“Now comes the good part, yeah?”
“Yeah, oh yeah. So I take an Uber to his condo, which was probably worth triple the house I grew up in, in Connecticut. Big, open concept, super modern, all black and white and stainless steel, couches worth more than cars, the works.”
“Sounds hideous.”
I laughed. “Honestly, it was. But it screamed money, which was the point.”
“I knew a guy from Dubai,” Errol said. “Family was worth billions. He said something I’ll never forget—if you’ve got to talk, walk, dress, act, and drive like you’ve got money, then you don’t have real money. He had a garage chockablock with supercars, like a quarter-mil minimum for the cheapest one. And his condo was a penthouse, and his clothes were nice, but if you didn’t know he was worth several fortunes, you wouldn’t know. Screaming ‘I’ve got mad money’ just means you’re only rich enough to fake it.”
I thought about that. “You know, that sounds about right. His family had enough to own penthouses in New York, which cost enough that they had pretty serious money, but not billions. That’s a different level.” I waved a hand. “It impressed me, is the point. Growing up, we weren’t poor, not by a long shot, but not, like, rich, not on Teague’s level, and certainly not your Dubai friend’s level. We were comfortable and certainly privileged. But this condo had my jaw dropping. You could see most of Central Park from it, which is a pretty enviable thing. So I get there, and he’s got a whole, like, wing of his condo set up as a studio, with custom ventilation, an industrial canvas stretcher…and this whole huge cyc setup like he was about to film an ad for, like, Apple or something.”
“A psych?” He asked. “What’s that?”
“C-Y-C, cyc, short for cyclorama. The plain white backgrounds they use in videos and such so it looks like you’re in an all-white room. It’s a huge piece of white cloth, essentially. You can rig one lots of ways in a pinch, but a pro cyc setup costs serious money, and he had a pro set up. Including a chaise lounge for me to sit on, covered by the cyc.”
“So he wasn’t fucking around.”
“Showing off, you mean. That should have been my first clue. I’d come prepared for just about anything, but I was hoping he’d say nude so I could use that as a jumping-off point for the seduction part of the day. And he did not disappoint. He got this big smirk, like a real shit-eating grin, and he was like, ‘so, you up for a nude portrait?’ I thought it was a shoo-in. Pose nude, he’d like what he’d see, we’d have some fun, and I’d be over the stupid crush.”
“He batted for the other team?” Errol suggested.
“What, like he was gay? No, I knew for a fact he liked women—as I said, I had it on good authority, meaning I’d spoken to his ex, who had been more than happy to share details. So no, he played for my team. So, I say sure, I’ll pose nude. Strip down, sit on the chaise lounge. He goes to work, does the sketch, and then starts painting. I’m waiting for him to make the move, right? I provide the in, he just has to take the hint. Like, why the hell else would I agree to pose nude for a classmate for a portrait assignment? I knew his style, and he didn’t go in for shock stuff, he was super classical. The day wears on, and I’m still just posing, a pretty conventional portrait pose, you know, lounging on the chaise, thigh over the other so you can’t quite see my hoo-hoo, elbow just here. Hours of posing. Like, when do we get to the fun part, right?” I sighed. “Never happened. He just went, ‘okay, I’m done, you can go.’ But he had this smirk. I was like, ‘So that’s it? We’re just done?’”
“He didn’t take the hint?”
“No, and I was still buck-ass naked, like, I could not have been any more obvious.”
“Had to be gay, in that case.”
I frowned. “What? No, I already told you—”
“Yeah, I know what you said,” Errol interrupted, “but I submit that no heterosexual male, faced with you, naked, all but throwing yourself at him, could or would remain unmoved. Therefore, gay.”
I eyed him sidelong. “You haven’t seen me naked, though.”
“More’s the pity, and not for wanting,” he muttered, and I wasn’t sure I was meant to hear it. “So what the hell was his game?” he asked.
“I wasn’t sure myself until the day we all turned in our work. He was last to present his. We all had these prepared presentations, right? Like talking about our influences and the style we chose and all that, but Teague? Walked up, stood next to the easel that had his portrait on it, covered with a piece of canvas. He hesitated for dramatic effect, and then whipped the canvas off.” I paused, recalling with uncomfortable clarity my horrified mortification at the time. “He’d done it as a direct copy of Titian’s Venus of Urbino. Which if you don’t know art history, is one of the most famous and scandalous nude portraits in history.” I slid my phone out of my purse and Googled the painting in question, the Titian version, I mean, and showed it to Errol.
