The clerk leaves me with a, “Let me know if you need anything else, sir,” and I start to explore the room. “Villa.” It really is more than a room. It’s several rooms, with a fireplace and a piano and everything. This will do very nicely indeed. I haven’t gotten that good at spinning stays more than a month, but maybe this is the perfect time to practice.
The sun is just beginning to peek through the shades but I ignore it in favor of the plush bed in front of me. I sleep like the dead.
* * *
“Excuse me,” a voice calls out as I walk through the lobby, “young man! Excuse me.”
I turn to see a woman waving me over from reception. I barely suppress a sigh and eye roll as I saunter over to the desk.
“Yes?” I ask politely.
“You arrived earlier this morning, correct?” she asks, narrowing her eyes at me. “You’re staying in one of our Deluxe Villas?”
“That’s right.” I nod.
“Peter mentioned you would be staying with us for a while,” she continues. “But it seems he forgot to get your payment information.”
I clench my jaw in annoyance, distantly hoping I didn’t get this Peter guy in trouble and wondering how much I should spell this out for her.
“Yeah, look,” I say after a moment, deciding on the blunt approach, “you’re not going to get payment info from me. And you’re going to let me stay in that room for as long as I want, and it’s not going to be a problem. So write whatever little note in your system you have to to make sure that happens.”
As I’m speaking, I’m thinking, Believe me believe me believe me, even though thinking it doesn’t seem to make a difference. As long as I want it, even if it’s subconscious, it happens. But it still feels good to try, to put effort and intention behind it, giving me the illusion of control. And sure enough, she nods, hits a few keys on her computer, and then looks back at me. Blank. They’re always blank. I sometimes wonder if wanting people not to be blank is something I could make happen. Maybe I just don’t want it enough.
* * *
As luck would have it, the Sunset Marquis is part of one of the most famous music scenes in the entire world, the name registering in my head as familiar because of some rock star’s biography I read a while back. After wandering the area for a few days, letting myself become part of the landscape and routine of the neighborhood and the hotel, I start going to shows along the Sunset Strip. Rock shows, weird new electronic bands, even some stand-up here and there. I dance and I laugh and I still don’t talk to anyone, the crowds too big and too raucous to infiltrate.
It’s the closest thing I have to a routine—I arrive in a new city, pick a neighborhood, and soak up as much of it as I can. Now that the chaotic loudness of Halloween is over, Los Angeles reveals itself to be livelier and brighter than anywhere I’ve ever been. I’m entranced by the mismatched buildings, the sparkling hills, the scents of interesting food wafting down the street. But it’s as overwhelming as it is enticing, and like with every other city I’ve been to, I have a hard time seeing how and where I’m going to fit into it.
Not even a week has passed and I can feel myself getting restless. This is the problem with getting everything you want, with going to see some of the best bands for free, being seated at the front of the most famous comedy houses, having bottomless bottle service wherever you go. When I was first on my own, the novelty of it kept me busy for a while. The unfettered freedom, and then, the necessity of figuring out how to actually survive, was an activity. I guess most people my age are in school or have a job, but both of those options seem like a waste of time. So I read books and go to shows and spend an entire day in my villa watching TV and subsisting off of minibar food just because I can before I realize I haven’t gotten the bartender’s tattoos out of my head. I didn’t get a good look at them and I want to.
So I do.
“You came back,” Indah drawls, and I shrug sheepishly as I slide onto a bar stool.
“I can’t find another good vodka bar in this city to save my life.” I grin and I see the moment she melts. No hostility, no revelation. Simple acceptance.
Something inside me deflates, just a little.
She should be pissed, she should be annoyed, she should be something. I barreled into her life, haven’t apologized for stealing her vodka and making her take me home, and she finds it adorable. My desire to be liked overcomes everything else and I try not to hate myself too much for it.
“I don’t know what it is”—she shakes her head—“but you are some kind of charming. Especially for a kid,” she adds pointedly, and I just shrug again.
She’s already pouring me a double. I don’t even really like vodka that much. But I drink it down as I examine her tattoos. On the back of one forearm is horizontal writing in a language I don’t recognize. The other arm is covered in delicate vines that wind from her wrist to her shoulder, snaking around her light brown skin. Small flowers bloom along the vines, the largest one in the center of her wrist.
Suddenly feeling self-conscious about staring at her, my cheeks warming in a blush, I swivel my stool to take in the early evening crowd populating the bar. A few loners but mostly pairs. Couples on a first drinks date, work friends swapping stories, bespectacled hipsters no doubt discussing their nauseatingly basic screenplays. I don’t need to talk to any of them to know that Indah is the most interesting person in here.
I turn back to tell her so, only to find her frowning at me, vodka bottle still in hand.
“You shouldn’t have just up and left the other night,” she tells me, a crinkle in between her eyebrows.
“What, were you worried?” I tease.
“Yes,” she says humorlessly, and I stop smiling. “Look, this is a pretty safe neighborhood but you’re just a kid and you’re new in town and people get weird on Halloween. With what happened to Blaze … I just, I came back with the dustpan and you weren’t there and I panicked, okay?”
“I’m not a kid,” I snap, a knee-jerk reaction. Her face softens, my unconscious need for her to not be mad at me doing its work.
“Who’s Blaze?” I ask, knowing Indah won’t ever call me a kid again.
“A friend,” she says, dropping the bottle back on the shelf. “He’s a year older than you and he … sort of went missing last week.”
“Oh,” I breathe, not knowing what to say. “Sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry.” Her big brown eyes stare earnestly into mine. “I didn’t mean to scold you. I just … I care.”
The word is like honey rolling off her tongue and I want her to mean it so badly. That want twists in my gut, carving out ugly shapes of need that I know will be met regardless of what the other person truly feels. But does it matter? Does it matter if Indah really cares? Or is it enough that I want her to care? Either way, I can feel my restlessness settling, being replaced with a bubbling curiosity I haven’t felt in a long time.
“So what is there to do in this town?” I ask, not wanting to linger too long on the question of if she means it when she says she cares.
“What do you mean?”