The Rules of Attraction (Page 63)

“Vittorio, you remember Sean,” she says. “You were in one of Vittorio’s classes, weren’t you?” she asks me.

I have never met the guy in my life, only heard about his lecherous activities from Lauren who spoke about them plainly and easily, as if it were a joke. When she spoke to me about his behavior it was hard to tell whether she was bragging or trying purposefully to turn me off. Whatever.

“Yeah,” I say. “Hi.”

“Yes, yes … Sean,” he says, still gazing at Lauren.

“Well…” I say.

He’s breathing hard and I can smell the alcohol on the geezer’s breath.

“Yes,” he says, absent-mindedly as he ushers Lauren into the living room, forgetting to close the front door behind him. I close the door. I follow.

There are only six other people at the so-called party. (I don’t understand why Lauren doesn’t realize that six people do not constitute a “party,” but more like a f**king “gathering”) And they’re all sitting around a table in the living room. Some young pale guy with a shaved head wearing John Lennon glasses and a Mobil gas station uniform, smoking Export A’s, sitting in an armchair, eyes us contemptuously as we walk in. This couple from San Francisco, Trav and his hot wife Mona, who are living near the college while Trav finishes his novel, and Mona takes a poetry tutorial with Vittorio, are sitting on two chairs next to the couch, where two creepy female editors from the literary magazine Vittorio edits, along with Marie, a plump, silent woman in her mid-forties, who has the Italian widow look and who, I guess takes care of Vittorio’s needs, sit.

Lauren knows one of the editors, who has just published a poem of hers in that magazine’s last issue. I had thought the same of that poem as I had of all the rest. None of them made any sense to me. All this stuff about depressed girls sitting around in empty rooms, thinking of past boyfriends, or masturbating, or smoking cigarettes on foam-drenched sheets, complaining about menstrual cramps. It seemed to me that Lauren was just writing one endless poem and I told her honestly one night after we’d had sex in her room, that none—no, not none; hadn’t said that—that a lot of it didn’t make sense to me. She had only said, “Doesn’t make sense,” and laid back on the pillow we were sharing and when I tried to kiss her, later that night, her mouth and embrace seemed cold, indifferent, frigid.

“This is quite a promising young poet … um, yes…” Vittorio says of Lauren, resting his meaty, hairy paw on her shoulder.

Vittorio then turns to the bald guy in the armchair and says of the pretentious geek, “And this is Stump, another … yes, very promising poet….”

“We know each other,” Lauren smiles flirtatiously. “You did your thesis with Glickman last term, right? On…” She’s forgotten. Must have made a big impression.

“Yeah,” Stump says. “Hunter S. Thompson.”

“Right,” she says. “This is Sean Bateman.”

“Hi, Stump?” I offer my hand.

“Yeah. Used to be Carcass but changed it.” He salutes instead of taking my hand.

“You … look familiar,” I say, taking a seat.

“Wine? Uh, vodka? Gin?” Vittorio asks, sitting in the chair next to Lauren’s, gesturing at the table we’re all “gathered” around. “You like gin, don’t you … Lauren.”

How the f**k does he know?

“Yeah, gin,” Lauren says. “Do you have any tonic?”

“Oh, of course, of course … I’ll make it,” Vittorio says in his soft, almost faggoty voice, reaching over Lauren’s knees to get to the ice bucket.

“I’ll just have one of those beers,” I say, but when Vittorio makes no move to get one I reach over and take one of the Beck’s.

It’s quiet. Everyone waits for Vittorio to make Lauren’s drink. I sit there, looking at Vittorio’s shaking hands, alarmed at how much gin he’s pouring into Lauren’s glass. When he turns around to hand the glass to her, he seems shocked, taken aback, and as she takes the drink from him he says, “Oh look … look at the sunlight, the sunlight … through your golden … golden hair….” His voice is trembling now. “The sunlight…” he murmurs. “Look how it glows … glows in the sunlight…”

Jesus Christ, this is really making me sick. She is making me sick. I grip the beer firmly, tear at the damp label. Then I look at Lauren.

The sun is still up and streaming through the large stained glass window and it does make Lauren’s hair glow and she looks very beautiful to me right now. Everyone’s giggling and Vittorio leans over and starts smelling her hair. “Ah, sweet as nectar … nectar,” he says.