South of Bixby Bridge

by Ryan Winfield

  I’ll find it, I say.

  When you get here, ask for the Champagne Suite.

  Champagne Suite. Got it. What can I bring?

  Just bring yourself.

  Then I hear Tara again. She says,

  Tell him to come as soon as he can.

  You hear that, sport? We’ll be waiting.

  Paul hangs up before I can say goodbye.

  Kari rolls over and groans, her sleep interrupted. I grope my way out of bed and pull on my jeans. I smell like booze and bad BO. I need a shower.

  The BlackBerry vibrates again. I snatch it up and answer. Hello. I hear talking in the background. Hello. I press the BlackBerry to my ear. I hear Tara say, I’m getting the diamond facial. Paul says, I want the six-hands massage and the caviar-hair treatment. Hello. Nothing.

  Paul must have pocket-dialed me. I hang up. I jerk open the stateroom door and step into the main cabin. The burst of light sends me cowering blind against the wall. I squeeze my eyes and wait for the headache to pass.

  When I open my eyes again, I’m stunned to see a mile of blue water in every direction—the Valombrosa II is floating adrift in the middle of San Francisco Bay.

  I feel better after a shower. I feel almost good after some cold chicken chow mein. And by the time I have a couple swigs of Jack and a line of coke, I have wings.

  Kari isn’t happy but when we get the yacht back to the marina, I give her a fistful of cash and the last of my cocaine and then send her away. She’ll be less happy when she figures out it’s Christmas Day.

  THE YACHT CLUB sits on Belvedere Cove just off Highway 101. Driving south, 101 follows the coast until it turns into the PCH and runs into Bixby Bridge. From there I think it goes clear to Dana Point where you can see the beaches of San Diego. Driving north, 101 leads me through a soft rain toward Napa.

  The shallows between the hills hold a thick fog like soup bowls and the rows of grape vines rise from the fog and roll over the hills to meet distant groves of naked winter trees. There’s a kind of strange allure in the grape vines of Napa Valley. Even when they’re winter bare, the thick, gnarled vines wrapping around their wires look like long lost Eden waiting to spring forth with juice-joy temptation. I wonder if Napa would be as charming if they planted rows of corn.

  Spotting the sign for Rutherford Hill Road through the quiet rhythm of my dull wipers, I turn east to follow the vines upward.

  After climbing, dipping down, and then climbing again, the road turns sharp to the left and leads me up a massive tree-dotted hill. Halfway up, I rise above the fog and rain and then the road widens into a private drive lined with silver birch trees. I pass a monument sign that reads LA SPA ROUGE DU SOLEIL, NAPA VALLEY.

  Coming to a stone guardhouse, I stop at the white gate and lower my jerky-power window. A young guard in a pressed blue uniform leans out and looks over my Porsche. My dull wipers squeak back and forth on the windshield. The guard frowns at me with suspicion. Where you headed, he says.

  The Champagne Suite to see the Valombrosas.

  He turns his back to consult his computer. Without turning around again, he raises the gate arm and says,

  You’re good.

  The vine-covered lodge is nestled into the bluff and a steep relief gives it the appearance of cantilevering out over the valley. To the left, down a gentle slope, stone paths lead through an olive grove to other stucco buildings terraced into the hillside. I pull beneath the carriage porch, toss my keys to the eager valet, and ask him where I can find the Champagne Suite. He points me toward a stone path and tells me to follow the signs at my feet. I hand him a 20. As I head for the path, the valet calls to me. He says,

  Hey, Mister, you staying overnight?

  I look back. No, I say. Just through dinner.

  The path leads me down through lawns speckled with garden sculptures, winding me around twisting Napa Valley oaks. Olive trees dot the lower hills that roll down to the valley. Copper signs at my feet mark each tributary path. One reads HILLSIDE VIEW SUITE, another reads COGNAC SUITE—MERLOT SUITE, ZINFANDEL SUITE, BORDEAUX SUITE—and then the CHAMPAGNE SUITE.

  The Champagne Suite break-off path ends at a white-adobe bungalow tucked into the hill. A wooden sign hangs from a rope on the gate—THE VALOMBROSAS.

