I didn’t throw this party, but I am prepared to survive it.
Malibu Hills. Severe modern house. Pacific view, Sonos surround, bespoke hors d’oeuvres. Dozens of humans in dozens of outfits, chatting in happy little groups without me. The house has been featured in Architectural Digest.
There’s music coming from landscaped boulders, but I was uncomfortable before that. I wasn’t here eleven seconds when I was handed a drink I couldn’t identify by sight, smell, or taste by a goateed Black man in a (seemingly) unironic white suit, who welcomed me on the host/my cousin’s behalf. I had no idea if the man was guest or staff — standard for one of Dale’s parties — but damn, that drink went down easy.
“Another?”
“Why yes.” Hours ago, my doc’s shoes delivered a diagnosis, and I’m on the run.
Behind me, a woman’s voice. I turn to see a mom tell her teenage daughter, “You can either go to the dermatologist or you can pick at it.” The girl scratches at her forearm, seeming to have made her choice. They are resplendent in seafoam loungewear.
“I feel your pain,” I tell the girl. Then, hoping to scale back from creepy to merely intrusive, I expand my sphere to include the mom. “I have reasons for disdaining the gastroenterologist,” I say. “Bloody stool.” The mother takes her daughter by the unafflicted arm and seeks somewhere else to berate her. “It’s ok,” I call after them, though it’s not. “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”
There’s a valet to park cars, among which are more Priuses than you might expect. I walked. Wasn’t planning on attending at all, but nightbird song called me from my bungalow, and the soft evening breeze drew me on. That’s bullshit. I had panic to elude, and it had been months since I’d enjoyed the particular humiliations of a Dale party. My cousin and I live but two miles apart, in different worlds. I’m downwind.
The pool makes a soothing sound, of water almost running. I warned Dale it was overflowing but Dale told me it’s part of the design. You think I’m slow, it took the fork nearly a hundred years to make it from the tables of the rich to the rest of us. Dale would have been an early adopter.
A copper-haired man in a (presumably ironic) wetsuit and fancy aquatic slippers strolls the pool perimeter carrying a magic cocktail in a stemless martini glass. After his ordeal, St. Denis walked for miles carrying his severed head in his hands.
A male child of maybe eight snakes through the crowd pouring parts of drinks into other drinks when he thinks no one is looking. He’s wearing what I think of as a Tommy Bahama shirt, deep blue with a pattern of needle-nose fishes, plus bright pink swimwear and what I can only describe as hula slippers. He’s either my nephew or a miniature hedge fund guy. I generally don’t like him, but I am currently a fan of his mischief.
There are saints for every setting, home remedies to salve any sore. The particular smell of the doctor’s office, dead skin cells and despair, made my leg itch.
Here the furniture is all technologically enhanced rattan supporting thick, cream-colored cushions or thick slabs of glass. It’s the usual crowd, more or less.
A groan from the kid, now held in the grasp of his father by the collar of his fish shirt. Dale starts to drag him indecorously from the action, which apparently is not the sort of exit the kid had in mind. Plus which, everyone has paused to observe. The music is lounge surf. The diagnosis is dark. The half-eaten hors d’oeuvres are chevre-fig bites and gluten-free toasts with rosemary and red pepper coulis. When the kid’s efforts to plant his hula slippers against the cement fail and he is dragged offstage, he yells at his father: “You are all four body parts — plus you are bad for the environment.” His words echo after his body has left the scene. The music boulders adjust to calypso at enhanced volume.
And after all, Dale is a landscape architect. In high demand. In magazines. I like to say we are colleagues, in the same field. I am a landscaper. This annoys Dale, in part because he thinks I’ve underachieved or, as he says, I sell myself short. The state school overachiever and the Little Ivies slacker. But still, he keeps his son at arm’s length from me on the infrequent occasions we see each other.
Now there’s a man at my elbow wearing a wetsuit and copper-colored hair, in checkerboard Vans. I can’t tell if it’s a different guy or the same guy in fresh footwear.
