 
# Hope For Change

## But Settle For A Bailout

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012, Bill Orton
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Chapter One – Showdown at Buckstores

"Perhaps not since the great influenza epidemic of 1918 has the flu brought a greater sense of doom to the people of London.... There is not the horrific death toll as after the Great War, but public health officials say as many as a quarter of the people in London are sick with this rare late- summer flu bug. Ask a Brit, though, and they'll say their agony is that local girl Rebecca Adlington, one of the world's greatest female freestyle swimmers, is so hobbled by influenza that Team GB's doctors won't allow her to compete in these London games. Down a dozen athletes to the flu so far, Brits did gain one reason to cheer, as moving Baljinder Gill up to Addington's number one freestyle slot has meant that Gill's baby sister, Jazz – who tells everyone she'd rather be home, swimming the Mersey with her best blokes – also earned the chance to compete for Jolly Old England. And a jolly time it's been for those Gill sisters, who are spinning water into gold and silver. Only an American army sergeant in her mid-30s, in her own improbable first Olympic appearance, has been able to keep up with those fabulous Gill sisters."

* * *

"L-O-R-I-!" Larry van der Bix waved his arms and ran towards the tall blonde slowly riding a beach cruiser down 1st Street, towards Belmont Shore. "Lori!"

"Hey, Larry, on my way to work," said Lori Lewis, a pair of cloth tote bags hanging from her handlebars. A multicolored sock drooped over the edge of one bag.

"Can I bum five bucks from you?"

"Aw, man," said Lori. "That's all I got till work. Can't you hit me up after my shift, when I'll have some tips?" Lori leaned forward and tucked the wayward multicolored sock into the bag.

"Oh," said Larry, dejectedly, "sure."

With a deep exhale of breath, Lori reached into her jeans and pulled out several crumpled dollar bills and a handful of quarters. "Please, Larry, don't just blow this," said Lori, dropping the money into Larry's outstretched hand. "Buy some actual food... from the store."

"I will," said Larry. "Promise."

"I'm not giving you my laundry money so you can just drop it on the lottery."

"It's how I know I'm still alive."

* * *

As Lori approached Bucksters Coffee on the retail stretch of Second Street that cut through the heart of Belmont Shore, she had to slowly navigate a maze of police cruisers that had pulled up to the coffeehouse at such sharp angles that traffic was forced to merge left to pass. On the sidewalk, officers and gawkers – their faces glowing alternately from sunshine and the red and blue emergency lights – hovered near the entrance, as Lori locked her bike to a parking meter. Looking at the officers, she unlocked the bike and walked it to the rear of the building, locking it to a pipe. Alongside her bike was the district manager's red convertible, parked in the sole space designated as staff parking. Around a license plate that read "CA-FA-N8D" was a frame that declared, "It's Good to be the Boss."

As she entered, she saw seven or eight officers looking sternly at the customers in the shop. Lori stashed her tote bags in the employee break room, tied on her apron with its "Hi, I'm Laurie" name badge, and approached the register. "Clearly not a caffeine and starch run," she whispered to a tall, 20-something redhead standing behind the register.

When Lori turned to the first customer in line, she saw metal glinting at belt level.

"Gun!" Lori immediately crouched, and, with no one else showing panic, she stood slowly. Half-a-dozen other customers were also openly displaying firearms.

"Hey there, Missy," said the customer. "I'm here to get me a mocha latte."

Lori kept looking around, to the officers and then again to the customers carrying guns, most in their 50s or 60s, and each seemingly delighted with their day.

"I'm thinking about shutting the store," said the redhead, to Lori.

"You can't do that," said Lori. "I just got here. I need to work today." Lori looked at the man at the front of the line, waiting patiently. "Why are there a bunch of people with guns in the store?"

"This is open-carry, Missy," said the customer. "And I still want coffee... to go along with my Second Amendment freedoms. Do we live in a great country, or what?"

"Look, mister, nothing personal, but civilians and guns don't mix for me," said Lori.

"Oh, these aren't loaded, Missy," said the customer. "We abide by the law."

Lori turned to the redhead. "Can I throw them out?"

The redhead flinched, but said nothing. Lori turned back to the customer. "Again, nothin' personal, I was US Army, but civilians and guns don't work for me."

The customer bristled, but stood in front of the register, glaring at Lori.

The officers stood ever-more erect, their heads moving left-to-right, eyes scanning. The customer at the head of the line looked intently at Lori, who stood leaning slightly forward, with both hands gripping the register.

"We are not violating any laws," said the customer. "I want my mocha latte, Missy."

"Sorry," she said. "No shirt, no shoes, carrying a firearm... no service."

"Are you refusing service because I'm exercising my Second Amendment freedoms?" The man pointed to the officers with a sweep of his hand. "Bet you serve them."

"They're not civilians," said Lori, as she turned to the redhead. "Can I please throw them out? I mean, if we need help doing it, we don't have to wait for the cops."

"Missy, that'll be a...."

"No!" said Lori, turning and cutting the man off. She looked pleadingly to the redhead, who silently nodded. "Thank you!" Lori said, clearing her throat. "May I have your attention? I want everyone with a gun – who's not a cop – to please leave the store. You can come back unarmed, but civilians with guns will not be served today."

The customer at the head of the line straightened his posture and narrowed his eyes. "You haven't heard the last of us, Missy. We'll be back, and I'll get me my mocha latte."

As the last open-carry patron exited the shop, a couple seated in recliners clapped and the officers stood a bit more casually. Two cops approached the register, one of whom bore a star on his collar, and the other captain's bars.

"I'm Commander March, miss. Long Beach Police. This is Captain Walker. That was incredibly brave. A little foolhardy, but definitely brave."

"They will be back, you know," said the captain, to the redhead and Lori.

"Not to...," said the redhead.

"Shoot up the place? Naw," said the captain, who looked to the commander. Both shook their heads. The captain turned to Lori and the redhead. "But they'll be back."

"Probably soon, and probably with media," said the commander. "We can't advise you what to do, but this young woman is now the face they're going to look for."

"You should go," said the redhead.

"I just got here," said Lori, insistently. "I need these tips... c'mon, I was army."

A commotion at the door erupted, as the customer from the front of the line came back in to the shop. The officers within the shop stiffened, as Mr. Mocha Latte walked briskly to the register. He leaned in to look closely at the name badge on Lori's apron. "Laurie...." He walked out again.

"Oh, shit," said Lori.

The commander pulled out his wallet and put a ten-dollar bill into the tip jar. "Miss, you're brave, but army or not, you shouldn't also be stupid."

The captain, fishing for his wallet, pulled out a five and dropped it into the tip jar. "Thank you for your service." He then lifted his hand above his head and pointed towards the door. All of the officers inside the shop headed towards the entry. As officers moved out, several customers who had been watching from their comfy chairs got up with their paper cups to seek refills. The tip jar began to fill with singles while Lori and the redhead whispered back-and-forth.

With the captain and commander at the door, watching the officers exit, the redhead spoke from behind the register. "I have... an... announcement," he said. "As District Manager, I've hired a new assistant manager for this store," motioning with his hand to Lori. Two of the refill customers stopped doctoring their coffee to look up briefly, before returning to adding half-and-half and sweetener to their cups. The captain and commander each nodded, and exited.

Lori and the District Manager went back to whispering. Moments later, the redhead slid several keys from his own ring and handed them to her, with a plastic card he had pulled from his wallet. He poured out the tip jar contents onto the counter and handed the bills to Lori, who crumpled them into a wad and stuffed them into her jeans pocket. She left out the back door, carrying her two bags, which she put into the passenger seat of the red convertible parked next to her bike.

* * *

Lori lurched to a stop in front of Larry's apartment and, attempting to back the convertible into a parking space, popped the clutch and stalled. She threw on the emergency flashers, engaged the parking brake, grabbed the keys and ran into the courtyard, where she found Larry laying in the sun on a wooden lounge chair, surfing on a tablet, two burritos on a plate on the table next to him, alongside a glass of ice water.

"Thought you were working...."

"I need your help," said Lori, breathlessly.

"Now?" said Larry. "I'm in a chat with Miss Milkshakes."

* * *

The distance from where Lori dropped off Larry so he could get her bike was less than a block from Bucksters and barely half-a-mile from his apartment, but twenty minutes later, when he rode the Schwinn up the slight hill to his building, he looked as though he had been riding for hours.

"You look like shit," said Lori. "My bike has gears, you know?"

"So what do you wanna do with it?" asked Larry, panting. "I mean, I love ya', but there's no way I am riding this thing to north Long Beach."

"We can leave it here," said Lori. "I'm not ready to go home yet."

"Let's go to my grandma's," said Larry. "My dad will be there later, but if we go now, we can blow out before he gets there."

* * *

Standing at an ornately-carved, heavy oaken door, Larry knocked for almost a minute, while Lori stood with her two cloth bags. A finely-uniformed, attractive female servant answered the door and, upon seeing Larry, smiled thinly and turned. The two walked in and closed the door behind them. Larry and Lori worked their way through a long hallway, lined with framed photographs and newspaper clippings, showing Larry's family patriarchs with the power elite of Long Beach. They passed through a main foyer, with its massive stairwell rising to the second and third floors. They continued through a formal dining room, with its long banquet table piled with toys, children's books and art supplies. Three children suddenly sped into the room, one of them bumping into Lori. The child fell, appeared stunned momentarily, and then sprang up and resumed running towards the opposite end of the hallway. Larry and Lori flinched at the distant sound of an object smashing onto the floor, as they turned into a dark passageway and reached a plain door with three bolts and a locked doorknob.

Larry drew a set of keys from his pocket and unlocked each bolt and swung the door open, to reveal a grand stairway of white marble that climbed four stories to the suite originally built as a lure to bring Larry's great-grandmother to America. The marble, despite not having been polished in years, glowed in the sunlight that streamed in from tall, wide crystal-paned windows and a sweeping skylight.

"In all the time I've know you, Larry, has that thing ever worked?" said Lori, pointing to the electric chair lift that hugged the banister of the stairwell.

"In middle school," said Larry, taking the steps slowly, puffing. "Just before we met. But my grandmother is having it fixed, as the stairs are becoming too much for her."

As the two climbed, the stairs opened into a wide landing at the second level, where a single plain door was set into the unadorned foyer. Larry stood on the landing, panting. They continued climbing, passing the Long Beach elite, staring out from behind glass.

Reaching the fourth floor, the stairwell opened onto a wide, elegant foyer, at the center of which was a sculpture in alabaster, of an athletic female glancing downward. Sunlight bathed the work by Bertel Thorvaldsen so intensely as to make the figure of a dancer glow like a flesh-toned ghost. Above the door in a glass-and-wood display case was an American flag presented to Larry's great-grandfather, Carl, by General Pershing at the end of World War One, when the head of the American Expeditionary Force visited victorious troops and gave flags to each of the aviators in Carl's unit. Alongside it was the red-and-white Dannebrog that the artistic director of the Danish Royal Ballet had given Astrid Ullagård in 1922, before she sailed off to start a new life in California.

Larry stood next to Thorvaldsen's dancer and panted.

"Larry, you really ought'a see a doctor," said Lori.

"Don't have health insurance," said Larry.

"Your family's rich and you can't go to the doctor?"

"Tell it to my dad," said Larry, pulling out his keyring and unlocking the double doors to the suite built to convince his great-grandmother, the Danish ballerina, Astrid Ullagård, to leave her ancient European capitol and the dance troupe for which five generations of her family members had performed, to come to Long Beach, California, a city then barely 30 years old. They entered the mirrored recital chamber, though long gone were the 60 matching chairs that Astrid and Carl would set out for guests to watch the ballerina perform to discs played on a Victrola. Reduced to a framed newsclipping was a report of how, during the spring of 1931, the dancer, choreographer and artistic director Harald Lander displayed in the studio works that Astrid would later perform, after she rejoined the Royal Ballet as Principal Dancer under Lander, splitting time between Copenhagen and California.

Inside the recital hall, as Astrid had insisted, was flooring of Danish oak and cabinetry in white birch, soft pine and other light woods shipped from the Baltic. Next to the main doors, standing like a schoolchild, was the Victrola phonographic disc player given by the family's original patriarch, as a wedding gift to Carl and Astrid. Its handle hung down and the great amplifying bell sat in silence. Larry walked to the phonograph, cranked the handle and lowered the needle apparatus onto the disc on the turntable, filling the suite with the voice of Enrico Caruso.

"Hi hi," said Larry's grandmother as she entered the room with a wide smile. The three crossed the wide, mirrored studio, and passed through a pair of French doors, into a much larger main chamber, with high ceilings and panoramic windows that looked onto Alamitos Bay from three sides. The kitchen, dining room and bedroom were separated by lines of potted plants and folding Japanese screens. The late afternoon sun streamed golden through the beaded glass of French doors that opened on every wall, each leading to the wide, tiled wrap-around balcony.

The grandmother kissed both Larry and Lori, and motioned for them to sit at the covered table directly outside the kitchen, on the balcony, as she went to the refrigerator. Larry and his grandmother were soon talking loudly through the open doors in Danish, as Lori closed her eyes in the sunshine.

"I still have a hard time figuring out when one word ends and another begins," Lori said to Larry, as the grandmother set three frosted glasses on the table. The grandmother set a Perrier in front of Lori, and a Carlsberg next to her glass and another for Larry, who used the tip of a spoon, with his index finger as the fulcrum, to open his own and then his grandmother's bottle.

"Spanish, no problem," continued Lori. "Picked that up in the neighborhood."

"See? There's an advantage to being the only white girl on your block," said Larry.

"Arabic, in Iraq, hanging out between convoys with the translator," said Lori. "But Danish, though? And you learned it in, what, a summer?"

"Living over there for a few summers helped," said Larry, pouring his beer into the glass, "but moving in at 10 with a relative who only speaks one language, you have to pick some of it up. I still can't really read it, though.... Can only speak it."

Lori pointed to her tote bags, sitting next to the table. "Can I run those?"

Larry and his grandmother talked briefly. "Actually, she's doing linen," said Larry. "Has tablecloths and place settings running now. Maybe after the food."

"A huge place with servants and shit," said Lori, "and she doesn't get help with laundry."

"My dad won't let anyone help her," said Larry, anger in his voice.

"Asshole," said Lori.

Larry promptly translated the opinion to his grandmother, who replied, simply: "Nej." Larry looked at his cell phone. "Actually, he's supposed to be here in like an hour, so we should be out'ta here soon. So maybe a laundramat... since you're driving."

* * *

Larry drank from his beer as his grandmother brought out a basket of dark and white bread slices, crisp breads and crackers. Turning, the grandmother smiled and put her hand softly on Lori's cheek and whispered sweetly. Larry finished pouring his Carlsberg, and the bottle swiftly disappeared, as his grandmother returned with it to the kitchen. Lori drank her mineral water and looked out at the setting sun.

A knock loud enough to be heard from the balcony prompted Larry to look with panic at his cell phone. "He's not supposed to be here for 45 minutes." A moment later, ruddy-faced Calvin was being walked to the balcony by Emma, who wordlessly waved with her hand for him to be seated.

"You always know where to pick up a free meal," Calvin said to Larry. "And look, another hungry mouth to feed." He sat, his legs apart, leaning back, and reached across to snatch the still untouched bottle of beer next to Emma's place setting. Calvin sat back and drank directly from the bottle, swiftly draining it and setting it back next to Emma's plate.

"Pig," said Larry.

"I love you, too, son," replied Calvin.

Emma swept up the empty beer bottle alongside her setting, gave a fresh bottle to Larry and collected the Perrier bottle. She set them down on a rolling tray on which were plates that she transferred to the table. She set down a platter of herring in a cream sauce, a baked liver pate, a plate of salami and cheeses, olives, pickles, mustard and an assortment of thinly-sliced vegetables. Larry had opened his fresh bottle and poured half into his grandmother's glass and the remainder in his own. Calvin reached across for the glass half full. Larry used his fork to poke his hand away.

"Don't you poke me, boy," said Calvin, as Emma returned to the table with another Carlsberg. Seeing her own glass half full, she set the bottle down. Calvin swiftly snatched it and searched the table for an opener.

Calvin scanned the table. He reached for the plate of fish, pulling the two largest fillets off the platter and setting it back down. He grabbed white bread and spread it with mustard and piled on salami. He put cheese onto a cracker, and pate onto another piece of white bread – all without looking up to anyone – and powered his way through his plate, taking time only to hand his bottle to Larry and, after the top was popped, grabbing it back and taking a deep swig.

Lori reached for the bread, cheese and vegetables she had placed onto her plate.

"What's wrong, granola girl? Cat got your tongue?" Calvin said to Lori, as he wiped cream sauce from his lips. "Look like you've seen a ghost."

"Just a bunch of people with guns," said Lori.

"It's your shithole part of town," said Calvin, belching. "Everyone packin' heat."

"It was a quarter-mile from here," said Larry, "in our shithole part of town."

A basic Nokia ringtone sounded from Lori's phone, as Calvin reached for his beer. Lori stepped away from the table. "Hey," she said, not out of earshot of the table. "Naw, I'm still in Long Beach. I don't like running away." She paused and listened. "How many? With FOX News?" More listening. "The car's fine. Sure, Asst Mgr is great. I can definitely use a better job. Benefits, if I'm more than 30 hours? I still have VA, but that'd be great."

Larry and his grandmother looked at one another as Lori returned to the table. They spoke in their familiar, foreign tone, as Larry dug a spoon deep into the pate and spread the steaming baked meat onto a slice of thin, dense, dark bread. He topped it with a wafer-thin pickle slice, cooked beet and a sprinkling of chopped onions. Speaking steadily to Larry, the grandmother motioned towards Calvin and then silently nodded.

"Um," said Larry, holding the bread with steaming pate.

"What is it, boy?" said Calvin, flecks of fish spitting forth on the last word.

"The monthly living expenses amount barely covers utilities and rent," said Larry. "There's never money left over for groceries."

"Tough," said Calvin, taking a deep swig from the beer bottle. "If being a trust fund baby is too strenuous for you, find a box to sleep in and starve, for all I care." Calvin drank from his beer. "You inherited the family jewels. Make some money doing films, like I did." Calvin smiled distantly. "That's where I met your mother... and Candy." Calvin ate, moving food from plate to mouth in an unceasing cycle, with the only sounds to be heard being of the water, the wind, a single bird sounding a call, and Calvin – chewing, swallowing, drinking and belching.

* * *

Lori drove silently, her hair whipping in the wind, as Larry lolled his head idly in his beer buzz in the passenger's seat. She turned into a strip mall off of Atlantic Avenue, the engine sputtering as she slowed, so as to allow a haggard man to push a baby carriage laden with everything but a child across their path. The car slowly passed a liquor store, a payday lender, a nail salon, a donut shop and a smoke shop before parking in front of Wash-A-Teria late-nite Laundra-Mat.

"You wouldn't happen to still have any of those quarters from earlier?" asked Lori.

"Bought real food at an actual store," said Larry.

"Frozen burritos barely qualify as real food," said Lori.

"Hey," said Larry, defensively, "they're as many calories as a slice of pepperoni pizza. Thirty-three cents; 250 calories. The best caloric value around."

"You're gonna get hypertension with all the salt you're pouring in to your system." Lori grabbed her two bags and headed inside Wash-A-Teria. Larry followed, fiddling with his tablet, causing him to bump into the glass door. He didn't take his eyes away from the screen and he kept walking. Lori dumped her bags onto a washer and began sorting colors from warms and hots. A television mutely displayed "Married with Children," as she turned each garment inside out. She went to the sole change machine and fed a five from the tip jar. "F-u-c-k-!" she yelled, as the machine swallowed the bill and gave no change. Lori pounded on the machine as she cursed, and then turned to Larry. She held out several bills.

"I need change," she said.

"I got'ch'yer change," said Larry. "Just call me Barack."

Lori sneered. "The only change Obama'll give me is if they put his face on a coin."

"A dollar coin," said Larry. "The Obama Buck."

"More like the Obama Half-Penny... worthless from the start," scoffed Lori.

"Anyway, my grandmother made a deposit, so I got yer hope for change covered."

* * *

"Thanks for the roll," said Larry, as he set two single bottles of German beer, a bottle of club soda and a heaping armful of bagged snacks on the counter. "My lady friend sure will appreciate it." Larry unzipped a pocket in his wallet, unsnapped a snap and dug out a VISA card. A folded lottery ticket was also in the hidden compartment. "Also, three bucks on MegaMillions. Gotta invest in my retirement future."

The clerk printed the ticket, rang up the order, swiped Larry's card and handed him a credit authorization slip for signature.

"And can you give me tonight's winning numbers?" The clerk picked up several orange slips from a pile of narrow orange papers sitting atop the computer unit of the lottery terminal, handing one to Larry, who put it without a glance into the snapped compartment of his wallet, with his VISA card. "You really ought to think about stocking Tuborg or Carlsberg," said Larry, as he signed the authorization slip. "Danish beer is good stuff." He walked out with a wave.

* * *

"Bought you some club soda and essential survival supplies," said Larry. "I hear Hermosa Beach is pretty primitive."

"Why do you throw your money away on that shit?" asked Lori. "Salt, sugar, fat." She took the club soda and sifted through the snacks, pulling out a bag of unsalted trail mix.

"See? I know what you like," said Larry. "So can I hang out with you in Hermosa?" Larry opened a bag of Cheetos.

"I don't know," said Lori. "It's not my place and I don't even know if I'm gonna go there. If I do a 'stay-cation' thing and just don't show at work, I can avoid the 'open carry' people."

"Sort'a yer call, isn't it?"

"I may just stay at the beach after my swims or something." Lori pulled a narrow bottle with "eco" on the label from her bag and poured a capful of liquid into each of the three machines. She closed the lids and set the temperatures, fed in coins from the roll of quarters Larry had brought and started each load.

"Aw, c'mon," said Larry, as he systematically moved bright orange puffs to his mouth. "You'll need company. I can be your bodyguard."

Lori laughed, as she popped a handful of trail mix, while watching the muted TV over Larry's shoulder. The sitcom had broken away to a FOX News teaser, showing Mr. Mocha Latte and several of his open-carry compatriots, standing in front of Bucksters Coffee, one with a handmade sign reading, "We Want Our Freedom... & our coffee!" Mouths moved mutely to the sounds of washing machines chugging. The news teaser cut to the nodding, solemn, seldom-moving face of the redhead. Lori watched motionless as the teaser morphed into a Chevrolet commercial.

"I can see what's in it for the manager," said Larry. "You, alone in an apartment in Hermosa... his keys, his raise, his vacation, his benefits." Larry licked Cheetos dust from his fingers. "Sweet deal for Peter Pan."

"Peter Pan is too dorky to make a move," said Lori. "Change the subject."

"So...," said Larry, pulling out a bag of Doritos, "you stopped talking about whether to reenlist. Does that mean you're gonna go back in?"

"Maybe," said Lori, hopping up and sitting on one of her three washing machines. "Still talking to a recruiter. Can't make a commitment yet... cuz... I got another big thing that I might take on this summer."

"Where would they put you?"

"Probably Afghanistan.... Hopefully as an E6, like I came out," said Lori.

"What'ta'ya think you'd be doing?"

"Convoys. Fuel. Vehicle repair. The stuff I was doing before."

"Such a girl," said Larry.

"There's actually a lot of women in theatre," said Lori. She glanced up to the muted TV, which was showing a commercial for psychic telephone readings. "But they're so... young... tattoos and piercings... it's like high school, except now I'm the Old Lady.... Thankfully, I'll have some rank. The PFCs and corporals can go way past annoying."

Larry looked around the empty Wash-A-Teria and, with no one inside or outside to object, pulled out a beer bottle, lodged his key ring under the bottletop and over his finger and pushed down on the ring, popping the cap up.

Lori watched Al Bundy slumped in sofa as his big-haired wife silently sauntered.

Larry pulled out his wallet, unzipped and unsnapped it and pulled out the two folded, orange-tinted slips of paper, with an admonition to "play responsibly" printed on them. Larry held the slip with the winning numbers that the clerk had handed to him in his Cheetos hand, and the ticket he spent three of the dollars that Lori had given him earlier in his relatively clean hand.

Much of the orange paste on Larry's thumb and index finger rubbed into the winning numbers slip, obscuring the draw date under an orange-tinted slick of oil that penetrated the paper and a coating of flaking orange matter that Larry smudged into the paper with his thumb and forefinger, with which he had clamped onto the ticket as he looked back-and-forth between the two slips.

Larry van der Bix stood motionless, hands raised close to his eyes, each clutching an orange slip. "Lori?" Larry asked, urgently. "Do you have a pen?"

"Larry, we're at Wash-A-Teria. Why would I have a pen?"

Larry began laughing.

When he didn't answer Lori's question of "what's so funny," and just laughed more loudly, she hopped off her washer and looked at the slips in his hands. Soon, she was laughing. The two hugged and danced in spasmodic fits, each returning to look at the slips and resume laughing.

If Line 3 of his three-dollar ticket was to be believed, Larry van der Bix had hit it big, on a night when a nationwide pool of dreamers and malcontents, each yearning to breathe free of debt and fear of losing a job, had driven the MegaMillions jackpot to $235 million. The man who scorned monthly trust fund money from his vulgar, illegitimate father and who ate only due to a meager allowance from his grandmother, suddenly appeared to be richer than all of them, then his whole lineage, or likely anyone on Treasure Island, or Naples, or any of the toniest parts of Long Beach.

Lottery Larry had won it all.
Chapter Two – Banking the Old Fashioned Way

So, Saturday night, I get a call from Larry, all excited. "Forget those calls for money," he says. "I need your financial advice. Please let me pay for a week of your time," he said. Wanted me to meet him and some "mystery person" on Monday outside the state Capitol building in Sacramento or, better, drive up to Sac with them.

Eight hours on Interstate Five with Larry? Yeh, right.

Still, I felt compelled to say "yes" to Larry, in part out of curiosity and also because he said he'd pick up my airfare if I wished to fly. I can't recall a time when Larry ever spent money on me, aside from picking up rounds at the Reno Room or 3636 Club or whatever bar he would drag me to when Lori would kick us out of the apartment.

I called my District Manager on his cell that Saturday night, and asked if I could take an emergency vacation for the coming week. I hadn't taken a day off at this new incarnation of my old bank since they had rehired me at reduced pay, just after the fall of Lehman Brothers and The Collapse. Only two years of perfect attendance, said my District Manager, kept him from firing me over the phone for springing such a request. "Three years," I noted. He told me to be back the first thing that following Monday, and that meant 8 am, if I valued my job.

I called Larry and told him I'd meet him in Sac on Monday, but I preferred to fly. Alone. He gave me a VISA number for JetBlue. It didn't get declined.

* * *

What can I say about Larry van der Bix?

He likes to play the lottery. He's been playing since we were in high school.

I married the girl that Larry and I both had a crush on in high school, although it didn't last. Lori had always been Larry's girl in high school, pretty much from the day she transferred to Woodrow Wilson from Thomas Starr Jordan, in north Long Beach, after the Rodney King riots. People said her standing as one of the top swimmers in the state allowed her family to get a transfer approved, since otherwise Long Beach Unified didn't allow whites to transfer out of Jordan. Something about racial integration numbers.

Each of them said they weren't dating and would go silent if I questioned it, even after Larry's car crash up north, which put him into an upper-body cast for most of our senior year. Larry had begged his grandmother for that car. His dad said there was no way he'd ever spend a dime on a car for Larry, no matter how much money he made from building tract homes and doing redevelopment projects for the city. When he got that car, Larry drove every morning at 5 am up Atlantic Avenue, to pick up Lori from her house near Houghton Park, so she could make swim practice before school. Every afternoon, it was the same route back, past the boarded-up storefronts and graffiti, to drive her home.

When she'd visit Larry on Treasure Island, the two of them would go in his rowboat to circle the Naples canal or row to the Queen Mary or to Marina Pacifica to see a film. When she'd do her ocean swims, he'd row ahead of her, so he could keep visual contact and so she could climb in when she tired. There had always been an ease between them that suggested something was going on with them, even if they insisted there wasn't.

Lori seemed flattered when I asked her out, or when I'd pick her up for a date or open a door or hold her chair. She was always grateful when I'd pay for dinner or the movies. We were nice to each other then. It felt like we were part of something larger.

To his credit, when Lori told Larry before we graduated that me and her were going out and, later, that we were getting engaged, he said he only wanted Lori to be happy. "If that's what you want," he said. After that, how could I hate the guy, even if it seemed he lived on our couch and ate all our food? Still, he was always the shadow I couldn't catch; the person I couldn't be.

When Lori filed for divorce and left me to enlist at the end of the 90s, she said it was so she could unwind. All through her army years, she'd send Larry long letters, saying how being a motor pool grease monkey made her feel useful and alive. After 9/11, she wrote how she kept getting bumped up the ladder. When her contract expired, she wrote she was "totally fine" that the army "stop-lossed" her and how she quickly accepted a cash bonus and a bump up to E6 for volunteering to stay in theatre for 18 months.

Oh, and another thing I can say is Larry still doesn't know my name, even though we grew up on the Island and went to elementary, middle school and high school together. Sure, for most people, "Larry" is an easy jump from Lawrence, but my name is not Larry. I hate the name, and it isn't just because Larry van der Bix barged in to my life, contantly begged for money, slept on my couch and was my wife's perpetual companion.

That may have been years ago, but how do you forget stuff like that?

* * *

Larry never worked as best as I could tell, but I always knew I wanted to be a banker, ever since I saw my Dad in the business. But the industry my dad grew up in was gone forever after The Collapse. Decisions were all pushed up the ladder, making branch managers little more than another face at the shop. After Lehman, all management cared about was cash flow and capital-on-hand.

It had never mattered before what the branches had on hand. Corporate mantra had been: "Don't let business walk out the door." Paperwork, verifications, salary history... those details kept us from capturing business. "If a customer walks out the door with a mortgage, we've got them for life," the District Manager said at every staff meeting. "Nothing is more certain long-term than a mortgage."

We all saw the giddiness – capital flowing based on paper and disbelieving customers walking out with mortgages double what they had originally sought. If accountants like me weren't eating the pie, loan agents and management certainly were. Junior associates — like the one who fired my Dad for saying "no" to too many loans — drove up in new cars and left paperwork for me and others to finalize — just "robo-sign" — while they turned the next property.

I didn't move mortgages or sell financial products. Perhaps if I had, I would not have been threatened with being fired for calling the District Manager to ask for a vacation. Instead, three years after The Collapse, every footstep at work is like walking on eggshells. My own profession was generally ridiculed. Accountants, intoned the District Manager, got us into this mess, by failing to see the warning signals and apply the brakes. It was just like Enron, he'd moan.

When I offered that accounting, in its purest form, can save a business — large or small — because it dealt with much more than just numbers, but in analyzing complex systems, I was brushed off. According to the Wall Street Journal, I'd say, a third of all new businesses fail in their first year, and half of those are due to inadequate accounting. "Go back to your cubicle and polish your eyeshade," the District Manager would reply.

I couldn't have saved a bank. I was just one little person. I didn't like the swagger and dismissing accountancy was worrisome to me, but the financial sector's business is to turn capital. That's how banks make money and what drives our economy. To deny that impulse is to strike at the heart of capitalism. So while I found government bailout money to be a repugnant admission of failure, somehow even that fit into everybody's world.

"What?" asked the District Manager. "Does anyone think banks won't pay it back?" Banks, he would say, had just hit "a rough patch."

* * *

Larry spent his life in a "rough patch," seemingly by his own choice.

I don't know if Larry ever worked. Can't think of any marketable skills he possesses. He certainly never showed any personal discipline. He speaks some languages, but when did anyone get hired in southern California because they could speak another language?

Still, there was no reason Larry had to live like a pauper. His family had old money. The Old Man may have been penniless when he first got to Long Beach in 1890, but that was the last time the van der Bix family was busted. The Old Man quickly got rich selling sunshine by the seashore to complete strangers in Des Moines and Council Bluffs. Along the hallways in the downstairs part of the mansion were ancient newspaper clippings of the family, in their striped tent at the annual Iowa picnic or of the Old Man handing keys to a couple in front of a house, under a sign reading "1000th Sold."

Larry was one of the few van der Bix family members who had legitimacy on his side, although a Las Vegas marriage between two porn actors and then the mom bailing out of the marriage just after Larry was born didn't inspire much love from his son for Calvin. Still, only his grandmother and great-grandfather could claim to be legitimately born; not the Old Man or Larry's dad, Calvin, who was born only after the Old Man refused to arrange an abortion for Emma Mathilde, after she had been raped during her one visit to the Pike. Some called Emma "The Scandinavian," although she was born in Long Beach. Calvin just called her, "The Cow."

Larry would tell me this family trivia when we'd sneak beers and listen to the discs in his grandmother's hall of mirrors. How Astrid and Carl quickly had Emma, and how Astrid shunned appearances with the family, venturing beyond the suite only for outings with Carl and the child, like to cross the San Pedro bay by motorboat on a Sunday to reach the Norwegian sailors church, where Scandinavians would talk afterwards over coffee, breads, pastry, salads, and the locally-caught fish.

Carl appeared regularly with the Old Man in photographs for business and civic leadership, starting with Carl and the Old Man sitting at a card table at the 1910 Dominguez Air Show, but the sole photo showing Emma Mathilde, Carl and Astrid with the Old Man depicted Emma dancing the Charleston and a politician holding a straw hat. That picture is also in the room of mirrors, with foreign words printed under it.

When you're very rich or very poor, one can he invisible, and so it apparently didn't matter that Larry's great-grandmother spoke no English and didn't want Emma to learn it. European servants taught Larry's grandmother in Danish and Swedish and German. Locked in a fourth-floor tower, Emma Mathilde van der Bix grew up doted upon, but apart from children downstairs and in the neighborhood. Her dad, Carl, as an army aviator, split time between Long Beach and, later, at the Presidio, overlooking San Francisco Bay. Emma grew up riding on trains between California's great cities, before she was given the suite, at 18, so she could raise Calvin, though the Old Man eventually convinced his great-grandson to move downstairs and later to take over the land development company. A deal had been reached on the Old Man's deathbed that Calvin would inherit the family mansion if he outlived his mother. Otherwise, it'd go to the next legitimately born heir, which was Larry.

* * *

Why do I even care about this stuff? Larry confused my acquiring all his secret family trivia as my being interested, when, of course, I listened to it all only so I could join him in stealing beers from his grandmother's pantry. Larry always confused captive listening with friendship.

I remember Larry on our first day of kindergarten at Naples Elementary telling me how his family was really rich, but he didn't like them. His words have gotten cloudier since then, especially after discovering beer, but the feelings obviously never changed.

When I first started going over to see Larry when we were growing up, he lived downstairs, in the main part of the mansion. I hardly ever saw Calvin, though his voice was everywhere. When Calvin did appear, he'd take me away from whatever it was that me and Larry had been doing together – though Larry never stopped – to tell me things he said I should always remember. Show up on time or, better, be early; people don't expect it. Better to have short hair then look like a Bolshevik. Keep your head while others panic; let others run away from opportunity. He seemed convinced of everything, and then off he'd go, with his huge ring of keys.

Calvin never spent more than a few minutes in his mom's suite, which explained why Larry asked to move in with his grandmother. That was just after Calvin brought Candy to live at the mansion. Larry living in the suite worked well for his grandmother, who had lived alone for decades. When I'd come over, she'd ask, "How... are... you..., Law-rence?" and every time that I started to tell her, her eyes would glaze. Larry would explain that the question was just a courtesy, and that she didn't understand what I was saying.

So middle school was largely spent pilfering beer and storing bottles in his closet. When we'd get home from school, we'd quickly climb the huge marble stairwell, or both ride the chair lift, and go into his room to carry out our ritual of splitting one bottle, before I had to go home.

After we all graduated high school, Larry spent almost a year living on me and Lori's couch, before moving to an apartment by Bixby Park, which his grandmother arranged. When I helped move things, Calvin yelled, "Live on the street for all I care."

Through it all, the only time Larry didn't seem angry was when he drank. When Lori needed time alone in our apartment, Larry would take me to a bar on Broadway where the bartender didn't check his ID. We'd talk about what we'd do if we each had money. He'd talk about winning a lottery jackpot and how then he would finally be free.

* * *

Eight hours trapped in a car with Larry van der Bix on The Five?

Yeh, right.
Chapter Three – Sorting Memories

Emma Mathilde van der Bix, in slippers and housedress, with sunshine streaming in through the windows and bending into bands of colors, sat at a small table next to a thriving plant and held a magnifying glass over a stack of pictures and postcards. A faded pink ribbon lay limply around the postcards, as the magnifying glass traveled across the delicate colors, showing a hacienda-style inn with smiling vacationers seated on a terrace, looking out upon a vast valley of citrus trees, underneath the words "Pasadena, Calif." Emma gazed at Mission San Gabriel and Fullerton, and a depiction of a train, with the words, "SP's Coast Daylight," before placing the cards again in a pile and folding the pink ribbon across them, leaving it untied.

She picked up a framed photo, showing ruddy-faced Calvin, wearing only swim shorts, handsome, like a genuine movie star, with his beautiful young wife perched, smilingly, on his lap. The woman stayed long enough to bear Larry, but, like almost every woman who entered the van der Bix mansion, she fled quickly. Emma looked deeply at her ruddy-faced son, studying his face under her magnifying glass.

* * *

The Old Man had been in Long Beach almost 15 years when city officials awarded him control over development of the mud flats that he would convert into the high-end community of Naples – its elegant Italian-style main plaza lined with a colonnade leading to an enormous fountain surrounded by olive trees, and fine homes that fronted to the Venetian-like canal, all protected by publicly-financed seawalls and waterworks, and the opulent, tranquil Treasure Island, with its large lots and private docks. With the military dredging crews shaping the mudflat to fit the Old Man's development plan, he spent a great deal of time and money erecting his great mansion upon the sweetest lot on the most desirable portion of the entire development. The Old Man ordered a flat roof over his three story home – built exclusively of Pacific lumber and household materials crafted locally or bought in California. "My roof tells good citizens in Council Bluffs that no snow falls on this home," the Old Man wrote in the series of letters that he sent to every newspaper in Iowa, changing only the name of the towns so that good citizens there might also wish to read about bright, warm, sunshine in February.

The Old Man's twelve-room mansion, with its servants' bungalows and orchard of fruit trees and vegetable garden and spice terraces, made the compound an ideal spot to raise a brood of kids, though after Carl van der Bix was born, the children came from the string of women who passed through the Old Man's bed, as the teenaged girl who crossed the great southwest desert on horseback with her runaway husband and arrived in Long Beach pregnant soon grew weary of the life she chose. She nursed her baby as she also snatched coins and currency, until she could pay third-class passage on a steamer for San Francisco and, some say, eventually to a town at the mouth of the great Columbia River. The Old Man never chased her.

Plenty of kids grew up at the mansion, some of whom shared their father's blood with Carl, but all knowing there was only one true heir. Still, the kids all ate fruit from the orchard and swung from the trees and jumped from the mansion's dock into the water. Carl would row the younger kids in his Whitehall across the bay to the public beach or take the older boys into the unprotected, choppy waters of the main harbor, coming ashore near the Rainbow Pier so they could spend long days at the Pike.

Inside the mansion, the Old Man personally installed multiple bolts to lock off passageway entries on the third floor and had workers install padding and heavy drapes along its long walls and covered all the windows, creating a den of isolation to which the Old Man nightly retired, pulling the latest woman by the wrist with one hand and carrying an enormous ring of keys in the other. During his marriage to Astrid, Carl listened each night to the screams and other sounds that nightly floated up, muffled, from the locked chambers on the floor below them.

Calvin van der Bix may have been the Old Man's great-grandson, but he lived under his roof well into adulthood. He observed the Old Man openly kiss and grope every woman he brought into the house, pulling each by the hand into a hallway of padded walls and locked passages. Indeed, since each van der Bix mother typically bred young and fled young, the Old Man and Calvin spent decades together as each other's principal company, becoming the family members most like one another. Calvin's womanizing began in high school, with a Long Beach State student who had been a senior at Wilson when Calvin first got to her when he was only a freshman. After chasing a string of women throughout his 20s, including a stint making skin flicks, Calvin married Larry's mom, who left the mansion shortly after Larry was born. When Larry was 10, Calvin brought Candy, then 21, into the house and proceeded to spend the next twenty years repeatedly making her pregnant, though they never married, leaving Larry as the only legitimate heir to the van der Bix fortune.

* * *

Emma set the magnifying glass atop the postcards and drank her orange juice.
Chapter Four – Milkshakes on a Sunday

"You think this place in Hermosa has wireless?" asked Larry, as Lori drove through the industrial moonscape of Terminal Island, home to the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, America's gateway for imported goods. On either side of the elevated roadway were stacked shipping containers, like Lego piles, bathed in stadium lighting.

"No idea," said Lori, slowing behind a big-rig.

"It's probably some yuppie building," said Larry. "I can probably bootleg."

Lori climbed the Vince Thomas Bridge, its blue bulbs glowing, with trucks chugging in the right and cars speeding in the left. Lori glided onto the 110 Harbor Fwy north, her hair whipping about as they drove with the top down. Lori exited at Pacific Coast Hwy. The car stalled as she played with the clutch, waiting for the light to turn.

"Shit," said Lori, restarting with her left foot all the way down on the clutch and her right foot on the gas pedal. Lori slowly eased her left foot upwards and the car jerked forward. She made the right turn onto PCH.

"Didn't they have stick shifts in the army?" asked Larry.

"Just because I fixed 'em doesn't mean I like driving 'em." Lori shifted. "I've always been a bike person."

Larry and Lori passed quietly through the working-class town of Wilmington, before cutting across the narrow strip of Los Angeles known as Harbor City which, with Harbor Gateway, connects the port and harbor area to the rest of the city. Beyond, in Torrance, the working-class made way for the middle-class until, as P.C.H. wound into the Beach Cities, retail and beachfront high-rises suggested wealth and leisure.

"You don't seem too excited about this 'being rich' thing," said Lori.

"Oh, no, I totally am," said Larry, watching suburbia pass by. "I wanna send an email to someone," he said. "Find out if she can meet us up there, or maybe go with us."

"What do you mean, 'go up with us?'" asked Lori, as she slowed and began actively checking individual street signs. "You aren't just cashing this thing down here?"

"I gotta do this right," said Larry, pulling a bag of chips from his still-teeming bag of snack food. "I wanna cash this up in Sacramento."

Lori broke hard approaching a red light, sending them both forward into the unyielding seatbelts. "Sacramento!" Lori yelled. "We can't take this car to Sacramento. It's not even my car, Larry, if you remember. I don't have a car. You don't, either. Remember?"

Larry ate a chip. "Maybe we can just do a Bucksters or McDonalds for a signal."

* * *

Lori slowly snaked her way down Esplanade, until finding the high-rise matching the number she had written down. They could hear the pounding of the ocean. She used the plastic card the District Manager had given her to open the garage and parked in space 128, as instructed. The card allowed them into the elevator that carried them to the 7th floor. When Lori unlocked the door, the sound of the ocean and smell of salt hit them both, as the unit overlooked the beach directly below. Lori repeatedly uttered "wow" and "amazing" as she walked through the apartment. Larry slid the balcony door closed and closed the windows, muting but not entirely masking the sound of the sea.

"I need the keys and that card thing," said Larry. "I left my tablet and our survival supplies in the car," he said, clutching the bag of chips he had been munching on his way up from the garage. When he exited the elevator in the garage, a tall redhead entered silently. Larry got to 128, gathered up the snack bags that had spilled from the paper sack and grabbed his tablet. He booted up the unit and stopped first at the elevator and, a moment later, on the first floor, trying to get a signal. Successful in the lobby, he opened Yahoo mail and typed:

To: december@missmilkshakes.com

Subject: Can you do Sacramento?

December, Hey, got a bunch of money coming to me. Am gonna drive to Sac in a convertible tomorrow to get it. Do dinner and hotel at Harris Ranch. RU available? My treat. Sky's the limit. — Lottery Larry

Larry put the tablet to sleep and slipped it into the snack sack, to an audible crunch from the bags below it. He slid the card to call the elevator. On the 7th floor, standing outside the door, he heard yelling from inside the unit. He unlocked the door as quietly as he could and entered silently. Directly front of him, Larry saw the backside of the tall redhead he passed exiting the elevator. He and Lori were struggling and yelling.

"Stop it," screamed Lori. "No!"

"What the...," said the redhead, as something smacked into the back of his head.

"You heard the lady," said Larry, a bag of raw, unsalted trail mix in his left hand. He chucked the bag and hit the redhead just below the eye, causing him to grunt. Lori broke away. Her tee-shirt was torn and she had scratches on her face. Larry threw an oversized bag of peanut M&Ms.

"Who the fuck are you?" yelled the redhead, as he took a bag of Doritos square in the cheek. He turned away from Lori to face Larry.

"I'm your worst nightmare, asshole," said Larry, as he drew close enough to push the redhead backwards. Lori went to her knees and the redhead fell backward, lost his balance against Lori and wound up on the floor, with Larry quickly scrambling to get on top of him. As Lori held the redhead's hands, Larry smooshed and then tore open a bag of Cheetos and poured them into the redhead's face, concentrating the orange chip dust onto his eyes. Larry used his other hand to smoosh the orange puffs into the redhead's face as Lori pulled both of the District Manager's hands above his head. Larry grabbed the largest intact cheese puff and stuffed it into the redhead's nostril and repeated it for the other. He grabbed for the top item in Lori's folded laundry, pulling out a white fuzzy sock with what looked like some sort of face on it.

"Not Lambchop," yelled Lori, putting her knee onto one of the redhead's wrists as she grabbed a balled-up pair of athletic socks from the bag and rolled them to Larry, who stuffed them into the redhead's mouth.

His mouth gagged, his nostrils stuffed, the pair holding his hands and sitting on him, there was little the District Manager could do. He shook his head and blinked rapidly, but the orange dust was as stuck to his face as if to pre-licked fingers. "Able to breathe?" The redhead shook his head and Larry pulled out one of the puffs.

Larry turned the redhead onto his belly and told Lori to switch places. Lori gripped each of the District Manager's wrists and pushed his hands high up into his back. Larry scrambled about, found a pen and paper and got on his knees, leaning low so as to get face-to-face with the redhead. Larry grabbed the red hair and used it like a mop handle, dragging the District Manager's face back and forth through the orange chip debris, smooshing it deeper into the plush cream-colored carpet. Larry pulled the red hair and whispered into his captive's ear.

"You're gonna sign two notes, your Assholiness," said Larry. "You're allowing Lori to borrow your car during her vacation and you're fine with that or we release note two, in which you confess to having tried to rape her." When the redhead appeared to object, Larry reached for another cheese puff and restuffed the empty nostril. Larry pulled out his cell phone. "Let's take some pictures." Larry shot several images of the redhead, his face caked in orange paste, chips in his nose, gagged. Larry looked at each one and showed them, in turn, to the kid. "Now some video," said Larry, pointing the camera. He let go of the hair, pulled out the socks , and leaned in. "Out loud, now: 'It's okay that Lori's using my car. I tried to rape her.' "

The redhead said nothing. Larry pushed his face deep into the carpet, matted with food and sweat. He used a knee to keep the redhead's face deep in the carpet as he tore open the pork rinds he had thrown earlier. He ground them into the redhead's face and repeated the instructions.

"Lori..., she is using my car... it's okay," said the redhead.

Larry scooped up a mixture of orange and light brown mush and pushed it into the redhead's cheek. Nothing. Larry held his hand just below the kid's nose and put his middle finger on his thumb, before releasing it, thwacking the cheese puff deeper into the nostril. Nothing. Larry thwacked the second puff. Nothing. Larry stuck his finger into the stub of the puff and jammed it deep into the nose itself, then pulled it out and wiped it on the redhead's lips.

"I... I tried to... rape Lori," said the District Manager.

"And one last photo," said Larry, snapping and showing before he pocketed his phone and went to the counter to write out the two notes, while Lori held the District Manager's wrists high in his back. Circling through the apartment, Larry found two cell phones and a wallet. He opened the sliding glass door and hurled each of the phones out towards the ocean below,

"Was the iPhone the company line?" Larry asked the redhead, who didn't answer. Sifting through the wallet, Larry found the driver's license, which he flicked out the window, and proof of auto liability insurance, which he pocketed.

* * *

"You and that carnival arm!" yelled Lori, as she drove up Hawthorne Boulevard.

"It's hard to knock over metal milk bottles," said Larry.

"You're gonna have to win me some more stuffed animals one day," said Lori. "Hey, we should make it back to Long Beach just fine, but this thing's almost out'ta gas."

"We're fine," said Larry. "My Grandmother deposited three months of pocket money, so I got us covered. But I'm hungry."

* * *

"Oh!" screeched Larry, putting down his double cheeseburger. He looked at his tablet while Lori ate from his fries, dipping them into his side of tartar sauce. "She wants to come! Can we go to Harbor City?"