  I unlatch the gate, swing it open and step onto the stone terrace. The valley sweeps out beneath me. The French doors leading into the bungalow are open and white-lace curtains sway in the breeze.

  I turn to the doors and knock against the wood frame. There’s no answer. I knock again. Hello. Still no answer. I lean my head in past the curtains and take in the room. Whitewashed walls run up to dark-timbered ceilings and shag rugs cover the tile floor. Overstuffed pastel furniture surrounds an enormous stone fireplace and in the corner, a tiny tabletop Christmas tree hung with silver ornaments sparkles in the gas firelight.

  Strong hands grab my shoulders from behind.

  We almost gave up on you, Paul says.

  You spooked me.

  Paul laughs. You’re like a horse that way, he says.

  I follow him into the bungalow. He walks to the bedroom and when he parts the curtains, I see a tall California king bed piled high with white pillows. After a minute, Paul emerges from the bedroom wearing a white terrycloth spa robe. He hands me another robe and a small pair of black Yimps shorts. He says,

  Put these on.

  PAUL DISROBES and steps down into the steaming spa water. I guess Paul is smaller than I am because his shorts are tight. I toss my robe on a chair and get in the water quick. We sit across from each other, our arms along the spa edge. I’m reminded of a couple birds I see drying their wings every morning in the marina.

  The pool area sits between the Champagne Suite and the main lodge on its own private terrace overlooking the valley. A few paces away from the spa, Tara swims laps through mist rising from the heated pool. The rain has stopped but fog lowers from wispy clouds and licks at the wet hills below us.

  Paul smiles. Now this is living, he says.

  Yeah, it sure is, I say. Do you come here a lot?

  Whenever the mood strikes us.

  Paul runs his hands through his thick damp hair. Then he says,

  I look like a fucking bank executive on a mental health retreat, here. Look at you! You look like my tanned tennis coach. You been on vacation or something?

  Yeah, to Sacramento. Hey, about Benny—

  No business today, stud, he says. You’re here as our guest.

  There’s a splash from the pool and Tara pulls her lean topless body from the water. She strolls toward us with complete comfort. Her ivory white skin is broken only by dark nipples on firm teardrop breasts just big enough to fill a wineglass.

  I stare at Tara as she steps down into the spa. Paul stares at me. Tara glides over to Paul and French kisses him. Then she looks over her shoulder at me and says,

  I’m glad you came, Trevor.

  Yeah, I’m glad I came too—this place is gorgeous.

  A young masseuse stalks toward us carrying a clipboard. She’s a cute Eurasian and her waist is no bigger than one of my legs. She must be 90 pounds soaking wet. She asks if I’m Trevor with a tone that apologizes. Before I can answer, Paul says,

  Take good care of my man here. Have fun, sport. Meet us at the lodge at eight. I’ll leave the room open so you can dress for dinner.

  I climb out from the spa, trying to act cool even though my shorts are so tight my hard-on is obvious. I shrug on my robe, avert my eyes from Tara’s breasts, and follow the masseuse.

  HER NAME IS ZIN, like the wine. She lights a lavender oil diffuser and starts a mixed CD spinning in a player on a shelf next to a lion’s head fountain. She holds a white sheet up to the massage table making a curtain and asks me to strip off my shorts. I wonder what Paul meant when he told her to take care of his man.

  I lie naked on the massage table. Zin drapes the sheet over me. My hard-on makes a tent in the fabric. She giggles and says,

  Maybe we should
start with you facedown.

  I smile up at her and say,

  Maybe you could release the tension in my front first.

  She raises her eyebrows, turns her head away, and lifts the sheet waiting for me to flip over. I’m glad she doesn’t see me blush. I guess Paul didn’t mean take care of that.

  I look at the floor through the face hole in the massage table while Zin works on my back muscles. The brushed-stone tiles have streaks running through them and if I half close my eyes, they remind me of the silver veins of the delta snaking through the valley as I flew over heading to rehab. In some ways, it seems like 10 years ago—not two months. In other ways, it seems like I’m still on the plane.

  As Zin moves down my back to work my legs, Delerium’s song ‘‘Silence” with Sarah McLachlan comes up.

  ~~~

  I remember when this album released, the same year my mom died. I bought the CD the day before the call came. I played it driving home, I played it driving back, I played this CD so many times that year the aftermarket player in my Porsche broke with this album stuck inside.