“Sunday Jackson,” he says. “The accountant.”
We shake hands. His skin is rubbery. “Preston,” I say. “The cousin. Dale and I are in the same field.”
“He hasn’t mentioned you.” It’s not cold out. I would think he’d be warm and mildly uncomfortable in a wet suit.
“There are a variety of explanations for that.”
“Okay,” he says in the tone of someone whose philanthropic efforts are being rejected. He mingles in a different direction.
There’s too much light to see by and I’ve had enough of mirrors.
I grab a cocktail from a passing tray. Dale and I both come from a background where you are what you’ve accomplished; where continual hard work is the only self-justification. Dale will drive himself to an early heart attack and his mourners will sing of his achievements. Only his son will hate him. Me, I was at least supposed to last.
I inhale deeply. I do love a good eucalyptus tree, but I’m a guy who’ll suck cough drops for fun. I feel a non-rubbery presence at my elbow.
“You look as uncomfortable as I feel,” says a woman beside me, shortish, a trim light bulb for a nose. Her hair in pigtails. She holds a drink that looks suspiciously like mine, but fuller. It isn’t that I fail to respond, it’s that I’m a bit laggard. She is all of Girls5eva and I am a sad little house with a banana-colored refrigerator.
“Did I say the wrong thing already?” she says. “That’s going to be the title of my memoir — Turns Out I Was Wrong.”
I shake my head. “Not at all.” I half-offer my hand. “My sources are unreliable, and my conclusions are suspect.”
Her eyes smile or grimace. “I’m Bonnie,” she says. She’s wearing overalls, which strike me as a bold choice.
“Preston.”
“Not a name you hear every day.”
“Actually, I do.” Even with low expectations, I often disappoint myself. “I’m sorry,” I confess. “It’s the pigtails. I get tingly.”
She leans back. Her eyes weigh whether I’m going to be a problem. “Don’t,” she says.
“Understood.” I am not always in control of what comes out of my mouth, but I recognize the difference between meaning no harm and doing none. “I apologize.” I do have loved ones. A son of my own, in the Midwest. A few core friends. A woman I live with out of mutual convenience. That’s bullshit, too. I just can’t go there right now. The pitying looks. The vast sadness. I gulp my cocktail.
A leatherfaced woman in sunflower bathing cap and goggles traverses the pool in elegant strokes. Bonnie and I watch, long enough that a breeze clears the air. Lights along the coastline twinkle. Headlights on the PCH.
“Not my crowd,” she says. “You are an interesting enough diversion, as long as you don’t encroach.” She is maybe late twenties, as yet undaunted.
I am early fifties with a foreshortened future and nowhere to run. “I hear you,” I say. “I’m mostly here for the magic cocktails.” Baby-faced doc and his almost-certainly-Italian shoes. Just comes out and says it like, oh, by the way, it’s Tuesday or whatever. I understand, he says. Bullshit. No one likes hearing this, he says. Duh. Sip of drink. Breath. Sip of drink.
I swear I can smell fish, but it’s just my nephew snaking his way through the guests again in his needle-nose shirt and pink trunks, pinballing off cushions and sprinkling something into selected drinks. This time he’s followed by what can only be the new nanny, the vein in whose forehead throbs. She’s gaining on him, but it’s an effort.
“The little shit,” I say, watching him. “I hope she’s well-paid.”
“She is.”
I cock an eyebrow Bonnie’s way.
“She’s my sister.”
“He’s my nephew.” Clink of glasses.
***
I’m waiting for my shorts to air dry. There are people not interested in revealing their flesh. I am all of those people, minus two. But the water had been too damned enticing — a polka, a foot massage and a flan dessert all at once. I found a quiet corner of the pool and eased in. Ahh. Soft, sparse lights left the water in deep dark, a private enclave where, for a glorious moment, mine were the only set of bubbles to be seen.
