The Last Guest

by Tess Little

  “No,” she said. “Dad did.”

  Lillie dawdled for a second, like she wanted to leave but wasn’t sure how.

  “You know you don’t have to spend all of your time in your room,” I said. “It’s your home; you can sit in here, or on the couch. And if you want this space on the table, I can move. I don’t want you to feel like you have to keep to your bedroom just because I’m staying here.”

  “I don’t feel like I have to,” she said, then put the row of chocolate onto the plate. “I prefer it.”

  I was left with my screen again. The blank white page. Lillie’s bedroom door shut behind her.

  What had happened after my arrival at Richard’s? The meal, the speech. My conversation with Tommo; then we had watched Persephone. I looked at the blinking cursor. Opened the web browser instead.

  It was out of boredom—not curiosity—that I typed the word into the white bar. The first results were brands and PR companies, then the Wikipedia page, then some videos. Lacking concentration, I clicked on the latter.

  The documentary opened with dramatic strings, a murky sea. We were beneath an octopus as it pumped itself forward with all eight limbs—lifting them up, up, slowly into a parachute and then thrusting them down. An ominous voice detailed the alien’s anatomy over a montage of prey being hunted, and then, with a climax of thudding drums, we were given the title. I slipped off my shoes. Pulled up my feet to cross them beneath me.

  The rest of the documentary was much more sober in approach. We met a marine biologist, heard about his experiments to map out the creature’s intelligence, and watched as his test subject slopped herself out of the tank and onto the floor to inspect the laboratory. The octopus was returned to its tank and underwent a series of tests. Mostly they consisted of objects being dropped into the water; her interactions with them were observed. Other experiments, with other octopuses, followed. They seemed to have different personalities: Some would tentatively explore objects, with gentle curiosity; others handled them roughly, with flashes of impatient aggression.

  Despite my distance from these creatures—they were only images on a screen, after all—I felt a growing unease. There was something very real, something evocative, in the way they moved onscreen. How they gripped the glass of their tanks, how their heads dragged like soft sacks.

  I lost myself in these movements—jumping when the voiceover man began to talk again. He and his dramatic strings were beginning to grate, so I dragged the volume slider to zero and sat with the images alone. When the first video ended, the player automatically selected another, then another and another. And so I sat there, watching. The cars passing on the road could only be heard faintly, every now and then. I liked this silence—the surreality it lent the videos.

  At some point I realized my ankles had grown numb. I was bathed in the blue of the screen. I stretched my arms and stood up—checked the missed calls on my phone, replied to none of the messages. When I brushed my teeth, I noticed red veins webbing my eyeballs.

  The creeping unease had remained, deep in my stomach. It was there as I washed my face and smoothed on eye cream. There as I passed Lillie’s door, noted the cracks of light at the hinges. It followed me to the bedroom, between the sheets.

  I saw them still when I shut my eyes, and they were watching me, and I was watching them. As my breathing steadied, my thoughts tumbled into the obscurity of a dreamer teetering on the brink of subconsciousness, and the tentacles became barbed wire, and Richard was a pile of pebbles, and my fingernails were teeth, and the ocean encroached, and the pebbles turned to emeralds, one by one….

  I couldn’t name my unease until the next morning, after the sun had risen and dazzled me awake. I stretched my legs and buried my face in the pillows. Then it came all at once:

  The itch at my arm where it had lain in water; I had rolled over to dry it off. I’d opened my eyes to the shaft of light. And my arm was cold and wet.

  If I had sucked my fingers after feeling for Richard’s pulse, would I have tasted salt?

  * * *

  —

  “But what people don’t understand is that the industry isn’t cyclical. I see it as more of a bicycle wheel: It goes around, sure, but it’s always moving forward. And I was thinking…”

  I regretted taking this seat. Miguel Montana, Montana Entertainment—as his business card stated and as he had repeated while pushing it into my hand—had now talked for ten minutes without ever asking me a question. Why hadn’t I left the party altogether? After I was cornered by Miguel, there hadn’t been a pause for an excuse.

