6 comments/ 9647 views/ 12 favorites A Girl Named Maria By: Adrian Leverkuhn There were no lift lines – it was simply too cold out for most people. Too cold to even think about getting out of a warm bed to go out and ski, especially when the wind was howling and a new storm was barreling in, especially when that bed was so nice and warm and your thigh muscles were still burning from skiing the day before. But even so, when all was said and done, there were still a few good reasons to go out on such a day. No lift lines meant no crowds on the slopes. No crowds on the slopes meant the snow conditions might be pristine. Only then, the man knew, when just a few die-hard skiers are out, can you take quiet, solitary meditations down untracked runs, your body lofted along on a magic carpet of downy snow – and perhaps most important of all, looking out over some of the most majestic scenery on earth with nothing but your own beating heart for company. So, yes, there were no lift lines, and the man skated onto the boarding ramp of the high-speed quad by himself. The lift attendant, a kid perhaps twenty years old and still standing in the foothills of his life, looked at the man like he was crazy, because only the lonely ski when it's twenty below up top – and the winds are gusting to forty-five in the trees. Still, the kid was envious, if only because he too wanted to be up on the mountain making "first tracks", and not down here at the bottom of the mountain standing around with half-frozen feet herding three skiers every fifteen minutes onto "his" chairlift. The next chair swung around into position and the man plopped down onto the snow-crusted black vinyl slab some called a seat. He scrunched his butt around on the slab, trying to get comfortable even though he knew it was impossible, then marveled that this miracle of modern engineering would carry him twenty-six hundred feet up the mountain in just a few – bitterly cold – minutes. And the lift was empty! The lift attendant had barely croaked out "have a nice day" before the chair grabbed hold of the high-speed cable overhead and whisked the man onward and upward into the howling wind. Snow bit into the small patch of bare skin under his goggles, skin not covered by his neoprene face mask, and as always, his nose began to run, forming a nice rim of frozen goo on his upper lip. He pulled the overhead footrest down and lifted his skis onto the bare little perch, then reached down and unfastened a too-tight buckle on his right ski boot, right over his barking instep. He let his left leg dangle from the perch to increase circulation, and he swung that leg back and forth to help pump blood throughout his leg. A vicious gust tore across the mountain and the chair swung from side to side, yet he barely noticed the upset. He had been skiing most every winter, for most of his life, for well over sixty years and counting, and such things barely registered anymore, though when he was riding up the mountain on lifts packed with teenaged girls from places like Houston or Ft Lauderdale, they always squealed when gusts like this caught them unawares, and he always smiled with them. He could almost remember what it had been like – once upon a time – to have those kinds of feelings. To have been so innocent. To have had no need to hide such feelings. To cherish the isolation of cold winter mornings. Another gust slammed into the lift and swung the chair violently, and the operator up top must have decided it was time to slow the rate of ascent a bit, and the man groaned as he heard the cable overhead slowing down. His five minute trip up the mountain was going to turn into a ten minute ride, and so he knew that when he reached the top of the mountain he was going to resemble a cherry popsicle: red all over and frozen to the core. But the wind fell off a bit and the man thought his luck was holding when a moment later the chairlift sped up again; soon he could begin to see the top of the mountain through swirling mists of snow and scudding cloud, and he lifted the footrest back overhead and dangled his legs in earnest. "Come on legs...you can do it!" he said to the wind. When the unloading ramp drew near he casually raised the tips of his skis, then pushed himself off the chair when the tails of his skis slapped down on the snow covered ramp. He skated off to an area a few meters away and adjusted the buckles on his boots, got his poles strapped to his wrists, then, after flicking windblown snow off his goggles he pushed off and started down the mountain. It was exhilarating. This first run of the day almost always was, no matter the conditions. Up on top of the mountain, there were almost solid walls of pine trees lining the trails, and these silent sentinels were sheltering him from the worst of the wind. After a quick series of tightly linked turns he stopped and took in the completely untracked carpet of powdery snow that lay ahead, and smiling, he pushed off again and centered himself over his skis, found his rhythm, began soaring down the mountain. Deep powder was like flying, he'd always thought, a feeling as intense today as it had been the very first time he'd tried skiing, sometime back in the early sixties at Heavenly Valley, high above South Lake Tahoe. Some things never change, and he smiled at the thought. Some needs never change, too. The trail wound down the mountain, crossed open meadows, slashed through narrow glades of trees, wandered past little cabins where you could stop for a hot chocolate, and today as always he felt some sort of special magic up here on the mountain. He was cold, he was uncomfortable, and he had never been happier in his life... Too soon he was coasting through the runout at the bottom of the mountain, but he slid to a stop near the bottom, but still well away from the lifts at the very bottom. Instead of skiing down to the bottom of the run, he skied off the main trail into a group of very expensive looking houses, and he stopped and unbuckled his boots by the side of a gray four story house clad entirely in redwood, a crisp, contemporary house of glass, wood and steel with a weathered copper roof. This was his home, and he took off his skis by an alcove on the south side of the imposing structure. He entered a code on a numeric keypad by the side door and slipped quietly inside, put his skis and boots away in a special room dedicated to his ski gear, then took the elevator up to his bedroom on the fourth floor. He stripped off his one-piece Bogner ski suit, went into the bathroom and, setting the water temperature for the shower just so, stepped under the spray and let the warmth penetrate his body. He usually went off into a trance under the shower's spray, but today he soaped up and rinsed off rapidly, before getting out and drying off. He shaved, dressed, then went over to a huge expanse of glass that looked out over the mountain and, shaking his head, looked up at the storm now enveloping the mountain. Yes, he told himself, a good day for one run. And it had been a good one. He took the elevator down to his study, opened his Mac and looked over his morning emails, saw a new script had been sent along from his agent and frowned. He read the message, groaned when he saw who the director was but downloaded the file anyway, opened it, then quickly parsed the synopsis. Mildly interesting, he thought after reading the overview, but more than likely a box office flop in the making. Not sure he wanted to get involved with a questionable project like this one, he sent his agent a curt 'thanks but no thanks', then went back upstairs to finished getting dressed. With a heavy winter coat and snow boots on, he went to his bedside table and picked up the book he'd been reading the past couple of nights, then took the elevator back down to the ground floor. He grabbed a long scarf and went back out into the storm, and began the short walk down into town. He remembered the town when it had been considered "new", that is, before it had been discovered by the Glitterati. It had been a mining town, or so the legend went, located high in the Rocky Mountains of central Colorado. Then, in the sixties, it had been discovered by a new breed of American adventurer, a group of kids who lived and loved somewhere along the ragged edge of human existence, lost under the south side of the sky. This new breed had, generally speaking, not a lot of cash on hand but more than a few had trust funds hidden away from prying eyes, and so they skied all winter long, at least when the weren't screwing their brains out. As it happened and in the beginning, they tended to migrate from one undiscovered ski area to the next for the five or so months of winter in the American Rockies, then they were off to Maui to get in some surfing over the summer months. These folk tended to smoke a lot, but by and large not tobacco, preferring instead something known locally as Maui-wowie, so after a few months surfing and toking it was back to Colorado or California, and usually the pot came back with them. And so the worm turned. America went to Vietnam in a Purple Haze, before the great Manic Depression in Berkeley. Still, in a great shift that happened over the next couple of years, the freaks settled down in the town, and by the late sixties had become home to these nomads. Not long after a few uncharacteristically adventurous singers and actors got into the groove of the place and bought houses there, then, as such things