He glanced at it, back at the road, at the image on my phone again, and then at me. “I see why it was scandalous.”
“The frank, unapologetic look in her eyes? The position of her hand?”
“And she’s not facing away or semi-modestly arranged. Just laying there all like, ‘look at me, I’m naked!’”
“Right. I’d assumed he’d do the modest version. Oh no. He did the Venus of Urbino. And he went further. He made it look like my fingers were unmistakably not just resting demurely over my crotch.” It was still embarrassing to think about. “And he exaggerated…certain features, like, into cartoon-level absurdity. Made me look like a porn star with beach ball-sized tits, fingering myself.”
Errol glanced at me. “Why exaggerate perfection?”
I looked at him—no grin, no jokey smirk. He was dead-ass serious.
He looked at me. I looked at him. Why exaggerate perfection? Three words, a genuine compliment. But the way he looked at me right then took it somewhere else. Not hitting on me. Something beyond that. Not undressing me with his eyes—nothing so simple or pedestrian as that.
I was going to fuck the blue out of his eyes, I realized. It was going to be world-class sex.
Not yet, though. I mean, I had to at least give it twelve hours from hello to naked. But with compliment comebacks like that, how could I refuse?
I mean, shit, all he’d have to do is look at me with those devilish blue eyes and say something clever in that delicious Kiwi accent, and I’d be naked and screaming in no time.
It would be purely physical, though. Purely. My heart had nothing to do with this whatsoever. I was traveling, he was traveling—our paths intersected for a while, we’d get some mutual satisfaction out of it, and then we’d go our separate ways and that would be that.
It felt like our eyes met for an eternity, felt like sparks flew thick and fierce as if someone had thrown a log on a campfire. In reality it was a matter of seconds, a mere heartbeat, and then he wrenched his eyes away and back to the road. Hand passed through his hair, he blew a sigh, scrubbed his beard, glanced back at me again ever so briefly, and if I wasn’t mistaken he mumbled something like “Gonna be in deep fuckin’ trouble with this one, ain’t I?”
Oh yes, Errol, you are. The best kind of trouble.
A long silence.
“He was a bastard.” Errol growled, eventually. “Pulling a cheap trick like that. What was his game?”
“His game was he was just an asshole. Thought he was nice, but I was mistaken. His ex told me he was a real asshole, but I chalked that up to her being a bitter ex. He’d caught wind somehow that I liked him, and figured he’d have fun with it. I was nowhere near his social status, and that meant I was not even worth sleeping with. I guess he only slept with girls who were his social equals, or nameless nobodies, and I was neither, so he just…had his fun fucking with me. Led me on, painted me, embarrassed me, and then didn’t give a shit. He got a shitty grade for the piece because Mrs. D knew exactly what he’d done and why, but he didn’t give a shit. He didn’t need the degree—he was set for life.
He was just taking classes for something to do until Daddy gave him the keys to the family business and the unlimited credit that went with it.”
“What’d you do? I mean, I know we only just met an hour ago, but you don’t strike me as the type to take that lying down.”
I chuckled. “Oh, I didn’t. I snuck into the art department, and repainted his codpiece to be much, much smaller. And I used the technique where, from most angles, it looks like there’s this odd smear on the painting, but from a specific angle it’s actually, like a skull or something. I put the word ‘prick’ under his feet so if you stood to one side and below it, you’d be able to read it. And then I borrowed a ladder from maintenance and hung the painting from the ceiling so, as you entered the art department, that word would be the first thing you saw.”
“You do not fuck around with revenge, do you?”
I laughed. “That was just the start of my revenge. I got his ex to help me steal and unlock his phone, and we made him a Grindr account soliciting dick pics to his personal cell number.”
“Oh, mate, that’s cold.”
