Easy Money (14 page)

He moved on to another cottage. Stayed there two days. And now he was gonna switch it up again. Had to keep moving.

He walked for over three hours. Wanted to get away from the area where he’d just stayed—watchful neighbors equaled foes. His nigger look a threat. One family has a break-in and suddenly every unknown individual with dark hair in the area’s a suspect. A miracle that no one’d stopped by the side of the road yet to ask him who he was and what he was doing there.

A cold wind. The middle of October wasn’t his favorite time of year. But Jorge-boy’d planned ahead. The knit sweater and the winter jacket warmed. Thanked the thrift store for that.

He turned off the main road. Read a sign that said
DYVIK, 2 MILES.
Smaller road. No houses yet. Pine trees all around. He kept trotting along. Hungry. Tired. Refused to lose heart. J-boy: still on the way up. Out. Onward. Toward success. Radovan would yield to him. Give him a passport. Kale. Opportunities. He’d head to Denmark. Maybe invest a few grand in blow. Deal. Make cash. Move on. Maybe to Spain. Maybe Italy. He’d buy a real identity. Start all over. Play drug kingpin with hard-core connections in Viking territory. Hook his old homeys up. Everyone except Radovan would bathe in his glory. The Yugo faggot would have to beg to get in on deals belonging to Jorge, King of Blow.

The road sloped downward. The forest opened up. He saw houses. To his left, a barn with two run-down green tractors out front. Farther down, horses. Not good. Someone lived on the place. He kept going. Found another house. Broke in.

A small kitchen, a living room, and two bedrooms—one with a queen-size bed, the other with a twin. It was cold. He turned on the radiator. Kept his jacket on.

He unpacked his food. The fridge and the freezer were turned off—a good sign that the house was closed for the winter. Fried two eggs. Cut thick slices off the loaf of bread. Put the eggs on top. Checked the pantry. Almost empty: an old box of chocolates, two cans of crushed tomatoes, and beans. Worthless.

Sat down in the living room. Opened the door of a corner cupboard that was painted with florid designs in red and blue: crammed with bottles of booze. Jackpot. City’s sickest juice-juju.

Screw safety. Jorge-boy was gonna have a niiiiice night.

No mixers. No ice. No fruit or drinks to blend it with. Fuck that. Real men take it straight. Jorge did a whiskey tasting all by his lonesome. Lined up five glasses on the living room table. Poured out five different brands. Picked the ones with the weirdest names: Laphroaig, Aberlour, Isle of Jura, Mortlach, Strathisla.

Munched on stale chocolate. Turned on the radio on a huge Sharp stereo. A display with blinking yellow stripes and patterns began to glow to the beat of the music. Felt very 1991.

Mortlach was the best. He poured himself another glass. Sang along to the songs from the radio. Tried to wail like Mariah Carey.

Poured water into a glass and more whiskey into another. Not his thing to drink straight, but what the hell. He drained the glass.

The house was spinning. Poorly built. Crooked corners. Tilting windows. He laughed at himself—the countryside’s new urban architect. The buzz washed over him.

Joy. At the same time: little Jorgelito, so alone.

Drunken rush. At the same time: He had to be vigilant.

He sat down on the floor to steady himself.

Suddenly, he remembered something he hadn’t thought about in a very long time. How he and Mama’d been walking together from the grocery store. He might’ve been six or seven. Paola was already at home, waiting for them. Preparing dinner. Everything but the rice—they’d run out and so Jorge and Mama’d had to go buy some. Rodriguez’d refused to help out, and Jorge’d been scared to go alone. He saw his mother’s face now, clearly: the dark furrows under her eyes and the lines in her forehead that made her look like she was always wondering about something but never could find the answer. He’d asked, “Mama, are you tired?” She’d set the bag of rice down on the sidewalk. Lifted him up into her arms. Smoothed back his hair and said, “No, Jorgelito. If we sleep well tonight, I’m going to be wide-awake tomorrow. That’ll be nice.”

Jorge reached for the bottle. Poured out more Mortlach.

The living room was spinning like crazy.

He stood up.

Lost control.

Passed out on the floor.

Three days later. Jorge had some serious problems. He’d been out of food for twenty-four hours already and he had only four hundred kronor left. Couldn’t even muster sit-ups. Too tired to go to a new cottage. Unfortunately, you couldn’t live on whiskey and water.

He needed to get to a store and buy food.

He needed to get cash. The question: Would Radovan agree to his proposition? If not, his need for cheddar would grow even more.

