run with Len since long before Alex and was always just there, tall, stocky, and soft-bellied, his chin perpetually flecked with acne.
Alex and Hellie started walking, heading toward the concrete bed of the L.A. River, then up to the bus stop on Sherman Way, with no destination in mind. They’d done it before, even sworn they were leaving for good, gotten as far as the Santa Monica Pier, Barstow, once all the way to Vegas, where they’d spent the first day wandering hotel lobbies and the second day stealing quarters from old ladies playing the slots until they had enough for bus fare home. Speeding down the 15 in the air-conditioning on the way
back to L.A., they’d fallen asleep leaning on each other’s shoulders. Alex had dreamed of
the garden at the Bellagio, the water wheels and piped-in perfume, the flowers arranged like a jigsaw puzzle. Sometimes it took Alex and Hellie hours, sometimes days, but they
always came back. There was too much world. There were too many choices, and those
only seemed to lead to more choices. That was the business of living, and neither of them
had ever acquired the skill.
“Len says we’re going to lose Ground Zero if Ariel doesn’t come through,” Hellie said as they boarded the RTD. No grand plans today. No Vegas, just a trip to the West Side.
“It’s talk,” said Alex.
“He’s going to be pissed we didn’t clean up.”
Alex looked out the murky window and said, “You notice Eitan sent his girlfriend away?”
“What?”
“When Ariel came to town. He sent Inger away. He hasn’t had any of the usual girls around. Only Valley trash.”
“It’s not that big a deal, Alex.”
They both knew what Ariel was coming to Ground Zero for. He wanted to slum it for a
while and Alex and Hellie were supposed to be part of the fun.
“It never feels like a big deal until it is,” Alex said. There had been other favors. The
first time was a film guy, or at least someone Len said was a film guy, who was going to
get them lots of Hollywood business, but Alex learned later he was just a production assistant, straight out of film school. She’d ended up sitting on his lap all night, hoping that might be all there was to it, until he’d taken her back to the little bathroom and put
their filthy bath mat down on the tiles—a weirdly chivalrous gesture—so that she could blow him in greater comfort while he sat on the toilet. I’m fifteen, she’d thought as she’d rinsed out her mouth and cleaned up her eye makeup. What does fifteen look like? Was another Alex going to slumber parties and kissing boys at school dances? Could she climb
through the mirror above the sink and slide into that girl’s skin?
But she was fine. Really okay. Until the next morning, when Len kept slamming
cabinet doors and smoking in this way he had where it seemed like he wanted to eat the
cigarette with every drag, until at last Alex had snapped and said, “What is your problem?”
“My problem? My girlfriend is a whore.”
Alex had heard that word so many times from Len it barely registered anymore. Bitch,
slut, occasionally cunt when he was feeling particularly angry or when he was affecting British gangster. But he’d never called her that. That was a word for other girls.
“You said—”
“I didn’t say shit.”
“You told me to make him happy.”
“And that means suck his dick in Whore?”
Alex’s head had done a dizzy spin. How did he know? Had the film guy walked right
out of that bathroom and just announced it? And even if he had, why was Len angry? She
knew what “make him happy” meant. Alex had felt nothing but rage and it was better than any drug, burning doubt from her mind.
“What the fuck did you think I was going to do?” she demanded, surprised at how loud
she sounded, how sure. “Impressions? Make him some balloon animals?”
She’d picked up their blender, the one Len used for protein shakes, and smashed it against the refrigerator, and for a moment she’d seen fear in Len’s eyes and she had wanted very badly to keep making him feel afraid. Len had called her crazy, slammed out