  ~~~

  The music flies me higher. I imagine Zin has me strapped down boiling in a pot and is stripping the meat from my bones. This is the feeling I’m looking for—somewhere just this side of alive. Dead, but not quite. Zin massages my feet, the lyrics massage my mind and I sink into the silence and fall asleep.

  IT’S LONG SINCE DARK returning to the Champagne Suite. The room is empty, the lights dim, the fire burning. My pants lie folded on the bed with a new collared shirt next to them. On top of the shirt is a note that reads MERRY CHRISTMAS!

  Under the shirt, sunk into the white comforter like an egg in a nest, rests a platinum diamond bezel Rolex Day-Date Masterpiece.

  I pick up the Rolex and turn it over in my hand. I’ve seen this Rolex in a Wine Spectator magazine ad and they didn’t even list the price. I fasten it around my wrist—a perfect fit. I hold my arm out and test its weight. It’s heavy, but not so heavy that you can’t forget you’re wearing it.

  How can I accept it? It’s too much. I’m not sure what one costs, but when they don’t list the price in those magazine ads it means you can’t afford it if you have to ask. I’ll bet it cost more than the down payment I lost with my house. Can you say no to a gift like this?

  I look at myself in the mirror—naked except for a terrycloth robe and a platinum diamond bezel Rolex. I feel like a million bucks.

  THIS NIGHT FEELS like a slow-motion version of a foreign film. At the restaurant, a white-jacketed Maître d’ delivers me to Paul and Tara’s table.

  Candlelight reflects from a decanted bottle of wine. Paul wears a suit jacket but no tie. Tara wears a white chiffon dress with a neckline that plunges to her navel, a blood-red ruby and yellow diamond necklace draped around her neck. After filling Tara’s wineglass, Paul looks up at me. He says,

  You found the shirt.

  And the Rolex—Wow! Thanks.

  I hold out my wrist and let the Rolex glitter in the candlelight. Paul frowns and clicks his tongue. He says,

  Ooh, that’s my Rolex. I must have left it by mistake.

  Blushing like an idiot, I hang my head and unclasp the Rolex. Even Tara laughs at me. Paul fills my wineglass. He says,

  I’m fuckin’ with ya, kid. Merry Christmas.

  Really? You mean it’s mine?

  It’s yours, sport, he says. Tara picked it out.

  Tara laughs again. She says,

  It looks good on you, Trevor. You’re very handsome.

  Thanks, Tara, you look beautiful. Paul, are you sure about the Rolex? It’s too much—I don’t know what to say.

  You already said it, pal—thanks.

  I pick up my wineglass and take a taste. Paul smiles. Tara runs her slender index finger across the rim of her glass. It’s quiet. I can hear forks on plates, wine pouring, a blowtorch for someone’s tableside crème brûlée. A fragile-looking veteran waiter approaches with two other waiters behind him. They set a delicate plate of rare-seared tenderloin filet in front of each of us. Paul leans back, pats his belly, and says,

  Wagyu beef! Flown in fresh from Japan just for us.

  The senior waiter presents an ornate ebony case to Paul. The waiter raises the lid and inside the case, nestled in red velvet, are three tortoiseshell-handle folding steak knives. Paul plucks one from the box, snaps open the long slender blade and hands it to Tara. Then he does the same for me. The knife is heavy, the blade razor-sharp. There’s a golden V inlaid on the tortoiseshell handle. I say,

  You bring your own steak knives?

  Paul snaps his knife open. He says,

  I never cut my meat with another man’s knife.

  The waiter closes the case, bows to Paul. Anything else at the moment, sir?

  Yes, Paul says. Bring another bottle of my ’95 Château Margaux for the table and two Glenfiddich 40s neat for us men.

  A little water on the side with the scotch, sir?

  No. And don’t pour us drams either. Fill them up.

  IT’S PAST MIDNIGHT when the tired captain comes over and suggests, after many compliments, that we might enjoy the services of the spa better tomorrow if we call it an evening—just a suggestion, of course. Paul orders him to bring out a bottle of Louis XIII and four cognac glasses. Then Paul makes him join us for a drink.