“I snuck in after our finals were turned in and stole his final work, and hid it behind some props in the theater department. Got busted for that one, but it was worth the ten percent she docked from my final grade. That painting had been his opus for the year, he’d been working on it for months. I would never have harmed the thing, I’m not that much of a monster, but when he thought it had been stolen, he was sick with panic. He knew it was me, too. I played dumb until campus security showed Mrs. D footage of me sneaking around after hours. Messing with someone else’s work was a no-no, so I did get into trouble, but it was worth seeing that dickhead become a laughingstock.”
He laughed. “Still laughing about the Grindr thing.”
“Oh he was pissed. I guess he had been presenting in another class, using his phone connected to the projector to display something or other, and a giant dick pic popped up on the screen. Like, a big veiny monster cock, in a lecture hall full of students. He was the TA for the class, and he got fired for it. Couldn’t prove it was me, but he knew.” I cackled. “I did shit like that to him for months. Wrote his number on the stall wall of a bathroom, and I guess his phone blew up with strange-ass propositions all day for weeks until he figured it out and changed his number. Finally, he hauled me aside after class and apologized and begged me to stop. I told him he had to give me the painting, for one thing. And then I strongly hinted that a truce could be arranged if a Birkin bag somehow found its way into my possession.”
“You bribed him?”
“Sure. He embarrassed me, manipulated me, led me on, and pissed me off. Am I proud of myself for bribing him? No. Do I regret the pretty little Birkin that’s currently waiting for me at my mother’s condo in Alaska? Also no. Don’t cross me. I’m not nice when I’m angry.”
“Clearly,” Errol said, his voice droll. “Did you honor the truce?”
“Of course I did,” I said, aghast. “I’m an honorable woman, in my own way. If I give you my word, it’s good as gold. And I gave him my word—if I were to find myself suddenly in possession of a Birkin, the malicious sneak attacks would cease immediately and permanently.”
“And you have the painting?”
“Sure do. At Mom’s with the rest of my stuff I couldn’t travel with.”
“You kept it?”
I laughed. “Yeah, because it is a technically amazing piece. He’s a talented artist; he’s just an amoral cock-hair. I couldn’t destroy a work of art, no matter how personally embarrassing it is.”
Errol guffawed. “Amoral cock-hair. That’s a good one.” He glanced at me. “So what are you going to do with it?”
“I have no idea. It’s wrapped up and boxed and sealed, and my mother has orders not to open it under threat of death and dismemberment, because I did tell her the basic story. When I get there, I’ll probably get drunk with my sisters and show it to them, and then I’ll let them decide what to do with it. It certainly should never see the light of day. But, if I’m being even a little objective…it is kind of funny.” I pointed at him. “So. Your turn. You mentioned involuntary public defecation. Or would I rather hear the one about the prostitute and you going to jail?”
He laughed, shook his head. “Oh no, not telling that one.”
“Come on. Please?”
He shook his head. “No! It’s awful. Stupid, horrible, and awful, and I’m not telling it.”
“Errol. You can’t drop hints of a great story like that and not tell it.”
He sighed. “Fine.” He scrubbed his jaw again, muttering under his breath. “Gotta be munted to tell this one.” He shook his head. “It’s not really all that complicated. I was on my way to China for a feature on the crazy topography they have over there, and figured I may as well take a detour and see Kuala Lumpur. I hired a guide and a translator, same guy, got a two-for-one deal. Turns out the deal was he didn’t know shit about the city and couldn’t speak either language—joke’s on me. I didn’t know he didn’t speak Malaysian for shit, since I don’t speak it myself. Sounded like he did, and what do I know?
“I told him I wanted dinner, so he brought me to a nice little place he knew, good food, didn’t get sick, everything was alright, so we continued on. Told him I wanted somewhere to sleep, but first a drink to relax. And that’s where the trouble started. He misunderstood what I meant somehow and brought me to a brothel. Didn’t realize it at first, being jetlagged and not the sort to go visiting brothels anyway. Asked for a room, and got shown a lineup of girls, and I was like what? No, not what I meant, just a room, just for me, alone. Lots of not understanding each other, me and the madam in charge of the place. Guess she thought I was saying none of the girls were what I wanted, I dunno. So she brought out a guy. And I was like NO! Jesus, not that either, lady, I just want to fuckin’ sleep, been traveling for days and I’m wrecked, just totally ready to fall asleep standing up. I’d had a few drinks as it was, and that was making it all worse being half-pissed. And then, worst luck ever, who should bust in but Malaysian police, busting the place for trafficking and prostitution, which is actually illegal there. I got swept up in the bust, arrested, and held until I managed to get hold of Jerry who cleared the situation up. Moral of the story is…well, I dunno what it is. Don’t hire shitty translators, maybe.”
