Here too, a reefdog adapts, wincing a bit less when he sees the red car glaring brighter than the sun. The brilliant redness blinds and annoys but it’s sometimes fun, and it’s a car—just a fucking car, like a beater Tercel used to be, what basic transportation came to, and that’s all it is. He’d throw some tanks and gear in back if he had a reef nearby.
The turnaround perspective comes out of the blue, as it were, in a lightning bolt of insight and understanding. Celebrity by this time has become a challenge, then a burden, then a bad feeling of life forsaken in swarms of fans, with the dashing red car a homing beacon on their hero. Ravi avoids certain routes that will surely expose him to more of the same, routes through thick fan habitat—fans whose loss of personal identity has left them bereft of anything but the stars to look up to. They stop in their tracks to point a finger and utter his name. He qualifies as a sighting.
One early evening when the radio announces triple fender benders at three exits in a row on just the freeway he needs to get home in less than an hour, he takes the low road, to try for an hour and a half.
Somewhere on the fringe of West Hollywood, headed for Santa Monica, he approaches a group of young prostitutes in a known sex-zone. They yell at the likely john in the hundred grand car who could splurge on a five-bill blowjob and not even feel it—that would be the money he wouldn’t feel, not the blowjob; oh, baby. A guy in a red Jag ragtop might not even feel a five-bill tip. He won’t return their gaze, even as traffic slows to a crawl, and soon he’s near the line-up of tawdry boys in short shorts, heavy eyeliner and other facial pastes, putties, and colors. The scene is busy, garish and colorful like a reef but not so innocent. Violent spawning and unnatural acts form their own dark order. This is depravity in its lowest form as a means to an end. Well, one of the lowest forms, around here.
A furtive boy steps off the curb to put both hands on the passenger door and say, “You’re the fish guy. Ravi Rockulz.” Ravi looks up casually enough and can’t help a double take—is that rosacea or rouge over Kaposi’s? What difference does it make, except to the young man? It could make a difference to him and surely must. The boy says, “I love you—no, I mean, I really do. I love your fish. You make me want to be a fish. I want to be you. God.” And he yells to the other boys in the shrill excitement of a genuine siting, “Hey! It’s the fish guy! It’s Ravi!”
So the boys of the evening gather round, chattering like birds roosting at dusk, with their bangles, half t-shirts and flaunted emotions—unusual boys going stranger still when they morph in macro, leaning into the car. Up close in lingering daylight Ravi sees the soiled life. But they are not the living dead; they’re up and at it, surviving another day, as people must, on dollars earned. They gather without shame, quickly slipping out of character, shedding lascivious postures to become fans in appreciation of the fish guy and what he does and where he’s been and how he thinks, as if a fish guy is different from other guys, as if the fish guy knows, sees and feels what is dear to them. And this is a reef, maybe, and he’s here.
An indelible imprint on Ravi Rockulz’s showbiz career careens out of nowhere on a salacious, disturbed boy whose lipstick is smudged over one cheek from recent service or as suggestive merchandizing. “I got the big one, you know. It’s so huge. I love that. I get off about three. I mean, unless it’s really busy, you know. People don’t realize how hard we work. We’re like everybody else. I used to be homeless, but now I have a place and a few things, now that I suck cock, you know. Anyhoo, you know, I can buy things now, too, and I like to open my book, your book, when I get home. It makes me feel, you know, so… I can’t really tell you what it makes me feel, but it’s so good.” The boy is twenty, give or take, and could have been a stunt double to Leonardo DiCaprio—same puffy face, sandy hair swept sideways, ski nose and baby blues. Unless… Unless he’s more spot on for Johnny Depp, considering the eyeliner and method insanity in every posture, move, and word. And he cries, just as Ravi cried on cleaving emotion—cried for something unnameable but knowable, rare and of the greatest value.
The wayward boys on the driver’s side touch the fish guy in appreciation of his gift or in order to say they did. One caresses his hair. One offers to pay five bills to suck off the fish guy, and he laughs nervously, sincerely. Most of the rest laugh too, waiting to see if the fish guy will. Offering thanks all around with a quick nod, Ravi peers ahead to traffic, starting to move. Even a crawl would ease him out of this bind, and so it does. So he says thanks again in gratitude to such great fans, and that’s that, except for the boy who gets home late and feels good, looking at fish pics.
