‘This is Leo,’ said Hermes, hesitating slightly before the fake name. He hadn’t been too keen on it but Eros thought it sounded Italian and he seemed convinced that Violet would prefer it to something American or gods forbid, Greek. ‘My cousin,’ Hermes added.
Violet fought the urge to roll her eyes. She had suspected for a while that Henry was related to someone in the Olympic hierarchy – largely based on his inability to get fired, no matter what he said or did – and the sudden appearance of his cousin seemed to confirm this. The cousin glanced at her shyly through impossibly long, girlish eyelashes. Violet picked him for about twenty – missing the mark by a mere 3467 years – but his obvious shyness made him seem younger. He was dressed slightly awkwardly, although it was hard to say exactly what was awkward about his outfit. There was a certain family resemblance too, but again, it was hard to put a finger on exactly what was similar about the two of them. Henry was dark, whereas Leo was fair; Henry had green eyes, Leo blue; they were both the same height but Leo was somewhat broader across the shoulders. Both were extraordinarily good looking, but in such a clean-cut, boyish way that it seemed almost cloying.
With a sudden flash of insight, only slightly misguided, it occurred to Violet that they might be aliens. ‘You guys look like pod people,’ she said, holding her hand out to Leo.
Eros had absolutely no idea what she meant, or how he was supposed to respond. He had a vague sense of being caught in a hilarious ‘fish out of water’ movie, minus the hilarity. He froze, staring at Violet’s hand until Hermes stamped on his foot and his arm shot out like a lever, suddenly unlatched. Of course, he knew about Earthly customs like the handshake, it was just that he hadn’t been expecting to touch Violet, at least not so soon. He was completely unprepared for the shock. ‘Oh,’ he said. His palm felt as though it was being licked by kittens.
Violet smiled, the corner of her mouth curling up in a slight question mark. ‘Oh to you too,’ she said. Hermes coughed. And when Eros still wouldn’t let go of Violet’s hand, he coughed again, as if bringing up a furball. Eros withdrew his hand and looked at the ground, trying hard not to giggle. ‘You’ll have to excuse him,’ said Hermes, ‘he’s from Canada.’
‘Canada!’ said Violet, slightly relieved. She had just been thinking he was autistic. ‘What part of Canada?’
‘Vancouver,’ said Eros.
‘Montreal,’ said Hermes.
‘So you get around a lot, then?’ said Violet.
‘NO!’ said Eros, completely misunderstanding her meaning.
Hermes fought the urge to roll his eyes. ‘Actually, he’s a virgin,’ he said, busting out the slightly unhinged grin that always seemed to throw Violet off guard. ‘They don’t allow premarital sex in Manitoba so he’s in LA to get laid. Just like in the movies.’
‘Thought you said he was from Montreal,’ said Violet, smiling at the simple Canadian cousin, who was now turning a lovely shade of maple leaf.
‘So how about it?’ said Hermes, nodding towards Eros. ‘It would be over in five minutes. You’d barely notice it.’
Violet laughed. She had grown so used to Henry that even his most outrageous suggestions barely caused a murmur from her internal censorship board. ‘Why don’t you go and show your cousin – Leo, right? – how to use the photocopier. And when you’ve finished that I’ll dream up something G-rated for you both to do.’ And then, because the cousin still looked somewhat shell-shocked, she grabbed his arm as he followed Henry past her desk toward the print room. ‘By the way,’ she said, squeezing his wrist in such a way as to cause cascades of butterflies to explode from his shirtsleeve, ‘great name.’
This time, Hermes really did roll his eyes. It was far too easy to play up Eros’ naivety, and it had become clear to Hermes, in the simple act of vicariously propositioning Violet, that his intentions toward her were still, as Jesus might say, Biblical. He was going to have to remind himself of the whole reason for this intern ruse on a daily basis or risk blowing their cover. Or – even worse – betraying his cousin. The latter was so unthinkable to Hermes that he was about to come clean and confess his impure thoughts when the angelic god of love grabbed him by the collar, dragged him into the print room and flipped him to the ground like a pro wrestler.
‘Why did you tell her I was a virgin?’ Eros demanded.
‘I can’t breathe,’ said Hermes. It was easy to forget just how strong Eros was. All those endless hours of archery practice and gallons of goat’s milk clearly hadn’t gone to waste.
