coming right before sleep, after the buildup of daily hormones. The force of orgasm that much more powerful.
I read Classics of the Horror Film. The early chapters were the best, about silent films and the ’30s. Lugosi in White Zombie, Boris Karloff in Frankenstein, and oh so many photographs of Tod Browning’s 1932 masterpiece, Freaks.
The latter film serves as a vehicle for the prolonged display of actual, identifiable human deformities. Siamese twins, the human torso, midgets. Three deeply distressing pinhead girls, sufferers of microcephaly with tiny little bodies and elongated skulls, hair shaved except for knots at the top of their heads, inversions of a monk’s tonsure.
The rest of the book was a bummer. The Hayes Code had destroyed the horror film. I was looking through the last few pages, reading about The Exorcist, when I heard the front door open.
CRASH!
Running to the hallway, I bumped into Adeline.
—Was it another earthquake? I asked.
A blood cry from downstairs.
—ADDDDDDDDDDDELLLINNNNNNNNEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEE! ADDELIIIIINNNNNEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE EEEEEEEEEE!
—Oh no, said Adeline.
Suzanne was sprawled on the floor, a black party dress hiked up around her waist, one pump on, one pump off. She’d broken a heel. A man in his early 50s stood over her, penny loafers, blue jeans, black sports jacket. His shirt was open at the top, bony breastbone visible, sun damage and freckles.
His teeth, every last one, were perfect. They blazed white.
—Your mom had a little too much to drink, he said.
—Obviously, said Adeline.
—I’m going to help her upstairs, said the man.
—No, said Adeline. You’re not.
—Adeliiiine, groaned Suzanne. Adeliiine.
My parents had problems, but neither were this pathetic, this drunk.
—Time for you to leave, said Adeline. We’ll help my mother.
—Adeliiiine, noooo.
—It doesn’t quite sound as if the lady’d like for me to leave.
—What’s your name? asked Adeline.
—Call me Stu, he said. I’m a friend. I’ll help her upstairs.
—I’m not moving, said Adeline. You aren’t going upstairs.
Stu bent over and tried to lift Suzanne, whispering into her ear, but his efforts came to nothing. He’d pick her up, she’d slip back down, like he’d tried to grasp water with his bare hands.
—You’d better leave, said Adeline.
—I’m not going anywhere.
—Baby, she said.
The toxic reek of alcohol drifted from Suzanne, wafted off Stu. I didn’t know Suzanne’s age. I guessed maybe fifty. I hoped I wasn’t like this when I was fifty.
—You have to go, I said to Stu.
—Who the fuck are you? he asked.
—I’m the guy who’ll make you leave.
—Sure you will, sweetheart, he said. Won’t you worry about breaking a nail?
It was interesting. I didn’t feel the same instant anger that had fueled previous encounters, but a tormented person can manufacture rage with the reliability of an industrial product. All you need do is tap those deep reservoirs of misery and memory. Think about your past and something’ll raise your ire. You find your hands clenched into fists, grabbing a middle-aged man named Stu, bashing Stu’s head into a wall, lifting Stu by his age-inappropriate pants and throwing him face-first into the front yard.
—I’m not doing anything else to Stu, I said. I could kick him a few times, but why bother?
—Much as I’d like it, said Adeline, I’m not sure he’s worth it.
I hefted Suzanne over my shoulder and put her on a couch. I worried that she might choke on her own vomit. Adeline assured me that Suzanne was a weathered veteran of this particular war, too much of a soldier to die in her sleep.
Unconvinced, I lingered. Adeline went upstairs. Suzanne was awake, her watery eyes unable to focus.
—Hi, she said.
—Hi, I said.
—I drank too much bourbon, she said.
—Looks like it.
—I think I’ll sleep now, she said.
—Okay, I said.
—Goodnight, Emil, she said.
—Goodnight, I said.
I found Adeline on the floor of her room, listening to a record that I didn’t recognize. To see her mother like that. To see Adeline, see her see Suzanne.
—I don’t want to be like her, she said.
—You aren’t, I said.
I lay next to her, the carpet bristling against my flesh, my arms around her. We didn’t say anything. I hugged Adeline until she fell asleep, her face against my chest. The record started skipping. I turned off the player and put a blanket over Adeline.
Jaime didn’t answer. Where could he be? I didn’t own him. Or want to own him. But I wanted him with me, right there, right in that moment. Would have given anything to hear him talk about the stupid things that he liked. About skateboarding or Dungeons & Dragons or beer or anything.
I beat off.
MAY 1988
Baby Gets into NYU
Then there was the time when I got into NYU.
MAY 1988
Adeline Makes a Decision
I was downstairs, watching a VHS recording of The Wonder Years, a television show about a junior high student in 1968. The idea is that this kid, named Kevin, narrates from an indeterminate point in the future, presumably 1988. The whole thing is an excuse for Baby Boomers to remind everyone yet again about the irrefutable Monumentalness of the
1960s.
This particular episode hung on Kevin’s love interest, an eleven-year-old girl named Winnie Cooper who wears fishnet tights and go-go boots, and her older brother, Brian, an incredibly sexy nineteen-year-old. He’s presented as an archetypical all-American midcentury rebel, but anyone with even a rudimentary knowledge of queers would spot Brian as an ace player for our team. Kevin has an adolescent hard-on for Brian, describing him as “sweaty, greasy, working with his hands . . . Whatta guy!”
Brian goes to fight in Vietnam. And like anyone who ships out to Vietnam in film or on television, Brian returns in a body bag. Kevin finds Winnie hiding in the woods. She’s staring into the abyss of existential meaninglessness. Kevin takes advantage of her sorrow and confusion. Kevin scores a kiss. End of episode.
Click. Clack. Rising over the television show. Click. Clack. Click. Clack. Click. Clack. Click. Clack. The credits rolled. I paused the VCR. I went upstairs. Click. Clack. From Adeline’s room. Her door half-shut. Click. Clack. I pushed it open, a little, and peeked inside.
She sat on her bed in a lotus position, legs folded, left hand pointing downward. Click. Clack. Her right hand held a child’s toy. Two plastic balls equidistantly suspended from a string, with a handle in the middle. Click. Clack. Through vertical motion, the balls crashed into each other on a horizontal plane. These collisions sent them in the direction opposite their previous vertical movement, where they’d crash into each other again on another parallel horizontal plane, repeating the process. Click. Clack.
Adeline’s eyes were closed. She never lost control of the balls. Click. Clack. They went up, they collided. Click. They went down, they collided. Clack. Like a train over tracks.
I watched another episode of The Wonder Years. Click. Clack. Winnie Cooper’s family buried her brother. Click. Kevin attended the wake. Clack. The last time that he saw Winnie Cooper was when they kissed in the woods. Click. His future self reflects that his adolescence is ruled by the strongest forces of human existence, Eros and Thanos, love and death. Clack.