“I used to drink, but then I…” She trails off, her hesitancy making me more alert, more curious. I lean forward, my elbows sliding farther onto the bar top.
“Things change,” she finishes anticlimactically.
She keeps moving her arm in circles, cleaning an already pristine bar, when my curiosity finally does the work for me and prompts her to say more.
“I’m Muslim,” she spells out. “A lot of us don’t drink alcohol. Working in a bar is questionable to begin with, but, well…”
She trails off again and I opt for nodding like I know exactly what she’s talking about. I want her to say more but the desire is dulled by the feeling that I’ve said something stupid. The vodka running through my veins lets me admit to myself that I want Indah to think I’m cool.
“You’ve never met a Muslim person before, have you?” she asks, cocking her head as she peers at me and breaking me out of my reverie.
“I’m from Kansas.” I shrug like I’m being clever and it makes her laugh that big laugh again.
“You know,” she says, “they have Muslims in Kansas too.”
“Figure of speech,” I clarify. “I’m from more of a nowheresville than even Kansas has.”
“Oh yeah?” She cocks her head. “Where you from then?”
“Wait,” I say, deflecting, “aren’t you supposed to be, you know, wearing one of those, you know…”
I circle my head sloppily with my hand and Indah clenches her jaw but smiles through it.
“There’s lots of ways to practice Islam,” she says simply, and I nod sagely like I understand the conversation we’re having at all.
“You’re sweet for asking though,” she continues, her jaw relaxed, the smile easy again. I’m pretty sure it’s me making her smile like that, brush off my ignorance, but I have a hard time feeling too bad about it with the vodka warming in my blood. Her smile is so beautiful, so welcoming—I can’t be blamed for wanting to see it over and over.
“You’re not a bad sort,” she continues, looking at me sappily. Blankly. Her smile is turning generic and there’s a familiar rush of delight and disgust coursing through me.
“Nice of you to say, darlin’,” I say, pushing away the bad feeling, and she giggles again.
“You’re a hoot.” She snorts.
Encouraged, I say: “You wanna know how old I really am?”
She leans her elbows onto the bar, mirroring my posture.
“Sure.” She wiggles her eyebrows like she’s indulging me.
“Eighteen,” I whisper, and her eyes widen.
“No, you’re not,” she gasps over-dramatically.
“No, I really am.”
“You couldn’t have gotten in here if you were eighteen.” She looks at me dubiously.
“I have my ways,” I purr, and she rolls her eyes.
“Why would you tell me that now?” She smiles. “I should report you.” She crosses her arms, but she’s still grinning playfully.
“To who?” I ask. “The alcohol police?”
She just lifts a single eyebrow and leans against the back counter.
“I really shouldn’t have served you.” She shakes her head, the grin collapsing. “I thought I checked your ID…”
“Don’t worry about it, sweetheart,” I croon, liking the way the endearments flow off my vodka-soaked tongue. “Just pour me another drink and forget I said anything.”
And she does exactly that. Almost as if she’s asleep, Indah grabs the nearly empty vodka bottle and pours me another double. I have no intention of drinking it—any drunker and things will get very bad—but I take pleasure in watching her hands do the work while her mind is somewhere else.
She seems smart. Maybe she’ll catch on. Some people do, like the head of security at the Bellagio. They never understand what it is they’re catching on to, but I see a revelation dawn in their eyes and make sure to leave them before they can examine it, or me, too closely.
“Why…,” she starts, looking at the drink she just poured.
“Do you have a place I could crash at?” I interrupt.
I already know the answer. But my parents taught me to be polite.
* * *
“Robert?”
I spin around to try to find the source of my mother’s voice. She can’t be here. She can’t be in LA.
“Robert?” I hear again, and I spin and spin and suddenly I’m not in LA either. I’m sitting at my kitchen table. The table I sat at when I was small. The table where we had every meal together, as a family.
“Robert, eat your peas,” my mother tells me gently. She’s smiling down at me, love in her eyes.
“I don’t wanna.” I pout, swinging my legs back and forth, my toes inches from the ground.
“Robert, remember what we talked about,” my father says, his voice strong and warm and never stern. “Sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do, but we do them because they’re good for us.”
“But I don’t wanna,” I whine again, voice rising. They both sigh, their breath a soft breeze over me. They tilt their heads in unison, shaking them slightly.
“Oh, you sweet boy,” they say, their hands brushing softly along my cheeks. “Remember: sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to do, but we do them because—”
“I don’t wanna!” I screech. The hands recoil from me, leaving my face cold. Their mouths snap shut. And then they have no mouths. Their skin grows over their lips, their eyes, their noses. They are blank and screaming and I wanted them to stop. I wanted them to stop telling me what to do and now they can’t tell me anything. I’ve taken it all away and suddenly their faceless bodies are gone too and I’m left alone with two empty chairs and the echoes of their screams—
I gasp awake.
It’s not so dramatic as it is in the movies. I don’t shout out, don’t jolt upright in bed. Just a quick inhale of breath, the opening of the eyes.
I am in a cold sweat though. That much translates from the screen. I soaked through my T-shirt. My jeans stick to my legs, suffocating my lower half.
Indah’s couch is serviceably comfortable. It’s not the MGM Grand, but tomorrow I’ll find a more permanent crash pad. Some hotel suite or maybe a Malibu mansion. I should get a car first, but then the world is my oyster.
I make the short walk from Indah’s couch to her kitchen and pour myself a glass of water. It might be worth it to try to fall back asleep but I don’t like my chances. I’m never able to get back to sleep after a dream about Them. My watch reads 4:02. The worst goddamn hour of the night, four a.m. Too late to hit up a bar, too early to hit up a diner. Might be the perfect time to go lift a car, even though I’d prefer just to get the keys from someone. I still haven’t really mastered the hot-wire—
“Robert?”
The glass falls from my hands as I spin around in panic. The shattering gives me an extra jolt of adrenaline, and in the few seconds it takes my eyes to adjust to the darkness and make out Indah’s confused face, my heart has made a pretty decent bid to permanently exit my chest.