Lori mixed her salad with her fork, and looked up at Larry. "Who wants to come?"

"December Carrera," said Larry. "Miss Milkshakes, from the internet."

"Classy, Larry," said Lori, sipping her unsweetened iced tea. "It's not a big car."

"She's not a big girl," answered Larry. "Well, except for her milkshakes."

* * *

Lori exited the 110 Fwy at Anaheim Street and motored past the Phillips 66 refinery. "Right back where we started from," she said.

As they passed the refinery, Larry pointed to an old corporate logo – an orange globe. "Looks like your District Manager's face."

"You think he'll call the cops?" asked Lori.

"Probably not right away," said Larry.

"Maybe not at all, since you have that video," said Lori, "though I can kiss the job goodbye."

"My phone doesn't have video," said Larry.

"What?

"He just has to think it does," said Larry. "I uploaded the photos, though."

Lori pulled in to a Mobil station and snaked through the cars at the gas islands, parking in front of the Food Store.

"I thought this kind of food is against your religion," said Larry.

"Clean bathrooms are my religion," said Lori. "Any supplies you'll need? Cheetos, trail mix... condoms?"

"Lori?"

"Who is this woman?" asked Lori. "This Milkshake girl? Should I be worried?"

"She's from the internet," said Larry. "She's nice. You'll like her."

* * *

The convertible pulled up to an apartment building most notable for being the sole building on either side of the street with a uniform coat of paint –walls, trim, and doors were all one color. Larry pushed the door buzzer for #9 CARRERA.

A breathy voice answered.

"Hi, December. It's Larry."

The breathy voice got out the three words, "Be right down," and Larry stood next to the door. He made a mostly unsuccessful effort to straighten his hair, using his fingers as a comb. The door opened, and a woman with dark hair, black like a crow, stepped out, pulling a full-sized suitcase and carrying a SpongeBob day bag.

"Hi," said Miss Milkshakes, holding her hand out in the way one would if the other person were expected to kiss it. "I wouldn't go with you, except you're so nice on the site, and I know you're a gentleman. Oooooo, nice car." Upon seeing Lori behind the wheel, December quickly asked, "Who's dat?"

"My friend," said Larry. "She's driving."

"Do you need her?" asked December. "I can drive."

"No, I need her."

"Girlfriend?"

"No," said Larry. "No."

"She won't be after this, hunny," said December, climbing in to the front seat, leaving Larry to lift the heavily-packed suitcase into the back seat. "Careful. There's a video camera in there." Larry climbed into the back and wedged himself into what remained of the narrow back seat.

Miss Milkshakes extended her hand to Lori, who ignored the gesture, only uttering, "Charmed."

"She definitely won't be after this," said December, over her shoulder to Larry. Lori pulled out from Belle Porte onto Anaheim, and back towards the 110 Harbor Fwy.
Chapter Five – Heard it on the Grapevine

"How come Miss Got-the-Keys don't know where the secret button is," yelled December, standing alongside the passenger's door of the convertible, which was idling on the emergency shoulder of the 405 Fwy north. Cars whooshed past as Larry felt under the folded top. "Did you guys steal dis car or what?"

"No," said Larry, his face suddenly brightening. He pulled at a latch under the top and one side sprang up. "It's manual." Larry circled to the other side and reached under for the second latch.

Larry wiggled the top into place, grabbing a glance toward December, smiling, and latching the passenger's side, as she smiled slyly. Lori latched the driver's side as Larry opened the passenger's door, flipped the seat forward and wedged himself into the rear seat

Miss Milkshakes leaned her seat back and used her elbows to push together her breasts, giving Larry a glimpse into her deep, long line of cleavage. "You sure dis car isn't stolen? No one is taking me to jail, if dat's the way it is," she said, relaxing her elbows.

"She's trash, you know," said Lori.

"And we're not?" said Larry.

Lori started the engine, signaled and pulled into traffic, driving silently as December searched the radio dial. She cycled quickly through the buttons – pop, oldies, classical, KROQ – and, grumbling about "white girl music," rolled through the dial, pausing at and then passing several hip-hop numbers before stopping at a Spanish-language station.

December reached to the right side of her seat and adjusted it so she was back far enough that she could see Larry, wedged against the driver's side of the narrow back seat. The angle gave Larry a clear view to her entire upper body, and she smiled, as he lingered on her face and then his eyes would periodically roam.

"Sky's the limit, huh?" said December. "So, what are we going to do next? Steal a plane?"

Lori dialed 90.7 on the radio and two Spanish-speaking DJs cut to music from Colombia.

"Who's dat?" said December, only slightly less catty.

"KPFK," said Lori, blankly.

"We're not stealing," said Larry, and December quickly returned to him. "We're driving up to pick up a big pile of money I got coming."

"Pile, huh?" said December. "What? D'j'ou win the lottery, or something?"

Larry said nothing. December quickly turned to Lori, who stared straight ahead. Looking to Larry, December said she would need his help at the hotel, because she had to do her regularly-scheduled show. He could be the cameraman. It'd be fun, she assured him. But Miss-Got-the-Keys couldn't be there. Strictly business.

"Like I said, Larry," said Lori, not breaking her concentration on the road. "Like I...."

"I am not trash, white girl," spat December. "You think I don't have ears?"

"Trash," said Lori.

"How come when people say 'trash,' it's white people they're talking about?" said December. "What are you, driver girl?"

"I'm in management," said Lori, never shifting her gaze from the roadway.

"Yeh, right," said December. "Ripped tee-shirt and clothes in a bag, driving some stolen car."

"Leave her alone!" said Larry. "It's not stolen."

December slid a bit lower in her seat and, put on coo-ey eyes when she spoke to Larry. "Like I told you, hunny. She ain't gonna be nothing to you after this."

* * *

Lori pulled into the Mobil station in Gorman where unleaded 87 stood solidly 6O cents a gallon more than in Harbor City. "Wonder if this one has a clean bathroom?" said Lori, getting out. Looking to Larry, she said the tank was half full but it couldn't hurt to top off.

She pocketed the keys and went in to the station's Food Store.

Larry flipped up the driver's seat, opened the door and worked his way out of the car. He unzipped and unsnapped his wallet, and fingered between the carefully-folded lottery tickets and a slip of winning numbers to pull out his VISA card. He slid the card at the pump and entered his ZIP code and began pumping fuel.

December got out and joined Larry. "Hunny, you need someone young and pretty," said December, leaning against the car. "Not someone old, like her."

"We go back," said Larry, as he replaced the nozzle. "We got history."

"Dat's what I mean," said December. "Old." December turned and walked away, towards the food store. Lori crossed the lot to the line of pumps and, as she did, December veered in her course so as to not come within talking distance as they crossed paths. When Lori got to the car, Larry was watching December walking off.

"Do we really have to bring her?" said Lori. "We're still less than a hundred miles. We could turn around and then head back up after dumping her."

Larry opened the driver's door, pushed the seat forward and climbed into the back, turning his upper body so he could fit up against the rear seat when the front seat was pushed back into place. Lori got in. They waited in silence for Miss Milkshakes, who came out several minutes later, a tall beverage in one hand and a bag in her arms. Lori snorted.

December handed the beverage into the passenger's window and when Lori made no effort to reach for it, Larry shifted his body such that he could slide close enough to grab the cup. December got in, and only when strapped in and after choosing a bag of corn chips did she reach for her cup. Larry re-adjusted, re-slid and re-wedged himself into place. Lori made her way back onto the Five North.

* * *

"I can only imagine the sort of show you put on in a hotel room" said Lori, aiming the comment to December, but not turning her head. "Let me guess: you're in the entertainment business?"

December puckered to sip from her straw and looked at Larry. "I keep my fans entertained." She took another sip of her drink. "I take care of myself, old lady."

"I don't have to do porn," spat back Lori.

"No one would buy it if you did," said December. "And I don't do porn, driver-girl." December looked toward Larry, almost tenderly. "I make people happy. And I don't hurt anyone, or steal anything."

"This car isn't stolen," yelled Lori.

"Then how come it's registered to some man in Hermosa Beach, huh?" said December. "Like I don't know how to open a glove compartment. You think I'm stupid?" December aimed her corn chip bag towards Larry, who reached in for a handful.

"My District Manager loaned me this car during my vacation," said Lori, an air of nervousness in her voice. December leapt at it.

"Who borrows someone's car on vacation?" said December. "I thought you were Miss Manager? Can't you afford to rent one or are you just a manager who doesn't get paid more then anyone else, but has to work twice as hard?" December took a long sip, puckering hard and releasing the straw with a pop.

Alongside the convertible, a California Highway Patrol cruiser kept pace with Lori. She glanced several times to the left. The cruiser sped up and weaved through traffic.

"Should I just wave my arms for him to come back?" said December, nodding with her chin towards the CHP cruiser now several truck lengths ahead.

"Why?" said Lori. "So... so they can get you for indecent exposure?"

"My exposure is more than decent, as your man will find out when he's holding the camera during our little show," said December, looking straight to Larry.

"Stop, please," said Larry. Both women said nothing more. After a few seconds, Larry repeated, "No, I mean, stop... please... pull over." Lori signaled, taking the convertible across two lanes before stopping on the shoulder. December quickly opened the door, jumped out and flipped the seat forward. Larry struggled to make it out, retching as soon as he was outside.

"Poor bracito," cooed December, her hand on his back. "Must be her cooking."

* * *

U.S. Interstate Five is a study in the lesson that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. The Five cuts through California's great central valley, like a chalk line from the Tehachapi Mountains which separate Los Angeles from Bakersfield and, beyond that, to Sacramento and, if one were to just keep going, into Oregon and Washington. Reduced swiftly to two lanes in each direction after descending from the Grapevine – the pass that traverses the mountains – the Five lures every driver to find out how fast their vehicle can move. Like Las Vegas, where abundant light wipes out all sense of time, the blackness of night driving on the Five leaves one unsure of time or distance.

"Where's Harris Ranch?" asked Lori, as she drove past a marker citing the number of miles to Sacramento,

"Coalinga," said Larry, sifting his way through the outstretched bag of assorted snacks that December held for him. "We'll smell it before we see it." He pulled a bag of trail mix from the sack. "Getting to appreciate this stuff," he said, using his teeth to open the bag.

"Is Harris Ranch close to Sac? Far from Sac?"

"I don't remember," said Larry, as he picked through the trail mix, pulling out the M&Ms and raisins. "Just that we can see it from the Five."

"I know," said December, quietly.

* * *

December leaned her seat back to where it almost touched Larry's legs, stretched across the back seat. "So what's this history you have with driver-girl?"

"Been best friends since high school," said Larry, who watched Lori's head above the seat.

"You act more like married people," said December, "except you still obviously have a thing for her, and married people never do when they're old like you, so you must be telling the truth."

"He doesn't have a thing for me," said Lori. "That's just how he is after he's carsick."

December laughed.

"So what are you?" asked Lori. "A webcam girl? Or sex tapes? Or...."

"Naw," said December, "I don't do sex movies. Just pix and vids of me and my milkshakes."

"Classy"

"No," said December, quickly. "It is classy. I tell them, the producers, no sleazy stuff... just keep the fans happy with the F-cups."

"The whats?" said Lori.

"Double F," corrected Larry.

"I'm 32-double-F," said December. "God gave me this. It's His gift for me. Some people are smart, some people are strong, and some people are good looking... everybody's got a gift. It doesn't mean you're better, but go with what you got. I mean, what's your gift?"

Lori didn't answer.

"I'm not dissing you," said December. "I mean, like, what do you bring?"

"I don't know," said Lori.

"You're even headed," said Larry. "You never lose it. You hold it together. Even when you and Lawrence were on the ropes, you never raised your voice."

"How come you said Lawrence here, but you never called him Lawrence to his face? That used to drive him nuts, you calling him Larry."

"Cuz I knew it got under his skin."

"Even... well, dat's something," said December. "Good in a getaway person, I guess."

"I'll keep that in mind," said Lori.

"If you ever leave management," said December, who turned to Larry. "How about you, hunny? What'chu got?"

"I don't give up," said Larry.

"Gag," said Lori. "C'mon, Larry."

"I don't give in."

"Dat's not what I mean," said December. "I mean, like, okay, my milkshakes won't always keep the boys coming around... but they sure do now, so I figure, they're real, they're mine, no one's forcing me... so I use what I was given. And if you've looked around... hello! It's pretty tough out there, especially for a Dreamer, so if I can use what God gave me and I'm not hurting anyone and I make people happy, then what's so bad about that? It's not like I am asking for a government bailout. Dat's what I mean."

Turning to Lori, December went on. "You're in some guy's car. What did you do that got him to say yes? I don't think borrowing a convertible is in the employee manual."

"We stuffed Cheetos up his nose til he said yes," said Larry, matter of factly.

"Okay, you're funny, we got your gift figured out," said December, turning to Lori. "I mean, you're tall... you're thin... bet you don't have to work hard to stay thin. That's something."

"Well, I don't eat shit," said Lori. "And I swim everyday."

"Oh, c'mon," said Larry. "You don't starve yourself."

"I mean I don't eat crap. What is everyone pouring in to themselves? Sugar, salt and fat." In the moments after she spoke, the car was filled with the sounds of two people munching on chips.

"Okay," said December. "So, tall, thin, natural. Doesn't make you better, but those're gifts. You know how many girls wanna be thin? And every girl lies and says she's an inch taller then she really is."

"Everyone around me thought they were better," said Larry. "My dad, the people in my neighborhood. Everyone, except my Grandma."

"I love your grandmother," Lori said, absently. "Wish I understood what she was saying."

"No you don't," said Larry. "The sarcasm is okay cuz it's funny, but she is always afraid that something terrible will happen. When I told her at dinner about the gun people, it scared the shit out of her."

"What do you mean, gun people?" asked December. "People with guns are chasing you? I don't do guns."

"No," said Larry. "Some people came in to her business...."

"Open carry people," said Lori.

"Open what?"

"They carry their guns around," said Lori.

"Dat's legal?"

"If they're unloaded and you can see them, yeh, I guess," said Larry.

"And they're after you? I'm serious," said December. "I don't do guns. My ex used to wave his around. You can just take me back."

"No," said Lori. "I don't do guns either. I grew up, guns all around. I'm sick of guns. Went into the army to get away from the insane shooters in my neighborhood."

"She chased out a bunch of open-carry people from her business."

"Brave. Or crazy. At least one of those is a gift," said December. "So who is this Lawrence guy?"

"Bankerman?" said Larry.

Lori stared straight ahead. "We all went to school together," she said, flatly. "He's ancient history."

"Actually, you'll meet him on Monday," said Larry.

"W-h-a-t-!" said Lori.

"I need someone I can trust on the whole money thing," said Larry, defensively.

"Aw, man," said Lori. "I thought I was done with him with the divorce."

"It's okay," said December, soothingly. "He won't pay any attention to you with me around."

* * *

"Stop dere," said December. "I'm hungry. Let's eat."

"We have a choice," said Lori, pulling off the freeway. "Denny's, or what's that over there...."

Larry and December both chimed in for Denny's. Lori slowed as cars and trucks weaved onto and off the road connecting the freeway to gas stations and fast food joints. She let out a deep sigh after parking and switching the engine off.

"C'mon, hunny," said December, after exiting the car and flipping up the seat. She held out her hand to help Larry uncork himself.

"Oh, puh-leeze," said Lori, under her breath.

As they waited for a table, Lori stood at a distance and occasionally glanced at December, looking her over. Larry and December spent their time talking and laughing together, his eyes staying largely on hers. The two were each smiling easily when the hostess showed them to a table. All three asked for coffee. December hummed softly as she looked over the menu. Larry flipped through the dessert display with seriousness as Lori excused herself and walked to the restroom.

"She believes in clean bathrooms," said Larry.

December leaned across the table to Larry. "So," she whispered, "is it the lottery, den? Is dat da big pile of money?"

A waiter approached the table, smiling at Larry and December.

"Hello, I'm Ollie. I'll be helping you tonight," he said.

December, as if Larry may not have been aware another person had drawn near, let out two "shh" sounds and quickly said, "Oh, hello... we're waiting for someone... still need a minute."

The waiter, with a look on his face that suggested recognition, stood frozen.

"You can go away now," said December. When Ollie left, she leaned across the table again and whispered. "So the lottery, huh?"

"Yeh," said Larry. "I finally hit it."

"You hit it?" said December, trying to hold her voice down. "Like, all the way, hit it?"

"Yeh," said Larry, with a slight laugh. "Big.... Crazy big."

"Oh, hunny," said December. "So now you got two girls and dis big pile of money... yeh baby."

Ollie approached with three white mugs.

Lori approached the table and before she could choose whether to sit with Larry or December, each got up for their trips to the restroom, leaving Lori to choose her spot freely. She sat and sipped at the one remaining black coffee on the table. She moved the other two cups across the table and slid the place settings so she had her side to herself.

"Was everything okay?" asked Ollie, as he rang up Larry's payment and gawked at December.

"Yeh, fine," said Larry, tucking his VISA card away. "Hey, can I use that pen again?" he pulled out his folded lottery ticket and began to write his name on the back. The pen hit a grease spot and left no ink on the section for Name. Larry tried to put down a signature, but the pen made no more marks, even when be drew invisible circles on the credit card receipt. "Damn." He refolded the ticket and put it with his VISA card, re-snapping and re-zipping his wallet.

Outside, Lori handed the keys to Larry.

"Drive, Larry. I'm tired."

"I'm... uh...," said Larry. "I really shouldn't." He handed back the keys.

"I'll drive," said December. "I like to drive."

Lori hesitated, but gave the keys to December, who let out an "ooo yeh" squeal at the handoff. "Can I have the back, Larry? I need sleep."

"Can you?" said Larry. "It's all yours."

* * *

December Carrera drove with the intensity of a race car driver, passing without hesitation and weaving through the lines of cars and trucks plying their way north through the night. She held her hands high on the wheel, giving Larry the opportunity to periodically watch her breasts jiggle under the loose hooded sweatshirt that otherwise effectively offered no real sense of a body that she charged subscribers like Larry thirty dollars a month to watch online.

"Dey call 'em turn signals, bitch... use 'em!" yelled December, as a car sped past on the right and cut directly in front of the convertible. "Aww," said December, to Larry. "Must be hard to enjoy the show. Hold the wheel...." Not diverting her eyes from the road, December swiftly pulled her sweatshirt off, leaving her with only a low-cut top that showed off a purple satin bra. "It's okay, hunny," she said, as Larry nervously grasped the steering wheel. "You can look at the girls." December took the wheel again. "Even gentlemen like to look." Larry gazed downward in the intervening long silence. "And you're a real gentleman... you look at my face when we talk."

"I'm not a gentleman," said Larry, openly staring. "I'm not even nice, really."

"Oh," said December. "I've met plenty of gentlemen who weren't very nice."

Larry broke his eyes away from Miss Milkshakes' chest and leaned his head back. "I'm just... some g-u-y," said Larry, "with not very much going on in my life."

"I don't believe dat," said December, revving the engine to motor past a Winnebago and quickly change lanes in front of it. "Dis girl, she's nice, and she likes you, so you can't just be some loser jerkwad."

"I didn't say I was a... a loser... jerk," said Larry.

"Jerkwad," corrected December. "And now you're definitely not a loser jerkwad.... Yer Mister Money, hunny." December shifted to the left lane, motored past three sedans and ducked back into the right lane.

"Yeh," said Larry, with disbelief in his voice. "It seems that way."

"Is dis the first time you've had big money, hunny?"

"Well," said Larry, awkwardly, slowly, "my family has money, but...."

"But what?" said December, passing an SUV and returning to the right lane.

"I don't like the money... or my family... mostly my family," he said.

"Did your family do crimes or something? Is dat the people with the guns?"

"No," said Larry. "It's just my family has money and mostly are assholes about it." Larry looked to the darkness beyond the roadway. The car lurched ahead as December sped past a big-rig. As she motored past the truck, she took her foot off the gas pedal and slowed, so as not to pass a California Highway Patrol cruiser in front of the truck. She stayed parallel with the big-rig.

"How 'bout you?" she asked. "How do you make your money?"

"I don't have a job, or anything," said Larry. He turned his face towards December, her body pulling his eyes downward. "Guess maybe I am just a loser."

"Do you have a girl?" December lifted her hand to point with her thumb. "Is she your girl?"

"No," said Larry. "We've always been just friends."

"No fucking?"

"No," said Larry, quickly. "No... None of that."

"Ever?"

"Well... no, no," he said. "Not ever."

"It's the kind of thing most people remember," said December. With the voice of a calculator tallying numbers, she added, "Now you'll have lots of women all over you, going for lottery man." She nosed the car forward and saw the CHP cruiser. She fell back. "For a lot of people, the dollars, dat's all they see. Be careful."

"Yeh, I know," said Larry, looking up to December's face, to the sculpted mountain of a nose rising from her olive skin. "I grew up... money was all anyone cared about, except my grandmother."

"Did she grow up poor?"

"No, she's had money her whole life," said Larry. "But somehow, money doesn't matter to her. Family is what makes her happy. And considering how messed up our family is, that's saying something." His eyes again fell, at a moment when the uneven road made for swaying and bouncing that even in the darkness held him in a hypnotic daze. "My God, you have an incredible body."

"Dat's a nice thing to say," said December, again, nosing the car and, not seeing the CHP cruiser, speeding up to pass the big-rig and pull into the right lane ahead of the truck. "Your gram'ma sounds nice."

The cab of the convertible glowed red and blue, as a cruiser came from behind and hugged up tight to the car. Both cars slowed until they could safely make their way onto the shoulder. Both cars stopped, as the long train of vehicles sped past.

"Damn it," said December. "You promise dis isn't stolen?"

"It's not," said Larry, patting his pocket. "I have a note."

From behind came yelling and then the crackle of a loudspeaker. "Place your hands on the dash. Hands on the dash!" Larry stopping fishing in his pocket and put both hands in front of him, on the dashboard. December kept her hands high on the steering wheel. A harsh, wide beam of light flooded the cab, moving to both sets of hands, across Larry's face and then December's. The light followed December's face to her neck and, as though with hesitation, moved to reveal curves and shadows one typically wouldn't expect.

"A note...," said December. "Here we go."

A knuckle lightly tapped the driver's window. December lifted one hand to crank the window down. "Hello, officer," said December.

"Sweet Jesus," said the highway patrol officer, after leaning in enough as to see December. He looked across to Larry and back to Lori. He shined his flashlight to Lori's face, but she didn't stir. "She okay?" Wagging the light so it danced across Lori's face produced no movement. "License and registration please."

Larry reached to open the glove compartment, inches below his hands. The officer poked his head fully into the cabin, speaking angrily to Larry. "Not you," said the officer. "Her."

"I'm sorry, officer," said December, "but my license is in my bag in the back. I didn't expect to drive, but she got tired." She pointed to Lori. "Must be because it's so hot tonight."

"Registration and proof of insurance, please."

"I have a letter," said Larry. "It explains...."

"Sir, I said not you... her," answered the patrol officer. "Miss, what is your name"

"December Carrera."

"December?" said the officer, as one would pronounce the name of a new flower.

"And it's not Miss Carrera; it's Miss December," she added. "Hef said it'd confuse everyone if I was Playmate in a different month."

The officer seemed to have difficulty speaking. "Hef?"

"Hugh... Hugh Hefner," she said, in a matter-of-fact tone. "He runs a magazine."

The officer shined the light onto Larry. "What's this letter?"

"In my pocket, my front shirt pocket," said Larry. "My friend's District Manager is loaning her the car for her vacation from work."

The officer shined the light at Lori, who still did not flinch under the light.

"I thought the car was stolen, but it's not," said December.

"Show me this letter," the officer demanded to Larry, following the movement of his hand with the beam of light. Larry reached into his shirt pocket and produced a note and a slip of paper giving proof that insurance was paid through the end of the year. "Registration?" December leaned so she could reach into the glove compartment. She pulled out the white, square DMV envelope with the single sheet of paper inside, which she then handed to the officer. "I'll be right back."

The officer headed back to his car with the registration and proof of insurance.

"A note!" said December. "Like a cop is gonna believe a note!"

The CHP officer walked to Larry's side and tapped the window. He kept his light aimed at December, illuminating her entire upper body. "Sir, can see some identification?" Larry hesitated and then spoke slowly. "I'm not exercising... a privilege of the State for which I need to show identification," he said, unmoving.

"What did you say?" the officer demanded. Larry repeated his statement and the flashlight swung so the beam was directly on Larry's face. After a moment, the light fell back on December's shoulders. "I guess that's true."

"I understand, officer, if you have to give me a ticket," said December. "You don't want people getting hurt, I know."

"That's right, miss," said the officer, his voice beginning to reveal the hypnotic power of light and shadow.

"December...."

"Right... Miss December."

"Just December." She squared her shoulders in the light.

"This time, I'm going to just give you a warning...."

With a slight shimmy in her shoulders, the light and shadows danced and she murmured agreeably. "Oh, officer... I know everyone drives so fast."

The officer handed back the papers and quickly turned away.

* * *

"Harris Ranch should be coming up soon," said Larry. "I just saw the sign for it."

December, again in her sweatshirt, spoke flatly. "I know where we are. My family drove up and down this Five a lot." A long silence. "But we never ate at the Harris Ranch, except to buy cantaloupe and pistachios at the farm stand." More silence. "Yeh, a lot."

"Drove the Five, like as migrants?"

"Part that," said December, "and partly my parents just didn't know where they wanted to live. Sucked for me. Never had friends. Teased for this weird name. But so what. Who's laughing now?"

"Do you wanna dig out your license when we get to the hotel?"

"I don't got no license," said December.

"But you told the cop...."

"Yeh, but I don't got no license. I'm a Dreamer," she said. "Dat's why I like to drive, cuz I never get to." Downshifting, December exited and headed to a grand pink hacienda glowing against the darkness. She slowly drew up to the hotel's main entry and parked outside the lobby doors. A teenaged boy ran to open her door, and she put her hand into the air, for him to assist her from the car. He did exactly that and she smiled at him. The teenager circled to Larry's door, opened it and let him climb out unaided. Larry leaned in to the car, calling Lori's name several times. Larry unlatched the roof on the passenger's side and, with December being walked in by the teenager, walked around the car and unlatched the driver's side and wiggled the roof open. He leaned close to Lori and whispered. She opened her eyes, sat upright, wiped her mouth, and climbed over the seat and stepped out of the car.
Chapter Six – Putting on the Ritz

"We need a big room, hunny," cooed December, looking through a brochure showing Harris Ranch room packages and configurations. "These photos are tiny," she said to the desk clerk. "Do you have big ones?" With the answer a nod, she continued, "... of the Luxury, Triple Crown and Presidential suites... thank you." She looked up to Larry and smiled. The desk clerk returned carrying three small bound sets of photographs.

Lori approached the counter, face freshly washed and wearing a David Bowie tee-shirt. She walked up to December and Larry. "Grade A bathroom.... Double A."

"Pretty, too, huh?" asked December, as she looked at photos.

"Amazing," said Lori, absently. "So... elegant, so simple... so... classy."

"Me, I'd recommend the Presidential," said December. "The Triple Crown's nice, but the real value is the Presidential."

Larry turned to Lori, who stood, silent and refreshed. "What'ta ya think?"

"What? For, like, the room?" asked Lori. "As long as it has a bed."

December pulled the Presidential photo pack forward and pointed for Larry. "Driver girl can sleep in this separate bedroom area and look at all the space we have to do my show... see? Here, by the fireplace, and here.... Wouldn't that be nice, hunny?"

Behind the counter, a middle-aged man with a badge identifying himself as a manager, took over the booking, while December showed Larry features, pointing, "equipment there," "I come in here," "you shoot up," "I'll need several costume changes," and, finally, "we'll have fun."

Larry looked to the manager, who was shaking slightly. "How much is the Presidential?"

"Please believe me, sir," said the manager, "if that is what she suggests, that is definitely what you want," as he rang Larry's VISA card.

Quickly, four bell staff were leading the trio, rolling the single suitcase, and carrying the SpongeBob bag, December's purse, two grocery bags with Larry's clothes, and Lori's near-empty duffel bag. Larry carried a large sack filled with snack foods to the suite.

As Larry unlocked the door, December said to the two bell staff closest to her, "Wait, okay? Don't leave 'til I come out."

"Uh, okay," said one of the bell staff.

"Can I just go in," said Lori.

"Sure, yeh," said Larry.

The four bell staff watched Larry follow Lori in. They stayed outside. A few minutes later, the door opened, and December stepped into the hallway, in a Harris Ranch robe. The four stood at attention. "I wanted to ask if this is the right thing to wear by the pool tomorrow at eleven?" December pulled her robe open, revealing her thousands-of-monthly-subscribers body, tightly packed into a candystriped-patterned bikini that somehow projected purity and innocence, and also made each seemingly impossible. "Thanks for staying, boys," she said, handing them her paper bag of snacks.

December returned to find Larry sitting at the kitchen table, carefully studying a menu of the Harris Ranch restaurant. She picked up a second copy and focused on the breakfast menu. She abandoned breakfast and began flipping through pages.

"They open in about an hour. Let's go eat," said December. "Your girl is out. She'll be down for hours. We'll pick her up something to go." December stood and let her robe fall open, revealing red-and-white candystripes. Larry kept at his studying. She smoothed her robe, smiled, and walked to the bathroom. "I'm going to freshen up, hunny."

From the master bath came sounds of water running. Twenty minutes later, as Larry poured over the beverages and sides, December came out, wearing only a towel. "I'm almost done," and slipped back into the master bath. Ten minutes later, wearing very little makeup and a top as clingy as any fabric could he, her cleavage a deep abyss, December stepped next to Larry, who didn't turn his head. December cleared her throat.

"Gazpacho, the half cantaloupe, a croissant, granola and coffee," said Larry.

"Wha...?" asked December.

"For Lori," said Larry. "I think that'll be good."

December laughed. "You t'ink, huh?"

* * *

At a wide, heavy table, in wood chairs that didn't move except with deliberate effort, and with big, white mugs filled with steaming coffee, December and Larry went back-and-forth over menu details for almost ten minutes before signaling the server. Watermelon lemonade and grapefruit juice, two coffees and an orange juice. The ranch hand breakfast with bacon and country potatoes. Huevos rancheros with corn tortillas. Two Belgian waffles. Extra berries and cream. Cottage cheese; 4%. But only if it's 4%. Seasonal fruit.

"Oh, and the warm spinach salad," added December. "And tomato juice."

The two folded their menus and handed them to the server, who spent several minutes repeating back and clarifying the order.

* * *

Larry and December swatted back several hands that attempted preliminary table-clearing, as they talked and poked through the remnants. "So your filming is mostly on the milkshakes, and a lot will be on your knees or back or laying down and the milkshakes will be waving. 'Hi,' say the milkshakes. I think the fireplace is a classy backdrop, real good for the show, don't'chu?"

December held her arm aloft, and three female wait staff passed their table before a young male waiter crossed two bays to reach her. "How come you don't got desserts on dis list?" asked December. "I want a Berry Boost, but dat's not a sweet. What'ta you got dat's sweet?"

Larry ordered the gazpacho, half cantaloupe, croissant, granola, coffee and tomato juice for delivery to the room, billing everything to the Presidential suite. The two sat back, satiated, as the table was cleared and December's dessert was prepared.

* * *

Lori, in jeans and a B-52s tee-shirt, was eating heartily, as December and Larry entered.

"See? We took care of you," said December.

"Good thing I did win the lottery, cuz we pigged out," said Larry, sitting at Lori's room service cart, which she had rolled next to the kitchen table. Half of the plates held nearly-full portions, with only the gazpacho emptied. Lori had poured the seeds and brown sugar into her granola, but no milk. She dipped her croissant into her coffee quickly and smiled, but did not cease eating until, suddenly, several minutes later, she stopped. Within two minutes, all of the covered plates were in the spacious refrigerator.

Lori stood and stretched, her long body toned, muscular and fit, like a dancer ready to perform or paratrooper awaiting the next jump.

"Nice out. Hot, though," said December. "Good day for a long swim. If you want, I got a swimsuit dat'll look good on you. You'll be raging hot, if you wanna go swim."

"Taking a couple days off from swimming, thanks," said Lori.

"Dey got a big jacuzzi, too," added December. "It's big. Round, too."

"Won't be doing the jacuzzi, thanks," said Lori.

Larry sat in a reclining leather chair, near the fireplace. In a panel on the armrest was a button with a chimney icon. When Larry pushed it, the light under the button glowed as, across the room, a flame in the fireplace sparked into ignition, blues and yellows suddenly dancing with other colors. Larry pushed the illuminated button again and the fireplace self-extinguished.

December's tone sharpened and she picked up speed in her talk with Lori.

"Maybe you wanna work out and if you don't go out, fine, but me and your hunny are gonna pay the bills," said December, her arms and hands in full motion. "I can set you up with a sizzling hot two-piece, or you can have the kitchen table area," she said, waving possessively, "but the fireplace and this area is for show time."

"Whatever," said Lori. "I got some thinking to do."

* * *

"With Adlington sidelined and the Gill Sisters trading in open-water river swims for their first Olympiad, it was 36-year-old Lori Lewis, of Long Beach, California, who gave England a run for the gold. Absent on the winners platform in women's freestyle swimming were the American teenagers and 20-somethings who sparkled in Omaha, and instead this former army sergeant astounded everyone by showing that age really must be just a number. Originally on the American team only to swim in the grueling 800 meter freestyle and the 10K open water event, but with so many athletes out with this London flu, Lewis picked up slots in four freestyle events and the four-by-one-hundred and immediately won silver in both the 50 and 100, chasing Baljinder Gill, who scored gold in each for England, with baby sister, Jazz, taking bronze."

* * *

"Too much furniture," said December, sweeping her hand with an air that suggested she would not lifting anything. "We can lose all the chairs, and tables." She pointed to the leather recliners. "Both of deze, too."

"No, really," said Larry, quickly. "You'll wanna keep those."

"Okay," said December. "I'll go with dat."

* * *

The leather recliner was back in its furthest position. Larry, holding a camera, was on his back, about a third of the way slid down the chair. December, her feet straddling him, counted from four, and, at two, said, "and... go." A green light on the camera went red.

December moved her hands under her breasts, lifting them; to the sides of her breasts, pressing them together; across her breasts and back down under, gripping and shaking them, before resuming the circular pattern. She slipped her thumbs under the low-cut neckline of her clingy top and pulled the fabric down such that each breast slipped out of her top with a silent 'pop.'

Larry, on his back, aimed the camera up to Miss Milkshakes, hovering and swaying above him. He filmed. December writhed and wobbled. She sat squarely onto his stomach and, able to leverage the couch with her knees, used her elbows and arms more freely to squeeze her breasts together. She leaned forward and hoisted each breast to the camera, and then leaned in so her breasts hung no more than a foot above the camera. She swung and jiggled, then only swung, and alternated back to jiggling, as Larry took in more and more shallow breaths, until, at last, he began to cough, causing the camera to jiggle. "Turn off da volume," said December. Larry just coughed. December reached to the side of the camera and disengaged the sound.

December leaned forward, her crotch now pressing into Larry's torso, as he gasped for breath. He slowly released his grip on the camera, his eyes rolled back and the camera slid to the floor. Larry passed out.

Lori slid her key card and opened the front door to the suite. Inside, Larry lay limp under a barely-clad December. Lori rushed to Larry, handing the camera to December, so she could kneel next to Larry. December set the camera on the desk next to the computer, its light still glowing red, as Lori pulled open his mouth and visually checked Larry's airway and then placed two fingers against his neck. She lifted him to lay him higher in the chair and turned to December.

Viewers of the live webcam then saw – but couldn't hear – the two women yelling at one another, arms waving. December shoved the blonde away and soon Lori had December pinned in the second reclining chair, which was also laid back as far as it would go. December swung from under Lori's body and sprung up, standing and then leapt onto Lori. As the fight continued, December's monitor showed the cam-feed and a chat window, where subscribers were cheering on the blonde "AngryGirl" and the raven-haired Miss Milkshakes. December was still topless and Lori – her own shirt pulled and ripped – pulled off the B-52s to untrap her arm and made a move to slap December, who caught her wrist.

"Nobody slaps me," said December.

Larry woke up in the recliner. Lori was topless, like December. The two were wrestling in the other recliner. The only sounds the two were making were grunts, each clearly not ready to stop until victory was theirs. Larry saw the red light, laid back and closed his eyes again. He smiled.

* * *

Larry woke up in a darkened room, equipment stacked on side tables, cables carefully coiled. He was covered by a thin blanket. A pillow was lodged into the area under his left hip. He got up. December and Lori were each asleep in the California king, in the master bedroom, both only partly covered by a sheet. Larry lingered. Lori appeared to be wearing only panties. December was in a nightshirt. Larry returned to the recliner, stretched out, moved the pillow and threw the blanket over himself.

* * *

The sounds of Lori and December jostled Larry awake.

"No, I don't do hotel pools," said Lori, with insistence in her voice. "When I am at a pool, it's early... to swim... alone."

"You have to do this with me," said December. "You have to."

Larry rose from the recliner, walked over to the kitchen counter, and set about to make coffee.

"You don't know how many boys dere's gonna be," said December.

"Again, really," said Lori. "All the more reason."

"No, you don't understand."

Lori looked at December, and her face seemed to lose its resistance.

"Dere's gonna be so many boys.... Dere are just gonna be... so many. I can't go out dere alone. Please," begged December. "Please, really... please."

"I didn't bring a swimsuit," said Lori.

"Oh," said December, jumping up, "I got dat covered."

* * *

Though the top and bottom came from different suits – of the ten bikinis December packed – and the top was designed for a woman whose body was clearly of different shape and proportion – the promise December made was easily kept, as Lori – broad shouldered and toned – looked burning hot alongside the soft glories of Miss Milkshakes, in her candystripes.

Larry stood in long, baggy trunks. "I'll be in the jacuzzi."

"You said eleven," said Lori. "It's after eleven."

"Dat's what I told the boys," said December, putting on lipstick, and dropping SPF 45 lotion and bottle of water into a small bag. "Dey'll wait. Makes for a bigger entrance."

December and Lori walked to the main pool. Perhaps thirty young men had gathered at the corner of the pool furthest from the jacuzzi. December, in a steady voice, said, "Okay, Blondie Girl, here we go."

"No problem," said Lori.

In the crowded corner, a single lounger was empty. Lori put her backpack on the lounger and stood over a teen on the other side. "We'll need that. Move!" Lori ordered another teen to bring four towels. Applause broke out.

"Me and Blondie need more air," December announced, waving at the wrist for the crowd to recede, which, swiftly they did. "No cameras, sweeties, or the hotel'll toss us."

Lori pushed the lounger with the backpack next to December's and pointed to a table. She snapped her fingers and it moved without a word. She loaded everything onto it, spread her towel, and lay flat on her belly, showing a body with no fat, no lost muscle, no imperfection, no surrender to time, no suggestion of decline or reason to despair of it.

"You got something to show, Blondie," said December, as she straddled Lori's ass, took out a bottle of sunscreen and began working it into Lori's back, leaning deep to get the arms and shoulders, her 32FFs heavy in her top, swinging, brushing across Lori, mooshing into Lori, as December breathed slowly and took her time. "Legs? or flip?"

December became the back-facing cowgirl, creaming Lori's incredibly toned legs, as the young men watched in silence. From the far corner of the massive main pool, Larry van der Bix's view from the jacuzzi was both distant and blocked by more-than-could-be-counted cave boys, packed tightly like guilty observers at a gang-rape crime scene.

Lori's front was as incredibly tight, toned and pliant to December's fingers as the backside. Deep breathing could be heard as December's hands slid across Lori's body, her fingers briefly disappearing under the waistband or top.

Lori sat upright, holding the strings to her top, which December tied. Lori looked to December. "Is it your turn?" The question was met by a cheer.

* * *

When Larry returned to the Presidential suite, he was greeted by a "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door handle. Sliding his key card, the door would not open due to a latch thrown from inside. Larry knocked. He heard December's voice. "Hunny, could you come back in a little while?"

Larry went to the coffee shop.

* * *

Lori and December, each smiling and laughing easily, found Larry at the restaurant, and sat down. Soon, all three had coffee.

"I feel like some f-o-o-d-!" said December. A waiter approached with three menus and, seeing one on the table, set down two. December immediately offered, "Oh, we're definitely ready."

Lori casually picked up a menu and scanned the pages.

"I'd like the filet mignon," said December. "The twelve ounce." She ordered a chopped salad, with oil and vinegar. "I like the watermelon lemonade, but it's so big...."

Lori suggested they each order club soda, and one lemonade between them, so they can make watermelon spritzers.

December added a club soda with her lemonade.

Lori closed the menu. "I'm going breakfast," she said, ordering a Mediterranean veggie omelet, with tomatoes as the side, a club soda, and a bran muffin.

Larry began reciting his ranch hand breakfast order of the previous day, but stopped. "No," he said, "no, I'll have... the baseball-cut top sirloin and eggs. And cottage cheese?"

"Absolutely," said the waiter.

"Can you check that it is the full cottage cheese? Yesterday, it seemed like non-fat."

"I'll check on that." The waiter looked up from writing. "A steak comes with a starch."

"Can I get Belgian waffles?"

"For this table, anything," said the waiter, whose clean-cut good looks and slight sunburn suggested his having been at the pool earlier.

* * *

"The reviews are in," said December, to Lori. "Fans want more of you and me fighting."

Lori drank her coffee. "I'll wrestle. That's fine."

"No, baby," said December, "they like the slapping and pushing."

Lori put her mug down. "After making sure my friend is alive, yeh, I get steamed, but I don't fight unless I'm in a fight... and I don't go looking for fights."

"No, it has to be real," said December. "The fans can always tell."

Lori poured lemonade into her club soda and set the tall glass back near December. "I don't do things for fans," said Lori, sipping. "I'm not some WWE actress."

The waiter approached and leaned toward Larry, while eyeing December and Lori.

"The cottage cheese is non-fat."

"Skip it then," said Larry. The waiter left.

"Won't'chu do it for me, baby?" cooed December.

"Dee, why would I slap you?"

"Oh," said December, in a huff, "you couldn't if you wanted to. No one slaps me."

"How 'bout just count me out," said Lori.

"Don't'chu wanna do more shows with me? Please?"

"Whatever."

"I'm gonna make u like it," said December, "and u know u r."
Chapter Seven – The Shining Tower

"Jeeze," said Larry, turning on his phone for the first time in a day-and-a-half. December folded several bikinis, and set them in her open suitcase, over a mix of cables, a router, the video camera and other equipment laid carefully atop neatly folded clothes. As four of the bell staff waited to help the Presidential suite guests carry bags to their car, December looked through a mesh-net bag filled with bras, panties and other lingerie, before placing it in her suitcase. Every few moments, she would turn towards the young workers. She closed her suitcase and snapped the TSA-approved padlock.

December stood up abruptly, causing most eyes in the room to also spring upwards. "Be careful," said December. "It's heavy, but see if you sweeties can get that into the trunk, won't you?" One bell staff carried the bag and and another got keys from Lori. "We're okay, now," said December, waving with her hand. The other two bell staff left.

Lori lay on the bed. Larry sat on the opposite side. "So, is it hitting you, being rich? How much is it again? Two hundred million?"

"Two thirty five," said Larry.

"That's a lot," said Lori. "Are you, like, freaked out or anything?"

"Naw," said Larry, "cuz I don't have it, yet, and it'll be like half that."

"Yeh, I mean, but c'mon, still," said Lori."Half of 'a lot' is a lot."

"Okay, sweeties," said December. "I'm ready."

"Lori, can you have them add it up for me to sign. I'll follow you guys out," said Larry. "I've got to clear some of these missed calls. I've got like 4O-something."

* * *

"Oh, jeeze, man, Lawrence, I am so sorry," Larry told me over the phone, on Tuesday, the day after we were supposed to meet in Sacramento.

"Yesterday, I went and looked at trains," I told Larry. "Trains."

"W'ull, hey, that's good, cuz they got a train museum in Sac, if you really like trains," interrupted Larry. "And there's some really nice ones. That's how my grandmother...."

"Larry, this vacation could cost me my job," I said, doubting the point would register on the most selfish, socially inept guy I'd ever known. "Can you tell me now what this is all about?"

"Over dinner tonight," said Larry. "See if you can get a table for four at Morton's."

"Why are you doing this to me, Larry? And why are you calling me by my name?"

"I'm very sorry, Lawrence," said Larry. "Honestly, I forgot it was Monday yesterday. It's been quite a weekend."

"Alright," I said. "Four at Morton's. Okay."

"Nine o'clock," said Larry.

"See you at nine o'clock, Larry. Tonight, Larry. Nine o'clock tonight."

"What? Do you think I'd forget about steaks at Morton's?"

* * *

After clearing the 28 missed calls from Lawrence and erasing junk voice mail, Larry took two messages from a man whose voice somehow reminded him of his grandmother.

"Hal-lowww," echoed the voice, as Larry carried the phone into the bathroom. "This is Tres Von Sommerberg, a film director, from Denmark. I am with my colleague touring the United States on a project that I believe you would find interesting. We are searching for someone named Emma Mathilde van der Bix."

Larry pushed the red button on his phone, ending the message.

* * *

"I think we can do this in two hours," said Larry, as they approached Sacramento. "The Lottery Building is supposed to be close to the Capitol and also by a river."

December leaned her chair back. "Oh, come on, silly. Gimme the address." December's iPhone soon added a third female voice to the cabin and after a short drive, Siri's instructions deposited the convertible and its crew at the base of a gleaming, mirrored seven-or-eight story building, with a front that was curved in such a way as to suggest a great cruise liner somehow beached on the banks of the American river. It was just after four o'clock.

"Oh," said Larry. "I wasn't ready to be here so fast."

Lori parked. She and December each got out and Larry exited, sliding out back-first, having to steady himself with one hand on the pavement until he could pull out a leg, and then stand.

"Let's go get your money, hunny," said December.

The trio searched the exterior of the mirrored for an entryway. Upon December finding a mirrored door, opened a crack as she approached, Larry's frustration melted into a slight smile. Lori led the way in and Larry followed December.

Looking over his shoulder as they entered, Larry could see that the glass which outside had appeared to be a mirror was perfectly see-through from the inside.

At the far end of the large chamber was a long marble counter, behind which sat a young women with very pale skin and flaming red hair that cascaded over her shoulders like ropes. Larry strode forward.

"Hello," the woman said.

"Hi, I'm Larry."

"Nice to meet you, Larry."

"I... I...."

The woman with red hair sat quietly, looking upon Larry with a gentle smile, as he stammered.

"I won the lottery," said Larry, quickly.

"Well, isn't that wonderful," she said. She slid a panel of the marble counter aside to reveal the same "Are You A Winner?" machine found in retailers selling SuperLotto™ and MegaMillions™ tickets. "Would you like to check your ticket?"

"I don't put tickets in a machine," said Larry. "I compare numbers to numbers."

"Oh, of course," said the woman. "What was the date of the draw?"

After Larry gave the date of the Saturday draw, of three days earlier, the redhead suggested Larry back up a few steps, and as he did so, the front of the counter glowed as a holographic depiction of the drawing of five ping pong balls and a mega number ball flickered before them. Larry sneered and waved his hand through the image.

"No," he said, sharply. "Please, this is the ticket," and he placed it on the counter.

"Sir, wouldn't you like to sign your ticket, and complete the other information?" She handed Larry a pen.

Lori looked around and saw, outside the building, a pair of middle-aged women scanning the exterior of the building, running their hands over the glass, like mimes.

Larry signed his name, gave an address and phone number and printed his name and date of birth. "Thank you," said Larry. "You really helped me out there."

"We still don't know if you are a winner, sir," she said, routinely.

Larry reached again for his wallet and – a zip and pop later – had the slip of winning numbers. "These are right, right?"

The redhead checked the numbers and said, yes, they had been for the previous Tuesday's MegaMillions™ draw.

Larry dropped his ticket onto the counter in an inelegant dribble from his fingers, and, like a professor giving a closing argument to the jury, he got flustered, but reasoned, "So, if the numbers are right, and the numbers match, how much is it? I think two-hundred-and-thirty-five million dollars."

The woman with pale skin waited for Larry to conclude. "Perhaps so," she said, "but let's make sure." She handed Larry his ticket from the previous Saturday and the slip of winning numbers from the Tuesday drawing. He looked confused.

"But this is for my jackpot," said Larry. "I won a bunch of money."

"On what date, sir?"

"Saturday night. My ticket was for Saturday."

"I'm very sorry," the woman said, "but based on Saturday's draw, your ticket is not a winner."

* * *

Larry's father, Calvin, lay buried under the sand, or stood, as the case may have been, entombed by his son, who had recruited four of the half-siblings that Calvin had fathered with Candy to help in a beach hole digging operation. Once Calvin was buried to the neck, and the other kids wandered off, Larry had dug a long moat that snaked to the water and, with the tide coming in, began bringing in water that at first barely splashed its way up the moat and finally, as the tide came in, began rising around Calvin's neck. Larry leaned in close to his father's head. "Here's another wave," said Larry.

