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by Andrea HY Kim Anne called me at work last Friday afternoon while my mind was splintering in 8 directions. Needed to get wasted, she said. The comraderie of clinking frothy beer cups appealed to me, accompanied by loud music and strangers and old acquaintances with attitudes. Anne said there were some late-night shipping deadline of her children's clothing line to meet. Nine o'clock sounded about right. Anxiously I drove to the place in LA where I knew the name of every cocktail waiter and waitress since '90. I settled into a secluded corner booth, thankfully 7 feet away from the loudspeaker cranking upbeat music and indecipherable lyrics. The old red lamp shades illuminated the deteriorating interior of the former four star restaurant next to the Ambassador Hotel. I arrived early. I studied the familiar oil paintings on the flocked wallpaper and the red tablecloth in front of me. When they cleared the tables, they simply flipped the tablecloth so any stains left by the previous patrons would go undetected. This used to be my favourite haunt but strangely, my heart was a trapped bird thrashing inside my throat. It was already ten past nine; and yet the Hoff overflowed with faces I failed to recognize. The place had gone to the dogs. Thirty and forty-somethings crowded the bar, their beer guts ballooning downwards under the table and sagging down the thighs. From my seat I had a great vantage point that faced the subterranean entrance. I scrutinized the elegant drapery types, dorky corporate Armani Emporium-types, casually emaciated CK-model types that passed through that door and strutted down the short stairs. Still no Anne and it was already 10 PM. I wondered if Anne would be courteous enough to contact the Hoff if she changed her mind about our rendezvous. Just when I was considering calling it a night, a female bartender I didn't recognize called out over the frenzied cacophony of the bar. "Is there an 'Andy' here?" In the haste, I toppled a Chanel-knockoff handbag belonging to the whisper-thin woman smoking a cigarette next to my booth. The woman looked as if she had been through hell, judging by her shameless imitation of an agonized divorcee in some kind of Joan Crawford black and white. I had seen her companion also smoking in the twinkleroom. They had shared a smirk when I ordered a bottle of inexpensive lager for myself in stark contrast to their two sophisticated stems of chardonnay. They could have been lesbians, judging from the way they stared into the silence. No two women can refrain from talking to each other unless they are lovers experiencing temporary communication breakdown. As a single gay man you pick up on these things. Muttering incoherent apologies, I dodged the sevice cart obstructing the pathway to the bar and reached the barkeep. "I'm Andy," I yelled at the indifferent face of the female bartender. Her eyebrows signalled puzzlement and I bumped into Ms. Gorillatang, who pointed to the wall phone unit in front of the kitchen. Fairly leaping, I grabbed the phone and yelled again. "This is Andy!" It was a female voice, as much as I could tell over the deafening music. I shut out half of the world with my other hand and concentrated. Squeak squeak. "This is Andy. Are you Anne?" I stretched the twirl line as far as it would go into the kitchen. "Is this the Hoff?" "Yeah. Anne? Is it you?" "Do you do food to go?" I pondered this for a second. "Yes, we do." "Then can I have an order of rotisserie chicken and..." "Would you excuse me please? I seemed to have picked up another line." I couldn't say something nasty, for I felt some degree of propriety over the Hoff. With the diner on hold, I alerted Ms. Gorillatang to take down the order. There were no other blinking lights placed on hold. I scarcely had time to plop my ass back on the seat when Ms. Shin called me by my Korean name. "Hey Young-a!" This time, it was Anne. She had been detained at work and would drive right on over in 20 minutes from the neighboring city of Gardena. Okay, I was willing to wait; I had no one to go home with this Friday night. Anne showed up a quarter past 10 in her Donna Karan sheath dress, flashing her jewelry, looking composed as ever. She wanted to get smashed and I was there to help her with the demolition. It had been months since I'd been subjected to her revolving carousel of self-righteous rants. It would be fun to try to predict, secretly, of course, what she was going to talk about once the alcohol seized control. Once she sat down and ordered the strongest drink, I unscrolled the imaginary topic chart over her head. I sipped the potent mixture of distilled potato spirits and lemon as Anne began her well-rehearsed autobiograpy, initiated into fucked-up girlhood by traumatically witnessing her father sleeping with his wife and his concubine in the same bed. She would talk about her failed marrige with the Taiwanese aeronautical engineer. From there, the chart said, she would boast the number of affluent men who were still chasing her, and finally on to how much she loved and hated Scott, the boyfriend 12 years her