  “So maybe you need to get back into the game. But I would do it sooner rather than later. There’s a real craving for the older actress at the moment. Sorry, mature. Gritty emotional roles. Can’t say it does great at the box office, but it’s something, right?”

  Did this qualify as a question? He did not wait for an answer.

  “Look, I’m not going to promise you the world; we can’t turn back time and I don’t need to tell you that. How old are you? Mid-forties?”

  I was only forty-two, but I couldn’t be bothered to correct him.

  “Mid-forties, we can work with that—you still have an agent, right? You know, I want to look out for you. A friend of Rich, any friend of Rich, is a friend of mine. And I’m all for this feminist stuff…”

  I winced a little with each “s.” Miguel had one of those wide-cornered mouths that stretched itself to mild speech impediments and exaggerated facial expressions.

  “…because I can appreciate male actors have longer careers, higher pay. I listen. It’s my job to listen. Ask anyone—I’m the biggest cheerleader for actresses. I mean, look at you, you’re gorgeous, why can’t you get interesting roles too? We’ve got to do better. I said the same thing to Honey: He needs to put himself out there. Modeling pays fuck all, and I said he should get into the game, there are some solid roles for Black actors right now.”

  He smiled conspiratorially, came uncomfortably close. I could see the transition of his hair as it moved from natural wisps at the sides to a grid of transplants.

  “And that scene in Anatomy. You were—”

  “Miguel.” I stood up, flashed the smile I now reserved for the biggest donors at my fundraising events, the smile that had charmed many a producer, journalist, maître d’ in the past. “Miguel, as much as I’d love to sit here basking in your flattery all night, I’m afraid my phone is beckoning. Would you excuse me?”

  “Sure.” He grinned. And then, with a wink, “And I won’t tell Rich about your contraband if you promise to come right back to me. I mean it, I think you’ve got a great career ahead of you.”

  I dashed out of the room, rummaging in my purse as though I could feel impatient rumblings, until I had turned the corner.

  The distant noise of traffic hit me as I crossed the doorway from kitchen to yard, past the little pile of cigarette stubs left by the chefs and waitress. I stared at my phone screen for a few minutes—still no reply from Lillie—in case Miguel was watching, then raised my head. It was lovely to be alone. I would let myself enjoy this moment.

  From here I could understand the clever illusion: how the slope of the hill beneath the atrium had been hewn to a straight line, creating the impression of a dramatic drop. Inside, I had thought the house clung to a cliff face. But no: The lawn was a plateau, and as I walked across the pristine grass to its edge, I found a five-foot drop before the hill rolled again.

  I sat on this smooth-concrete border, a kid dangling legs into the swimming pool. Its coolness pressed through my skirt. Beyond the shadowed trees, I could see string lights hanging over a neighbor’s garden—and could just about catch the chatter of another party on the night breeze.

  It had been a while since anyone had mentioned my acting career, but it still happened every so often, when Richard’s fans caught me in coffee shops, when
working the small-talk crowds of charity galas and art shows. I had rehearsed my response well: the smile, the modesty. I knew that the most interesting part of my character was my past; I wasn’t deluded. But it was still tedious. They were always well-meaning inquirers but not without pity—that unarticulated thought that it was too late for me, as they insisted: You were so beautiful, such a shame you left it all behind.

  These comments weren’t malicious. Yet it was difficult to brush aside the mention of my looks, rather than my talent, and the conspicuous past tense. I would smile through aching cheekbones. I would demur, touch the forearm, and think: You have no idea. My sun-kissed life in California soured long before my looks ever did.

  How bizarre—to find myself here once again, swallowed by the sky and hemmed by the hills. The city lights below speckled from the black.