“Thank you, Ravi! You’re so great. And I love your car. It’s a flame angel, just like you. Please come and see us again. Okay?”
Ravi waves, as the flow picks up to twenty-five for another half hour, giving a waterman time to ponder the strange ways of God or Neptune or whomever, finally reaching an on-ramp beyond fender benders. It’s some crazy fucked up shit all right. But those guys… those guys back there. Man. How can they get it so well and wind up so far from clear, blue water?
Fan appreciation is the lifeblood of the industry and can come where least expected. The tawdry boys are not polite subject matter for a talk show or even with associates, who may have spent a grand or two on that very same strip, making them what, any different than the boys? But not sharing fan appreciation does not diminish the value of the fans. The tawdry boys are victims of a tawdry world, but a glimmer shines through. Sexual innuendo notwithstanding, Ravi’s little secret is that he loves those guys because of what they saw and had to say about it and mostly for their appreciation—for the time they took to feel the magic below sea level, as conveyed in the work. At least one of those guys lets himself go thousands of miles, away to a reef in his mind. That guy sees the light, and that is attitude—his attitude connecting to my attitude. That guy gets it, and that’s a laugh, considering what else he must get.
•
The studio techs help again with street cover for anonymity, mobility, privacy and a normal life or approximation thereof. A baseball cap, shades, and a three-day growth restore the amazing reefdog to life among commuters and consumers. Newly amazed at this dreamy place, this phantasmagoria seeking realization—this LA—he feels many people staring, but it’s not just at him. They stare at every anonymous pedestrian in three-day growth, baseball cap, and shades, knowing that greatness is strolling down the street casual as you please, if only they can find it.
Is that you?
In collective anonymity, everybody looks famous, maybe, kinda sorta. A few look like bit players, so familiar but hard to place. Some capture the beauty and loss of souls unbound, seeking a role and reasonable direction. Do you realize the potential here?
Among faces drawn in comedy and tragedy are huge talents awaiting discovery at street level. The dry cleaner no longer looks like Charlie Chan or speaks of number one son; he animate and crazy as chop-socky original, martinize to modern specs.
The ice cream guy has scorpion tattoos on his neck and glares in searing drama through special contact lenses of incandescent blue for this audition, in case you happen to be or know or might be able to get in touch with…
Waiters, waitresses, cab drivers, clerks and the whole service army wear second hats over their first, ready for the break because it will come. Until then, they’re kindred spirits, backstage. “Hey. You’re the fish guy. Right on, man. You’re terrific.”
Recognition does feel good—a certain return on effort, until he hears the recognition and turns, to see that the guy recognized looks amazingly like the fish guy but is not. How could he be? I’m the fish guy. I wear a disguise, and for what? So some nebbish can claim the glory? Fuck.
This too is unsettling, till later that night. Reviewing his work, as many artists do, critiquing or trying to see what a viewer might see, Ravi stops on a dazzling plate, a shot for sore eyes, a bell-ringer in brilliant red. Normally a shy fish, this flame angel presents the classic mu
g, front and a bit off-center. Fish are presumed cold, but this fish is hot on a point. This flame’s eyebrows bunch in consternation. Behind him peeking out, his mate waits. On a whim, Ravi checks the files for an earlier shot of a flame angel in profile. He prints it and in the morning drives down to the custom car place where the art crew takes a half hour to estimate cost of four black bars on each side of the red Jaguar. Nobody questions the request because art is a private statement of values. It can get oblique in La La, but who are we to say, uh, anything? The bid is twelve thousand “to do it right.” Ravi says he’ll ponder the work, but on his way home he buys a four-inch brush and a gallon of black in satin finish for sixty bucks.
