Access Unlimited

by Alice Severin

  He had told me half the story that night. I hadn’t pressed for the rest. When he finally gave more details, leaking them out like tears quickly swept away, I knew he was grateful that I remembered everything he had told me before. The shorthand was enough. I knew what he meant. I wasn’t sure how anyone could forget.

  Tristan had the cab pull up on the corner, and we got out. “Come on. There’s a nice little wine bar near here.”

  “Won’t they recognize you?”

  “Probably. But then again that means we get a seat.” He grinned. “I think I deserve a bit of pampering, don’t you?” He took my hand and led me to a grey door.

  “Turks and Frogs?” I asked.

  Tristan shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”

  “Cacik and Camembert?”

  He laughed. “Something like that. Come on, it’ll be fun.” He pushed open the door, and sure enough, the second the bartender behind the small wood bar spotted Tristan, he stopped pouring and put down the bottle. Gesturing to the server, he handed her a white plastic “reserved” sign and pointed to the small table in the corner, against the bookshelves. A collection of thick white candles, all burnt down to various heights, were reflected in the big ornate mirror. The yellow light flickered against the red painted wallpaper.

  The server wiped down the table, and stopped two people from sitting down. The couple who had been waiting put up a mild protest to the bartender, who shrugged. “Sorry. Oversight. That table’s been reserved all night.” The man started to get irate. The bartender offered him and his girlfriend a place at the bar, and a free glass of wine. They walked past us, unaware, vowing never to return. Tristan ignored them, and went up to the bartender. “Chris. Cheers. Sorry about that.”

  He pulled out a wine list and handed it to Tristan. “Good to see you, Tristan. Glad you’re here. Hey, they were tourists. The table was already reserved. And a free glass of wine. Who turns that down?” He looked at me. “Why don’t you and…”

  Tristan stopped him. “Lily. This is the divine Lily. Lils, meet Chris. Pours a mean glass of wine. Can really open a bottle too.”

  Chris laughed. “Too kind. Nice to meet you, Lily. Mi casa, su casa and all that.”

  I shook his hand, which was slightly wet from taking the glasses out of the dishwasher. Tristan ordered a bottle of Sancerre and a mezze plate, and his arm firmly around me, guided me over to the small table in the corner. By this time, everyone in the place had seen him, and if they hadn’t known who he was before, their friends were telling them in stage whispers. I looked around, and the first person I saw stared at me, then quickly turned away. I smiled at Tristan, and stopped looking around. He was still more used to this than I was.

  After a glass of the very good wine, Tristan looked more relaxed. “I got them back. That’s what counts.” He swirled the wine around in his glass. “A bit of excitement. Probably needed. But I’m glad we got there in time.”

  “Yes,” I replied. “And tracking down who did it?”

  Tristan looked tense again. I was sorry I’d brought it up. “I need to speak to Trevor. He’s a master of revenge, really.” He saw my expression, and reached for my hand. “No, kidding. Really. But he does know how to solve puzzles. An excellent judge of character as well. As I’ve learned.”

  “He’s a complicated man.”

  “Trevor? He is that. But underneath it all, he knows what counts. I’d trust him with my life.” Tristan laughed, quietly. “I have.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. “We’ll see him in a couple of days. In California.”

  Tristan smiled, that dazzling, flirty smile that was designed to get him everything he wanted, and usually worked. I’d learned it could also be his way of changing the subject. Making people forget what they had asked. “One more day of rest. Fortunately. I’m not sure I can keep up this pace.”

  I winked at him. “I’m sure you can keep it up as long as you like.”

  He smirked, his eyes alight. “At least now I know.”

  “What?” I asked.

  Tristan leaned back in his seat, his body suddenly elongated and very much on display. He raised his glass and gave me a sideways glance, a half-smile playing around his mouth. “What we’re doing tomorrow.”

  chapter twenty-two

  L.A.

