5. A Certain Enemy

“A doubtful friend is worse than a certain enemy. Let a man be one thing or the other, and we then know how to meet him.” –Aesop

When Jen opened her eyes the next morning, Skipper was standing at the foot of the bed, facing away from her, pulling on his clothes. She looked at his naked back as he wriggled into the skinny pants. He had a tattoo she hadn’t noticed last night, along the right side of his back. The design was a snake and a bird. They were either fighting or embracing; she couldn’t see it too well in the dim morning light and with him moving around like that. Jen usually disliked tattoos, especially on men she was sleeping with. This one seemed to be well-executed, with crisp lines and intricate details, but the Asian-style embellishments made it look like something off of a cheap vase. Looking at it, she felt disappointed and irritated.

Skipper turned to pick his rumpled yellow cowboy shirt from the foot of the bed. As he caught her watching him, his face took on the guilty expression of a cartoon bank robber caught tiptoeing out of the vault.

“Good morning,” Jen said in her most pleasant but casual voice.

Skipper mumbled something. Jen though it was something about the door.

“What about the door?” she asked, confused.

“Morning,” he repeated himself, enunciating a bit more. He closed up his shirt, which had snaps instead of buttons, and began looking for his shoes. He found them on the floor, near Jen’s large armchair by the door to her room. He looked up to watch her staring at him, and then sat down on the armchair and began pulling his socks on.

“How are you feeling?” Jen asked. She herself was feeling puzzled. Skipper’s flee-the-scene-of-the-crime bedroom manner was not unfamiliar to her, but she had never seen quite such a desperate example of it. His socks were on inside-out, and he was trying to cram his foot into one of his still-tied sneakers. Really, there was no need to be this anxious to leave; she certainly wasn’t going to propose marriage in the time it would take him to dress himself properly.

Skipper answered her question with a little grunt. She tried again. “Do you want some coffee or anything?” she asked.

Skipper mumbled something else that definitely included the words, “gotta go,” “work,” and “fun girl.” His voice trailed off as he managed to cram his left foot into his second sneaker, crushing the heel inward before his foot slid in. Jen winced in empathy for his shoe; she was always careful to fasten and unfasten her own shoes, even when she was in a rush.

With his clothes and shoes sloppily arranged on his skinny frame, Skipper headed for Jen’s door.

“Going now,” he mumbled, giving Jen a little wave. Then, as though recognizing his rudeness, he walked back to the foot of the bed and extended his hand for a goodbye handshake. Jen reached across the bed and squeezed his hand lightly. Satisfied that he had fulfilled his duty, Skipper headed back toward the bedroom door.

“Bye,” said Jen, but Skipper was out of the room and, by the sound of his footsteps, halfway down the hall.

When Jen heard the front door slam, she rose from the bed, pulled on her nightshirt, and hurried down the hall to watch him from the window. His tank-car was already pulling out of the driveway, backing down the long private rode that lead to her secluded house. Jen noticed how well it handled in reverse; that must be important for maneuvering under fire, she thought. She scanned the sky to check if there were any helicopters waiting for good photo opportunities. She didn’t see any, but she had missed them before. She crossed her fingers and hoped, for once, that her personal life was being documented; a nice, juicy tabloid headline would at least make this fiasco worthwhile.

Walking back to her room, she noticed the door to Becky’s suite was open, and she didn’t hear any sound from inside. It seemed that Becky had not come home last night. Well, at least somebody’s having a good morning, Jen thought bitterly.

As she lay back down in her bed and stared at the peaceful, eggshell-blue-colored ceiling, Jen sleepily debated whether it was something about her personality that made seemingly appealing men turn into horrifying assholes, or whether they were like that with everybody.

Wondering what time it was, Jen looked across the room toward the alarm clock on her dresser. It had been a present from her husband, purchased, she was sure, by his personal assistant at some trendy gadget store. Its shape was a long, asymmetrical triangle, and it was the color of dark stone. But the most important feature of this clock was the noise it made to wake up its owner. Instead of beeping, the clock would omit a series of increasingly loud chiming noises, so that waking would be peaceful, not jarring. The hands of the clock were shaped and colored like twigs, making it difficult to read the time from a distance. After squinting at it for a few moments, Jen was pretty sure it was seven thirty.