"Yer not winnin' the lottery today, boy," said Calvin, spitting salt water from his lips, as the receding wave sucked away the flow of water around his neck.

* * *

"What'ta'u mean, it's not a winner?" said Larry.

The woman handed Larry an official printout on official lottery orange-and-white paper from a machine that made official-sounding dot-matrix sounds for the few seconds it took to spit out a line of numbers and a list of how many people won the past Saturday. The pyramid of winners was topped with a "-0-" for those who had 5+Mega. Larry picked up the oil-stained slip containing a line of numbers that matched his ticket's third line. Orange flakes fell from the paper.

"W'ull, what'ta'bout these?"

"They are correct numbers from last Tuesday's draw, a week ago tonight," said the woman. She produced an orange-tinted slip showing the Tuesday line that also matched his third line of numbers from Saturday's draw.

"But that means I didn't win," said Larry, now holding four slips of ticket paper, each worth nothing.

* * *

Calvin squirmed his shoulders, first in a horizontal twist, and, when a wave brought more water – which Larry announced in an excited whisper into his father's ear – with an up-and-down motion, attempting to dislodge an arm, or rise to get traction under a foot, and thus free himself from what would surely be the end, since only his head rose above the sand, and Larry leaning in close guaranteed no one would see Calvin die.

* * *

"W'ull, if I didn't win the lottery," said the professor to the jury, "what'ta'bout this ticket?"

"That's for tonight," said the woman with ropes of red. "Good luck."

Larry looked at the slips in his hand. He politely handed them to the woman. "Could I give these to you?" he asked.

"Certainly," she said, taking them from Larry's hand with a touch so gentle as to have been almost imperceptible. He looked at the ticket in his other hand and showed it to the woman, who said simply, "tonight." He folded it and placed it carefully in his wallet, behind his VISA card.

"Oh, and thanks for the pen," said Larry.

"Of course," said the woman.

Lori put her hand on Larry's neck and the other on his shoulder and she hugged him briefly. She stood at his side and put her head on his shoulder. He leaned his head against hers.

"Poor bracito," said December, grabbing Larry's hand, and holding it. "Poor baby."

* * *

Calvin's head lolled in the water, as two lifeguards furiously dug until they each could use the underarm as a leverage spot to pull the unconscious man high enough that he was no longer under incoming tidal waters. A lift by the two and the timing of a wave resulted in Calvin, like a dolphin, squirting up from the water, and landing in the foam of the sea; but, unlike a sea mammal, his landing was flat on his stomach, and yielded a projectile expulsion of seawater, one small fish and a long stream of diluted vomit. Calvin coughed.

* * *

December squeezed her arms together and shifted so her body enveloped Larry's arm, marshmallowing it in the glowing warmth of her cleavage. "I'm sorry you didn't win the money, hunny," she said. "It's been fun, tho, hasn't it?"

"It's okay," said Larry, limply.

"Oh, poor baby," December purred, feeling his upper arm with one hand. "We don't even have to drive long. We can make it back tonight, for sure."

"No," said Larry. "I've got a table booked for all of us at a really good steakhouse. I thought we could eat while we're here."

"Too much high eating for me," said Lori. "And this isn't coming from lottery winnings anymore, Larry."

"I know," said Larry. "I'll have to talk to my grandmother when we get back. It's okay, though. There's other times I thought I won even bigger. But my life didn't change then, either. This was just money."

The three exited the glass building, exposing the doorway for a relieved pair of middle-aged women who made their way into the passageway as the three exited.

Summer's evening warmth rested leisurely on the convertible, its faux-leather seats still hot, as the three swiftly drew back the top, with December driving, Larry in back and Lori stretching, lowering the passenger's seat to almost entrap Larry.

"Yer a pretty together dude, my friend," said Lori. "A'lot'ta people would'a just lost it in there. You held yourself together good, Bix. Real cool-headed."

"She's right, hunny," added December. "And you were such a gentleman to that nice girl when she gave you dat pen."

* * *

December and Lori each offered reasons why they would pass on the steakhouse. They could just hang out at the room while Larry and Lawrence ate. "Then when you two are done, we can just head back," said December. "You don't have to put out room money you don't got, baby. We'll be okay." After a moment, December instructed Larry to bring back a doggie bag. "A big one."

* * *

"Why the lounge?" asked Larry.

"I'd like to be on neutral ground," said Lori.

December stood, surrounded by seven or eight men in suits, at the bar. Larry removed the paper umbrella from his drink and tried to stab a pineapple chunk floating in the glass.

* * *

When I entered the hotel lobby looking for Larry, it occurred to me that since I had not seen him in years, there was a chance I might not recognize him, but Larry had not changed at all. I approached and realized that the tall, attractive woman with Larry who had her back to me was my ex-wife.

"My God, Lori," I said, as she turned around. I was stunned by the deep honey glow of her perfect skin and flawlessness of her remarkably toned body. "You look amazing."

"Yeh, well, swimming.... training."

I stood, unable to speak, just looking at the woman who I would trade everything in the world at that moment to again have in my life.

"It'd be great if you'd just let me hang out in the room while you guys eat," Lori said. "Isn't my scene, the steakhouse thing."

"Sure, yeh, of course," I said, still struggling for words.

"K, well," said Lori, "gimme your keys, whatever the hotel gave you."

"Both of 'em?" I asked.

"It's the whole army thing. Don't like surprises."

Lori took both keys and excused herself. She walked across to the bar, and an incredibly hot Spanish or Italian woman followed her to the elevator.

* * *

At 8:45, it took almost five minutes to make it from the front door to the Morton's counter, to confirm our table.

"I'm sorry," I said, "but we've lost half our party. We're just two."

"We have your table for four opening, but nothing right away for two and we do have a couple with a standing nine o'clock. They may wind up taking the next table," said the hostess.

"Are they here?" asked Larry.

"It's a... standing reservation," said the hostess.

Larry turned to me, as we stood next to the counter, unable to make our way much further. "Looks like we wait. So how's life at the bank?" asked Larry.

"It's still there," I said.

"Thanks to Mr. and Mrs. America, huh?" he said.

"Guess so," I said, to brush away the comment.

"Wait," said Larry, as he looked over my shoulder. "That's the Governor."

California Gov. Edmund G. Brown, Jr., and his wife, had entered, unescorted, and approached the counter. Within seconds, the crowd had parted and the couple stood next to me and Larry.

"I thought I recognized that bald head," said Larry.

"Is our standing reservation available?" asked the Governor's wife.

"Actually, these people's reservations went from four to two, and so they are awaiting the next seating for two," said the hostess, pointing to me and Larry.

"Is their table for four still available?" asked the Governor.

On seeing nods, the Governor turned his hawk-like nose to me and Larry. "The next table's yours," said Gov. Brown. "May we share your table for four while another table for two is prepared?"

"Yeh, sure," said Larry, and without another word, we were being escorted, me following the Governor's wife, as Larry and Gov. Brown followed the hostess.

"It's lovely of you to share a table, and thank you," said the Governor' wife, as we sat. "But no need to concern yourselves about us."

"You're... Edmund... Junior," said Larry, ignoring the First Lady's request for space.

"Correct," said the Governor.

"Your father was Pat... Edmund... Senior."

"Also correct."

"And he was city attorney in San Francisco before he ran for Attorney General?"

"District Attorney. Remember," said the Governor, "San Francisco is both a city and county."

"And he started his first campaign at the Oregon border, with a sign reading 'Thank you for visiting California' at his back," said Larry, as though telling a tale of his own life, though the tale was from decades before he and I were born.

"Correct, as well. A simpler time."

"And then he lost to Reagan?"

"The third run was Mr. Reagan. My dad beat Mr. Nixon the second time around," said the Governor. "That's why we don't have Dick Nixon to kick around anymore."

"How'd you go bald?"

"Ever been mayor of a big city?" asked the Governor.

When the manager came to table to welcome the First Couple, he brought two squat glasses of amber liquid over ice, and chatted warmly. As he stepped away from the table, he looked briefly to me and Larry, smiled weakly, and walked off.

Larry pulled his own chair slightly towards mine and leaned forward. I leaned in, as he whispered. "Today, I found out I didn't win the lottery."

"I'm sorry," I said. "What was that?"

"Two-hundred-and-thirty-five million dollars in the MegaMillions. I had all five plus the Mega, but I didn't win." Larry sat back. "So that's why I don't have anything to say about the business angle. There isn't one, anymore... although some director wants to make a movie about my grandmother, but that is not why I asked to meet you."

"You called me here, paid for my flight... put my job on the line, made me spend half the day yesterday looking at a train museum... to tell me you didn't win the lottery?"

"Like I say, I had all five plus the mega number. I had the whole line."

"You said you didn't win."

"Right, I went to the shiny building and the woman with red hair told me the date was wrong," said Larry. "So I didn't win...."

"Excuse me," interrupted the Governor, "but it sounds like you are discussing a state operation. Did you win the lottery, son?"

"I thought I did," said Larry. "I had a slip with winning numbers, and it matched a line on my ticket... all five and the mega."

"Did it match your date of play?" asked the Governor.

"No, it was for the previous draw," said Larry. "And my friends drove up with me from Long Beach, all of us thinking I had won."

"That's some tough luck, kid," said the Governor. "Hope it was a nice drive."

"Thanks, Governor." Larry reached to his wallet, on the table, and pulled out his ticket for that evening's draw that he had shown the woman with the red hair. "I got one for tonight, tho."

"Well," said the Governor, pulling out an iPhone, "let's see how you did."

The Governor's wife reached her hand towards the phone and asked if she could help, to which the Governor responded that Sutter wasn't the only old dog capable of learning new tricks. "And, bingo...." Gov. Brown paused. "Bingo, bango, bongo... you appear to be a winner, kid."

"No, like I say...."

"Tonight's draw, son," said the Governor. "You did it. You hit all five plus the mega." The Governor handed the ticket back to Larry and reached into his shirt pocket for a pen. "You better sign that."

Larry took the pen and ticket and quickly filled out the back side.

"Keep the pen," said the Governor. "Maybe you can write a check to the State of California with it one day. We certainly could use it."

"No joke?" said Larry.

"I don't joke about state government operations," said the Governor.

The hostess approached, telling the Governor that his table was ready. "Good luck, kid, whatever you decide to do, and, seriously, please use that pen if you want to write a check. Our state parks could use it." The Governor and his wife stood, prompting me and Larry each to also stand. Larry reached across and shook the Governor's hand, and then the First Lady's, before he turned to me.

"Should we stay or should we go?"

"We could go tell Lori," I said, wanting more than anything to trade in Governor Jerry Brown and his steakhouse for another five minutes gazing at Lori Lewis.

"I can't eat now, anyway," said Larry.

* * *

"You have a lot of choices in front of you, Larry," I said, listing some options, vis-à-vis tax obligations and cash-flow, as we walked to the car.

Larry talked on points completely unrelated to sound management of a vast fortune. "I'd like to fund some of the people that I like, like the woman on Lente Loco and this Polish singer and my friend in Italy.

We got to the car. "Didn't Lori take both room keys?" I asked.

"Yeh, and we are supposed to call, but this is pretty important," said Larry. "And December must have some projects she wants to do."

* * *

"Jeeze," said Lori, in a robe at the latched door, "you weren't gone an hour."

"Sorry we didn't call," said Larry, "but it's really, really, really, r-e-a-l-l-y important."

Lori closed and unlatched the door. Larry entered my room first, to see Lori in my hotel robe, and as I stepped in, I saw an incredible bombshell with pitch black hair, barely dressed, laying across my bed.

"Oh, Lawrence," said Larry, "this is Miss Milkshakes. December, this is Lawrence."

"You boys are interrupting us," said December.

Larry looked around. "Where's all the equipment? Were you doing a show?"

"Our own kind'a show," said December.

"Are you back for good? or leaving again?" asked Lori.

"I won," said Larry.

"No, Larry, remember?" said Lori. "They told you that you didn't win."

"No," said Larry. "Tonight. I won the lottery, tonight."

"Tonight?" said Lori. "You won the lottery tonight?"

"I did. Promise," said Larry. "Lawrence was with me. The Governor told me."

Lori stopped. She looked at Larry as a sergeant would a private who had come back to base with a wild tale to explain being absent without leave. "The Governor told you?"

"Lawrence was with me," he said. "Tell her."

Lori looked at me in the way that made clear she wanted the complete truth.

"God's honest truth," I said. "Just like he says. We sat with the Governor and his wife... long story... and when Larry whipped out his ticket for tonight, the thing was the big winner."

"The Governor gave me a pen," said Larry, who reached into his shirt pocket and produced a plastic, Southwest Airlines pen.

"You never have a pen," said Lori. "Must be true.... You're still interrupting us, but why expect good timing now?"

"Dat's it?" said December. "We're not kicking dem out? Dey didn't even bring a doggie bag."

Lori said nothing.

"Fuck!" said December. "Boys, we're not done. Go get us food. And don't hurry."

Lori opened the door. "Can you wait outside?"

"Like in the hallway?" asked Larry.

"The hall outside my room?" I blurted. "Outside my own...."

"Yeh," said Lori, pushing Larry out by the shoulder and guiding me behind him without touching. I heard the door close and latch behind me, and shortly thereafter came the sounds of moaning.

"Um, so, yeh, I need your help, Lawrence," said Larry, over increasingly vocal sounds from inside the room. "I can't handle money, but I want to be the decider, you know?"

Rhythmic word repetition was added to the moaning, from inside the room.

"You need a team, Larry," I said. "I'm just one person. You've got decisions to make on investments, cashflow, tax issues, planned giving... all that stuff."

The moaning didn't sound like Lori, who, as I thought of it, really didn't moan that much during our marriage.

"That's what I mean, Lawrence," said Larry. "I have to be okay with who is guiding me through all this stuff, and that's you. I'll pay you, like a job. Tell me what you make and I'll pay more, though you'll have to help with the pension and benefits stuff. You figure out that and tell me, cuz I wouldn't want you to not have those."

"Stop, Larry," I said. "You're talking like you are going to hire me, and I cannot think of a person I could never imagine working for more than you."

Larry looked confused.

"I mean, glad you won the lottery, that's great," I said.

"Lawrence," said Larry, with an air of self-awareness, "you know this won't last. It'll probably kill me, unless I have help. Who else can I trust? You're the only person who can save me. I'll pay you way more than you're making, but, please, I need your help."

"I can't," I said. "The bank is hard, Larry, but I could never work for you." I tried to pull up something to seal the no-deal. "It'd kill our friendship for good."

The moaning through the door sounded like both were wrapping up in a big way.

"Yep," I said. "It'd be over for good."

"Do it!" came a sharp voice from inside the room. "Get me off, Blondie!"

"C'mon, Lawrence," said Larry, "Don't kid yourself. We haven't been all that tight since high school.... Just thought you'd welcome a chance to ditch the bank."

* * *

I sat with Larry at the table in the room, as my ex-wife and the Spanish or Italian girl lay sleeping on the king-sized bed, "Where'd you meet up with her?"

"Duh, Lawrence, in high school."

"Not Lori," I said. "The black-haired one."

"We're friends on the internet," said Larry. "She has her own website."

"I'll bet she does," I said.

"She's a nice girl," said Larry.

"She must be," I said. "My ex-wife obviously likes her."

"So, I'll want to give most of it away," said Larry. "I just need your help to set something up for me, for my grandmother and for Lori, okay?"

"Does she know about any of this?" I asked, looking up to Lori, who lay on her belly, stretching under the sheets.

"No, just that I was gonna ask you for help."

"Okay, I'll help." I looked over to the two women in bed. "How long have they been... you know?" I asked.

"What?"

"... How long have they been... you know...."

"What?" asked Larry. "Sleeping? Should we wake them up? Guess if we are gonna figure out who sleeps where, yeh, huh?" Larry stood, and shambled towards the bed. "Hey, girls...."

"No," I said, loudly, startling Lori, who moved her head and tensed her arms, pushing herself up slightly, before slipping back down. December rolled, found Lori, and spooned her in her sleep. Lori wrapped her own arm across December's, pulling it deep into her chest. December's hand rested on Lori's flat, tight stomach.

* * *

"Coffee?" asked Lori, holding out a white mug to Larry, who sat, in one of the rolling kitchen chairs, his head against the wall. He stood and held the blonde coffee, just slightly sweet, as Lori had been making Larry's coffee since the mornings he would drive her to swim practice in high school.

Lawrence was slumped forward on the table and snoring.

"Where's December?" asked Larry.

"At the coffeeshop, using the wifi," said Lori.

"We should be quiet, huh?" said Larry, setting his cup down loudly on the table, next to Lawrence. Larry reached into the complimentary basket of fruit and pulled out an apple, which he crunched into.

"Oh, he'll be out for awhile," said Lori. "That's his, 'just-getting-started' snore." Lori stood behind the chair. "Let's move him to the bed." She reached under the arms and clasped her hands at his chest while Larry grabbed the feet.

"You want to get something at the coffeeshop?" asked Larry.

"How about just something in the room," said Lori.

"You don't wanna hangout with December?"

"She's a little demanding."

Lori turned on the television, switched to Nickelodeon, to an episode of SpongeBob. She instructed Larry to order whatever; she was gonna take a shower.

As Larry made his way through the room service menu, December entered. "Oh? You ordering food, hunny? Put me in there. Where's Lori?" When Larry pointed toward the bathroom, December grabbed the second robe and headed into the bathroom, locking the door behind her.

Larry ordered for four people, speaking loudly, over the sounds coming from the shower.

* * *

December poured herself coffee, orange juice, and tomato juice, pulled a slice of toast from the basket of bread, and lifted the silver dome from her plate, revealing eggs, potatoes, fruit and steamed spinach. "Yeh baby," she said. "Dat's what I'm talking about."

"Didn't you have anything at the coffeeshop?" asked Lori, pouring nuts and raisins into her granola.

"I was busy," said December, "had to do a Twitter check-in, and pardon me but I am done with FaceBook. Every page I start gets flagged. Done. Then email. It's a lot." She ate toast. "Only had coffee."

"So you have... a website?" I said.

"And you have a bank, right?"

"Well, I work at one," I said.

"I work at one too, not a bank, a site."

"Do you keep your clothes on?"

"Mister," said December. "Take a good look. Why would I have a website and leave my clothes on. Are you slow or something?"

Lori smiled.

"What about your future?"

"You must be slow," said December. "In my future, they're always gonna say, December Carrera, Miss December, oh dere goes Miss December... and dat's right now, and tomorrow and five years from now and fifty years from now. So why would I worry what anyone's gonna say? God gave me gifts and I am gonna cash in on them, so long as the milkshakes keep the boys coming round."

"What if you get married?"

December turned to Lori, "I can see why you dumped this guy." She turned to me. "My husband's gonna be the luckiest dude around. You know why? He gets me." She looked to Lori. "Unless dey make it legal so I can marry some super hot chick."

"I want to go cash this thing in," said Larry, pushing back from the table. Audible protests from all three at the table quieted Larry, who scooted his chair back to the table and picked at his food.

* * *

"How do we get in this place?" I asked, as Larry and I walked across grass, to a space between two bushes. Larry felt around, and pulled open an otherwise-invisible entryway to the glass building shaped like a ship. He led me into a room with more glass and mirrors, and a wide marble counter. A woman with very pale skin and long red hair greeted us.

"Hello," she said. "Oh, you were here yesterday."

"I have another ticket," said Larry, casually. "The machine's fine."

The women slid back part of the counter, revealing the scanner to check the bar code on a lottery ticket. Larry placed the ticket under the scanner, and WINNER appeared in red, digital letters at top. "Oh, my," said the women. "You are, indeed, a winner."

The sound of a dot-matrix printer could he heard between the breathing of three people. Larry looked at the winning line and the ticket.

"Oh, and you have already written your name and other information on the back," she said. "Very good." She reached under the countertop and produced a one-page form with large boxes. "This form is for all winning tickets in excess of $599 of winnings, which clearly applies to you."

"I have a pen," said Larry. "The Governor gave me his, when he told me I had won." Larry held up the Southwest Airlines pen.

"Right," said the woman.

"Should I just sit? Or do I have to go somewhere?" asked Larry.

"For what, sir?"

"To get my big check and the money."

"A fitting question," she said, clearly having to answer it many times before, "but this is an operation of the State of California."

"I know," said Larry. "That's what the Governor said."

"Right," she said. "Payment is made by a check issued by the Office of the State Controller, after we verify the winning ticket, determine the exact payout and submit the needed advice to the Controller for the issuance of a check." She pointed to the form. "Please complete this form and I can notarize it for you. If you would like a copy for your records, I can produce a photocopy for thirty-two cents."

"I'm sorry, I didn't follow that."

"You can submit the ticket and claim form here. I can take that now," said the woman with red hair. "But you should keep a copy of both sides of your winning ticket and of this form, as proof of your having submitted a claim." The women reached under the counter and pulled out a thin book with a photo on the cover of two people, clearly ecstatic, leaping for joy in the air. "The 'Winners' Handbook' will give you answers to many of the questions you may have."

Larry began filling out the form. He carefully spelled out his name, gave his address and searched for numbers on the ticket, asking the woman several times what information to place where. When it came to prize claimed, Larry wrote in the figure at the top of the money pyramid on the winning line printout: $285,850,920.

"Let's get this notarized for you, Larry, and you're ready to go," said the woman.

* * *

"Tak, Farmor," said Larry, finishing his call to his grandmother.

"She must be blown away," I said.

"She's happy Lori found someone nice," Larry said, absently, as we drove through Sacramento. "She wants to meet December."

"Didn't you tell her about the money?" asked.

"Lawrence," said Larry, with impatience in his voice, "it's just money. It's not like my grandma doesn't have any. What? Am I supposed to shake my bootie doing the money dance in front of her? She wanted to talk about the movie thing. She gave me a number for the director, who's visiting San Francisco. Thought we could drive over to meet him." Larry rolled down the window.

"Larry, I know I said I would help you, but...."

"You gotta," said Larry, in a tone of panic. "I'll pay you double."

"It's not the money," I said..., though... double.... Double!

"Triple," Larry countered.

"Oh, man," I groaned.

"Triple and you tell me what you need for benefits and all that stuff... social security... all that.... But I need someone I can trust."

"I don't know this stuff," I told Larry, who seemed preoccupied. He had put his hand out the window, and was busy aiming the thumb up so his hand glided up and then aiming it down, so his hand went down.

* * *

Lori and December were in the hotel bar, surrounded by what must have been every male in the hotel for business travel. Had they not called us to give us their whereabouts, we would have missed them in the circle of bodies at the bar. Lori, in a short tee that exposed her belly, was leaning against the bar, sipping a clear drink with a cherry. December had a tall glass with fruit and paper umbrellas in it and a tall, windy straw.

As we walked towards the bar, December hooted and waved. A chorus of "gotta be kidding me" rose from business class, as December trotted to me and Larry. One gazelle having fled, the men at the bar turned to Lori, who put up a hand, and carried her drink over to join December, me and Larry. "Take care of your business?" asked Lori.

"Yep," said Larry.

"Right on," said Lori. "I'm happy for you."

"So you really won?" squealed December.

"Yeh," said Larry, with a little laugh.

"How much, hunny?"

"$285,850,920.42"

December laughed with both excitement and nervousness. "... And forty-two cents."

"It doesn't come right away," said Larry. "Six weeks or so."

"Hey, that's okay," said Lori. "You got a pretty stable thing going at home, so you just gotta hang tight for a month or two."

Two of the men from the bar migrated to our group, and as Larry and Lori were talking, they asked December if she would sign their conference badges. The second asked her to sign his arm.

"And Larry's gonna be my banker," said Larry, pointing to me. "I mean Lawrence." Larry's face brightened. "You can all work for me. You don't have to, like, do stuff, but you can all work for me and I'll, like, just give you money."

Three more men came over, asking December for autographs. The first asked her to sign his bald head. She used a marker the second one had to write out "D.C. missmilkshakes.com" as he leaned in close to her, before a bell staff worker approached and shooed him and his friends away from December.

* * *

"Where's Lori," Larry asked, back in my room.

"Down swimming," said December. "Been down dere forever,"

Larry took a towel from the bathroom and headed out.

* * *

Lori was wearing the swimsuit combo from Harris Ranch and paid no notice to Larry, as he dangled his feet in the pool. Lori swam another twenty minutes before joining Larry at the pool's edge.

"Hey," she said.

"Hi," he said.

"You okay, buddy?"

"Just worried."

"I'd think your worrying days are over," said Lori, hopping up, out of the pool. They sat together on the edge of the pool. She had wrapped the towel Larry brought around herself and reached to hold Larry's hand. "Why're you worried?"

"Everyone in my family who's got money," said Larry, "it fucked 'em up." He kicked at the water. "I don't want to end up like my dad."

"Well, just have Lawrence take care of all that business and you'll be fine," said Lori. "He's good with that shit. Just give it to him. You can be like your grandmother. She's not messed up over money."

"I suppose," said Larry.

"I gotta go back, tho," said Lori. "I love you, but I gotta get home and return this car. I may not have a job when I get back, but I'm not gonna get tossed in the klink for theft." Lori stood, and Larry did as well. She put the towel on a lounger and slipped on a pair of cut-offs and a tee-shirt. "And please take December with you guys."

"She seems to like you better," said Larry.

"She likes the orgasms," said Lori, "but I don't like being a sex toy."

The two began walking back to the room.

* * *

December sorted through the items in her suitcase, counting swimsuits before putting them in. She occasionally glanced over to Lori, her eyes lingering.

"I don't have any cash to give you," said Larry, "but there must be an ATM."

"Don't worry about it," said Lori. "I have enough to get home. I just want to get back. Hotels and fancy eating are tripping me out. This all feels really foreign to me."

"I'm going with Blondie," said December, packing the last of her things, and zipping and locking her suitcase. "I got business to take care of. Dis is seriously throwing off my timing." She looked at Lori as a sailor would look at a girl on a beach. "Besides, I'm going where the fun is."

"Fine," said Lori. "If we just drive, and get there... that's fine. I just wanna get home."

"Oh, I'll take you home, Blondie...."
Chapter Eight – Astrid's Travels

Emma Mathilde van der Bix carried a leather-bound album across to the dining room table and sat, the morning sun streaming in through beaded crystal panes and breaking into the colors of the rainbow.

Pushing aside a plate with toast and cheese, she opened the heavy leather flap and lifted up a large magnifying glass that had sat next to her glass of orange juice. She looked closely at each of the six photos on the front page, of her tall, thin, elegantly-dressed, blonde mother, clearly engaged in pleasure travel.

"Astrid, San Francisco, 1931, w/ Harald Lander," read her father's handwriting on an image of the two riding a cable car. Next to it, another image, of a deeply-wrinkled Chinese man playing a single-stringed instrument.

Emma opened the book to the back, and pulled out a faded envelope holding several dozen pages of onion-skin typing paper. At the top of the page she read from were typed the words "First Tutor":

"Oct 1927 – Emma's first tutor stayed with us only a short time. The child is a niece of A's colleague from the Royal Troupe and quickly took up the role of older sibling, with Emma too small for book learning and the child little able to offer much beyond companionship. She proved helpful until she would wander off to the seashore or the Pike and its pleasure zone. When we motor across San Pedro bay to the Seafarer's Church, the tutor lay on the foredeck of the skiff – the sons of the Swedes and the Norwegians watching our approach with great interest. She rode without a word in the Vanderlip's buckboard, alongside their stable hand, as we climbed the Hill by wagon, to reach Nansen Field for Constitution Day festivities. While adults listened to speeches, she and the stablehand ate cookies and danced. The families brought all variety of home-brewed beer, saying Astrid should move from backward Long Beach to the Hill, where people could drink beer with less fear. The tutor was not shy there either. She spent many long afternoons riding in the buckboard. Her marriage to the Vanderlip's stable hand soon brought on the need for a new tutor."

Emma delicately pulled her finger across the typed words, creating a tiny smudge.

* * *

The Old Man afforded no display of interest in Carl's childhood, asking no questions when the boy would ride off on his bicycle to watch local aviator Earl Dougherty land his aeroplane on the shoreline. The boy's love of flight merely made it easier for the Old Man to force Carl to join him in taking the Pacific Electric Red Car to Dominguez Hills every morning for ten days, to pass out fliers advertising home sales in Long Beach to the vast crowds gathered for the great air show of 1910. Carl marveled at a sky filled with all manner of flying craft, as he sat at a folding table bearing a sign for "v.d. Bix Land Co., Long Beach, Ca." The Old Man scoffed when later that year Carl tried to enlist in the army, but said nothing when, just after his 17th birthday, Carl was visited at home by a colonel, who told the Old Man that his son would rise quickly through the ranks, as there were very few soldiers with any background in flight. In 1912, Carl van der Bix, then 18, was commissioned a lieutenant and assigned as a mechanic at the army's air field in Los Angeles and, later, to Crissy Field, in San Francisco. When America went to war, in 1917, and Carl's unit was deployed, he made captain, at 23. He was in the air, training a pilot, when word came that Congress had promoted Carl to major, at 24.

Carl met Astrid Ullagård – the Scandinavian dancer – after the Armistice had been signed that ended the Great War. The tall Yank who carried a ukulele and could sing and dance like a stage performer traveled the Continent with his ballerina and sent letters home, with addresses of where to wire cash. Soon came a mention of the ballerina he had met in Paris at a benefit for the wounded. "Don't worry about me," Carl wrote from Brest, where unreported in the letter, he had proposed marriage to his ballerina, several years his junior and considered a likely Principal Dancer with her Danish Royal Troupe. "War damage profound," wrote Carl, on a card from Amsterdam, where perhaps space did not permit mention of the points that Carl and Astrid were negotiating, if she were to forever forego the possibility of attaining a rank in this troupe – older then America itself – which five generations of her family had not reached in dancing on the same stage. In Carl's last letter, from Stockholm, where the couple stayed with her friends, he wrote expansively, with suggestions of a life in Europe for himself, and asked only for money to last til spring in Copenhagen, where holidays and the royal audience ensured remarkable productions with the woman he intended to marry. No cash came from America. Only a telegram, reading: "SINGLE PASSAGE AWAITS SOUTHAMPTON."

Upon his return, Carl fought the Old Man's insistence that he join the family business, but soon shifted, accepting a shingle, insisting that Astrid's arrival would bring prestige within the community and credibility to the family.

Long after the Old Man said yes, Astrid hedged, saying her Artistic Director was keeping alive talk of her becoming Principal Dancer, though he made no moves to alter the troupe's assignments. Carl promised a private suite constructed atop the three floors, made of the finest European materials and designed by an architect of her choice, with a dance studio suitable for recitals that would honor a visiting maestro. She would enjoy sunshine virtually every day and Long Beach was now a city 30 years old, and had its own pleasure zone, municipal airport and seaport, as well as elegant hotels and department stores, and the Red Car trolley line that linked the town to Los Angeles and Newport Beach, each less than an hour away.

In 1923, Astrid arrived to fanfare – a prominent dancer in an ancient royal European troupe, arriving by ship from Copenhagen, to marry the sole legitimate heir of one of the most powerful land developers in town. She stood on the deck of the steamship, waving a red-and-white Danish flag, waiting to join her army aviator to live in a suite designed by the noted Norwegian architect, Emme Arefson, and constructed of Italian stone and Baltic lumber, built above the van der Bix mansion. An elegant, enclosed grand marble stairway – complete with an all-electric, mechanical gliding chairlift to ascend the four flights – led to a main entry that centered itself upon the most spectacular gift of all: a friend of the bride's father had given the wedded couple an alabaster female nude carved by the Danish master sculptor, Bertel Thorvaldsen. A skylight was designed to bring in sunlight such as to cause the pink alabaster to glow, like human skin illuminated in a spotlight. So far as anyone knew, it was the first Thorvaldsen on the west coast, perhaps in all of America.

* * *

She dug randomly with her fingers into the scrapbook. Looking with the magnifying glass to a page containing six photos, five of Astrid Ullagård and a group image, Emma spent a moment with the group shot and turned to the next page.

She placed a finger on the chest of her father, in a third picture, he standing with his wife and Harald Lander, in front of San Francisco's grand Opera building. Written on the edge of the photo was, "1931." Two years later, Lander – a fellow dancer who rose to become the new Artistic Director of the Danish Royal Ballet – sent for Astrid, asking her to return to the stage as Principal Dancer.

"Mor, leaving for the 1933 season in Copenhagen," read the caption below a photo showing Astrid standing, smiling, at the base of a gangplank to the ship that carried her from Long Beach to Europe. She held an American flag in one hand and the Danish flag in the other.

Emma rested her finger on one of the photos showing her father, raising the magnifying glass so she could see his face, his eyes, his smile.
Chapter Nine – Waiting for the Dough

When Lori left with the hot Italian or Spanish girl, the air got sucked out of my vacation. The last thing I wanted was to drive Larry van der Bix around in a rented car, but I did agree to go to San Francisco, with a stop in Berkeley, before driving south.

"Upstairs," said Larry, carrying his double cappuccino and croissant to the loft of the Cafe Mediterraneum, on Telegraph Avenue. College kids with laptops and the homeless slumped and slouched in close quarters, virtually every table filled; everyone drinking from wide, white, porcelain mugs. With virtually every table filled, Larry squeezed his way to a pair of chairs at a small round table alongside the railing that overlooked the incredibly busy ground floor.

"Coffee for the proletariat," I muttered aloud.

Larry waved, as though I would miss him as he stood next to the table, ten feet ahead of me.

"It's good you have some time before the check gets cut," I said, "as we can come up with some investments and shells that allow you to hold on to more of the money."

"I don't care about that," said Larry. "It isn't about the money. It's the freedom." He pulled the tip of croissant away and ate it.

"Larry, you can create 'freedom' for every van der Bix that comes after you. This jackpot is big enough that if you handle it right, your investments could allow you to reach a billion dollars of value in your lifetime."

Larry lifted and chewed away on his turkey-and-cheese croissant, melted cheese clinging in a thin string to his chin. I pointed to my own chin, and Larry reached up with his other hand and brushed. Seeing the string of cheese, he lifted his hand to his mouth. "If you'll notice," said Larry, taking another bite of his croissant, and, after chewing and swallowing, continued, "I don't have kids. I'm never gonna have kids. So this isn't about me handing money down the line."

"What do you mean, you're not gonna have kids?" I asked. "How can you know that?"

"Lawrence," said Larry, "look at me. Do I look like someone who's gonna get married? gonna make some woman pregnant? gonna raise a bunch of kids?" He sipped from his coffee, leaving foam on his upper lip. "I mean, seriously."

"You may think that now," I said, "But in a few months or years, you may wind up with some woman on your arm and you may want to make her pregnant."

"Oh, c'mon," said Larry, "get real." He finished his croissant and lifted the tiny spoon on his saucer and began stirring and pushing foamed milk into the cappuccino. "I'm not gonna have kids. I've known that since I was a kid. This line is dying with me. The name doesn't deserve to live."

"What about your grandmother?" I asked. "Don't you want her to be a great grandmother?"

"She already is a great grandmother," said Larry. "She doesn't need me to pop out a kid to be more awesome."

"Not what I meant," I said.

Larry quickly said, "I'm gonna end this name, end this line. To hell with the whole lot of them. That mansion on Treasure Island poisons everyone who enters. If I inherit it, I'm gonna tear it down and turn it into a park."

* * *

The National Cemetery at The Presidio, where Larry's great grandfather is buried, may be home to the most spectacular view of San Francisco Bay of any spot in the city, but because the graveyard was set on a steep hillside, I felt like I would tumble and roll into the Bay, and not stop rolling until I bumped into Alcatraz, off in the distance.

Larry said we needed to wait at the cemetery to meet two Danes who wanted to shoot a film about his family. He sat on the grass, eating a pastrami sandwich, which he would occasionally set down on the stone that read:

"Col. CARL VAN DER BIX. 1896 – 1944. Army Aviator WWI, WWII. Loving Husband, Loving Father, Devoted Son."

Mustard dripped from Larry's sandwich onto the stone. "I guess this was my great grandmother's favorite spot in America," said Larry. He picked up his sandwich, leaving a heavy glob of mustard on the date 1896. "Not the cemetery, necessarily, although it is pretty."

"Hal-lowww," said a tall, blond man, walking up the cemetery hillside, towards me and Larry. With him was a tall, blonde woman, carrying a handheld camera and aiming the enormous lens at us. "Tres...," said the man, fully ten paces away, but reaching his hand out, as though Larry and I would be shaking it a second later. "Tres von Sommerberg... the director, film director... from little Denmark... hello."

Von Sommerberg and the tall woman closed the distance between us and, his hand as an invitation, soon four hands were shaking.

"Lena," said the woman, extending one hand as she kept the camera running.

"Nice to meet you," I said. "Lawrence."

"Larry? Lena. Nice to meet you."

"Tres, Lawrence, yes."

Then, in the seconds it took for her to pass the camera, suddenly, the tall blonde-haired man was operating the camera, whose lens seemed grotesquely oversized for the proportions of the unit.

"Hello, yes, The Presidio, and whose is that stone?" The man with the camera circled Larry and cut my physical presence from becoming part of his photographic field. "Is that family?"

"That? That?" said Larry.

The man hovered over Larry and then stooped down low, in a way that might suggest to a viewer they were on a roller coaster, and, just as suddenly, von Sommerberg stood, and slowly descended the hill, then stopped, did a long pan of the sweeping 180-degree view of the Bay. With his long legs, the Dane closed the distance with Larry, and – avoiding Larry's face – brought the camera in low to the ground, and halted inches above the van der Bix stone. When von Sommerberg raised the lens upwards, he photographed Larry's face, twisted into an angry sneer.

* * *

I watched Larry as he sliced and cut his way through a Porterhouse steak. We had joined the two Danish filmmakers at the Hotel Intercontinental and with their bags stowed in their rental car, had agreed to turn in my own rental, and join them to drive down the coast to Long Beach.

I was half-way through my Asian chicken salad, and Lena well on her way through her halibut, as von Sommerberg ignored his food and kept pulling Larry away from his methodical cutting of his steak, to offer greater detail about his commission to film the story of Astrid Ullagård, and to hammer away at Larry's objections to participating.

"Because you're an annoying idiot," Larry said, not looking away from his plate. His steak had been reduced to a pile of meat cubes. He sat back and raised a hand, drawing the waiter.

"Can I get beer?" asked Larry and, getting a nod, asked if what was on draught and in bottles. Larry steered his questions towards draught. "So, twelve ounce, pint or by the pitcher?" Larry looked around the table. Lena and Tres showed interest. "A pitcher and three glasses."

"Our patron is very interested in Miss Ullagård's story," said von Sommerberg, "and of course, it is our pleasure for meeting you, but there are gaps in what we know and to complete this film, we must ask questions to your family."

"I'm sorry," said Larry, "but I don't buy your facts. My grandmother's mom didn't have any more kids, so what you're saying is wrong." He leaned back into the booth. "The dates don't work. And the people you describe don't fit anything I've been told. My great grandparents were married and living together until Carl died during the war."

"Two years after Astrid ceased her dancing career, she bore a child as Harald Lander's mistress," said Lena. "Her rank on retirement was as Principal Dancer, a status that her son, Ingeborg, also attained."

"She lived here during the war, here, in San Francisco, while Carl was teaching Jimmy Stewart how to fly," said Larry. "Jimmy Stewart."

"Yes, during the war," said Lena. "After Carl was stationed briefly at Fort MacArthur, San Pedro, Los Angeles," said Lena, "but that was years after Astrid had returned to Copenhagen."

"And returned from Copenhagen.... She always came back!" said Larry. "Every year after she danced the ballet, she came back to Carl and Emma in California. I've seen goddamned pictures! She even brought members of the Royal Troupe to vacation in California as her guests in the suite. That's how she stayed fit as a dancer. That's why she had the dance studio."

The server set down the pitcher and glasses and von Sommerberg took the first poured beer. "Yes," said the director, "we all have our interesting little stories, don't we?"

* * *

"So bright," said von Sommerberg, stumbling from the Intercontinental and shading his eyes with his hands. A valet handed the director the car keys and he stiffly made his way to the rental car. Lena passed him the camera and he wobbled as he filmed Larry getting into the car, the subject appearing none too happy at the filmmaker's attention.

"Maybe I should drive," I suggested, after the director nearly took a fall – camera and all – when Larry slammed his door closed as von Sommerberg filmed him. Lena, who drank as heartily as Larry and Tres – though showed little in the way of intoxication – took shotgun, as von Sommerberg climbed into the back, joining Larry.

* * *

We had left the Intercontinental a little over an hour earlier and managed good time moving down the San Francisco peninsula. Since Larry was busy spacing out, the time passed pleasantly. When I would look at him through the rear-view mirror, I would see his head turned, as though something far off in the distance, in the middle of the southern waters of the San Francisco Bay, called out to him.

"California, I have to tell you, is really something," said Lena, looking out from the front seat of the car, onto the waters of the San Francisco Bay.

"And it's really great to ask us to come back with you, to Long Beach," said Tres. "After two years, it will be really something to meet Emma Mathilde."

"Two years?" asked Larry, reconnecting with the conversation, breaking his gaze to the Bay. "What about two years?"

"My research," said Lena. "Ever since Tres got this commission almost three years ago, I've been studying the life of Astrid Ullagård and her son, Ingeborg. And so now to be able to meet the ballerina's first child... that'll be really something."

"She may be research to you," said Larry, "but she's my grandmother, so you better be nice."

"We'll be really nice," said von Sommerberg.

* * *

"There!" yelled Tres von Sommerberg. "Stop there!"

I screeched the Danes' rental car to a halt on the southbound lane of State Highway One, just past a solitary restaurant built over the edge of one of the steep cliffs overlooking the Pacific. I backed up slowly and then inched into one of the few open parking spaces. "We only have a few hours of daylight and we've got quite a ways to go before The One straightens out."

Lena had quickly made her way of the car and had opened the trunk and lifted out the camera, which she put onto her shoulder. Larry wore his customary scowl as Lena shot him exiting the car.

Inside, I flipped through the menu, as did Larry, while the director slowly moved through the dining room, seemingly to irritate the greatest number of patrons possible before being seated. Lena dutifully took the camera from the director when he approached the table and got waved away by Larry, who flashed the middle finger up to the enormous lens.

"Denmark is a flat little country," said von Sommerberg, "and we are only here on the coast, and it's like a mountain range."

"Like Norway," said Lena.

"Of course, the fjords," said von Sommerberg, quickly, quietly back to Lena.

The waiter approached and Larry ordered. "A dinner salad with oil and vinegar. And water."

"Just that?"

"Um, uh," said Larry. "Yeh, only that."

"The Chef's salad," said Lena, nodding to Larry. "And beer. What do you have from Europe?" On hearing the list of German, Dutch, Belgian Italian and English beers, she ordered the Italian.

"Never had that," said Larry. "Two."

I ordered the fifteen dollar patty melt and von Sommerberg, the thirty dollar fish.

"The facts are as they are," said Lena. "We are not accepting the ballerina's granddaughter's statements without verification, and that also is why we are here. The film in its written form is ready for shooting, but perhaps the story is wrong, perhaps there is a better story."

"Perhaps there is no story," said Larry.

"Harald Lander is one of the great Artistic Directors in the history of the Royal Ballet and a great figure of Danish culture," said von Sommerberg. "That the master had a love child with a dancer who returned from America, even though she was washed up, that is a story worth telling."

"Washed up?" said Larry, anger in his voice.

"Astrid Ullagård was in her mid-thirties when she was Lander's principal dancer," said Lena. "She had only four years on the stage after her return. The films show...."

"The films...?"

"The performance recordings," said von Sommerberg.

"You have films of my grandmother's mom dancing?"

"Not us," said Lena. "The Queen's household. It is a part of the collection the Royal Ballet compiles after each season as a gift to Her Majesty, or, in this case, to King Christian X."

"The Royal House allowed us to view the films, but we don't have them," said von Sommerberg.

Salads arrived and Larry, on getting a pair of flasks in a basket, seemed baffled as to how much oil versus how much vinegar to sprinkle. He went back and forth until a deep lake soaked the greens, turning his plate into an oil-&-vinegar soup. He poked at his croutons. "What does Lori see in this stuff'?"

Three beers arrived. On seeing an extra, unordered bottle, von Sommerberg grabbed a spoon, slipped the tip under the bottle cap and, his index finger the fulcrum, pushed down on the spoon's handle, popping the cap. Larry and Lena did the same, one using a knife and the other a lighter.

"The material is ready; a crew is on call," said Lena. "It is only finance and distribution that await finalizing." Lena lifted her glass towards me, and on touching her glass to mine, said, "Skål" and took a sip.

"Why even bother meeting my grandmother then?" said Larry, with spite in his voice.

"She's the unknown one," said von Sommerberg. "Mysterious minds make for good cinema. Who is she? Why did she stay? Why did she get left behind?"

Food arrived. Plates filled the table, as salads got pushed aside to allow fish and a patty melt to crowd in. Larry pushed greens through his oil-&-vinegar soup and formed an island in the center of his plate, before giving up. The waiter, on returning to ask if anyone wished to have anything else, took Larry's plate and swiftly returned with three more beers.

"This is really lovely," said von Sommerberg, gazing out the window. He raised his bottle, prompting Lena to quickly grab hers. Larry slowly, hesitantly lifted his, and von Sommerberg touched his together with the other two, offered a "Skål" and took a long draw.

"My grandmother is not a mystery to me," said Larry.

"But look," said Lena. "A famous dancer, coming back from America. She is alone."

"No, Carl...."

"... never returns or stops her," injects von Sommerberg.

"She dances for Lander," said Lena. "She is pregnant by Lander. No one denies it. And now, after she is retired, the Dame raises another dancer, a sixth generation to take the Royal stage, and a Principal Dancer."

"No one here will care," said Larry.

Lena looked at von Sommerberg, and then to Larry. "This movie is not for Americans," she said. "Of course, some will see it. That's bound to happen, but this...."

"This is a movie for Danes," said von Sommerberg, "about Danes and it will be in a style of filmmaking that Danes invented." Von Sommerberg finished his fish.

"My grandmother was born in America," said Larry. "And you didn't invent the movies. Thomas Edison...."

"Dogme," said von Sommerberg. "Dogme95. This film will meet the Vow of Chastity," he said, nodding his head, and looking to Lena, who, upon his looking her way, also began nodding. She stopped when he looked back to the panoramic view out the window.

"We are here to arrange financing, which traditionally is the challenge with Dogme films," said Lena. "We met my contacts in Connecticut earlier and hopefully Tres...."

"The director," corrected von Sommerberg.

"Yes, hopefully the director's contacts here in San Francisco will consider the presentation we made this morning," said Lena.

"You don't have any money then," said Larry, finishing his beer. "But you already know what yer gonna say, even though you haven't met my grandmother. What's that style called again? Oh yeh... 'lying.' "

"Everybody's got their little stories," said von Sommerberg, pouring the last of his beer in his glass and smiling.

* * *

"We are going to be driving some winding parts of Highway One in the dark," I said to the three drunken people shambling towards the car. "Here we go, I guess."

Larry and the director piled into the rear seat, as Lena and I each slid our seats back. I felt the twin bony lumps of Larry's knees in the small of my back.

At first, the two-lane, tightly-turning roadway seemed to thrill the drunken passengers, with each winding turn eliciting prolonged "woooooo" sounds. After several of the most harrowing turns, the silence of the Prius and the image of the headlights shining onto a paltry railing separating the roadway from a plunge into the abyss prompted even me to sense panic. The "oooo" sounds were replaced by cussing in English – and, I assumed, Danish. By the time that fog and darkness had fully set in, von Sommerberg was openly calling for God's intervention to save them and Lena would repeat every few minutes that this fog was thicker than anything in Copenhagen. Larry had fallen asleep.

* * *

"It feels straight now," said Lena. "Is it straight now?"

"There is flat land on both sides of the road now," said von Sommerberg. "My sweet God."

"What if you don't find financing?" I asked, as Larry snored.

"Well," said Lena, "if there are no investors, there can be no film."

"It's not so much bad for me," said von Sommerberg, "as the director is not credited on screen, but this is bad to Lena, also as producer, and to Ingeborg's daughter. This is her story. This is Denmark's story."

"And Emma Mathilde's," said Lena.

"Oh, yes," said von Sommerberg, "her, too."

* * *

"Heya," said Larry, into his phone, as he stood on the balcony of the Motel 6, before the final push into Los Angeles. "Make it back okay? Did the dude press charges? That's good, but getting canned sucks. Maybe you can work for me.... Think about it? Okay, we'll be home in a few hours. Bye."

Larry and I leaned against the railing, each of us watching Lena through the open curtains, folding clothes and putting a garment onto the ironing board. Von Sommerberg's boots shook the entire balcony and the morning sunshine reflected off the grotesquely-oversized camera lens as he approached. When the director reached us, we turned to see Lena, in jeans and a white brassier, ironing a blouse.