  L.A. It’s like the garden of the kings in mythology. An untamed paradise of long boulevards and tall palm trees, bungalows carved out of hillsides, desert and mountain and sky, all leading down to the sea in a ritual of primeval worship. Except the gods are money—as usual, and sex—the airbrushed, oddly buoyant kind, and power—the silent kind, everywhere, like oxygen, and exerting its pressure just like the emptiness in your lungs when you don’t breathe in. It’s in the shortcuts that are available to certain people, there to remind you of a different track than the one you’re on when you look up, exhausted, from your so-called honest ways. It’s where a child grows up in privilege and is handed the keys to the kingdom, along with your dull obedience. Some do work for it, determined to make second or third generation success be more than just an accident of birth. And a few simply wind up there, out on the far coast, having fought their way to the top on the colder side of the country, any country. The pleasures of cruelty insure that once the fortunate ones dance on the top of the big candy mountain, we get to hear any reversal, amplified, the sound of their fingernails ripping out as they desperately cling on. Others just open the big candy store and we finally hear the real story after the ultimate failure of their last trip to rehab. It is the land of fantasy, even—or especially—if that fantasy is a disaster. Drag it out now, entertain us.

  Tristan leaving to lick his wounds elsewhere, depriving the media machine of the joys of watching him lying in the gutter, hadn’t endeared him to the place. His ex-wife and her contacts, and whatever vendetta she might wish to conjure up now that we were both on her turf made me very wary of what we were going to find here. I crossed the arrival hall slightly behind Tristan, and listened for the first salvo. I didn’t have long to wait. The photographer we came across in the airport yelled out over the echoing floors and walls to look his way. When that didn’t work¸ he came closer, snapping away. When we didn’t pay attention to him, he called out to me. “Lily, Lily, come on sweetheart, you know how to smile.” We ignored him. He followed. Then he tried a different approach. “Lily, how are you going to stack up against the ladies out here? They all know how to work it.” The giant bodyguard the airport or airline had provided, I wasn’t sure which, placed himself between us and his mouth and the lens. We carried on, once again reminded that sunglasses only block the light.

  Walking through LAX, I thought how sometimes the pictures of a place are like the trailer—only the best parts, and the rest is fairly dull. So far, it didn’t feel like Hollywood. I didn’t know what I was expecting—it was just an airport. But when Tristan noticed how on edge I was from the encounter with the sleazeball camera hound, he squeezed my hand quickly, and murmured. “You’re doing fine. Try not caring—they smell fear. It’s a lagoon of piranhas out here.” And he winked at me. I tried to relax my shoulders. I’d signed up for the whole funfair ride. The drop was only a part of it.

  The bodyguard led us out to the front, and handed us over to the not as large but almost more intimidating rent-a-cop-slash-driver, who looked a little bit like he’d been a Top Gun and survived a crash of some kind. He was menacingly good looking, with a scar that peeked out the top of his mirrored shades, and ran down his cheek, across his lips, and disappeared under his chin somewhere. He and the bodyguard nodded to each other, and the exchanged look of mutual respect that they took the time to engage in, was very different from the one the driver proceeded to give us. Tristan was, as usual, in black jeans, a leather jacket, a white t-shirt, a collection of necklaces and bracelets of different colors and materials circling the smooth veined skin. And there was
me, my look now incorporating most of the rock star girlfriend clichés. The boots with a heel. My own collection of necklaces, including the one Tristan had placed around my neck that fateful night in the LES bar. A chiffon blouse under a new leather jacket that Tristan had bought for me in New York. Blue tinted metal framed sunglasses. And a self-protective air of both arrogance and irony that seemed to be rubbing off on me. Judging from the stares that met me every time I looked around, apparently I was getting better at the act. I wondered when it would stop being a game of pretend. Maybe it already had.

  Tristan introduced himself and shook hands with the driver, smiling in my direction as I gave a little wave, which seemed to unfreeze the atmosphere somewhat. After the driver put our bags in the trunk of the 1960s convertible Caddy Tristan had insisted on renting—we climbed in the back seat, and the roar and rumble of the old 8 cylinder engine felt like the ignition stage of a Saturn V-5 launch. I adjusted my sunglasses, and braced myself.

