by James Franco
“I guess I ruined your one friendship,” I said.
“She wasn’t really a friend, just a girl.”
“I know,” I said. “Want to come to my buddy Tom’s and smoke pot?” I said. She said sure. Tom lived close to Jordan.
At Tom’s we smoked a lot of pot. Tom was there, we were in his room. We sat in a little circle near the open window and passed around a six-inch bong. We blew the smoke out the window. I got really high.
“Look at my eyes,” I said. “I’m Chinese too.”
She said she wasn’t Chinese, that she was half Vietnamese and half Caucasian. Then she said, “I’m adopted.”
I looked at her. I was so high.
“I love adoption,” I said. She looked at me weirdly, then she laughed. I liked making her laugh, because then she wasn’t so ugly.
“I love adoption too,” said Tom.
We all laughed some more. Tom was tall and blond and handsome. The Sunday sun from the window was warm on my back.
We were sitting there, and then I said, as if it was the best idea I’d ever had, “Let’s play ‘Camping’!”
She asked what Camping was.
“Tom, go get a flashlight. And a sleeping bag. We’ll pretend we’re out in the woods, camping.” Tom got up and went out to get the stuff. I went to the door and closed it, and turned off the lights. She was on the floor, watching me. I went to the window and closed the blinds, which made it pretty dark in the room. There was only the light from around the sides of the blinds, which glowed, a dull, radioactive orange. I took the comforter off the bed and went over to her.
“Roll up in this blanket with me, and we’ll pretend it’s a sleeping bag,” I said. I laid the comforter on the floor. I opened my arms, and she got close to me. We lay on the comforter, I took her in my arms, and we rolled ourselves up in it. Our heads were covered too. We giggled.
Then I heard the door open. Tom was there, but I couldn’t see him and he didn’t say anything. He was standing there, and we were lying there. We were being quiet, as if he wouldn’t know where we were if we didn’t make a sound, as if we were out in the forest. We were giggling but we kept it in. Silent giggling.
“I got the flashlight,” he said from the doorway. That really made us want to laugh, because it sounded like a question. Very quietly I said, “Shhh.” Her face was right next to mine. She was holding on to me tightly.
Tom stood there, and then said, “Fuck you guys.”
I heard the door close, and it was all dark again, except for the radiating window.
“We’re camping,” I whispered.
“Yes, we’re camping,” she said.
Then I whispered, “I heard that Chinese people have sideways vaginas.”
She didn’t say anything. Her face was touching mine, cheek to cheek.
“I’m Vietnamese, half,” she said, like it was a secret, and like she hadn’t told me before.
“Do you have a half-sideways vagina?” I whispered.
She said, “No,” very quietly.
“Can I see?” I said. She was quiet, but not as long as before, and then she said okay. I took her pants off. We were still in our blanket, so it was hard to maneuver. I couldn’t see in the dark, but I could feel. Her ass was fantastic, very hard. And her tits were big for an Asian. I spit on my hand, and then I put my dick inside her. It was good. And in the dark I couldn’t see her face.
After—after I got her number, and after she left—Tom and I were in his room. We turned the lights on. It was dark outside now. He found a blood spot in the middle of the comforter.
I added it up. I had eighteen.
Part II
Headless
We talked on the phone a few times. She had just moved to Palo Alto. She was an orphan. She was half Vietnamese and half white, she had white adoptive parents. I didn’t talk long on the phone, just enough to make her feel comfortable. She didn’t talk much; I did all the talking. I was a nice guy. I’m a nice guy to everyone. I asked her questions. Her parents were both doctors. They lived in a big brown house near Castilleja, a few blocks down Embarcadero from the park with the wooden sculpture of the couple sitting on the bench. It was from France, and the couple was headless because Jason King sawed their heads off. He lived just across Embarcadero.
I called Pam one night and went over. She opened the door and came outside. Her parents were home. We went around the house to a shed in the backyard. She gave me a blow job in the shed. I asked her if she liked it. She said that she did. Then I left.