Jen suddenly remembered the name on the box that the clock had come in: the Zen Alarm Clock. She knew that was the clock’s name, but had never given any thought to what it signified. After last night’s conversation with Skipper, Jen didn’t see what was so Zen about an alarm clock—although like Skipper, it was difficult to read. And perhaps the very notion of a peaceful alarm clock was a contradiction, gentle chimes reminding you to violate your body’s innate instincts about how much sleep it required. Acceptance versus desire, Jen thought, working on fitting the ideas together in her head, until she grew incredibly drowsy from the effort.

A few hours later, Jen was awakened by the sound of loud, laughing voices and the front door crashing open. Jen listened. One of the voices belonged to Becky. Jen couldn’t make out exactly what Becky was saying, but she was sure that Becky was still drunk. She was swearing loudly between every sentence, and she normally never swore, plus she was using the crass and reckless tone that Jen had usually only heard from her very late at night at a party or club.

The voices grew louder and the conversation more distinct as Becky and her friend moved down the hallway towards Jen’s room. The other voice didn’t sound like Chase. Jen wasn’t sure if it was a man or a woman; it moved from a high to low pitch, never hitting an extreme that would identify the speaker’s gender.

“Shut the fuck up,” Becky yelled loudly. “You’ll wake her up.”

“Girlfriend,” the other voice drawled, equally loudly, “it’s you making all the noise.”

Who has Becky brought home, Jen wondered. And what happened to Chase?

When the pair had almost reached Jen’s door, their footsteps stopped, and they began to whisper loudly. Jen could tell they were debating whether to wake her up. She hoped that she knew this other person with Becky; she didn’t want a stranger bursting in and seeing her in her flimsy nightshirt, most likely with smeared makeup and her hair sticking out at funny angles.

“Becky,” she called, “I’m awake.” Afraid this would be interpreted as an invitation, she added, more loudly, “Don’t come in.”

But Becky evidently didn’t hear her, because at that moment the door burst open and she rushed into the room, calling, “Jen, wake up, we’re back!”

“See, and you were so worried,” said the other person, entering behind Becky. Jen was startled to see that it was Chase. He was wearing the same button-up shirt and black leather jacket from last night. But something looked different about him. And why was his voice different? She blinked her eyes, trying to focus them better so she could see him all the way across the large room; they were still blurry from having just woken up, and from the alcohol she could now feel beginning to seep its way out of her body via her sweat glands and forehead muscles. Not wanting him to see her looking like a mess, she glanced at her reflection in the mirror on the bedside table. She ran her hands quickly over her hair, flattening it.

When she looked up again, Chase had his arm around Becky and the two of them were looking expectantly at Jen. She suddenly realized what was different about Chase’s appearance: he was wearing eye makeup. As Jen’s vision sharpened, she became quite certain that Chase was modeling the dark, smudged eyeliner, shadow, and mascara that Becky normally wore for a night on the town. Becky had spent a week learning how to apply this combination. She had done it on Jen a couple of times, but the dark eyes over the hollow cheeks made her look like a prisoner of war, which Becky said was how it was supposed to look, but Jen thought it was grotesque. This look was all the rage in fashion magazines, so much so that it had a special name.

“The smoky eye,” said Jen, pointing at Chase.

Becky smiled sheepishly, looking proud and embarrassed at the same time. Her own makeup was faded and worn away, although Jen could see the sparkly gray remnants on the tops of her cheeks.

“He wanted me to do it,” Becky said. Chase turned and threw a light punch at her arm. “Shut up!” he said. Then, looking back at Jen, he added, “No, she’s right, I asked her to.”

“Where were you?” Becky asked accusingly. “I turned around and you and Skipper had disappeared.”

“Yeah, where is he?” Chase asked, glancing around the room as though Skipper might be on the bookshelf or under the dresser.

“I dunno,” said Jen, mumbling as horribly as Skipper had just hours before.

“See,” said Chase to Becky, “I told you she wouldn’t go home with him.”

“Well then, what happened?” asked Becky, to Chase rather than to Jen.

Jen interrupted them hastily. “Where have you guys been?” she asked, trying to deflect Becky’s accusing manner back towards her.

Becky’s business-like manner changed immediately, as she got excited to tell the story. She regained the brazen, curse-laden tone she had been using when she first entered the house. “Well, we left the Game at fucking midnight, and we went to Spanky’s.”

