Less Than Zero (20 page)
W
hen I left there was nothing much in my room except a couple of books, the television, stereo, the mattress, the Elvis Costello poster, eyes still staring out the window; the shoebox with the pictures of Blair in the closet. There was also a poster of California that I had pinned up onto my wall. One of the pins had fallen out and the poster was old and torn down the middle and was tilted and hanging unevenly from the wall.
I drove out to Topanga Canyon that night and parked near an old deserted carnival that still stood, alone in a valley, empty, quiet. From where I was I could hear the wind moving through the canyons. The ferris wheel pitched slightly. A coyote howled. Tents flapped in the warm wind. It was time to go back. I had been home a long time.
T
here was a song I heard when I was in Los Angeles by a local group. The song was called “Los Angeles” and the words and images were so harsh and bitter that the song would reverberate in my mind for days. The images, I later found out, were personal and no one I knew shared them. The images I had were of people being driven mad by living in the city. Images of parents who were so hungry and unfulfilled that they ate their own children.
Images of people, teenagers my own age, looking up from the asphalt and being blinded by the sun. These images stayed with me even after I left the city. Images so violent and malicious that they seemed to be my only point of reference for a long time afterwards. After I left.
FIRST VINTAGE CONTEMPORARIES EDITION, JUNE 1998
Copyright
©
1985 by Bret Easton Ellis
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Simon & Schuster, Inc., New York, in 1985.
The author gratefully acknowledges permission to reprint the following
:
Lyrics from “The Have Nots” by John Doe and Exene Cervenka. Copyright © 1982 Eight-Twelve Music. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Stairway to Heaven” by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant. Copyright © 1972 Superhype Publishing. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Crimson and Clover” by Tommy James and Peter Lucia. Copyright © 1968 by Big Seven Music Corp. All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Straight Into Darkness” by Tom Petty. Copyright © 1982 Gone Gator Music (ASCAP). Used by permission.
Lyrics from “In the Sun” by Christopher Stein. Copyright © 1977 Jim Music, Inc. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “The Earthquake Song” by Carol Maso and Mick Walker. Copyright © 1981 John Fransome Music. Used by permission.
Lyrics from “Worlds Away” by Jane Wiedlin and Kathy Velentine. Copyright © 1982 Lipsync Music (ASCAP)/Some Other Music (ASCAP). All rights reserved. Used by permission.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ellis, Bret Easton.
Less than zero / Bret Easton Ellis.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-307-75646-6
1. Young men—California—Los Angeles—Fiction. 2. Narcotic habit—
California—Los Angeles—Fiction. 3. Friendship—California—Los Angeles—
Fiction. 3. Generation X—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3555.L5937L4 1998
813′.54—dc21
97-53236
Author photograph
©
Quintana Roo Dunne
Random House Web address:
www.randomhouse.com
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