her buttocks toward him as he thrust, feeling rush after rush of the druggy sensation ripple through him; she was playing with her breasts – for herself, for him, and for the mirror…
Prentice closed his eyes to savour the sensation – and somehow this narrowing off focus opened a new channel to him. He seemed to see himself as she saw him, rearing over her like a raging horse, mouth slack, eyes wild, the skin of his chest mottled with flush and glossy with sweat. And then he saw the two of them in the mirror, as she saw it. The mirror provided a voyeur's charge of objectivity that somehow tightened the concentration on the act, for some people; crystalized it in the mind. She was one of those people. Staring at the two of them, focused on the three of them in the mirror…
Three of them. The guy on the other side was the third.
A guy sitting in the dark, rocking slightly on his chair, watching them through the trick mirror. Face unseen, hidden by shadow and by turmoil. Something writhing in the air like a nest of transparent snakes…
But the vision faded and Prentice felt himself drawn, quite powerlessly, into the sucking void of orgasm.
Prentice stood in the guest room's shower, feeling unreal, and a little sick. Drained; still mildly buzzed. She'd said, 'You use the shower first. You know how women are, it'll take me forever to get myself back together… There's a bathroom down the hall I can use. I'm just gonna slip into my dress for a second and run down there… the Back Room Sprint, it's called… Now gimme a kiss. And we'll meet downstairs at the pool.' She'd been tender about the parting, after having mouthed the usual 'God you must think I'm so cheap' stuff which neither of them believed even before he gave her the ritual reassurances. It was obvious to him that she had no real regrets or insecurities about the incident at all.
Now, in the shower, feeling the water but not feeling it, as if someone else were showering, he thought of the vision he'd had, the voyeur behind the mirror…
Bullshit, he told himself. You're just stressed out and a little drunk and way paranoid, God knows.
And then Prentice returned, feeling dislocated, to the party. He seemed to see everyone in a new light, now. He could see the various mating dances, now that he had less reason to perform one himself. What odd contortions they put themselves through…
God, he thought, what's odd is me. Seeing things. Feeling drugged without drugs. Something put into my drink? No. It wasn't like that.
Where was Lissa? He didn't see her. He saw Jeff, though, waving at him from a lounge chair by the pool.
Jeff didn't look happy. Standing near Jeff, smiling crookedly, was Arthwright. When Arthwright looked over, nodding at Prentice, continuing that tilted smile, Prentice knew he hadn't imagined the man behind the mirror, and he knew who it had been.
Near Malibu
Mitch was watching the heavy set woman being carried to the pool, but he was thinking about his Mom.
She had left Dad, she said, because he was a drunk, that was the weird thing. Hypocritical bitch. After the divorce she started to get drunk all the time.
He remembered when she'd come home and taken him into her lap and kissed him on the neck and there was something sick about that kiss…
Not just the smell of liquor, although that always made him sick No, it was a lingering kiss and there was something about it being on the neck, on the throat; a sense of being used for something. Like a sex toy, he realized now, though she'd never actually touched his dick or anything.
Why was he thinking about this now?
The woman was actively struggling now, as a group of five men dragged her to the pool; she was grinning with effort and hysteria. They were nearly there.
They'd changed the music. Now it was an old Madonna song, Christ, from years ago. Material Girl. But then somebody turned the record player's speed down, so it was playing it at 16 rpm, and Madonna was singing baritone, I'm-m-m-m l-i-i-v-i-i-n-g i-i-i-n-n-n-n uhhhhhhhhh m-m-muhhh-t-earrr-i-i-www-urrrr-lll-dd…
Mitch was still thinking about his Mom; how she'd have a few drinks and start whining, almost crying.
Using him for a sympathetic ear. But shit, he was only a kid. How was he supposed to help her? It made him feel all shrunk up inside.
Aaaa-nnnn-d l-i-i'm uhhhhh mmmm-uhhhhh-t-e-eerrr-i-i-i-uhhhh-lll guh-ernrrrllll…
Once in a while he'd try to get away from Mom by going to his Dad, asking could he move in with him. He wasn't really able to tell Dad how weird it felt living with Mom. But Dad was mostly into his guns, all he wanted to talk about was guns, and the one time they were going to 'do something together' he'd got Mitch down to an NRA volunteer office to help stuff envelopes for some anti-gun control mailing. His Dad would change the subject when he tried to talk about how he didn't want to live with Mom any more, and changing the subject was a message to Mitch, told him that Dad didn't want to get around to the possibility of Mitch moving in with him so that meant he didn't want Mitch around… Didn't really want Mitch at all…
So big deal, Big, fucking deal.
Someone switched the record speed again, this time to 78 so Madonna was keening:
I'm living in a material world and l'm a material girl oh l'm living in a…
Now they were peeling off the big woman's clothes. Her rolls of fat and tits flopping free. Nearby, a few people were poking absently at the collapsing bonfire of chairs. Mitch could just make out the black filigree of the cat's skull and skeleton in the guttering coals.
The Handy Man was at the pool, forcing the woman in with the others. Where was the More Man? Nearby. Very near. Mitch heard a sound from the next room: it was a human sound, from a human throat, but it was not a cry, or a whimper, or a groan. It was a squeaky kind of noise that said: There are places underneath despair.
Outside, the men had the woman half into the pool, holding her down, so her legs and torso were under the surface. Mitch could hear her screaming now, a thin faraway sound that might have been the happy squeal of a woman being teased by her friends, if you didn't know better, if you couldn't see her, now, fighting like a cat trying to get out of a tub of bathwater – that look on her round, childish face like a baby with its blankets on fire. And then her back arching, as something under the surface of the pool found her. As something happened to her, under the water, something you couldn't see. Her eyes popping and her mouth open wide as it would go but no sound coming out. And then…
It was hard to see from up here, but…
It looked like something was forcing its way out of her mouth. Something white and shiny and wet and quivering with strength.
The others crowded round her, holding her down into the pool, the men yellow in the firelight, looking like a cluster of wasps he'd seen once feeding in the wound of a roadkilled puppy.
A squeak from the next room.
A noise outside the door.
Mitch felt himself testing the waters of catatonia.
The San Fernando Valley
Jeff was simmering about something. Prentice thought maybe Jeff was pissed off at him because he'd deserted him at the party, but then, as Arthwright walked away from Jeff to say goodbye to some producer with a lousy hair transplant who was taking his jiggly bimbo out to a white Rolls, Prentice saw the glare that Jeff sent at Arthwright's back. It was Arthwright Jeff was mad at.
'What's up?' Prentice said, trying not to look smug about Lissa as he sat down on the lounger next to Jeff.
Jeff looked him over irritably. 'You just had a shower, looks like.'
'Number one on the list of tell tale signs. Yeah. You look bummed.'
'Arthwright's been hassling me to – Never mind, here he comes back.'
Arthwright was strolling up with his hands in his pockets humming to himself along with the George Michael's tune the DJ was playing. Father Figure.
Arthwright stood a little too close, just between them. Prentice was still seated so Arthwright's crotch was level with Prentice's face. It made him vaguely uncomfortable.
'Can I have a quick word with you, Tom?' Arthwright said. It would have been more honest to say, despite the smile and light tone, Get your ass over here, I want to talk to you.
'Sure.' Prentice got up, making a What the hell is this? expression at Jeff, though privately he was hoping it
