Sex and Violence in Hollywood (13 page)

“Wait, Goddamnit!” Rain shouted. Then she hissed through clenched teeth, “Finish!”

He leaned over the edge of the bed, left hand probing the tangle of clothes.

Rain closed her hand on some of his hair and pulled him toward her hard.

The sting of his scalp as she pulled his hair was an unpleasantly familiar sensation. Adam was on his knees again instantly. His right arm whipped around fast and the back of his fist struck Rain’s face. He regretted it immediately, but she pulled his hair again, harder as she laughed. He hit her again, with his palm this time, and she laughed some more.

“Finish,” Rain said.

He did. Later, he would hurt from pounding so hard, but all he wanted at the moment was to finish. He was closing in on that powerful release when Rain violently pulled his hair again. He slapped her again. “Stop it, Goddamnit, or I’m gonna—”

She pulled again. Adam swung his arm back and forth, struck her with each arc. He did not know how many times. They came together, loudly, with Adam’s hands on her breasts, squeezing, crushing them in his fists.

When he rolled off Rain, he got off the bed and onto his feet. Walking in a slow, small circle, he inspected his wounds. There was a lot of blood but it came from nothing more than scratches. The blood alone made him woozy. “I must be out of my Goddamned mind,” he muttered to himself.

“Don’t blame yourself, Adam.”

He turned to her as she stood beside the bed, gun in hand. There was some swelling and discoloration around the outer corner of her left eye and her cheeks were bright red.

“I had a gun on you. Remember?” She waved the gun around a little and grinned.

Putting his jeans on quickly, Adam said, “You know, people use words like ‘insane’ and ‘crazy’ all the time. Without even thinking about it, without ever really knowing what those words mean. But I know what they mean.” He pointed at Rain angrily. “Because you...are fucking crazy. You are insane, you should probably be in a facility somewhere, not walking around free, you’re a menace!”

“I thought this was pretty fuckin’ nice,” Rain said, shrugging. “Just what I needed. What’s the matter, too rough for you?”

“Rough? In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m bleeding where you tried to gut me like a kill!”

“Aawww, you gotta owie?” She bent down and kissed the bleeding wound, licked it. Sucked on it. When she stood, there was blood on her lips. Her tongue licked it off as if it were ice cream. “Mmm. I think I got most of the fuckin’ body fluids covered. All that’s left is for you to piss on me.” She smiled.

“That’s disgusting,” Adam said. He didn’t put his shirt on. He wanted to wait till he could wash off the blood.

“Time for you to go, Adam,” Rain said, moving closer to him. “It’s my bedroom this time. Don’t forget. Ten o’clock. Your car.”

“I’ve got other plans.”

“Oh, would you cut that shit out? You know how easily I could fuck you up for life today? I mean, this afternoon? All I have to do is go to the cops, tell them I was raped by my step-brother, and give ’em a fuckin’ sample of your boybutter I got bubbling in me right now, you’d be in jail before dinner. You think your dad’s gonna pay the bail? What would he do, anyway?”

“You won’t do anything like that if you need me to help kill your mother.”

“I didn’t say I needed you, I said we’re doing it together,” she snapped. “I don’t fuckin’ need anybody. You’re replaceable, Adam. But I like you a lot. I really do.” She kissed him. It was another of those kisses that loosened his fillings and shortened his hair.

“Hey, hey,” he said as he pulled away from her. “Have you ever kissed anyone without severing the brainstem?”

“What? Whatta you mean?”

“Well, when you kiss, you don’t have to suck so hard. I think you put a kink in my uvula.”

Rain laughed. “So how the fuck’m I supposed to kiss?”

“Well, you just...just...” What am I doing? Adam wondered. Being in this room is dangerous. Hell, being in this house is dangerous.

“Just go ahead and kiss however you want.” He turned and went to the door.

Rain followed him, saying, “Show me!”

Standing in the doorway, Adam turned to her slowly. “If I show you...do I still have to go out with you tonight?”

