Wrong City
Authors: Morgan Richter
Wrong City
A Novel
Luft Books
www.luftbooks.com
This book is a work of fiction.
Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales
or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 Morgan Richter
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States
by Luft Books.
www.luftbooks.com
eIBSN 978-0-9859768-2-8
Cover design by Morgan Dodge
To
Ingrid.
T
he party was already on the decline when
the girl in the bumblebee dress climbed onto the patio railing. Silhouetted by
the Los Angeles skyline, which crawled along the horizon in an unbroken stretch
of glittery lights, she stood on the slim beam and wobbled.
Vish watched
her, his hands clutching his near-depleted bamboo tray of bite-sized
chimichangas. She shouldn’t be doing that. One wrong step, one wobble too far,
and this girl, whoever she was, would tumble into the darkness of the canyon
below, gone forever. Vish couldn’t see anything beyond the reach of the lamps
at the edge of the patio; where their light ended, blackness began and swept
down the hillside, stopped only by the barricade of sparkly lights that marked
Hollywood Boulevard.
There were
murmurs from the guests: amusement, disapproval, no overt concern. The girl
shifted sideways, one tiny foot in front of the other on the railing, arms
raised at her sides, poised like a gymnast preparing to execute a flip.
Not that a
gymnast would wear those shoes. They were shiny leather—the stark light from
the lamps drained color from everything it touched, so Vish couldn’t be sure,
but he thought they were bright blue—with pointy toes and skinny gold spikes
for heels. She wasn’t really dressed as a bumblebee, not literally, but that’d
been Vish’s immediate thought upon seeing her. Her dress was short and
strapless, made from a narrow length of ruffled yellow taffeta wrapped around
and around her tiny body until her waist looked wider than her slight
shoulders. A black fringe dangled from the ruffle, giving the impression of
horizontal stripes that shifted and rippled as she moved. It was belted with a
wide black satin sash, the ends of which spilled down to her ankles. She could
trip on them, lose her balance, fall to her death.
Someone should
stop her. He should stop her. Vish hovered near the patio door.
“Better watch
your step, Kels,” a woman called out from the crowd. She laughed, teeth
glinting in the patio lights. Her face glistened with perspiration, and to
Vish’s eyes she looked slithery and unearthly, a golem calling for the blood of
this girl.
The
girl—Kels?—shook her head. She had a mess of pale hair, cut short and jagged,
which stuck up like a cloud of downy fluff around her head. She was very
pretty, in a childlike way, and she seemed much too young to be at this party,
amongst this collection of directors and producers and sundry members of the
entertainment industry. The bulk of the guests were in their forties or beyond,
Vish guessed, though it was hard to be certain with all the lean, toned bodies
and tight, unlined skin on display.
“I’m fine,” the
girl said. Her voice was light and babyish. “Look, I’m perfectly balanced.” She
pivoted on the railing, pointed toes shifting smartly, until she faced the
guests. “I could do a cartwheel on here.”
She seemed
sober, at least. Clear eyes, no flushed skin, no slurred speech. Still, Vish
felt his stomach clench in anticipation of something terrible. Should he step
in and haul her down from there? Should he find the hostess and alert her to
the possible tragedy and/or lawsuit waiting to happen on her patio?
The girl
glanced over her pale shoulder. “I can’t even see the bottom,” she said. “If I
fell, they’d have to wait until morning to look for me.”
A man angled
through the assembled guests and approached the railing. Laughing, he held a
hand up to her. “Time to come down, darling,” he said.
The girl smiled.
She had a dimple in each cheek. She crouched and took his hand in her own
dainty one, then hopped down to the patio floor. She wobbled on the gold spikes
when she landed, but she stayed upright.
Vish’s stomach
relaxed. His face felt hot. Silly to get so worked up; she was fine. She’d been
fine all along, she was having a good time, and he was an overprotective ninny.
It was just the combination of the crowd, and the looming blackness beyond the
patio, and maybe something in the night air that made him feel anxious.
The girl tilted
her face up and pecked the man on his jaw. “You always take such good care of
me,” she said.
Huh. The man
was probably in his early thirties, a few years older than Vish, and thus was
too old to be her date. He was pretty, slim and foxlike, with glossy black hair
worn long in front, short in back. Dark eyes, a mad fringe of black eyelashes,
dark golden skin.
The man
murmured something to the girl that Vish couldn’t hear. She giggled in reply,
then released him and drifted off into the crowd.