It seems crazy to hand-paint a car of such magnitude, and that feels good—compensatory and counterbalanced. Yes, it’s a car, just a car, and now it will show the values we hold dear. For most viewers, the dearest value is industry success, which is obvious if the driver is a known face and apparent if he’s in a Jag. He could be a producer or casting wizard or special effects guru on the very best crashes, explosions, catastrophes, and cyborgs.
Ravi Rockulz is a face from the talk circuit, eminently known and just as recognizable. Hey, it’s the fuckin fish guy! Recognition is mostly annoying, so he gets the hat and shades and boom! The fish guy is a different guy, stealing the juice, and that’s more annoying. So the real fish guy holds a seventeen by twenty flame angel print in one hand and a four-inch brush in the other. Four fell strokes put paint on steel slick as eel snot for perfect black bars easy as no effort at all. Clean and simple as Neptune’s calligraphy, the four bars render something more than a car, what a car. It’s more fun for starters, transcending value and even upping the bucks on one-off identity and a star-studded past. The other side is more difficult, with perfection so casually stumbled onto. But he goes snake-eyed and breathes deep and slow and lets the flame flow from the bristles to the car. He recalls his first difficult cruise in the red Jag and feels corrected, at home on the urban reef. He feels the idea, on the way to Oybek’s office, where he shares his epiphany on entering.
Oybek’s receptionist listens patiently and says the phenomenon of non-constraint is growing in leaps and bounds, and in many cases can be seen as a classic illustration of the Oybekian influence. “It’s like you, painting a Jaguar with black stripes by hand. I get what you’re trying to say. We’ve suffered so long. We keep ourselves locked up inside. Look at the surge in special effects studios. We used to have two that supplied the industry for decades. Now we have a few hundred. You can pooh-pooh explosions and wrecks as the death of drama, but they’re not. They’re an extension of drama. Take the golden age and Joan Crawford. She’s my all-time fave. I can’t tell you what it was, but she had it… Oh… Excuse me. Mr. Navbahor will see you now.” The receptionist smooths a bushy brow and bats his lashes. “Now that lady threw some hand grenades. God.”
“Thanks, but they’re black bars, not stripes. Bars are vertical. Stripes are horizontal.”
Oybekian?
Such is the show that never ends. The contract on Oybek’s desk is thick with caveats, subordinations, sub-rights, exceptions, conditions and continuing permutations. Oybek squeezes all but the last page between thumb and forefinger and says, “Standard. I review same with your best interest in my mind. Good for you. Okay by me.” He folds the stack back and lays it flat on his desk for signature.
Many people between Oybek’s front door and the inner sanctum lingered in the hallway to praise Ravi’s fabulous launch, which gives him a fabulous foundation on which to build; just you watch. So he signs off. “Now you see. We make magic. Presto. From nozzing, we get rabbit out of hat. You see.”
A month later the same TV talk shows want Ravi again. Other producers say they didn’t take the fish guy seriously. Now they do. They want—they stipulate—that the fish guy be the fish guy and appear in mask, fins, and snorkel because nobody needs all that water-in-the-tank business with the knock ’em sock ’em scuba gear and the clunky camera stuff. For what? We need him, the fish guy. We need him to show the body of artistic pursuit. That’s where we’re going with this.
Oybek masterfully declines all offers, then triumphantly resists all offers, then reluctantly agrees to see what he can do. Ravi merely declines, so the talks are off. Then they’re on again—okay, no mask fins and snorkel on stage, and hey, no need to be so testy. Okay?
The world wants Ravi, especially those women sitting beside him on the guest couch. But if celebrity status went toxic, sexual objectification is worse. He has used and been used, but as a human, not as fantasy gratification. He belches, farts and picks his nose to calm them down, but they rave for more.
It gets worse. One odd host is known for esoteric humor but depends mostly on puns and bad plays on good ideas, like calling reef society the same as LA without the tuna smell. Get it? Ravi does not throttle him but rises like a tiger to chum. He grabs the host by the lapels and says, “You’re not funny.” The host shrivels and the fish guy exits, aware of media exposure boring in. Never mind—cut to commercial like it never happened. But the lunge and grab boost the fish guy’s stock, and a producer calls with a million-dollar idea for The Jerry Springer Show, where a bunch of pregnant trailer-trashers will yell that the fish guy is the father. Then he can join the brawl.
