So we’re only two blocks down Sunset and I’m already over this night. What was I thinking taking in a stray? I mean seriously, who is this Rachael chick? Although I can’t come up with any real reason, I just flat can’t stand her. She’s so, I don’t know, lame. The way she’s hanging her head out the window all wide-eyed and beaming and panting at everything passing makes me feel like I’m taking a Schnauzer to the park… pathetic. Plus I’m almost certain she’s a lesbian. I so need another bump. Not holding out too much hope though, I’m all blah. My brain, my heart, my soul (if there is such a thing) is set to do not disturb. It’s like a bad Xanax coma.
I don’t know anymore. But whatever, I’m over it.
Why is this person in my car? I can’t get over it. Did I want to get away from Stacy and the other drones at that fashion show that bad? And if so, where else is there to go any better? And why bring this stranger along?
Aside from scanning my brain for ways to ditch this chick on the ASAP, I keep asking myself what Donnie was doing at that shithole? Probably scoring drugs. He actually wasn’t looking too bad with that whole scruffy-bad-boy-look all the fag actors in town try so hard for, where he just has naturally (I’d wager without knowing or caring about). Whatever though, he’s still a total asshole. Like I didn’t catch the whole stale awkward air and not wanting to meet eyes thing he (and every other male on the planet) does. Spare me. Like I’m the type to actually expect any sexual reprieve from a guy after a coke-blazing one-night? Or like I care? I can fuck Donnie or any other guy tonight and walk the next morning care free (hopefully disease free) and completely emotionally vacant. I’m like a guy in that respect – no problem using my body (or someone else’s) to get exactly what I want and then split. Since the day I grew tits I’ve never had an issue getting what I want.
Finding what it is I really want, however, there’s the problem.
“… never really been this far out west before. Wasn’t that the hotel there on the left?” the mousy sounds of Rachael’s voice chime in – interrupting my train of thought – as I realize she very well may have been speaking this entire time.
“What?” I ask her, careful to sound distant and not up for conversation.
“You said we were going to a hotel called The Standard?” She points behind us, “Wasn’t that it?”
The Standard disappears in the rearview and I curse myself. The Standard, would have been the best place to ditch the chick but now I realize I hate The Standard so no big deal. Ignoring Rachael, who is still awaiting a response from me – I press the pedal with my new Jimmy Choo Orchid-Leather Knee-Highs some music promoter bought me while out for lunch earlier and keep west with no particular destination in mind.
It’s a big city, I think to myself, there are plenty of places to ditch a stray.
Have I mentioned by the way how badly I need another bump?
Unable to remember where my purse is I ask Rachael-the-cabbage if she can check behind her seat. She does this with an energetic-glee akin to a lame virgin teacher’s assistant with no life and bad hair. I hold back a gag.
After a beat she emerges with my black crocodile-embossed Alexander McQueen bag – which I actually stole from Stacy hours ago as an interesting side note – and places it on her lap. Then, in true off-the-bus fashion chirps, “Omygod, your bag! Isn’t this an Alexander McQuinn bag? These are like a thousand dollars! I can’t wait until I’m famous so I can afford a bag like this.”
I want to strangle her. When I get famous? Are you kidding me? That moronic and inhumanly optimistic phrase has been to me a song the radio never stops playing and sadly I doubt it ever will. Rapper, actor, writer, painter, designer… you pick the flavor, they’ve all got a when I get famous story – yet not a one can explain how they plan on getting there. A city of dreamers oblivious to one simple fact – Nothing real comes from closing your eyes and drifting to sleep. Only dreams. The minds way of fooling its host to wake to another day.
I’m so over thinking and haven’t stopped hating the stranger beside me so I snap, “I fucking hate it when people say that, when I get famous? What are you nine? Don’t you know naïve shit like that gives every jerk-off in town the green light to fuck us over?” Still without a bump I’m getting edgier by the second and can’t stay on track with my rant so sigh and conclude, “I don’t know… it’s just, like, fucking stupid. You’re not stupid are you?”
To this she says nothing. Taken aback I suppose. Maybe even hurt. Who cares? The light’s red and Rachael is catatonic. I grab my bag from her lap and before the light goes green I’ve already dosed the nose.