go, within a few more years more actors than singers moved to the town, and it became the epicenter of a new Rocky Mountain High. It was all over when even New York intellectuals began to pay attention to the place. Houses that had cost five hundred dollars in the early sixties were soon selling for a hundred thousand, then a million dollars. By the late eighties, property values had grown to obscene levels and all the local color, all the hippies, simply vanished, but by then the town's new reputation was cemented into the global gestalt, and that was that. In the "new" town, money was everything. If you had it you were in. If you didn't have money? Well, you just didn't last long, did you, Slick. Still, the man remembered coming to the town for the first time "back in the day", back when he was a struggling actor, back when hippies defined the times and tie-dyed aquarian motifs were everywhere you looked. Skiing was just a part of the kultur, too. In summer rugby was the thing, jeep-trails beckoned and rock climbing was a big deal, while eating pizza at a place called Pinocchio's was the hip thing to do when you were stoned out of your mind and the munchies hit somewhere 'round midnight. Rich kids and their parent's – almost always from Texas – grazed at a subterranean Mexican dive called Toros, while the locals passed time at a saloon called The Red Onion, and for most of the sixties that was about it. The town soon became known around the country as the new cool, the anti-Elvis. The town was Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, while Conway Twitty wasn't welcome. It was too good to be true...too good to last, and even then the man understood it could never last. Even then money was just too powerful. But now? Well, it was somewhat different, the man mused. Now you couldn't find a lot to build on in town for less than ten million bucks, and a decent lunch at any of the tonier restaurants cost well over fifty bucks a head. Hotel rooms in season? A thousand bucks for a tiny space you could barely turn around in. Valet parking was mandatory...because you could never find a parking place. The town had become what it never should have become: a little slice of New York City right in the middle of the Rockies, and while the man disliked what had become of the place, he knew it had been inevitable way back when, because there was no place else like it. Knowing this, he had bought the lot for his house after his second movie. The film had made some serious money, and he loved the town. That was when? 1978? He had never regretted the decision, even though it had taken him several more movies to afford the house he built. But that was then and this was now, and he'd starred in more than fifty movies to date and made more money every year than many countries. He had his house in BH, or Beverly Hills, a beach house north of Santa Barbara and a flat in London, but they couldn't compete with his favorite. His favorite house was in his favorite little town in all the world, and his friends knew it. Still, very few beyond a select group knew he lived here, and fewer still knew that he did so for most of the year. That illusion provided a cherished cloak of anonymity over the years, at least while he was here, because only a few real estate agents and bartenders knew the real score. That, and the fact the man was acutely aware of just how much a ball cap and a pair of Ray-Bans could conceal. Because in the end he was a very private person offscreen, and he avoided publicity, at least when he was here, "at home". Even so, he was in some ways a local and as such had his haunts, his favorite places, and he'd decided to get lunch at one of those that morning. So, he lifted the collar of his sheepskin jacket to protect his neck from the bitter cold, then took off from his house on the side of the mountain. He walked carefully down a few snow and ice covered streets to the outskirts of the central district, to one of the last truly cheap, truly authentic Mexican places in the town. Pepe's was a ramshackle old place, a white frame house with pink and green trim converted to a restaurant. The place was, generally speaking, dark inside, with wood walls stained a deep brown and warm lamps casting amber light all around the various little dining rooms. The glowing adobe floors seemed to absorb the light and radiate a peculiar warmness, and the overall effect was something like 'welcome to my home, please enjoy your time here.' The man entered and, as he was early and the place still almost empty, he found his favorite corner table unoccupied. He nodded to Pepe and stealthily slipped over to the corner and sat down, then saw his favorite waitress and waved to her; she waved back, appeared genuinely glad to see him, and he smiled inside. She had been working here for a while, maybe five or so years, and she was a knockout. She wasn't tall, some would have called her short, but she had a smile that made him feel alive, great legs and a face that oddly enough reminded him of Elizabeth Taylor back in the day, she was shy and no one knew anything about her, but everyone in town knew who she was nonetheless. There were stories about how she had come to America, and while these were awful no one really knew the score. She never talked about herself and, indeed, few people knew her name. She was painfully shy when forced out of her role as waitress, and few had the heart to press the point. Still, she was the reason lots of men ate at Pepe's, and if asked, the man might have admitted he was one of them. She came to the table, brought him chips and salsa, a pitcher of ice water, and her smile, which he never seemed to tire of, but today there was a redness in her eyes, an unfamiliar sadness hovering around her like a dark cloud. He watched her, watched her eyes, and he felt something in his world lurch. Something was wrong. He could feel it. "How are you today, Tio?" she said as she put the chips down on the table. She poured some water while he struggled out of his coat. "Good, good. How about you?" "Oh, I'm good." Her shy eyes darted away from his, he failed to make contact, and he flailed about for words. "Oh?" She looked at him now, parried this thrust. "Do you need a menu today?" She spoke with an accent he found charming; maybe it was real, maybe not, but he didn't give a damn as long as she seemed to want to talk. "A menu? Not for the last twenty years, I reckon," he said as he chuckled, struggling. "What can I get you today? Some guacamole?" Pepe's guacamole was the best he'd ever had, anywhere, and they always served it freshly made, prepared table-side, and always with soft, warm homemade flour tortillas. "That'd be great," he said as the front door opened and the Ghost of Christmas Past entered. "Oh, Hell," he groaned inwardly. "Why Renata? I can't deal with her today..." Renata Colson was the local Supreme Bitch Goddess of Real Estate, a true White Queen if ever there had been one, and she looked around the room before her laser-beam eyes settled on him. When she saw him hiding in the corner she perked up and cruised his way like a hound on the scent, or more accurately, like the Titanic crashing through April seas – racing for New York. "Jack! Darling! I was hoping to run into you today!" Bottle black hair with prominent white streaks framing her face, a vapid assortment of pasty-white make up framing black eye highlights and a lipstick somewhere beyond red, she reminded him of Disney's Cruella de Vil – and he found himself involuntarily looking around for an escape route. He watched her approach and suddenly felt like one of Disney's Dalmatian puppies. "Looking, for me? Were you, indeed? But really, Renata, I've already given blood this week. Surely you don't want mine?" She laughed. "Oh, Jack, you can be such a fucking prick!" Her face was all smiles, but there was an undercurrent of pure, calculating menace in the woman's eyes. "Will you be joining Tio for lunch today?" the waitress asked. "No!" the man cried inwardly. "Yes, why not?" Cruella de Vil snapped back. "I'll get your guacamole, Tio..." the waitress said as she rolled her eyes and walked off. "Tio? Tio? Why does she call you Uncle?" "I fucked her mother's cat once. Up the ass." Blank stare. "You are so charming, Jack." "Thanks, I think. So, how are you, Renata. Still eating young children?" "Oh, Jack, cut the shit, would you?" "If it's something you really feel strongly about, sure." He looked at her, wanted to get this over with as fast as possible. "What can I do for you today, Renata? Need a new kidney, perhaps?" She ignored him. "Did you hear about the Segals?" she said. "They're getting a divorce?" Frank Segal was a very big deal from Houston, something to do with trading oil and cornering the market on supertankers and owning at least twenty senators and half the House of Representatives, but more to the point he owned the lot just above Jack's house. Segal had plans to build a Texas-sized MacMansion just above his own little place, a phallic monster that would be the biggest ever built in town and, more to the point, effectively block almost everyone's view of the lower mountain. Segal was so reviled his name had become, Horror of Horrors, a verb, and the man had once considered taking Segal to court to block construction – but the town had come to his rescue and beat him to it. Things had grown so ugly so fast there were Vegas odds on when the divorce papers would be filed. C'est