  “Freddy, we’re ready for take-off,” Tristan laughed, and pulled me closer to him, as we pulled out of the loading zone. “Let’s do this right. First stop—In N’Out Burger. Something on the way.” Tristan had rented a place out in Silver Lake, the hipster paradise on the other side of the 101 from West Hollywood. We were due to spend two weeks out here while Tristan did promotion, played a couple of invite-only acoustic shows with AC in conjunction with some radio stations, and hopefully get to relax a little before the big awards show. Tristan had been emphatic. “Yes, I’ll get a driver,” he had said to Trevor on the phone from New York, “and a limo for the appearances, naturally, but we’re not going to sit at home and wait for party invitations. L.A. parties,” and he made a face, “don’t make me do nothing but. I’d like to try and actually have some fun.” Trevor had flown out the day before, but he was staying in a hotel, even though Tristan had tried to convince him to stay with us. We had both been on the phone with him on a conference call so he could speak to us about this promotional section of the tour. His response had been classic Trevor.

  “L.A. isn’t a place I come to often enough to cushion the blow. When I’m there, I want to feel the poison. All of it. Running through my blood. Speeding up my heart just to slow it down, fatally. Clearly, I need a hotel.”

  Tristan had just laughed. I thought it was a little too close to home. Trevor was joking—mostly. But so much temptation—it couldn’t be denied. I wanted to resist asking Tristan what it was like to be back here. But driving around the endless loops of concrete off-ramps filled with a steady stream of cars each containing one impatient person, I couldn’t wait.

  “Tristan.” Then I faltered. The last thing I needed was to sound like some jealous, worried girlfriend, busy laying down the boundaries, secretly wondering what happened when she wasn’t around, if the appeal was still there. Honesty. Right. Mostly.

  “What’s wrong, Lil? You’ve got that look on your face again.” He squeezed my hand. “It’s going to be fine, really.” He looked at me again. “Let me guess.” He looked up at the sky for a moment, and ran his hand through his hair in that way he had, his long fingers twining with the dark strands. Against the backdrop of unfamiliarity, it made him look more like an image, the icon he was. I didn’t know why that made me feel better. It shouldn’t have. “You’re worried, that here, where it all went a bit tits up for me, I’m going to be tempted. And indulge. And stray. And with Trevor here, and AC, it will be easy to give all of you the slip, and go say hello to some old friends of the chemical sexual kind.”

  I glanced down, then away. A Mercedes convertible was passing us. The blonde woman with her gloved hands on the wheel looked like an advertisement for every excess California promised.

  Tristan followed my look. “Exactly. That’s it. All promise. All of it. And for people who haven’t been there, and seen into the black heart of it, it’s extremely alluring.” He took my hand. “I’m not going to lie. As far as the drugs go, it’s always going to be there. That tug. In fact, out here, where it’s so easy, just too easy, I’ve got to be careful.”

  I frowned. “Tristan…”

  “Lily, I’m not a saint. I’m a person. Surrounded by people who want things, who are ready to offer me whatever they think I want, or whatever they want to give, as a way of getting what they want or need. Sometimes they guess right.” He squeezed my hand again. “I have you. That’s what I really need. I trust you to remind me of what’s important.”

  I shook my head. “Tristan. Gatekeeper and girlfriend. That’s a tricky combo.” I took a breath. “You’re expecting a lot of me.”

  He smiled, in that way that was both reassurance and challenge, the slight crook of his mouth balanced out by a certain darkness around his eyes. “Yes. Yes I am. And maybe it’s not fair, but here we are. In the looking glass, down the rabbit hole, whatever it is. And you’ve been there too, so you know what it’s like.” Tristan pulled me towards him, and I rested my head on his shoulder. “I can’t do it without you.”