  I don’t think it was nostalgia that I felt while sitting alone with this view. Maybe instead it was that dislocation that can come with revisiting a place of memory: the thought that I had been there before and that my self of the past, looking out across the city, would have seen my current self as a stranger—might not even have recognized me. And that made me wonder if I would ever be here in the city again, thinking back to this time as a memory. Maybe I wouldn’t even need to be in the city to revisit this moment. Maybe it would come to me suddenly, while sitting in the back of a New York taxi. Maybe I would see it in some other cityscape, or at another lonely party. I knew I would remember the moment again: if only the dusty smell of the polluted breeze, the city lights, that small but incessant curdling in my stomach.

  This had never been a city, or an industry, to which I had desperately aspired. Chance had led the way. A job at Douglaston Golf Course, a co-worker—a friend—with ambitious plans: Tanya had wanted to move to L.A., and I simply wanted to escape. A party we attended so she could meet casting directors. And a charming encounter with a famous British filmmaker.

  But now—could that be right?

  Was I nothing more than a passive creature? Or had I flown to L.A. with Tanya, nursing an unarticulated desire? Had I not taken care with my makeup, my outfit that night? Had I not attended dozens of parties? Had I not been living there for months by the time I met Richard? How many hours had I already wasted listening to men as the ice melted in my glass? How many lines on my compact to keep myself awake and interested? Maybe it was easier to believe I had never wanted to become an actress—that I had effortlessly slipped into it—than to admit that I had wanted this career, more than anything, and yet had quit regardless.

  Maybe it was easier than to fully confront the reasons I had left—to confront the past that pushed incessantly into my mind.

  (Lift your head, look over here.)

  (I said, lift your head.)

  There, on that ledge, I let myself swallow it all: the countless car headlights, the glowing windows, twinkling into the distance.

  (Lift your head. Your head.)

  Perhaps I could appreciate the beauty, from up there, then.

  (No, your chin, upward.)

  (Like this.)

  (Can you feel? Good girl. Take it from the top.)

  Hearing heeled steps behind me, I stood.

  “Don’t move by my account.” It was Sabine, taking a black cigarette from her purse. There was no generosity in her voice: She had wanted me to stay in my own world, but we both knew it was too late for me to turn back and ignore her.

  I wandered over, arms crossed, unsure of where to pitch our conversation.

  “Warm night,” I began.

  “For an East Coaster, perhaps.” She struck a flame from a matchbook, drawing her first smoky breath. “Wear nothing in June, do as you wish in May.”

  I had noticed this affectation, eavesdropping on discussions earlier, how she expressed herself in the poetry of a stranger to a language: mother-tongue idioms that no longer made sense, phrases from movie dialogue, wild metaphors invented in the search for adjectives.

  “You’re French?” I asked, hoping geography would be easy terrain. “I was in Paris just last spring.”

  “Yes, a piece of me.”

  She did not elaborate. I wondered whether I could escape the conversation yet—or whether that would confirm my worthlessness. She was barely acknowledging my presence, her boredom palpable.

  I settled into silence, looked beyond Sabine to the atrium. Richard was weaving between conversations; the waiters stood, expressionless; the guests laughed and talked without sound escaping the glass. I imagined the house as an enormous aquarium. A brilliant display in the dark of night. The bright clothes, sparkling jewelry; a tank shelved on the hillside. It was enchanting, if I let it be so.

  “How well do you know everyone?” I asked.

  Sabine inhaled, exhaled, before answering. “From Dominus, yes. Kei and Charlie I know the best. Then Honey, I know. Miguel, not so much. Thomas, Jerry, I only meet tonight.”

  She turned to the window, watched the others as well. I couldn’t tell which figure’s path her eyes were tracing.

  “And Richard?” I said. “He’s a close friend too?”

