Sex in the Title (31 page)

“Only once. And I haven’t stopped thinking about it ever since.”

“Tell me more.”

“Sometimes I think that I still chase women just to forget about her. Because I know I can never have her. But I can’t seem to forget about her, no matter what girl I’m chasing…No one can possibly compare….”

“Who is she?”

“Delilah,” Evan said wistfully.

“Delilah?” asked Heeb, intrigued.

“Delilah Nakova,” Evan replied, with a hint of awe and reverence in his voice.

“Delilah Nakova?” Heeb repeated, with dismissive skepticism.

“Yeah,” Evan said, looking up reminiscently. “I met her.”

“You met Delilah Nakova?” Heeb was still incredulous but very curious.

“Yeah…I met Delilah Nakova…Once.”

“Where? How?”

“About a year ago. And I completely blew it…I haven’t stopped thinking about her ever since.”

“Where were you? What happened?”

Evan sighed heavily, looked down, and shook his head, as if he were experiencing the deep disappointment in himself all over again. He then seized upon a hope-filled fact on which he had clearly reflected many times, and abruptly looked up with newfound optimism. “Do you realize that she’s half Czech?!” he exclaimed.

“So?”

“So I’m one-sixteenth Czech. My great grandfather was Czech.”

“And?”

“And so was hers.”

“So?”

“So that means we have the same heritage.”

“That’s completely absurd. You don’t identify yourself as Czech. Or even a fractional Czech. In fact, this is the first time I’ve heard you say anything about your one-sixteenth of Czechness. You mentioned French and Italian.”

“Yes, and my paternal great-grandfather moved to France from Czechoslovakia, so I’m one-sixteenth Czech. And I’m very proud of that one-sixteenth.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“I even speak some Czech…I studied it for two years in college.”

“You were just fulfilling some foreign language requirement. And you probably wanted to choose something that seemed interestingly exotic.”

“That’s not true.”

“Yes it is. Bohemian literally refers to a Czech dialect, and you can’t get much more hip than Bohemian, right?”

“I studied it because I’m proud of my Czech roots, and of Czech culture,” Evan declared, in a tone that seemed somewhat forced to Heeb.

Heeb rolled his eyes doubtfully and said, “You embraced your Czechness only after you discovered your Delilah infatuation.”

“Kafka was Czech,” Evan boasted insistently, as if to prove the sincerity of his ethnic affiliation.

“Kafka was Jewish,” corrected Heeb, with equal pride.

“He was a Jewish Czech.”

“No, he was a Czech Jew.”

“Whatever. We can claim joint ownership of the guy, OK?”

“All right, the point is that you think this one-sixteenth gives you some special connection to Delilah Nakova?”

“And she’s majoring in political science at Brown College. That’s my alma mater. And I studied some political science there too.”

“Everyone takes a political science course in college.”

“And I’m interested in writing for Hollywood. And she works for Hollywood.”

“So?”

“So how many people are there who have some Czech blood, speak some Czech, have an interest in working for Hollywood, and studied some political science at Brown College? You can’t deny that Delilah and I are in a very small class of people, with very similar experiences, values, and interests…We were meant to be together…We’re soul mates.”

“You’re being completely delusional, Evan. The two of you couldn’t be more different. She was a girl of mixed race growing up in Eastern Europe. I’m sure that formed her identity and personality far more than any of the stuff you mentioned. You’ll never have any idea what it’s like to be a girl of mixed race growing up in Eastern Europe.”

“But I can imagine.”

“And she’s only twenty for God’s sake. You’re twenty-nine.”

“So? She’s got the maturity of a twenty-five-year-old. And I’ve got the maturity of a twenty-three-year-old. So that makes us more like two years apart.”

“But you’ve lived a totally different life. She became famous at the age of fourteen, and is a world class actress now with fans flocking towards her wherever she goes.”

“I can imagine being that famous. Writers can imagine anything – especially their own fame.”

“Well you’re definitely imagining this connection you think you have with Delilah Nakova because I just don’t see it.”

“But I spoke to her in Czech, Sammy.”