She frowned. “What the fuck do you mean, course you’re still goin’ out with me tonight. Quit being such a prick and relax a little, would you? Don’t worry, you’re gonna have fun.”

He left the room and started down the hall wearily. Shirt wadded in a ball in his hand. “I’ll show you later.”

ELEVEN

"Dude, when
...did your life turn into a V.C. Andrews novel?” Carter said. He stared across the desk at Adam as if he had never seen him before, jaw slack.

They sat facing each other at an old partners desk that had occupied the attic for as long as they could remember. Adam had told him all about Rain, and Carter had quickly forgotten the issue of Fangoria open before him.

“I like to think my life is written better than a V.C. Andrews novel,” Adam replied.

“Maybe written better, but still trashy as hell. And definitely paperback.”

“What am I going to do? I mean...I can’t go to Gwen about it.”

“Why not?”

“Are you high?” Adam said. “She’d go ballistic if I told her I was—look, can you imagine me saying to Gwen, ‘Rain made me have sex with her at gunpoint this afternoon, could you have a talk with her?’ Think she’d believe something like that?”

“Hey, she might! Sounds like your story might not surprise her.”

“She’d kill me.

“Look, if anybody’s gonna kill you, my money’s on the underage chick.”

“Rain.”

“Yeah, whatever.” He shook his head. “Who the hell names a kid Rain? What kind of sick bastards would do that? Was her father a weatherman, or something? I think I’m more upset about you boning a woman who would name her daughter Rain than about you boning an underaged psychoslut.”

“Look, Carter, I know my situation may be funny from a certain distance, but I’m in the middle of it, okay? I really need you to be serious.”

“I am serious!” Carter said. “She should sue her parents for that shit. Naming her after weather.” He shook his head, looked down at the magazine.

Adam felt fidgety. He stood and wandered around the studio, looked at the strange objects on the shelves. “What am I going to do, Carter?”

“You’re asking me?” Carter blurted. “I just found out about all this sordid shit, I need a little time to digest all the details, man, that’s a three-part miniseries at least. Probably ABC.”

Adam sighed as he stared back at a human face with skin that had been eaten away. Carter had researched the flesh-eating virus, printed up some pictures from the Internet. He had done a great job, too. Adam never ceased to be amazed by Carter’s talent. But at the moment, he was getting angry with him.

“What part of ‘I’m in serious trouble’ don’t you understand, Carter?” Adam asked with an exasperated swing of his arms as he went back to the desk. Hands flat on the desktop, he leaned toward Carter. “If she goes to the police, I’m fornicated, my friend. I mean, if the jury finds me...what, Carter? What do you think the jury would find me?”

Carter looked at his friend with surprise and concern. He was uncertain if Adam expected a reply. “Well, I-I-I—”

“Even if they found me not guilty, that would be with me forever. You can’t shake something like that. Statutory rape, jeez. Of course, being a free statutory rapist is better than being one in prison. I already have hemorrhoids, Carter, I wouldn’t survive prison!”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know this was such a big deal with you, shit, I didn’t mean to make fun of it. But think about it. Should you be takin’ her this seriously, man? She’s sixteen, for crying out loud. And obviously neurotic already. Maybe she’s just a...I don’t know, maybe she just likes to make trouble, you know? Like one of those soap opera vixens? Or maybe, hey, no offense, but maybe she just annoys the hell out of you and you’re making her sound worse than she really is, you know what I mean?”

Adam ignored him, frowned as he went away for a while into his own thoughts. After half a minute of silence, he asked, “You think mental illness would keep me out of prison if Rain turned me in?”

“Is that, like, a plan?” Carter said.

“It might be, I don’t know. It just came to me.”

Carter leaned back in his chair and put an ankle on his knee. “Maybe it would keep you out of prison. But you’d go into some kinda mental institution. You’d be in prison, what? Five years, probably less. Once they get you in one of those cuckoo’s nests, though, they can keep you there till the day you turn into a great big pissed-off pre-casino American Indian who can lift a marble sink and throw it through the window. ’Bout how long you think that would take?”