So they weren’t
a couple, or probably weren’t. Vish looked at the man, aware of the combination
of gratitude and envy he felt for the easy way he took charge of the situation.
He wore what was almost certainly a terribly expensive suit, with sleek lines
and a burnished shimmer to the fabric. He didn’t look familiar exactly, but he
looked like someone Vish should know, like his life would be richer and more
interesting for including him in his circle of acquaintances.
He was here to
work, not to ogle the guests. His sad little tray of chimichangas was cold. He
entered through the open French doors into the heart of the party.
He skidded on
the floor, which was made of raised, rounded tiles, polished until they
gleamed. In his best shoes, Vish could barely walk without wobbling or sliding.
From behind him, a hand clamped around his upper arm, holding him in place.
He glanced back
at his assailant, a fierce, compact woman in a sleeveless batik-patterned dress
that displayed her ropy biceps to full effect. It was the hostess, Maryanne
something-or-other, and she looked furious. Her grip on Vish’s arm tightened;
her thin lips twisted into a snarl.
She didn’t look
at him. Her attention was fixed on the far end of the living room where Jamie,
her own empty tray held by her side, was cornered by a middle-aged man with a
tidy beard.
Ah. Maryanne’s
husband. Jamie had pointed him out to Vish and Toby while they were loading
their trays in the kitchen earlier.
“She’s supposed
to be serving guests, not schmoozing,” Maryanne said. Her forehead creased, her
sculpted eyebrows almost touching. “It’s unprofessional.”
If Jamie was
schmoozing, she was doing a poor job of it. The man carried on what appeared to
be a lively monologue while Jamie nodded at frequent intervals, her blonde
ponytail bobbing up and down. Her expression showed nothing but polite
interest, but she seemed to be recoiling from him, pressing herself against the
sofa in the hopes it would swallow her up.
“Every time
I’ve looked at her, she’s been gabbing with my husband. This isn’t a networking
event for the caterers. She’s not going to get cast in one of his films just
because she served him a taco.”
Vish cleared
his throat. “You know, I really don’t think she’s trying—”
“I don’t want
to get her in trouble, but I’m a step away from going into the kitchen and
telling her boss.”
Vish paused.
The only one in the kitchen was Toby, and the idea of Toby as anyone’s boss
seemed ludicrous. “Ah… she’s in charge. She owns the company.”
Maryanne looked
at him for the first time. The forehead crease deepened. Vish hastened to
continue. “I’ll pass your concerns along to her.”
“Do that.”
Maryanne shifted her attention back to Jamie. “She’s an actress, isn’t she?”
“She does this
full-time now.”
“But she used
to act, didn’t she? She’s got that actressy look.” The snarl relaxed into a
contemptuous smirk. “It’s a cliché because it’s true: Everyone in the service
industry in this town is a wannabe movie star.”
Vish smiled.
“I’m not,” he said.
Maryanne
glanced at him again. Her expression shifted again. She looked puzzled. “No, of
course you’re not,” she said. Like she was explaining something obvious to
someone who had difficulty with simple concepts.
Vish took a
moment to sort that one out. Maryanne pointed her chin at Jamie. “Talk to her.
I spend a lot of money on my parties, and my friends value my recommendations.
Right now, I don’t think I have much good to say about you people.”
Vish nodded.
“Sure. Of course. No problem.”
Maryanne looked
unappeased. She maintained her death-grip on his arm. It hurt. At a loss for a
graceful way to free himself, he proffered his tray. “Chimichanga?”
Success. She
released him. One hand hovered above the tray, then she hesitated. “Those are
eggrolls?” she asked.
“Chimichangas.
Like little deep-fried burritos,” Vish said.
She grimaced
and shook her head. “I don’t eat anything fried.” The hand withdrew. She
stalked off, expertly navigating the rounded tiles in her spike-heeled sandals.
At a low
chuckle behind him, Vish turned. Ah. The pretty man from the patio. “No, of
course you’re not an actor,” the man said in a perfect imitation of Maryanne.
“Whatever do you suppose she meant by that?”
Vish smiled.
“I’m sure it wasn’t flattering,” he said. “I imagine she was saying I’m
insufficiently cute to be a movie star.”
“Says her,” the
man said. He winked. “Could be simple bias, you know. She could be saying
you’re insufficiently white to be a movie star.”