la vie. Few marriages survived building a house. Alimony made such partings sweet sorrows, too, didn't they? "Oh? Couldn't happen to a nicer couple. Do you still not go to the little orgies they don't hold?" "You are a prude, aren't you, Jack?! They're not orgies, Jack, just little parties. You really ought to come once, check things out." "Sorry, we're fresh out of riding crops at my place, and no more strap-on dildos up the ass for me, Renata, not with my prostate." Her eyes went round and grew full of transparent concern: "Jack, it's not cancer, is it?" "No, too much Viagra. Now it takes me three hours to take a piss. One of those fun side effects they forget to mention." "Does it still work?" she asked. "What?" "Viagra." "Wanna come home and find out?" She pasted her contrite smile back on her contrived face, then cast her eyes about covertly, as if checking under tables for spies, or worse. A Girl Named Maria "Anyway," she whispered after a moment, "I hear the lot is going on the market and I thought you might want to slip in an offer before it goes public..." He nodded. "Good thinking, Renata. Any idea what they're asking?" Yeah, like duh. He knew a hard sell when he smelled one, and he already had the figure, anyway. "Twenty," she said, meaning twenty million dollars for a quarter acre lot on the face of the mountain. But, he knew, it would take the property off the market, forgo a bidding war he might lose, and preserve the integrity of his own property's value. It was a quick calculus, and he'd made it days before. "Make the call," he said, and the White Queen fired up her iPhone and dialed away. "Bitsy? It's Ren. Will twenty work?" Pause... "Okay, I'll swing by and pick them up...What? Oh, we're down at Pepe's? Oh? FABulous! We'll get started on a pitcher of margaritas! Oh? Yes, we'll be ready for you!" He looked her way, a quick, sidelong glance before he rolled his eyes away from her. Then a young couple came in the front door, and the girl squealed when she saw him. She pointed at the man and ran over to his table. "Oh fucking God no!" he moaned. "Not now." "We heard you were here! Could I have your autograph!?" the girl cooed as she whipped out a black permanent marker from a coat pocket. His face upturned, his eyes slightly crossed, steam seemed to seep from his ears. "Sure, darlin'," he said as nicely as he could. "Where?" The girl, a cute blond thing with a New York accent, flipped around and pulled her pants down and so presented her ass. Turning her face to his, she said: "Right here!" while pointing to her left cheek. "How about, 'To Madison, with all my love!'" "Sure you don't want to do this at a tattoo parlor?" the man said as he took the marker and flipped off the top, before he grabbed the girl's ass and started writing. When he was finished she squealed, then he handed her the marker. "Ooh, could I kiss you?" she said. "No tongue, darlin'. I've got the clap." The girl squealed again, leaned over and kissed him full on the lips, pushing her tongue deep inside his mouth. She kept at it for about a minute. "Ooh, I heard you were the best, but you're even cuter in person than I thought you'd be!" "So are you, kid. Now, if that's your boyfriend over there, you might want to go check him out. He's either going to have a stroke or he's going to shoots us." The girl squealed again, turned and saw her boyfriend. He was red-faced, livid, and was squirming around like a squirrel had just burrowed up his dick. So of course, she turned back to the man, squealing. "I've always wanted to ask...what's your favorite movie?" "Debbie Does Dallas," he deadpanned. "Ooh, were you in that one? I don't think I've ever seen it!" "Really? I play Debbie, but, um, if that's your boyfriend, I think you better go do something to him. And use that tongue." She turned, looked at the fuming kid by the door. "Oops, right, gotta go!" She leaned over and kissed him again. Maybe two minutes this time and, he thought, she tasted like bubble gum. A wide-eyed Renata turned to him as the girl scampered away. "Does that happen often?" she asked, clearly astonished. "More than you might imagine." "Really? That was fascinating." "Fascinating. What an interesting choice of words, Renata." "Well, really, I'd have sworn with just a little encouragement she'd have pulled out your dick and sucked you off, right here at the table." "Yeah, ain't life grand?" He looked across the room at the girl, now sitting with her boyfriend at a table by the door, and he appeared to be simmering along just south of a cataclysmic meltdown. "Well, the days not over yet," he said as he watched the guy stand up and storm out of the restaurant in a huff. The girl got up too, looked over and waved at him, then took off after her beau. "Fucking amazing," said Renata. "It wouldn't have worked out, anyway," he replied with a mock sigh. "Why? Too young for you, Jack?" "Nope. Didn't take a Viagra this morning." "You sick prick!" she said, laughing wickedly. He turned, looked at her while he blinked rapidly, his trademark grin melting away all her pretenses and false airs. "Ya know, come to think of it, you'd look real good with my cock in your mouth." "Oh Jack, stop it!" "Maybe a load of cum dripping off your tongue. Assuming I can still get it up." "Jack, really, is sex ALL you think about?" He smiled, laughed a little. "Story of my life, sweetheart." The waitress returned to his table with a bowl and a fork. She placed the bowl on the table; it was loaded with avocado, some salt and pepper, tomato, onion, garlic and cilantro. She squeezed some lime on the avocado and began mashing all the ingredients together, then asked if he wanted jalapeño peppers added to the mix, while pointedly not asking Renata what her preferences were. "The hotter the better, darlin'", he said, and he smiled when she diced up two roasted peppers and mashed them into the bowl. Satisfied, she put the guacamole and fresh flour tortillas on the table and turned to leave, casting an evil eye at Renata before she left. "My God, Jack. I think that girl's jealous!" "What? Who?" "Our waitress, that's who!" she said. "Did you see the way she looked at me just then?" "You gotta be kiddin' me," he said, looking first at Renata, then at the waitress as she walked back into the kitchen. "I don't even know here name. Seems kinda cute, though." "Are you serious? That pig?" "Oh, look," he said while he tried to not kill Renata, "here comes the Red Queen!" He pointed at the door as Bitsy, the Segal's realtor, entered. Renata waved and Bitsy made her way over to the table. Bitsy then looked at the guacamole and frowned. "Jalapeños?" she asked. "Two," the man said, holding up two fingers. "Not with my GERD. I'll need an IV of Nexium." The man raised his hand and the waitress came back to the table. "We're going to need one more guacamole," he said, "this one without the napalm." The girl smiled, nodded her head, and started to turn away – but then he spoke. "Ya know, I've been coming here for something like twenty years, maybe more, and I'd bet you've been working here at least five. How come I don't know your name?" "Probably because you've never asked, Tio." "Well? Como se llama, darlin'?" "Maria. Or Maria Louisa, to be more formal, Tio." "Where are you from, Maria Louisa?" "Near Cuernavaca, Tio, which is near Mexico City." "I know where it is, Maria. I used to love it there, shared a house there sometime back in the 70s, or once upon a time, I guess you'd say." She smiled and turned to Bitsy. "Could I bring you something to drink, Miss Salzman?" "What? No pitcher?" "We got kinda side-tracked here, Bit," Renata said. "Remind me to tell you about it. Later." "Oh, well then, a Cadillac, rocks, no salt," Bitsy said dismissively with a flip of her wrist. Jack took in the gesture and his face went red. An offended Maria left, Bitsy opened her briefcase and pulled out a few papers and her notary stamp. "Got your checkbook ready, Jack?" "Never leave home without it, sweetheart," he replied. "Okay, sign here, here, and here," she said, pointing to three separate pieces of paper. He signed, Renata witnessed and Bitsy placed her notary seal on each paper, then the man wrote out the check. She placed them all in her case just as Maria returned with a margarita and another bowl of avocados. "You know," he said, "I came here for a quiet lunch and here I am with you two dames. Fate. Ya gotta love it." He pulled out the book he'd picked up from his bedside table and placed it on the table. "And I was just going to sit here in my corner and read all day. Now, ain't life grand?" Maria started making the second bowl of guacamole. "Are you reading again, Jack?" Renata seemed amused as she looked at the book. "That's not your style." "What makes you say that? I love to read. Especially the classics, like Mad Magazine." "I'd have taken you for more of a Penthouse type, Jack," Bitsy sneered. "Used to, swetheart, but it takes me too long to jack off these days, and, well, my hemorrhoids aren't what they used to be." Bitsy rolled her eyes. Renata picked up the book and looked it over. "More Die of Heartbreak? Saul Bellow?" Renata said as she looked over the back cover. "What's it about?" "Ren, really, I thought you were a Radcliffe type." She shrugged, looked him in the eye. "Vasser, Jack." "Well, I haven't quite got a handle on this one, yet," he said, "I'm only a few chapters in, but it looks like a story about older men being used for their money, over and