But worst of all: He felt so alone.

He needed to talk to someone—meet some old friend or relative. Human contact.

Was he already fried?

He had to get to the city. Eat. Scrape up some extra dough while he waited to call the Yugos. That’s just the way it was.

Jorge checked out map books in the bookcase. The scale was too bad. He checked the back pages of the phone book—he wanted to know how to get back to this cottage when he’d completed his mission in the city. Looked for Dyvik.

Considered boosting a car.

It was, without a doubt, the bash to break all bashes—the year’s most prestigious, profligate private party.

JW lived off the hype several days beforehand. It was high-gear, high-class, high-line. Most of all, it was so goddamn jet set.

Carl Malmer, alias Jet Set Carl, alias the Prince of Stureplan, was turning twenty-five and was having a courtly revelry in his four-room, sixteen-hundred-square-foot apartment. The apartment was on Skeppargatan and the rooftop terrace’d been booked for months.

The hottest chicks were booked; the kids from the best families were invited; the bottles and models set would naturally be featured at the party.

JW arrived with Fredrik and Nippe. They’d pregamed at Fredrik’s. It was eleven-thirty. Overflowing coatracks stood in the foyer, as did an enormous black dude without bouncer tag but sporting a spot-on style: black leather jacket, turtleneck, dark jeans. Fredrik grinned. “A bouncer at a private party?”

The bouncer checked them off a list and waved them through.

They hung up their coats and walked in.

Heat, perfume, party din, and the smell of eau de cash hit them as richly as at the velvet-roped entrances of Stureplan’s best clubs. They made their way through a crowd of underage girls who seemed to have just arrived—they were fixing their faces in front of the mirror in the hall. Nippe was drooling, couldn’t help himself; started flirt-chatting with one of the girls. Fredrik asked where Carl was. Someone pointed toward the kitchen. They pulled Nippe with them.

The kitchen was nearly six hundred square feet. An island remade as a bar filled the middle of the room. Two guys in bandannas mixed drinks. The place was packed. The music from the speakers: the Sounds. In the middle of it all was Jet Set Carl himself, wearing a white tux and a blinding smile.

“Hey, boys.” Carl hugged and welcomed them. Introduced them to the two chicks he was talking to. Top-tier superbimbettes. Fredrik made conversation and Nippe pulled his telltale tail tales. JW looked around with a bored expression. Had to keep the surface ripple-free, couldn’t show how impressed he was.

He thought, Carl must make a killing on his parties and club gigs, almost better than you make on C. The kitchen area was redone. Boffi, Italian design for people with black cards. Corian countertops. Slim, discreet cabinet handles. Oven in brushed stainless steel, Gaggenau—four gas burners and a built-in grill. Tap and levers in stylish chrome floated like a swan’s neck over the sink. The fridge and freezer were of stainless steel, American extra-wide size, with round, wide handles. To the left of the fridge was a wine cooler with a transparent door, filled with bottles. Having a kitchen like that scored more adult points than having kids.

Right mix of A-, B-, and C-list celebs in the crowd. Bloggers, actors, models. Scenesters and artists. Princess Madeleine plus entourage. He glimpsed former Social Democratic minister Leif Pagrotsky smack in the middle.

Nippe was swallowed up, disappeared on a mingle crusade. Fredrik lit a cigarette.

Jet Set Carl turned to JW. “Good to see you. You haven’t been here before, have you?”

“No, but it’s a damn nice apartment you’ve got.”

“Thanks. I like it myself.”

“How many people did you invite tonight?”

“Many. I’ve booked the rooftop terrace, too. Probably hundred and fifty people up there already. Gonna be wild. You’ve got to go up and check it out; that’s where the food is. There’ll be some stuff happening on the roof later, too.”

“What about your neighbors?”

“I booked rooms at the Grand for the families next door and below me. They were happy as hell.”

“Who wouldn’t be for a free night at the Grand Hôtel? Everything cool with the stuff?”

“Sure thing. Sweet that you could get it on such short notice. It’s in the bedroom.”

“Sophie here?”

“Yup, check the terrace.”

JW thanked him, moved on. Felt good that he and Carl were starting to become tight.

He walked out through the foyer, nodded to the bouncer, and took the stairs up.

The terrace looked like a forest of metal mushrooms—gas-powered heaters to soften the October chill. Carl didn’t take any risks—a third of the terrace was covered by a party tent. But there were no rain clouds tonight. The gas ’shrooms spurted heat and the girls felt good in their tiny tops and bling. JW was scanning the scene for Sophie. The crowd pushed from all sides. Enormous speakers blared Robyn’s latest hit.