I was laughing, because I could see a half-drunk Errol trying to tell a madam he didn’t want the male prostitute. “What was the jail like?”
“Horrifying. Worst bugger-all experience of my entire fucking existence. Even compared to the time I got plane wrecked in the Gobi desert and had to walk out. This was worse than that. Standard-size jail cell, but there were easily fifty of us in there, with one toilet overflowing with shit. Got fed scraps I wouldn’t feed a pig, and that was when they felt like feeding us at all.” He shuddered. “The misunderstanding is funny in hindsight, but ending up in a Malaysian prison is not fucking funny at all.”
“Yikes.” I blinked at him. “Plane wrecked in the Gobi desert? What the hell, dude? You sound like Indiana Jones.”
He laughed. “Not hardly, I’ve just had a few runs of shit luck. We were flying over it, landed a few times to take photos, and we were heading out. Nearing the edge of it, something goes munted on the engine; pilot tries for an emergency landing. It’s the desert, nice and flat, right? Hits the only fucking rock in half a mile, we go spinning and bouncing, flip over. Engine catches fire, the pilot is out cold, and I’m bleeding like a pig from a stupid little head wound.” He points to a small cut on his forehead, over his left eyebrow, now just a thin white line, almost invisible. “I get the pilot out, he comes to, and realizes we’re stranded, radio’s on fire with the rest of the damn thing, night is only a few hours away, we’ve got half a liter of water and a melted Snicker’s bar between us. Fortunately, we were only a few kilometers from a ranger station in the national park, but shit, what a walk that was. First I was gonna bake to death, then die of thirst, th
en freeze to death, all in a matter of half a day. Didn’t, obviously, but I learned then always carry extra water, extra clothes, and a satellite phone that works almost anywhere on the planet.”
I shook my head. “Now I understand what you meant when you said you tone back the truth.”
“I could be lying. I coulda got that cut playing army as a kid, you don’t know.” He grinned, laughed. “Only joking. It’s all true. I can show you the photos from the Gobi when we stop. I took photos of the wreck and along the walk, figured shit, if I’m wrecked, might as well get some good photos out of it.”
“Did the shots of the wreck make it into the feature?”
He laughed. “You know they did. Turned it into the main event—Stranded in the Gobi, Jerry called it. One of my most well-known pieces, matter of fact. I took lots of video on that one, too, and Jerry pitched it as a mini-feature on the cable network channel. I’d actually recorded the crash itself, as I’d been interviewing the pilot when it happened and never stopped. Caught the whole thing, by some miracle. I’m not really a videographer, but I like to experiment sometimes, and that was an experiment. Fairly successful, I guess.”
“You’ve been on TV?” I asked, incredulous.
“I mean, yeah. It was a little half-hour special that aired at midnight on a Tuesday in February. Nothing to go nuts over. I’m no David Attenborough.”
“Still. It’s cool.”
He shrugged. “I mean, yeah, I thought it was mean as to be on the telly, but I’ll take not being in a plane wreck if given the choice. Makes a good story, but it wasn’t exactly fun at the time. Thinking you might not make it home is never a fun thing.”
I frowned, considering that. “Yeah, I can see how the possibility of dying would put a damper on things.”
Conversation wandered naturally and casually after that, from topic to topic as easily and freely as if we’d been old friends for years. He’d discovered an appreciation for American country music on his journey—I don’t mind country and will listen to most songs if they pop up in a playlist, but it’s not my favorite. He introduced me to the fact that other countries had their own local favorite bands and famous singers—which seems like a duh, but I’m a self-centered sheltered American and never really considered the notion of New Zealand having its own crop of artists of all genres. Discussing artists and using references that are unfamiliar to me was something I had never explored. He had a whole playlist of favorites, and we spent a good two and a half hours listening to the playlist and discussing the songs and styles and comparing his New Zealand bands to my favorite American counterparts.
Goode Vibrations Page 7