"A truly lovely day," said the director, "and next we are in Los Angeles!"

"Long Beach," I said at the same time as Larry.

"Long Beach," said von Sommerberg. A few moments later, Lena, now dressed, wheeled her bag to the door, closed the curtains, and then came outside with her things "Great, really great."

* * *

"How much does a film like you're making cost to produce?" I asked, as Lena looked out at the scenery along the Ventura coast. "Not so much," she said. "Nothing like Hollywood. That is why Dogme95 is really good. The money is to pay for story, not sets or car crashes."

"So, like..., what?" I asked. "Ten million? Twenty?"

"Dogma95 is cheap," interrupted von Sommerberg, as Larry snored, "but it is not that cheap. Fifty million, sixty million kroner, at least."

I barely heard the fifty and sixty through Larry's snorts and snoring. "That's a lot. And for a film about a ballerina's daughter. You don't think that's risky?"

"This is Harald Lander's love child's kid," said von Sommerberg.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I still really have no idea who Harald Lander is.... Just never learned that name."

"Do you know our country has a monarchy?"

"A king? Yeh, you're telling me," I said.

"We have a Queen, actually, right now, but, okay," said Lena. "And you've heard of ballet?"

"The dancing? Of course. My wife danced ballet as a kid."

"Is that Lori, you mean?"

"Yes."

"How long did she dance the ballet?" asked Lena, earnestly.

"Oh, I don't know... when she was a kid."

"Interesting," said Lena. "Anyway, how old is your country?"

"America?"

"Right? How old are The States?" asked Lena.

"Born 1776."

"The Royal Danish Theatre was founded in 1748. Harald Lander came to be Artistic Director in 1932 and was really great. He was truly, really great," said von Sommerberg.

"He was really something," added Lena "He saw Astrid dance here, in California, when he visited in the '20s. She left to dance 'The Widow in the Mirror.' It is said she was his inspiration to write 'Etudes." And so, you see, it is a movie about much more than your friend's grandmother. There are so many fragments."

* * *

Lena and Tres walked along the Venice boardwalk, wide-eyed and smiling; the director pointing his oversized lens at musclebound men, at times with Lena posing with, or hanging from one, or more, of the men. They walked in front of Larry and me, filming a man in a saffron body suit as he contorted himself before the silent crowd. Tap-tap-tapping to our side led us past a man sitting at a folding wooden typing stand, with a manual portable, advertising "Finished Letters: $5/pg." Across from the for-hire-correspondent were three women, in brown matching uniforms, singing Andrews Sisters' tunes. A brunette in a scant bikini handed me a postcard advertising an adjacent medical marijuana dispensary: "PharmaGreen Wants You!" I handed the card back.

I drew alongside Larry, slowing so we fell increasingly out of earshot of the Danes.

"Just an idea," I said, "but your money would probably allow you to buy your way into the movie they're making."

"Why would I want to be in their movie?"

"No, for your grandmother?"

"From everything I see," said Larry, "I can't imagine her wanting to be in it, either."

"No," I said, as the Danes turned, their faces lit up like kids, and approached us.

"This is really amazing," said von Sommerberg. "Really amazing. It's too bad Astrid didn't wind up here. This would be the perfect place to shoot a movie."

"It's a fantastic place to shoot a movie," came a familiar voice from behind.

Von Sommerberg turned and, with a camera on his shoulder perhaps blocking his peripheral vision, he bumped into a hulking man on a bicycle, nearly toppling both.

"Oh my God," said Lena. "It's Arnold Schwarzenegger."

"Put dat down before you hurt someone," said California's former Governor, to Tres. "Say, is dat a microphone in your pants or are you just pleased to see me?" Schwarzenegger said to Lena. "What'tar you shoo-teeng?"

"A feature-length dogme story for the European market," said Lena.

"I thought the Dogme95 is dead," said Schwarzenegger. "Even von Trier and Vinterberg have moved on."

The director circled Schwarzenegger, who smiled into the camera while continuing to flirt with Lena, asking if she wanted to feel his bicep.

"Larry," I said, in a hushed voice, "these two have no money. With a small business investment representing only a portion of what you've won, you could at once become their principal investor and dictate the film they make."

Thirty feet away, von Sommerberg photographed his producer running her hands over Arnold Schwarzenegger's arm, as he flexed and smiled to her.

"It's a thought, I suppose," said Larry.
Chapter Ten – Fishing for Help

A cat, with a small fish hanging from its mouth, ran past Larry, as we walked along the Belmont Pier, its gray concrete matching the morning haze. Asian and Hispanic families stood watch over poles that did not twitch.

"We can do this several different ways," I said. "People can work directly under your employ, or you can pay me to be your representative and I can contract with a firm, or with individual talent,"

"That sounds confusing," said Larry. "I just want people – the same people – who do what I tell 'em and don't ask me stupid questions when I explain things." Larry leaned onto the north-facing railing of the pier, his shaggy hair waggling in all directions, unkempt animation set against his dull expression and a backdrop of a grand luxury liner, a beachfront of high-rise residential buildings and America's busiest port complex.

"If you want a team that you hire and we all work directly for you, then we should fix a sum for an annual budget, and I will hire based against that," I said. "We can probably start off with two or three other people... a tax person, an investment advisor, at minimum, and a person to make sure it all keeps running."

"That's Lori."

"Oh no," I said quickly.

"No, she would keep things running," said Larry. "That's what sergeants do."

The cat, with another fish, ran past us hugging the rail, as a small child bumped into me, chasing it. "Fuck!" I said, as the child careened off my leg and continued running.

"C'mon, man, watch your language," said Larry. "There's kids around here."

* * *

"Why do I have to be part of your team?' Lori asked Larry, as each lay on a wooden lounger in his courtyard. Lori, her face covered by a folded towel, reached over to the small table separating their loungers and lifted her glass of ice water, with its slice of lemon.

"You know Lawrence's failings," said Larry, "so if he's about to hire someone who he can't see their problems, you can give me an alert."

Lori leaned up, moved the towel slightly, sipped her water, and set the glass down and returned the towel to cover her face.

"If Lawrence works in banking and he can't see someone's failings, how on earth would I know that someone won't work out?"

"Cuz I have no clue about this stuff," said Larry, "and you were in the army. That means you can tell... about people."

"Larry, I appreciate it, but I don't know if I can actually, really work for you," said Lori. "I mean, the coffee thing's done, but they're not challenging the unemployment, so I have something coming in while I look, and why fuck up a good friendship, you know?"

"Lori, please," said Larry. "You're the one person in the world I can trust. You don't really have to work, like, in an office kind of thing. I don't care if you do any work at all but I can't do this alone. I need someone I can totally rely on to be at my side. I need you on my team, Lori. Please."

Lori turned to her side, adjusting the towel so it covered the side of her face, leaving no skin above her neck exposed to the sun. "I don't know, Bix. I'll think about it. I'm kind'a thinkin' about a lot of things right now...."

"Like December?" said Larry.

"Like going back in."

"What? The army?"

"Thinking about it."

"But then you won't be here. You'll be off fighting in a war," said Larry.

"I'm burning out on this 'find myself' thing," said Lori, sipping water, laying back down and readjusting the towel. "I know where things stand as an E6 in a warzone."

"What about the whole getting killed thing? And what about December? Don't'chu like her? And doesn't she like you?"

"I haven't told Dee, okay, so don't say anything.... Okay? Larry?"

"Yeh, okay," said Larry.

"I don't want to have to explain something that I'm still only thinking out," said Lori, her body limp on the wooden lounger. "Larry! Promise!"

"Okay, okay... I promise."

* * *

When I walked in to the Jack-in-the-Box near the Belmont Pier, Larry awkwardly lifted one hand, as though otherwise I might miss him in the nearly empty fast food joint. As I drew closer to the table, Lori approached from the other side, exiting the restroom.

"Do you want to order'?" asked Larry. "On me."

I hemmed, and while searching for a diplomatic way of saying I hadn't eaten at Jack-in-the-Box since my early 20s, Larry stood, took my arm and walked me to the counter, where he ordered a breakfast Jack combo, with coffee, and then turned to me, with the look one reserves to welcome family to their favorite eatery.

"I..., I...," I stammered, looking at the menu.

"It's a little early, but the churros are good," Larry said.

"Coffee," I blurted out. "A tall coffee."

"Large, coffee, j'yes?" asked the middle-aged, dark-haired woman behind the counter. I nodded. She smiled.

As Larry picked up his tray, he passed me, doctoring my coffee.

"Nothing for you?" I asked Lori, when we got to the table.

"I'm training," she said. "Nothing here I can really eat."

Lori's swims. During our marriage, Lori insisted any apartment we looked at have a pool. After small apartments that meant hundreds of laps under watchful but hidden eyes, she would ride her bike to the Belmont Olympic Pool, and, increasingly, to the Pacific. As the light in our marriage dimmed, the length of her swims grew. I got the message of where I fit into things when Lori recounted, after one morning's swim, how a pair of dolphins had swam alongside her for much of that day's swim, and that she extended her swim by half-an-hour, as the two dolphins were so forward and affectionate that she felt it had been the most passionate, fulfilling, soulful experience of her life.

Larry ate a fried hash brown stick, as I outlined the skills he would want in a team. If we were lucky, I said, we would find two people who possessed the litany of traits and skills needed.

"Where will they work?" asked Larry.

"What do you mean, where...?"

"Like, am I gonna rent some office building? And would I have my own key so I could go in whenever I wanted?"

"Larry, this is why I say you have to let me oversee this process," I said, exasperated.

"No," said Lori, instantly drawing Larry' full attention. "If he wants to be involved in a decision, you have to make that happen. This is his money. It has to be his experience."

Larry looked at both of us and raised his two index fingers, perhaps signaling something, or perhaps only due to his body at times moving independently of his mind. "Lori knows my thinking. Lawrence, you know the whole banking thing. I want two people to sign things, her and you. Two signatures on everything."

"Well," I said slowly, "signature control is an important part of all this.... I would prefer that, uh, that we not... work so closely together."

"Oh," Lori said swiftly, "that is my preference, too."

"That's fine," said Larry. "So now you have two more people to find. Don't bother screening. Lori and I will sit in on the interviews."

As Larry ate another hash brown stick, his cell phone rang. "Hello? What? Who is this? Do I know you?" said Larry. "What? No, I'm not going to give you money. Hello?" There was a long silence at the table after Larry put his phone down.

"Lawrence, can I hand my phone over, too?" Larry said, picking up a hash brown stick, looking at it, limp and oily in his fingers, before dropping it onto his tray. "People're calling me and I want someone else to tell them no. It's stressing me out." He unpopped the lid from his coffee and added another sugar and stirred. "It'd just he easier if I could hand everything over to someone who could, you know, just handle it all?"

"Just the phone? or... mail and bills?"

"You know," said Larry. "Just all of it."

* * *

Lori lay on her stomach on the lounger, as Larry, seated upright, surfed on his tablet. "December says she bought a gift for you," said Larry. Lori groaned. "She's asking if you're around."

"Don't tell her I'm here," said Lori, "She'll just come over,"

"That wouldn't be so bad," said Larry.

"You're not the one she's needy about," said Lori.

"She likes you," said Larry. "You know how many guys would kill to be in your shoes?" Larry typed. "She says it's an official army thing, the gift."

Lori smiled. "She can have 'em all. I just want one – boy, girl, I don't care – but someone who's not needy. No more like Lawrence, ugh."

* * *

"Miss Atkins, this is Larry," I said, showing the potential tax attorney to a chair.

Larry unwrapped a breakfast Jack sandwich and took a bite.

"Thank you for coming, Miss Atkins, for this...."

"Please, it's Emily," she said, sitting easily. "But it's not Atkins. It's Kashabara. Very nice to meet you," she said, offering her hand to Larry. "Your family is quite famous."

"Google doesn't include that they're all bastards," said Larry, a dab of egg yolk on his chin. "Except my grandmother. She's not."

"Okay," said the attorney.

"Right," I said. "Miss Atkins...."

"Please, Emily, or Ms. Kashabara," she said. "Really not sure where you're getting 'Atkins.' "

I looked down at my notes. I had Atkins written several times and nowhere saw Kashabara. "Miss... um... you appear, on paper, to be an ideal candidate on tax issues of sudden capital inflow and long-term derivative income," I said, as Larry looked on, with a dull expression.

"It's Ms. Kashabara," said Larry, before he turned to Emily. "Where'd you go to school?" Larry asked, opening his straw and trying to work it into his orange juice container.

"I hold an M.B.A. from Stanford and a Juris Doctor from Yale," she said, with a hint of a smile. "I am a member in good standing of the Bar in three states and the District of Columbia."

"No," said Larry, still struggling with puncturing his juice box, "where'd you go to school? High school... Where'd you grow up?"

"High school?"

'Right," said Larry, abandoning the straw, and pulling open one end of the juice box.

"I grew up in Torrance," she said, "I went to Torrance High."

"I hate Torrance," said Larry. "Nothing but red lights on P.C.H., no synchronization at all... you look like you skateboard."

"So random," said Emily, staring at Larry. "How would you even know that?"

"Okay, Larry," I said, "back to the tax issues."

"So what's so interesting to you about tax law?" Larry asked.

"I wouldn't say 'interesting' is the right word," said the attorney. "Frankly, tax law is about as dry as it gets."

"Yes...," said Larry.

"But I got into it, actually, because I saw my mom's business fail. She ran into a brick wall with the Board of Equalization and the Department of Corporations. And no one she brought on would give her the help she needed. It was all about their specialty and billable hours." The attorney sat up straight. "I'm sorry, that was not the sort of thing one should say...."

"Oh, that's... hey..." said Larry, "would you like something, by the way? It may not be fancy, but this is a food place."

"Actually," she said, standing, "if you wouldn't mind. I rushed out the door."

"Tell 'em you're with me," said Larry, waving his hand, as she disappeared around the corner. Larry leaned towards me. "She's the tax person."

* * *

"By school," asked the man in the crisp, dark suit, "do you mean graduate? undergraduate?"

"High school."

"High school!" said the man. "I attended preparatory in Ossining, on the Hudson, as a student at the Atwood Academy."

* * *

"Would you like something, by the way? It may not he fancy..."

"Oh," said the woman, in her mid-20s, looking around, "I simply never eat at... at...."

* * *

"Larry, this is Mr. Lossé," I said, pronouncing the last name in two syllables.

"The little thingie over the E makes it silent," said the tall, thin man, who sat without hesitation. "Just 'loss,' like losing. But Ed Lossé doesn't lose. I'm like Charlie Sheen... always winning. Must be the tiger blood. Mind if I get coffee or something?"

Larry nodded his head to me as Ed Lossé wandered to the counter. Larry's phone, buried under food wrappers and napkins, buzzed. Larry pushed the debris aside, looked at the screen, and picked up the cell. "It's the stupid film people. Tell 'em I'm not here." He handed me the phone.

"Uh, hello," I said. "You've reached a private line for Larry van der Bix."

"Hel-loooow," said von Sommerberg. "Tres... Tres von Sommerberg, from Denmark... the director, the film...."

"I remember you," I said over the phone. "I was with Larry in the car."

Ed Lossé returned to the table with a full tray of food. He proceeded to doctor his coffee, as Larry unburied sugar packets and unused creamers, which he offered silently to Ed.

"Can you tell your friend we've been six days here," said von Sommerberg. "Soon we fly to Connecticut, and it would be really lovely if we could meet Emma Mathilde."

"I will tell him that," I said.

"Great." I watched Ed and Larry both eating. I waited during the long silence on the phone. "Well," said von Sommerberg, "please do."

"I will."

"Okay.... Lena says hello."

"Good, yeh, tell her hi," I said. "Thanks."

"Really," said von Sommerberg, finally, "soon would be great. And we're not in the Hyatt. A smaller place, but still really lovely. Please, if it is possible to see her today...."

"I will be sure to let him know." As I handed the phone to Larry, Ed looked up from eating. "Being chased for money already?"

"What?" I asked.

"Film people," said Larry.

"Oh, they're the worst," said the investment advisor. "If you hit the gamble, it can pay off big. Cameron's a solid bet, but he's already got a pool of investors. Not a gamble anymore, really."

* * *

"Most of your money will necessarily be invested," I said Larry, as we both stood at the counter for his coffee refill. "You'll still have a portion as liquid cashflow, but...."

"More coffee yes?' the woman asked me, warmly.

"Si, thank you," said Larry, as he handed his cup and mine to the dark-haired, middle-aged woman. "Remember, I want to give it away."

As Larry waited for the woman to return with his fourth cup of coffee and my second, I pointed to the cash register. "Larry, imagine your money is all in that cash register."

"It wouldn't fit," he said.

"Just... imagine, Larry."

"Even a stack of hundreds is only ten thousand to the bundle, so two hundred and eighty four million...."

"Larry," I said, cutting him off, "Just... just...."

The woman returned with a fresh cup of coffee and a bag of creamers and sugar packets. Both she and Larry smiled warmly at one another and we returned to the table.

"Okay," said Larry, adding cream to his coffee, "a big register that can somehow hold 28,485 bundles... it'd probably be more like a vault."

"Fine, a vault. Imagine a vault...."

"Lawrence, I am not going to get a vault. Those're probably really expensive and besides...."

"Larry, please, just stop... and imagine. Just imagine," I said, taking a fast breath.

"Okay, what next?" asked Larry.

"Imagine a vault or a register...."

"Or both..."

"Yeh, good, both," I said. "Better image. You've got all your money in the vault."

"The 28,465 bundles and the loose change."

"Right, it's all there."

"Probably on pallets. I think that's what they do, Pallets, and they shrink wrap it. So, guess we'd have to get a fork-lift or something. Those're probably pretty cheap, or we could rent one. A fork-lift would be a good thing to have."

''Larry...."

Larry, after stirring his coffee, looked up. "What?"

"So most of your money you want to keep safe, right? You want a little available.... Not much, just some."

"Like the loose $920," said Larry. "That's not much, though. That's barely a month's rent, so it'll go quick."

"Right," I said, drained. "But still, most of it is protected..., safe. Those're your investments, Larry. That's what we're shooting for. Safe, over the long-term, but you still have money available – liquid capital – for when you want to pay for things."

"Do you think I'm dumb, Lawrence? I know what an investment is."

I looked at Larry, whose dull expression took on an air of disgust. "Right. So you know that it's about protecting your assets."

"Which I want to give away."

"Larry, let's say everyday you grab money to hand out."

"Like, what, ten bundles a day? That's $100,000 a day, Lawrence. That's why I need help," said Larry. "I can't walk around with a hundred grand. That'd be crazy." Larry sipped his coffee. "And you ever tried to blow that kind of money? I haven't, cuz I haven't had it, but even if you're at a high-end girly bar where you're paying twelve bucks for orange juice, you couldn't blow that kind of money, although, you know, maybe, if you're really tipping."

"Not where I was going with this, Larry,"

"Just thinking outside the box, Lawrence."

"Well, okay, you seem to get the whole investment thing. Emily will protect as much of your winnings from taxes and Ed will help make the money grow."

"I'll look at getting a register, but I really think the vault thing is a ridiculous idea," said Larry.

"You don't have to get a cash register," I said. "It's just an image. You open the drawer and take out a little bit. Even if you give away that money, the register is just an image, a tool to help you remember how cash goes in and out."

Larry looked at me as he sipped his coffee. "I'm not slow, Lawrence."

"Larry, do you have any sense of what you spent on your trip up to Sacramento?" I watched with a sense of triumph, banking on his inability to track cash to win my point."

"Up? Back? Or both ways?"

"Uh," I said.

"Let's see," said Larry, pouring a bag of curly fries onto his tray.

"Up; gas, three stops, $41.80, $36 and $42 even; Harris Ranch, sort'a pricey, but December saved us $420 on the package; snacks, $51.50, plus tax."

"I take the question back," I said.

"I may not have money much of the time," said Larry, "but it's not because I can't count, or track my cashflow. When my grandmother makes a deposit to my account, it only goes down, so I gotta know where I'm at every day. It's the burden of being poor. That's the freedom I was talking about." Larry ate a curly fry. He reached in his pocket and handed me a slip of paper without looking at it. "Just look." I did. An ATM receipt. "Now give it back."

"Okay, what was that about?" I said. "So long as we can arrive at a system to track cashflow and it works, is all that matters to me."

"What was the balance?"

"What?"

"The receipt you just looked at."

"Huh?" I said. "Oh, I don't remember." Larry handed the slip back to me without looking at it.

"$4,218, after a withdrawal of $6O, of' which $54 is in my pocket," said Larry. "I get cashflow. If I didn't, I'd have to go to my dad for help and I would rather starve then ask my father for money. Actually, I have. So tracking money it is sort of life-or-death."

* * *

Ed Lossé, Emily Kashabara, Larry, Lori and I managed to fill an entire table at Jack-in-the-Box with opened wrappers, sandwiches, starches, coffee cups, Lori's unsweetened iced tea and – for Larry and Emily – desserts. Lori dipped her fingers into the tea and pulled out a slice of lemon, which she squeezed and dropped back into her drink. I watched her put her lips back around the straw as she sipped. I cleared my throat.

"Thanks, everyone, for coming," I said, as Ed dipped an egg roll into a sauce container. "Based on calls with the lottery office and the state Controller's office, we're looking at another two weeks or so before the check is cut for Larry's winnings. Based on that information, we're going to need to take some immediate strategic steps on day one to shield the winnings from tax loss and guide the bulk of the asset into safe harbor. This will mean each of us doing work while we wait to be paid, but think of these two weeks as waiting for a paycheck." Larry cleared his throat. "And, Larry has some things to say."

"Okay," said Larry. "so, yeh, do your best, and all that, but remember, this money, and I don't think it'll be on a pallet or be shrink-wrapped, it's gonna get handed out, and that'll be me; I'm the decider, so I know Lawrence will be making a lot of calls, but if you have questions, yeh, okay."

Lori sipped her iced tea, the sound of the straw finishing the liquid sounding about as eloquent as Larry's comments.

"Can I talk?" ask Emily. Larry nodded. "First," she said, reaching to shake Lori's hand, "I'm Emily, Emily Kashabara."

"Hey," said Lori, meeting the handshake. "Lori Lewis."

Ed reached out, shook Lori's hand, the two trading first names and sparking a round of hand shaking, which Larry joined, including his shaking my hand and Lori's.

"I know you want to give this money away," said Emily, "and I would be very happy looking up charities and outlining a giving strategy that steers clear of the 35-percent federal rate on gifting. But before you take possession of the asset, we should create some trusts and philanthropic funds which could become vehicles for distributing dollars and also safeguard the asset. That will mean more to hand out over the life of the asset."

"Are you going to eat that?" Larry asked Emily, pointing to her untouched cheesecake. She looked down and quickly covered the slice with her hand. Emily looked down to her dessert and held it up to Larry, who waved it off.

"I have churros... just hadn't tried the pumpkin cheesecake," said Larry. "On the money, not everyone I'm gonna give money to is a charity, and probably some who get money will make people mad, but I'm the decider, so it'll be what I want."

"Purely for tax purposes, I'd stick to organizations that meet the 501 section of the tax code," said Emily, "and obviously (c)(3)s are best, but others, too, if you want to engage in advocacy or giving that's not deductible. Gifting that fulfills your heart sometimes comes at the cost of non-deductibility, but even there, you can avoid tax hits."

"That sounds nice, but not everything I give will be like that," said Larry, "like there's some artists who I want to encourage, and some actresses and singers and models, too."

"Singers and models?" said Ed.

"I don't know if you've heard of Ewa Sonnet, but she's from Poland."

"If you wanna call her a singer," said Ed. "Isn't she just a tit model?"

"Excuse me?" said Emily.

"That's just how she got her start," said Larry. "I'm sure December's got stuff going on, too, and my friend, Anekee, in Italy, and that woman on Spanish TV with the candid camera show...."

"Odalys Garcia?" asked Ed.

"Exactly!" said Larry.

"Incredibly short mini-skirts," said Ed, in a matter-of-fact tone. "If you wanna do Spanish TV, why not throw money at Don Francisco? His numbers are bigger then anything on English-language media."

"I suppose."

"Larry, you know, this isn't really the sort of direction... owww," I said, cut off mid-sentence by a kick to my shin that, based on expression and proximity, came from Lori. "Is this where you wanna go? Are we just going to be team players on your fantasy cruise?"

"I got feelings about these things," said Larry. "There's talent there and if someone with money treated these artists seriously, I think there is real money to be made. Not all of the projects will hit it big, but it's not like this money is real. It's all a fantasy, so why not climb on and go with the ride?" Larry looked to Lori and smiled.

"I could do that for awhile," said Emily. "Honestly, it's hard out there, and the money you're offering for a one-third-time gig is better than the full-time offers I've gotten. Can't believe I'm out'ta law school and this is my best offer, but if this is the direction you're headed in, then I'd be signing on with the intent of finding another gig."

"That's the nature of the gig economy," said Ed. "Welcome to the new normal."

Larry offered churros to Ed and Lori, who each declined, and then to Emily, who took one.

"Those are good, wow," she said, after biting in.

"Well," I said, "again, Larry, there will be cashflow, and then there will be long-tern asset protection and growth. Why don't you start looking at your own priorities, including... including your... artists, and Emily and Ed will go to work on their end of the bargain. We know there is a short delay for the payments, so I appreciate everyone's willingness to start building a path for the next quarter. I think that will keep us busy until the money comes in."

"Is that December Carrero you're talking about?" asked Ed.

"Yes," said Larry. "I know her. She's nice."

"She is smokin,'" said Ed. "And she's like, what, 24? Kind'a raw, but if you can Henry Higgins her, you'd be able to bottle gold on her."

"Who's Henry Higgins?" asked Larry.

* * *

Larry lined up his pool cue and badly missed the nine-ball-in-the-side-pocket shot he had called. Emily moved up to shoot, as I watched from the bar. Lori and Ed, each holding a cue, talked while they waited for their turns to shoot.

* * *

Lori uncovered her face and sipped from her water glass, as she and Larry lay in the sun.

"So what'ta'ya think of Lawrence's new team?" asked Larry.

"It's your team," said Lori, "and, honestly, I think they're good. I think you'll be able to tell them what you want and they won't fuck around."

"I kind'a think so, too," said Larry. "Wanna burrito?"

"Too much salt," said Lori, turning on her belly. "You will lose Emily, though, if you're too much of a pig."

"Pig? I'm not a pig."

"Bix, if you're pouring money into women's g-strings, that isn't going to inspire the loyalty of a talented young professional woman," said Lori. "Isn't that kind of obvious?"

"You know, some people like Picassos by Rembrandt. Me, I like the other side of the canvas."

"Larry, that doesn't even make sense," said Lori. "I know you've got an active life going on in your head, and the internet obviously is a big part of that, but when it goes from being a secret life to dragging others into a TMI world, you're gonna lose people."

"W'ull, like December... I'm sure if she didn't have to pay the bills with web diva stuff, she'd be able to find a project that allowed her to grow as an entertainer."

"Larry, I love you, and I like the girl, but, let's be real here."

"Remember at Harris Ranch, when we were eating and she said the reviews are in? What was she focusing on? Her public. Don't you think someone who focuses so closely on web chat fans will be thinking about the fans when she considers a real part?"

"Again, Larry, c'mon," said Lori, flat on her lounger, speaking with her face smooshed into the towel under her. "Is Hollywood knocking on her door? As great as the money thing is, it's not like you have contacts with filmmakers who'll put Dee in a movie just cuz you wave dollars at 'em."

"Um," said Larry, slowly. "Maybe."

"Bix, it's good you hit this jackpot," said Lori, "cuz you've always been in the clouds. It's part'a why I love you. And everyone has a secret life. But money doesn't change a person's fiber. It just magnifies everything. Including your secrets."

"She's asking about you," Larry said absently.

"Tell her I'm not here."

"She wants to give you the gift she got."

Lori grunted. "There's all sorts of things she says she wants to give me."

"She likes you."

"She's a nice girl," said Lori. "But she's really young." Lori reached for her water, dipped her fingers in to grab the lemon, which she squeezed and dropped back into the water. She licked the juice from her fingers and sipped from her glass. "But she's more than I can deal with right now."
Chapter Eleven – The Charleston

"How much do these film people know of my mother and father?" asked Emma, as she sat, after having laid out a table with a baked pate, a cooked roast on a wide platter with crackling fat glistening, a tureen of fish bisque, sugar-glazed skillet-caramelized potatoes, a bowl of steaming red cabbage, and a platter of sliced breads, crackers, cheeses, cold salads and condiments.

"What they say doesn't match what you've told me," said Larry. "I think they've been fed lies."

"In this age, facts are treated as lies," said Emma, "and lies become facts."

A loud knock boomed into the dining room. Emma asked Larry to answer the door, where Calvin stood in a white tuxedo shirt, wrinkled pants and a red bow tie. "Don't even start," said Calvin, walking past Larry, through the studio and French doors leading to the living quarters of his mother's suite. Larry went to the Victrola, cranked the handle, lifted the needle and dropped it onto a disc of orchestral music. Another knock came and Larry opened it, revealing von Sommerberg circling the Thorvaldsen, and Lena, silently pointing, and mouthing "Thorvaldsen," as the director filmed. Larry nodded.

Von Sommerberg entered the studio with a sweeping pan of the camera, and circled the space where Astrid Ullagård had danced for maestro Harald Lander, and for the leading citizens of her day, where Lander had Astrid as his private dancer as he sketched out new works as he awaited passage to return to the Royal Ballet.

"Lander would spend long months during the off-seasons throughout the 1930s with pairs of Troupe members, at once even five dancers with him," Lena said in a loud whisper to Larry.

"Bullshit," he replied. "That's just... that's just.... bullshit."

"Members of the Royal Troupe, in California with Astrid, prepared the core structures of Lander's work for the coming season," said Lena.

"That's... that... when she danced in the '30s... she did come back each year – and was here most of the year – and other dancers came, too...," said Larry. "Until Carl and Astrid moved when Carl got transferred because of the Army, up to the Presidio in San Francisco. My grandmother stayed in the Suite and her parents lived in commander's housing until he died and then she went back and stayed and Emma got the Suite, but her dad is buried up at the Presidio.

"We met there," said Lena, flatly. "So you see it is the connection of the Maestro and Dame, it is long-standing, and what follows...."

"... is bullshit... speculation... bullshit," said Larry. "You can't prove that." Larry turned and walked to the silent Victrola.

Emma Mathilde came to the French doors as Tres von Sommerberg filmed Larry flipping the orchestral piece and winding the Victrola.

"I hope that your journey was a safe one," said Emma.

Von Sommerberg smoothly glided to Lena, as he kept his camera's enormous unit aimed at the French doors. He handed the camera to Lena, its light aglow red, he straightened, extended his hand, and, without breaking rhythm, approached Emma, smiling. "Hel-lowww," he said. "Tres..., wait, you speak Danish? Hello, Tres von Sommerberg, the director, from Denmark. I didn't think you would speak in Danish. Is this for us that you have learned?"

"It was for my mother," said Emma. "Come. You've met my grandson. Come meet my son, and join us for lunch." Emma walked the two filmmakers through the studio, pointing out several photographs on the walls before stepping into the main quarters, where Calvin sat quietly at the main dining room table, alongside a line of potted plants.

"My God," said von Sommerberg. "Spectacular."

"This is as my parents designed it, with an architect from Oslo," said Emma.

"The food!" said von Sommerberg, leaning in deeply over the roast pork and inhaling.

Calvin, alone seated at the table, signaled the filmmaker to a chair across from his. "Eat. No one else is smart enough to."

Moments after von Sommerberg sat, bodies moved into chairs, conversations continuing and Lena, standing with the camera, slowly paced, holding a steady, benign gaze on the faces of those seated at the table.

"This Suite was my mother's demand if she were to leave the Royal Troupe to join my father in America."

"Really something," said von Sommerberg, serving soup with a heavy ladle to his own bowl and plucking an assortment of breads and crackers.

Calvin sat back and looked at the director piling his plate with potatoes and cabbage. After he had set his plate down, von Sommerberg extended his hand to Calvin.

"Tres... Tres von Sommerberg," he said, with a glow, "the film director, from Denmark."

"Calvin van der Bix," said Larry's dad, standing up to shake hands in a grip strong enough to cause the director to grimace. "Pure American."

"Ingeborg's nephew," said von Sommerberg.

"Don't know who that is," said Calvin "Excuse me, but I need a beer." Calvin walked off as Lena filmed the platters and dishes on the table, and the hands moving past the camera's enormous unit. As Calvin returned with two opened bottles, he took more time then needed to slowly pass Lena, watching as she bent forward to film the table. "Welcome to America," he said, as he passed. He set both bottles down in front of him and, sat, openly staring at Lena as she worked.

"Carlsberg?" said von Sommerberg.

"Good shit," said Calvin, drinking from the first bottle.

Larry, standing across the table from Calvin, motioned with his head towards Emma, and Calvin put down his bottle, stood, walked behind his mother, pulled out her chair and, after she sat, helped her scoot in, before he and Larry also sat. Lena continued filming.

Larry's cell phone rang. He quickly pulled it out of his pocket, as Calvin scowled.

"Son, how many times have I told you not to have your phone at the dinner table?"

Larry looked at his father, at his phone, pressed "reject" and, upon letting the call go "missed," changed to silent. "Right, uh... Dad," said Larry.

"My God, look at this food," said von Sommerberg, as Calvin reached across to snap off a piece of crackling fat off the cooked roast, only to have Larry swat his hand away.

"Don't swat me, boy," said Calvin, returning to his beer, finishing the first bottle.

"Beer?" Emma asked the director. Von Sommerberg nodded, and Emma slid from her chair and, a moment later, returned to the table with four opened bottles of Carlsberg, and frosted glasses on a tray that she wheeled on a small, silver cart.

"Nej," said Lena, under her breath.

* * *

Under the shade of the balcony's two main parasols, Emma sat stiffly on her father's rattan loveseat as von Sommerberg filmed and Lena, notebook in hand, asked questions.

Calvin and Larry each drank silently.

"Did your mother ever travel with her son to visit you or ask that you meet them in Denmark?"

Emma held her hands together on her lap and fixed her gaze slightly downward. "She did not, because my mother did not have another child."

"Did your mother write to you or place telephone calls, to talk with you about her life in Denmark?"

My Child,

Nights grow longer and the cold bites as I ride my bicycle home after each evening's performance. Tonight we filled all seats, no doubt because the King brought his young family. Winter's curse: I see sunlight only on my ride to the Theatre. I await my return to the light and warmth of life in California.

Mor

"No, I don't recall so," said Emma.

"Did your father tell you about Astrid's life in Copenhagen, and that she had borne a son?" Lena asked, looking up from her notes.

Emma sat motionless, without answering.

"I'm sorry if this is difficult," said Lena.

"Only for you, as everything you believe is incorrect," said Emma.

Calvin turned to Larry and slurred out, "What is she asking her?"

"How would I know, Dad," Larry said. "It's in a foreign language."

"You spe... oh... okay," said Calvin. "Right, you don't know." Calvin watched his mother. "Well, when you do know, tell me."

Von Sommerberg suddenly turned the camera onto Calvin, who grunted with anger as the enormous camera lens suddenly closed in to within a few feet of his face. Lena shifted to English.

"Did you know that your grandmother had given birth to a boy in Copenhagen?" Lena asked.

"Me?" said Calvin. "Why would I know that? I never met the Cow's mom."

Larry winced.

"You never knew you had a famous cousin in Denmark?"

"We're the ones who're famous, lady. We've got parts of this town named after us. What's this mystery cousin got?" Calvin reached to his mother's setting and took her half-full beer glass, which he swiftly emptied.

"I think maybe this is a good time," said Larry.

"No, no," said von Sommerberg. "It's just getting good."

"Look, you're taking advantage of both my grandmother and my dad," said Larry.

"Do you want to continue?" Lena asked Calvin.

"Depends on what we continue doing," he responded, letting out a glimmer of the movie-star qualities that enticed women like Candy to linger in Calvin's world. "I'm free all night, if you'd like to sashay around for me."

''Dad.''

" 'Nuther time, boy. I got a hot one."

Emma stood and pushed the rolling silver tray towards the kitchen, as von Sommerberg followed her with the camera. At the table, Calvin continued, "You know, this mansion's been in our family for almost 100 years. If the Cow goes before I do, this whole thing is mine. I could use someone in this suite who appreciates the beauty of California."

Lena said nothing, using the time to go through her notepad, crossing out lines and marking up others.

"A lot of money here," said Calvin, in a casual tone. "A pretty easy life for the right person... yep, pretty easy." Having finished Emma's beer, Calvin reached for von Sommerberg's glass and, as his hand drew near, Lena, without looking up, swatted him on the wrist with her note pad.

* * *

Emma, with the director filming her, wheeled the silver cart out to the balcony, where the sun beat down harshly, drawing sharp lines between the brightness of the day and the shaded area where the main parasols on three sides of the long glass-and-rattan table met the red-and-white striped awning extending from the French doors. Atop the cart rested several thick leather-bound albums. Bougainvillea flower petals floated one-two-three from the trained overhang and landed nine-ten-eleven onto the leather book.

"I traveled with my dear father to Copenhagen when mother performed in her first role as Principal Dancer," said Emma. "We took the train to New York and boarded the Queen Mary and then took a miserable ferry across the North Sea to Denmark." She slowly opened the first bound volume, as a seagull landed a few feet from the book of photos. Emma waved her hand and the bird hopped to another part of the table. Lena threw bread across the table, causing the bird to hop off for the snack. As Emma picked up her magnifying glass, the gull hopped up to the far end of the balcony table, pecking at a remnant of bread on a nearly-empty plate. The bird pecked tentatively at von Sommerberg's keyring, as the director filmed the bird poking and then lifting the keyring with its bill. Larry threw a breadroll that hit the bird square in the chest, causing it to squawk, dropping the keyring.

"My father could not stay for the full performance," said Emma, slowly turning each of the pages, showing one picture after another of a woman who just as easily could have been Lori, in flight, in pose, in the arms of her male partner. "We ate ice cream and saw the Little Mermaid. She told us that her life would never be complete without Copenhagen and the ballet."

The final image in the volume was a close-up, showing Astrid, sweating, smiling, coming up from a bow, with a look of triumph and ecstasy on her face. Calvin, in his stupor, leaned in to view the photo, and did a long second look. "Damn, granola girl looks good."

Emma closed the volume and let her hand rest on the leather cover. A teardrop splashed onto the leather, instantly soaking into the cover and leaving a dark circle. Several more tears fell, and she pushed the album slightly forward to spare it more tears. "She talked of having another child. My father, my dear father, said no, 'Let's love the child we have,' he told her, on our last night in Copenhagen. I pretended to sleep while they talked into the night. 'But she'll never be a dancer,' Mor told my father over and over. 'Who will continue the family's legacy?'"

Emma stood and walked to Larry, whispering in his ear. Larry left the balcony and Emma guided Lena and the director to the main quarters and then through the French doors, back into the main studio, where Larry was on his knees, going through books of 78s, seeking a specific disc. Standing, with a single record in his hands, Larry carefully set it on the small table next to the Victrola, removed the orchestral piece he played earlier. He placed the new disc onto the turntable, cranked the handle, and set the needle into the groove.

Up came "The Charleston."

Emma Mathilde walked the two filmmakers to a framed newspaper clipping from Politiken Dagbladet, from September 1928, showing a smiling, wide-faced blond man in a straw hat, standing behind a young child and a tall, elegant blonde, all on a stage with about a dozen men seated behind them.

"This is me," said Emma. "And mother."

A caption below the photo read: "American presidential candidate Herbert Hoover (center) enjoys performance of "The Charleston" by the daughter of Royal Ballet dancer Astrid Ullagård, now Mrs. Carl van der Bix, of Long Beach, California, during the politician's visit to that city." Hoover is beaming as Astrid wears a look of horror and disgust. Emma Mathilde's face, closest to the camera, is filled with joy and pride.

The slightly twisted, funhouse-feeling of "The Charleston" filled the studio. It's a song that a good band could stretch into long minutes or which the mind, if fixated, could never be rid of. Everyone can hum it; no one could hate it.

"Farmor?" said Larry. "Why are you crying?'

Emma Mathilde slumped into the sofa beneath the framed newspaper clipping, her eyes glistening, tears rolling down her cheeks. Calvin, drunk, stumbled into the studio, and on hearing the song, began to dance as best a drunken man could, before blurting out, "It's our song, Cow!" Calvin staggered a few more steps, before falling heavily onto the floor.

* * *

Lena sat just off camera as von Sommerberg kept his huge unit aimed at Emma, seated, deflated, on the sofa she had slumped into while showing the clipping with Herbert Hoover. Calvin lay on the floor, his head on a pillow that Emma had insisted Larry place under his head. Larry sat at the far end of the sofa, listening.

"How did he come about?" Lena asked, pointing with her pen to Calvin.

Emma gazed at her son, passed out. There was a faint red glow on Emma's eyeglasses from the "on air" light, no more than two feet from her face.

"I think we should stop," said Larry.

"No, please," said von Sommerberg.

"Emma? Do you wish to stop?" asked Lena.

Emma only gazed down to her son, whose mouth hung open. He was snoring lightly. "Mor forbid me from going alone to the Pike," said Emma.

"The what?" said von Sommerberg.

"Oh," said Lena, "you mean the pleasure zone?"

"The amusement area, yes," said Emma, "with the Cyclone Racer that went out over the sea and everyday I would hear the screams from our suite." Emma looked slowly around the room. "We rode the Red Car," said Emma.

"We?" said Lena. "We, your mother? Your father?"

"The girl... from downstairs," said Emma, distantly, "and the air smelled like salt and sugar, cotton candy and hot dogs. So many people... she held my hand while we walked and I looked up to the Cyclone racer."

Lena leaned forward in her chair. "Yes."

"She pulled me...."

"The girl?"

"And then we were in the hall of mirrors."

"The House of Mirrors?"

"She walked up to boys," said Emma. "She laughed and kept holding my hand."

"Oh, no," said Lena.

"She didn't let go. I could hear the clack-clack-clack and smell the candy," said Emma, "and then we were behind the mirrors. I could hear children on the other side...."

"Emma, how old were...?"

On the floor, Calvin coughed and twitched and then rolled onto his back.

"She wouldn't let go," said Emma, sitting very still, her hands folded together on her lap.

"Damn!" said von Sommerberg, setting the camera on its side. "Don't stop, just... a moment...." He rustled through his pockets and produced a large, gray square battery, which he swapped out for the gray cube within the unit. He hoisted the camera back up, aimed the oversized lens back to Emma, and said, "white balance... and... go."

Calvin, now sitting upright, managed to stand. He stumbled to the Victrola, which he wound and dropped the needle again play "The Charleston. "Hey, Momma, isn't this what the Old Man taught you to dance?" Calvin staggered through the French doors, towards the kitchen.

"Keep going," said von Sommerberg, in a methodical, quiet voice. "Really good..., really good."

"No," said Larry. "It's over...."

"Emma," said Lena, softly, gently. "Do you want to stop?"

Emma stared out into mirrored studio as the winding gyration of "The Charleston" danced around them invisibly.

"Please Emma," said von Sommerberg, his face hidden behind the camera with the enormous lens. The red light glowed.

"This was the song," said Emma, in a whisper.

"Yes, with the politician," said Lena, pointing to the photo above Emma's head.

"All I could think was when the pain would end."

"Oh," whispered back Lena. "Oh, no."

"The pretty girl with the crooked teeth never let go," said Emma. "The boys laughed, one after another." Emma wiped away tears as Larry moved next to her and held her hand. Emma looked up to the camera. "I kept it all a secret until my son was born," she said, in a stronger voice. "A servant acted as midwife. When I told my father, it was only part of the story and he told mother only part of what he knew. My mother begged for us to move permanently to Europe. Each year, she returned to Copenhagen to dance and stayed longer before coming to California, until finally, when my dear father was ordered to San Francisco, she joined him there and never came to Long Beach again."

"The Charleston" had finished its latest spin. Larry reached up and placed his open hand in front of von Sommerberg's enormous lens. The director lowered the camera. Lena moved from her chair to the sofa, next to Emma, and placed her arm around her.

"When secrets become common facts, there is only pain," said Emma, her eyes red as she looked at Lena. "But he's not a monster. He's my son and I love him. How can I not?"

* * *

A light knock at the main door to the suite was followed by the door opening. Lori Lewis, in jeans and a Ray Davies tee-shirt, stepped into the studio. "Larry?"

"Granola girl!" slurred Calvin, in a red bow tie and tuxedo shirt. "Nice pictures."

"Where's Larry?" asked Lori.

"With the Cow and some movie people," said Calvin, motioning towards the balcony.

"Movie people?" said Lori, walking past Calvin, who reached a hand towards her ass. Lori spun and, within a second, had Calvin's arm high up his back, as he grimaced in pain. "Keep your hands to yourself, old man," said Lori, just as quickly releasing his wrist. She crossed to the French doors.

"The Cow's all weepy – boo hoo – so she must be telling the story of getting poked at the Pike," said Calvin, drinking from his bottle and chuckling.

Lori stopped at the doors. "What are you talking about?"

"How'd'ya think the Old Man finally chased off the Cow's mom?" said Calvin.

Lori turned and walked to the balcony, where Larry sat with his grandmother. With them were two tall blondes, one holding a camera with an enormous lens.

"My God," said Lena, on looking up at Lori. She patted von Sommerberg on the shoulder and he opened his eyes, having been soaking up the California sun. He immediately grabbed the camera and aimed it at Lori. "I'm Lena Martin, from Denmark. Very good to meet you."

Lori reached out her hand "I'm Lori Lewis."

"Really good to meet you, Lori Lewis."

The director handed off the camera to Lena and as the unit turned to him, von Sommerberg reached out his hand and wound up his smile. "Hel-lowww. Tres. Tres von Sommerberg, from Denmark. The director, film director, hello."

Lori shook his hand and walked over to Larry and Emma, who sat together at the breakfast table. Lori leaned in to look at both their faces, smiling to each. Emma reached her hand upward and gently placed it onto Lori's cheek. Lori reached her own hand up, gently cupping Emma's hand and giving it a light kiss.

"Did I call?" asked Larry. "I don't remember."

"We were supposed to have lunch," she said, sitting. "It's okay."

"It's remarkable," said Lena. "Who are you?"

"His friend," said Lori, pointing to Larry. "School."

"My dearest friend," said Larry.

"Just amazing," said von Sommerberg.

* * *

Lori Lewis slowly turned the page of the leather bound album, as von Sommerberg photographed her gazing intently, sometimes getting her eyes just inches from a photo, sometimes gasping. "I can't believe I've never seen these," said Lori, turning another page. "Wow," said Lori, as she came to the final image, of the sweating, joyous, smiling, triumphant Astrid. Lori gazed at it for fully a minute before closing the volume. "Larry, ask if she sees her mom when she looks at me."

"Um, yeh," said Larry, "but I can't." Larry motioned with his head towards the kitchen. "Uh, can you help me bring something out from the kitchen?"

"I gotta know, Larry."

"But I don't speak her language," said Larry.

"Oh, come on," said Lori, as Larry silently moved his head back and forth. "Oh, I mean, come on... to the kitchen."

The two got up end quickly made their way from the balcony. "What? You're not letting on that you know their language?"

"I want see if they're playing us for dopes," said Larry. "My grandmother's going along with it, but I'm gonna get them out'ta here." The two walked back to the balcony, looked at each other, and walked quickly back in to the kitchen. They grabbed what was close at hand and carried out two empty beer bottles, a nearly-cleared plate of cracker bread and a napkin holder to the table.

"Oh, sorry, I don't drink beer, let me get fresh ones," said Lori, disappearing again to the kitchen, before returning with four bottles of beer.

"Napkin?" asked Larry.

* * *

"I guess I never really paid too close attention to it," said Lori, looking at the newspaper clipping of Herbert Hoover, Emma and her mother. "And I guess I didn't see myself in the pictures before, cuz I didn't look like that when I was a kid."

Emma slowly walked through the French doors and stood next to Larry and Lori. "Please excuse me. I am going to rest."

"Grandma, before you go to sleep," said Larry, "Lori wants to know if, when you look at her, do you instead see your own mother?"

Emma put her hands together and slowly lifted them to her lips, as though in prayer. "No," she said, lowering her hands. "I see a loyal friend who makes my grandson happy." Larry kissed his grandmother, who smiled, and turned to the open doors. She walked into the main living quarters, saying over her shoulder, "You can both stay. You don't have to leave. You don't ever have to leave."

Larry's cell phone rang. "It's the danged movie people."

Emma walked towards her bed and Lori, in the other direction, went to the Victrola, cranked the handle, lifted the needle and placed it on the start of the disc. "The Charleston" again wound its way through the room.

"Oh my God," said Lori, "I haven't danced to this in forever." As Larry talked on the phone, Lori turned towards the wall and, seeing her reflection in the mirror, leaned slightly forward and swung her arms and legs. As the chorus swirled, she dropped her hands to her knees, then back up to swinging her arms and legs.