“You went to West Hollywood?” Jen asked, incredulously. She had only been to Spanky’s once, years ago, with one of her hairdressers, and had found it fun but incredibly trashy; it was the gay dance club with the cheapest cover charge and least attractive or famous clientele. Why would they go there?

“Oh,” said Jen aloud, as everything suddenly made sense. She clapped her hand over her mouth, realizing too late that this was horribly rude.

“Yeah, I’m a fag,” said Chase, in a sing-songy voice that implied he was ironically vocalizing Jen’s own thoughts.

“I, um” said Jen, embarrassed. She wouldn’t have used that word. She felt annoyed that Chase would imply she would be shocked by this news. Why should it matter? It didn’t. She wasn’t sure what response would properly convey her utter nonchalance. “I knew that already,” she said finally.

“Oh, did Bradley tell you?” asked Chase anxiously. “I mean, I never told him, but I always thought there was a kind of energy between us.”

Now it was Becky who punched Chase, but more subtly, knocking his thigh with the side of her already lowered fist.

“Sorry!” Chase exclaimed. “I was probably making it up, anyway.”

“So,” said Jen, trying to get back to Becky’s story before she had time to think about what Chase had said. “You were at Spanky’s all night?” She looked over at the Zen clock. The twigs were pointing at ten and six.

“No,” said Becky. “They close at four. So we walked around until six when Dino’s Diner opened, and then we had breakfast.”

“And where have you been since then?” Jen asked.

“We were still too drunk to drive,” said Chase. “So we slept in the car.”

Jen couldn’t quite imagine how someone as enormous as Chase could sleep in Becky’s miniature car. She wondered if he curled up in the backseat or just stayed in front.

“So were you guys dancing until four?” she asked.

“We danced a lot,” said Becky.

“But mostly we just talked,” Chase chimed in, as though finishing Becky’s sentence for her. “We have so much in common.”

“Yeah,” said Becky, “We totally have the same taste in guys.”

“Toxic pseudo-intellectuals,” Chase said. Jen wasn’t sure who exactly this category was supposed to encompass, but Skipper seemed to fit right in.

“With commitment issues,” Becky added.

“Oh, totally,” exclaimed Chase happily.

Jen was beginning to feel a little jealous; Becky was her best friend, but they never acted in this old-married-couple fashion. Of course, she rationalized, she wouldn’t want Becky to act in this flippant manner around her; it would make her a terrible personal assistant.

As though sensing that she might feel excluded, Chase sat down on the edge of Jen’s bed and looked seriously at her. “Sweetie, Becky’s been telling me all about your breakup,” he said. Jen shot Becky a nasty look over Chase’s shoulder; Becky shrugged and mouthed the word “sorry.”

“You’ve got to forget the guy,” Chase continued. “Let me tell you, I’ve been there. You can’t let him make your life miserable for one more day. You’ve gotta sleep with someone else; it’s the only thing that works.”

Jen felt highly annoyed with this advice, coming from Becky’s new Groundbreakers buddy.

“Becky told me that wouldn’t work,” said Jen. “She said it was ‘mind-havoc.’”

“It is,” said Becky, insistently. Her tone indicated that she and Chase had debated the issue at length already, probably at Spanky’s over tequila sunrises.

“Well, it is if you’re trying to make Bradley jealous,” said Chase. “That’s an insincere motive; you’re doing something to affect someone else, not because you want to. You need to want it.”

“But I don’t want to sleep with someone else,” said Jen. She felt a little odd saying it under the current circumstances, but it was true, nevertheless; now more than ever, she did not want to sleep with anybody. Ever again. As far as she was concerned, she could take her vow of celibacy right this very minute.

“Why not?” said Chase. “What are you afraid of?” He paused for a moment. “God, you women are so crazy! You can have sex with anyone but you don’t want to. What’s the worst thing that’ll happen? You take someone home with you, have some fun, and if you don’t like him you never have to see him again.”

“You take a nice guy home from the bar,” Becky interrupted, in a contradictory tone, “and he ties you up, throws you in his trunk, and drives his car into the river.”

“Jesus, Beck,” said Chase, “why do you have to be so morbid?”

“You meet an interesting, well-spoken guy,” Jen said, while Becky and Chase were still arguing. “You bring him home with you. The next day, he is unable to construct a complete sentence.”

They both fell silent and turned to look at her.

“Oh, honey,” Chase exclaimed, a look of intense sympathy growing on his face. “You slept with Skipper?” The way he said it, it definitely sounded like a serious mistake.