Rachael has been dead quiet throughout all of this – eyes at her feet like a recently reamed-out child. It’s all a sad and pathetic sight and although I should feel something in the lines of bad or apologetic, I don’t.
My membrane starts to get dusty and I can taste the drip. I find a Newport and light it. Inhale. Exhale. Another red light. Rachael’s still silent. I feel so much better.
“And who says you have to be able afford anything?” I say, breaking the dead air in the car with a uncharacteristically calmer (and even sisterly) tone.
She waits a beat and then very matter-of-factly says, “Price tags”.
I can’t place it but there’s something in the way she responded to me I respect. Maybe I’m just high but I think I may have had this chick figured wrong. Sure she’s green and maybe a little lame but she’s no rollover. After my little rant she could have just sat there like a timid cat but instead she decides to be a little smart-ass. I think I can respect that.
“Funny” I say, not quite sure what to say next, hating the dead silence that occurs between two people who’ve just met but don’t really have anything to talk about – I come up with, “You want another bump of shit?”
“I don’t know” she responds, “The bathroom back there was really my first time. Drugs really never do much for me.”
“Drugs never do much for anyone, sweetheart. They’re just there. And first time or whatever, it felt good didn’t it?”
“Oh yeah…” she pauses, “at least I think it did. It’s not really like pot where everything tickles and changes. I don’t know, it’s just different…”
Did she just say pot? Who is this chick? With the here and there moment I see potential she has to go and throw a lame stick in the spokes - further tempting me to find a corner on Sunset to ditch her. With traffic tightening up the further west we go and me still unsure where to go with the night I almost sigh out, “Do you want some coke or not? It’s in my purse.”
She chews on my question for a beat and finally swallows. Without a word she digs through my bag and comes up with the vial. Probably not wanting to embarrass herself by exposing any lack of knowledge or experience, she gauges out herself a monster mound of sniff (that would even have me wired for sound) and vacuums it all in one swift movement.
She gags instantly and I can’t help but to laugh.
“Eck!” her face contorts and neck-veins bulge and eyes sweat, “that’s gross!”
“That’s the drip sweetheart”.
“Whatever it’s fucking gross.” She says in a way making me cool with the fact she pathetically did the blow just to impress me. A beat passes and then she says, “Man I really want a cigarette. This feels totally different than the bathroom. I mean it’s the same but different. I don’t know am I making any sense? Do you have any cigarettes?”
With the amount of blow Rachael put into her nose she’ll be yapping at close to light speed for I’d wager the remainder of the evening – and in realizing this fact something startling occurs to me – I really don’t mind.
Here I was just minutes ago desperately seeking a place to ditch the chick and now I’m not even blinking at the prospect of hearing her go on and on in a cocaine-fueled verbal rampage.
What just happened here? It’s got to be the coke. I’m sure once I come down I’ll be singing a different tune.
And then it hits me – the whole reason why I invited this stranger out with me in the first place – and I can’t really put a finger on it. Maybe it’s the innocence. Maybe it’s her smile. Maybe it’s her style. Whatever. Point is, all things that usually bug me about other girls in town I’m okay with for some reason.
There’s something unique about this girl.
Once on the road I instantly regretted inviting Rachael out for the night, but I never thought to wonder how she managed to get into the car in the first place. Now it’s all so clear to me. At first glance this chick is one of a kind.
In a town full of dime-a-dozen moronic single-serving sluts, a girl like Rachael provides a blue-moon contrast. Rachael isn’t the type a guy would just want to fuck; she’s the type a guy would want to love.
Stupid as I may feel inside to admit it, but Rachael possesses a likeness akin to Audrey Hepburn – a woman entirely unique to those around her – exuding class and innocence that can’t help but to inspire and melt the coldest of hearts at first glance.
Sure I’ve got what it takes to trick a guy into loving me but sooner or later they figure my shit out. With Rachael on the right hand however – meshed with the right kind of grooming on my end – who knows where we could take this.
Rachael goes on and on about how menthol cigarettes taste better when she’s on coke and how she felt tired earlier and now can’t wait to take on the rest of the night with me. How she can’t wait for me to show her around. Show her how things work.
I light myself another Newport and smile.
I can’t wait to show her how things work either.
This girl has no clue how lucky she is...
If only everyone had someone to show them the ins-and-outs fresh off the bus like Rachael here, maybe LA wouldn’t be such a fucked up place.