“You had a conversation with her in Czech?” For the first time, Heeb’s tone seemed to acknowledge that Evan might be remotely justified in sustaining some illusions about Delilah Nakova.

“Yes, I did…How many chances in a lifetime does a man get to speak with Delilah Nakova– in Czech, no less? And I blew it. On May 5, 1999, I fucking blew it.”

“What happened? How did you meet her?”

Evan had never shared the story with anyone because of how ashamed and frustrated it made him feel. But now a cathartic urge to tell someone overcame him and – at this point in their relationship – Evan and Heeb were comfortable discussing anything. Evan looked down for a moment and exhaled some regret, before recounting to him everything that had happened on that momentous night.

Chapter 22
The Fiasco at Float

At 10 p.m., on May 5, 1999, in the VIP section of Float, a chichi midtown club, several new media companies threw a gala Internet-Hollywood fete with a Mexican theme to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. The Hollywood guest list was rumored to include five major movie stars, and with all of the fanfare and publicity surrounding the party, it was virtually impossible to gain admission to the soiree. Fortunately for Evan, one of the event sponsors was a CEO who remembered the free software consulting that Evan had provided him a few months earlier.

At 11 p.m., Evan walked right past the hundreds of people waiting outside and flashed the classy key chain invitation that had been mailed to only eighty VIP guests the week before. The large bouncers unclasped the velvet cordon and Evan walked into what was undoubtedly the best party he had ever seen.

The dimly lit club space was illuminated by softly hallucinogenic lights passing lightly over the hundreds of people walking, dancing, and chatting. He saw inviting and indulgent faces. People seemed happy just to be inside the festive and magical ambiance rather than waiting outside in the long line, hoping for the ill-tempered bouncers to respond to a smile.

Sexy House beats occasionally sampled with mariachi themes gently reverberated throughout the dreamy interior. The ornate tables had trays spiraling upwards, full of quesadillas, nachos, guacamole, miniature burrito dishes, ready-made tacos, and a full assortment of sweet desserts. The open bar was serving tequilas, margaritas, and caipirinhas. The seductive music, the posh extravagance, the exclusive and mysterious milieu, the glossy cover faces everywhere, all created the heady feeling that anything was possible that night.

Evan was never one to shy away from women or the dance floor and the music quickly drew him to the pulse of the party. Swaying all around him to the intoxicating beats were gorgeous women of every nationality, slick-haired boy toys of the Latin flavor, groups of young ravers, media executives, dot-com millionaires, and people who made their living from their association with the “in” crowd. In the background, journalists, and photographers were busily documenting the high profile affair.

By 1 a.m., Evan was taking a breather by the bar. He had drunk and danced and flirted and eaten, and was back for some more drinking. The grooving bodies all around him seemed to move more slowly and easily as the tequilas took their toll. He stood by the bar, waiting for his next glass, when a blonde with a lifeguard tan tried saying something to him above the din of the music and club chatter.

“What was that?” he asked, with a tipsy nonchalance.

“Do you know what that line means?” she said, with her index finger pointing upward and moving rhythmically to the music that was playing. “I want to know what that Spanish line means,” she said flirtatiously. “You looked kind of Spanish, so I thought you might know,” she continued, with a playful gleam in her eyes.

“Hold on. Let me listen,” Evan replied. He paused for a moment, pretending to listen to the line in Spanish. “OK, I got it.”

“What does it mean?” she asked.

“It means, ‘I couldn’t be luckier that you thought I was Spanish.’ Cool lyrics, huh?”

“You big liar!” she said, taking another sip of her margarita.

“All right. You got me. I’m a big liar. But an honest one,” he said, basking in his own silliness.

“So what does it really mean? I never studied any foreign languages…”

“You got me! I was too stupid to study any languages that I could actually use.”

“You didn’t study Spanish?”

“No, that was far too useful for me to study it.”

“So what did you study?”

“Only pointless, impractical languages that nobody cares about or speaks,” he said, trying to make her feel better about not having studied any foreign languages.

“Like what?” she said in a giggle.

“Like Czech!”

“Czech?” she said, as if she had never even heard of the language.