Adam sighed. “Let’s get out of here, go someplace. I’m antsy.”

“Where you wanna go?”

“I don’t care. Let’s go to Creature Features, see if Wally’s got anything new. You drive.”

Carter brightened. “I get to drive your convertible?”

“No. Your car.”

Carter’s car was one of his dad’s Mercedes. He drove them to Hollywood.

“There has to be another alternative,” Adam said on the way. “Go to prison for a few years...go to a balloon factory for God knows how long, or...what? Everybody gets better choices than that. Sophie had better choices!”

“Oh, you’ve got another choice,” Carter said. “But it would, you know...you’d have to, like...well, you know.”

Carter looked at him, serious and unsmiling. Adam knew what he meant, and it surprised him. Carter was letting him know that considering it was not so bad. And actually doing it might be...negotiable. The very thought made Adam dizzy. And it was not an entirely bad kind of dizzy.

“Jeez, you sick bastard, you did it again,” Carter said. “Got me caught up in one of your stories.”

“It’s not a story, Carter.”

“You tell it like one. Look, man, I’m not saying I don’t believe you, I’m just saying I know how you get when somebody pisses you off.”

“How many times do I have to tell you? This is not just how I perceived her. She makes the girl in The Bad Seed look like Cindy Brady.”

“But don’t you think it’s a little unfair that I don’t know this girl? I mean, you’re telling me all this stuff about her, and I haven’t even met her.”

“Unfair? You should get on your knees and thank God you haven’t met her!” Adam spotted an opportunity and grabbed it up. “You want to meet her tonight?”

Shrugging, Carter said, “Sure.”

“So you’ll come with us?”

“Come with you where? On your date? What planet is your dealer from, Adam? Huh? You strung out on pangalactic gargleblasters, or something?”

“I’m serious. I don’t want to go alone with her, and you’re right, you should meet her.”

“What if she doesn’t want me to go?”

“So what?”

“If she’s carrying a fucking piece, man, I don’t wanna—”

“If she’s carrying a piece?” Adam interrupted.

“Huh?”

“You just said the words, ‘If she’s carrying a fucking piece, man.’”

“Well, yeah. So?”

“Who are you, Al Pacino?”

“No. But I still say DePalma’s Scarface is a masterpiece, no matter what you say.”

“Look, Carter, I don’t know if she’ll be, uh...carrying a piece, or packing heat, or whatever. But I think she might be safer with two of us there instead of just one.”

“Think so?”

Adam nodded. “You might be saving my life, for all I know.”

“I’ll think about it.”

In Hollywood, Carter parked in a public lot and they walked the remaining block to Creature Features Book and Video Emporium. When they walked in, a skull beside the door screamed as its eyes flickered red.

“Hi, guys!” Wally Kirk said from behind a row of glass display cases. He closed the register drawer, grinned, and a gold-capped front tooth gleamed.

Adam and Carter had been frequenting the store since they were in the sixth grade. Most of the genre movies and books they owned had been purchased there. They sometimes hung out in the store and talked movies and books with Wally even when they bought nothing.

“Where you guys been?” Wally asked. “Haven’t seen you in a couple weeks.”

Carter said, “Takes time to satisfy all the women in Los Angeles. We’ve been busy.”

They went to the display case and looked down through the glass top at the merchandise inside: trading cards, buttons and key rings bearing logos of genre movies and TV shows, expensive pewter figures of characters from Star Wars and Star Trek.

“Anything new since we were here last, Wally?” Adam asked.

“You kidding? Lotsa stuff.” He was fifty-nine, with unshaven steel-colored stubble on his round, chubby-cheeked face. His gray hair, shot with a few remaining streaks of black, was long and braided in back. He moved along the showcase and turned, dropped suddenly as he went down the ramp. What was left of him, the part he had brought back from Vietnam, was in a wheelchair. “C’mon over here. You guys’re gonna love this. The horror movies of Herschell Gordon Lewis, all on DVD.”