A dozen or so girls stood in the middle of the crowd, trying to get the dance party going. Maybe it was too early; in an hour, the terrace would explode. People just needed more booze and a noseful of blow.

The buffet was stylish. Tiny portions on tablespoons: a crouton with fois gras, sour cream with fish roe and red onion, potato salad topped with Russian caviar. You just cleaned the spoon with one bite, tossed it in a bin on the table, and then chose a new gourmet spoon to your liking. Farther down were plates with wineglass holders attached. The buffet consisted of lime-marinated chicken kebobs, tabouleh, and sweet-and-sour chili sauce. The catering crew worked efficiently. The morsel-laden spoons were quickly replaced with new ones; the bucket was emptied in time with the filling of wineglasses.

Real New York vibe in the Stockholm night.

There were ads for Kharma posted everywhere. Jet Set Carl was no dummy—he’d write off this entire party as a company expense.

Sophie was standing at the far end of the terrace, where the party tent began. JW made his way to her. She was talking to a tall guy in a pinstriped blazer and skinny jeans. The guy had some sort of trendy image painted on the back of the blazer. He was unshaven, with hair as short as his stubble. JW recognized him. He was a famous ad guy with a cheesy smile permanently glued to his face. Named Sweden’s seventy-third-sexiest man by
Elle
a couple of years ago. Generally infamous cunt-catcher. A total tool.

He positioned himself near them, wanted to be introduced. Sophie dissed him majorly, kept talking to the trend tool. JW shoved his hands in his pockets, made a serious effort to nail the disinterested look again. His couldn’t-care-less chin hung.

She looked right through him.

He gave up, skipped her. Played the game and went downstairs to the living room.

A single word in his head:
fuck.

Something was wrong with Sophie. JW worried. Did she see through him? Would she call his bluff? Predetermined tracks were hard to hide. A guy from Robertsfors just couldn’t make it with the Stureplan scene’s coolest chic.

A thought: What’s my yearning for Sophie about anyway? Maybe Sophie was like an incarnation of Camilla. A party girl with brains. Something’d happened to his sister, something he repressed. And still he was doing what she’d done. Moved to the city, partied, spent money. Was falling for girls who looked like her. Was faking Life, like she’d done. Camilla’d lived some kind of double life, definitely in front of his mom and dad, but also in front of JW. That had become apparent after he saw the pictures of her riding in the Ferrari, though she’d never told him about the car. She’d only hinted to JW once. Said, “I make more dough in two months than Mom does in a year.” Why? And how was it possible that she’d only had
one
friend at Komvux, Susanne? JW remembered her as Robertsfors’s number-one socialite.

The thoughts churned. He thought about what he’d found out three days ago from Jan Brunéus.

It was all so shady.

He had to know more.

The living room was more crowded than a late subway car on a Monday morning. In one corner, a stroboscope was spurting flashes of light. Six different-colored spotlights were moving and painting pictures on the opposite wall. There was a smoke machine on the floor, and gigantic speakers in the corners of the room ensured that everything vibrated. Two flat-screen TVs that were set up on top of the speakers were projecting video installations by the artist Ernst Billgren.

JW got it confirmed once again: People with money party better.

He was dancing wildly with some twenty-year-old silicone celeb from the Paradise Hotel when he saw the closed door from the living room. There was another bouncer positioned in front of the door. Older, subtler, slicker, with his hair gelled back. The revealing factor once again: his clothes. Black turtleneck, dark jeans, and a thin leather jacket—indoors. JW recognized him. He was the head bouncer from Stureplan’s biggest security guard company, Tom Schultzenberg.

He thought, That’s gotta be it.

The bouncer checked JW’s name off the list. He slid in.

He found himself in Jet Set Carl’s bedroom, remade as a Lebanese café—super-
privé.
The bed’d been carried out; in its place were brass hookahs filled with fruit-flavored tobacco on the floor. Purple-and-red fabrics hung on the walls. A thick carpet and tasseled pillows with gold embroidery swallowed the sound in the room. Still, an amped aura: elated, active, sexy. JW clocked right away. In the middle of the room was a glass-topped table. In the middle of the table was a pile of snow.

Magnificent.

Six people were sitting on pillows around the table. Two of them were snorting lines. Two others were preparing theirs. All the people in the room were sniffling, wiping powder with the backs of their hands, sneezing, and babbling about the glory of existence.