  I’ve never met anyone with enough money or power to make a captain, waiter, and bartender stay three hours past closing on Christmas night. I can only imagine the tips Paul leaves.

  As the three of us stumble along the lantern-lit path toward the bungalow, Tara says the garden statues look like they want to dance with us. I grab the arm of a bronze boy holding a daisy and do a grapevine one-step but he doesn’t want to dance. I run to catch up with Paul and Tara. I say,

  Paul, what about that guy trying to cut our drinks off tonight? Who gets cut off in a place like this anyway? We do. That’s who!

  That’s right, buddy, he says, we do. I can buy this place tonight and fire them all and they know it.

  Tara just whistles.

  We enter the suite. I stretch out on the couch beside the fire and look at my Rolex. The diamonds glow in the soft light of the flames. Paul and Tara sit in a loveseat across from me. They light a joint. I haven’t smelled marijuana since college.

  Paul nods in my direction. Tara brings the joint over and sits on the edge of the couch beside my head. She’s light—the cushions don’t sink at all. She holds the joint to my lips. I take in a long pull of hot, acrid smoke, holding it in as long as I can until I cough it out.

  Tara leans down and kisses me. I push into her kiss. Her tongue searches my mouth. She tastes sweet. She grabs my hand and cups it on her perfect breast. Paul says,

  You can do anything you want, except fuck her!

  I pull my mouth away from Tara and look up. Paul is smiling down at me with a camera in his hand. He says,

  If you fuck her I’ll castrate you, you got that? But you can do anything else. And whatever you do, look like you’re enjoying it.

  I wriggle out from beneath Tara and jump to my feet. I say,

  It’s late. I really should go now.

  Tara takes my hand, holds up the Rolex, smiles. You got your Christmas present, she says, now it’s time for me to unwrap mine.

  Then she pulls me into the bedroom. She unbuttons my shirt and peels it off my shoulders. Then she slips off her dress, steps out of it and slides onto the bed naked.

  24 A Forgotten Prayer

  Sun pours through the open windows and warms the soft white bed linens as I drift in and out of weightless sleep. I’m floating on a cloud. Memories pass beneath me like a silent movie I saw in another life. I smell wood smoke from a distant fire and it reminds me of summer camp when I was 10.

  ~~~

  I don’t remember where the camp was, but I remember it took Mom two hours to drive there. I pretended to be sick because I didn’t want to go, but Mom laid me down in the back of our old station wagon
with a blanket and pillow. It felt good to close my eyes and listen to the hum of highway rolling by beneath the floorboard. I remember hoping we would never stop. Knowing my mother was driving made me feel safe—nothing could touch us, we were invincible.

  I was terrified when she dropped me off. In one hand, I held an envelope with $20 for the candy commissary, in the other I held two weeks’ worth of clothes stuffed in a duffel.

  They put me in a cabin with five older boys. The next morning everyone went to the lake. I stayed in the cabin pretending to still be sick. A camp counselor came to see me. I wish I knew his name but everyone just called him Red because he had red hair. The other kids said he was a volleyball coach or something, but I thought maybe he was in the movies because he always said, That’s the ticket.

  Red sat on the edge of my bed. He didn’t ask me what was wrong. Instead, he told me about his first time at camp. He said he was scared of the other kids because he wet the bed. He said he was scared of a woman counselor because he thought she was pretty. And he said he was scared of the horses just because. I’d never heard a man admit he was afraid of anything before. When I told him I couldn’t swim, he laughed. It wasn’t a mean laugh—it was a no big-deal laugh. He said he’d teach me to swim and he did. By the second week, I was jumping off the cliff into the lake. I got a ribbon for most-improved swimmer and Red pinned it on my shirt, smiled and said, That’s the ticket.

  The last night there, we built a bonfire by the lake. I was sad to be going home. Everyone was. The headman stood in front of the fire with his walking staff and talked to us about Jesus. Then he asked whoever was willing to make a decision to give his life over to God to come up and say a prayer. Red was looking back and smiling at me. I felt like he wanted me to go and I couldn’t let him down. I was the first to stand and walk to the edge of the bonfire.