Now, soggy shorts in a breezy spot at the edge of the action. My nuts itch and my top half is wrapped in a colorful – tropical plants and the like – cotton tablecloth I repurposed from the kid’s table. Caterers pass carrying trays of foods I will never eat again. Goodbye, wagyu sliders. Hello, avocado cucumbers.
What now? I ask myself and answer lightning round-style at a variety of levels:
Go home, cry in her lap and start the rest of my shriveled life
Make peace with some god of low enough stature to care
Eat, drink, and self-distract without having to face myself or my almost loved one
I am mercifully interrupted by a text:
R U coming home or shall I do dinner for 1?
I’m at Dale’s
Wuh-oh. What happened?
I’ll explain later
Later. I love that word. Sounds specific, even promise-like, but it’s a vast, open plain without landmark or boundary.
My legs itch.
I spy Bonnie. She has drifted from the partygoers, out beyond the pool to a patch of unimproved land overlooking the canyon, the moonlit Pacific. I approach.
“If you had a hang glider and the requisite knowledge,” I say, “right here right now, would you do it?”
“Absolutely.” She doesn’t miss a beat. “You?”
I wonder do the pigtails have an emboldening effect. I don’t have time to grow my hair that long or, likely, to cultivate the courage to check off that bucket list item. I nod vaguely. “I’d like your particulars and am prepared to wait.”
Shadows cloud her face. I’ve done it again.
“I thought I’d been clear,” she says. “I do not want your kind of trouble.”
“Absolutely.” In my head, I kick my shins. “I’m really not trying to be an ass.”
“And yet, succeeding.”
I nod. I bow. “It won’t happen again.” I don’t want to be that guy. I do want — need — her banter. A tropical tablecloth of false warmth for this moment. “I’m an interesting diversion,” I plead/remind her.
She considers. Her pigtails weigh the evidence. “Interesting enough diversion.”
Ahhh. The canyon stretches before us like hope. Beyond, the Pacific gleams.
Her eyes do that thing they do. “I bet you a dollar my full name is more ridiculous than your full name.”
We shake on it.
“Preston Sorrows.”
She doesn’t flinch. “Boneva Rash.”
“Well, that was unexpected.”
She nods. “I’m willing to call it a draw.”
Laughter erupts behind us and draws our eyes to the party.
“What’s your excuse?” I ask.
“For my name?”
“For not leaving.”
“The nanny. My sister. I’m her ride.” By the nearest bar, a cluster of humans is dressed like a ‘70s R&B group, matching pastel suits and ruffle shirts. “You?”
“Specters lie in wait.” There’s almost nothing I like about the word reckoning.
“I’ve got a taser you can borrow if you promise to give it back.”
She flips her pigtails. I can see heaven through the open doors of a helicopter.
She’s looking at me like I’m a puzzle that only half-intrigues her. “Have you had a falling out with a particularly vicious drug cartel?”
“Not lately. Why?”
“Your eyes. Like a cornered animal.”
“Hm.” I don’t feel dartish, but we humans — mysteries to ourselves and each other.
“You wanna talk about it?” she says.
“Absolutely not.”
We chat. Her day was Olivia Rodrigo and a hoverboard. Mine was Nate lowers the shovel and says, “I meant no harm.”
I stood lost in the lobby of the medical building, unable to find an exit. Some kid from reception had to usher me out. I suck at my empty glass.
The canyon twinkles. It really is a marvel to be alive.
“Refill?” I offer.
“Thanks.” She hands me her glass. “Seltzer. The traditional kind.”
I head to the bar where the tender greets me with professional warmth. “Hi,” he says. “How are you?”
“My future is tied to a colostomy bag.”
He avoids eye contact. He’s looking for a lackey to hand me off to. “I’m sorry.”
He’s not, of course. Why should he be? I lean an elbow on the bar. It’s trembling. He’s impatient for my order. Fair enough: there’s a lineup of the privileged and he’s on caterer’s wages. “One magic cocktail and one soft seltzer, please.”