JW regarded his work, his delivery. VIP room without borders. What an event, what class.

He sat down on a red pillow. Reached for a razor blade and started to cut a line. A girl across from him was staring him down, sucking him off with her eyes. JW smiled back, snorted the cocaine. The straw was made of glass.

Four hours later. JW was a little too sweaty for comfort. He’d danced, mingled, tried to make out with the girl from the cocaine room in front of Sophie. She kept up her don’t-give-a-shit act. They’d talked for a total of only seventeen minutes. He pulled out all the charm cards he had in his deck. Thought, If I can’t get her tonight, I’ll never fucking get her. He chatted with Jet Set Carl, his friends Fredrik and Nippe, snorted with them, snorted with the silicone bimbo from the Paradise Hotel. Chatted with celebs and silver-spoon babies. He sold himself in.

JW’s message was simple: I’m hot as hell and I’m your local cocaine dealer. Buy from me.

He didn’t see her coming. Suddenly, Sophie was there, took his hand, looked at him. This time, she wanted something more than to chat. He could feel it.

JW was already on a rush. He couldn’t distinguish between the heat in his pants, the heat in his nose, and the heat in his heart. They pushed their way through the party people. It was four o’clock and the party’d peaked. It was still crowded, but not as crowded as before. JW found his jacket on the floor of the foyer. Sophie’s was dangling on a hanger. They pushed the button for the elevator. Giggled together. JW squeezed Sophie’s hand. Still no other bodily contact. In the midst of the spell he was under, JW felt unease. Was it really all set?

On the way down, Sophie said, “What happens now?”

JW looked at her. Grinned. Pulled a cliché. “Can I come up for a cup of tea?”

She smiled. JW got even more nervous, tried not to let it show.

Out on the street, they could hear the music from the party pounding several stories up.

JW said, “Weird that no one’s complaining. Did Carl put the entire neighborhood up at the Grand?”

Sophie, with a Mona Lisa smile: “Maybe they like the music?”

They started walking. JW was unsure of the direction. He thought, Is she playing with me? Is it a joke? She’d done a 180—first ignoring him, as if he were no better than chopped liver, and now taking him home with her.

After a while, she stopped. Looked like she was about to say something. JW’s heart skipped a beat. “Of course we should go to my place for a cup of tea.”

Was happiness on the horizon?

They kept walking along Linnégatan, past 7-Eleven. At least ten people from Carl’s party were stuffing their faces with hot dogs inside the store. JW didn’t have the energy to say hi; he didn’t want to let anything break the mood.

He and Sophie were quiet, which was unusual for both of them. They just kept walking toward Sophie’s place.

They arrived at her apartment on Grev Turegatan—a small studio, 380 square feet. She went into the kitchen. JW, clueless. Was she really going to make tea? He wanted to caress her, kiss her, and hug her, just lie and talk all night with her. At the same time, he wanted to have sex with her more than ever.

The coke kick was wearing off. He got an idea. Went into the bathroom and turned on the tap. Created white noise. He pulled his cock out and began to masturbate. The inspiration came from the movie
There’s Something About Mary.
He thought of Sophie naked. He came after two minutes. He was pleased with the security measure—if he was to make it with Sophie, he’d be able to marathon it.

He unlocked the door and walked out.

Sophie was standing by the edge of the bed. Her top’d slid down over one shoulder. Was it a hint?

She looked him in the eyes as though she were saying, What are you waiting for?

He took two steps forward, ended up a few inches from her face. Waited for a reaction from her. Shit, he was such a pussy. Not even now, with all the vibes she was sending out, did he dare make the first move. He was too scared, too nervous. Didn’t want to make a fool of himself and burn his bridges with her. Miss future opportunities. Sophie took a tiny step closer. The tips of their noses touched. He hoped she didn’t suspect what he was feeling—his heart was pumping 230 bpm.

She kissed him. Finally.

He was flying. Soaring.

JW put his arms around her. Kissed her back. No one had ever tasted so good: smoke, alcohol, and Sophie smell. They ended up on the bed. He took her top off, carefully. Cupped her breasts over her bra. She licked his neck.

JW put his hand on top of her pants, over her butt. Began to kiss her neck, breasts, and belly. He unbuttoned her tight jeans and pulled them off. Kissed the inside of her thighs. She made sounds. JW was dying to put his cock in her, but at the same time he wanted to wait. Sophie started to take her thong off herself. Straight shot, Sophie-style. He continued to kiss around her pussy while he caressed her left breast. Carefully pinched her nipple.