Larry lowered his cell phone and just watched, as did Emma, who had walked back to the French doors, and was just gazing at Lori dancing.

On looking up to see her audience in the mirror, Lori stopped dancing. Speaking to the mirror, she said, to Larry's reflection, "What?"

"I never knew you could dance," said Larry.

"I don't anymore," said Lori, "but every girl can dance."

'Why didn't you go to the dances?"

"Wasn't cuz I couldn't dance," said Lori. "Didn't wanna be thought of as just a girl."

Emma smiled, turned, and walked off towards her bed.

"Before I met you, my mom had me in little girl dance classes," said Lori, "and my instructor loved the Charleston, so we always did that one almost every recital. A real show stopper."

Larry's phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket, looked at the number, smiled and took the call. "Hello? Oh, hey. No, hasn't come in, yet. Just a couple weeks more, though.... Yeh, exciting. She is. Hold on." Larry handed the phone to Lori. "December."

Lori rolled her eyes and took the phone. "Hello? Oh, yeh, heya. No. Just lookin' for work. I know he says I am on his team, but I'd like to find something on my own. A pride thing, I guess. Sure, that'd be okay. Now? Um, sure, okay. See'ya."

"Looks like you'll finally get your gift."

"Whatever."

Larry's phone rang again.

"Oh, man," said Lori, "if it's December, tell her I went outside or something...."

"No," said Larry, sitting on the sofa. "It's the movie people." Larry pushed "speaker."

"Hel-lowww. Tres. Tres von..."

"I know," said Larry. "... from Denmark...." Lori walked over and sat down next to Larry. They leaned in together to listen.

"I have a question for your friend, Miss Lewis. Is she still with you?"

Lori shook her head no. "Sorry, she's outside running.... Preparing for a marathon."

"Wow," said von Sommerberg. "Really something. I want her to be in the movie. We are willing to make major changes to the film. Can I come back to talk with you and your grandmother?"

"She's gone to sleep."

"May I speak just with you, then?" After a moment of silence from Larry, von Sommerberg spoke in a side conversation. "No, he isn't giving an answer." Von Sommerberg then spoke directly into the phone again. "Hel-lowww, I am really eager to again visit. Lena and I are on the way."

"No!" said Larry.

"We will see you in a few minutes," said von Sommerberg.

"Shit, he hung up."

"I am not going to be in some... movie," said Lori.

"You just said you wanted to get something on your own," said Larry. "No one helped you get this. Could be decent money."

"You promise me, Larry van der Bix, that you are not fronting this," said Lori, a stern expression on her face.

Larry put both hands in the air. "I have nothing to do with this. If they want you, it's entirely their own idea."

* * *

"Really good to see you again," said Lena Martin. "Your skin is so clear after a run."

"Yeh, well," said Lori. "Good genes, I guess."

"We should sit down," said von Sommerberg, "because I am going to talk about something really big with you."

Lena shouldered the camera, as Tres moved to the sofa.

"Put that away," said Lori, "I don't want to be filmed."

The director nodded quickly and Lena carefully set the camera onto the hardwood floor. "My film is what is called for those who know movies, the Dogme95. The director makes a vow that guides how every Dogme film is made. All the scenes are shot in the here and now. But these are still stories told with a camera and if I have an actress who can be here and speak now, then I can weave a new element into my film and that will make this Dogme film different than all others. You are that new element, Miss Lewis."

"You may be a director and she may be a producer, but I am a soldier, not an actor," said Lori. "Vice to ask me, but I don't think it will work me being in your movie. Thanks."

A booming knock came from the main studio door.

"What the fuck?" said Larry, rising from the sofa and crossing the studio. He opened the door. Calvin leaned into the doorframe, a satisfied grin on his face, as December, in an oversized hooded sweatshirt and sweats, stood at the Thorvaldsen, reverently, slowly running her hands over the surface, as one would over a lover returned from a long journey. After trading her warmth with the coolness of the stone, she dropped her hands and walked to the main doors of the suite.

"Hi, sweeties," December said, stepping into the main studio. "Ooo, pretty," she said, "and the mirrors... nice. Larry, is dis where you live?"

"No," said Calvin, "remember what I said coming up the stairs, Hot Stuff? When the Cow here kicks off, this place is mine."

"Get out'ta here, Dad," said Larry.

"... And I could use some sweet thing up here who can appreciate the good life."

December, walking in Lori's direction, seemed to be pulled magnetically to each item of furniture, which she touched; to framed photos on the walls, which she looked at; and, finally, to the Victrola, which she caressed when she reached it, one hand on the handle and the other on the elegant wood casing.

Larry, a few steps away, looked to his father, in the doorway. "Calvin; go!" His father, without a word, turned and left, the sound of his footsteps growing dimmer as he descended the stairway. Lena crossed the room and closed the door, as Larry stepped over to the Victrola, cranked the handle and dropped the needle onto the Charleston, filling the room with the opening strains.

"Old timey," December cooed. "I like it." She crossed to Lori and whispered loud enough for all to hear: "Hi, baby. I bought you something army." December sat down and put her hand casually on Lori's thigh. "Who're dey?" she said, pointing to the filmmakers. "Dat's a big lens."

The Charleston hit the chorus, and suddenly December looked up. She stood and ran to the middle of the studio, declaring, "Oh! I know dis one!" and she proceeded to dance a version of the Charleston that was heavy on leaning forward and running one's hands across the knees.

Von Sommerberg picked up the camera and began to lift it to his shoulder, before Lori put her hands onto the camera, and said, "Please, just let her dance."

The filmmaker looked up to Lori, who stood over him. "Only because that it is you who asks." He set the camera dawn and turned again to December, who danced on the floor where once danced Astrid Ullagaard, and now also a woman identical in appearance to the famous Scandinavian. After the disc finished its play, December laughed. "I learned dat one in high school. Again! Play it again!"

Lori wound the phonograph and set the needle to the start of the disc, again filling the studio with music. Lori stepped to December, the two smiled and each began dancing their own versions, until, midway, they found a common rhythm and danced together. Larry clapped, and, after a few seconds of his lonely applause, the filmmakers joined. December smiled broadly and bowed. Lori smiled to December and stood, her hands in her pockets.

"Is dis where your grandmother lives?"

"Yeh," said Larry. "My dad lives below. I lived with my grandmother from middle school," said Larry, as he crossed to December, lightly took her fingers, and brought her across the room to show her the picture of Emma with Herbert Hoover.

"I can't read it," said December.

Larry pointed to the little girl.

"Who's she? the one who looks like Lori?" asked December.

"My grandmother' s mom," said Larry, "and that's my grandma," pointing to the little girl. Larry pointed to the man in the white suit. "And that's Herbert Hoover."

"Who's dat?" December turned away from the photo, to the two filmmakers. "Who're dey, and what's with the camera? Dat's a serious unit."

"Tres," said the director, approaching December. "Tres von Sommerberg... from Denmark..."

"Dat's the number three where I come from," said December. "Where's Denmark?"

".... Above Germany... I'm a film director, from Denmark. We're just a little country, but we're famous with the films."

"Are you famous?"

"I'm here with my producer," said von Sommerberg, pointing to Lena. "We're making a movie about his great grandmother, the famous dancer and I've come back to ask Miss Lewis here to star in our movie."

Lori exhaled as though she had been punched. "P-uhhh, what?"

December excitedly jumped up and down, noticeably causing her sweatshirt to flop about. "Do it, Lori! Oh! Do it! Can I be in the movie with my Baby?"

Lena stammered, "Tres, we have to...."

Von Sommerberg, seemingly hypnotized by the flopping of December's sweatshirt, weakly let out, "... well, I don't see why we can't write another part."

"No!" said Lori. "I'm not going to be in some movie. I'm not your 'star.' No."

"We, of course, would pay you," said Lena. "And we wouldn't be shooting during this trip, as we need to rewrite our story."

December ran over to Lori and held both of her hands. "Oh, hunny, they want you to star in a movie! We can be in a movie together! Please say yes!"

"No."

"Oh, hunny, please," begged December. "At least say you'll think about it."

Lori looked across to Larry. "Bix?"

"Basically, he's an idiot," said Larry, "but, you know, maybe hear out the offer, huh?"

"What's your offer?" asked Lori.

"Well," said von Sommerberg, "we have to rewrite the story, so we are not sure how the part will play out, but it will be a leading role. You bring together the past and the present as has never been done in Dogme. It is not about the money, but we cannot let this movie be made without you. I have never seen anyone who more closely resembles Astrid Ullagård. Can you dance... other then... that?

"Every girl can dance," said Lori.

Lena smiled.

"No, can you dance?" von Sommerberg asked again.

"I danced as a kid."

"How long?"

"Oh, I don't know. Seven or eight years"

"Why did you stop?"

"I didn't want to be thought of as just a girl."

"What kind of dance?"

"Ballet, mostly."

"That's lovely," said Lena. "Really great."

"I think you will be the right one," said von Sommerberg. "Will you please consider our offer?"

Lori sat on the sofa. December sat next to her. Larry sat beside December, who scooted close to Lori, taking her hand and setting it onto her own lap, and resting her own hands on top. "You haven't really made an offer, but, okay, yeh, I'll think about it."

"Great!" said von Sommerberg.

"This is really great," said Lena.

"You'll be glad for doing this," said the director. "We will make sure."

"This movie will be really something," said Lena. "We can tell our investors we really have something big."

"Yeh, okay," said Lori. "Whatever."

"And me," said December, "write something for me."

"I don't know," said Lena, as December shucked her sweatshirt, revealing a tightly packed, clingy top that could not possibly have hugged her curving lines any more tightly.

"We'll just have to figure out how," said von Sommerberg, lifting the camera to his shoulder and throwing the red lamp on as he drew in tightly on Lori's face, and December's face and then back, sweeping across their bodies. He lingered on December, who did a slight shoulder shimmy.

Lena groaned.

* * *

"Are you ready?" said December, to the mirrored wall of the studio.

"Larry, close your eyes," said Lori. "Please don't look." Lori stepped out of a small dressing room set into one of the mirrored walls of the studio, wearing only an extremely small, olive green bikini, with the word "ARMY" printed in small white letters across the backside.

"Yeh, baby," said December. "Dat's what I'm talking about. Turn around, baby." Lori did so. "Oh, yeh. Lookin' good, Soldier Girl."

Larry, with his hand over his eyes, asked if he could look.

"I'm just wearing a swimsuit, Larry, but can you turn the other way....," said Lori. "Please."

"Thanks, hunny," December said to Larry, as she got up and stood belly-to-belly with Lori, and put both of her hands on Lori's waist. "See? I'm thinking of my soldier girl." She let her hands roam across Lori's ass and down her thighs, digging her fingers deeply into the tight flesh. "Oh yeh...." December leaned into Lori's chest and began to lightly kiss her skin.

"Now?" asked Larry.

"No, Bixie, please," said Lori, pulling December by the hand to the dressing room, and closing the swinging, mirrored door.

When Larry asked "now" again, Emma replied, "Is Lori gone?"

He uncovered his eyes, turned and looked around. Soft moaning, seemingly too faint for Emma's ears, drifted across the studio. "I think she may have just stepped out," said Larry, going to the Victrola and winding the crank.
Chapter Twelve – The Golden Register

Emily Kashabara sipped her Jack-in-the-Box coffee, as Ed Lossé and Larry van der Bix ploughed through the scattered wrappers on the table, searching for hash brown sticks, curly fries, egg rolls or mini-churros.

I watched Lori sip her iced tea and thought back half a lifetime ago, before divorce, before marriage, back when we were just kids, piled into Larry's car, pooling coins to afford gas. Her skin, then as now, was flawless, honey-colored from the sun.

She was always the strongest of the three of us, better able to run, jump, throw, climb and anything else demanding strength and dexterity. She was always humble, always gentle, always finding the way to make something happen, rather then wielding the needle to burst a balloon.

Now, all I can think of is how I messed up in losing her. Back then, I thought things were going badly, when she thought they were going well. I saw it as a failure that all we could afford were small apartments, never a house. She would say, "look at how comfy we are." Then as things finally started going well for me at work, she soured on the direction of our lives. When finally we bought a house, she complained we were never together to enjoy it.

Now, seated across the table, she was as beautiful as anytime I'd ever known her, her skin the color of cinammon, her hair full and flowing freely, and her body perfect, tight, muscled and youthful. It's almost as though aging had decided to visit later perhaps, but take nothing up front.

A voice still repeated that I needed her. My mistake had always been to tell her so. She wanted to be wanted – everybody did, she said – but she hated to have someone need her. I couldn't see how there was a difference and the harder I tried to keep her, the more difficult it became to convince her to stay.

"Do we have to do fast food each time we meet?" asked Emily.

"Doesn't matter to me," said Ed, robotically moving seasoned curly fries to his lips.

"I like this place, but, yeh, no, sure, okay, whatever," said Larry, popping a churro.

"There's some decisiveness," said Lori.

"We can rotate," I said, alone at the table having nothing to eat or drink. "But we do need to move through the business here. Emily, you start..."

"Larry indicated his wish to create trust funds for him, his grandmother, and a couple others," said Emily. "Those are straightforward, and we can execute papers today and have final documents ready to file in time for the disbursement conference. While that may not necessarily cushion the initial tax hit on the sums invested, it will protect those assets from future liabilities." Emily drank from her coffee and, appearing to have spotted something, reached and picked up a mini-churro. She held it up in Larry's direction, and, with his nod, ate it. "Much of the philanthropic giving — not for... the... artists — can be done with a foundation. I've drawn up articles of incorporation and by-laws for a basic foundation structure. I have Larry, Lawrence and Lori as the officers, so all that is really needed on that is a name...."

"I've been thinking a lot about this," said Larry.

"And...," said Emily.

"Well," said Larry. "I don't know."

"True leadership, Bix," said Lori.

"The Bixie Fund," said Larry.

"Lame," said Lori.

"It's not lame," Larry said, sounding hurt.

"Not as a nickname, but c'mon.... How about, like, the Sunshine Fund?"

"Yawn," said Ed.

"What do you suggest?" asked Emily.

"The Fantasy Foundation?" said Ed.

"Gross," said Emily.

"Only cuz you know Larry has some weird ideas of where to throw money," said Ed, "but maybe his donations will make things happen that no one thought possible?"

"And it sure doesn't feel real," said Larry.

"I kind'a like it," said Lori. "Fits Bix."

"Can you draw that up, Ms. Kashabara?" asked Larry. "And please can tell me if I ever ask anything of you that is distasteful. I don't want to lose a talented professional just because you think I am being a pig."

Emily appeared surprised. "I don't think you're a pig. Actually, you seem very respectful, which, honestly, is why I took this gig over another offer. But, okay, I'll tell you if it becomes an issue, I guess." She thought for a bit. "Thanks. Thanks for that."

"Good boy, Bix," said Lori.

"Okay," I said, "so trusts, a foundation... anything more, Emily?"

As Emily outlined how Larry could avoid the 35% federal tax hit on all gifting over the $5.12 million level, I watched Lori pucker her lips around her straw, to sip her iced tea.

It had been almost ten years since I last kissed Lori, and short of serial dating and a fling with a fellow accountant, it had been years since I regularly kissed anyone. Never had I felt more secure, more at ease, more fully loved then when I gave myself completely to my wife's kiss. And yet I could count on one hand the times during the marriage when I had let go enough to feel loved that completely.

"So the parks gift might not be accepted for this sort of tax-avoidance strategy," said Emily. "We can submit the question for consideration at the disbursement conference."

There was silence at the table. After a few moments, I felt a glancing blow to my calf and, by her expression, could see that Lori was sending me a subtle message on timing. "Thank you, Emily.... Ed, investment report...."

"I'm recommending a greater liquid availability than most clients would normally feel comfortable with, as Larry seems like he's ready to move dollars out the door," said Ed. "This is going to mean there has got to be some pretty strict signature controls."

"Got that covered," I said.

"I've got a range of portfolio options that I've been emailing back-and-forth with Larry, Lawrence, and Emily, and the consensus, tell me if I am wrong, is we all like the stock index funds and bond mix.... Larry, yeh?"

"Uh huh, yeh," said Larry.

"Okay," said Ed, "we can put those signatures down upon receipt of the asset and get the State to route funds directly. He sat up and rubbed his hands together. "What I like is that even the liquid portions fit with where Larry seems to be going, as we have sufficient reserves that we can work with currency holdings... and so the Euro, the Yen, the Pound, the Kroner and some others give us the chance at return and to park assets, while still having the capital at hand to invest in Larry's... personal ventures..."

"Like with Ewa or Anekee," said Larry.

"Anekee?" I said.

"... van der Velden," said Larry.

"Some hot-blooded, furious Italian model," said Ed.

"Investing in her is to build a charismatic personality cult that fawns over everything she says," said Larry.

"Mostly while they're staring at her tits," said Ed. "Granted, not the sort of business model each of us at this table might pursue, but not unprofitable, if done right."

"She's really opinionated," said Larry. "It's really exciting."

"Okay, yeh," said Emily, "you're both being pigs, kind of."

"Him, maybe," said Larry, pointing to Ed, "but I know Ane. She's exciting, because of her mind. She's way more than what meets the eye, but all people say is, 'Fake or real.'"

"Piggy-ness is kind of a fine line, Larry. Hard to walk next to it and not fall in," said Lori.

"Have I been a pig about December?"

"You shot a frickin' web cam show with her climbing on you almost naked," said Lori.

"W'ull," said Larry, as Emily gasped, "that's how she makes her living. So if someone didn't go to college – and can't, cuz she's a Dreamer – and has other ways of making money, legally... that's bad?"

"We're not talking about Dee being bad," said Lori. "It's about being a pig."

"Time out," I said. "We all go places online that would horrify our friends and neighbors."

"True," said Ed. "Let's face it. Our client is going to blow money – probably a lot – and to some of us, a lot of that money will have been wasted. But, it's Larry's money. Let's all do our best as long as this gig lasts. We won't solve the piggy debate here, so I'm gonna finish my report and hand it back to Lawrence."

Larry opened his soda cup and took in a mouthful of ice, which he chomped loudly. "Sounds good to me," he said.

"Alright, Ed, finish," I said.

"We have the liquid funds in currency. We have consensus on the mix of funds vs. bonds vs. equities. Last point is do we want any real property'? Some of that would fall under the foundation and trusts, but how 'bout it, Larry?"

"What?" said Larry, his cup now tipped upside down as he tapped on the bottom to get the last of his ice.

"Wanna buy houses? Office space? An island somewhere?"

"An island?" said Larry. "Why would I want an island?"

"Chew on the property question," said Ed. "Maybe there's a special space you've always wanted, or some building you thought it'd be cool to work at." Ed started stacking debris onto his tray. "That's it for me."

"Lori," I said, savoring the word as it came out. "Anything?"

"No, just that I may not be sticking around much longer," she said, "Might be re-upping."

"In the army?" I said. "Again?"

"I might," she said. "We'll see."

"That's cool," said Ed. "Brave shit."

"Yeh, whatever," said Lori. "I'm good at it. The whole deal works for me. We'll see."

"What about the movie?" asked Larry.

"The movie?" asked Emily.

"These filmmakers from Denmark want Lori to star in a movie," said Larry.

"Star?" I asked. "Those two we drove down with?"

"Do you have a contract?" asked Ed.

"When you get an offer, show me the contract and I'll go over it before you sign," said Emily.

"Me and Emily can help negotiate terms," said Ed. "I love dealing with entertainment people. They're fuckin' wacked."

"Lawrence," said Larry, "what about you?"

"I don't know anything about movies."

"No," said Larry, saving me. "The meeting.... Your report."

"Signature control," I said. "Cashflow."

"I'm not getting a vault," said Larry, "but I get the whole vault-and-register thing, so we're on the same page there. And I appreciate the level of concern you're showing, Lawrence, to make sure that I don't totally just blow everything I've won."

"Wow," I said. "That's, um, really well said. Thanks."

* * *

Larry van der Bix waved awkwardly to Emily Kashabara, as she entered Modica's deli, from Ocean Boulevard, as though she might otherwise miss him in the dining room. She set her small bag down on the plastic chair at the table, leaned her skateboard on the chair and sat in another, across from Larry and next to the wide, plate-glass window that overlooked the stretch where downtown Long Beach touched the water and once stood the Pike – among the most popular pleasure zones in the nation in its heyday.

"Thanks for joining me," said Larry. "Thought you might like a place with metal forks and interesting cheeses. The pastrami's good here, too... like, really good." He pointed to the next room, with its glass case of marinated asparagus spears, basil with sliced tomato and mozzarella, multiple pasta salads, and a shelf containing plates each with a slice of dark chocolate mousse cake or a pair of filled cannoli. Emily took her wallet into the next room as Larry drank soda water and flipped through the local weekly paper, the Grunion Gazette, stopping at a piece about the future of the Queen Mary.

"Nice selection of sandwiches," said Emily, sitting down and setting plastic number onto the table, alongside Larry's.

"So, a question," said Larry. "When your mom got into trouble with the tax board, did it mean she couldn't be in business anymore?"

Emily raised her eyebrows. "Uh, well, um, she closed her video business, but business people tend to be business people, so it didn't take her too long to figure out another line, and she opened another shop. She's doing antiques right now, though that's pretty slow. The recession and all."

"Yeh," said Larry.

"As long as she is paying rent and can turn a profit, then the only person she has to report to is herself," said Emily. "Sort of envy her in that way, but it's a really scary idea to me. She's carrying a lot of debt. I don't think I could do that."

"You're a lawyer, though," said Larry. "Don't you owe a ton of student debt?"

"But that's different."

"You're both still carrying debt. Whose is bigger?"

"Mine, probably. Over a hundred grand. I don't even want to think about it."

A white platter with a pastrami sandwich as long as an arm and just as wide, with melted Swiss and gloriously yellow mustard dripping from the edges, cut across the conversation.

"My God," said Emily.

"It's even better then it looks," said Larry. "It may be the best pastrami sandwich you'll ever have in your life. In two lives."

Another platter, with a grilled sandwich, a side of asparagus, tomatoes and a small plate with a slice of dark chocolate cake replaced the number Emily had set down,

"What's that one?" asked Larry.

"Roasted bell peppers, goat cheese, dried tomato, basil and greens," said Emily.

"Sounds healthy."

The two ate joyfully.

"So where's your mom's shop now?"

"In Hermosa Beach," said Emily. "Kashabara's Place." I told her it was a so-so name, but she said people still look her up that way, so...." Larry broke his sandwich apart and offered a three-inch section to Emily, who nodded while working on her own sandwich, but when done chewing added, "there's no way I'll ever finish this."

"That's why God invented styrofoam," said Larry.

As Emily bit in to the pastrami, she rolled her eyes upwards slightly and gave out a soft groan.

* * *

Larry and Ed wandered through the business machines aisle of Antique Warehouse, stopping occasionally so Larry could poke the buttons of gray or yellowing metallic or plastic cash registers.

"So how serious are you about these models?" asked Ed.

"I haven't seen a model here I like," said Larry.

"No, Ewa Sonnet and your Italian friend with the big blood."

"Hot blood."

"I bet," said Ed. "So, what're you gonna do for Ewa Sonnet? Finance an album?"

"Well, maybe," said Larry, "or try to break her in to the U.S. market."

"I checked her out and as best I can tell, the girl can barely speak English," said Ed.

"Depending on the videos, that might not be too big a problem."

"True," said Ed. "And Anekee?"

"Like I said," said Larry, "some sort of vehicle where people are following her because she's so hot-headed."

"Where's the money in that?"

"There may not be any up front," said Larry, stopping at a green register. He looked it over, poked, and walked on. "It may be down the line, when my support allows her to build a unique brand in the marketplace."

"As what? An opinioned model?"

"Why not? If the internet means someone will pay Ane to talk, why shouldn't she use her gifts that way?" said Larry. "There aren't many talking heads who think as deeply as she does, and when you pull back the camera there's more to her than a gray suit."

"You are correct on that one," said Ed. "And Miss Mini Skirt, Odalys Garcia?"

"W'ull, she's already a proven media property," said Larry. A highly-polished silver register drew Larry's eye.

"She's the host of fuckin' Spanish candid camera, man," said Ed. "What? Are you gonna fund a movie version of it?"

"She's got that, and calendars and posters and albums. Maybe she can act. Or maybe just some other TV show. Sofia Vergara got her break doing a travel show on Spanish language TV." Larry raised his hand as a staff member in a blue vest walked up the aisle, and, with Larry waving, kept walking. "I mean, 'Lente Loco' is an imprint and she's got a built-in audience...."

"Half of which wants to see her get naked," said Ed. "Sixty percent, if you count straight men and lesbians."

"See? You're the one who says this stuff and I get in trouble."

"ZTL, dude," said Ed. "Zip the lips. You can't be called a pig for what you don't say." The two rounded the end of one aisle and continued down another row of business machines. "And December Carrero?"

"What about December?"

"Is it just cuz you want these women to pop out their tits for you? Cuz, dude, if that's where you're going with this, there's easier ways...."

"No, it's not about that," said Larry. "Everyone always goes straight to sex, and it's not about that. I grew up with people telling me how I oughta do this, I need to do that and I hated it. I vowed never to tell another person what they ought to do, but if I can make it possible for my friends to do what they want...."

"Friends... December, okay, you did a road trip together," said Ed. "Anekee, you've been writing back and forth with for how long?"

"Almost ten years."

"But never met, right?"

"W'ull, um," said Larry, "not in person."

"And Ewa? And Odalys Garcia? Do they even really know you exist?"

"Um, no."

"So maybe what turns people sour on your plans is the fantasy aspect," said Ed. "Me? I dig it. The smoking hot babes... the movie people... the wacked way you think. I like it. But you look like a guy at a strip club throwing twenties on stage. Impressive, but grody."

Larry looked both directions on the long aisle. "This isn't a fantasy. These are my friends. Or... some of them are."

"Well, dude," said Ed, "you got scads of money coming your way and you'll be a chick magnet until your body parts start falling off, so don't blow it all at once."

"I'm not seeing what I want here," said Larry. "I wanna ask if this is all they got."

Larry and Ed walked past the remaining adding machines, cash registers, copiers and computers of all shapes and sizes, finally making it back to the main aisle, where Norge and Philco refrigerators stood alongside teak credenzas, maple phonographs and row upon row of bookshelves and cabinets, to the customer service counter, where an elderly, well-dressed man sat behind a gleaming, golden cash register.

"Can I help you, gentlemen?" he asked.

Larry ran his hands along the back of the golden register, as one would a lover returned from a long journey.

* * *

Larry sat on the sand, a Mexican blanket wrapped around him as he looked out to sea, at the tall figure walking out of the waves, up the shore, towards him. Lori, in her olive green swimsuit, stood like an Olympic champion, towering over Larry, when she finally reached him. He opened the blanket and stood, shaking the sand from it and then letting the wind spread it so they could both sit. Lori grabbed her rolled-up towel, put it around her shoulders, and sat cross-legged on the cotton blanket. Both she and Larry looked out to the sea.

Larry's phone rang. He let it ring. He let several calls in a row go to "missed," as the two watched the pelicans diving into the water, neither saying a word, each as silent as the pelicans. Finally, Larry reached into his pocket, and, without looking at the screen, pushed and held the red button, silencing the device.
Chapter Thirteen – A Check from the Governor

Larry van der Bix stood fidgeting in front of a California Lottery backdrop, as a technician wheeled a full-studio-version television camera into position, the wheels of the unit lined up with blue duct tape on the linoleum flooring. Larry checked his shirt pocket, removing and examining the giveaway Southwest Airlines pen in his pocket, before carefully placing it back in his pocket.

Bright lights flashed and glowed around Larry. He raised his arms to the orbiting glowing suns, and under the shade of his hand he watched as Governor Jerry Brown, and a group of uniformed workers crowded the stage near Larry. A line of uniformed park rangers stood several feet behind the Governor, whose bald head reflected glare from the overhead lighting, as a makeup artist applied powder to his head.

Two voices — a male and a female – welcomed viewers to the California Lottery channel. "With us is Larry van der Bix, of Long Beach, winner of one of the biggest MegaMillions™ jackpots in state history," said the woman. "Let's look...," said the man, as the holographic video of the numbers being pulled for Larry's $284 million jackpot played.

The blanket of lights – harsh and bright – glowed around Larry, prompting his pores to open, as though on cue, with instruction to release any moisture they held.

"I normally don't do these, kid," whispered a gravelly voice at Larry's side.

"Thank you for coming, Mister Governor," said each of the hosts.

"My pleasure. I am here to present a lump-sum payment," said Brown, holding an oversized check, "and with federal taxes extracted – California not receiving one penny of state tax, I might add – here is the check for your winnings, son." Larry reached to touch the oversized check, but as he stepped forward, he again raised his arm to shield his eyes from the studio lighting, knocking the check out of the Governor's hands. As the hosts scrambled to pick up the foam-core-board check and regroup for the photo op, Larry kept his hand above his eyes, and his pores continued their drainage. Larry's shirt clung wetly to his body.

"And, cut."

The lights dimmed and Larry blinked.

"Am I entering from the left or the right for this next shot?" asked the gravelly voice. Workers rolled into place a tall backdrop with a dark blue curtain against which was set a white oval depicting the state Capitol. The female host removed the California Lottery logo from the podium and, seconds later, a young man in a crisp suit affixed the circular seal of The Governor of the State of California onto the podium.

Larry, having remained in place, was now standing alongside the Governor's podium, slightly behind where Jerry Brown would be standing, with the row of uniformed state park rangers alongside him. The lighting rose on Larry and the wardens, with two spotlights aimed to the podium. The studio camera glowed red.

The Governor of the State of California entered the stage and strode directly to the podium and began to speak.

"Thank you, today I have the pleasure of welcoming to Sacramento again — because we met earlier, at a local steakhouse — a young man, from Long Beach, and not just from Long Beach, but a member of one of the families that pioneered our state's sixth-largest city – used to be fifth, but now Fresno; number five – Mr. Larry van der Bix."

Larry smiled weakly and nodded several times, before finally waving feebly.

The Governor turned his body so he was speaking directly to Larry. "Son, you had asked us to join you. Is there something you wanted to say?"

"Uh, yeh," said Larry.

After a moment of silence from Larry, the Governor guided Larry to the podium. "Yeh, sir, um, it was a steakhouse," said Larry, patting his pocket, "but when the Governor told me I hit all five plus the mega, he gave me this pen, and said the state parks sure could use some money." Larry reached his hand into his shirt pocket and struggled to pull out the pen, finally producing a plastic Southwest Airlines pen. "This's how everybody knew it was true. And I like parks, so I am gonna do it, but not with a big check... it'll only be on this," said Larry, reaching into his trousers and pulling a plastic Farmers & Merchants Bank checkbook. "I'm gonna write a check with this free pen... Dang it... is this thing out'ta ink? Okay, there... I'm just gonna come up with a number," said Larry, writing with his hand tightly gripping the very tip of the pen. "And then spell it out... eighteen million... oh, damn... cramp...." Larry stopped, spreading open his fingers and then returned to writing. "... and four-hundred-ninety-two-thousand... and, um, 64 cents." Larry wrote "State Parks per EGBjr" in the area for memo and signed his name on the bottom right. "So, here, Governor, you said the state parks could use it. You can also have your pen back, too. I know you're cheap."

"Keep it, kid," said the Governor, as the studio camera rolled to within six feet of Larry and the Governor. Two of the park rangers circled in front and took out snapshot cameras to photograph Larry handing his personal check for $18,492,800.64 to the Governor. "Mr. van der Bix," said the Governor, gently and insistently extracting the narrow slip of paper from Larry's grip, "your gift is extremely generous, and noting your memo, I pledge that this contribution will be directed as you indicate to our beautiful state parks." The Governor finally succeeded at extracting the check from Larry's hand. "And thank you, not only on my behalf, but for the men and women who staff our state parks, some of whom are with us today."

When the Governor stopped speaking, Larry was mobbed by the rangers, hands outstretched and every person smiling. For nearly a minute, hands were patting Larry on the back and shoulder or reaching to grip his hand. Brown looked on, from the podium.

"Well deserved, kid," said the Governor, muscling in and shaking Larry's hand in prolonged, photo op fashion, as the park rangers formed an orderly line behind the pair.

The studio lighting was switched off. Jerry Brown exited stage left. The young man in the crisp suit removed the Governor's seal from the podium. Workers wheeled off the dark blue backdrop. After another round of jovial handshakes, the rangers left. A minute later, Larry was alone on stage. The two Lottery public information staffers who had served as hosts for the big check handoff stood in the spots they had held throughout the Governor's photo op.

"Well," said the woman, holding a clipboard, "perhaps your team would wish to join you for the disbursement conference."

"What an incredibly generous gift," said the man. "The Governor will give your check to the Treasurer, who will then deposit it into the state's account, and so you've got a little time before the check hits. Don't want to bounce a check for eighteen-and-a-half million dollars to the State."

"Won't be doing that," said Larry, walking towards the PR duo.

* * *

"Off the top, my client asks the taxing authority to subtract against the overall asset, or exempt, the eighteen million dollar check given to the Governor for parks," said Emily Kashabara, standing with her back to a panoramic window showing the forested riverbank and the snaking, dark-blue American River. "As the chronology of this gift, as laid out in Attachment IIIa, states, the origin of this transaction was the initial encounter at Morton's, where the Governor suggests a gift for state parks and hands Larry a pen. The memo on the check – 'per EGBjr' – suggests to any reasonable person that my client transacted this sum at the behest of the Governor. Therefore, my client seeks to be spared the 35% federal rate on this item," said Emily, to the group of tax officials seated around a long, austere, wooden conference table.

"Decision deferred, but the request will be considered," said an official sitting behind a paper nameplate, on which was printed simply "IRS."

Emily nodded to Lori, who stood, holding a stack of stapled papers. The stack rested in the crook of her arm, just inches above her navel and the thin sliver of skin visible under her short David Bowie tee-shirt. The scent of oranges lingered around Lori and her skin glowed a warm honey brown. On the drumming of Emily's fingers, Lori swiftly distributed a set of papers to each of the seven individuals seated at the table.

"Foundations, two are outlined; one is purely personal – the Fantasy Fund – and non-exempt; the second – the California Sunshine Fund – will be a 501(c)(3) philanthropic fund, based upon the By-Laws, Articles and Statement of Officers included," said Emily, casually.

"Each to be considered as submitted," said the IRS official.

"Trusts, six, as noted in support notes, identical to draft 1.32 distributed to this office four days ago, save the disposition of dollars, as outlined here," said Emily, who took a sip from a diet Coke. "Consideration?"

"Taken upon advisement," said a figure seated behind the placard that read "FTB." Others around the table took notes.

"Any other matters taxable?" asked the IRS representative.

"None taxable," said Emily, casually, holding her soda can.

"Very good, thank you," said the IRS official. "Decisions will be transmitted through the means of contact outlined in earlier communications." Those around the table closed their folders, gathered papers and stood, exiting as a single group, leaving Larry, Lori, me, and Ed with the two PR people.

* * *

"The client believes in flexibility and liquidity," Ed Lossé said, standing while making his presentation to a different group of officials, seated around another conference table. Water glasses and cans of soda sat on circular disc coasters. "Euro, yen, dollars; metals; short- and long-term government debt.... Prefers tax deferred, of course..." Ed pointed to the cooler on the floor alongside the table. "There'a Cactus Cooler in that thing?"

"Cactus what?" said an aide, reaching a hand into a layer of ice, pulling up a green can. "7-Up?"

"Naw, orange can, cooler... Cactus Coo...."

The hand plunged back into the ice and brought up a brown and white can. "Root beer... wait, orange?" and with a fast twist and another pull upwards, the hand held an orange can displaying a stylized saguaro cactus and handed it to Ed, who smiled in a way that drew all eyes to his face. Ed popped the soda and a faintly-orange mist sprayed out, offering the smell of pineapple and orange.

"I think we're making progress," said Ed.

"A question," said one of the distant voices. "On expenses..., let's see... oh, yes, page 9 of your final appendix... 'Investment in modeling, photography, and video services.' Could you explain that 'investment?'"

"Why? There is no request for tax exemption," said Ed. "The client will be paying in real, post-tax dollars for linear services and investing in business plans."

Two aides stood in a hushed mini-conference, each pointing to spots on their respective papers and whispering to the seated figure who had raised the question. The figure deftly lifted the papers out of the hands of one aide, glancing at it in passing. "Picqued my curiosity," said the figure, letting the papers fall to the table.

"Then I can answer that," said Larry, taking an apparent interest in the conversation, pulling himself away from his study of the soda cans on the table, which he had stacked into a pyramid, a wall, a tower and other shapes.

"My client's role here is not to speak, per se," I quickly injected, hoping to cut Larry off from attempting to explain away the weakest part of our presentation. Ed sat down and turned to me, folding his hands in his lap.

"If he'd like to say something, this is about his wishes," said the seated speaker. "Isn't it, son?"

"Everybody thinks they're my parent," said Larry. "You, the Governor, but he gave me a pen," and Larry felt in his shirt pocket, then the front of his Dickies trousers, producing a Southwest Airlines pen.

"Is that all you have to say, Mr. van der Bix?"

"What? About the models?"

"Yes, if you wish."

"W'ull, it's not what you'd think," said Larry. "There's lots of beautiful people, who are plenty ugly inside, so it isn't about the surface."

The seated figures nodded and slightly gyrated in their chairs, like caterpillars.

"Why models? How do they figure in to this?"

"I have this friend, in Italy... Anekee. I know that her life has been really hard until only just the last few years. It took her a long time to get free from the awful life she was trapped in, but now she's a single mom and everything's working out good for her. But this would let me pay her to build a charismatic personality website, linked to pay sites, but those would... would... Lawrence? What about those sites?"

"... All derived revenue streams would be segregated and reconciled under a strict regime of accounting protocols, we a written contract stipulating royalties," I said.

"It sounds like you want to make dreams come true," said a seated figure.

"I believe we should view such spending as routine conduct of business as outlined within the provided attachments," said another seated figure. "I move approval."

"I don't like it," said a third person at the table. The aides in the room suddenly began writing. "These gifts take hedonistic form. Spending is untraceable. Vulnerability and exploitation walk hand-in-hand. I simply cannot sit idly by and let legitimate concerns go unvoiced."

"Anything more, son?" said the figure who had spoken of making dreams come true.

"Me?" said Larry. ''I'll take advice and listen to my team, but if it's my money, then I'm gonna be the decider." Larry waved his arm towards his team. "I'm really lucky, because not only do I have really great help with investment and tax issues, but yeh, no. Was that the question you asked?"

"Spellbinding," said Lori.

"Son," said the central figure, softly, "what are ya gonna do when you're with the models?"

"What all friends do. Talk, eat, work, go to the movies," said Larry. "With Ane, it's gonna mean having someone translate, although her English is better than my Italian."

The third figure sat upright. "I see no reason to presume negatively this foundation so long as accurate and verifiable account is taken of all expenditures, obligations and receipts. It's not for us to judge. I second the motion." The aides wrote.

"Great," said Ed. "Do you need to... vote? Or... okay, moving on to the cinematic investment. European content. EU produced. Stake may rise from single millions to as high as ten million. Purely speculative. Request is to seek a 'clear and release' order so we can execute rights."

The left seated figure sat up, looked into the soda tub, reached a hand up, and dipped rapidly, a moment later holding a Lipton unsweetened tea. Before the hand had lowered, a female voice said, "tea, here," and the figure stood, stretched and handed the can to Lori before again plunging wrist-deep and this time pulling out a red Coke can. "I support yes on all questions." A flurry of writing, silence, and Ed moved to his next points.

* * *

"And Mr. van der Bix, your signatures on this last set of papers will complete the documentation for the distribution of your lump sum payment," said a tall, very well dressed woman in her 40s, standing at a wide desk with its amazing view to the river, this being the corner office on the top floor of the building.

"This is it?" asked Ed. "After he signs those, we can blow out'ta here?"

"That's right," said the tall woman. "The electronic transfers have been made."

"So when I am done with this, then I don't have any more business here?"

"Correct," said the woman, straightening, smiling less.

"Then I have a request...."

* * *

Larry stood to the edge of a wide marble counter in the lobby on the ground floor.

I looked at Larry's reflection in the polished marble and mirrors, behind the counter, as he carefully lifted each sheet of paper, and used his Southwest Airlines pen to affix his signature. The woman with long red hair waited patiently for each signature and, upon the last one, lightly touched Larry's hand with the tip of her finger. Larry looked up immediately. "You're done, Larry. You've finished everything." The woman put down her pen and just smiled to Larry. "I'm happy for you. Good luck."

Larry looked at the woman for a long time, and with a faint smile, before finally saying, "Will you please be in a picture with me?" A moment later, he was holding his ceremonial big check, smiling widely, and looking squarely to her face and slowly, delicately reaching his hand towards her tangle of red hair.

And then the cameras were gone.

Finally Lori whispered, "Bix...."

Larry separated from the woman with the red hair and exited the shining tower.
Chapter Fourteen – Rowing the Whitehall

Larry van der Bix lay on the sand, his head resting on the crisp, red nylon covering of the flotation device from his newly-purchased 14-foot rowboat. He pulled idly at a heavy cord wrapped around his hand that hung limply from the bow of the Whitehall, pulled far up onto the shore. Larry looked out lazily towards the palm trees lining the beach.

"Dude," called out Ed Lossé. "Let's get back on the water." Ed, in long, brightly colored trunks and an equally colorful shirt, tossed the towel and brown bag he had been carrying into the boat, and started to gather up the four oars, flotation devices and several empty beer bottles from alongside the rowboat. He lifted the oar rings from their hardware mounted on the railings of the boat and slid one onto each of the four oars, laying the oars across the width of the rowboat.

Larry's phone rang as he stood up. "Hey, Lori," said Larry. "Naw, me and Ed are on the peninsula. We could row and meet'cha if you want. Might take us awhile." Larry watched Ed as he grabbed two tie lines, pulling them together so as to slide the Whitehall towards the water.

"We meetin' up with Swim Chick?" asked Ed, knee-deep in the water as he held the rowboat parallel to the beach, holding each tie line tightly as Larry deftly climbed in, and carefully lifted first one and then a second oar so he could lower the peg of each oar ring into its mount, clinking brass upon brass. Ed tossed the tie lines into the boat and climbed in, taking the seat in front of Larry and also lifting and placing each oar into position. They gave a pull together on the starboard oar, turning the rowboat.

"Hey, see," said Ed, "told'ja we'd get into a groove on this thing."

Awkwardly, each pushed forward with both oars, sending the boat into the straight that separated the Peninsula from Treasure Island and Naples. When they had reached the center of the straight, each held their starboard oar motionless and pulled on the port oar. They then began pulling each oar equally, moving the boat towards the main bay and, beyond that, into the jetty that led to the calm waters of the protected harbor shared by Long Beach and San Pedro. With two people rowing, the Whitehall made quick time through the jetty.

"Damn, that's choppy," said Ed, as the rowboat emerged from the narrow confines of the jetty, into the protected waters of the harbor. The bow of the rowboat began to lift and drop into the waters of the harbor. While the federal breakwater built during World War II to protect warships from being torpedoed by the Japanese kept the harbor safe from the full force of the Pacific's waves, a rowboat — even a 14-foot Whitehall, with its wide hull and steadying keel — reminds occupants of their puniness against the ocean. The two continued pulling, finding harmony, cutting through the low-but-choppy waves, towards the Belmont Pier.

"So, buddy," said Ed, pulling as he yelled over his shoulder, "what's the origin to the whole tit fascination?"

"What?" yelled Larry, rowing in time with Ed, the jetty receding in the distance.

"Tits!" yelled Ed, "what's the big thing about tits...!"

"What?" yelled Larry again, as a wave smacked the side of the boat, spraying both.

Ed half-turned his body, stopping his rowing, suspending his oars above the water. "Shit, there's water in the bottom."

"We gotta get Lori," yelled back Larry. "C'mon. Row."

Another wave dropped more water into the boat.

"Shit!" yelled Ed.

"Turn!" yelled Larry.

Ed, trying first one oar in the water, and then another, succeeded only at halting the movement of the Whitehall.

"Put yer oars up!" yelled Larry, who deftly maneuvered the boat into the direction of open sea. The bow of the boat cut through the oncoming waves. After half-a-minute, Larry again turned so the boat was headed directly to the shore. As they drew nearer to land, the choppiness lessened.

"Bail while I row!" yelled Larry.

Ed grabbed the only vessel able to hold water – a beer bottle – and pushed it into the water at the bottom of the boat, creating little air bubbles as it filled. Ten seconds later, he lifted the bottle and poured out the few ounces that had collected in the bottle, as another wave lapped over the stern.

"Keep bailing!" yelled Larry, as he pulled harder.

Ed, holding the beer bottle under the water, started to retch.

The Whitehall rose and fell in gentle crashes, as Larry turned his head to see Ed bent forward. "Keep bailing!"

Ed came up with the bottle and poured out a few ounces. As he poured, he vomited over the side of the boat.

"Everything okay?" yelled Larry, not turning.

Ed continued vomiting.

Larry turned his head to see Ed, pale-faced, gripping the edge of the boat with one hand and a narrow-necked beer bottle with the other. Quickly shifting both oars so they could be held by one hand, Larry grabbed the bottle, struck it downward against the rail of the boat, sending the neck into the sea, and handed it back to Ed. Ahead to their left was the Belmont Pier.

"Lori's at the fish dock," yelled Larry. "Almost there." Larry returned to two-handed rowing, adjusting direction and looking over his shoulder to check his navigation.

Ed, now pulling up a full bottle at a time, kept bailing, while spitting out last bits of vomit. Several minutes later, unable to draw out more water, Ed dropped the bottle beside him and grabbed the two oars that had been pulled in straight across the hull. He found Larry's rhythm just before the boat arrived along side the boat dock at the end of the pier. Larry, slowing the rowboat with both oars, yelled for Ed to tie it off.

"Guys!" yelled Lori, on the dock.

"Swim Chick!" yelled Ed, to the tall blond in the olive-green bikini. As Larry drew the boat parallel to the dock, Ed tossed the tie line to Lori, who held it as Ed reached for a second line, which he then also threw.

"Get the glass out!" Larry yelled to Ed, who tossed overboard shards of green glass. "Watch your feet, Lori!" yelled Larry.

Lori turned and extended one foot into the rowboat as Ed watched her ass. Once she was in, Ed pulled in both ties lines, while Larry held a dock cleat. Ed kept watching Lori's ass, the word "ARMY" in white letters across her backside. Lori slid onto the seat, next to Ed, and took up one oar, as Larry pushed off and swiftly had both his oars in the water.

Ed, unable to find rhythm with either Larry or Lori, pulled lamely at his oar, causing the boat to skip left and right as Larry's pulling moved them ahead.

"In synch, man, c'mon," said Lori.

Ed held his oar above the water, waiting for Lori to come forward for another pull. He dropped his oar in with hers and the two pulled together, in time with Larry, sending the Whitehall swiftly across the water.

* * *

Ed, taking Lori's extended hand, stepped up from the boat, as Larry held the cleat on his grandmother's dock. Larry tied off the rear rope as Lori tied the bow. Before climbing up to the dock, Larry lifted each of his oars, removing the oar ring and handing the oars up to Lori, and setting the rings on the dock. He climbed to the seat ahead and did the same with the second pair of oars. He gathered the four flotation devices and handed them to Ed, before climbing out.

"Fuck," said Lori, as she walked with a limp. "Think I may have taken some glass."

"Do you need to see a doctor?" asked Larry.

"Maybe," said Lori, grimacing. "Let me see if it gets worse."

"What were you asking out there?" said Larry, to Ed. "I missed all that."

"I'll ask you later," said Ed, walking wobbly.

* * *

December Carrera, wearing only a bikini bottom, lay on her belly on the lounger next to the breakfast table on Emma Mathilde's balcony.

"Oh, December," said Larry, as he, Lori and Ed made their way out.

"Hey, Dee," said Lori.

December, turning her head, cooed, "Hey, Baby.... Hey, sweeties."

"Where's my grandma?" asked Larry.

"Your dad took her to a doctor appointment," said December. "Just left. He said it's okay for me to be topless up here."

"I'm sure he did," said Ed.

"Doctor?" said Larry.

"Dat's what he said," said December, "over and over."

"Did she look okay?"

"She looked, fine," said December. "I mean, she's old, but I wanna look that good in my 90s...."

"Towel?" asked Lori, stepping back out onto the balcony and handing a bath towel to December, who wrapped the towel around her, tucking the end into her deep cleavage.

"Good moment to take a break," said Ed, stepping inside.

"Did'ya do lots of swimmin', Baby?" purred December running her hands over Lori's shoulders and arms.

"Six miles maybe," said Lori. "Pier to the jetty and back." Lori sat on the edge of the lounger and melted into December's hands. When Ed reappeared, the two were curled together on a deck hammock, spooning under the shade of an oversized parasol.