He grabs a rocks glass. “Seltzer is at the other station.”
Before I can complain, here comes Dale.
I flee, drinkless. Dale’s relentless positivism would make me puke blood right now. I employ evasive strategies, going serpentine until I end up at the other drinks station, where I secure both a magic cocktail and a can of seltzer. Ha! I fully intend to return to Boneva, but I am waylaid by a hairy dude I’ve spied at these parties before. He mistakes me for an actor I was once told I resembled. Seems my rumpled look is not dissimilar to that actor’s rumpled chic.
“Are you — —?” he asks me with a conspiratorial semi-wink.
“I assure you I am not.”
“No need to be modest here,” he says. “You’re among friends.”
Or some actor he mistakes me for is. I’ve come to hate Friday nights, even though I’m pretty sure this is Thursday.
***
Chemotherapy tolerances and clinical trials. Plant-based yogurt with maybe banana slices. I plunge into a cluster of men discussing indexed annuities or some such.
***
I’m in the parking area — yes, there’s a parking area, tucked behind the music boulders. I’m leaning against what I hope is Boneva’s car and smoking a cigarette I bummed from the second bartender. I need a moment. What am I here for if not to avoid my truth?
I hear a crunch behind me. I expect feet on gravel but it’s the nephew, eating fried wontons from a cloth napkin.
“Not fair,” I say. “Where’d you get those?”
“Kids’ table.” His voice is loud, uncalibrated to the setting. I’m 99.7 percent sure he’s the only kid. He’s also wearing pjs with palm trees, sailboats and tiki huts. I’m 71 percent sure they’re silk.
He gestures at my cover-up. “Isn’t that my tablecloth?”
“No one likes a snitch.” I reach for a wonton — punitive foods will come soon enough — but he pulls them away. Undaunted, I retrieve a paper napkin from hopefully Boneva’s car roof and unwrap the morsel I’ve been saving for emergency. We’re leaning against the car like a couple of badasses except that one of us is me and the other is this eight-year-old kid. I take an indulgent bite of my hors d’oeuvre.
“Do you have any idea what’s in that?” The kid speak-shouts.
“Pretty sure chicken and some sort of waffle.”
“Fourteen grams of saturated fat,” says the little shit.
I make the shush sign. “Aren’t you afraid they’ll put you back in your cage?”
“They don’t care, long as I’m not in the way.” He chomps wonton. “The food people had to include a list. I read it.”
“That’s not exactly health food you’ve got there.”
“I’m eight,” he says. He’s got a point.
“You should be nicer to me,” I try. “I could be dead in six months.”
“Couldn’t anyone?” I’ve not noticed before, but behind the snark is the frightened face of a kid who’s seen too much.
“Sure. In theory.” I wave at my torso. “But I’ve got shit going on.”
His face is blank. It’s possible no one in my current life takes me seriously. I reach again for a wonton. He again moves the napkin.
“Tough crowd.” I finish the cigarette. Sip my drink.
“Got one for me?” he asks.
I hand him the seltzer I intended for Boneva.
He makes a face. “I want one like yours.”
I move my drink away. “I might be a lot of things,” I say, “but I am not that guy.”
I tote my beverage and my veneer of integrity back toward the pool area, determined to find either Boneva Rash or a catering tray of fried wontons.
Fortunately for whatever’s left of my future I spy Boneva and her overalls, standing alone on a patch of grass taking in all the pretty people who aren’t me. I sidle up.
“The kid’s on the loose again,” I say. “He drank your seltzer.”
She frowns. “Your dedication is underwhelming.” Her thumbs are tucked into her suspenders. “It seems this is going to be a long night.”
As if to confirm her assessment, the music boulders move to a dance beat, the lights dim, and a line of partiers sways toward the speakers.
