by James Frey
A sampling of customers at Larry’s firearms on an average day:
Angelo. Age 18. Purchases a .30-30 rifle. Also purchases a scope.
Terrance. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Glock semi-automatic handgun.
Gregory. Age 22. Purchases a .357 Magnum revolver.
Aneesa. Age 19. Purchases a 12-gauge pistol grip shotgun.
Javier. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Luger Parabellum handgun.
Quanda. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal AR-15 M4 assault rifle.
Jason. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Beretta semi-automatic handgun.
Leon. Age 19. Purchases a .30-06 rifle.
John. Age 24. Purchases a Colt .45-caliber handgun.
Eric. Age 26. Purchases a Smith & Wesson .38-caliber handgun.
Lisa. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Glock semi-automatic handgun.
Tony. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal AR-15 M4 assault rifle.
William. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm semi-automatic handgun.
Troy. Age 21. Purchases a Remington Derringer.
Andrew. Age 21. Purchases a .50-caliber Desert Eagle semi-automatic handgun.
Clay. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Browning semi-automatic handgun.
Tito. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal AK-47 assault rifle.
Tom. Age 19. Purchases a California-legal AR-15 M4 Flat Top assault rifle.
Carrie. Age 19. Purchases a California-legal Bushmaster AR-15 M4 assault rifle.
Jean. Age 22. Purchases a .357 Magnum revolver.
Terry. Age 20. Purchases a California-legal AK-47 assault rifle.
Phillip. Age 21. Purchases a 9mm Glock semi-automatic handgun.
Gus. Age 22. Purchases a 9mm Beretta semi-automatic handgun.
Stanley. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal AK-47 assault rifle.
Ann. Age 19. Purchases a California-legal AR-15 M4 assault rifle.
Alex. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal AK-47 assault rifle.
Doug. Age 19. Purchases a 12-gauge pistol grip shotgun.
Daniel. Age 22. Purchases a .357 Magnum revolver.
Peter. Age 22. Purchases a .50-caliber Desert Eagle semi-automatic handgun and a California-legal AK-47 assault rifle.
Carl. Age 18. Purchases a California-legal Bushmaster AR-15 M4 assault rifle.
Ricky hasn’t had a job in four years. He used to work at a printing shop, but it closed due to advances in printing technology that allowed small businesses to do their own printing. He went on unemployment, it ran out, he couldn’t find another job, printing shops all over the city were going under. He liked sitting at home watching television and drinking beer all day, so he stopped trying to find another job. He needed money, was trying to figure out how to get it, when a friend, a convicted felon, called him and asked him to buy a gun (felons can’t buy firearms in California). He went to Larry’s Firearms with the friend, bought a 9mm semi-automatic handgun and a California-legal assault rifle using the friend’s money. When he got home with the weapons, he filed off the serial numbers. He charged his friend, who needed good weapons for his work, five hundred bucks.
That felon told another felon who told another felon. Ricky started making money. Under California law, he could only buy one handgun a month, but there was no limit on the number of assault rifles, and if needed, he could always go to Arizona or Nevada to circumvent the California law. He bought a set of files and some hydrochloric acid to make the serial numbers disappear properly. At this point, not one of the 300 firearms he has bought for convicted felons has been traced back to him.
He’s in Larry’s today with a man named John. John just got out of prison for manslaughter and wants an assault rifle. Ricky doesn’t ask why, but John makes several comments about an ex-wife, a former business partner, and some missing money. Larry is showing them AKs and AR-15s, weapons that can be easily converted from semi-automatic to full automatic. Ricky, as per John’s instructions, buys one of each. He also buys the parts that allow the conversion from semi-auto to full, and a book with instructions on exactly how to do it. Ricky will have to wait a day to pick up the weapons, and will need two more days to get rid of the serial numbers. At that point, he will turn them over to John, and if asked, will deny ever meeting him, speaking to him or having anything to do with him. What John does with the weapons is none of his business.
None.
He held a gun to her head, made her drive into the hills above Malibu, made her park at the end of a remote fire lane. He raped her in the backseat. He pistol-whipped her. He threw her into the dirt and drove away.
It took her four hours to find help. She went to the hospital, filed a police report. The incident was reported in the papers and on the local news.
There were no fingerprints. There was no DNA.
She didn’t tell her parents or her coworkers. She didn’t want to hear I told you so, she didn’t want any pity. She took her vacation and she stayed at home in bed and cried for two weeks. She called the detective working on her case twice a day, there were no leads.
When she went back to work, she was a different person, she no longer smiled, laughed, she ate lunch alone, she left at exactly five and never went out with her coworkers. The man she had dated that night called her and she never called back he called three more times she never called back. She saw a therapist it didn’t help. She saw a rape counselor it didn’t help. She saw a pastor it didn’t help. She joined a support group it didn’t help. She started drinking it didn’t help.
She recognized him when he took her order at a fast-food restaurant. He had worn a mask and she didn’t see his face, but she knew his voice and she knew his eyes. He smiled at her as she ordered. He asked if they knew each other from somewhere. He asked her name. There was no mistaking the fact that he knew who she was, and he knew that she recognized him. He touched her hand as he passed her order over the counter. As she walked away, he smiled at her and said I hope to see you again.