  I stayed there, and he kept his arm around me, and silently, we watched the road, and the cars going by, the rolling stop-start of the traffic locking us into the rhythm of the city. Tristan only held me tighter when the motion of the car made me shift position, and we moved together. It was a silent conversation, and the warmth of his body seemed a little like a guarantee.

  After a while, we turned off the highway, and we were on roads that still were like freeways—car-controlled stretches always leading away, never towards. Then we were right in the heart of it, and everything looked familiar because it was. Wherever you looked it seemed like it had been in a movie or a TV show, or maybe some music video. The total picture made you wonder what would happen if you leaned on the surface, if everything would fall backwards, revealing dust, scaffolding, discarded paint cans.

  And then we were driving on Sunset Boulevard, and the big sun was going down behind us, and the artificial lights were coming up. I was driving in a convertible, with a beautiful man, the background of the deepening sky bringing out the sharp lines of his nose and his jaw, solid, strong, the sparkling lights reflected in his dark sunglasses. The twilight smelled warm, faintly like dry sand, the crisp acrid smell of old car exhaust adding a strange urgency to the coming night.

  Even the little red palm trees on the packet of French fries, and the neon glare of the burger place, in all its garish glory, didn’t erase that image from my mind.

  * * *

  Trevor, amazingly enough, was waiting for us at the little bungalow Tristan had rented, standing at the door, with what looked like a gin and tonic in his hand. Tristan went up to him and gave him a huge hug, while Trevor looked over his shoulder at me. He raised his eyebrows, and pointed to Tristan’s head with his free hand, but his crooked smile was real. Tristan whispered something in his ear, then kissed his cheek, and Trevor laughed. “But you don’t like gin,” he responded to whatever Tristan had told him. He came over to me and awkwardly bent down to wrap me in a hug. I squeezed him tightly, and I felt him relax, pleased. We kissed, half cheek, half ear. But we were done with the air kissing.

  The driver brought the bags up, and we all went inside. We sent the driver home—it was unlikely we were going anywhere tonight. Trevor had a bottle of champagne out, and an oddly shaped rectangular pizza covered in artichokes, olives, capers, and arugula salad was on the dining table. That part of the house looked like it used to be a porch, and had been covered over with windows, like a greenhouse. The sliding doors were open, and it was warm, but not unpleasantly so.

  Trevor smiled. “All organic. Thought you needed something healthy.”

  “You know me too well. We just stopped at In N’Out. But this looks fantastic.” Tristan glanced up at Trevor. “You’re staying here tonight, of course.”

  Trevor shook his head, and a momentary flash of worry crossed Tristan’s face. “I’m…,” Trevor gestured to the outdoors, “staying for din
ner. Naturally. I picked it out. And I will be back in the morning. We’ve got some logistics to work on, I’m afraid.” He walked over to the champagne and began to unwrap the top. “But you two need some space, and I’m a creature of habit, so.” The cork came out with a satisfying pop, and Trevor poured it out into three flutes that were waiting by the ice bucket. He handed them out, and raised his glass. “To success. Without stress.”

  We clinked our glasses. Tristan looked relieved. But he downed his in one go. “Oh, that’s good. How can champagne go so well with hamburgers and pizza? How did they know?” He laughed. “I’m going to go wash off the plane. Be right back.” We both followed his long form as he headed back to the door. “No, don’t tell me. I’ll find it.” And he went around the corner and out of sight.

  Trevor turned to me. “He doesn’t look too bad. Any drugs?”

  “Maybe. But not a lot. He wants to, but so far I think he’s managed to restrict it to mostly drinking. He asked AC to score for him that night in Dallas, but I think that was down to the events. No visible signs, but he knows how to hide it.”

  Trevor looked thoughtfully at his glass. “I’ll find out. And AC?”

  I glanced at Trevor. Then at my glass, which was suddenly empty. I walked over to the table and refilled it. “Which part?”

  Trevor gazed at me, a deep line between his brows. “That’s all you needed to say, my dear. Are you all right, that’s the next question…” he looked up. “For the guest of honor. Come drink some champagne. Are you going to surf? That’s really what the fans want to know.”