A week later, I was riding in Tom’s car. Seth was there too. I said, “Let’s go over to Pam’s.” Everyone said okay. I called her from a pay phone on University, then we went over. I knocked on the door. She came out.
“Hey, Pam,” I said. We all walked down the street to the park. Tom Carver and Seth Klein are my best friends. I call Seth “Chunk,” but he’s not that fat, just short and chunky, and hairy. Rich and Jewish. He has a big dick.
Pam wore sweatpants and a T-shirt and a brown jacket that looked like a man’s. We walked through the park, past the headless couple on the bench. A light was shining up from the ground at where the heads should have been, but they weren’t there, they were hidden in Jason King’s bedroom across the street.
We walked to the bowling green. The old people lawn-bowl there on Sundays. There’s a place in the fence that is easy to slip through. I went through first, then Pam, then Seth and Tom. It was secluded in there. Just moonlight. On one side there was a big community house. It was white with green trim and the three stories of windows were dark. It was old. No one lived there.
Seth was excited, he was bobbling around. Tom was smiling big. He had big white teeth and a blond flattop. He had a Budweiser bottle that he had carried in his jacket pocket. His jacket was denim with a white fur collar. He was handsome.
Pam took off the brown man’s jacket. She was in a white T-shirt, no bra.
Tom walked over to her. He was still holding his beer bottle. He just stood in front of her. She unbuckled his belt. Everyone laughed because we were excited. She unclasped his top button and unzipped his jeans. She took it out. She got on her knees in the middle of the soft, manicured bowling green.
After, Tom zipped up and walked back over to us, on the side. She stayed on her knees. Next, I walked over to her, before Seth, because I didn’t want her to be too messy. She had to do it for a while. I made a mess. It got on her shirt and hair. I laughed, and Tom laughed. She was all messy for Seth.
Tom and I sat off to the side, on the ledge of the green. We shared the rest of his beer and watched.
Seth started talking to her.
“Baby, baby, baby, Klein is gonna explode on you.” Everyone laughed. Even she laughed. “Ow,” said Seth. We laughed even more, and she laughed even more, and he said “Ow” again, and we all kept laughing and it kept happening, until Seth had to push her off. She was laughing quietly. Tom and I laughed a ton, because Seth looked so mad. Chubby little devil in the moonlight. Finally she stopped laughing and finished. He did it on her face.
She was on her knees and wiped her face with her shirt. It was cold, and the big community house looked haunted. She stood up and we left the bowling green. The guys went to the car. I walked her to her house. She carried the jacket in her arms.
* * *
That summer, there wasn’t much to do. It was just the guys a lot of the time. Usually we were over at Simon Kats’s house. His mom worked nights as a nurse. Pam came over a couple times. She went into the bathroom and sat on the toilet. I went in and took her shirt off. Everyone lined up outside, and she blew everyone who went in there.
One afternoon we played football in the park next to the bowling green. Then we went to Jason King’s house to get drinks. Jason’s parents were gone. We were drinking sodas and vodka and smoking pot.
Pam came over. I got her into Jason’s parents’ bed. I got her naked. She wasn’t even drinking. The guys lined up outside the bedroom. We went in, t
wo and three at a time. Everyone fucked her. She got really messy. Some of the guys were so smelly. The room smelled like oysters. I kept going back in with everyone, like I was the party host. I didn’t put my clothes on when I ushered people in. I was a wild monkey.
Toward the end, I got some vegetables from the refrigerator. I had carrots, and cucumbers, and a squash.
I squeezed past everyone who was standing at the door, watching. I took a raw wrinkly carrot and broke off the tip, so it wasn’t too pointy. Jose was doing her doggy, and Angelo was in her mouth. Jose is half Mexican and Angelo is Filipino. I made Jose slow down; he was doing it real hard. I put the carrot in her butt. Everyone in the door was laughing like it was the best thing in the world. She let me keep it in there for a while. I moved it in and out. Then Jose and Angelo stopped, and we turned her over onto her back. I put a cucumber inside her. She didn’t really want it, but I shoved it up there. I kept it up there for a while.