‘You don’t need to,’ snapped Eros.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Hermes. He really was. ‘It just popped out.’ His eyes were starting to water and his back was throbbing painfully where Eros’ knee was planted against his spine. ‘I can’t help it,’ he said. Another few minutes of this and he was going to pass out, which could mean an unscheduled trans-dimensional leap. Without the buffer of a countdown, the leap could be brutal and unpredictable. It was not something Hermes particularly wanted to contemplate. Nor did he want to fight Eros. Despite the fact that he would probably lose, he was feeling guilty enough already without the added burden of inflicting actual bodily harm. Instead, he opted for honesty. ‘She makes me nervous,’ he admitted.
Slowly, Eros released his grip. ‘You too?’ he said.
Hermes rolled over, rubbing his neck. ‘I’m no Hero,’ he said.
Eros laughed. ‘No,’ he said, ‘you’re not.’
‘And I’m not completely full of myself.’
‘Well…’ said Eros.
‘I’m not Apollo,’ said Hermes, qualifying his statement. Gingerly, he pushed himself into a sitting position and leaned against the stationery cupboard. ‘I made out with Violet in this cupboard,’ he said, tapping it with his the back of his head.
‘You didn’t!’ said Eros, tensing his muscles. Sure, he was in a defensive position but he still had a few Greco-Roman match winners up his sleeve.
‘Calm down,’ said Hermes. ‘Of course I didn’t. But she did drag me in there once.’
‘Why in Hades did she do that?’ asked Eros. He was becoming increasingly perplexed by the everyday anomalies of Earth. Nothing here made sense to him. His pixelated testicles itched constantly in the restrictive undergarments and after a week of supermarket coaching from Hermes and Jesus, he was still coming to terms with fat-free half-and-half.
‘She was trying to avoid him,’ said Hermes, and then regretted it. A melancholy resonance filled Eros’ eyes, reminding Hermes of the first time he had heard a Siren sing, shortly before being held underwater by her magnificent breasts until his spontaneous orgasm alerted the Furies to his plight. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Didn’t mean to remind you.’
‘That’s OK,’ said Eros. It was hard to describe the way he was feeling. Unlike his uncle Apollo, who, among his other annoying talents, possessed the gift of prophecy, Eros was about as clairvoyant as a $5.99 psychic. But some part of him knew, beyond a Pyrrhonian doubt, that he would be together with Violet. Ever since she had opened her eyes and spoken to him in her sleep, he had been utterly sure of this. So whatever privation he had to endure, whatever pain, whatever pixelation, it would all be worth it in the end.
At the same time, he wanted to rip out the movie star’s teeth and crush them under his bronze-capped hunting boots. Unfortunately, he had left them in Olympus and all he currently possessed in the way of footwear was a pair of original 1971 Nike trainers that he’d borrowed from Jesus. Hermes, whose tumultuous century-long affair with Nike had ended in tears when she left him for a discus thrower, refused to wear anything other than Converse but Eros had very high arches and the flat-soled skate shoes had given him blisters. ‘You’d better show me how to use the photo machine,’ said Eros, pulling himself to his feet.
‘It’s not a photo machine,’ said Hermes, reluctantly joining him at the bench. ‘It’s a photocopier. Fax machine, photocopier. That,’ he said, pointing to a beeping, chugging artifact in the corner, ‘is a fax machine.’ Photocop
ying was Hermes’ least favorite of the menial tasks associated with his fake internship, and generally he made one of the real interns do it. He instructed Eros to do the same, but for the purposes of playing the game, showed him the difference between ‘enlarge’ and ‘reduce’, and how to turn a single-sided document into a double-sided document without inadvertently doing the opposite and wasting half a tree.
‘Seems pretty straightforward,’ said Eros.
‘And yet, you’d be amazed how often they fuck it up,’ said Hermes. He wasn’t very popular with the other interns.
‘And what’s that?’ said Eros, pointing at the creaking fax machine which at that moment was spewing sheets of paper onto the floor. Hermes folded his arms impatiently. ‘I told you, it’s a fax machine. Fax machine, photocopier, fax machine, photocopier. Got it?’
‘I know it’s a fucking fax machine,’ said Eros. ‘I’m not deaf. I meant, what’s coming out of it?’
Hermes bent down and picked up a random sheet. ‘Looks like a script,’ he said, tossing the page back onto the floor.
‘Shouldn’t we pick it up?’
Hermes sighed. ‘You’re taking this job way too seriously. We don’t actually have to do anything. Come on,’ he said, heading toward the door, ‘let’s go get a quesadilla.’