junior. Anne's Scott-bashing had no effect on me, although I knew him before Anne. This didn't make me a traitor, because she genuinely cared for the 21 year-old whose heart was bigger than his brain. Predictably, Anne raged full steam about the latest tempest in their twisted love saga. She announced that finally she told him to haul his stuff out of their apartment and get the hell out. Such ultimatums had been routine for the past 4 years they have been together. It simply sounded like another bubble popping in the cauldron of voodoo love. It didn't bother me at all. In fact, it was sadistically entertaining to see the vulnerable side of this mature woman who only had seemed to feel safe within the walls of material wealth. We finished our one-liter bottle of liquor when she slipped from sensibility and started to cry, right there in front of everyone. I mouthed, guppy-like over the rock and roll, for Ms. Gorillatang to bring us another jug. Things were getting melodramatically interesting. Prissy Anne usually doesn't go for the bare-all, let-your-humanity-show kind of scenes. I poured another shot glass for Anne and toasted sympathetically in support. "Men are assholes!" "So I told him to wait until I finish up work. I had a bad feeling about his going off to Vegas by himself again this weekend. Laura's been telling Scott to move up there." "You mean that fat Laura who lives with a Filippino guy?" "She doesn't have any friend out in Vegas. Scott went to visit last weekend when I left for Frisco," she said as she wiped her tears with a stained paper napkin. "We don't spend enough time together so I asked him to wait until I closed up the office, but he said he needed some time to think by himself." Anne gulped her glass without any visible restraint. "You know I can't leave LA if he decides to get a job in Vegas. Then we could only see each other once or twice a month." "And you know how difficult those long-distance things are," I nodded. "When I called home in the afternoon, he was already gone. And I begged him not to leave without me," Anne said. "He was gone! Andy, I've never begged anyone before in my entire life! But he didn't care. He just left." I was running out of dirty napkins to offer. Scott was beginning to sound like a real scoundrel. "Maybe he really needed some time by himself. The way I see it, Anne, sometimes you get so involved in the little things that you neglect to see the big picture," I said. "Sometimes you need to take a step back and assess priorities." "But that's not it. I have a hunch that there might be someone else." Anne, poor, old Anne worrying if her younger lover had taken on another, more fresh meat. She was playing the classic insecure older woman suspicious of her mate. "Well, I know better. Scott has no one besides you. Only you, Anne. No need to worry about that." I said earnestly. There was a look of surprise on her face which disappeared as she descended further into her sobbing. There was an angel perched on my right shoulder, grinning with approval at my tactfulness. On the other, the red horned one poked the sides of my neck with the knowledge of the little Japanese student lodging at Laura's house. "So I couldn't help it but call him on his cell phone. I said I was sick and tired of this rollercoaster." "Oh no. That's when you..." "I'm going to a boarding house and staying there until he packs his things and leaves for good. I told him I never wanted to see his ugly face ever again." "Anne, if that's what you feel, then kick him out! You're the one who invited him to move in," I said indignantly. I poured and she gladly swigged glass after glass. I never knew that one-beer Anne could handle so much of the stuff. "No, I don't think I can manage facing him again. If I did, I'd probably forget all the pain and suffering he caused me and fall into the same trap," Anne said. "I used to get in these fights and leave the house in the car. Just driving. I have no family and no friends to run to. I'd just wind up somewhere in Fontana in the dead of night and stop at a liquor store," she paused to wipe her tears daintily, "I'd buy a bottle of Crown Royal and just sit inside the car in the parking lot, drinking." "That sounds awful. You shouldn't do that," I frowned, tempted to say that whenever such a thing happened again, she could count on me to offer a shoulder to cry on or at least a couch to crash in. But who was I kidding? I could only tolerate four or five hours with this egomaniac with my sanity intact. "If I didn't have you with me tonight, I honestly don't know what I'd be doing," she said, her red rimmed lash soaked eyes in grateful crescents. "Knowing that you too come from the same kind of family environment, I can open up to you, like a sister." "Well, I'm flattered that you called me," I said. I'm such a sucker to people who say they need me. I volunteered to pay the tab, but let Anne settle it after a friendly scuffle. Outside, I waited for the valet to bring my car around. Anne stumbled into her Chevy SUV, and at that point I figured being gay didn't excuse me if she couldn't hold her alcohol. I followed Anne to her