over again, by younger girls. All the men are looking for is love. You know. Kinda like they're being taken advantage of," he said as he looked sharply at Bitsy. "Over and over again." "Oh, so we're taking advantage of you, Jack?" "Did I say that? Heavens no, Bitsy! You're doing me a favor, aren't you?" They both looked at him. "Anyway, Bitsy," he continued, "I told Ren I thought she'd look great with my cock in her mouth. Wanna go back to my place and make it a threesome?" Bitsy paused, maybe even considered it for a moment before she saw the irony in his eyes. "Well, I think I'll head back to the office and finish this up," she said, taking a long pull from her margarita. "Me too," Renata said, taking her cue from Bitsy and suddenly seeming quite offended. "Glad I could be of some use to you ladies today," he said. "Renata, who tipped you off I was here today?" "Binoculars, Jack. Never leave home without 'em." "Really. Fascinating. You were in the CIA once, I take it?" "Good bye, Jack. Seeya later?" "Sure thing, kid. Enjoy my money." And as quickly that, the man was alone, just like he'd planned it that way. Well, hadn't he learned about the Segal's divorce three days ago, from a member of the planning commission? Hadn't he let his attorney in on it, and let him plant the bug in some realtor's ear? How else had all that paperwork been ready in less than ten minutes? "Maria, I think I'll have some iced tea, maybe you could put some peppers in that other bowl of guac?" "Certainly. Could I bring you anything else?" He looked at her and once again noticed her eyes, the sense of despair he found in there. "Maria? Are you alright?" She looked away, then over her shoulder – back towards the kitchen. "I'm not supposed to say anything, but I think Pepe is going to close the restaurant soon..." "What? Why?" "The rent, I think it has doubled. At least he says so. And there are no apartments around here I can afford anymore, anyway, so I am thinking about leaving." He pursed his lips. "Is Pepe around?" "Si...yes." "Ask him to come here, will you?" "Please, do not..." "Maria, I'm not an idiot. Now please, fetch him for me, would you?" Pepe Gonzales was an old man, almost as old as the man was, but Pepe was short, fat and certainly not famous. When Pepe saw the man he smiled and came to the table. "Señor Jack! Good to see you, my friend! How are you!" "Good, my old friend. Now tell me, I've heard a rumor floating around town that rents are exploding around here, and that many businesses are in trouble. Some are closing. Anyway, I thought of your restaurant and was worried about you. Now, tell me the truth. What's happening?" Pepe looked around, dread in his eyes. "Si, it's true. My rent is going from ninety thousand a year to four hundred. There's no way any of us are going to make it at those prices." "So, you're shutting down?" "Si." "When?" "The new rent? It goes into effect the end of next month, after my lease is up. We will close before then." The man reached in his coat again and pulled out his checkbook. "Pepe, I've been thinking about getting into the restaurant business. How would you like a new partner?" Pepe sat down. "A partner? Si, yes, that would be good. But what would you want? What percentage?" "Lunch, maybe, from time to time? I don't know. I'd feel just awful if you left town. Besides, you're so much a part of life here, things would never be the same." "Señor Jack, I don't know. This sounds a little bit crazy." The man opened his checkbook and wrote out a check for a million dollars, then handed it to Pepe. "Will this do? It'll pay the rent and maybe give you some money to redecorate the place." Pepe's eyes went round, his hands began to tremble. Maria had been watching, and her eyes went wide. "Now, Maria," the man said as he turned to face her. "You need a place to live. The whole bottom floor of my place empty. Two bedrooms, a couple of bathrooms and kitchen. It's going to waste. You move in, take care of the housecleaning for me, and we call it even. What do you say?" "Tio, it's not so simple. Not with me. I have a little girl, and..." "Are you married?" "No, no Tio." "Where's the girl's father?" She looked away, clearly hurt, and embarrassed. "Sorry," he continued. "That's none of my business..." But Maria had disappeared, run off to the kitchen. "It's a bad story," Pepe said as he looked after her. "On the journey from Mexico she was I think raped, several times, by the coyotes. Her daughter does not know this, of course. I think very few people know this, Señor. She has had a hard life. You understand...hard?" The man glowered at the table, hated his received insensitivity. Unlike Renata and Bitsy, Maria had never done an evil thing to him, not ever. Maria was as undeserving of anyone's arrogance or insensitivity as anyone he could imagine, and he was agonizing over his choice of words when he saw her coming back to his table with a glass of iced tea in hand. He smiled, smiled at the goodness he found in this girl's soul. "I'm sorry, Tio. It's just that..." "There's no reason to apologize, Maria, and anyway, if anyone deserves an apology it's you. I was out of bounds, and I'm sorry. Okay?" "Si." "But, like I said, I have two bedrooms going to waste. They're yours if you want them. Maybe when you get off work this evening you could come over and look at them?" She nodded her head, though she looked torn between tears and a smile. "Si, si, Señor Tio. But there is no question. If your offer stands, well, I would be pleased to be your housekeeper." Pepe looked at the man, then at Maria as she walked back to the kitchen once again. "She's a nice girl, Señor Jack, old fashioned, not like the women in this town. If you know what I mean?" The man looked at Pepe, his meaning clear. "No dishonorable intentions, Pepe. I'd just hate to see her go, and my house is empty. She would be a big help, and it seems like a good solution to me...for us both." Pepe nodded his head. "Maybe we change the name? Of this place? To Jack and Pepe's? That be okay with you?" "If you want, Pepe, sure," but the man was looking into the kitchen, looking after Maria. "Okay, Jack. Okay." He got up from the table, and held out his right hand. "Thanks, Jack. You just helped a lot of people." The man looked up at Pepe, then took his hand. "Isn't that what money is for, Pepe? To help make dreams come true?" "Maybe. Yes. But you have a good heart, Jack." "Pues, porque asi es, Pepe." He smiled that winning smile of his. "Besides, I've always wanted to be in the restaurant business." "Sure, Jack, sure." The man looked at the bowls of guacamole on the table, and the ice tea, then the book. "Sure thing, Jack," he said to himself as he watched Pepe walk away, then Maria taking orders at other tables. He picked up the book and turned to the dog-eared page he'd stopped at last night, and began reading. Every few pages, he turned and looked at Maria, and every now and then she looked his way and smiled. +++++ She got off at eight; he picked her up outside the restaurant and they drove off down the valley to where she said her apartment was, but he'd never seen this part of town before. Snow swirled over the highway but the Rover's amber fog lights lit the way well enough. She told him to turn off 82 by a bus stop well past the airport and he went down the steep ice covered road until she told him to turn again, and there it was. The apartment building, such as it was, looked to be a very modest affair from the outside, but he simply wasn't prepared for what he found inside. Maria had a room in the building. One room, and it was a shit-hole, he saw. A shit-hole, for herself and her daughter that cost a grand a month. There was a toilet down the hall, shared by about fifty people, and of course they were all from Mexico or El Salvador so dared not complain. And hey, for a grand a month all fifty people got to share a communal kitchen. Assuming the rats he saw let the humans into their kitchen. Her room was, perhaps, ten feet square, painted a dingy white, and there was a single, gloriously bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling by an exposed cord. In the room were, he saw, two mattresses on the floor, a small table and two chairs, and two suitcases in a corner. No closet, no refrigerator, no microwave, no television. Just two mattresses and a table. A thousand dollars a month, for this? He felt sick to his stomach, and wanted to find out who the slumlord was that running this dump. A young girl, perhaps ten, maybe twelve, sat on one of the mattresses, laughing and taking care of another toddler. "That's Louise, my daughter," Maria said as they entered. "She babysits when she gets in from school, for our neighbors." The girl looked up and immediately recognized the man from one of the few movies she had seen, and her eyes went wide. She stood up from the mattress and came over to the man and took his offered hand. She seemed puzzled, and looked to her mother for answers. Maria, Jack noted, simply shrugged her shoulders. "Uh, look, I'm Jack. Pleased to meet ya," he said as he held the girl's hand. "Uh, you and your mom are going to move in to my house. I've offered her a job, and we're moving you out of here tonight. My car's downstairs, so let's get all your things together and loaded up." "Most of our belongings are in these two bags," Maria said. "A few things to get in the kitchen, that's all." "Like what?" he said. "A hot plate, some tortillas. A few