“Yeah. Czech!” Her doubtful reaction provoked him into a brief diatribe. “I spent two years in college learning Czech. And who the hell speaks Czech around here?! When was the last time you heard Czech on the streets of America?” The young woman was clearly amused by Evan’s unexpected tirade, which only encouraged him to continue. “When was the last time you saw a job that requires Czech language skills? How many English words come from the Czech language? It’s a completely useless language!”

And then – out of nowhere – between Evan and the woman he was talking to, Delilah Nakova playfully protested Evan’s commentary in Czech. True to Evan’s invective, he hadn’t heard Czech spoken in almost five years, but he still remembered enough to understand what Delilah Nakova was saying: “How can you say that about my beautiful language?! And how useless does it seem to you now?” she said with a mischievous look – as if she fully expected Evan to be shocked by the stunt she just pulled.

Evan was dumbstruck. No more than two feet away from him stood the starlet herself, in all of her five-foot-six splendor. Her black hair was sculpted into dark tendrils adorning her raised cheekbones. Her impish smile, long dark lashes, and large emerald green eyes looked larger than life. The black satin halter neck top hanging from her nape perfectly complemented her smooth coffee complexion and hinted at her delicately shaped breasts as it hugged her hips. Delilah’s tight white pants highlighted her gracefully feminine figure, and ended just above her open toe, silver stilettos.

Evan desperately tried to jog his drunken memory enough to assemble a decent reply in Czech. But the combination of genuine shock, too many tequilas, and too many years since he had practiced his Czech produced only an unimpressive “What…What are you doing here?”

“I have an invitation,” Delilah said in Czech, innocently waving her key chain VIP admission, as if she was completely willing to prove to anyone who challenged her presence there that she was legitimately invited to the party. “And I was just waiting in line behind you for a drink,” she continued with a coy smile.

Delilah Nakova was so adorably sweet and humble and charming all at once that Evan realized, then and there, that he had fallen helplessly in love with her. But it was for precisely that reason that he had no idea what to say next – even in English – much less in Czech. Instead, he just maintained a stupidly dazed look on his face, oblivious to the fact that the drink he had ordered was waiting for him and that Delilah was actually herself waiting to get a drink.

“I think your drink is ready,” she said to him, politely amused that he was still so shocked.

But Evan was paralyzed in a loose, dizzy sort of way. He couldn’t bring himself to say anything else, even though his jaw and tongue felt like they could move on command, if he could just think of something to say. The problem was that his mind had been slowed by the alcohol, just as it was being overwhelmed by the emotional intensity of falling in love – of witnessing before him the perfection of a human being whom he couldn’t imagine parting with – while fearing that she was just seconds away from fading away forever. He couldn’t decide whether to say something cheesy but intelligible in English, or something infantile and possibly incoherent in Czech. And because everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, he felt as though he still had some time to figure out the best course to take.

And then, just as abruptly as Delilah Nakova had appeared, she disappeared. Her entourage of six male friends and four female friends, all in their early twenties, pulled her away and absorbed her into their midst. “The other bar is less crowded!” was all Evan heard someone from her group call out before Delilah vanished with a playful wink. And where Delilah Nakova had been standing right next to him just seconds ago, was now an empty space that might, at any moment, be filled by some lesser specimen of humanity. Evan became so consumed by what just happened that he didn’t notice the woman who had been talking to him earlier. She asked him several times to recapitulate the conversation he had had in Czech with Delilah Nakova, but she soon realized that there was no way to get Evan to pay attention to her again. He was now in a deep and lonesome trance for the rest of the night.

He forgot about his drink and the woman next to him, and aimlessly wandered about the club, trying to collect his thoughts, formulate a strategy, and figure out the meaning of what he had just experienced – particularly Delilah’s goodbye wink, which he continually replayed in his mind. He still noticed all of the gorgeous women at the club, but their beauty suddenly struck him as vain and vapid. He meandered around with the hope that he might spot Delilah Nakova again, but eventually stopped at a centrally located table with food, where he began mindlessly munching on mini-tacos and guacamole-dipped nachos.