Larry went in to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and began pulling out meats, cheeses, breads, condiments, veggies and several bottles of juices.

"Yeh," said Ed, walking in to the kitchen as Larry prepared a spread. "About what I was asking...."

Larry worked at cutting a pork roast into thin slices, which he brushed with a gelatinous glaze from a small bowl before setting onto slices of dark, brown bread.

"What's the origin of the whole tit thing?"

"The what?" said Larry, briefly stopping his slicing to look at Ed.

"Just the whole tit thing," repeated Ed. "There's gotta be some origin. I mean, don't get me wrong, tits are great, but...."

"Look, I get what Emily and Lori are saying, cuz you're really starting to annoy me," said Larry, wrapping the roast pork back in foil and moving on to slice a red bell pepper.

"Ewa Sonnet, and the Italian chick...."

"Anekee," said Larry. "She's Dutch, actually...."

"Yeh, whatever," said Ed, picking up a slice of meat from a piece of bread. "I mean, did your mom have a huge rack or you just have a thing for women with big tits?"

"I never met my mom, or don't remember her anyway," said Larry, swatting Ed's hand from the meat.

"Dude," said Ed, pulling his hand back, "you've asked me to contact some of the biggest-titted women in the world to see if they will meet with you about projects and investments. I mean, unless there's something I'm missing, I'd assume you're picking and choosing based on cup size."

Larry stopped cutting bell pepper and turned to Ed. "You're wrong."

"Okay, fuck me," said Ed, "but why these women? Why not just call Warren Buffet or Don Francisco or some chick in a power suit?"

"I don't like people like that."

"Like what? Successful?"

"Cut-throat. Mean. Greedy."

"And big-titted women somehow skip the greedy or mean gene?"

"I don't see the connection between people I support and what you're saying."

"Dude, December and Ewa and Anekee make their living swinging their tits online," said Ed, looking around the kitchen. "Odalys Garcia, same thing."

"That's totally wrong. Odalys is on TV and has her own show."

"Which viewers tune in to so they can look up her miniskirt and down her cleavage," said Ed. "Dude, she's a sex bomb. Why else would anyone watch candid camera?"

"Lente Loco."

"What-ev-er," said Ed. "I don't get how you even know these women. I mean... you!"

"December drove to Sacramento with me cuz she said I was a gentleman," said Larry. "Do you think someone like her would get in a car with a guy like me if it wasn't real?"

"Dude, yer the gentleman now," said Ed, "but you better start asking, 'is this person hanging with me just for the Benjamins?'"

"I'm gonna give you the same advice you gave me," said Larry, moving plates and a platter onto the silver rolling tray. "ZTL."

Larry finished loading glasses and juice bottles onto the rolling tray and wheeled it past Ed, towards the balcony, with Ed following. Outside, Lori and December still lay on the hammock, spooning. As Larry began loading the food onto the balcony table, December sat upright.

"C'mon, Hunny, let's eat," said December, standing, and reaching for Lori's hand.

Lori stood and stretched, while December watched her. As Larry loaded the last of the glasses onto the table, he looked to Ed. "That's never what I'd do. I wouldn't want someone who was my friend only for that."

"For what, Baby?" said December, scanning the table.

"Money," said Larry, sitting down.

"Pays the bills, but it's dirty," said December.

"So all the money the banks got, that was dirty?" asked Ed, across the table.

"Don't even go there," spat Lori. "Greedy pigs!"

"Money down a rathole," said December.

"So the United States government shouldn't have spent a penny to save the financial system?" goaded Ed.

"Why?" said Lori. "So banks could keep ripping off the little guy with fees and shit? They don't care about people. All they care about is money."

"Shouldn't someone care about money?" said Ed.

"Where's my bailout?" replied Lori. "Or my buddies who shipped out of Iraq missing a foot, a leg, an arm, but have to wait for disability? Bet they could use a few bucks."

"Didn't Larry buy you a house?" said Ed.

"Larry's not the frickin' government," replied Lori. "He paid off what was left on my folks' mortgage and I love him for it. But Larry's a little guy, the whole 99-percent thing."

"He's a One Percenter now," said Ed.

"I'm not the One Percent," said Larry, "and when I'm done handing all this away, I'll be back to normal."

"You'll always be normal," said Lori. "Well, as normal as normal is for you."

"You're all deluded," said Ed.

December examined the platters of food, with her hands on her hips. "Ed, if you make me lose my appetite, there's gonna be hell to pay."

"Subject change," said Lori.

"Yeh, anything," said Larry.

"Anyone watching, 'Lonely Island?'" asked Ed.

"Watching what?" asked Lori.

"Lonely Island," said December. "Reality show."

"Oh, I don't watch that shit," said Lori, leaning back, with a slice of bread and cheese.

"It's getting good," said Ed. "There's a shark in the lagoon." Ed piled a heap of meat and cheese onto a slice of bread and took an enormous bite, consuming almost a third.

"How can you care about that stuff?" said Larry. "It's so obviously fake."

Ed chewed. "It is not," he said between chewing. "No one knows who's gonna have to go in the water." More chewing. "Someone's always gotta swim with the shark."

"Hey, hot stuff, granola girl," said a booming voice. Calvin walked alone to the table and grabbed a slice of bread.

"Where's Grandma?" said Larry.

"They wanted to keep the Cow for a few days," said Calvin, setting himself down next to Ed, with a clear view to December and Lori. Calvin scooped up cheese and veggies for his slice of bread and then took a bite. Bits of fluffy white bread hung from Calvin's lips.

"Keep her? What do you mean, keep her? Where is she?"

"They can have the Cow for all I care," said Calvin.

"Where is she?" said Larry, more loudly.

"Long Beach Memorial."

"I thought it was just going to the doctor? What'd they say is wrong with her?"

Calvin took another bite. "She got dizzy. Now she is safe from falling. You should fuckin' thank me, you sniveling ingrate." He took another bite. "Won't hold my breath."

"We can go to the hospital in my car, sweetie," said December, looking to Larry.

"Not taking visitors," said Calvin. "She's out, right now."

"Out?" Larry looked to Lori, to December and then to Ed. The four rose and made their way to the studio, where December ducked into the changing room and emerged in a tank top and shorts.

* * *

"You can't be in here," said a nurse to the four gathered at Emma Mathilde's bed. December, Lori and Ed looked to Larry, who had not broken his concentration on the tubes, needles, bandages and medical devices in and on his grandmother.

"I want to see her doctor," said Larry, not looking up.

"Are you all... family?" asked the nurse.

Olive skin, white skin, dark skin; all said yes.

The nurse shook her head. "Right."

"Look," said Larry, "I'll buy a new wing for the hospital, but just get the doctor."

The nurse walked out of the room.

Lori sat in one of the chairs near the bed. "Damn, my foot is killing me."

"Oh my God! Baby! You're bleeding!" said December, pointing to the floor. One of Lori's high-tops was soaked through with blood, which had then formed drops that pooled on the floor.

"Oh my God, blood," said Ed, quickly stepping out of the room.

"Oh, fuck," said Lori, pulling her foot up to her thigh. She quickly untied her shoe and loosened the laces, pulling off the shoe and then her sock. Each was dripping with blood. As Lori used her fingers to probe and open the source of the blood, the glinting tip of a piece of green glass protruded from a jagged rip on her heel.

"Nurse!" yelled December. "Somebody!"

The nurse returned.

"My baby's hurt!" yelled December. "She's bleeding!"

The nurse leaned towards Lori's foot, looked without touching, reached into a jar of gauze pads, handed a stack to Lori, and instructed her to apply direct pressure and said she would return.

"Look," said Larry, to the nurse, "I'll pay out of pocket today for both my grandma and my friend, but please get someone who can help now."

The nurse exited.

December, on her knees, gently rubbed Lori's calves and leaned forward to kiss Lori's knee. "You'll be okay, Soldier Girl."

"Larry, Dee, look up there for tweezers or something," said Lori, holding a pad of gauze to her foot. Larry rifled through several drawers before producing a pair of long-stemmed scissor-like grips with a narrow, tweezer-like tip. "Bullseye, Bix," said Lori, grabbing the tool. December brought the jar with gauze pads and pulled out a handful. Lori leaned forward and instructed December to support her foot with both hands, with gauze cupped in her palms to catch falling blood. Lori used her fingers on one hand to open the ripped skin and the tip of glinting glass rose slowly from the crevice. Lori opened the tweezer tip of the tool and clamped down gently. "Got'cha, sucker," she said, pulling until a jagged shard of green glass about half the size of a dime came out. December applied the gauze directly to the wound and held it in place.

"Aw, baby, yer so brave," said December, again kissing Lori's knee.

"Larry, is there some sort of antiseptic wipe or alcohol up there?"

As Larry sifted through the open drawer, the nurse and a doctor, in a white coat, entered. "Excuse me," said the woman in the white coat, "but this isn't self-service."

Lori, still holding the clamp in her hand, lifted the tool, offering it to the woman, who took it and examined the shard dripping with blood. December, still on her knees, motioned with a nod to the bloody foot.

The doctor leaned forward, pulled away the already-soaked gauze, and looked at the broken skin. She reached to a box of latex gloves affixed to the wall, slid on first one and then a second glove, and probed the heel, drawing a grimace from Lori when she spread the ripped skin so she could shine a pen-sized flashlight into the wound. "Good extraction. No evidence of any remaining foreign object. Have you been admitted here? Or did this just happen?"

"Earlier today," said Larry. "She stepped on broken glass in a boat. But like I told the nurse, I'll pay cash today for her and my grandma."

The doctor turned to the nurse. "Admit her and x-ray the foot, after cleaning the wound." The nurse stepped out. "You should be fine, miss. You'll probably just be off that foot for a couple of weeks." The nurse returned with a wheelchair, indicating with hand signals for Lori to take a seat. "Does she not speak English, too?"

"I speak English," said Lori.

"Oh, the resemblance was so close and this patient hasn't said a word that anyone on staff could make out."

Lori climbed into the wheelchair and December took up position, ready to push her. The nurse led the two out of Emma Mathilde's room, leaving Larry alone with the doctor and his grandmother.

"You don't have to promise to build a new wing to our hospital just to get care here," said the doctor. "Things may not work that well healthcare-wise here in America, but we haven't quite reached that point."

"We're all Americans," said Larry. "My grandmother, me, my friends...."

"Oh," said the doctor. "I thought you were visitors. I'm Dr. Bosch. Your grandmother should be fine... when... when this all clears up."

"When what clears up?"

"The disorientation, more then anything," said the doctor. "She'll be out today, but when we bring her back around tonight or tomorrow...."

"Bring her around? What has she got?"

"When her son brought her in a few hours ago, she was unable to walk, vomiting, displaying signs of what appears to be vertigo. There doesn't appear to be anything physically wrong. And vertigo is a virus, so I am leaning towards that being the cause." The doctor closed the drawer that Larry had been rifling through and straightened the items on the counter. "In a couple of hours, we will perform a CAT-scan to see if she suffered a head injury. That's the last major physical thing I have yet to rule out."

"W'ull," said Larry, reaching for the chair Lori had been sitting in, "she has insurance, but I also have a lot of money, so whatever she needs, okay? Do I have to like sign papers?"

"The man who brought her in, is he... your father?"

"Looks like a pig? Yeh."

"Your father signed the admission papers, so everything is fine."

* * *

"Sorry about that, man," said Ed, as Larry walked into the ER waiting room. "I don't do blood." Ed offered Larry his opened bag of Skittles. "Taste the rainbow?"

"Naw, thanks," said Larry, slumping in a bucket-shaped chair near Ed's. Near the entry to the ER, two teenagers held a third teen by the arms, all walking in wobbly steps.

"So yer grandma's admitted and Lori's in," said Ed. "You wanna hang here or blow this joint?"

"What'ta'ya mean, blow this joint?" said Larry.

"We could hit someplace, ya' know, instead of staying in a hospital, with sick people and blood and shit." Ed poured the remaining candies into his mouth, releasing the wrapper, letting it float to the floor.

Larry looked at Ed and then to the wrapper. Ed leaned back in his chair and looked towards the TV, which showed CNN Headline News, with Barack Obama soundlessly addressing a crowd and then showing the smiling, young president shaking hands with a man and a woman, each in an orange reflector vest and hardhat.

"Pick that up."

Ed looked casually to Larry. "What?"

"The wrapper," said Larry, pointing to the red bag on the floor.

"Oh... man," said Ed, chuckling. "Be real."

"Pick it up," said Larry, his voice hardening. "Don't... litter."

Ed laughed. "You serious, man? Without me, janitors would lose their jobs."

"I'm serious. You're not gonna work for me if you're a... a... litterbug."

Ed, doing an exaggerated double-take, leaned forward, picked up the wrapper, and placed it on the table that separated his seat from Larry's. "Dude," said Ed, "priorities."

"Throw it away," said Larry, pointing to the trash can.

Ed stood and walked to a trash can near the entry, and demonstrably dropped in the candy wrapper. He returned to the seat next to Larry. "C'mon, dude, let's blow this joint."

"We don't have a car, and I'm not leaving my grandmother and Lori here."

"Dude," said Ed, "you could order a frickin' limo and we could be at the Peppermint Elephant in ten minutes."

"Hey," said Lori, in a wheelchair, as December pushed her into the ER waiting room. The two men watched December and Lori approach, one in a tank top clinging to her enormous breasts and the other toned and tanned like a goddess, in a short tee.

"Of course," said Ed, watching the pair, "we don't have to go."

"You okay?" asked Larry.

"Foot's okay," said Lori, "but doctor says ocean swims won't work until the wound completely seals. Too much bacteria in the ocean off Long Beach." Lori had one hand on December's, which rested on her shoulder.

"What about your training?" said Larry.

"I've been going to meets for almost three years," said Lori, as December's hands moved from shoulders onto Lori's arms and upper chest. "It's all points and formula.... Pat's tracking all that Olympics stuff."

"Olympics, as in, the Olympics?" said Ed.

"My baby's a stud," said December.

"Who's Pat?" asked Ed.

"Mrs. Pat's Champs," corrected Larry.

"Pat won gold in Fifty-Two and Fifty-Six; Women's Diving," said Lori. "She's been one of my trainers since I was a kid. Big on the whole head thing. Be strong in your head. That's where you win or lose it."

"Wow," said Ed. "Army... Olympics... What kind of stuff are you made of?"

"Same as anyone else," said Lori. "But ocean swims are my strength swims. If I'm not doing those, I'd need to be in a training center with this foot."

"A training center...," said Larry, slowly repeating Lori's words.

"Doc says it shouldn't keep me from re-upping, if I go that direction, so, whatever. Unless I'm training somewhere, there's too little time before trials to lose a few weeks. This may just sort of end the Olympics thing, I guess." Lori squeezed December's hand. "It's all good."

"My baby's so brave," said December, leaning forward to kiss Lori's cheek.

"Tongue kiss 'er," yelled one of the teens.

* * *

"Bix," said Lori, from the door of Emma Mathilde's room, causing Larry to stir from his sleep. He sat up in the chair, a line of drool hanging from his lips. "December drove me to your place to get you some clothes and basics." Lori entered, looking over her shoulder back to the door. "And these two... insisted...."

"Hal-lowww," said Tres von Sommerberg, from the doorway. He entered the room and a split second later, Lena, camera on her shoulder, followed. "I'm really sorry to hear...."

"Really sorry," said Lena, the camera on Tres, Larry and the unconscious Emma.

Dr. Bosch entered, looking at the film crew before she sat next to Larry. "More... family?"

"An idiot cousin," said Larry.

"Would you like privacy for our conversation?" asked the doctor.

"It's okay," said Larry. "They're fine."

"Okay," said Dr. Bosch, looking at the camera just a couple feet from her. "The tests on the brain show no physical abnormalities. Blood work shows nothing unusual. Based on your account of her recent history, there isn't anything that would lead us to suspect any chronic condition. Actually, she is in remarkable shape for a woman in her 90s. Will anyone be staying with her? Having someone there would be very helpful."

"Yeh, yeh," said Larry. "Someone."

"No one was able to cross the language barrier," said the doctor. "That seems to have stranded her on an island.... Alone among many."

"It's Danish," said Larry.

"What's that?" said the doctor, absently.

"Danish. She speaks Danish."

"I don't know we have anyone on staff...."

"I gotta go, Larry, said Lori, handing him the bag she had brought. She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "Dee and I will come back tonight."

"It's okay," said Larry. "Don't worry about tonight. Rest your foot."

Lori, walking with a slight limp, exited, as Lena followed the departure with the camera.

"Your grandmother is unconscious because your father authorized her to be sedated when be signed the original admission papers," said Dr. Bosch, holding a file folder.

"My dad said put her out?" asked Larry. "What other papers did he sign?"

"He filed a DNR, a next of kin, and...,"

"DNR? What's a DNR?"

"Do Not Resuscitate," said Dr. Bosch. "The instruction was to not authorize use of a respirator, feeding tube or other heroic measures, should she fall into a vegetative state or should her body fail catastrophically."

"Where do I sign reversing that? I'll pay for anything that needs to be done to keep her alive." Larry reached into his shirt pocket and smiled when he produced a Southwest Airlines pen.

"You can file competing instructions, but unless one of you holds conservatorship or, at minimum, a power of attorney, disagreements like these would either need to be resolved within your family, or through legal clarification."

"What?" said Larry, "you mean, like, in court, with lawyers?"

* * *

"I know it's late, Emily, but I really need your help. Can you come meet me at Long Beach Memorial?"

* * *

"I'm pure tax," said Emily Kashabara, sitting in the second chair beside Emma's bed. "I can make calls and maybe draw someone in, but are you sure you want to start by sicking a lawyer on your dad? Don't you want to at least try starting with conversation?"

* * *

"Bix," said Lori, standing with December in the doorway of his grandmother's room. The two entered, followed by Calvin, who sat in the second chair.

Tres von Sommerberg and Lena entered, Lena carrying the camera, but setting it down just inside the doorway once they entered.

"What the hell are they doing here?" said Calvin. "A trap so I look like a dick?"

"Dad, they're... they won't film.... I told them not to," said Larry.

"Larry, Dee and me are gonna go to...."

"Don't go, granola girl," said Calvin. "I need all the distractions I can get right now. Why don't you and hot stuff make out or something."

"Pig," said Lori, turning. "We'll be in the cafeteria, Larry. Call when you need us."

"Too bad," said Calvin. "Instead of eye candy, I get heartburn."

"Look," said Larry, "between insurance and me, whatever grandma needs, it'll be paid for, so just please sign, saying they can do whatever they need to, okay?"

"No way, boy," said Calvin. "I'm first in line. If she's ready to go, then it's her time."

"Don't be a complete asshole," said Larry.

"She's 90-something years old," said Calvin. "She has no friends. She lives alone. Aside from you mooching food and money, she's got no interaction with the world. What the hell is there to live for?"

Larry began crying.

"I know you hate me," said Calvin. "But look at it from the Cow's perspective. She's got one grandkid who will never have kids.... Hell, you've never even had a woman. You're miserable all the goddamned time, whether you have money or no money."

"But she's got me, and we have each other," said Larry, tears rolling down his cheeks.

"Let's suppose that's enough for today. Your grandmother loves you. Ring the bells. But what about next week and next year on Treasure Island? Do you have any clue what she's going through medically? I'm not saying 'kill the Cow.' I just said don't act like heroes, pulling out all the stops. Sometimes, people just die."

Larry sat silently, holding Emma's hand and using his other hand to wipe away tears. "I do hate you," said Larry. "And you obviously hate her, so that makes me hate you even more."

Calvin turned to von Sommerberg and Lena. "Why don't you flip on the camera so you can capture the family love and tender affection?"

"Can we?" said von Sommerberg.

Lena slapped his hand, as he reached for the camera.

"I'm next of kin, boy," said Calvin. "That gives me some rights. I'm not changing instructions and you're in no good position to get your way." Calvin stood up. "Damn, wish granola girl and hot stuff were here doing a show." He turned to the door and walked out.

* * *

Emily Kashabara stood alongside a 40-ish man in a green-checked jacket and khakis, across the hospital bed from Larry.

"You can challenge the DNR order, though your outcome will depend on whether there are papers establishing your father as the signatory for your grandmother," said the man, "but absent such papers, your odds are almost as good as his, unless it's dismissed."

"Do it," said Larry. "Whatever you need to file. Whatever it takes. You and Emily."

"Larry, I'm all tax," said Emily.

"Emily," said Larry. "I need your help. You may be a tax person, but this isn't all about the law. Please. Will you work on this team for me?"
Chapter Fifteen – Trials

December Carrera held an enormous coffee cup as she sat alongside Larry on the bleachers overlooking the San Diego Kroc Center aquatic competition pool. The sun, barely risen, was losing its daily fight with the morning fog, leaving those gathered for the Western Regional Trials to fend for themselves for warmth.

"I can't believe I didn't bring blankets," said December. "The girls hurt, they're so cold."

"You can have my jacket," said Larry, unzipping a straight-out'ta-the-'70s down vest.

"I should'a told Lori to bring two of what she's got on, cuz she looks warm," said December, as, in the distance, standing poolside, Lori stood in a long, lined windbreaker that went almost to her ankles. December sipped from her cup. "I hope she wins fast so we can get someplace warm."

At the pool, Lori removed the windbreaker and stretched, and then shook each leg. As she walked, it was with the barest limp. December screamed, "Go Soldier Girl!" Lori looked up towards the bleachers and smiled.

"Is she a soldier?" asked a teenaged girl sitting next to December.

"All Army," said December.

"Ho-yah!" said the girl. "My dad's Army. He's in Bahrain."

Lori and a line of swimmers took their places on the line of blocks and, as one, drew into a crouch. On a gunshot, the swimmers dove and swam. Lori and two others made quick time in leading the pack. In the stands, December chanted, "Ar-MEE! Ar-MEE!" which was picked up by the family next to her. By the third lap, dozens of people in the bleachers were chanting. Lori and a second swimmer led the pack by a wide distance at the two-minute mark. Lori would pull ahead and the other swimmer would close the gap. As Lori entered the last lap, Larry, December, the teenager, her family and about a dozen others in the stands stood, yelling, "Ar-MEEEE!" With a splash, Lori and the second swimmer reached the finish at nearly the same moment, followed just seconds later by the rest of the pack. "Ar-MEEEE!" Lori looked up towards the bleachers, smiling.

The scoreboard at pool's edge flashed times. "L Lewis – 04:10.03."

"Is dat good?" yelled December.

"I think so," said Larry.

"Two can qualify," said the teen. "And she did really good. She your sister?"

"Something like dat," said December.

"You guys look totally different."

* * *

December ran straight into Lori and wrapped her arms and as much of her body as she could into an engulfing hug. "Baby! You were so good!"

Lori smiled and put one arm around December.

"When do you know if you are going to the Olympics?"

"Dee, we're not even done with the 400 meters," said Lori, laughing lightly. "I've still got the hundred, two hundred and eight hundred. I got a lot of heats."

December pulled Lori's swim coat open, popping the snaps in one motion. "Dat's what I want. Some heat. Let me in dere." She quickly inserted herself into the flaps of the coat and pulled herself tight to Lori's body. "Yeh," she purred. "How long before you swim again? Maybe we could go somewhere and... you know."

Larry walked up to the two, carrying two styrofoam cups. "Hot chocolate or coffee?"

"Dee, I'm a little busy," said Lori, kissing December. "I gotta stay focused, okay?"

"No!" said December snuggling in.

Lori laughed. "I'll take the chocolate, Bix, thanks."

"Share?" asked December.

* * *

"I wish she'd worn the suit I gave her," said December, as Lori stood at the block for the finals in the 400 meter women's freestyle.

"There are really strict rules about suits," said the teen next to Larry and December. "You can get disqualified for having the wrong suit or cap."

"They should be hot, like the one I gave her," muttered December.

As the gun sounded, Lori's launch left her at the end of the pack. She closed the distance by the end of the first lap, but never made her way deep into the pack and, despite a burst of speed in the final lap, lagged, coming in sixth. Climbing out of the pool, the limp was pronounced.

December got up and quickly made her way down the bleachers to the area where she could wait for the swimmers, with Larry following. The teenager followed Larry. When they arrived at the open area, December had attached herself to Lori, and a woman in her 80s stood next to the two, she and Lori locked in an intense conversation as Larry and the teen approached.

"You have to see through the pain and the pack," the woman said to Lori.

"Hey, Mrs. Pat's Champs," said Larry. "Lori, are you okay?"

Pat McCormack went button-lipped, nodded politely to Larry and smiled to the teen, before stepping a few feet back.

"Horrible leg cramp," said Lori.

December loosened her two-armed wrapping grip on Lori and pulled back so she just held one arm around Lori's waist. The teen stepped forward. "Miss Lewis? You're Army? I hope you win."

"Thanks," said Lori. "Um... what's your name?"

"Mary," said the girl. "Mary Elisa. My dad's in Bahrain."

"You just keep loving your dad and hug him extra big when he comes home," said Lori, reaching out to wrap her arm around the teen.

"Okay," said the girl, as she hugged Lori.

"Lori Lewis is a real champion," Pat said to the teen. "She's the real thing."

The teen smiled and then jogged back to the bleachers

"Are those for this match?" asked Larry, pointing to the board, which showed Lori in fourth.

Lori let loose a sigh. "Those are the 400 overalls," she said. "Missed a slot by two."

"For the Olympics?" asked December.

"No, Dee... qualifying for the nationals," said Lori. "The top two at Nationals go to London, but you gotta get to the Nationals." Lori gently pulled December to her and kissed her forehead, as December wrapped her arms around the narrowest part of Lori's waist. "Pumpkin, I gotta get back to it, okay?"

"So you're not going to London?" asked Larry.

"Not for the 400 meters," she said, gently pulling December to her and smiling to Larry. "Maybe the one-, two- or eight-hundred, but no matter what, I got it pretty good."

* * *

Lori lay back in the leather of the rented limo, as Larry opened a can of club soda. "Seltzer?" he asked.

"Yeh, I'll take that," said Lori, sitting up and reaching for the glass. "And a glass... fancy."

"Now dat yer not training, can you have a French fry?" asked December.

Lori laughed. "I'll have some of yours, sure."

December climbed to the seat next to the smoked glass that separated the driver from the passengers and tapped on the glass, which lowered. "Sweetie, when you see a Mickey-Dee's, pull in, okay?"

"So is the Olympics thing done then?" asked Larry.

"Since the best I did was third in the 800, I suppose one of the qualifiers from today could get hurt or something before the Nationals, but unless something like that happens, yeh, done," said Lori.

"Hey," said December, "I got some thuggy friends who could take care of things for ya, if you know what I mean." She smiled and lifted her eyebrows. Both she and Lori broke into laughter. "Lunch is served," said Larry, pointing to a pair of golden arches. The driver slowly threaded the limo into the narrow drive thru and Larry lowered the rear window, ordering three double cheeseburgers, two large fries, an apple-walnut salad, two grilled chicken snack wraps, a diet Coke, an unsweetened iced tea, a large coffee, an ice cream cone and six oatmeal raisin cookies.

Larry collected his change off the hundred he gave the cashier and began passing bags and a drink tray to December and Lori. The two women placed the bags on top of the refrigerator in the limo and began taking items out of the bags. December tapped on the glass again and when it lowered, she held one hand close to the driver's shoulder. "Ralphie, want some fries and a burger?" December thrust a bag forward, which the driver took.

"Thank you, Miss," said the driver.

"Sure, sweetie."

The glass went back up and December crossed back to lay beside Lori, who was picking at her salad. December fed her a French fry, playfully getting it into her mouth after several misses.

"So did you need a coach and training camp and all that?" asked Larry.

"I've had my coach since high school and Pat's always been there for me, since I was a kid, so coaching's covered," said Lori. "I got invited to the trials through the swim club, and coach tells everyone that it's strength, form and discipline, so that's all basic."

December felt Lori's bicep. "You're plenty strong, hunny," she said, her hands on Lori's body.

"Strength is no problem," said Lori, "but I kept losing my form, like when the cramp happened. If I had been more disciplined, I could have kept my form and swam through the cramp.... Guess that's what separates the amateur from the real champion."

"You did great out there," said Larry.

"You did, Soldier Girl," said December.

"Who was yelling?" asked Lori.

"Oh, we had the whole crowd going," said December. "Ar-MEEE!"

Lori lay in the leather and smiled. December rested her head on Lori's chest. Larry drank soda.

* * *

"Does five hundred cover it?" Larry asked, pulling a money clip of folded bills from his pocket.

The driver, in his blue coat and beige slacks, accepted the hundred dollar bills, looking at each against the sky. "Oh, this is fine," said Ralphie. "Thank you for a very good day rate."

"Look," said Larry, as December and Lori made their way up to the main door of the mansion on Treasure Island. "I'd sort of like to have, you know, when I need someone, being able to call for help getting around." Larry looked to the driver. "Can I just... like, call? Or, maybe, hire you?"

"This is what I do," said the driver. "I could give you a weekly rate, or you could buy a number of days within a given month."

As he finished, the sound of a volcano erupting bellowed and Calvin stormed up the path, towards the limousine.

"Maybe you should go," said Larry. "He can be...."

"Lawsuit, boy?" yelled Calvin, still a distance from the car. "You filed a goddamned lawsuit?"

"That's alright," said Ralphie, calming looking down to his driving gloves, which he slowly removed, pulling each finger before taking off the glove itself.

"You don't have to like what I did at the hospital, but sue me?" Calvin bent at the low front gate, unlatching the swinging door and still yelling until he stood a few feet from Larry. "Now that you have money to burn, why not take the old man to court? Is that it?"

"Will that be all, sir?" Ralphie asked Larry.

"Actually," said Larry, "can you come back? I wanna go see someone in the hospital."

Calvin, beating his arms onto his hips, walked in a circle. "I don't believe this."

"Like, in two hours," said Larry.

"Yes sir," said Ralphie, climbing into the limo, leaving Larry and Calvin on the sidewalk.

Two kids on bikes skidded to a stop next to the curb. "Is that your limo, mister?" asked one of the kids.

"Beat it," spat Calvin.

"We weren't talking to you, old man," barked back the second kid.

Larry lowered his head, needling past Calvin, and then quickly to the mansion, with Calvin following, still yelling, as Larry without deviation made his way to the door, opened it and entered closing the door behind him. Calvin, reaching the door, turned the knob, but could not open the locked door. "Are you fucking kidding me?" he yelled, pounding on the door.

* * *

Ralphie opened the door to the limousine and Larry van der Bix – in shorts, flip-flops and a loud floral shirt – climbed out. "I don't how long I'm gonna be. You don't have to stay. Maybe I can call when I'm done?"

A pair of women in surgical scrubs walked out of the main entrance to Long Beach Memorial, looking at Larry, standing next to the limo. "That would be fine, sir," said Ralphie. "Call when you'd like. I'm going off the clock from my regular client for a few days and so I'm available for you."

"Thanks," said Larry, "cuz, like, driving and me... not good."

* * *

Larry held Emma's limp hand in his and watched the variety of monitors – one following the heart rate and another regulating a drip tube and a third connected by electrical receptors to track her breathing, though for Larry his eyes rested on the subtle rise and fall of Emma's chest.

A nurse entered silently and checked the drip, pressing a green button several times until beeps sounded. Without speaking to Larry, she exited.

"Farmor," Larry said. "I don't know exactly how long they want you to... to... sleep," he said, holding her hand. "I can't believe there isn't someone on staff who could talk to you, but I guess Danish isn't common." Larry sat up, his eyes wide. He pulled out his phone with his free hand and called Lawrence, only getting voicemail.

"Lawrence, yeh, ok, it's Larry... me, not you," said Larry. "I need you to arrange something. A medical thing. When you call for the details, tell me 'Copenhagen.' Okay? That's it. Nothing else. 'Copenhagen.' "

As he ended the call, his phone silently flashed "December."

"Hello," said Larry, pushing loudspeaker.

"Larry?"

"Uh, hi December."

"Larry, are you with your grandma?"

"Uh, at the hospital, yeh."

"Can you have Ralphie get me and take me so I can be there?"

"Yeh, sure. I'll text you his number. Tell him I said it's okay."

"Thank you."

"Should I call Lori, too?"

"No!" said December. "Please, definitely not."

"Okay," said Larry. "Whatever."

A second nurse entered silently, wrote numbers from the monitors onto a paper chart in a thick folder, and quietly exited.

Larry held Emma's hand and sat silently for almost ten minutes. His phone, resting on the bed, flashed.

"Hello? Oh, hi Emily." Larry pushed speaker.

"The papers went in this morning and should show up by the end of the day when someone serves...."

"My dad got them, yeh," said Larry. "Thanks."

"If you need me, you know where to find me, but I have family stuff that I've got to deal with," said Emily.

"Ok, if I need you, I'll call."

"Dude," said a voice from the doorway. Larry looked at his phone, which was now blank. "Dude," said the voice again.

Larry turned to see Ed Lossé in the doorway. "Want someone to hang out with you?"

"Um, uh," said Larry.

"Ralphie said you were here, so I thought, you know."

"Um, yeh, ok," said Larry. Ed went around the bed, pulling the second chair alongside Emma's bedrail. Ed lowered the rail, sat down and scooped Emma's hand into his own.

"Holding hands is a good thing," said Ed, who had tenderly slipped his hands such that one supported Emma's wrist and hand and the other rested lightly atop it; two large dark hands holding a tiny, pale hand.

"Yeh," Larry said, dutifully.

Silently, the two men sat as nurse visit was followed by nurse visit, and no one in the room spoke for nearly an hour, when a female voice broke the silence.

"Mr. van der Bix," said a voice from behind Larry. "She is doing very well."

Larry turned without losing his grip on Emma's hand. "What?"

"Dr. Bosch, remember?" said the doctor. "We've been able to hold back from the very difficult decision of whether a respirator is needed, and in light of the dispute over the DNR, that's good.... Emma is doing very well. That's the most important thing."

"Yes, Dr. Bosch," sail Larry. "Why is she still out?"

"We are working on two tracks," said the doctor. "We have largely ruled out major risks and conditions that she does not have."

Larry fully turned to the doctor. "And the other track?"

"Based on descriptions from others, observation of emergency personnel, what you've told me, and what her son said on admission," said Dr Bosch, "and what I've seen...."

"Yes...," said Larry.

"It does appear to be vertigo," said the doctor. "Which, again, is temporary, a virus, and while its effects are harsh, it is still relatively mild, compared to what a woman of her age could suffer from."

"Larry?" said a soft voice. Larry turned to see Ralphie pushing December in a wheelchair. She was in loose sweats and a baggy sweater and wearing a wide-brimmed hat and sunglasses.

"Miss Carrero said she will be joining you, sir," said Ralphie, bringing December's wheelchair to Emma's bedside. "Shall I wait for you?"

"No, sweetie, I'm gonna hang out with my hunny and his grandmamma," said December.

Ed cleared his throat. "Ed... Ed Lossé." He reached his hand out.

"I know who you are, Ed."

"Just putting up the little nameplate, you know?"

"Yeh, I know," said December.

Ed framed a wide rectangle with his fingers and held it over his chest, making pulsation movements, saying quietly, "... you know... Name Badge."

"Okay," said December.

"Doctor is telling Larry that Emma's doing good," said Ed, in a loud whisper to December, who had wheeled her chair to Ed's side of the bed. She looked at both of Ed's hands, holding Emma's.

"And so, Mr. van der Bix, vertigo isn't the sort of thing that would kill her, but the condition is not easy at any age, and if she were to suffer a dizzy spell and fall at home, she could badly injure herself," said the doctor. "For a woman of Emma's age, it is better to rest comfortably and regain strength then to be awake and suffer the dizzy spells and disorientation. She's doing very well."

"... yeh...," said December.

"... well...," said Ed.

"So," Larry recapped, "she's out so she can avoid the 'ick' stuff of vertigo."

"Correct," injected the doctor. "We are avoiding the 'ick.' "

"... no ick...," said Ed, in a deep whisper.

"If she lost her bio-navigational sense of order, that could lead to a bad outcome."

Larry turned back to Emma. Dr. Bosch stepped closer. "So how long will she be out?"

"If she continues doing as well as she has," said the doctor, "let's hope soon."

Larry thanked her. The doctor departed.

* * *

My phone flashed "L V D B." Only the fourth or fifth call this week from Larry. Not a bad week. "Larry, what?" I said.

"Copenhagen? Remember?" said Larry.

"I was supposed to tell you the word 'Copenhagen,'" I said, looking onto one of the note cards on which I jot notes during Larry's calls. There, the fifth of seven bullet points, was written: "Copenhagen / ask? remind?"

"I'll want doctors or nurses or skilled care providers," Larry told me.

"What?" I said.

"Please arrange for six, total, who will cover three shifts," said Larry, sounding as though he was buying bread. "I know it's a lot, but, maybe the Royal Ballet can recommend someone, or the Queen's Office, or someone like that. She is the daughter of a Principal Dancer. Danish, though; not Norwegian or Swedish."

"Was that what you meant by Copenhagen?" I said, crossing out the word on my notecard.

"Not was," said Larry. "Is. Please, Lawrence, it's really important. Whatever it costs, we can spend it all, but please, okay? Copenhagen?"

I underlined the crossed-out word. "Sure, Larry."

"Thank you, Lawrence," said Larry. "Fast, okay? Please?" Larry hung up.

I pressed the red button on my cell, so I could watch Larry's initials disappear from my phone. It always feels good watching Larry go away. It made me think of the joke my dad would tell, of the man who purposely bought shoes two sizes too small, and when asked, he would explain that he worked a dead-end job and came home to an empty apartment, so the one pleasure he had was taking off his shoes every night.

Is big money – even triple what I was making – enough to keep taking calls from Larry van der Bix?

* * *

"Beautiful girl," Ed said to December, "can I ask you something a little personal...."

"I really don't wanna talk about questions, Ed, okay?" said December, her voice rising from under the brim of her hat.

"More an observation," said Ed, as he sat still, holding Emma's hands, as he had been since December entered. "Are you in any pain?"

There was silence from under the hat. "You have big hands," said December.

"Someone obviously hurt you up bad."

"Nice hands."

"It's good being nice," said Ed. "Not enough niceness going on."

The hat remained still.

Ed continued holding Emma's hand as Larry returned from a restroom break. He watched monitors as December and Ed sat quietly. No one stirred during nurse visits, and neither Ed nor Larry let go of their grip on Emma.

Larry' s phone flashed "Idiot Director" and Larry put the phone on loudspeaker.

"Hal-lowww..., Tres, Tres von Sommerberg, from Denmark," said the voice.

"Yeh, the director, I know," said Larry. "Do you know any doctors? Like a Danish version of Doctors Without Borders; someone who could come out for like a month, or two... all expenses paid and salary... all that...."

"Just some oral surgeons and general dentists, but doctors?" said von Sommerberg, "Maybe Lena does."

"Ask her, would you?" said Larry.

"I was calling about the movie," said von Sommerberg.

"It's not good news," said Lena.

"There is no movie," said von Sommerberg. "There. I said it."

"The Royal Ballet will archive our work and we retain exclusive first-use of the raw material for five years," said Lena.

"Oh," said Larry, not shifting from monitor scanning and hand-holding. "Um, hey, sorry, you know. It's not gonna kill you, is it?"

Lena laughed. "You Americans are so dramatic."

"For me, it's not so bad," said von Sommerberg. "In the Dogme95 style, the director does not receive a credit, so for me, well, who would know?"

"And Larry," said Lena, "Larry?"

"Yes, Ms. Martins?"

"Please, would you tell Miss Lewis a big, big hello from me? She will be viewed in the archive, perhaps even by Her Majesty."

"Okay," said Larry. "I will, Lena. Sorry about the movie."

"And the Royal Ballet, Larry," said Lena. "Someone from the ballet will visit Emma."

"Okay," said Larry, "that's good... bye," and he pushed the red button, ending the call.
Chapter Sixteen – Potatoes in the Pilothouse

Larry clamped a red-&-green navigation lamp to the bow of the Whitehall, as I sat in the rowboat. "Why do you use clamp-ons?" I asked, watching Larry screw a white lamp onto a thin metal pole mounted to the stern.

"Calvin's bastards go to war with me over every rowboat I've ever had," said Larry, reaching into his pocket to pull out a brass ring. He knelt and picked up one of the four oars, sliding the ring onto the oar and handing it to me. I slipped the peg of the oar ring into a mount to my left and, when Larry handed me a second oar, into the mount on my right. Larry slid rings onto the two remaining oars, which he left on his grandmother's dock as he stepped carefully into the boat. When he was seated, he reached for the oars, mounted them into their hardware, untied the boat from its cleat and pushed off.

"Why are we doing this at eight at night?" I asked.

The Whitehall drifted lazily into the middle of the wide slip that could easily berth an enormous craft, but which held only Larry's 14-foot rowboat. Larry dipped his oars into the water and pulled, moving silently into the straight that separated Treasure Island from the Peninsula.

"Helps me think," said Larry. He motioned to the bay, to the dock from which Italian-style gondolas took couples and groups on picturesque tours of the Naples canal, and beyond that, to the thatched-roof beach shack, with its holiday lights glowing around the bamboo bar and the sounds of laughter drifting across the water.

As Larry rowed, I looked onto the water, at the long, wiggling silver reflection of the full moon. If I was trapped, at least I had a warm jacket.

"Keep your oars up, Lawrence," said Larry, as he rowed, facing me as I sat at the rear. "I don't want to go fast... I just wanna row." He took the boat to the middle of the bay, towards a tall, white buoy. When he got alongside the buoy, he made a 90-degree turn and continued rowing. "Ed had a scandal, you know."

"What?" I said. "What do you mean, he had a scandal?"

Larry kept up his rowing. The water rushing over the oars came up silvery-green as Larry rowed the Whitehall into the river of moonlight.

"When I said to Ed that you had something on him," said Larry, rowing without breaking rhythm, "he said, 'oh, he probably just wants to tell you about the scandal.' "

"What scandal?" I said.

"Just a sex and drugs thing, Ed told me," said Larry. "Entertainment clients."

"O... k-a-y...," I said, not sure where to go with this. "Do you wanna dump the guy?"

"No," said Larry, as we approached the entry to the Rivo Alto Canal that circled its way through Naples Island. "Sort'a makes me feel more comfortable with the dude. Just thought you would want to know." Larry turned the boat so he was pushing the oars to move, with my end of the boat now at the front. "Oh, and Emily's got a lot of family stuff going on, so we might not see her much."

"Larry, we really don't have that much to do right now," I said. "Your money's safe. You have liquid capital. And it doesn't seem to have changed you, so...."

"You know Lori almost went to the Olympics?" Larry asked.

"Lori what?" I said, astonished. Why is it that every time I hear her name, I'm both happy and torn into little pieces.

"W'ull, it wasn't the Olympics, but she came in fourth. She needed to be first or second."

"Where? When?"

"Last weekend... the... uh... western regional trials to qualify for the national thing," said Larry. "Oh, and I'm gonna give you a receipt for five hundred from Ralphie and he'll come by asking for three months pay to be my driver."

"... Ralphie?"

"Yeh, my driver." Larry turned the boat easily and aimed us towards Treasure Island, looking over his shoulder several times to gauge position. "We agreed to $1,750 a week."

"Seven thousand dollars a month for a car!" I yelled. "Are you crazy?"

"It's okay," said Larry, lifting his oars oat of the water and letting the Whitehall slowly drift into his grandmother's enormous slip. "He's got a genuine stretch Lincoln. With a fridge. He's gonna put in a safe, too, so I guess you'll get your vault, Lawrence."

I was stupefied, but at least Lori wasn't kicking my shin. "Ralphie...."

"Yep," said Larry, rowing a tiny stroke at a time, to bring the rowboat in towards the dock. "And make sure he gets benefits and vacation and sick time and stuff." Larry dipped just one oar in the water for small circular motions, to control the drift to the dock. When we drew close, Larry grabbed a cleat, pulling the Whitehall to the dock and tying it off.

"The Olympics," I said softly, not disbelieving, but amazed. On a good day, I knew Lori could take any competition. She's as strong and disciplined as anyone I'd ever known. During our marriage, when she'd go for swims in the Belmont Olympic Pool, I'd watch her swim for as much as an hour at a time, just for that glimpse of her stepping from the water, like a goddess rising from the sea. Records she set at Wilson still stood fifteen years later. She once showed me a photo of her at 13 with the gray haired woman who coached her and in the photo, Lori's face showed awe and intense responsibility as she held her coach's gold medals.

"The Olympics," I said again, softly.

* * *

"So, uh, yeh," said Larry, stirring his coffee.

Ed, in a crisp tee shirt and baggy shorts, had a steaming egg roll in his fingers. "Hot! Hot!" he gasped after the first bite.

"Larry mentioned something to me," I said, holding my coffee.

"The sex-and-drug thing?" said Ed, dipping his egg roll into sweet and sour sauce.

"Those smell really good," said Larry.

"Want one, man?" asked Ed.

"No, no, I don't wanna...."

Ed pushed the box of two remaining egg rolls towards Larry and stood up. "No worries, dude, I'll get me more." Ed walked around the corner.

"Larry!" I fumed. "Bad timing."

Larry picked up an egg roll.

"You only get one chance to see a person's true reaction to a bombshell, and now Ed has time to compose himself and figure out the next thing he's gonna say."

Ed returned.

"So how's 'Lonely Island?' " asked Larry.

"Man, that shark!" said Ed, laughing. "Good add. They honestly all look freaked."

"So what's the scandal?" asked Larry, quickly.

Hearing a number called aloud, Ed stood. "My number, but I'll be back. I'm not running away." A few seconds later, Ed returned with two boxes of egg rolls and several sauce containers.

"What do we need to know?" I asked.

"No one got hurt, no one was arrested, no one lost money," said Ed. "Just had some wacked out entertainment clients who wanted me to score for 'em and then party 'em up." Ed bit off the top of another egg roll. "Hot! Hot!"

* * *

Larry stood near the front railing of his grandmother's balcony, with a metal bucket of tiny yellow potatoes sitting on a director's chair next to him. Below, two teens walked slowly onto the dock where Emma's slip lay empty, save for the Whitehall. Larry loaded a potato in one hand and several in the other and cocked his arm.

Seconds later, a yellow spud sped across the distance, smacking one of the teens on his back. A second and third potato caught the other teen on his leg and shoulder, and a fourth spud hit the first teen again, as they scrambled off the dock, flashing middle fingers upwards as they ran.

* * *

"Oh, this is really nice," said Emily, wrapping a wide shawl around her shoulders as Larry spun the Whitehall, maneuvering so that the rowboat moved slowly into the Rivo Alto canal. Docks on either side of the canal held electric pleasure boats, speed boats and motor cruisers of varying sizes, sailboats and, beyond the final bridge, the giants. "Thanks for suggesting this, because it's been really crazy at home. This helps a lot."

"Like, what's going on?"

"Oh, just my mom...."

"Who has a store...," said Larry.

"... Furniture now. Antiques," said Emily. "She's pretty deep in debt, and me and my brother and uncle, we have been the ones writing the checks for estate sales... and forget my stake, you know..., one day it'll be over, and she'll have nothing to pass down. Nothing. And so what's it all for?"

* * *

Larry cranked the Victrola, as Emily sat in a wing chair along the front wall, looking to the Thorvaldsen. "That's amazing you have a piece by Bertel Thorvaldsen. How did you even get that?"

"W'ull, it wasn't me, but I suppose I could probably buy another one," said Larry. "It was my grandmother's mom... she was really big as a dancer, real famous in Denmark, danced for the King, had lots of visitors here in California. A friend of her dad brought the statue from Italy as a wedding gift." Larry dropped the needle onto a disc of Enrico Caruso, producing crackling, popping hisses underneath the sounds of an orchestra and a voice that carried across the ages, across technology, each note filling the studio.

Emily finished her coffee and set the cup and saucer on her thigh. "Thanks, Larry," she said. "You're really a good guy. I hope your grandmother comes home soon."

"Yeh," said Larry. "Me, too."

* * *

Ed sat in the middle of the Whitehall, facing Larry, in the stern, who was doing all the rowing. Ed sat poised with a notepad and pen.

"Okay," said Larry. "Ewa Sonnet...."

"She'd take a meeting, her agent said. Preferably New York, Paris or Warsaw."

"Nichole VanCroft."

"She said to stop calling."

"Anekee," said Larry, pushing forward in a circular rotation, moving the rowboat ahead.

"Still waiting to hear back."

"Odalys Garcia?"

"Her agent said yes to an initial meeting," said Ed. "She is open to film or television. Depends on script."

The rowboat narrowly missed banging into the center lane buoy at the mouth of the canal, leading out onto the straight between the Peninsula and Naples. "A movie with Odalys Garcia," said Larry, absently. "Who wouldn't wanna see that?"

"Most chicks," said Ed.

* * *

Lori covered her face with a towel while adjusting her position on the lounger on Emma's balcony. "Bix, has December spent any time over here?"