Hollywood apartment. Twice she drove through the center divide on 8th street and still I didn't think much of it. The signal ahead turned red. I tensed and relaxed as she appeared to slow before the crossing. Slice by slice of the ticking second hand, I watched, horrified as she revved through the cross traffic. She was playing real life Frogger with a bloody two-ton SUV. She missed the first passing sedan. I exhaled a short breath which turned into a gasp at the sound of Anne's Chevy chunking into another black SUV. The crunch reverberated throughout the city block. But oblivious to the impact, Anne kept on driving. I watched, disbelieving, behind the traffic signal. The other SUV made a screeching U-turn and started pursuing Anne with all the vindictive righteousness of MADD. A short driver and his passenger hopped out of the damaged vehicle a few blocks further west. I followed suit and rushed over to Anne to see if she was injured. The Asian guys shouted expletives and from their swollen red faces. They looked ready for a good fight. Anne staggered out of her car. "How could you run a red light like that? And you didn't even stop!" The short one pointed an accusational finger at Anne who remained calm, almost innocent amidst the outrage. "I'm sorry, I didn't know I did that until you forced me to stop," Anne said. "Look at my car! You were trying to drive away!" The short snaggle-toothed driver stepped up closer, to get a good look at Anne. "I'm sorry. Are any of you hurt?" The two weasels remained silent, good collision tactics. Judging that I would better handle the situation, I stepped forward. "Think it'd be best if we just exchange the paperwork," I said. "Have you been drinking?" Ignoring me, the shorty inquired. "To tell you the truth, I have," Anne replied. "I have some problems. Why don't I just give you my telephone number and arrange to get your car fixed tommorrow?" Anne's crisp business facade had replaced the blubber queen a few streets back. Anne's frank and firm declaration forced me to retreat. Good old honesty could have earned some sympathy points in her favor with some other guys, but not these two assholes, who smelled prime steak and were determined to shove it up their spincters as much as they could. "Since we're being honest and all, can you write something that says you are drunk and that it was your fault?" the crooked toothed weasel said. I saw the subpeona coming already. "I don't see why not. First let me find a paper and a pen...if only I can find it in here. Andy, where's my engagement book? It must be in the car," Anne pointed shakily in the direction of her SUV. I watched the humiliation surface on Anne's face as they proceeded to "help" her, by rummaging through her private belongings to look for her driver's license. Her hands shook as she jotted the statement down with a mechanical pencil and a scrap of paper I found on the floor. Anne doubled over the hood of her battered Chevy and let out a frustrated scream, which I'm sure the two weasels heard as they drove away. She clawed around on the hard concrete of the sidewalk and wailed, the sticky saliva forming cave stalacites from the top of her open lips. The sounds of her paroxysms of pain echoed off the tall residential buildings. I looked around to see a lone Hispanic man standing hesitantly, near the darkened storefronts. "Neccesitan ayudes?" He offered. His kindly face made me smile, thankful that at least I had some hope and control left in me to decline. Still, he paused to see if either one of us did need help, or perhaps to see the conclusion of this street carnival. "It's okay, Anne. It's just small shit. Everything is small shit," I hoisted Anne's arm and held it over my shoulders. "Andy, I'm only going to be like this tonight." "Yes, and after tonight, everything's going to be fine," I carried her to the passenger side of her car. "Like I said, it's all small shit. Don't worry about those guys. Everything will be all right after I take you back home." "It's all small shit. It's all small shit." Anne clung on to me, her breasts pressing a little uncomfortably as I loaded her body into the seat. "I can still drive," she said. "No, I'm taking you home and you'd better not argue." I doubled back to my car making sure the locks were in place. Running to Anne's Chevy, I noticed that this was the low-class tree-lined neighborhood I grew up in. Despite the high crime rate, my rag top convertible would be safe here. As I pulled forward cautiously into the deserted traffic lanes toward Hollywood, Anne extracted a tube of lipstick and zig-zaged it across her lips, sobbing as she looked into the mirror. The redness bled into her skin like a grotesque clown. We arrived at the Hollywood apartment with Anne slung over my back. I laid her thin frame on the bed, patting her whimpering body to the rhythm of my sullen heart. With a tissue I wiped the nasty lipstick off her face. It took a long while before Anne's tears dried on her pillowcase. Sitting in the darkened bedroom, I hoped my own love would never devastate me this way. Copyright 6/99 Andrea HY Kim. All rights reserved. SIDDY@prodigy.net |