Savages

“Merry Christmas, my darling girl,” Paqu said, her face radiant with the glow of giving.

“I kind of like my breasts the way they are,” O said. Small, yes, but tasty, yes, and other people seem to like them, too. Given the right mellow weed, people have dined on them for hours . . .

“But, Ophelia, don’t you want breasts like . . .”

She searches for the right word.

The word is “mine,” O thought.

Don’t you want boobs like mine? Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who has the nicest rack of all? Me, me, me, me. I walk through South Coast Plaza and make men hard from across the aisle. To affirm that I’m still attractive, not getting old, getting old getting old not. Don’t you want to be beautiful like me?

Yeah, no.

“I really wanted a bicycle, Mom.”

Later, after three apple martinis over Xmas dinner at Salt Creek Inn, Paqu asked O if she was a lesbian. O confessed that she was. “I’m a five-five bull dyke, Mom. Carpet munching and strap-ons are what I like, you bet.”

She traded the gift card to Ash for a bright red ten-speed.

Quit her job three weeks later anyway.

17

One day when Chon—then Johnny—was three years old, his father taught him a lesson about trust.

John Sr. was a founding member of the Association, the legendary group of Laguna beach boys who made millions of dollars smuggling marijuana before they fucked up and went to prison.

Big John lifted Little Johnny up to the living room fireplace mantel, held his arms out, and told him to jump. “I’ll catch you.”

Delighted, smiling, the little boy launched himself off the mantel, at which point Big John lowered his arms, did an ole, and Little Johnny crashed face-first on the floor. Dazed, hurt, bleeding from the mouth where a front tooth had gone into his lip, Chon learned the lesson his father had intended about trust:

Don’t.

Ever.

Anyone.

18

Chon hasn’t seen much of his father since the old man finished his fourteen-year federal stretch.

John came back to Laguna but by that time Chon was in the navy and they just sort of drifted apart. Chon bumps into him every once in a while at Starbucks or the Marine Room or just on the street and they exchange greetings and as much small talk as Chon can manage and that’s about it.

There’s no hostility; there’s just no connection, either.

This doesn’t bother Chon.

He doesn’t yearn for it.

Chon’s thinking is that twenty-some years ago his father fucked his mother, the sperm did their SEAL thing, and so what? His father was getting his nut, not signing up for Little League, fishing trips, or heart-to-heart talks. As for the fuckee, aka Mom, she liked dope a lot more than she liked Chon, and Chon gets this totally—he likes dope a lot more than he likes her.

Ben once observed that you could say Chon was “raised by wolves,” except that wolves are warm-blooded mammals that care for their young.

19

Some backstory on Ben.

The missing Ben, the rarely present Ben.

Start with the genetic material—

Ben’s father is a shrink, his mother a shrink.

Can we safely say he grew up in an overanalyzed home? Every word reconsidered, every action reinterpreted, every stone turned over for its hidden meaning.

What he craved most was privacy.

He loved (and loves) his parents. They are good, warm, caring people. People of the Left who came from People of the Left. His grandparents were New York Jewish Communists, unreconstructed apologists for Stalin (“What was he supposed to do?”) who sent their kids (Ben’s parents) to a socialist summer camp in Great Barrington, Mass., where they met and formed an early association between sexuality and left-wing political dogma.

Ben’s parents went from Oberlin to Berkeley, smoked pot, did acid, dropped out, dropped back in again, and ended up with comfortably lucrative psychotherapy practices in Laguna Beach.

Where they were among the very few Jews.

(One day Chon was bitching about being one of the few [former] military types in Laguna Beach, California, and Ben decided to take him up on it.

“You know how many Jews there are in Laguna?” he asked.

“Is your mother Jewish?” Chon inquired.

“Yes.”

“Three.”

“Correct.”)

Ben grew up listening to Pete Seeger and both Guthries, Joan Baez, Dylan. Subscriptions to Commentary, Tikkun, The Nation, Tricycle, Mother Jones. Stan and Diane (Ben was instructed to call them by their first names) were not upset when they caught fourteen-year-old Ben with a joint— just told him to smoke it in his room and of course asked him endless questions: Was he happy? Unhappy? Alienated? Not? Everything okay at school? Was he confused about his sexuality?

He was happy, unalienated, pulling a 4.0 and relentlessly straight with a series of Laguna girls.

He just wanted to get high every now and then.

Stop analyzing everything.

Ben grew up in privilege but not wealth.

Nice but not luxurious house in the hills above downtown Laguna, such as it is. Mom’s and Pop’s offices were in the house, so he learned to come in the side door after school so as not to walk in on the patients in the waiting room.

He grew up Laguna cool.

Hit at the beach, smoked herb, walked around barefoot. Hung at the basketball court, the volleyball court (was really good there, met Chon there, partnered up and beat a lot of other teams there), the playground.

Did well in school.

Genius at botany.

And business.

Ben went to Berkeley—of course.

Where else?

Double major—botany and marketing, and no one asked what was up with that. Summa cum, Phi Beta Kappa, honors thesis. But Ben was a SoCal, not a NoCal (and these are not only different states of mind, they are