glasses." "The kitchen at the house is fully stocked. You won't need those things, and anything you do need we can pick up later, in town." He looked around the room, down the hall towards the bath and the kitchen, and suddenly he wanted to get as far away from this living, breathing Hell as he possibly could. "If it's just those two bags, I'll carry 'em down. That kid? I take it he's not yours?" "No, no, Louise just looks after him when she can, to give his parents a few moments alone." "Okay, well, you two take care of the boy, then come on down." "Si, it will only be a minute." Their bags were light, very light, and he wondered just how little they owned, just how barren their existence was, and suddenly he felt very old and lonely. He thought of how much money he'd made in just the past five years...what, something like a hundred and twenty million – after taxes? What had Maria made the last five years? What had she done to earn living in a place like this hovel, this shit hole straight from the bowels of Hell? He opened the hatch to the rear of his Range Rover and placed their bags inside, then got behind the wheel and started the engine, let the heater warm the interior. He flipped on seat heaters, then front and rear defrosters, while he checked his phone for messages. Another voicemail from his agent. The writer and director who had sent along the script he'd glanced at this morning had called; they really wanted him for the lead, and were offering seventy five million. "You can't turn this one down, Jacko. You'll screw me out of seven point five, buddy! Please?" A Girl Named Maria He shot his agent a text, said he'd take another look at it tomorrow, then he heard a knock on the Rover's glass. Louise was out there, half covered in snow and shivering. He opened the door and jumped out. "What's wrong, Louise?" "Nothing, señor, but I can't find the way in." "Ah. Here, let me show you..." He opened the door, got the seatbelt fastened around her tiny waist. Moments later her mother came out of the door, turning to look back at the squalid apartment building she had called home for five years. He could only guess what she was thinking as he ran around and opened her door, and as he helped Maria into the seat. He stopped, got her belted in, then he looked up at the shit-hole as he walked around to his door, and as he got behind the wheel. Soon they were on 82 headed back into town, but the vision of her room haunted him all the way back into town. "Anyone hungry?" he asked as they crossed the high bridge over the Roaring Fork. He turned right, into town, still waiting for an answer. The two girls were stone quiet, and he looked in the rear view mirror at Louise. Her eyes were as big around as saucers, and looked more than a little nervous as she glanced around the interior of the Rover. "You okay, Louise?" he asked. "Yes, sir. I'm fine." "What's wrong?" "I've never seen anything like this car, sir. It's amazing." "Call me Jack, would you? Anytime I hear 'sir' I think someone's talking to my dad." "Okay." "Now, are you hungry?" She looked away. "Louise, have you eaten today?" "Yessir. I had some carrots and celery at school." He felt sick to his stomach again. Of course. "Well, let's get you to the house, then I'll cook up some steaks. Sound okay?" "Yessir." He shook his head. Maybe in time, he thought, he might deserve a 'Jack', but she must be in shock. Don't push her. It's gotta be rough for the kid, her world turned upside down in a heartbeat. They came to his house and he hit a button on the rearview mirror that opened one of the garage doors. He pulled in between a Porsche 911S4 and an old Mercedes 300SL Gullwing, then got out and helped Louise with her seatbelt. Maria was already at the back of the Rover when he came 'round to fetch her, so he opened the tailgate and got their bags. Maria looked down, obviously feeling ill-at-ease. Maria reached for hers, but he said "I've got it" as he moved off toward the door that led into the house. He flipped on lights and walked them down the hallway to the door that led into their suite. He stopped, put the bags down and opened the door, turned on more lights and stepped inside. He'd had the suite finished out to meet the needs of his Hollywood guests, whom he had expected to visit often. It turned out his agent had come up once, so other than that one time the space had remained empty for pretty much the last ten years. It was finished to standards found in almost any house in Beverly Hills: gray-green walls, green slate floors, cypress ceilings stained light gray, gray-green granite countertops in the kitchen and baths. Sub Zero and Thermidor appliances, the best Kohler whirlpool tubs and sinks, elaborate tile work in both showers. The furniture: Danish, elegant. Sony televisions in every room, an elaborate Bang & Olufsen stereo in the living room, as well as a flurry of new iMacs everywhere you looked. "Excuse me, but is this your room, Jack?" "No, it's yours." She gulped, staggered backwards, her eyes so astonished it was almost scary. "No, no, no," she said. "This isn't right..." "What? What isn't right?" "Excuse me, but what do you expect me to do to you in return for all this?" "Could you help me with the housekeeping? Maybe the laundry?" "Who does this now?" she asked, incredulously. "Me, most of the time. I take my clothes to the laundry, though." "And you want nothing else from me?" He looked at her, now feeling ill-at-ease, but more for the little girl than for himself. "Maria? No! Now just make yourself at home, get unpacked. I'm going up to the kitchen, start working on dinner. Steak and a salad okay?" "Yes, okay Jack." "Louise, that okay with you?" "Yessir." "Maria, just come on up the stairs right over here," he said, pointing down the hall. "Kitchen is right up top, second floor. Come on up as soon as you get unpacked." He walked down the hall to his elevator and went up to the fourth floor, took off his coat and boots and put on some slippers, then walked back down to the second floor and into the kitchen. He pulled out some fresh romaine lettuce and the ingredients to make his own Caesar dressing, then pulled out three fresh porterhouse steaks, some lemon and butter, salt and pepper. He made the dressing, tossed the salad, then put it back into one of the Sub Zeros, then turned on the gas range and pulled out a huge black cast iron skillet and rubbed it down with sea salt before he put it on the fire. Next, he washed the steaks, patted them down with salt and, when the skillet was blistering hot, tossed the steaks on the iron and listened, satisfied, when they sizzled intensely. The room erupted in a rainbow of intense aroma and he looked at his watch. "Seven minutes a side, Jacko, and not a second more!" "What?" He turned, saw Louise staring at him. "I cook these steaks seven minutes a side. Medium rare every time." "I've, uh, I don't think I've ever had – steak." "Oh, uh, it's like Carne Asada?" She shrugged her shoulders, looked around the room. The glass walls in this part of the house were two stories tall and looked out on the ski slopes; the man's house was jealously regarded as one of the finest in the country, and as the one that had the best view of the mountain, bar none. He was justifiably proud of it, but the little girl was apparently stunned speechless by the sight of it. He looked at his watch: three minutes to go. "Come here, Louise. Give me a hand, would you?" She came over. "Get that fork, okay?" He pointed and she did. "Now, in about a minute, I want you to stick that fork into this steak, and right about here, then turn it over on the other side. Got it?" "Yessir." They both watched the steaks sizzling away on the skillet, then he said "Okay, let's do it!" The girl flipped the first one hesitantly, but with a little praise did the next two expertly. "Way to go, Louise!" he said, and the girl beamed. "Okay, seven minutes, then we take 'em off and put 'em on some plates." He went and got three plates down from a glass-fronted cabinet, then took the salad from the refrigerator and divided equal portions onto each. He looked at his watch: three more minutes. He saw Maria out of the corner of his eye, saw her watching him, watched her watching Louise. He went and got the butter and lemon ready, kept an eye on his watch, and an eye on Maria, as well. "Okay, Louise, it's about time. Maria, there's some stuff to drink in that fridge," he said, pointing to the closest Sub Zero. "Could you fix us something to drink?" Maria moved to the fridge, then asked where he kept the glasses. "There," he said as he pointed at a cabinet to her right. "Alright, Louise. Pick that one up and put it on this plate." He held a plate out for her, and after she got it onto the plate he put it back on the counter. "Alright, next one." When they were served, he turned down the fire and spooned a large dollop of butter into the skillet, then the juice of a whole lemon. He added some soy sauce, some ground ginger and whole peppercorns, that stirred some bourbon into the sauce until it was brown and delightful smelling. He picked up the skillet and poured the sauce on the steaks, then grabbed a plate and some knives and forks and headed over to the dining room table. "Y'all grab a plate, and come on over!" He sat, waited for them to come, then started to cut his steak...until he noticed mother and daughter deep in prayer. He stopped, waited, and when they were finished he resumed cutting away. And they