  Her attendance had been puzzling me all night. Charlie I understood. As Richard had said, he was at the very start of his career—and I could imagine it was important to maintain his relationship with Richard and Miguel. It was there in his veering from boredom to exhibitionism: He had probably expected a large, star-studded party, as I had; yet he couldn’t bring himself to snub Richard, kept trying, sporadically, to impress the birthday boy.

  But why would Sabine—a star, an artist, an icon—have stayed at this strange, quiet house? Didn’t she have other events to attend? More important people to see? She’d been involved in the group conversations all night—charming, measured—but I hadn’t seen her interacting with Richard much. They didn’t seem to be old friends or particularly close, and why would they have been? She was barely in her midtwenties.

  “He’s a friend, yes,” she said, and tapped her ash.

  “But you’ve only worked together on Dominus? No other projects?”

  “Many questions,” she remarked. “But no. No other projects with Richard.”

  And why had Richard invited Charlie and Sabine, out of all the actors he had worked with? Maybe they were ornaments, his latest pretty things. Maybe he had invited others and they had declined. Either way, I doubted Richard was really as close to the actors as he had insisted in his speech.

  “How did you find working with Richard on Dominus?” I asked.

  Sabine said, “You don’t know from your daughter?”

  This silenced me for a few moments. Her question had not been asked with sharpness, but I felt it there: something she didn’t want me to prod.

  “I’m just curious.” I smiled. “It’s such a small party. I’m fascinated by how everyone knows Richard. Aren’t you?”

  “I’m not very interested, no,” she said, tired. Opened her mouth as though she was about to say something. Paused, then settled on another thought: “But I can understand how you are.”

  “How I am…?”

  “Interested in Richard.”

  Sabine let her words sit.

  “I thought it was quite admirable,” she said. “How you stood by your man.”

  It sounded almost like a challenge. She drew on her cigarette, eyes thinning.

  My cheeks flushed as I grasped her meaning. There were many retorts in my head, but only one settled upon my tongue: “He’s not my man.”

  “And yet you still supported him.” She sucked on her teeth with a pink tongue. I couldn’t place her tone—was she mocking me? “Admirable.”

  What did she think? That I still loved Richard? That I still felt I had a duty to him?

  “My daughter,” I said. “I did it for my daughter.”

  Sabine blew another trail from her poutin
g scarlet lips. The stain wrapped the gold filter; the sky was velvet black. And then—I could not tell which—came either American acceptance or European sarcasm.

  “Sure,” she said blankly. “Sure.”

  * * *

  —

  I spent that morning on the internet. There were endless videos. Documentaries detailing octopus anatomy and behavior. Clips of killing prey. CCTV footage of the creatures escaping from tanks in aquariums, boats in the sea, mazes in laboratories. Recordings from experiments: Could they see humans, problem-solve, communicate? And, of course, the sensational: wrestling and swallowing six-foot sharks; leaping out of rock pools to devour crabs; dragging seagulls from the surface of the water down to the rocky depths.

  Watching the videos, I realized that it would not have been the bony beak that killed Richard, as I had first thought. They were not long and blunt but sharp, slicing things, made for puncturing prey and driving through hard crab shells. Richard would not have suffocated so much as bled to death. Bruised, they had told me, not shredded.

  I wondered how hard the tentacles were when flexed taut—whether Persephone could have stuffed one, two, or three into Richard’s mouth to block the windpipe.

  It was unlikely. It was ridiculous. Why would an octopus not use its venom, its toxic ink or flinty beak? How would it know we breathed through our mouths? But no matter how many times I told myself it was illogical, I could not shake the suspicion.

  All morning I could see it in my mind, captured—as it might have been—on that CCTV camera. How Persephone silently unscrewed the flap. How she forced her body through the opening. How she slipped out onto the floor, viscous. I could see her dark, grainy form in the pale-green infrared scene. Again and again I saw her slugging to Richard, clinging to his face, holding him tight as he struggled, injecting him with venom to slow his movements, and then, as he screamed, pushing a long, fat tentacle between his lips.