"Actually, I haven't seen her since the hospital."

"I haven't either," she said, reaching for her glass of water with lemon. "Just thought, maybe she'd... you know... like... call." Lori sipped her water and set the glass onto the table.

* * *

Larry rowed hard. The Whitehall, with its keel and wide bottom, flew across the water, as he looked over his shoulder, to gauge position. Behind him and closing from the distance was a gleaming motor yacht – grotesque in its enormity – crossing the bay.

Larry, in his 14-foot rowboat, craned his neck to look up, to the very top, and in the pilothouse there stood a smiling, deeply-tanned, bare-chested man, one hand on the wheel and another holding a beer can.

With Larry mesmerized, the wake from the motor yacht caught him by surprise. It took a moment for Larry to steady the Whitehall, as he watched the man and machine motor past. The shirtless man drank from his beer, smiled and waved to Larry.
Chapter Seventeen – Ring the Golden Bells

"So here's what I worked out," Larry told me, as we walked in the front door of his apartment. Inside, there was the heavy smell of stale clothes and food long ago lost in clutter.

On the long wooden dining table, heaped with newspapers, books and magazines, was a golden metal object rising through the mountain of papers.

It was a cash register. It could have been a hundred years old.

The round keys gave it the look of a typewriter, but with numerals and a few function keys. Larry eagerly stood next to the register, his hands tenderly caressing it.

"So, say I want to give my driver, Ralphie, the cash he needs to buy a safe and a second refrigerator for the Lincoln," said Larry, keying in numbers, pushing an arithmetic function key and pulling a long lever on the side of the machine, which produced a ringing sound and was followed by a narrow tape being spit out and the cash drawer opening simultaneously. Larry handed me the tape, which simply showed random numbers. "But then I just...," said Larry, taking the tape back, signing it and handing it back to me. "And, presto!"

"Okay, Larry," I said. "Um, this... doesn't... really...."

"Oh," said Larry, "it gets better," as he pulled out an inner tape from the machine that gave a faint carbon of the original tape. "It keeps track. Cool, huh?"

"As business machines go," I said, and suddenly, my ankle hurt. She wasn't even here and it felt like Lori was kicking me. "As business machines go, Larry, this is attractive, and it does have some useful – if limited — functionality. If this helps you... sure, it's fine."

"So when I give these tapes to someone with my signature, you just have to co-sign and then pay them, so I don't have to handle cash."

I looked at the slip of register tape, with one printed figure and Larry's signature. I imagined tax authorities asking about each one. The register left no date imprint. There was no way to integrate the tape into any sort of automated accounting software. There would be no way that I could do anything except throw pieces of register tape into a shoebox.

* * *

"Larry, this place is more disgusting than it was before you won," said Lori, walking through his living room. "Nice old cash register."

"That's how I'll pay for things," said Larry.

"Start by paying for a maid," said Lori. "Are you even going to keep staying here?"

"I paid two years rent when the money came through," said Larry. "Totally bummed out Doug."

"The weird neighbor?"

"He's been trying to get me tossed for years."

"But why do you want to keep living here? I know it's your place and all."

"It's not my place," said Larry. "It's never been my place. It's just where I lived."

"You have no attachment to it at all?"

"W'ull, it's safe, and... quiet, and... Calvin's never been here once, so no one's ever yelled at me here, so, that's a good memory, I guess." Larry absent-mindedly keyed numbers into the register and pulled the handle, spitting out a tape and popping open the empty cash drawer. "But I have way better memories of sleeping on you and Lawrence's couch, in Cal Heights. Then, at least, it felt like I could maybe be happy, even if I wasn't really.... I could be."

"We all could'a been," said Lori. "Too bad, huh?"

* * *

Six women – each short in stature, brown in skin and dressed in pink – stood next to Larry's buried table.

I watched as Lori, speaking in Spanish and motioning with her arms, directed the women. Two of the six started clearing the table, tossing newspapers in a wide, grey trash barrel. One made her way to the kitchen. Two more down the short flight of stairs to the bedroom and another stayed next to Lori, who walked through the living room, the sergeant keeping her troops moving.

"I got this, Lawrence," Lori said to me. "You don't have to stay. Just be here in four hours with the thousand dollars."

"I can't believe Larry's paying a thousand bucks," I said. "These women would easily do it for half that, or less."

Lori looked at me. "In Iraq, the State Department had lots of reconstruction money. Much of it was straight hundred dollar bills. If you had local currency in your pocket, coffee was three bucks. If all you had were U.S. dollars, coffee was a hundred."

* * *

"Oh, hey sweetie," said December, laying against Lori on the couch as Larry entered the now immaculate living room.

"Wow," said Larry. "Did anyone want any of the books?"

"Two of the women took most of 'em," said Lori. "Gonna donate them to their church."

"So what're you gonna do with this place?" asked December.

"I don't know," said Larry.

"Maybe Soldier Girl and me can play house," cooed December.

Lori chuckled.

"What?" said December. "Don't'cha think dat would be fun? Wake up.... Go to sleep.... Make food.... Walk around all naked together.... Wouldn't dat be fun?"

Lori smiled, but said nothing.

"Well, I think it'd be fun," said December, throwing her leg over Lori's and climbing onto her lap, her hands gripping the couch back on either side of Lori's shoulders. Lori placed her hands on December's waist as the two drew in for a kiss. "See-e-e-e-e?" said December, gently planting tiny kisses across Lori's lips, cheek, and chin before going back to her lips. December slid in tight to Lori and the hands moved from her waist to the middle of her back.

"Oh," said Larry, "Uh, okay, I'll be in my room." He walked down the small, wooden stairway, to the lower bedroom. With newspapers and other debris gone, the room held only a computer workstation and a single bed, small patio table and a single chair. Larry logged on to his computer and played spider solitaire.

* * *

"Do you guys wanna come with me to the hospital?" Larry asked, as Ralphie stood in the doorway of the apartment.

Lori and December, entwined on the couch, shook their heads.

* * *

Larry sat holding Emma's hand, watching monitors, watching nurses come and go, watching his grandmother breathe, watching time float past.

"Dude," said Ed.

Larry stirred, heavy-headed, sitting upright in the rocking chair next to Emma's bed. Ed took the second chair.

"Company?"

"Ed, you know, you don't have to...."

"No worries," said Ed, sitting, and wrapping his hands under and above Emma's unclaimed hand. "When are they gonna bring her back around?"

Larry took out hits cell phone and looked at the screen. "Tomorrow, they say... whoa, damn, 32 missed calls. Why do I even have this thing."

"You want me to take 'em?" asked Ed.

Larry looked at his phone and then to Ed. He handed the phone to Ed, who reached into his pocket and produced an elegant ballpoint pen. Disengaging from hand-holding duty, Ed stood, scanned the room, and then exited, returning a moment later with a sheet of blank paper.

"Man, this thing is an antique," said Ed, scanning the list of missed calls for the number most missed. "Hello, I am returning a call. You had called Mr. van der Bix...." Larry watched as Ed wrote a few words. Thirty seconds later, Ed called the next most-missed caller. "Is there a message you wish me to convey to Mr. van der Bix?" Ed looked around, stood up and carried the pen and paper with him to finish the call outside the room. Half-an-hour later, Ed came back into the room and handed the phone back to Larry. He looked down to a mysteriously-acquired clipboard.

"So," said Larry, "who called?"

"Sixteen begging for money, who're now DNA 1 through 16 on your phone...."

"DNA?"

"Do Not Answer," said Ed. "They'll just milk ya, so save time and just ignore future calls."

"Anyone else?"

"Two wrong numbers, a few women who sound like they wanna do ya, and a guy named Doug complaining about the vacuum cleaner."

"Weird neighbor," said Larry. "And women?"

"Dude, would you go on a date with someone who calls all breathy and sweet, who you don't know and calls cuz you're now a millionaire?"

"W'ull, um, you know, maybe they're nice."

"Dude," said Ed, firmly, "investment advisor here talking: bad move to give it away just cuz some hottie goes all breathy over the phone."

"I don't care about money."

"Giving away money is easy," said Ed. "But you give away control, and let the claws dig in, and it isn't just money tomorrow. It's the steering wheel."

"I don't drive," said Larry, "so how can I give away...."

"Look," said Ed, "let's take some of the liquid gold and I'll show ya' how spreading capital works."

Larry quickly put both hands on Emma's, as Ed also returned to hand-holding duty.

"It doesn't have to be at this moment," said Ed, "but you need to learn."
Chapter Eighteen – The Peppermint Elephant

"I will be outside, gentlemen," said Ralphie, as Ed handed $20 to an extremely tall, muscular man in a black shirt with "SECURITY" printed in white across his chest. A second security staff, equally enormous and muscular, pulled a red, velvet rope aside and motioned for the two to enter.

Inside the Peppermint Elephant, scantily clad women plied tables, walkways and the bar; money changing hands, bodies gyrating; the smell of beer and sweat wafting like dirty fog. Three women danced on three different stages, each with a pole and a cadres of fans and lurkers. Beyond, against the far wall, were what appeared to be luxury boxes, where women led small groups of men and then closed a door, allowing only glimpses of hair and shoulder to be visible through the dark tinted windows.

"Bingo," said Ed, guiding Larry to a table near the luxury boxes.

A woman in her 30s, holding a tray, approached, practicing a convincing smile. "Hey guys. What can I get'cha?"

"Oh, I'm just gonna...," said Larry.

"Two drink minimum."

"Double vodka tonic," said Ed, "and you got any Danish beer? Tuborg or Carlsberg?"

"Don't think so. I'll check," she said, walking off.

"They won't," said Larry. "No one ever does."

A young, well-endowed blonde in a scanty bikini and followed by a man dressed in a referee's uniform approached Ed and Larry. "Dance?"

"Sure, baby," said Ed. "Do him first." He handed the referee a hundred. "How much each?"

"Twenty," answered the man, holding the bill up to the light as the blonde straddled Larry and sat on his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck.

"Give him three," said Ed "and I'll take one. The rest is tip."

"Hi," said the blonde, turning her head towards Ed, smiling. "I'm Misty."

"Hi, uh, Misty," said Larry.

A new song came on and Misty rose and danced song after song over Larry's body, as he sat, transfixed until, after the third number, she leaned forward and gave him a small kiss on the cheek. The blonde then climbed off Larry and stood in front of Ed. She smiled broadly, put her hands on his shoulders and straddled his lap, sliding her arms around his neck. "Let's wait for a new song."

"Works for me, Misty," said Ed. A vodka tonic was silently set on the table. Three minutes later, the referee, the blonde and the hundred bucks were gone.

The server returned with a green bottle and a glass. "You're in luck," she said. "The buyer's a frog, so we have a selection of Euro brews."

"Aren't you insulting his French heritage?" asked Ed, holding out a hundred, smiling. "Open a tab and tell me when this is running low, beautiful."

At the center stage, a group of men in orange reflector vests yelled as Misty danced.

"Throwing money is an art," said Ed. "It's not about the dough, but, of course you gotta know when to be free-spending, when to be tight, when to reward and to deny. The babe serving is as hot as any of the youngsters here, but no one will give her the attention Misty's getting. Tonight, she's gonna party with us."

The server returned, and Ed held up his glass. He downed the remainder, handed it to her, and smiled. "Another, beautiful. And another of those bottles for Danish man, here." The server smiled to Ed.

"It's Carole, babe," and turned, heading directly to the bar.

A brunette in a schoolgirl uniform barely covering herself approached Larry, who looked to Ed.

"Can we go in there?" asked Ed, pointing to the luxury boxes?" The brunette smiled and she and a referee led Ed and Larry to a booth.

"Twenty-five a dance," said the ref. "Four dance minimum."

Ed handed three hundreds to the ref, who slid the bills into a black pouch bulging with cash. "Five dances each and fifty as a tip."

The dancer squealed.

The ref held each bill up to the window, as the dancer sat on Ed's lap and wrapped her arms around his neck.

"Be sure to tell Carole we're in here," said Ed.

"You know her?" asked the man in the striped shirt.

"Friends," said Ed. "That's why we came here." Ed smiled at the dancer. "Go ahead and start with him. Just give me the last dance."

The dancer leaned forward and wetly kissed Ed below the ear, whispering, "Whatever you want, handsome."

Larry sat silently as a woman a little over half his age mashed her body into his, bouncing softness against his own flabbiness. He watched as she climbed over to Ed for the final dance, pushing her chest into his face and pulling his head tightly to her body.

The door to the luxury box opened and the server stepped in, with another round.

"Wait, wait," said Ed, as the brunette released his hold on him. "Can we have this beautiful woman join us?"

"Not allowed," said the referee. "Beverage Control rules."

"That's okay," said the server, smiling, "Yer tab's still going strong."

"Put twenty of it onto tip," said Ed, his face inches from the brunette's chest.

The server stepped out, closing the door. Several minutes later, so did Larry, Ed, the ref and dancer. Ed and Larry returned to their table. The men in orange reflector vests had taken the two tables directly in front of them and were working on a pitcher of beer.

The brunette from earlier walked past the six men, waving to Ed and Larry. Ed smiled and Larry meekly waved back. One of the men in the pack of workers caught the ref's attention, and as the next song began, the brunette dressed as a schoolgirl gyrated over a dark-haired giant, as the other men chanted, "Sit-KO, Sit-KO...."

The server returned. Larry abruptly lifted his bottle and looked at the contents.

Ed motioned with his hand for Larry to put the bottle down. He smiled warmly to the server. "Hope I didn't get you in trouble back there," said Ed.

"For remembering my name?" The server bent forward and used a folded bar towel to wipe up a spot from the table, smiling up to Ed and he looked deeply into her cleavage.

"I wanna keep buying, but I am gonna just go for a soft drink next," sail Ed.

The server smiled.

"We got Ralphie, so it's not like we have to drive...," said Larry.

"The limo's nice," said Ed, not breaking his gaze from the server, "but I wanna appreciate what I'm seeing." The server smiled. "You got a Cactus Cooler?"

"Not sure," said the server.

"Fresca?"

"Oh, you are old school," she said. "I like that."

"Diet 7-Up?"

"Might, I'll take a look," she said, before turning to Larry. "And you?"

"Diet Coke?"

"That we've got," she said, walking off, directly towards the bar.

"Like I say," said Ed, "spreading capital is an art, whether it's a girly club or Hollywood or Washington, D.C." He leaned back. "You gotta know how to smile."

Larry stared at Ed, expressionless.

The server returned with four cans on a tray. "Isn't that something," she said. "We had 'em all."

"We'll take 'em all, but only if you'll join us for one."

"Oh, I can't," said the server. "The girls can, but not the bar staff. I'm strictly sales." The server placed the cans on the table and announced the fifteen dollar cost. Ed handed another hundred and said to include another ten to the tip. The server smiled, took a deep breath and appeared to purr as she walked off.

Misty passed, waving. Ed smiled and Larry weakly waved. The brunette passed, blowing a kiss. A redhead in sheer lingerie approached the table with a referee, looked squarely at Ed, placing her hands on her hips, and just stared. Ed slid down in his chair, pulled a hundred from his shirt pocket, and pointed to Larry. "Two for him, two for me and the rest for you," said Ed.

Four dances later, the redhead finished, dropping onto Ed's lap and leaning into his body so she could give a kiss on his cheek. She stood, gave Larry a tiny kiss, smiled warmly, waved and walked off with the ref.

"I know what you're thinking," said Ed.

"What?" said Larry.

Ed leaned towards Larry. "Yer thinking, 'why's it so easy for Ed? Is it just because he's so goddamned self-confident and good looking?' Well, I'll tell you, my friend," said Ed, "it's because there is nothing to fucking lose."

"Huh?" said Larry. "I'm not thinking that at all."

"But that's the answer," said Ed. "If you have nothing to lose, there's no reason to be uptight. You've got free money and all the time in the world. So just smile and go with it." And that's what Larry and Ed did, watching the goings-on of the Peppermint Elephant with a smile as they each emptied two cans of soda. As Ed drained the last of the Diet 7-Up and set the can on the table, the server approached.

"Get'cha something else?"

"What food you got?" asked Ed.

"Burger, dog, nachos, French dip, some other stuff," said the server.

"What'ta'u eat here?" asked Ed.

"The roast beef's good, but it's $15 a sandwich."

"Gimme one with extra meat and extra juice," said Ed, "and another Fresca. Larry?"

"I'll have a sandwich, too."

"Can someone deliver the third sandwich to the white stretch Lincoln in the lot? With a coke," Ed handed the server another hundred. "Keep it open."

Across the room, stepping onto to the center stage, was an incredibly huge-breasted dancer with a mop of raven black hair.

"Put your hands together for our featured celebrity dancer, De-CEM-ber."

The workers in the orange vest began chanting, "Sit-KO's girl. Sit-KO's girl..."

"Check your ATM receipts gentlemen, because we are going to auction off half-an-hour in paradise... with De-CEM-ber," said the DJ.

"I didn't know she worked at places like this," said Larry.

December, in a red bikini, gripped the pole and twirled, as a referee stood motionless on stage. She picked up a small handbag she had set on stage and walked into the audience, with the referee. She worked the room, dancing virtually every song. When she approached the workers, she looked up and her face brightened. "Sweeties!"

The dark-haired giant who had gotten the dance from the brunette dressed as a schoolgirl reached out to December, pulling her to him. The ref blew a whistle, and December yelled, "Let go, Sitko!" Several bouncers converged on the table. The giant laughed and sat back, raising his hands in the air, as December, now accompanied by the ref and two enormous men wearing "SECURITY" tee-shirts, moved her towards the stage. She turned to look to Larry and Ed.

"Get ready, gentlemen," said the DJ. "If you haven't taken a vacation this year, we're about to offer a trip to paradise.... Half-an-hour in a luxury suite... with De-CEM-berrrr."

"Sit-KO's girl. Sit-KO's girl..." chanted the workers.

"Looks like we have a chance to save a friend," said Ed. "It would be cruel to not win this one, don't'cha think?"

"Open yer wallets, gentlemen, because we are starting the bidding at... five hundred dollars," said the DJ, as December reached the stage with the ref and security. She put her hand over her eyes as a visor, looking out towards Ed and Larry.

"Five hundred," yelled Sitko.

"Five fifty," yelled a businessman in a gray suit, near the stage.

"Six hundred," yelled Sitko.

"Seven," yelled the businessman.

"Seven-fifty," yelled Sitko.

"Just $800 to spend half-an-hour in heaven," said the DJ. "Do we have eight hundred?"

"Eight hundred," yelled a Hispanic man, sitting in a group of men wearing birthday hats.

"Eight-twenty-five," yelled Sitko.

"We have eight-twenty-five, eight-twenty-five, going once; eight-twenty-five going twice..."

"A thousand," yelled Ed. On stage, December let out a hoot.

"A thousand dollars," repeated the DJ. "Gentleman, half-an-hour with our celebrity dancer, Miss De-CEM- ber... Do I hear ten-fifty?"

"Eleven hundred," yelled Sitko, turning around and glaring at Ed.

"Fifteen hundred," yelled Ed.

Sitko stood abruptly and was swiftly circled by three brawny men in "SECURITY" tee-shirts. He sat back down and whispered back and forth quickly with the other workers.

"Sixteen hundred," yelled Sitko.

"Two thousand," yelled Ed.

"Two thousand dollars for a trip to heaven," said the DJ. "Do we have twenty-fifty?"

Sitko alternately glared at Ed, talked with the men at his table and looked up to the stage. "Twenty-five hundred dollars!" yelled Sitko.

"Twenty-six," yelled Ed.

"Twenty-seven," yelled Sitko.

"Five thousand!" yelled Larry. Both Ed and Sitko turned to stare at Larry.

"I think we have a ticket to heaven," said the DJ. "Five... thousand... dollars. Five thousand, going once...."

Sitko glared at Larry and Ed and kept his hand down.

"Five thousand, going twice." On-stage, December hopped up and down and clapped. "Gentlemen, five thousand dollars... sold! One ticket to paradise." The ref and security walked a smiling December back towards Larry and Ed.

"Hundred dollar dance?" Sitko asked the ref as they passed.

The ref looked to December, who sneered.

"We're done, Sitko," said December.

"C'mon, baby," said Sitko. "Don't'cha miss Mr. Magnum?"

"Fuck yerself," said December, as she passed Sitko's table. "Oh! Hunny!" she squealed as she arrived next to Larry, who let loose with a feeble wave.

"Hey there, beautiful woman," said Ed, smiling broadly.

December reached for Ed and Larry's hands and pulled the two toward a luxury box. Inside, the referee unzipped his pouch and put out a hand, expectantly. Ed reached into the inner pocket of his coat and produced a bundle of hundred dollar bills. He counted off fifty, which the ref counted twice and looked at several of the bills in the dim light, before sliding the bills into the pouch.

"Who's the asshole?" asked Ed.

"Oh," said December, "just... someone." December leaned down and held Larry's face in both hands, kissing him repeatedly on each cheek, and straddling his lap so her knees dug into the vinyl cushion and her body pressed into his. "Thank you, hunny," she whispered into his ear.

Larry put his hands on December's hips and was swatted by the referee. He pulled his hands back and put them on the seat, just inches from her legs. December made no effort to keep her own body from mashing into Larry.

"You don't have to...," said Larry. "I don't want you to...."

December kissed Larry lightly and whispered, "This is how I pay the bills, hunny.... It's okay." She stood, angling her body so her chest was inches from his face. She slowly lowered the clingy fabric of her swimsuit top, causing her breasts to spill out, like a flood.

Larry looked up to December, who smiled sweetly, and repeated the move over and over, gently swinging her breasts back and forth inches from his face, then shaking them up and down, causing them to slap into his face.

"Is that the guy who hurt you the other night?" asked Ed.

"We used to date," said December, slipping her breasts back in to her top. "But that's over."

"Obviously, he doesn't think so," said Ed.

"Well, I think so, and so it is," said December, running her hands tenderly over Larry's face, as he closed his eyes.

"Is he messing with you?" asked Ed.

December, now sitting on Larry's lap, leaning into his chest and running a hand along his neck and jaw, looked to Ed and scowled. "C'mon, Ed," said December.

The remainder of Larry's trip to paradise passed with few words.

December stood over him, as he sat immobile, in a trance, until, with a tap by the referee on her shoulder, December leaned forward, wrapped her arms tightly around Larry, and kissed him several times on the cheek. "Thank you, hunny."

Ed – following Larry and December – leaned to the ref, as they opened the luxury box door. "Think we can get an escort out to the car?" said Ed.

The ref nodded, as they all exited the box and closed the door behind them. Seconds later, six huge men in orange reflector vests circled Ed, Larry, December and the ref.

"Leave me alone, Sitko," yelled December.

The ref raised the whistle to his lips, got off a short, shrill blast and, as quickly, a hand snatched it away, snapping the chain that held it around his neck.

"We're not done, bitch," growled Sitko, grabbing December by the arm.

"Hey!" yelled Larry.

"Shad' up," said one of the workers.

"Let go!" screamed December, as whistles shrieked and a sea of black-shirted, barrel-chested men converged on the circle, pulling December free and hustling her away. Larry and Ed were shoved back into the luxury box by the bouncer who had been with December, while, through the smoked glass, they watched as two bouncers grabbed Sitko's arms, while a third got inches from his face and was clearly yelling. The workers were shoved towards the main stage, away from the luxury boxes.

"Okay," said the bouncer with Ed and Larry, "lets go." Less then a minute later, they were jogging up to the Lincoln. Ralphie stepped out of the driver's cabin and opened the back door. Larry and Ed tumbled into the passenger's cabin. Ralphie slammed the door and got into the front.

Ed knocked on the glass separating the compartments. "Ralphie, we're staying for awhile. Gonna wait for someone."

"That's fine, gentlemen," said Ralphie. "Thank you for the sandwich, earlier."

"Oh, good, glad you got it."

"The waitress left this for you, Ed," said Ralphie, handing a slip of paper.

"Thanks for being such a nice guy," read the note. It was signed Carole, with a phone number.

"Thirty-ish brunette?" asked Ed.

"Yes," said Ralphie.

"Perfect," said Ed, reaching for his phone. He looked at the slip of paper and composed a text.

"got ur note. thanks. friend n me hangin' in lincoln, if ur free. — ed."

Larry dialed December's number, which went to voicemail, "Um, hi December, it's, uh, Larry. Me and Ed are in Ralphie's car, outside.... We can we drive you home. You don't have to be in there. If it's to make money for bills, I can pay them, but I don't want you to have to do that in there, I mean, if you don't want to. Um, w'ull, okay. Bye."

Ed opened the mini-fridge, producing a can of Cactus Cooler. "Friend, you've got a little bit to learn," said Ed. "The timing on your bid could'a been better."

"Timing's not my strength," said Larry.

Both Larry and Ed's phones beeped.

"off in 20 min. please wait 4 me," texted Carole.

"done in 20," texted December. "don't go."

"Ralphie, could you pull up to the security team up there?" asked Ed.

Ed rolled down the passenger's window, as the Lincoln drew up to the security detail. "Evening, gentlemen," said Ed. The two men looked into to the window. "We're gonna be over there for a bit, but could we stay under your watchful eye, in case anyone from inside gets rumbly?" Ed reached into his pocket and handed four twenty dollar bills through the window. "There's some dudes in orange vests who wanna fight, and I'm sure you don't want that on your property."

The security guards each took two bills and laughed. "No problem, buddy."

Ralphie returned the Lincoln to the spot they had been in and shut off the engine. Ed tuned in a jazz station and sipped soda. Larry pulled out a ginger ale.

In the front of the lot, the workers in orange vests were being manhandled by security. Two guards and six security from inside stood in a line, as the workers walked to their cars. Sitko and one other stood alongside a Ford F-250, smoking cigarettes.

"Easy, now," said Ed, slowly. "Not yet, but be ready to drive, Ralphie." From a side door, half-way between the front and back of the building, came both Carole and December, each accompanied by a security guard. Both made their way to the limo. December looked several times at Carole, shrugged and then walked together.

Inside the car, Ed and Larry watched as Sitko threw his cigarette onto the ground and stormed towards the two women, near the limo.

"Fire this thing up, Ralphie," said Ed, lowering Larry's window.

"Girls!" yelled Ed, and both Carole and December quickened their step, but not before being intercepted by Sitko, who grabbed December by the arm.

"Let go, Sitko!"

A can smashed into Sitko's jaw, exploding, showering him with soda and spraying wildly as it fell to the ground. Sitko released December, who bolted with Carole for the limo.

Larry let loose with another soda, as Sitko charged, taking the next can square in the face, sending him down. Larry dove into the open door. Ed yelled, "Go!" and Ralphie peeled forward, as Carole pulled the door closed. Ed rolled his window down and saluted the lot guards as they passed. The guards laughed as the limo sped passed.

"What an arm!" said Carole, to Larry.

"Care for breakfast, girls?" asked Ed, with a smile.

* * *

Ed poured the remaining salsa onto his Denver omelet, as December worked on a stack of pancakes and Carole poured honey onto her scrambled eggs. Larry wiped mustard from his mouth and returned to his pastrami sandwich.

"Why doesn't the driver join us?" asked Carole.

"Oh, Ralphie?" said December. "He's real proper."

"It's his own car," said Larry. "He says he feels better staying with the vehicle."

"Okay," said Carole, picking up a slice of wheat toast, "let me get this straight. You won the lottery, and you're giving the money away. Aren't you worried people will just glom onto you for the money?"

"W'ull, yeh," said Larry, "but that's why I hired people to help me... including Ed. He already told a bunch of people 'no' for me."

"Not to put too fine a point on it," said Carole, "but Ed was doing a pretty good job saying 'yes' at the club." The two women chuckled.

"I was offering my client an important lesson in spreading capital," said Ed, in an official tone.

"And what's that?" asked Carole. "How to get laid?"

"No," said Larry. "It's about smiling and having nothing to lose."

Ed nodded his head.

"Well, when we are done," said December, Ralphie's gotta take me back so I can get my car."

"Me, too," said Carole.

"That's fine," said Ed, "unless you girls wanna do something else, like maybe Vegas or something."

Carole laughed. "Vegas. Right."

December said nothing, but looked back and forth from Ed to Larry.

"No," said Larry. "If you guys want to, I'll pick it all up."

Carole and December looked at one another. "I'd need to pick up clothes," said Carole.

"Shopping?" replied Ed.

"Uh, yeh," said Larry. "On me."

* * *

"Ralphie," said Ed, knocking on the shaded glass. "Pull in there!"

The Lincoln pulled into a parking stall for PharmaGreen, with its green cross on the door. Ed grabbed his wallet and several bills from the bundle. "Be right back."

* * *

Larry drank a Diet Coke as Ed passed an enormous joint to December, who took a long hit and passed it to Carole.

"You are crazy, man," said December. "But definitely fun, Ed."

"Ditto," said Carole, handing the joint to Ed, who put it between his lips and leaned back into the leather seat, taking a long drag.

"Careful, okay," said Larry. "This is Ralphie's car."

Las Vegas, 110 miles, read a freeway sign.

* * *

"Welcome to Caesar's Palace," said a blonde behind the counter. "Do you have a booking?"

December made her way to the desk. "Do you have a list of specials? For a big suite."

The clerk reached for a sheet of paper and handed it to December, who studied it. "Do you have pictures?" After scanning photos and the specials list, December nodded approvingly to Larry, pointing to the Emperor's Suite.

* * *

December popped her head out of the dressing room, calling out to Larry. "Hunny." Larry walked over and December pulled open the fabric drapes, showing her body packed into a red dress that clung to every curve and was tight enough that it stretched across her navel, revealing that December's was an innie.

"It's, um..., wow," said Larry.

December smiled, and pulled the curtain closed.

Larry returned to his spot next to Ed, just as Carole carried in several outfits. She smiled sweetly to both men as she passed.

A moment later, Carole popped her head out. "Ed?"

* * *

"Hit," said December, drawing a six to the two cards totaling nine. "Damn!"

"Nothing to lose," intoned Larry.

December looked silently to Larry, and then asked for another card.

"A four," said the dealer, as December waved her hand over her cards.

Ed took a hit on 14 and busted.

Larry stood with 18.

Carole hit with ten and drew an ace. She shrieked and grabbed Larry's arm.

Larry's phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out and saw "LORI" on the screen.

"Hullo," said Larry pushing loudspeaker.

"Bix, where are you?"

"Las Vegas. Me and Ed and December and this nice woman named Carole are at...."

"Vegas? And December's there? And Ed?"

"Yeh," said Larry. "Wanna talk to 'em?"

"Can you put December on?" said Lori.

Larry handed the phone to December, just as the dealer busted and slid chips to Carole, Larry and December, who smiled and left them in front of her. The dealer dealt.

"Yeh, Baby!"

"We were supposed to go out this morning," said Lori.

"Oh, right, well, Larry and Ed showed up last night and suddenly now we're in Vegas." December called out "blackjack" and excitedly turned over a jack of spades and an ace of diamonds. "Yeh, Baby! You just brought me luck!"

"I planned a morning for us," said Lori. "Took a break from training so we could...."

"Oh," said December, leaving her winnings on the table. "How 'bout when we get back, huh? I'll bring ya' something real special, huh?"

"Dee, the only rule was if we were supposed to spend time with each other, just don't be with someone else."

"C'mon, Baby," said December, whose new cards totaled 18. She held her hand over the cards. "It's just Ed and Larry."

"And some woman?"

"Someone I work with," said December, as the dealer showed an 18. December left her winnings on the table after the push. "Look, I'm having fun, okay? Let's talk when I get back."

Larry took a hit on seventeen and drew a three.

December handed the phone back, and looked at her cards. A nine and four. "Hit." She pulled a picture card, and threw her cards on the table.

* * *

Larry adjusted the new pair of knee-length baggy swim trunks from the hotel shopping mall and then carefully carried four tall drink glasses, two in each hand, towards the pool, where Ed, Carole and December lay. "Long Island iced tea, Jack and Coke, and a mojito," said Larry, carefully setting the four glasses onto the small table between Ed and December's loungers. Larry handed the Long Island iced tea to Carole.

"Thank you, Babe," she said.

"So I still wanna know about the dude from the club," said Ed

"Sitko?" said December.

"Oh, they're regulars," said Carole. "They take their lunch at the club."

"They weren't eating anything.

"They're not there to eat," said Carole.

"So you used to date Sitko?"

December reached for her mojito, rubbed the mint between her fingers and dropped it into the glass. "Look, I'm sort'a tired of being interrogated, okay?"

"He's not beating you, is he?" asked Ed.

"Ed!" said December, loudly. "First Lori, now you. Can't we all just have some fun."

Larry stood, set his soda glass down, and walked to the pool, making a flawless dive into the water.

"What about this guy?" asked Carole "He married? Or seeing anyone?"

"Best I can figure, nope to both," said Ed.

"No," said December. "He's just a real sweetie."

"Is he... normal?" asked Carole.

"Normal's a relative thing," said Ed. "He doesn't seem completely weird or anything." Ed paused, seeming to recheck the facts in his head. "A little slow, maybe."

Larry climbed out of the pool and made his way to his lounger, which he covered with a towel before laying down. "Nice pool. Like Harris Ranch's better, though."

"So, do you have a girl?" Carole asked Larry, who appeared to miss that the question was aimed at him. "Larry?"

"Huh," said Larry.

"You got a girl?"

"Oh," said Larry, "no. I'm, uh... no."

"You seem nice," said Carole. "Do you want a girl?"

"W'ull, uh," said Larry, laying flat, his belly rising like a small mountain. "I mean, maybe." Larry lay silent for a moment. "Actually, no."

"Dude," said Ed.

"You don't want someone?" asked Carole. "Not even someone nice? And pretty?"

"No," repeated Larry, more convincingly. "I don't want a girlfriend. I don't want to get married. I don't want babies. I want it all to end with me."

"Aww, hunny," said December. "Take it a little at a time."

"All of what to end, Larry?" asked Carole.

"The whole family line. It's ending with me. I am not going to get weak like my dad, cuz if I do, then this awful family will keep going, and I won't let it. The van der Bix name is done."

"That's a lot of anger about other people, dude," said Ed, sipping his Jack and Coke.

"Why not live for yourself, instead of being angry over others?" asked Carole.

Larry stood up and walked back to the pool, diving in.

* * *

"Who's date am I tonight?" asked Carole, stepping out from the master bedroom of the Emperor's suite in a form-fitting, bright floral-print dress.

"I don't really wanna see a show," said Larry, in a tuxedo purchased from the men's shop in the hotel. "I feel silly."

December snuggled up to Larry and put her hands on his shoulders. "C'mon, hunny. Let's have some fun. And besides, what if someone messes with us and we need that arm of yours?"

Carole stepped forward, offering her arm to Larry. He slowly approached, touched her elbow and then inserted his arm to link with hers, as Ed, in a suit jacket and black jeans with a high-end tee, offered his arm to December, who ceremoniously linked arms.

* * *

December sat silently as Sitko Bladich rowed slowly away from Cabrillo Beach, towards his friends treading water, for the midnight swim to Fish Harbor.

"It's a school night, Sitko," said December. "I have dance first period."

"You can dance for my grandfather, Sweet Pea."

* * *

December and Ed, each giddy, bumped their way back into the Emperor's suite and made their way to a leather couch. They plopped down, laughing and groaning alternately.

Larry, wearing a serious expression, and Carole entered, each sober and sure footed.

"Let's do room service," exclaimed December.

"That would be nice," said Carole, looking to Larry. "Sound good?"

"Um, okay," said Larry.

Carole sat next to Larry at the table in the kitchen, pointing to different selections and calling out items to Ed and December. Larry said less and less. When all had been agreed to, Carole placed the call, warmly running through an assortment of meals, beverages and desserts. "Do you want to join them in the living room?" asked Carole.

The two walked into the sprawling main room of the suite, where Ed and December were making out on the couch. Ed held one of December's breasts in his hand.

"Oh," said Carole, in a cooing voice. "Here, you think?" she asked, standing at a second sofa, in clear view of the other couple. They sat and for almost a minute, Larry just looked at the two people kissing. Neither Ed nor December broke away.

"Larry?" said Carole. "Do you wanna do that?"

"What?" said Larry, in a voice that rose and broke. He turned towards Carole, who had undone the top two buttons to her dress.

"Nothing to lose, man," came a low voice from across the room.

Larry turned to face Carole, who smiled up to him, as she lay back in the couch, offering herself.

"It's okay," said Carole. "Really." She reached for Larry's hand and placed it on her breast. "Really."

Larry's phone rang and he quickly drew his hand back, pulled his cell from his pocket and saw "LORI." He looked to the other couch. "December, it's Lori," said Larry. "She's probably gonna wanna to talk to you."

December, breaking to catch a breath, said, "Little busy here. Let it go to voicemail."

"Larry?" said Carole, pleadingly.

Larry stood and walked to the window, away from the couches, taking the call.

Carol buttoned her dress and sat upright. Ed and December continued necking.

"Is that all you, Ed? Yer even bigger than Sitko."

* * *

"What happened to meeting your grandfather?" asked December, as Sitko Bladich tied a line around one of four pilings that protruded from the open water. Sitko offered his enormous hand to December, who tentatively stood, putting her small hand in his and stepping from the rowboat, onto the lowest of the four pilings.

"My grandfather drove these piles," said Sitko. "And my father fished from these docks."

"Dere's no docks." She sat as Sitko climbed to the top piling, smiled to December, and dove into the water, joining his six friends, who were swimming on their backs, circling the pilings.

"The ghosts are all around us," yelled Sitko. "Dance, Baby! Make 'em see you on every boat."

December stood a top the two tallest pilings, like they were giant go-go boots, and slowly moved her teenaged body in the moonlight, as Sitko and his friends swam on their backs, circling the pilings.

"Sit-KO's girl!" the friends chanted from the water.

* * *

"Hello?" said Larry.

"Hey, Bix. You sound down," said Lori. "You okay?"

Larry looked out the hotel window, onto the panoramic view of Las Vegas, aglow. "I'm okay."

"Look, hey, just wanted you to know that I re-upped and they even gave me a promise that they'd either drop me back in as an E6 or send me to officer school," said Lori. "Officer school. Get that. And if I make the London team, they'd allow me to compete before reporting."

"Wow," said Larry, without enthusiasm. "That sounds like everything you wanted."

"It is, Larry."

"Then you're lucky. Guess we both are."

"I just wanted you to know. I haven't even told my folks. You're first. My best friend."

"What about December?" asked Larry.

In the distance, Carole and December were giggling. "My God, Ed, you are bigger than Sitko."

"She's a nice girl," said Lori. "She'll be fine."

"Did she tell you about Sitko?"

"How do you know about Sitko?" asked Lori.

"She just... mentioned him," said Larry, looking down the strip of lights. Tears began to fall from each eye.

"Bastard beat the hell out of her."

"Me and Ed met him," said Larry.

"You met him? Where the hell'd you meet him? Was she with him?"

"No," said Larry. "She was trying to get away from him. I threw a soda in his face."

Lori laughed. "That great arm of yours, Bixie."

"Two, actually."

"But where?"

"Oh, just some club. It's kind of a blur now."

"December was with you and Ed... at some club," said Lori. "And you didn't call me?"

"Actually, it was just me and Ed, but December was there," said Larry. "Coincidence."

"Okay, whatever," said Lori, "she's a big girl."

The giggling continued in the distance.

"I guess so, huh?" said Larry. "I'll miss you, in the army."

"Could be worse," said Lori, chuckling. "We could be at war."

There was silence on both ends of the line.

"Joke," said Lori.

"I know," said Larry, freely and silently weeping.

"Hey...," said Lori, "hey, it's okay. The President's winding the whole thing down. Iraq's over and Afghanistan's almost done. It's not my time, yet, Bix. Still got lots to do. But this'll keep me on track. Bank some money. Get back among the gainfully employed. And this is what I'm good at. It's okay, Bix."

"I know," said Larry, squeaking as one who tries to hide tears does.

"Don't tell December, okay?" said Lori. "I'll tell her when I see her, okay? Larry?"

Larry's eyes were open, but the lights of Las Vegas were a watery blur. "Okay."

"Thanks, buddy. I love you, man."

"I love you, too, Lori."

Larry sat after hanging up and looked out on the lights.

Carole put her hand on Larry's shoulder, and he looked up in surprise.

"Food's here, Babe."

December and Ed were scooping from platters, pouring from pitchers and picking at their plates when Carole and Larry entered the dining room.

"Everything okay, hunny?" asked December, biting into a slice of garlic toast.

Larry sat and looked onto the table, filled with trays, platters, plates and carafes. "Everything's fine. Lori says you're a big girl."

"And Ed here is a big boy," said December, pouring champagne into a flute. "Champagne?"

"Where's Ralphie?" asked Larry.

"Some old joint off the strip," said Ed. "Said to call whenever."

* * *

Larry and Ralphie sat in the line of nickel slots on the main floor of the Ponderosa, a club long past its heyday and now host to seniors seeking cheap rooms and cheap slots.

"Wanna do the dollar slots?" said Larry. "I'll front'cha."

"Naw, I only do the babies," said Ralphie, holding a coffee tin with several inches of coins. "Little ventured, little lost, in a place where the plan is for you to lose. They can have a few nickels. I'll keep the dollars."

A server, whose name badge was engraved "Greg" but had Joey written in grease pen, approached. "Drinks, gentlemen?" he said, lacking enthusiasm.

"Diet Coke," said Larry.

"Gimme a club soda," said Ralphie.

"Big spenders," said Greg/Joey, walking off.

"So why ain't'chu with the hot women and your friend?" asked Ralphie.

"I... kind'a just... didn't feel like partying."

"Can get'ya inta' trouble, that's fer sure," said Ralphie.

"No," said Larry. "Wasn't even that." Greg/Joey delivered the beverages and Larry handed him a hundred.

"You honestly don't have anything smaller?" asked the server.

Larry looked to the server and then to Ralphie. "Actually, no, I'm sorry, I don't." The server walked off without a word.

"You must be new to the 'having money' thing?" said Ralphie.

''W'ull, my family has it, but, not me, so, yeh, I guess so."

"Not a crime," said Ralphie. "If yer a good person, it won't change you. It just depends on what's inside."

The server returned with the two soft drinks and $92 in change. Larry gave a $7 tip. "Thanks," said Greg/Joey.

Ralphie's slot rang, and a 50-to-l hit paid off two-and-a-half bucks, which Ralphie dutifully scooped into his coffee can, "Well, that's a mile I don't have to drive."

* * *

"You didn't have to come down here with me," said Larry, as he and Carole rode the elevator. When the doors opened, a sign reading "Pool," pointed to the left.

"I like to swim," said Carole, in an all-black one-piece.

"I can't believe there's so many people," said Larry, as a crowd of 20-somethings stood near the pool bar, some obviously staggering.

They're not here to swim," said Carole. "They're here because they look good."

Larry dropped his shirt onto a lounger and slipped out of the house slippers provided in the suite. "I'm going to swim."

"See ya in the water," said Carole, laying her towel on the lounger next to Larry's and setting her bag underneath. "I'm going to check what they have over there, though...."

Larry swam for nearly an hour. When he stepped out, Carole was gone. He dried himself off, slipped into the house slippers, put on his shirt, and headed back to the Emperor's suite.

Opening the main doors, Larry heard silence. "Hello?" said Larry.

Carole, in a robe, entered the foyer of the suite. "Everyone's asleep. It's just you and me. I was going to take a bath. Wanna join me?" Carole walked to Larry, and gently guided one hand to the belt on her robe. As he held the terry fabric belt, she slowly backed up, the loose knot holding the robe together untying. The bathrobe fell open, showing Carol's nakedness.

"Oh, um...," said Larry.

Carole drew close again and grasped each of his hands, placing them onto her hips. "C'mon, Larry," she said softly. "It's okay." She backed slowly towards the open door of the master bath, the sound of water rumbling from within. "C'mon...."

Larry was pulled magnetically, stumblingly forward.

Once inside the master bath, Carole dropped her robe, showing a body still firm and gravity-defying. She stepped closer to Larry and slowly unbuttoned his shirt and helped him to pull it off, leaving him in just his trunks, "You can wear those, but it is a bathtub..." She pulled the drawstring and unfastened the Velcro. The still-wet trunks slid down mid-thigh before bunching at the knees.

"Oh my God," said Carole. "Larry...."

"It doesn't work," said Larry. "Never has."

Carole dropped to her knees and got within inches of Larry's enormous, flaccid penis. She stared at it silently, wide-eyed. Suddenly, she stood up quickly and grabbed his hand. "C'mon," she said. "Let's get in." She guided Larry up the steps leading to the over-sized jacuzzi bathtub and climbed in first, putting her momentarily again at eye level with Larry's penis. "My God."

Larry slipped in to the bath, everything below his chest disappearing below the churning, roiling water. "Like I say, it doesn't work."

"Baby, we're gonna make it work," said Carole, laughing nervously. She slid, close to Larry and placed one hand on his thigh. "May I?"

Larry said nothing.

Carole's hand wrapped around Larry's limp member. She began taking short, panting breaths and making soft moaning sounds, while her fingers explored Larry's vast flaccidness. "You're bigger soft than most of the men I've had, hard." She kept her grip as they spoke.

"W'ull, like I say...," said Larry, sitting stiffly in the tub. "Never has."

"Never?" said Carole. "As in, never?"

"Never," said Larry.

Carole's hand tightened its grip and then began rhythmically squeezing and releasing. "So, does that mean... you're a.... Oh, Larry."

"Well, uh, maybe... kind of, but..."

"Oh, Larry," shivered Carole, suddenly swinging her leg over his, so she straddled him, her hands on either side of his arms, her face inches from his. "Can I kiss you, Larry?"

A voice came from the doorway. Larry looked up to the mirrors surrounding the bathtub to see December, wearing a long tee-shirt, coming in to the bathroom. "Don't mind me, sweeties. Just gotta pee."

Larry's face began to flush. Carole's breasts floated in the water and rubbed across his chest. The flush roared through the room, followed by December washing her hands.

"No," said Larry. "I don't want this."

"December!" yelled Carole, when December turned to exit. Carole flipped off the jets and climbed off of Larry. "He's bigger then Ed!"

"No, stop!" cried Larry.

"Oh my God," said December, standing over the bathtub. "You got something to show, hunny." December turned. "Goodnight."
Chapter Nineteen – Spreading Capital with a Smile

"Welcome to Bucksters," said the barista. "What can I get started for you?"

"Hi," said Larry van der Bix, smiling. "Sure is a nice day out." Larry stood still, smiling,

"Uh, sure is," said the clerk. "What can I get started for you?"

"Bright. Sunny," said Larry, holding his smile and placing his hand on the counter, leaning slightly forward. "... Yeh...."

"Okay, Mister, you're kind'a creeping me out," said the clerk. "Can I get something started...."

"Um," said Larry, straightening. "Large coffee." Larry's phone rang and he pulled it out and read "DNA 6" on the screen. "Pardon me," smiled Larry, "have to take a call. Could be important."

"Two dollars forty cents, Mister."

"Um, I mean, hello, this is Larry."

"Two forty, Mister...."

A tall redhead wearing a tie under his apron approached the register. "Is there a problem?" he asked the clerk.

"Just trying to get this creepy guy to pay for his coffee."

The redhead looked closely at Larry, who held the phone to his ear, but said nothing. "I know you from somewhere," he said.

Larry raised an index finger and pivoted his arm such that the motion might remind someone old of John Wayne. "Ya' know," said Larry, again holding a smile, "actually, I've stopped taking caffeine. I forgot. Don't worry 'bout me." Larry turned and quickly walked to the front door.

"It's the Cheetos Man," yelled a voice from behind him. "Run away, coward!"

Larry ran the distance to the Lincoln, panting as he climbed in. He looked at his phone, which still read DNA 6. "Um, hey, hold on, please...." He tapped on the smoked glass. "Ralphie, head to Lori's. Skipping the coffee."

Ralphie pulled into the Second Street traffic, moving through the heavily congested retail strip.

"Sorry," said Larry, into the phone. "Who are you?"

"My name's Dave," said the voice on speakerphone. "Someone said I should talk to you about a donation. I have no idea who you are, but I'll take your money. I give away fixed-up bikes — and some new ones — to kids in Long Beach 90805."

"I'm heading to 90805," said Larry. "My friend lives by Jordan high."

"Isn't that something," said Dave. "My bike program is in Houghton Park. I'm here. Why don't you stop by?"

"You are in the park?"

"Just look for the building with all the bikes in front."

* * *

"You don't look 75," said Larry, to the man in spandex cycling shorts and a tee-shirt emblazoned with Peacebuilders 90805 across the chest. The two stood alone in the bikeshop, where rims hung from hooks, frames rested against one another along walls and tires of various sizes overflowed from handmade cubby cabinets along one wall.

"Guess I'm lucky," said Dave, "and I am. I should be dead, but firefighters saved me during a heart attack. Anyway, this is a 501(c)(3) and all that and I can give you a receipt, but it's just me, so if you need a grant writer thing, I don't really do that."