joined him. He watched, expectantly. "My, this is excellent!" Maria said. He smiled, then he watched Louise, and the way she attacked her plate was gratifying. It was a huge steak, he noted, yet she finished it. The salad, too. "Who wants ice cream," he said after the girls finished. "I do!" Louise almost shouted. Smiling, the man got up, ambled over to the freezer and took out a tub of Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey, doled out three heaping bowls and carried them to the table. He passed them around, sat down and looked out the window at the mountain. He never tired of this view, night or day, only now he saw Maria's and Louise's reflections in the glass, superimposed inside and within this view of the mountain – and his own face. There was something about this juxtaposition of souls that moved him, that caused him to choke up a little, then his eyes met Maria's in the glass, and her eyes held his for a moment, before he looked away. "We'll do the dishes," Maria said. "We'll do 'em together," the man said, and she didn't argue. No, in point of fact she smiled, and his heart began to sing. +++++ After he had given them both the "nickel" tour of the house, showed them where key items were located and how to use the whirlpool pubs and showers, he noticed their clothing, or rather what meager clothing they possessed, and he shook his head once again. He told them 'good night' as he closed the door to their suite, then he took the elevator up to his floor, took out his cellphone and called Mike, the pilot of his G5. "Mike, I want to go down to L.A. tomorrow – Yeah, stay one night – Uh, two people with me, total weight less probably than two hundred pounds – About eight in the morning okay with you? – Fine, see you there." He flipped off the phone, put it on his bedside table beside Mr Bellow's manifest cynicism, brushed his teeth and slipped under the covers. He had a hard time falling asleep, perhaps because he kept going over the evening in his mind. It wasn't so much that he wondered whether or not he had done the "right" thing so much as he began to question his own motives. He truly felt like helping someone who had been nice to him for a long time, but after doing something as frivolous as buying the Segal property he had felt trivially useless in what should have been the afterglow of a modest victory. Maybe helping Pepe out of the jamb he'd found himself in had been a 'good' thing, and maybe that should have helped somewhat, but no, that simply wasn't the case. Sure, he was attracted to her, but screwing her, taking advantage of this wondrous soul would be the most vile thing he could ever do. And still, he was convinced his motives were pure, and if that was so, why did he feel so conflicted? He turned on a lamp by the bedside, sat up and rubbed his eyes. "Just what the Hell am I doing?" he said to the wall of glass by his bed. He got a bottle of water from the little fridge in the bathroom, then walked over and stared at the glass, and the mountain beyond. Then he saw Maria and Louise in the glass, but the reflection he saw inside the pane was of the two girls. The two of them, together. He wasn't there. He was alone, the way he had always wanted it. He kept coming back to that, and the image he saw of himself tore at his soul, forced him to confront the basic realities of his life. To, in effect, take stock of himself then and there, deep within the coming midnight of his life. Those girls. So many like them. So many eyes. So many haunted souls. So quietly we push them into the shadows. "What am I doing this?" The reflections were silent; they had no answers to share. He got back in his bed, turned out the light again and tried to sleep, but it was useless. Because what troubled him as he tossed around the bed was an image of himself he really didn't care for. Money, he saw again and again, as he always had in his nightmare. Money everywhere, money all around him. He bought people, just like he bought feelings. Experience didn't spring up organically around him, he manufactured custom made realities and peopled them with willing supplicants. He began playing that song, that symphony of the grotesque over and over in his mind, until he began to see the last twenty years of his life as some sort distorted Fellini landscape...and absurd, irrational images of this witty, balding self-parody of himself, dressed like a clown and prancing around throwing money into the air, filled the mind's eye of this sickening landscape. Then suddenly he knew he was dreaming, he knew it because there was a dime on an old, worn-out wooden floor. It was the floor of his bedroom, the room he had grown up in as a child. He watched with dread in his heart as the dime began to grow. To grow bigger and bigger, so big it began to break things in his room, so big it pushed through the walls of his room, then the walls of the house. So big the house ruptured. Soon it was pushing on his body, then the bodies of his parents, then the air was being crushed out of his lungs, and he watched as his parents died before his eyes, crushed by this huge dime, this dime that was fast growing so large it would crush the earth...then the universe... And then he heard the door to his bedroom open, and light from the hallway pierced the darkness of his room. He sat up, turned to see Maria coming into the room. He half expected to find her naked, but she had on a nightgown of some sort, and she walked with purpose to the side of his bed. "Were you expecting someone, Tio?" There was an edge in her voice. Unexpected. Dangerous. He shook his head. "No, not really." "Not really?" she said tauntingly. "I see." He stared at her. At her eyes. "I'm bought and paid for, aren't I, Tio? So, do you want to fuck me now?" She pulled back the sheets and got into his bed, laid on her back while she continued to look at him. Now she was naked, moaning while she fingered herself, imploring him to get on top and enter her. "Fuck me, Tio. Fuck me...fuck me..." He shook himself awake and looked at the alarm clock by his pillow, then at the faint band of light gathering along the eastern horizon. He sat up with his head in his hands, and began to cry. +++++ After he'd showered he took the elevator down to the ground floor; he found their door open, and the two of them wide awake, already dressed. "Breakfast, anyone?" he said as he poked his head in the door. "Si, Tio," Louise said, a smile on her face as she jumped up off the sofa and ran to him. Stunned, he hugged her and smiled. Maria stood and came over to him, smoothed down the disheveled collar of his Polo shirt, then smiled at her own domesticity. And his apparent shyness. "Well, let's go then!" he said, but he was definitely off balance now. Maria headed for the stairs that led up to the kitchen... "Nope, we're going out today. Follow me!" Fifteen minutes later the Rover pulled into a parking lot beside a row of private jets, and he helped them out of the Rover, then guided them through a small, well appointed building and outside again onto the ramp where all sorts of jets were parked. They followed along behind him, their wide eyes looking from jet to jet, until they came to a large aircraft at the far end of the ramp. As if by some sort of magic, the door to this jet opened and lowered, revealing steps that led up inside the aircraft, and just as they approached. There were seven steps to reach the inside of the Gulfstream, and he led them up, held Louise's hand as she stepped inside. Tracy, who once upon a time had made a somewhat respectable living as a porn actress, was his "Flight Attendant", and she guided the girls to seats over the wing. The man went forward to the cockpit, opened the door and stuck his head in. "Morning, Mike. What's the plan?" "We ought to be in Santa Monica a little after ten. You going to the house?" "No, not right away. I want to take the girls shopping first." Mike had been Jack's pilot for almost ten years, and as such he was used to the man's peccadilloes – at least where younger women were concerned. "That's Maria, isn't it? From Pepe's?" "Yessiree! And her daughter. They've moved into the guest suite downstairs." Mike grinned salaciously. "Well, alrighty then, Boss. I guess we're ready to get this show on the road? Best get strapped in... there's a bit of turbulence just west of here..." The man went back, noticed that Tracy had already served the girls Cokes. "Perrier for me, after takeoff," he said to Tracy as she helped him get fastened-in. "Yessir." The engines started, and the jet taxied down the runway and circled at the holding area, then lined up facing northwest. A huge, overwhelming roar, then the jet sped down the runway and leapt into the sky, pushing them back into their seats as the Gulfstream climbed at an impossible rate up into the clouds. "Asshole!" the man shouted toward the cockpit, clearly not amused. Then he turned to face two stunned girls; Maria was crossing herself, though Louise was grinning, apparently enjoying the ride. "Sorry. Mike was a Navy pilot. F-14s. He still likes to show off every now and then." Maria nodded. "I know Mike very well," she said. "He's a show off with tequila, too." "Swell," he said. "I coulda gone the rest of my life not knowing that..." Maria laughed, a small, constricted laugh, anyway. She was still quite nervous he saw, and when the Gulfstream banked left sharply her knuckles went white as her fingers tore at the armrests. "Tell him to