‘I thought we were supposed to report to Violet,’ said Eros, a little too eagerly.
‘What do you think this is, boot camp?’
‘But isn’t this for Violet?’ said Eros, pointing at the cover sheet with his toe. Frowning, Hermes stepped back into the room and picked it up. VIOLET, someone had scrawled on hotel stationery, MAKE CORRECTIONS AND EMAIL BACK ASAP. There was no signature, but Hermes took a wild stab in the dark as to who the author might be. There were only two real possibilities, and while one of them was renown throughout Olympus for his penmanship, this missive looked like it had been scribbled by a drunk Rhesus monkey. Also, Hermes knew for a fact that Ares was staying at the Venetian. This fax had come from the Tank World All Suite Motel.
‘Kurt,’ he snarled, bending down to scoop up the script and glancing at a couple of pages. Through the brief and bloody scenes he felt the blunt hand of his father.
‘Who’s Kurt?’ asked Eros.
‘You’ll meet him soon enough,’ said Hermes, ‘more’s the pity.’ Pausing in a low squat, he stretched out his aching heels and wondered, not for the first time, whether it was time to forgive his ex-girlfriend, if only so he could explore the option of shoes with decent arch support.
38.
The Montana skyline galloped like a thoroughbred across the rugged red hills. Tufted grass and mud sprayed in oscillating arcs as the bike chewed through the strategically placed dirt, mounted a hidden ramp and flew through the air, landing rather awkwardly on top of a greater sage grouse, which had thoughtlessly decided to stay on top of its eggs, despite the commotion that had been going on around it for the past two hours.
‘Cut!’ screamed the director.
‘Fuck!’ screamed the stunt rider. ‘I thought someone cleared the fucking birds.’ Limping awkwardly, he shoved a random person with a makeup sponge out of his face. His shinbones felt like they had been levered apart with a tire iron but the dramatic impact of his injury only added to the pathos of his exit. A gratifying hush descended on the set as he threw his ten gallon hat at the director’s feet. ‘I quit,’ he said, ‘this ad is a fucking joke. These guys don’t wear fucking aftershave. They wear diesel and Roundup.’
The director pinched the bridge of his nose. What’s-his-name was right. And by the looks of things, he also had a compound fracture of the tibia. The whole commercial shoot had been a disaster from the start. He turned to his assistant. ‘Get hold of Hunter, will you?’ he said. Then, as an afterthought, added, ‘And the paramedic.’
Hunter’s ranch on the edge of Yellowstone National Park was the kind of hobbyhorse that only country music stars, craft magnates and Robert Redford could afford to maintain. Its simple rustic cabin had featured in several architectural magazines and its recycled timber furniture had been handcrafted by fourth-generation artisans in solar powered workshops. Curiously, the free electricity and secondhand wood somehow made the furniture a lot more expensive than regular furniture but that only added to its appeal as far as Hunter was concerned. He had a thousand head of cattle and a Grand National winner called Jalapeño. He had a saloon bar with its own brewery. A nine hole golf course and a lake stocked with trout. Two dozen different leather hats. He was a regular country gent, a favorite with the locals and a patron of the Rib-Eye Film Festival, which took place in early April every year, just before sheep crutching.
Hunter was relaxing in his saloon bar drinking a long, cool pint of Yellow Ale (described on the label as ‘A gluten-free honey dandelion bock with citrus and pepper undertones, fermented in sustainable oak barrels and filtered using 100% vegetarian processes’) with a couple of fellow ranchers when that annoying pager thingy went off. At first he thought his meal was ready, then he realized that the last time he had eaten in one of those kinds of restaurants was the time he’d played the part of the beefy GI Joe type who takes a bullet for his ‘don’t-ask-don’t-tell’ best buddy, even though you’d written him off in the first act as a self-absorbed, womanizing homophobe. Those were the days, he thought, before ‘Steve’ and ‘Marty’ were just another couple of names in the address book. He supposed he should see whether they needed him on set, since it had been his idea to shift production from Los Angeles in the first place, but the beer was going down like a wet weekend and what was the point in owning a bar if you couldn’t run up a decent tab.