After, when she left, we burned the sheets in Jason’s barbecue. There was a lot of smoke.
Part III
Caffe Buon
My dad’s apartment building is near University Avenue. He owns the whole building. That’s where I live. There is a restaurant down the street called Caffe Buon. It’s Italian. I know the waiters, and the bartender, Al. Al said if I got him laid, I could have a free dinner.
I called Pam and I picked her up. I told her I was going to introduce her to someone. She knew what I meant. We went to Caffe Buon. It was five o’clock and Monday, so there were no customers.
Al was standing in the small circular bar in the corner. I introduced Pam to Al; they shook hands over the bar. Al was laughing, he asked her about school. The cooks peeked out of the kitchen to look at her. They’re all Mexican. Al is Italian, and knows my dad. Al nodded to one of the waiters, Esteban. Then Al and Pam went to the back. Pam didn’t look at me. She held Al’s hand and they walked through a door next to the men’s bathroom.
I sat at one of the tables. The place was empty. I had it all to myself. The waiter, Esteban, brought me a chicken dinner with farfalle. The chicken and the farfalle were under tinfoil. He brought a salad on the side. Farfalle is bow tie pasta, but it means “butterfly” in Italian. I ate and he brought me some red wine.
When I was almost done with dinner, Al walked out with Pam. She sat down at my table. The restaurant was still empty. I finished the rest of the chicken. Pam had a glass of water with ice. Al went into the kitchen and didn’t come out. Customers started coming in for dinner and we left. I drove her home.
The rest of that summer, when I would walk over to University Avenue for coffee or cigarettes, I would see the Buon cooks and waiters outside smoking. They would always be sitting and leaning on this bus bench next to the restaurant. They told me to bring Pam by for them too. They said they would make me the best dinners if I did.
I did it one more time, for Juan the cook. He was short, and chubby, and had a baby’s face and little baby hands.
I went over with Pam again. This time it was later in the evening than the first time, and there were customers inside eating, so we went around the side of the building to the kitchen door. It was a warm night.
As we walked up there was an orange glow spilling out of the side door where the kitchen was. Inside, through the screen door, I saw the two cooks were busy, but joking around too. It was Juan and a young one.
Esteban, the headwaiter, came into the kitchen to say something to Juan the cook. Esteban saw me and Pam looking in through the screen. He smiled and said something in Spanish. Then they all looked at us. The young cook said something to Juan in Spanish and they all laughed and made teasing noises. The young cook opened the door for us. I brought Pam in and introduced her to Juan. Juan didn’t say much. He was looking at the ground. He had been in the middle of cooking something, but he went with Pam. They walked to the door next to the men’s bathroom, where Al had taken her the other time.
I sat at a little table that was in the corner kitchen. It was where the cooks ate their dinners. The younger cook finished what Juan had been making and he made me some angel hair pasta with shrimp. It was good and had lots of garlic. I drank two glasses of wine with it. He was making me a steak cooked in butter when Juan came back with Pam. It hadn’t been very long. Juan didn’t say anything; he just walked back to his place at the stove. He took the steak that was cooking for me off the stove. Juan didn’t look at me.
Pam was standing next to me. She didn’t look at me, and she didn’t say anything. Then the young cook came over and said that we should leave.
School started in September and Pam was there. She didn’t have any friends. The only person she knew was me.
I tried out for soccer, and I made it on the team. At practice, I told the guys about Chinatown. That’s what we started calling her. We’d all go down to Chinatown.
After I made the team, I had to go to soccer practice every day. It was boring. I stopped going and they kicked me off the team.