She never went back to her job. She stopped leaving the house she was scared. She didn’t pick up the phone or use her computer. She stared at the ceiling, at her pillow, at her wall. She never looked in the mirror.
This morning she woke up and she showered and, for the first time in months, she put on her makeup and did her hair. She looked beautiful, like the girl who had arrived from Indianapolis with dreams, with a future, with a life ahead of her. She went out for breakfast with two of her friends from work. She called the man who had taken her on the date and apologized for not calling him earlier. She sent e-mails to friends and called her parents. She told them all that she loved them.
When she was done she drove to Larry’s Firearms. She bought a brand-new Colt .45. She submitted the information necessary to acquire the weapon.
She left with a smile. Tomorrow she’s going to pick up the weapon, bring it home, load it. At that point, she will make the decision, find him and shoot him in the face and kill him, or put the gun in her own mouth and blow the back of her head away. Either way, she will think of him just before she pulls the trigger, think of him touching her and smiling at her, think of him standing behind the counter knowing that she recognized him. Either way, her life will be over. She is going to think of him touching her and smiling at her. She is going to pull the trigger.
Larry closes the shop goes home eats dinner and drinks a six-pack of nice, cold American beer. He sleeps without a care.
In 1852, the first Chinese immigrant arrives in Los Angeles. By 1860, Chinatown is established and flourishing. By 1870, it is one of the largest communities in the city.
Amberton wakes up on one side of his house, a thirteen-bedroom mansion in the hills of Bel-Air, his wife and children are on the other side. There is a young man in his bed, as there often is, the young man’s body was purchased through a service, $5,000 per night, all inclusive. The young man is tall blond and muscular, and he is extremely accommodating. He is one of Amberton’s favorites. He doesn’t talk much and he leaves through the back door without a word. Amberton g
ets out of bed, takes a shower, walks through his house to the kitchen, which is made of Carrara marble, brazilwood and steel, and cost $400,000 to build. He says hello to his wife Casey, who is tall and thin with black hair and green eyes, and is regularly listed among the best-looking and best-dressed women in the world, and he kisses her on the cheek. Away from the paparazzi’s cameras, and away from the eyes of his adoring public, he has never kissed her anywhere else. As he pours himself a cup of coffee, which was prepared, along with his breakfast, by his chef, he speaks. He uses his private speaking voice, which is soft and lilted and slightly fey, a dramatic difference from his public speaking voice, which is strong, direct and forceful.
Good day today?
Casey speaks.
Yeah.
Where the babies?
They don’t like it when you call them babies, Amberton. They’re seven, five and four, they’ve sort of outgrown it.
I don’t care, they’re my babies, I’ll always call them that.
She laughs, speaks.
They’re at gymnastics, and then they have riding, and then they have art.
Busy day.
Very.
And what are you going to do?
I have a meeting with my agents to talk about this film in England.
They’re going to come over here for lunch.
What’s the film?
It’s about a poet who falls in love with a doctor who gets killed doing charity work in the Congo. She struggles with her work and contemplates suicide but pulls through and wins a huge award. It’s a really smart piece.
You’d be the poet, I assume?
No. I’d be the sister that helps her learn how to heal. It’s a great role. I might be able to get a best supporting nomination out of it.
He giggles.
Very nice. Very very nice. We like nominations.
She giggles.
We do. What are your plans?
Work out, lie by the pool for a while, maybe do some online shopping, Who was the guy last night?
How do you know there was one?
I could hear you.
He looks shocked. In a fake dramatic way.
No.
Yes.
Please tell me no.
She smiles.
Yes. You were loud. Or maybe he was. I couldn’t really tell.
It was that blond boy. The expensive one.
We were both making noise.
We make such sweet love we just can’t help it.
Try to keep it down. I don’t want the kids to hear.
Just tell them I’m working out.
She laughs.
And in a way it’s true. I’m working out.
She stands.
I’m going to yoga?
Here?
In the studio?
Can I come with?
Sure.
They go to their rooms, change, meet in their yoga studio, which is in the deep recesses of their backyard, a hundred yards from their house, built beneath two massive cypress trees. It is a simple building, the floor a light maple, the walls plain and white, two small windows on each of the walls. When they arrive their teacher is there, sitting cross-legged on the floor, quietly waiting for them. They spend the next ninety minutes doing yoga, assuming strange and difficult positions, the teacher gently guiding them and adjusting them. When they finish, they take showers, sit in shaded chairs by their pool, each of them reads a script for a film they’ve been offered. As they read their scripts, they talk, laugh, and have fun with each other. Though their marriage is a sham, and their public image a wild distortion of reality, they truly are best friends. They love each other, trust each other, and respect each other. It makes the charade easier, and makes their most important roles, those they play on red carpets and in interviews, easier to perform.