It’s funny but pitiful, and besides, “We don’t need his million.” Absence of need is the best icing on the showbiz cake. Ravi Rockulz could scratch his ass left-handed and pump ratings, and so he does because the show has gone sour. Oybek plays it as he must, calling for a reprieve—it’s time for the fish guy to visit some fish.
They head to the Bahamas for starters, to tie in with another money-maker. The fish guy cruises Nassau streets declining beautiful hookers, till one of them pulls a ThinSkinz rubber from behind her ear, so the fish guy steps back for a fresh assessment—cut to commercial on ThinSkinz. Then to Car Lust: We Make Car Buying More Fun than You Know What! Then the usual panoply: ab enhancers, fat pills, hemorrhoid ointment and boner pills for when you’re in the mood and don’t want to find a bathroom. They shore things up with terrific cleavage, a few camel toes and winning smiles. Ratings aren’t bad. Nothing Fishy in Nassau won’t go to sequel, but it won’t bomb. He gets in a day of reef photography but not a second day—they’re flying out to the Virgins. Will that be fantastic or what?
Island hopping to Martinique is a dead reef medley of brown algae and effluvia, treated and untreated. Living coral is a mile out but will move by next year to a mile and a quarter. Ravi the fish guy shoots dead reef, but what’s the market for that?
Minna goes along, regretting postponement of her professional career on the one hand but loving the scenery, travel and glamour on the other. Let’s face it: she’s a natural. She loves telling the camera she married Ravi years ago and he’s been just as hot ever since. She declines the inevitable offer that comes over the transom then, though it’s been telegraphed, predicted and mildly lobbied for a while—a center spread, such as it is. It’s pitched as art, only art, but the ohana back home wouldn’t see it that way. Ravi plays open-minded but is secretly pleased with her decision. He surprises her with a triple-header to the Maldives, Truk, and Colombo, but she declines that too. But she should reconsider because the Indian Ocean will be free of hookers, producers, and tourist noise and will allow them to…
“I’m preggers.”
“Wha?”
“You’re surprised?”
•
Yet again, a story might end on happily ever after or trickle to the near future when the beautiful young family buys a place in Malibu with an incredible loan package designed for rich people who need help because they’re not yet wealthy. Oybek’s money guy designed the package as a stress-free exercise that’s made him the talk of the neighborhood, and it’s not just any neighborhood.
Stephan Otis Monihan calls the place simply fab. “It ain’t Tahiti, okay? But LA does have some stimuli to jump your neurons if you give it half a chan
ce. And this neighborhood… God!” Stephan Otis is tediously optimistic on every subject under the sun and calls La La the greatest opportunity goldmine anywhere because it is what it is. Ravi asks where is what it isn’t. Stephan Otis chuckles, “Surely you know that apparent reality is best not confused with that yet to be actualized.”
“Surely. But it is millions of fucked up people, if you’re paying attention.”
“Okay, Mister Fish. But I’ll tell you something: some of those people, including yours truly, are very busy finding ourselves and getting well.” Stephan Otis brushes a shoulder that has no lint and smooths his shirt. “We’re smart people. We have the money thing worked out. We want more, and that’s called evolution.”
“Sorry, Stephan. I didn’t mean to ruffle your feathers.”
“I’m not used to it, but I get it. I have no feathers. And please, call me Stephan Otis. Monihan. I made the last name up. Get it? Money—moni… han. You’d be amazed how much money I’ve made for flaky people who can’t remember my name. I suppose Stephan is a more popular name now, but there’s only one Stephan Otis, so if you don’t mind, it really helps me out. Okay?” Ravi doesn’t mind, but he doesn’t say it, so Stephan Otis asks again, “Okay?”
“Yeah, fuck it, whatever.”
Stephan Otis calls the house quirky but harmless and definitely doable. He raises an eyebrow on double meaning. “Are you kidding me? On the beach at Malibu for seven point seven. Get out! Would you look at these views?”
Reefdog Page 27