One day at lunch we parked Seth Klein’s BMW in the far corner of the parking lot, behind the Palo Alto High School sign. I got Chinatown. I hadn’t seen her in weeks. Ramone Washington came with us. He is a huge black football player. China got in the backseat. She was on her hands and knees on the seat. Seth got in behind her and put on a condom. He pushed her skirt up and took off her panties. Ramone stood at the open back door, in front of her face, and undid his pants. His dick is huge and disgusting. I was standing guard at the back of the car, looking at the school. Every once in a while I looked back. Seth was doing it really hard, and the car was shaking. Pam was choking. A bunch of cars left the parking lot at the beginning of lunch, and after a while they came back.
A month later, Seth’s grandmother sent him away. He had been coming home drunk. His eyebrows would be shaved off, or he’d have felt marker beards and human shit on his face.
His grandfather had invented some sort of special part for microwaves. Seth’s grandfather and parents are dead, but his grandmother is very rich. She sent him away to an expensive boarding school in Connecticut.
The night before Seth left, he spray painted TAKE ME DOWN TO CHINATOWN on the wall outside the cafeteria, where they put all the rally posters. The next morning everyone at school saw it. Everyone started asking about Chinatown. Then everyone started hearing the stories. People thought I did the spray paint.
After that, Pam was different. She didn’t talk to me anymore. She wore white dresses and did her hair differently. She made some friends: nerdy girls who worked on the school paper. People still called her Chinatown behind her back. And people like Jose and Angelo called her Chinatown to her face. “What’s up, China?” they would say.
In March I got arrested. I hadn’t talked to Pam in four months. Two police officers came into my typing class, fifth period. They told me to stand up; when I did they bent me over and pressed the side of my face down on the desk, next to my computer. They put handcuffs on me. One of the police officers was this Mexican lady cop. Her name was Maria Gonzalez.
They took me to the main office and questioned me in Dean Forest’s office. Forest left so the cops could question me. They asked about all the times at the bowling green, and at Jason King’s house, and at Simon Kats’s, and about Caffe Buon, and the parking lot. And they asked about the vegetables. They told me they were arresting me for rape, and that they had arrested Seth in Connecticut. Maria Gonzalez said she was personally going to take me down.
But they couldn’t do anything. Nobody had forced Pam to do anything. Later Seth and me laughed about it. They had called his grandmother and told her that her grandson was a sodomizer. His grandmother had to go to the hospital for a little while because of the shock.
They tried to shut down Caffe Buon. The cops accused them of running a prostitution ring in the back. But they couldn’t do anything. They couldn’t prove that Al had done anything with her. And Juan was gone by that time. He left the day after I took Pam over there.
/> After that, I left Pam alone. I’d see her in the halls, but she was someone different. It was like I didn’t know her.
When we got older, I did things in my life and she did things in her life.
PALO ALTO II
April
In Three Parts
Part I
The Rainbow Goblins
I was driving Fred home from art class. It was a Wednesday night at about ten. Fred said, “That model was pretty hot tonight.”
“She looked like a sick tree with a rotten knot.”
“I’d fuck a tree,” said Fred.
He never drew in art class. He came with me every Wednesday after school and sat there high until class ended. He didn’t like to draw, so he just stared at the models. He even stared when they were naked men. One time, the teacher told him he had to draw, so he drew an explosion.
“So what would you do if you got into a car accident?” Fred said.
“Uh, I’d be pissed,” I said.
“I know, but what if it was a drunk-driving accident, and you were the one who was drunk?”
“I’m on probation,” I said. “I would go to juvie.”
“I know, shitface, so what would you do? Fess up or drive away?”
“How bad is the accident?”
“It’s bad, you crashed right into another car. But your car still runs.” He was making gestures as he explained.
“Oh really?” I said.
“Yeah, the other person could be dead, or they could just be a little whiplashed, you don’t know.”
“Who is the other person?”
“You don’t know, man! Look, you can either wait around and help the other person, and maybe it’s Cindy Crawford and you fall in love, or you can get the fuck out of there. But you have to decide. Pretend like it just happened right now, what would you do?”
“Uh, I guess I would drive away,” I said.
“Really? Drive away? That’s your final answer?”