Shortly after noon, Casey goes to her room and gets dressed. Amberton takes off his shirt and lies down on a towel at the edge of the pool. Their housekeeper sets a table and their chef prepares lunch. Casey comes back with a glass of champagne and sits down at the table, a few minutes later, her agents arrive. Two of them are gay men in their forties, one of them is an attractive woman in her early thirties, all of them wear expensive, custom-tailored black business suits. There is a fourth agent with them, a junior agent, a twenty-five-year-old former college football player. His suit isn’t as nice, and he lacks the accessories of his bosses, the shoes, watches, rings, designer glasses, the subtle touches that denote wealth and power. He also walks with a slight limp as a result of the knee injury that ended his football career. He’s six foot five, weighs 230 pounds. He has black skin, short black hair, black eyes.
Amberton waves to the group yells hello. He lies back and pretends to close his eyes and he stares at the football player, stares. As his wife and the agents start their lunch, Amberton falls in love, he falls in love, falls in love.
In 1865, the population of the city reaches 14,000 people.
They drift, drift through neighborhood after neighborhood, sometimes it’s hard to tell the good from bad, the safe from dangerous. They start looking at cars in driveways, figure European cars mean nice neighborhood, American cars mean okay neighborhood, shit cars mean shit neighborhood. Their theory holds until they hear automatic gunfire on a street lined with Mercedeses and Cadillacs.
Unlike most major American cities, there is no logic to the streets of LA, no easy grid to follow, there was no foresight in the construction of its transportation system. As the city grew, often at exponential rates, roads were built, highways were built. They go where they go and sometimes they make sense and sometimes they don’t. For two kids who grew up in a small town in the middle of nowhere, it’s daunting and intimidating.
They’re looking for something, looking for somewhere. Maps won’t help them, so they drive, they drift.
They sleep on the mattress in the back of the truck. In order to save money they eat popcorn and saltines for breakfast, lunch and dinner, they drink water from the sinks of public bathrooms. After three days they find the beach. They park in a mammoth lot in Santa Monica, they lie in the sun, swim in the ocean, sleep on the sand. They splurge and buy hot dogs and ice cream cones on the Santa Monica Pier, which is like a county fair built over the water with rides, a merry-go-round, games, and sweet, cheap, greasy food. They pretend they’re on their honeymoon. They forget about their past lives and forget about the prospect, or lack thereof, of their future life. They lie naked beneath a blanket. Their bodies warm the sand, they kiss each other, hold each other, say I love you to each other. The waves break twenty feet away. The moon spreads itself across the blackness of the water. For now, at least, they have found it. Whatever it is. They have found it. For now.
In 1869, City Marshal William C. Warren founds the Los Angeles Police Department. He hires six officers, and pays their salaries using funds collected from violations of city laws. He is also given $50 by the City Council to furnish Police Headquarters, which is in his house. He subsequently charges the city $25 a month in rent. In addition to being police commissioner, Mr. Warren is the city dog catcher and tax collector. He is later shot by one of his own officers and dies.
Esperanza started school, Jorge got a job on a landscaping crew, Graciella started cleaning houses again. Over time, they furnished the house, buying most of their belongings at secondhand shops and church auxiliaries. When they could afford it, they bought a television, which they watched together in order to improve their English. They also wrote to their relatives in Mexico, told them about their house, their good fortune, their life in America. When they could, they sent them money.
Esperanza was a good student. She was quiet and shy and well suited for school. She loved to read, loved to work on math equations, she helped her teachers at every opportunity. She was not a popular girl. The other students resented her intelligence, and her willingness to help her teachers, and her thighs, which grew with her, gave them plenty of reason to tease and harass he
r. As she got older, it got worse, with each passing grade, the taunts and insults became more pointed, more obscene, more vicious. Outwardly, she was impervious to their taunts and insults. She smiled at her tormentors and did her best to ignore them. Inwardly, they tore her apart. She wondered why they hated her, wondered what was wrong with doing well in school, wondered why she had been cursed with her giant thighs. She had never done anything to any of them. She actually liked most of them, and did her best to be kind to them. It didn’t matter, they tore her apart.
As the years passed, relatives started moving up from Mexico. None of them had any money or anywhere to live, all of them had entered the country illegally. Jorge and Graciella took them in with the understanding that once they found work and had some form of income, they would find somewhere else to live. No one ever left. There were two cousins four cousins seven. A sister, a brother, an uncle. Four children. Three more. The house, originally three small bedrooms, expanded.
Jorge did the work himself, with the help of his invading relatives, and none of it was done legally or within the building codes of the city. He added a side wing, a lofted bedroom, he put a kitchen and a bathroom in the garage, he added a wing to the back, built a second loft on top of it. Lumber and supplies were scavenged from construction dumpsters, abandoned buildings, burned-out buildings. Furniture often came from the side of a road, paint and wallpaper from wherever it was cheapest, or from wherever they could find it. The result was that different wings were different colors, one bright red, one yellow, one purple, the main part of the house was light blue, the garage bright green. There was no sense or real plan to any of the construction, additions were added where it was thought they might fit, the family sawed, banged and painted like mad until somehow it did fit or until it was sturdy enough not to collapse. When they were finished, the house and garage had a total of nine bedrooms, six bathrooms, two kitchens, an outdoor shower and two living rooms. It housed a total of seventeen people.