I indicate a snazzy couple that stays poolside. I start to riff. “Fern’s parents,” I say. “They go snorkeling, adopting the strategy of the coconut.” And of a man headed for the bar, “Floyd Flake is perfecting the cowboy-walk-away.”
Boneva watches the man stagger a minute. “Floyd,” she says, “has work to do.”
Even empty calories taste good in the spectral light of poolwear. It must be late. The catalog models in their British hunting outfits — red jackets, black pants and boots, the molded black hats — take up position on the starboard side of the auxiliary bar with the same wire-haired pointer Dale rents for every party. A crowd of the curious converges.
Boneva turns to me. “Are you aware you’re borderline hyperventilating?”
“I was not.” Though that does explain a certain fatigue in my chest.
“Why don’t you tell me about it?” she says. “It’ll be easier than finding you a paper bag to breathe into.”
“You’re kind.”
That look again. “I’ve got exactly nothing invested. I’m stuck here among a type of human I don’t like. And you and I will never see each other again.”
So I tell her about the gastroenterologist, the diagnosis, about my tethered and abbreviated future, about why I am at this miserable party instead of at home.
“Shit,” she says. “I’m sorry. I figured it would just be some perception-of-manhood-reducing penis or prostate thing.”
“Sadly, no.”
“And you haven’t told her?”
“I haven’t told her.”
Many revelers are now dancing. Those who aren’t hover around the hunting party. It’s just the two of us poolside.
“And yet,” she says, “you tell me.”
“Nothing invested. It’s the whole reason I’m here. Distraction. Banter. Performance.”
“How’s that working out?”
“Yeah. Well.”
I could leave now. I could fetch myself another drink and lose myself in the music boulders so I don’t yet have to reckon with the prospect of my loved ones. I’d rather carry my severed head in my hands than endure people’s pity.
Oops. “Did I say that out loud?”
“You did.”
Shit.
Something like disdain shadows Boneva’s face. “You must be exhausting to people who actually care about you.”
Before indignation can flare in my chest, Boneva’s hand is on it and pushes me and I fall backward into the deep end of the pool. I go under and pop up to see Boneva’s back fade toward the house. It’s chilly now that the breeze has picked up, and my almost-dry shorts are wet again. The tablecloth I had wrapped around my shoulders is now a tropical weight restricting my arms from moving, which seems ridiculous. I flail in the dark, invisible in the midst of the party. I may have cause to regret that last cocktail.
My head dips under and I swallow expensively denatured water. I tell myself I’ll pop back up and I do. I gasp for air and get some, but also water in my nose. I cough. Either the music boulders are playing my favorite Outkast song or I’ve ascended to hip-hop heaven. Back under. My opened mouth, greedy for oxygen, sucks in water. Stupid mouth. More coughing. Limbs flail. Heart races. Tablecloth pinning my arms. To grasp and clutch at things among the greatest human pleasures. Chicken and waffles. My son’s toothy grin.
Here in the depths of Dale’s underlit pool, the inanity of my situation is not lost on me. The idea that it could end here. That I would not have to face myself, or anyone else. And so of course, the prospect of telling her, of walking whatever dark stretch of road might be ahead, now feels alluring. I laugh and on the intake of breath that follows I swallow water and laugh again.
I watch the humans, vibrant in their revelry and bright clothes, everything softly diffused — enhanced — through the water that burns my eyes. It all looks so harmless, even pleasurable.
Image by Ioan-Dan Plesa on Pexels.com, licensed under CC 2.0.
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That is wild wild stuff and brilliant to a non-literate like me. Nice going! Someday you can tell me how you think that stuff up?!?
Ha! Thanks Brad.
Yeah…! Nice work. I love how each of your stories is a surprise.
David
We should all have just such a way to avoid our diagnoses. Brilliant!
Fabulous! In all senses of the word.
Thanks all for the comments – and for reading!
Ron–Just getting to this today. So evocative–you put us right into the heart of the party. Or, um, the heart of the outskirts. Loved it.