“What’s wrong with him?” Becky asked anxiously.

“Nothing!” Chase exclaimed, in an overly-chipper voice. “Nothing’s wrong with him. It’s great.”

“So you did sleep with him?” Becky asked Jen, as though hoping that they had misunderstood. Jen nodded.

Becky turned angrily to Chase. “Why did you leave him with her?” Becky asked accusingly.

Chase looked indignant. “I’m not her keeper,” he said, his tone implying that it was Becky who was indeed Jen’s keeper.

“Personal assistant,” Becky snapped back. Jen decided she needed to stop this argument; it was making her even more depressed than she had been before they showed up.

“It’s okay. I’m fine,” she said to Becky.

“Of course you’re fine. You’re great,” said Chase encouragingly. He paused, looking a little unsure of what other positive comment he could make. “Anyway, it’s a start,” he said finally. He rose from the bed and gave Jen a little pat on the arm on his way to the bathroom, which adjoined Jen’s room. He disappeared behind the dividing wall that led to the vanity area and then the toilet, but he didn’t close the door. Jen could hear the loud sound of him urinating.

“Is there some problem with Skipper?” Becky yelled at Chase, across the bathroom wall. Based on Chase’s initial reaction, Jen felt suddenly worried that Skipper’s undiplomatic departure might be the least of her problems.

Chase came around the corner, zipping up his pants. Becky rose and took her turn to head into the bathroom.

“Oh, no,” said Chase, clearly lying to Becky as she passed him. His tone had become as evasive as it had been yesterday when Jen and Becky had first asked about Skipper’s job. “He’s,” Chase paused, looking for the right word, “unusual, in number of ways, but there’s nothing wrong with him,” he said to Jen.

Jen suddenly worried that everything Skipper told her last night had been a lie, a trap devised to entice her into bed and then make her look like an idiot for believing him. “Has Skipper ever told you he was a Buddhist?” Jen asked Chase.

“Oh yeah, totally,” said Chase. “I am, too. We first met at the ashram.”

“Ashrams are Hindu,” Becky called out angrily through the bathroom wall. Becky had lived in an ashram for two years while she did her yoga teacher training, so she should know. Jen remembered tiptoeing through it the one time she visited, scared she would mess up someone’s meditation and they’d have to start all over.

“Not this one,” Chase yelled back.

He sat down on the bed and put his hand on top of Jen’s, a gesture that reminded her of how Skipper had done the same thing last night. In a voice too quiet for Becky to hear in the bathroom, he said, “Whatever Skipper said to you about Zen…” He trailed off for a moment, looking toward the bathroom.

“Yeah?” asked Jen.

“You should listen to him,” said Chase, turning back so that his head was bowed towards hers and speaking in a low tone that wasn’t quite a whisper. “He may be messed up about a lot of stuff, but whatever that guy says about Buddhism…” He stopped again, as though his sentence were so powerful that it didn’t need an ending.

“What?” asked Jen impatiently.

“He knows his shit,” said Chase. “Whatever else you hear about him.”

Becky came out of the bathroom just then, smiling approvingly at Chase and Jen sitting on the bed together, evidently happy that they were getting along so well.

After Becky and Chase had retired to Becky’s suite to take a long nap, Jen lay in her bed, not wanting to get up and start her day despite the fact that her Zen clock told her it was almost noon. Chase’s words about Skipper were troubling her. What did he mean, “Whatever else you hear about him?” What fresh horrors could she possibly uncover about this drug-dealing, womanizing, bullshit-spewing, skinny, funny-looking…

Suddenly another thought interrupted her own mental list of insults. It was something from yesterday— an unsolved puzzle, or something that she had forgotten to do. What was it? In her mind, she traced her steps from the tennis court to the café, to the gift shop.

That was it. Michigan. The magazine had said she was moving to Michigan. Why would it say that? She had never been to Michigan, didn’t know anybody from there, had no plans to leave L.A. This inaccuracy seemed beyond even the scope of the tabloids, whose lies usually had some sort of basis in reality, however remote.

Jen vowed that as soon as she worked up the energy to get out of bed, which would be soon, definitely within the next two hours, she would get to the bottom of the Michigan rumor.

Chapter 6:
http://kickoutofyou.blogspot.com/2008/05/6-for-your-pruning.html