His tone was
casual, almost flippant. The man was nearly as dark as Vish, though it was tough
to pinpoint his ethnic background. Latino? Filipino? Neither seemed quite
right.
No way was Vish
was going to be lured into chatting about the party’s hostess while standing in
the middle of her living room, surrounded by her guests. He held up his tray.
“Chimichanga?”
The man glanced
at the offering on display. “God, no,” he said. He waggled his empty glass.
“Can you get me a refill, or do I fetch it myself?”
Jamie didn’t
have a liquor license. Maryanne had hired the bartender separately, and the
libations didn’t fall into Vish’s territory. He took the glass from the man. “I
can get it. What are you having?”
“Scotch. Dude
at the bar will know what. Thanks.”
The bar was set
up in the sunken dining room, through a narrow archway bordered with
hand-painted ceramic tiles. “I need a Scotch,” Vish said to the bartender, a
sullen kid with hair winched back into a low ponytail.
The kid looked
skeptical. Vish shook his head. “Not for me. For that guy,” he said. He pointed
through the arch in the direction of the pretty man. “He said you’d know what
he was drinking.”
The bartender
scowled. “Him. Yeah.” He fingered his way through a selection of bottles atop
the rolling cart that served as a portable bar, picked one, and tossed a few
cubes into a fresh glass. “Rocks, water, right?”
“I have no
idea.”
The bartender
shrugged, fixed the drink, and handed over the glass. “Here you go.”
“Thanks. Do you
know who he is? That man?”
“Never seen him
before, but everyone here is acting like he’s the shit. Probably a studio exec
or whatever. He’s got a stupid name, Stubby or Stumpy or something.”
The pretty man
didn’t look like a Stubby, or a Stumpy. Vish glanced at him again. He was now
at the center of a small throng, deep in conversation with a cluster of party
guests, the girl in the bumblebee dress among them. She snaked her arm up his
back and hooked her hand over his shoulder, her body curving into his. He
seemed unaware of her presence, his attention fixed on the bearded host. Good
to see Jamie had finally escaped his clutches.
“Open calls
only sound like a good idea, but they’re more hassle than they’re worth,” the
host was saying. “I found this great kid last month—good-looking guy, theater
background, an absolute nobody but perfect for the part, so I took a gamble and
cast him. A week into shooting, he disappears on me. Doesn’t show up at his
call time, doesn’t answer his phone. I sent a PA over to his apartment to pound
on his door, but no dice. We’re going to have to recast ASAP.”
“Rough break,”
the pretty man said.
“You’re telling
me. Now there’s a whole list of re-shoots I’ve got to get through, all because
the kid turned out to be a goddamned flake.” He chuckled. “Of course, if it
turns out he died or something, I’m going to sound like a real douche here,
right?”
The pretty man
nodded. “Been hearing a lot of that these days. I mean actors disappearing, not
you sounding like a douche. Seems to be an epidemic.” He reached out and
accepted his drink from Vish. “Thanks, man,” he said. A smile and another wink.
Friendly. Flirtatious, maybe. Hard to tell.
Vish smiled
back and withdrew.
The
chimichangas looked sadder than ever. He headed into the kitchen, which was
connected through another archway, one step down from the dining room, which
itself was a step down from the living room. Between the slick tiles and the
steps in unexpected places, someone was going to trip over his feet and break
his neck before the end of the night. That someone would probably be Vish.
In the kitchen,
Jamie reloaded her tray with hot hors d’oeuvres. She dumped a handful of
crumbled Manchego over pumpkin empanadas, their flaky crusts brown from the
oven. “There. That should prevent confusion, right?” she asked. “I’ve had two
guests complain that they thought these would be sweet, like miniature pumpkin
pies. The pork in the filling really threw them off.” She glanced up at Vish.
“Everything going okay out there?”
“Fine,” he
said. He paused. “Maryanne saw you talking to her husband.” He made it as light
as possible.
Jamie looked at
him. Her expression sharpened. She nodded once. “Ah,” she said. “How are the
chimichangas going over?”
“Hard to say,”
he said. “Eggrolls are fried, right?”
“Of course.
Why?”
Vish shrugged.
“Just asking.”
Toby hauled a
hot cookie sheet out of the oven and plunked it down on the tile counter. Jamie
hurried to maneuver a potholder beneath it. The sheet held an array of
miniature chicken tacos, the corn tortillas translucent with hot grease. “Hey,
did you see Kelsey?” Toby asked.