knock it off," he said to Tracy, who instantly got on the intercom. Then he opened his laptop and started reading that new script. It was just about as bad as he thought, but seventy-five million for three months work would be hard to turn down. The ride settled down, and they landed in California two hours later. +++++ A limo carried them down Wilshire Boulevard to Rodeo Drive; they got out and walked up Rodeo to Little Santa Monica, then back down the other side of the street, then back up Wilshire to Neiman-Marcus. When he called the limo to pick them up – four hours later – they were carrying literally dozens of sacks and boxes of clothing, shoes, and toys for Louise. The limo carried them up to the 800 block of Foothill, to his house, and a housekeeper came out to help them carry their goods inside. He asked the girls to take a swim because, he said, he needed to talk on the phone for a while. They disappeared with the housekeeper, an elegant older woman from France named Teresa, to another part of the house to get their new swimsuits on. The girls, it turned out, had never been swimming before, and though the water was warm they were tense and never left the shallow end. When the man came out he could sense their unease, so went inside and popped on some old trunks and went back out to the pool. He dove in and slipped easily into a sidestroke, then swam over to the girls. "So, who wants a swimming lesson?" "I do, I do," they both cried. "Okay, okay, I get it. Well, age before beauty. Louise, you're up first. Give me your hands. Now, I'm going to pull you along through the water and I want you to let your legs just trail out behind." He started pulling her along by the hands, fascinated with the curious mixture of anticipation and fear on her face, in her eyes, then he told her to start gently kicking her feet as he pulled her through the water. "Now, if you ever start feeling like you're going to sink, just take a deep breath. Your lungs will fill up with air and become just like a big life jacket!" He carried her back to the edge of the pool, then asked her to hold on to the ladder. "Now, I want you to watch me," he said as he began to move around the pool using a breast stroke. "You take a deep breath when you stroke along with your hands, and you hold your breath when you glide along. If your lungs are full of air, you won't sink. Okay, got it?" A Girl Named Maria "I think so," Louise said. "Want to try?" "Oh, yes!" "Okay, like before, I'll pull you along, and when you're ready, just let go and try it. I'll be right there to catch you if you need me to..." He pulled her along for a few feet, then Louise let go and started to sink like a stone. He dashed back for her, pulled her up and she clung to him fiercely, afraid to let go. "It's alright, I gotcha." Louise pulled herself closer, and he could feel her shivering skin through his own. "Just relax now. I'm not going to let anything bad happen to you, okay?" "Okay." "Now, let's have some real fun and watch your mother have a go at it!" "Okay!" "Alright mama-san, you ready?" "Si, Tio." He took her hands. It was, he thought, one of the most electric moments of his life. Her skin on his was simply breathtaking, and he found he wanted to look away lest she see the effect she was having on him. "Okay, now I'm going to pull you through the water. Just let your legs float free..." "It feels so good," she said. "It's almost like you are flying through the sky!" "I know, it's great, isn't it? Do you want me to let go of you?" "Maybe not yet, Tio." "Fine by me." He continued to walk her around the pool, almost face to face, and he found he simply couldn't take his eyes off hers. "Okay, maybe I try now?" "Ready when you are," he said...and she let go...fell behind...began to sink...and he pulled her back up...to him. She kicked harder, kicked until her elbows and forearms were resting on his chest, her face just inches from his. "I think I like swimming," she said quietly as she looked into his eyes. "Me too," he whispered. "I'm hungry," she said. "Is it lunchtime yet?" "I have a place in mind." "Okay, but try with Louise one more time, okay?" He pulled Maria over to the shallow end and took up Louise and began to tow her around again, but she slipped free and began kicking and stroking and breathing on her own, and was soon doing well enough for him to relax. Louise then swam to her mother's side and put her feet down on the steps. "Ooh, that was wonderful, Louise!" Maria said. He came alongside and the girl stood up and flew into his arms. "Oh, that was so good. Thank you, thank you, thank you!" He hugged her, seemed to melt into her, and suddenly he knew in his heart what this was all about. +++++ The Gulfstream took off for Colorado early the next morning, and they were back on the ground before noon. He drove slowly into town, the roads a mix of deep snow on hard-packed ice and therefore demanding his full attention, but he made it into the garage without mishap. Maria and Louise carried all their new clothing into their suite, and he took the elevator up to his room and put on his ski clothes, then rode back down to the ground floor, collected his skis and stepped out onto the slopes. Once his skis were on he made a few quick turns down the hill and skied right onto the high-speed quad, and he was off to the top of the mountain. He had never married. Never really even come close, but as the chair carried him up into the clouds and the snow, he wondered why and the thought pressed in from every side of his being. Still, he thought he understood Maria, Louise too. He had never had a wife, never had any kids of his own, and now it was simply too late. Or was it? He was going to be seventy in a few too short years, but he had pushed his body too hard too many times over the years to think he might make it ten more years, let alone twenty. Hell, he wasn't even sure he wanted to live that long. He'd seen too many people grow too old, in the end becoming a burden to friends and family, or worse, an embarrassment. "I don't want to go out that way," he said to the clouds. But then the thought hit him, right between the eyes: 'Just how DO you want to go out, Jacko?' Alone? You want to spend the rest of your life...alone? Was that it? Was the reason really so simple? "Is that it? Is Maria simply...safe? There are a dozen A-list actresses back in Beverly Hills who would do anything to grab hold of someone like me. So, is that why I'm beginning to feel the way I do about her?" Yesterday had been something special. Swimming at the house, then out Sunset Boulevard to The Chart House on the beach for an early dinner. The three of them walking hand in hand on the beach afterwards, and it turning out to be first time the girls had seen an ocean, any ocean. Yet everything had seemed new to him, too. It wasn't just the newness 'they' were experiencing, it was the newness he was experiencing – through their eyes. It had been the most satisfying day of his life, and perhaps because everything was becoming clear. Then they were back at the house on Foothill. Louise, full of happiness, full of life. Maria, as sexually charged as any woman he had ever known, yet possessed by a calmness that only a dedicated mother would understand. He had sat up with them both out by the pool, and they had talked about the things they had seen and done that day, and the girls had talked openly about what a miracle he had become – to them. Louise soon grew sleepy, went off to her room, but Maria stayed by the pool with him, talking a little from time to time, looking at him constantly. Finally she had said it was time to go to bed, and she had held out her hand. She led him to her bedroom and they had made love all night long. Simple, pure love. A lot of holding and hugging, which soon turned into the most incredible kisses he had ever experienced, then the wildest, most uninhibited sex of his life. When they finished she had simply formed herself to the contours of his body and he had soaked her up, every inch of her, until a few hours later they were kissing and touching and dancing in the light they made together – again. And for the first time in his life he knew exactly what love was. And he was there. The chair danced in a bitter gust and he swung his skis, getting the circulation in his legs and feet going again as the unloading platform materialized in swirling mists just ahead. He swung the footrest up and out of the way just as his skis slapped down on the soft powder snow, and he pushed himself out of the chair and down the slope to a flat area near the top of the run, then flicked his goggles and got his poles around his wrists before he took off down the mountain. His legs felt good, his breathing too, as he arced across the face of the run. Suddenly he knew he was in for the run of his life. He felt great, more alive than he had in years as he slashed downward in a series of tightly linked turns that were fast turning into pure exhilaration. Then... He saw a shape out of the corner of his eye. 'There! Over there!' 