‘Fuck ‘em,’ he said, slurring his words slightly. He wasn’t actually drunk but he liked to create the impression among the ranchers that he was a borderline alcoholic in order to enhance his credibility. Actually, the ranchers couldn’t have cared less but they did appreciate the free beer, even if it looked like piss and didn’t exactly taste like Budweiser. It did, however, have a kick on it like a randy stallion and a couple of pints would see you all right with the old lady if you knew when to stop.
‘Think I’ve about had my fill, Hunter,’ drawled one of the ranchers, slipping off the stool without altering his straddled stance, ‘if you know what I mean.’ He winked at the boys, who all laughed heartily. They knew what he meant. A couple more hearty back slaps and Hunter was alone, staring into his beer like the lush that he wasn’t, feeling the melancholy tug of leather against the bit. ‘Don’t let it get you down,’ said the barmaid. She was forty-seven and had skin like buffalo hide, but her heart was made of churned butter.
‘I come up here to get away,’ said Hunter, ‘and all I end up doing is working. Even when I’m outside of my preferred network, they give me this!’ He slid the pager across the counter in disgust. That this hectic schedule was self-inflicted and he was being paid to sit and drink beer while stuntmen broke their bones on his behalf had somehow slipped his mind.
‘It sure ain’t no life I’d want,’ said the barmaid. This took Hunter somewhat by surprise.
‘Really?’ he said. ‘You wouldn’t want to be me?’
‘Hell no,’ said the barmaid, who was originally from Maui, Midwestern accent notwithstanding. Recently divorced, she had read ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ and thought she might skip the middle step. That she was now working at Hunter’s bar was no coincidence: she’d always loved steak and rugged, cattle-mustering movie stars, but Australia had seemed so far away. ‘I’d do ya,’ she said, leaning forward for the kind of bourbon boob shot that only women of a certain cup size and temperament can get away with, ‘but I wouldn’t be ya.’
‘This has never happened before,’ said Hunter, five minutes later in the back room of the bar. It was a lie, but on every other occasion, there had been a lot more than a pint of organic microbrew coursing through his veins. The barmaid, whose name, it turned out, was Barbara, lit a cigarette and smiled sympathetically. In her age bracket, it was a situation she was confronted wit
h on a regular basis and she handled it with all the tact and aplomb befitting her profession. ‘Want to go down on me?’ she said.
Hunter shrugged. ‘Sure,’ he said.
Barbara stubbed out her cigarette, hopped up on a bench and eased up her skirt, revealing a full map of Tasmania in all its verdant glory. Hunter hadn’t seen the likes of it since he’d jerked off to Country Sluts go Downtown, a little known screen gem that he’d discovered on VHS at an estate sale in Santa Clarita.
‘Wow,’ he said.
‘Eat it and weep,’ said Barbara. Hunter didn’t weep, but the texture of actual hair against his tongue inevitably reminded him of Violet, and this turned out to be enough of a sensory memory to stir the H-Man into action. It wasn’t the H-Man’s most commanding performance, and Hunter couldn’t help thinking that Barbara’s cries of ‘Buck me like a bronco, cowboy!’ sounded a little contrived. But as they lay side by side on the stone floor, Barbara running her hand through Hunter’s chest stubble, he felt a certain comforting familiarity, particularly when she purred: ‘This’ll be one to tell the grandkids.’ Of course, she failed to mention that she already had three grandkids, the oldest of whom had recently purchased her first training bra. But in that uncomfortable post coital cuddle, softened by the hum of flies and fluorescent lighting, the mood was such that these kinds of revelations were entirely possible.
Fortunately, Hunter was saved from Barbara’s life story by the annoying pager thingy, which was now buzzing at approximately two-minute intervals. ‘Fuck,’ Hunter said, sitting up.
‘Maybe you’d better go see what they want,’ said Barbara generously. Hunter grunted his agreement, pulling on his jeans and snapping the buttons on his check shirt with a speed that a lesser woman might have found offensive. ‘I’ll see you ‘round,’ he said.
‘Sure you will, honey,’ said Barbara, without a hint of sarcasm. And as she watched the movie star leave, she smiled with the sticky contentment of one who has achieved her American dream, with little more than determination, self confidence and an opportunistic work ethic; something that Ashley, for all her youthful sense of entitlement, had thus far failed to do. Barbara didn’t know Ashley, of course, but she had a daughter approximately the same age and was of the opinion that when it came to attracting real men, actual life experience – every line, stretch mark and hard knock – counted for a lot more than social networking skills. Also, she had been hula dancing since she was thirteen and even after three kids, could snap a banana in half with her twat.
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