'That little kid, he's cutting across the slope, heading right for me!' He tried to cut behind the teenager but caught an edge, and his body vaulted sideways through the air. He hit hard, his ski's bindings released and he began sliding head first down the mountain, then his shoulder caught something hard under the snow and he felt himself cartwheeling, spinning out of control toward those very same protective trees that lined the edge of the trail like sentinels. He felt those trees reaching out for him, calling him to their embrace. Then, impact, slamming into trees, tree limbs knifing through skin, shattered bone knifing through flesh... More spinning, then he could feel his head slamming into...pure white light... Then he felt nothing at all. +++++ She was still unpacking all their new clothing when she heard the doorbell. Then knocking on the door. A hard, insistent knock. She walked up the stairs and over to the main entry foyer, and she could see two police officers standing out there in the snow. She opened the door. "Maria? What are you doing here?" one of the local cops, Randy Newman, asked. "Oh, si, I'm living here with Señor Jack now." "Oh, well, listen, Jack's been involved in an accident. Up on the mountain. He's... " But Maria had burst out crying, and Officer Newman thought the whole scene felt a little odd. "Is he alright," she said through streaming tears. "I don't...they're not sure...yet." Newman saw a little girl running through the house, saw her run up to Maria and grab her around the waist." "Mama, what is it?" "It's Tio, Louise. He's been hurt, up on the mountain. He's at the hospital now." "Oh, Mama, no! The dream will be over!" Newman looked at the girl, wondered just what the Hell that meant. "Look, I can take you down to the hospital if you like..." "Si...yes, yes. Let me get our coats..." They drove out of town on 82, out over the Roaring Fork, then up the little hill to the hospital. Newman parked near the Emergency Room entrance, then helped the girls into the hospital. He asked the admitting nurse where Jack was; she advised he was still in surgery. The nurse looked at Maria and Louise and was just getting ready to take them to the family waiting room when she asked: "Are you family?" "What?" Maria responded. "Are you family? Only family are allowed back in surgical waiting. It's policy." "Yes, yes we are." Newman looked at the nurse and shrugged. Almost everyone in town ate at Pepe's and, therefore, almost everyone in town knew Maria, and they knew she wasn't a liar. And of course everyone knew Jack, knew his reputation, but no one had a clue about Jack and Maria. Still, in this town? Hell, anything was possible. The nurse escorted them down to the waiting room, and gave them each a bottle of water. "Someone will be back to tell you how the operation is going, as soon as we know." There was a television on in the waiting room, tuned to one of those 24 hour news stations, and already Jack was THE news. There was a reporter, standing just outside the hospital's entry in a howling blizzard, telling the world about the accident, retelling the storyline of his career, talking to the world as if Jack was dead, and Maria began to cry again. Louise simply looked empty, ruined, like a just glimpsed world full of wonder and joy was suddenly at an end. After what felt like days a surgeon in green scrubs came into the waiting room. "Maria? What are you doing here?" "Oh, Doctor Bill, how is he? How is Jack?" The physician pulled his face mask down, and Maria could see pursed lips and skepticism written all over the man's face. "Are you and Jack together?" he asked. "Yes, yes, but I think it is a secret still." "Oh." "How is he?" "Oh, he's going to be fine. He'll set off metal detectors in every airport he goes through from now on, but he'll be fine..." But Maria and Louise didn't hear too much after 'he's going to be fine...' – indeed, they couldn't even see the doctor's face anymore... But the doctor knew love when he saw it, and Maria was in love. That would do, for now. +++++ They were escorted to his room a few hours later, and Maria burst into the room only to find 'her Tio' on the telephone. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, smartass. You tell that motherfucker I won't do it for less than ninety. And get on to CNN, willya? Tell that goombah idiot out front I ain't dead, and that they've misspelled my middle name again...yeah, yeah, just like at the Oscars. Stupid Goddamn Motherfuckers!" He looked over at Maria, then at Louise, then winked an eye and held up one finger. "Yeah, Murray, listen, Maria's here. Get to work on that personal stuff, willya? I don't want her to have to worry about things like this ever again. Anyway, I'll call you in an hour. Yeah, yeah, probably in Vegas, unless I can talk a JP into doing it here." He flipped off the phone and only then did Maria begin to focus on Jack's body. His left leg was in traction, so was his right shoulder, and he had a few lacerations beside a black eye. "So," she began, "I hope you are not counting on me learning how to ski?" He laughed, held out his good arm. "Come here, baby," he said, sounding for all the world like Humphrey Bogart. "And you'd better give me a decent kiss!" "Dr Bill, what has happened to him?" she said as she leaned over and kissed him gently on the lips. "Yeah. Maybe Boo Radley here," the man said while pointing at the surgeon, "can explain it to you, 'cause I sure can't understand a goddamned thing he's told me so far. Only that airport metal detectors are going to be a pain in the ass from now on..." "What?" she said as she looked at the surgeon. "What does that mean, Dr Bill?" "Yeah, Doc? Take it away, would ya. Try to explain it to me again, and try using one syllable words this time, wouldya?" "Look, Jack, before I can...well, she say's she's family. I can't talk about this stuff around her unless she is." The man took Maria's hand in his, looked her in the eye. "Doc," he said, "she's the love of my life. She and the kid, well, they're all the family I got, if you know what I mean. We ain't married yet, but anyway, if she'll have me, I sure want her to marry me. Say, maybe you can be our Best Man?" Now Maria was crying again; Louise looked at her mother hoping against hope she wouldn't say something stupid... "So, what do you think of that, darlin'? Think you'd like to spend some time as Mrs Jack?" But now Maria was looking at him with something else in her eyes, something beyond a love cast off from far-away lands, to a love where fear held no sway. She looked back on her life, on the simple journey that had taken her from the innocence of bare-footed squalor to this cusp of a new world, here in this hospital room, and she took his face in her hands. She held his face while she kissed his lips over and over. When she was finished – it might have been weeks later – she looked up and saw that Louise and Dr Bill had left the room. She looked around, perhaps a little mischief in her eyes, then with her hand she reached under the sheets, sought out a very special place and began to... "Ain't life grand," the man said as he looked into the woman's eyes, as he fell back into the light of her precious smile. +++++ They were married a few weeks later, and the Hollywood types invited to the wedding could hardly believe what was happening. "I hear she's a waitress?" was the most common piece of "news" spread that afternoon. This was followed more than once by: "Probably a wetback. Goddamn illegal aliens." And then there was Jack's favorite: "Bet she tricked the poor sap into it..." But it seemed to Jack that these people hardly cared about happiness, any kind of human happiness, or whether Jack was truly happy – or not. They seemed to care more about their status at such affairs, and certainly much more about style, than they were concerned about such simple human truths as love and, perhaps, maybe, human compassion and understanding. In fact, when he looked out over the assembled Glitterati that afternoon he thought of them as carrion, as decayed creatures that seemed to be living caricatures of style over substance, at least when any sort of human principle was at issue. Still, he thought, these people seemed to epitomize the age they had created. Even so, the man enjoyed every minute of the Gliteratti's presence at his marriage to the shy little girl from Mexico. To a girl named Maria. His marriage was, he came to feel, a repudiation of human mendacity, and he wanted to have them witness his final turning away from the evil that consumed their flesh. He never did make another movie, by the by, and oddly enough no one seemed to miss him but the people who actually went to see movies from time to time. +++++ And so it was that in the fullness of time the man adopted Louise, and before he slipped away from this earth he saw her graduate from college, and go on to medical school. He missed that graduation, however, but only by a few months. He was proud of her, that much was known, and he had loved her as his own. There's still a ramshackle Mexican place out on the edge of town, out under the south side of the sky, though the name's been changed a time or two over the years. Pepe moved on a few years back, and a gal named Maria took it over and named it after her husband, or so the story goes, anyway. The place is called "Jack's" these days, named for some 'old school' movie star, and there are some pictures of him on the walls, too. Rumor has it that the gal running the place used to be a waitress there, and that she had been married to the big-shot movie star whose pictures hang on the walls, but really, nobody believes that kind of nonsense. I mean, really, just why on earth would some A-list Hollywood actor marry a waitress he ran into one day in a dive like this? It just doesn't make any sense at all, does it? (C)2015 "Adrian Leverkühn"