Larry looked around and back to Dave. "No, I don't need anything like that. I could just give you money. How much do you need?"

"How much you got?" laughed Dave.

"Couple hundred million," said Larry. "Some of the taxes are still being hashed out."

"How 'bout all of it?" said Dave, laughing. "No, really. I don't know, whatever you want to give. I just fix up bikes, you know. They don't cost much. But there's a lot of kids who don't have 'em. And none of 'em know how to fix one, so I teach 'em."

"I'll be right back," said Larry. "Don't go anywhere."

"Why would I go anywhere?" said Dave. "This is what I do."

Larry walked across the park towards the parking lot, where he waved at Ralphie, who stepped out and opened the rear door. "I'm going back out in a minute." Larry closed the door and opened one of two refrigerators in the cabin and removed several lines of sodas, revealing a small safe, which he dialed open. He reached in a pulled out one of several bundles of bills. He closed the safe, spun the knob, replaced the sodas and closed the refrigerator. He put the bundle into his pocket, stepped out of the car and tapped on the window, which Ralphie lowered. "Be right back."

Larry crossed the park again and found Dave mounting spokes to a rim.

"I didn't think you would come back," said Dave. "You want some water or something?"

Larry reached into his shorts and pulled out a bundle of hundred dollar bills. "How about this as a start?" said Larry, handling the bundle to Dave.

Dave held the bills and just looked at them, before looking back to Larry.

"Is this Candid Camera or fake money or something?" he asked. He rifled his thumb across the bills, which crisply responded. "These are hundred dollar bills. This is...."

"Should be ten thousand dollars," said Larry. "Bikes are good. I don't ride one, but my friend does."

"Bikes are good," said Dave. "You're just giving me this? Ten thousand dollars in cash, just like that?"

"Yeh," said Larry, "I mean, if you can use it."

"Sure, we can use it," said Dave. "Let me give you a receipt."

"That'd be good," said Larry, now smiling. "The people I hired, they like paperwork like that."

Dave rustled about for a receipt book, while holding the bundle. "I've never held this much money at one time."

Larry kept smiling. "Tell me when you need more."

"Do you just carry bundles of money in your pocket all day," Dave asked, handing Larry a receipt. He then spoke with an air of caution absent earlier. "You know, this isn't really the greatest neighborhood. Don't let on that you're loaded like this. You could have some problems out here, even if you are the Cheetos Man."

"W'ull," said Larry, shaking hands and smiling. "I'm off to see my friend."

* * *

"Larry!" said a tall, blond woman in her 60s, smiling broadly, and quickly crossing the grass to reach the Lincoln, as Larry stepped out. The woman warmly wrapped her arms around him and he smiled and hugged her back. She kissed his cheek and turned to Ralphie. "Lori's told me all about your nice friends." She smiled to Ralphie. "Would you like to come inside for dinner?"

"Oh, no ma'am," said Ralphie, closing the passenger door. "I have a book, thank you."

"I'll make sure to bring you a plate when it's ready."

"Much appreciated, thank you," said Ralphie, heading back to the driver's side

"Did you see the new flowers?" asked the woman, pointing to a freshly-planted bed of zinnias, marigolds, alyssum and lobelia along the entire front wall of the house, "Lori will be home soon.... She's just riding home from the library." The woman pulled Larry by the hand towards the flowerbeds. "Now that we don't worry about the mortgage, we're able to do things we never could before... because of you."

Larry smiled, as he looked at the bed of flowers.

* * *

"Bix!" said Lori, as she rode up on her bike. Dismounting, she wheeled her Schwinn into the garage, set it against a '70s green Plymouth and lifted the wicker basket, holding several books and DVDs, off the handlebars. "Heard what'cha did," she said, hugging Larry.

* * *

"... And you just handed him a bundle of money?" asked Lori's father, as he passed a plate of bread rolls to Lori.

"He told me, 'I have no idea who you are, but I'll take your money," said Larry, smiling. "Can't believe he's 75."

"He's always looked young," said Lori. "It's cuz he laughs all the time. Bread?" Lori passed the rolls to Larry, and followed with a plate of butter. "I didn't want him to know it was my best friend," added Lori.

"You're the one who told him to call?" said Larry, passing the bread to Lori's mom.

"Oh," said the mother, "I better take a plate out to Ralphie."

"Lori worked for Dave," said Lori's dad.

"My first job," said Lori. "It's what made me a bike person."

* * *

Larry sat back in the Lincoln's leather seat and waited for Ed to pick up.

"Yo, dude."

"How come you didn't tell me that one of the people asking for money was Dave the bike guy who gave Lori her first job?"

"Oh, hey Larry. What was that?"

Larry sat upright. "DNA 6, you said not to answer, but he gives away bikes to kids and Lori used to work for him. I gave him ten thousand dollars."

"You did what?" said Ed.

"How come you didn't tell me?"

"Dude, as I recall, I went through dozens of your missed calls in less than an hour," said Ed. "Oh, by the way, how's yer grandmother doing?"

"I'm going there now," said Larry. "They're gonna ease her back today."

"Good luck with that," said Ed. "Oh, man, 'Lonely Island.' Dude, I gotta go."

"But Ed, why...."

"Cuz someone's gonna swim with the shark, dude," said Ed, before hanging up.

Larry looked at the blank screen and put the phone down in the cup holder. He looked at the phone and picked it up. He scrolled down the address book and dialed DNA 1.

"Hi, my name is Larry. Who's this?" He reached for his Southwest Airlines pen.

* * *

My phone buzzed, while the television showed an obviously frightened contestant being led to the edge of the lagoon. Ed was right. There was something compelling about a shark in the lagoon. The buzzing stopped, only to resume a moment later. "L V D B."

"Aw, Jesus," I said, picking up the cell. "Yeh, Larry, what?"

"I just gave Lori's first boss ten thousand dollars and I have a list of charities I want to give another hundred and fifty thousand."

"Wait, huh?" I said, "What do you mean you just gave ten thousand dollars away...."

"Right," answered Larry. "And now I have this list. I'm gonna have Ralphie drive me around, but then when I give 'em a register tape, they're gonna come to you for actual money, so just wanted to let you know. Or I might just pull money and hand out cash."

I looked up to the screen. In the water, the camera showed a great white shark swimming menacingly as human legs stood in the distance, on the shore. "Wait, Larry...."

The phone went dead.

I went back to "Lonely Island."

* * *

Ralphie opened the door to the Lincoln and Larry stepped out, in shorts and flip-flops and a Hawaiian shirt. He was met by a petite, smiling woman in a red polo shirt, with "Lisa" stitched above a logo of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

"Nice car," said the woman.

"It's not mine," said Larry, patting his shorts pocket. "It's his," pointing to Ralphie. "I'm Larry."

* * *

Larry and Lisa sat at a long table with three other members of the humanitarian affairs committee, in a well-maintained union hall. "At Thanksgiving, we give out about 1,500 baskets of food," she said, while the others, also in red polo shirts with their names stitched above the union logo, listened. "Maybe the person who suggested you meet told you that."

"No, not really," said Larry, patting his pocket. "Just that I should talk to you."

"We spend two says putting the baskets together, right here," said Lisa. "When the turkey and everything else is included, it's around 80 pounds of food in each basket. The money's all donated by the workers and the union."

"It usually takes about 200 volunteers," said a tall African-American, with "Chris" stitched onto his shirt. "We just finished our 15th year."

"We do toys, too, in December," said Lisa.

Larry reached into his pocket and pulled out a bundle of hundreds. The four red-shirted union members looked at one another silently.

"We don't take outside contributions," said Lisa. "It's all internal giving. But you can go down to the John Mendez athletic center. Or I can introduce you around, if you want. There's lot of need here in the Harbor."

* * *

"And this is our marine biology library," said a middle-aged man with a long, graying beard. "We get a lot of graduate students and researchers who come here, but still our biggest source of visitors is from the field trips from local schools."

Larry patted his pocket. "And busses are the biggest thing holding back the visits?"

* * *

"There aren't many tall ships left," said a woman in her 60s, walking with Larry on the deck of TopSail's schooner. "Many of the kids we're teaching to sail have never even been to the beach, let alone hoisted a sail.

Larry smiled.

* * *

Larry pulled apart the fried calamari and ate, while Ralphie sat behind the wheel, occasionally reaching for a piece. "This may be the greatest day I've had so far with this whole money thing," said Larry.

"Making people happy?" said Ralphie. "That's always a good day."

A tapping at Larry's window prompted Ralphie to lower the passenger's-side front window and a server from Ante's handed a plate of meat and cabbage to Larry, who handed it to Ralphie, before taking the second plate for himself. The server then reached for silverware and napkins, in the pocket of his apron.

"Thank you," said Larry, passing a hundred dollar bill to the man, who smiled and turned. He put a coin in the parking meter before returning to the restaurant.

* * *

"So here're the receipts I got," Larry told me, emptying slips from his pocket – one written in pencil onto a plain sheet of lined school paper – onto my home office desk.

"Okay," I said, looking at each. "This is actually better then I was expecting. I thought it'd just be the register tape... which would have worked, but, yeh, definitely better. Thanks for making the effort, Larry." Each of the sheets had contact information, tax ID numbers, dates with signatures and descriptions. "Emily will need non-profit paperwork, to back up the charitable record-keeping, but, otherwise... this is really good, Larry."

I looked up to Larry, who was smiling more naturally and bigger then maybe I had ever seen in the years we'd known each other. "Philanthropy agrees with you."

"This has been a good day," said Larry. "W'ull, gotta get to Memorial. Doctor says my grandmother is coming out today."

"Good luck, Larry."

* * *

Larry sat holding Emma's hand, as she lay in bed, slightly turning her hips and torso. Larry's smile broadened.

"Bix," came a female voice from the door. Lori stepped in.

"Lori!" gushed Larry. "Today's the day!"

Lori stepped to Larry, gently placing both her hands softly on his shoulders and then leaning forward, so she could kiss the top of his head. She walked around the bed and took the spare chair, wrapping her hands around Emma's.

"I'm so glad you came," said Larry.

"Of course."

An orderly entered the room, looking at a clipboard. "Van der Bix? Correct?"

"Yeh," said Larry.

"Okay," said the orderly, with a shrug. "Wheel him in," the orderly said towards the hall.

"Hey, this is a private room, okay," said Larry, standing, as a gurney bearing Calvin van der Bix was wheeled into the spot where a second bed would have been, had Larry not insisted on paying to make it a private room. Attendants busied themselves attaching an oxygen tube and adjusting IV drips, as Larry and Lori silently looked on.

"Dad?" said Larry, standing alongside the gurney, as an attendant adjusted the gurney's height.

"He can't hear you," said the attendant.

"... Hell... I... can't," said Calvin, in a weak, hoarse voice.

"Mister van der Bix," said Dr. Bosch, entering the room and doing a double-take at the gurney. She reviewed the chart at the base of the bed. "Same van der Bix?" she asked.

"My dad, yeh," said Larry. "Don't know what happened, though."

"Oh, now I recognize him," said the doctor, looking in his ears, up his nose, and running a light beam across his eyes. "Doing fairly well for someone who just suffered a minor stroke."

"Oh my God," said Larry.

"Looks like you have your hands full," said the doctor. "Good you have friends and people who love you. You're very lucky." The doctor moved to Emma and began examining her. "Oh, very good responsiveness. Very good."

Larry picked up his phone. He dialed Lawrence.

* * *

I groaned when the phone flashed "L V D B." I took the call on the fourth ring, just before it went to voice mail. "Yeh, Larry, what?"

"Copenhagen. I need it now. Fly someone out now."

* * *

"I just asked my person if he can fly a doctor out from Denmark, and I'm not sure if he will come through," said Larry, to Dr. Bosch, who was checking Emma's reflexes.

"I also made some inquiries," said the doctor, smiling as Emma slowly opened her eyes and looked about. "Can you tell her that she is going to be just fine?"

"Farmor," said Larry. "We're here in the hospital. Calvin's here, too," said Larry, looking across to his father's gurney. "The doctor says you're gonna be fine. You gonna be okay, Farmor."

"We have an orderly who is Norwegian and a rehabilitation specialist from Sweden, each of whom will be checking on your grandmother," said the doctor, completing her examination. She spoke directly to Larry. "She'll be in for a couple more days, getting her strength back, but she should be just as she was before."

"Great news!" said Lori, clasping Emma's hand.

"Thank you, doctor," said Larry.

"Your father," said the doctor, looking to the drawn curtain separating the two beds.

"... what... a... bout... him...?" came a weak voice from behind the curtains.

"He's obviously a fighter," said the doctor, to Larry. "That will serve him well, as it's gonna be a fight, but he might just pull out of this. Depends on his spunk."

"He's got plenty of that," said Lori.

* * *

"Seriously, your dad, dude?" said Ed. "Man, it's a family affair." Ed pulled back the curtain separating the two beds and went to the gurney. After a moment fumbling with the wheel locks, he rolled the gurney closer, such that Larry sat between his grandmother and father. "In case you wanna do double hand holding duty," said Ed.

"He's out," said Larry.

"... nooo... he's... not...," came a hoarse whisper.

"Me, I bet on the old man making it," said Ed.

Larry groaned, while turning his chair so he was sitting such that he could reach to hold hands with Emma and Calvin.

"When's Lori coming back?" said Ed.

"She's at the cafeteria," said Larry.

"She eats actual food?" said Ed.

"She's training," replied Larry.

"Thought she missed it at the regionals?"

"Gotta be ready," said Lori, entering. "Thanks for sleeping with my girlfriend, Ed. Jeeze, man."

"... hhh... hottt...."

"You said it yourself," said Ed, "She's a big girl."

"... st... stuff...."

"You certainly found that out after riding in Larry's limo and partying her up in Vegas," spat back Lori.

"It's Ralphie's car," said Larry.

With Ed holding Emma's hand, Lori took a chair next to Calvin, holding his hand. "Grr... no...."

"Yeh, yeh," said Lori, glowering at Ed.

"So, Larry," said Ed, "sorry I didn't do the third-degree on your missed calls. Guess it's good I gave you a methodical list so you could call them all back. Sounds like you made a lot of people happy spreading the capitol."

"Sounds like you have no problems spreading capital, yourself," said Lori.

"No, please," said Larry, stuck between two hands.

"My client seemed to enjoy himself," said Ed, "especially relaxing in the jacuzzi."

"No...," plead Larry. "Please." Larry let go of both Emma and Calvin's hands and quickly scanned the room, before getting up. Walking unsteadily to the bathroom, he grabbed for a bedpan, but let go with an expulsion of vomit before he could reach it. A moment later, he was over the bowl, retching. Lori rushed in, and stroked Larry's back.

"It's okay. It'll be okay."

On the bed, Larry's phone buzzed. Ed, standing, took the call. "Mr. van der Bix's phone. How...." Ed pushed loudspeaker and a voice, speaking in heavily-accented English, echoed through the room.

"Lar-ry? Are you van der Bix?" asked the caller. "I am van der Velden."

"Anekee!" came an excited voice from the bathroom. Larry rushed to Emma's bedside and pulled the phone from Ed's hand and put it to his ear. "Anekee?"

"Lar-ry?"

Ed silently waved to Larry, and pointed to his own chin.

"I am now arrived for meeting you," said the accented voice.

"You're at the airport?"

"Yes," said Anekee. "Me, child and translator, who is also nanny and traveling friend."

"I'll send a car to meet you," said Larry.

"I'll go," said Ed, "I doubt Ralphie knows what she looks like," Ed said, while continuing to point to his chin. "You've got... right there...."

"I bet you know what she looks like," said Lori, drawing close to Larry.

"My driver can be there in an hour?"

"The Los Angeles," said Anekee. "The International terminal. Swiss Air."

"I'll call Ralphie," said Ed, walking to the door. He pointed to the corner of his mouth, "You got throw-up on your face, man...."

* * *

Anekee van der Velden entered Emma and Calvin's hospital room like a movie star – in stylish, oversized sunglasses; bags hanging from her shoulder bearing logos of New York and European designers and an entourage – a toddler and nanny – in tow. Wearing form-fitting jeans and a white turtleneck that hugged her spectacularly disproportionate body, she smiled naturally and broadly when she approached Larry, whose own smile looked oddly natural.

The two mashed their bodies together into a long embrace, which went on long enough that others in the room began commenting.

"Damn," said Ed.

"Okay, guess that one's been pent up," said Lori.

"Swe... eeet... shuggg... grrrr... tits...," groaned Calvin.

"C'mon, Ed," said Lori. "It looks like these two have some catching up to do. Why don't we take her daughter and friend to get something to eat."

Ed, openly gawking at Anekee's turtleneck, seemed to have missed Lori's comment. Lori swatted Ed on the shoulder. "Ed!"

A monitor above Calvin's gurney began beeping. Lori looked up to the readout, and ran into the hallway. "Need a nurse in here!"

Lori and a nurse came back into the room and Lori shepherded the nurse to Calvin. "Heart," said Lori. The nurse looked up to the monitor and then, with apparent urgency, to Calvin, and finally ran into the hallway.

"Cardiac," yelled the voice in the hallway. "Code red."

"... swe... eeet...."

Three medical crew ran into the room, with the nurse. The monitor line moved irregularly."

"Someone known to you?" Anekeeasked Larry, pointing to Calvin.

"... shuggg...."

"Defibrillate!" said one of the crew, reaching for a pair of plastic paddles attached to a device on the wall.

"... grrrrrr...."

The monitor began to flatline. "Clear!" called out the crew leader, who placed one paddle on Calvin's upper chest and the other on his left side. Crew members stepped away from the gurney.

"... tits...."

The sound of electricity jolted through the room, as Calvin's upper body bounced upwards from the gurney.

"Get this patient into ICU!" yelled the crew leader, and swiftly two crew members unlocked the wheels and within seconds, the nurse had transferred the oxygen tube to a canister below the bed and had taken several IV drip bags from the stands and placed each onto Calvin's body. Seconds later, the crew, the gurney and Calvin were gone.

From the hallway came, "Clear!" and the sound of Calvin grunting.

"Um," said Larry, staring at the door, "yeh... my dad."

"Oh," said Anekee, "I'm sorry for you."

"Dude, wow," said Ed.

"Larry, do you want me and Ed to take your friend's daughter and companion to the cafeteria or the playground in the children's hospital?" asked Lori.

"No," said Anekee, "We must sleep. Can you help for that?"

"Lori, can you get them to my grandmother's?" asked Larry. "Oh, wait, that won't work. Have Ralphie take them to my apartment?" Larry turned to Anekee. "It may not be fancy, but it's clean."

"Yes, good," said Anekee, taking a key that Larry from slipped from his ring.

Anekee again mashed her body into Larry, who surrendered to her arms. "We talk again on tomorrow."

Lori walked Anekee and her entourage back across the red carpet and out the door, leaving Ed and Larry alone with Emma, who, aside from shifting her body and stretching her arms, had shown little connection to the events of the last few minutes.

"Okay, Mr. van der...," said Dr. Bosch, entering Emma's room and looking for a moment at the empty spot where earlier Calvin's gurney had been.

"ICU," said Ed. "Heart thing."

"Ah," said the doctor. "Good thing he's in a hospital." The doctor stepped up to the bed and began an exam of Emma, who showed sign of responsiveness and fatigue as the doctor leaned in close and whispered into her ear. "Hello," said Dr. Bosch, cheerfully, and placed a hand onto Emma's cheek. Emma smiled faintly. "Very good."

"Hi hi, Farmor," said Larry, still gripping Emma's hand. Her faint smile widened.

* * *

Inside the Lincoln, Larry dialed 411 and got an address for Kashabara's Place, in Redondo Beach and, after writing it down on a slip of paper, handed the address to Ralphie, before dialing Lawrence.

* * *

"Copenhagen means Copenhagen," Larry yelled into the phone.

"Look, Larry, there's actually pretty strict rules about who can practice medicine in California," I said. "A doctor or nurse has to have a license in this state. You can't just fly in medical personnel like you're demanding."

"Lawrence, why are you telling me this now, when my grandmother is coming out of a coma?" Larry demanded. "Have you made any calls to Denmark?"

"Larry...."

"And I want to fire Ed," Larry added.

"Fire him?"

"He's doing the scandal thing here with us, too, and I am mad, so just fire him," Larry said.

"Immediately cutting him off wouldn't be wise," I advised.

I looked out the window as Larry ranted on about Ed. Outside the window, it was a beautiful day. I could be out there. I could just walk away. I could probably get my old gig back at the bank. Dealing with Larry doesn't have to be the path I choose for myself.

"Why?"

"I'm sorry," I said. "What?"

"Nevermind," said Larry. "I just want him fired."

"Ed?"

"Yeh," said Larry. "Do it soon." He hung up.

* * *

"Good job, Bix," said Lori, leaning into the leather seat. "Bet he takes his time."

"As long as it happens," said Larry.

Larry's phone buzzed. "ED." Larry answered. "What?"

"Dude, glad your grandmother is starting to come out," said Ed. "I know she means the world to you."

"Um, yeh," said Larry. "Thanks."

"I've got a native Italian-English speaker available for translation in bargaining with your Italian woman," said Ed.

"I'm not bargaining with Anekee," said Larry. "She's my friend."

"Anytime you're creating a business arrangement – especially among friends – there is always bargaining," said Ed. "Best to have an agreement with signatures. Clear expectations keep a friendship from going bad. Avoids miscommunication."

Larry looked out the window, as the Lincoln snaked its way along Pacific Coast Highway, past the Philips 66 refinery. "Uh, maybe, okay."

"Dude, if you like, I can make my translator available to you, and you can conduct talks yourself, but I'd suggest me hashing it out with her over the ideas she has. She may be focusing on something that has no possibility of going anywhere, and that way you don't have to be the one telling her no. Or, who knows, maybe she's got something brilliant," said Ed.

"I'm the decider," said Larry.

"Oh, sure," said Ed, quietly. "I know.... Just wanted to offer you Gina."

"Gina?"

"My translator," said Ed. "Nice girl. Met her a few years ago. She did the same thing for me when I bargained with a film company out of Rome that wanted to shoot a western in Arizona. Freakin' Italians love westerns. Go figure."

"Bullshit, Ed!" yelled Lori, laying back in the leather seat.

"Hi, Lori," said Ed. "Love you, too."

"Look, I don't know," said Larry.

"Think about it," said Ed.

"I'll think about it," said Larry.

"That works," said Ed, calmly. "Just think about it. Ciao."

Larry dropped the phone into the cup holder.

"He's full of shit," said Lori, sitting up and rifling through the refrigerator for water.

"He probably does know someone who can translate," said Larry.

"Because he slept with her," said Lori. "Notice, it wasn't Gino."

"I guess some people sleep with a lot of people," said Larry. "And then there's people like me, who never sleep with anyone."

Lori opened the water bottle and took a long drink. "If Ed won't keep his dick in his pants, then he will eventually cause real problems for you and everyone."

"Um, you know, actually, in Las Vegas, he wasn't the one pushing the women to...."

"I don't wanna hear it," said Lori.

"But he really didn't...," said Larry. "It was sort'a December and the other girl...."

"Woman, Larry," said Lori, quickly.

"I know," said Larry, softly. "I didn't mean...."

"Anyway, I just don't want to hear it," said Lori. "Guys with big dicks walk around like they are God's gift...."

"I... don't... walk around...."

Lori looked to Larry. "Oh, Bix, I'm sorry. I forgot. Ever since the crash, it's just that that's so not how I think of you, you know. I didn't mean to hurt your...."

Larry looked sullen. "It's... o...."

The smoked glass lowered. "Kashabara's Place," said Ralphie.

* * *

"Remember," said Larry, as Ralphie held the door open, "um, what did we say again?"

"Buyers for a film company," said Lori.

"Oh yeh," said Larry, stepping out of the Lincoln. "Thanks, Ralphie," he said, as he waited for Lori, who put on sunglasses after climbing out of the car. A fit, 60-something Asian woman stood at the doorway to Kashabara's.

"Welcome," said the woman, as Larry and Lori approached.

"Hi, we're from a film company," said Larry, smiling broadly. "We work in the movies." After a moment, he added, "Uh huh..., yeh."

Lori groaned.

"I won't hold that against you," said the woman.

Larry pointed to the sign. "Are you... Kash-a-ba-ra?"

The woman looked silently as Larry, turned and walked into her shop.

Lori shook her head, as she followed Larry inside.

"Oh, this looks like the treasure chest," said Larry.

Lori looked around and with each item she picked up, seemed more at ease, more interested and more impressed. "You have really good taste, Mrs. Kashabara."

"Ms.," said the woman. "There is no Mister."

"Oh," said Lori, with an immediate correction. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," she said. "I'm not."

Larry swaggered in an exaggerated John Wayne walk, almost knocking over a bamboo divider after bumping it with his hip. "This is some pretty good stuff, but we're gonna need a lot more then what's here." He idly picked up a lamp, and, without looking at it, put it down a moment later.

Larry's phone buzzed. "IDIOT DIRECTOR," read the screen. "Oh, look, it's the director calling." He took the call, pressing loudspeaker.

"Hal-lowww," said the accented voice. "Tres, Tres von Sommerberg, from Denmark, the director," said the voice, as Larry held the phone up and walked to within a short distance of Ms. Kashabara.

"Yes, Tres," said Larry. "Good to hear back. It must be about the movie."

"Right," said Tres. "Look, just to tell you, the Royal Troupe will be sending an emissary...."

"That's fine," said Larry. "I'm at a shop now and I think I've found most of what the prop people will need for the film."

"Prop people?" said Tres, "For the film?"

"Yes," said Larry. "Remember, your film?"

"My film. Well, yes, as Lena explained...."

"The funding is all here," said Larry.

"Are you kidding?" said Tres.

"That's why we're buying props," said Larry, lifting a bamboo umbrella, turning it and setting it back down.

"But the Dogme95," said Tres, "the manifesto is clear about props."

"Emma is soon going to be ready to resume," Larry added.

"Is it true?" said Tres. "This is amazing."

"Anyway, I have to go," said Larry. "This store is perfect."

"But the manifesto...."

Larry hung up. He looked at Lori, who silently glared back. "What?" Larry put his phone away and turned to Ms. Kashabara. "You know, this is going to be a huge production, and our people are going to want everything you have."

"I'm sorry," said Ms. Kashabara, "but exactly what do you mean by everything?"

"All of this," said Larry, with a wide sweep of his arm. "All of the items in your store."

Ms. Kashabara turned to Lori, who smiled briefly.

"And, if you have any other items, say, in a warehouse," said Larry, smiling. "Everything."

Ms. Kashabara crossed her arms. Larry sat down on a tall, dark stool.

"Get out!" said Ms. Kashabara.

"What?" said Larry.

"I don't know what you game is, but get out of my store."

Larry stood up and began to back towards the door, as Lori drew close to him and did the same. "This isn't a game. I'll pay whatever price you name," said Larry.

Ms. Kashabara went behind the counter and picked up a long-handled broom, which she pumped up and down, before grabbing with both hands. "Get out!"

"But...," said Lori.

"Before I call the police."

"But...."

"Out!"
Chapter Twenty – A Shot at London

Lori opened the second refrigerator in the Lincoln, moved cans and bottles, and pulled out an unsweetened iced tea.

"You know there's a safe in that refrigerator?" said Lori, as she opened her tea.

"That's where I keep my cold cash," said Larry, smiling lamely. "Ralphie put it in for me. I paid for it, though."

"Be careful, Bix. People get killed over pocket change in the real world." Lori took a sip of tea. Her phone rang.

Larry opened a refrigerator and pulled out a root beer.

"Hey, coach," Lori said. "You're kidding, right? I gotta take one, too? That won't be a problem, but, when? Now? Okay. Will do." Lori looked at her phone after hanging up.

"Everything okay?" asked Larry, opening the root beer and taking a sip.

"Can we go to Santa Monica? I gotta take a drug test," said Lori.

Larry coughed, spraying root beer across the cabin. "You? A drug test!"

"Jeeze, Larry."

"Aww, man... I got it on the seat."

* * *

"You're Lori Lewis, aren't you?" asked a teenager, as Larry and Lori sat in the waiting room of a lab in Santa Monica.

"Yes," said Lori.

"I met you in San Diego," said the teen. "My dad's army... Bahrain?" The girl smiled.

"Right. My cheering squad," said Lori, warmly. "Your dad doing okay?"

"He's good," said the teen. "Are you here to test, too?"

"Following orders," said Lori.

"My brother, too. They're doing all the men's finalists and the top non-qualifiers."

"My coach said the finalists have been tested and they wanted me to test," said Lori.

"Good luck," said the teen, waving and returning to sit with her brother.

"Lewis," said an orderly, holding a clipboard.

* * *

The Lincoln glided smoothly in the car pool lane, as cars in the lanes next to them moved at a snail's pace, in bumper-to-bumper traffic on the southbound 405 freeway.

"You are aware that you promised to finance that Danish director's movie," said Lori.

"It's not like I put it in writing," said Larry, drinking a Cactus Cooler.

"C'mon, Larry, you heard his voice. The only thing he didn't do was cry. You need to call him and tell him that you're not gonna do it."

"Okay," said Larry, putting his soda down. Larry scrolled through "received" calls, found idiot director, pressed the green button and put the call on speakerphone.

"Hal-lowww, Larry!" said the accented voice. "I am so glad to hear from you. I told Lena the news and she immediately told the Artistic Director at the Royal Ballet. Now, it is all the way up to the Queen! To the Queen! In just a few minutes, I tell Ingeborg's family the amazing news."

"Oh," said Larry.

"And I promise you that we will be gentle with Emma Mathilde," said Tres. "Will Miss Lewis also be available? If we must, I will write a part for her friend. Whatever is needed to make this happen. Absolutely anything... even if you insist on props. I can just sign the manifesto and say they were part of your home. For you, I would do that."

"You would?" said Larry. "I wouldn't want you to get in trouble."

"You are not making problems," said the director. "You have solved my problems."

"Oh," said Larry.

"Lena and I can be there in three days. Is that too soon?"

"W'ull, uh...."

"Say what you must," said Tres. "I am ready to hear anything."

"Anything?" asked Larry.

"You have made dreams come true for many people, and, so from you, anything yes."

"Right," said Larry. "Um, yeh...."

"This will be really great, Larry," said von Sommerberg. "Everyone told me I would not finish this film. I must say, I wept after our call. I am the luckiest man in Denmark!"

"Um...."

"Lena and I will see you in a few days," said von Sommerberg. "Tousand tak, Larry!"

The phone went blank. Larry stared at the blank screen.

"Good thing you told him, Larry," said Lori. "Jeeze, now they're gonna expect us to be in this movie. And maybe Dee."

"They told the Queen."

"Great job, Larry."

* * *

The Lincoln pulled in to the roundabout just outside the main lobby of Long Beach Memorial. Ralphie held the door for Lori and Larry, who, after saying thanks, continued into the lobby, past lingering families, to the front desk.

"Van der Bix," said Larry. "We know the room."

"Van der Bix, Calvin... is not allowed visitors," said the info clerk, reading from a screen.

"I'm not here to see my dad," said Larry. "Here for my grandmother, Emma."

"Oh, yes," said the clerk. "She is allowed visitors."

Larry and Lori rounded the corner, to the main elevators, where a man waited, holding the hand of a young girl hugging a stuffed giraffe with a bow around its neck.

"So are you gonna actually finance this idiot's film?" asked Lori, pushing the up button. "What is it? Millions of dollars?"

"Could be tens of millions."

The doors opened and the child entered the elevator. As the man passed Larry and Lori, he looked at them and said, "Everyone in Hollywood is an idiot," and stepped in.

* * *

"Jesus, Ed, you don't waste an opportunity, do ya?" said Lori, as she and Larry entered the room. Ed sat, holding Emma's hand, who was sitting upright with in the bed angled up. She smiled at Larry and Lori but did not turn her head. Sitting next to Ed was a bombshell brunette, in a conservative dress and a great deal of make-up.

"Turns out Gina speaks Swedish, too," said Ed. "Who knew?"

Larry stood next to Emma and put his face close to hers, kissing her cheek.

"Your friends have been with me since I woke up," Emma told Larry.

"I'm so glad you are up, Farmor!" said Larry, hugging his grandmother.

"Careful," Emma told Larry. "Don't break the merchandise."

Gina laughed. "She's funny."

Larry began talking directly to Emma in Danish, leaving all others to sit idly.

Ed scooted closer to Gina.

"What is she saying?" asked Lori.

"She thinks you're going to do well at the Olympics," said Gina.

"Where is my son?" asked Emma. "It surprised me that you would visit together."

"It wasn't exactly like that," said Larry.

"It's okay," said Emma. "You're not his keeper."

"The movie people are eager to finish their film," said Larry.

Emma placed her hand on Lori's. "Maybe I should pretend to still be sick."

Gina giggled.

"What'd she say?" said Lori.

"She's funny."

* * *

Larry stood alone at the railing of Calvin's gurney, holding his hand.

"Excuse me, but you're not supposed to be in here," said a nurse in surgical scrubs and wearing a mask.

"This is my father," said Larry.

"This is critical care," said the nurse. "You'll have to leave."

* * *

"Bix!" yelled Lori, as Larry walked slowly up the hallway, towards the main lobby. "Bix! I'm in! I've got another shot at London!"

Larry looked up, his face empty of any expression.

"Oh.... Oh, jeeze... your dad? Is he...?"

"Yeh," said Larry, glumly. "He's still alive."

Lori stepped up to Larry and hugged him. Larry hugged her back.

"What do the doctors say?"

"They told me to get out," said Larry. "Let's go in there," he said, pointing to a door labeled, "Chapel." Inside, was a small, empty room with stained glass, wood paneling, two rows of pews, and no clear sense of which faith or denomination the setting was meant to suggest. They sat.

"So you are going to London?"

"No, I get to compete at the nationals, in Nebraska, at the end of June," said Lori, excitedly. "The two finalists in the 800 tested positive and were knocked out of the rankings, so I moved from fourth to second in the regionals."

Larry studied a pane of stained glass.

"The coach thinks I should go to the Olympic Training Center."

Larry looked away from the stained glass, to Lori. "Will you?"

"I can't," she said. "How on earth can I stay away for a month and...."

"If it's money, I'll pick it up," said Larry.

"I know you would, Bix, and I love you for that," said Lori, "but, you know, there are things that are just about what I can do all on my own."

"That's not how you do it in the army," said Larry. "That's not how you do it on a team. You count on people all the time. People who aren't on the front line. People who will never compete for a medal. But we're part of your team," said Larry. "Team Lori."

Lori looked up to the stained glass. "Team Lori," she repeated, quietly.

"December's on your team," said Larry.

"Yeh," said Lori.

"Your parents. Your coach. Pat."

"Pat's my god," said Lori. "She's the first one who told me I could be a champion."

"I could never do what she does for Team Lori, but there are ways I can help that no one else can. And I want to."

Lori placed her hand on Larry's, as they sat in silence.

* * *

"Back on hand-holding duty?" asked Ed, standing in the doorway to Emma's room, with Gina Milani beside him.

Larry and Lori both looked up. Larry nodded.

"Great," said Ed, walking to Emma's bedside and gently touching her hand. "Me and Gina are meeting Anekee, so we're out'ta here."

"Anekee?"

"She wants to shoot some photos and then take her kid to Disneyland," said Ed.

"You're going to Disneyland? With Anekee?"

"It's mostly for the kid, but Gina's never been there, either," said Ed, quietly.

"Jeeze, Ed, why don't you just take her virginity, too," said Lori.

Ed looked confused. He leaned close to Larry. "She already has a kid," he said in a whisper. "Did she, like, pull off a Mother-of-Jesus thing?"

Larry scowled at Ed.

"Very nice seeing you again," Gina said to Lori, approaching the bed. Gina looked to Emma and gave a small wave and smile. "Let's go, Ed."

"I'll save the receipts," said Ed.

A moment later, Lori and Larry were alone with Emma.

* * *

Larry stood over his father's gurney. Calvin lay still.

As Larry stood immobile, all around him was a swirl of critical care nurses moving in ritualistic motion. Ten minutes after he entered the room, Larry left having not uttered a word.

* * *

"Her movements will be little shaky, so you really do want to consider having someone at home with her," Dr. Bosch told Larry, as Emma slept. "I don't know what your insurance covers. Otherwise, she has passed through the worst of the virus."

Larry looked to his Grandmother, asleep, and smiled. He then turned to the doctor. "I know you're not his doctor, but can I request a change of doctors for my dad?"

"Since you're a cash pay," said Dr. Bosch, "you can ask for whatever you like. Do you have a specific doctor you'd wish to substitute?"

"You," said Larry.

Dr. Bosch smiled. "That is very kind, but your father is in for a stroke, and I would advise staying with specialists, but I appreciate your confidence."

* * *

"Hallo, I'm Dr. Olson," said a tall blonde in scrubs, shaking Larry's hand. "Your grandmother is Danish?"

"She was born here, but Danish is her primary language," said Larry, not getting up from the chair beside Emma's bed. "Long story."

"Interesting," said Dr. Olson.

"Hey, Bix," said Lori, entering the room. "She's out again?"

"Just sleeping," said Larry.

"Dr. Olson," said the doctor, reaching out a hand. "Nice to meet you."

"Lori. Family friend."

"Pardon, I mistook you to be a relative... the resemblance," said the doctor, who promised to check in on Emma regularly during the shift.

"I did what you said," said Lori. "Booked myself in to the training site up through the nationals. I leave for Colorado tomorrow. Here's your card." She handed him his VISA.

"Team Lori," said Larry, smiling.

"Team Larry," said Lori, scooting her chair closer to his. He rested his head on Lori's shoulder, and she leaned her own head against his.
Chapter Twenty-One – Reach Out

Gina Milani smiled demurely at Larry, as he opened the double doors to the suite. "The Thorvaldsen is beautiful," she said simply. "Thank you for inviting me."

"You know it is by Thorvaldsen?"

"He wasn't Italian, but that's where he spent his life," said Gina. "Any Roman knows that."

"Oh, uh, right, Roman, sure," said Larry, gesturing for Gina to step in. "Thank you for coming. I need to, uh, ask you something."

Gina gingerly stepped past Larry. "Oh! What a magnificent studio!" Gina walked to the Victrola and looked at the disc. "It's like traveling back in time."

"My grandmother likes you."

"She's funny," said Gina, slowly walking through the studio, gazing at framed photographs. "This looks like your friend."

"It's my great-grandmother. This was her home... at least, here in California."

"Emma's mother?"

"Right," said Larry, sitting on the sofa nearest the Victrola.

"She enjoys making fun of people, your grandmother," said Gina. "Did he win?"

"Who?"

"This... Herbert Hoover," read Gina. "From the picture in the Danish paper."

"That year he did," said Larry, settling into the couch. "Mr. Roosevelt beat him four years later. The whole Great Depression thing."

"Oh," said Gina, in passing. "That's too bad."

"I asked you here, because I'd like you to be Emma's caretaker."

Gina turned casually to Larry. "Really? And why is that?"

"W'ull, um, first, uh, cuz you seem to like her and she likes you," Larry said. "She can be pretty sharp with people, even if they don't understand her."

"Oh, that's why she's so funny," said Gina, sitting on the couch across from Larry. "She smiled at Ed, as she said the most wicked things about him. Ed couldn't understand why I was laughing."

Larry smiled. "Are you hungry?"

* * *

Gina ate and talked as Larry served and listened. Together, they finished the platter that Larry had prepared and a second that the two made alongside one another just before sunset.

"I need someone to help me watch my grandmother," said Larry. "Can I hire you?"

"I don't have any formal experience doing that," said Gina. "I cook well and I am responsible, but I can't lift someone or...."

"I can hire an in-home support person to help with the physical care, but she likes you, and your Swedish means she would have someone to communicate with." Larry motioned to Gina for the two to step onto the balcony, where they sat near the granite railing, overlooking Larry's tiny rowboat tied up in the otherwise empty massive dock slip, and talked while the moon rose.

Gina put her hand on Larry's, causing him to stiffen. "I'll do it because of you," she said. "You're dedicated to your grandmother. I can see you would never abandon her."

"No," said Larry. "I never will. I love her."

"That's right," Gina said. "Good people should never abandon the ones they love."

* * *

Ed groaned, as Anekee tightened the rope around his wrist.

"There, I think for you, it is now pleasant, yes?" she asked.

Ed lay stretched on his back on Larry's single bed – naked, save for his boxers – with his arms and legs bound to the bed frame and his toned body straining, as he tested the ropes holding him.

"Pleasant?" said Ed, lifting his head to follow Anekee, fully dressed, as she walked through the room. "Couldn't be enjoying myself more."

"That's good, because you need to learn patience."

Anekee sat in the wooden chair next to Larry's desktop computer. "So many times have I seen this room and dreamed of my escape."

"... nothing to lose."

* * *

"Oh Baby, I'm just about to go on," came the voice over the phone, as Lori lay in bed, a tall duffel bag leaning against the mattress.

"I know, Pumpkin," said Lori, cradling the phone. "I just wanted to tell you something.... Something about tomorrow...."

* * *

Gina stepped into the Lincoln, followed by Larry. Ralphie smiled to Larry as he closed the door. Larry looked to Gina, seated across from him. She smiled sweetly and clasped her hands on her lap. The two rode in silence to Long Beach Memorial, with Larry saying simply, "After you," when Ralphie held the door open in the roundabout, outside the main lobby.

Inside Emma's room, Dr. Olson was laughing, as was Emma, when Larry and Gina entered. Emma kept her head perfectly straight.

"The old horse can only look straight ahead," said Emma.

Gina made her way to Emma's bedside and leaned forward so she could smile and wave in Emma's field of view. Emma smiled and waved back.

"I am off to my other patients," said Dr. Olson, reaching for Emma's hand. "I leave you in good company for the night."

"Don't be so sure," said Emma. "They'll talk so much, I will get no sleep."

* * *

December Carrera typed "special message" during her Miss Milkshakes web chat. While <boobluvr> urged December to shake her chest, December held up a paper plate, on which she had written in marker, "Good Luck, Soldier Girl! xoxoxo"

* * *

"Where is Mr. Tall, Dark and Handsome?" Emma asked Gina, who sat alone next to the bed.

"Ed?" asked Gina.

"The one with the big hands," said Emma, "who never lets go."

Gina smiled. "He does when he thinks you're not paying attention."

"Oh, the sort who slips out while you're peeing?"

"That's Ed," said Gina. "He's with Larry's friend, from Italy, with the big chest."

"All of Larry's friends have big chests, except Lori, who has big shoulders," said Emma. "Aren't you translating what comes out of her big chest?"

"They won't need a translator for whatever Ed has planned," said Gina.

"Excuse me," came a female voice from the door, and Gina looked up. Emma kept her head aimed toward Gina. "Emma Mathilde! It's Lena... Lena Martins... from Denmark."

Gina pointed to the chair next to her. "You have to sit here," said Gina, in Swedish. "Emma was bitten by a poisonous spider and is coming out of paralysis. It is hard for her to turn her neck."

"Oh, that's horrible!" shuddered Lena. "I hate spiders." Lena sat. "I have someone with me also from Copenhagen, someone who has traveled just to meet you."

"It's so dark," said Emma. "Lena? Are you there?"

"Oh, Emma! You simply must make it through. Damned spiders!"

"Who is with you, Lena? It's so dark. Is it that nice man with the big camera?"

"Careful, Emma. Remember, spitting can spread the poison from the spider," said Gina, turning to Lena. "Too much movement and it shakes up the blood, stirring the poison again," she said, in a matter-of-fact tone.

Lena backed her chair up and looked as though she would vomit. "My God, this is horrible."

"Lena... you've come so far...."

"Yes," said Lena. "I have brought Lars Ålling, from the Royal Ballet."

A tall, thin blonde in a crisp suit stepped to the foot of the bed. Emma slowly moved her head as the sound of high Danish filled the studio. "I am an emissary from the Royal House. The Artistic Director and the Royal Chamberlain have authorized me to offer you a presentation."

"That does sound important," said Emma, "but I am busy dying. Can it be next week?"

"Damn spiders," whispered Lena.

* * *

"And Lena and the dude didn't want to stay?" asked Larry, sharing a slice of zucchini bread with Gina and Emma.

"Young people these days," said Emma. "Oh, we should send you for food more often. They must use a prison cookbook for the old people."

"The man from the Royal Ballet kept saying something about spiders in the room," said Gina, peeling an orange that Larry brought.

"Nobody likes spiders, I guess," said Larry.

Gina and Emma smiled.

* * *

My phone buzzed. "L V D B." Oh, God. "Yeh, Larry, what?"

"My grandmother's doing fine," said Larry "Cancel Copenhagen."

This felt like a good time to tell him that I wanted out.

"That's good news, Larry," I said. "I've got some news, too."

"Not now, Lawrence. I've got Lori on the other line." Larry hung up.

Damn.

* * *

"Bix, no matter how I do, I know that I'm not alone," said Lori, over speaker, as Larry's phone lay on the balcony table.

"You've got 'Team Lori,'" said Larry. "And you've got heart and discipline and all that."

"Strength, form and discipline," said Lori. "Those're the three."

"I'd rather have heart," said Larry, looking across to Gina, who was sipping coffee and looking out to the bay. "Heart gives you strength."

"I love you, Bix."

* * *

Anekee sat next to Ed, still tied spread-eagle on Larry's bed, his boxers visibly tenting.

"How it flies, the time," said Anekee, putting down her fashion magazine. "I must return to my duty as a mommy, but don't go anywhere."

Anekee stepped from the room, closing and locking the door behind her.

* * *

"Why didn't she let you go to the Pike?" Gina asked.

"She said it was a dirty, dangerous place, where sailors waited for pretty girls to take advantage of," said Emma, sitting up in bed and not moving her head as she spoke.

"Was it?"

"Of course it was," said Emma. "That's why I kept begging for permission."

"And she never."

"I stopped begging and then later just asked if I could go on bike rides."

Gina laughed.

"Where's that grandson of mine? I'm hungry."

* * *

Larry stood silently next to his father, who lay unmoving in his gurney.

"I really don't know how he's going to fare," said a female voice behind Larry.

"Is he gonna.... I mean, will he... live?" asked Larry, turning to see Dr. Bosch.

"Honestly," said the doctor, stepping next to Larry, "I'm not sure. The specialists may have a better sense, but I don't understand why he is not showing signs of improvement. A stroke and cardiac arrest are each major events, and your father is advanced in age, but... it's as though he is giving up."

"How come he's still in a wheelie bed?" asked Larry.

"We've been moving him around a lot," said the doctor. "I will call you if his situation takes a turn, good or bad."

The doctor left Larry standing alone.

Larry held Calvin's limp hand. "Dad, I know you want Grandma to die before you, so you get her suite and the whole mansion, but right now, it sort'a looks like you're the one who will check out early. That will mean she gets the whole house and when she is gone, I'll get it. I'll kick out Candy and all her kids... probably tear the whole place down... not really any good memories for me there... maybe just keep the studio, somehow.

Calvin's facial muscles twitched and then went flaccid.

"I'll probably donate the entire grounds to the city so they can turn it into a park."

Twitch.

"I'll tell them to name it after Grandma's mom and dad," said Larry, leaning in within inches of Calvin's ear.

"Or just the mom... Astrid Ullagård Park, with that little thingie over the 'a' so people know she wasn't American. I'll get a bunch of ballerinas from the Nutcracker to dance at the ribbon cutting."

The twitching continued.

"I'll tell the Mayor not to say anything about the Old Man or the family," said Larry. "It'll all be about the Scandinavian."

* * *

"How good for you that Larry's computer room is so comfortable," said Anekee, checking the bonds on Ed's wrists, and then unfastening the necktie that she had used to keep a balled-up pair of nylons in place, as a gag. "You are right, about having nothing for losing." Anekee pulled up the single chair in the room and sat alongside the bed, still fully clothed. She gave Ed's tent a squeeze. "How many times I have seen this bed, from Larry showing himself to me. He is the only man I can trust. None else are honest. He tells me how he wants me and does not hold back. The others are sweet and pretend they want only my words." Anekee moved the chair close to Ed's hips. She gazed at length at Ed's pulsing tent. "Perhaps with all the blood, you are larger then Larry... but, no... still... I don't think so. He is the real man."

Anekee slowly walked around the room. "Not very much here, is there? Larry, so wealthy, could have anything or anyone, but that is not what he seeks. You, on the other hand, pretend that my daughter's smile is owed only for your wallet."

Anekee looked back to the bed, where Ed was following her every step. "No man is as worthy," she said, wiping her forehead and then peeling off her top, leaving her standing in just a bra and clingy skirt. "California is certainly warm."
Chapter Twenty-Two – Or Hardly Workin'

"Amazingly, the domain name isn't taken," said Ed, as he, Larry and Anekee sat in the sun on Emma's balcony. Gina carried out a pitcher of orange juice. Ed stared openly at Anekee.

* * *

I looked at my phone. Larry's fourth call on a Sunday morning. I gotta tell him today. I gotta get out of this thing.

"Yeh, Larry. What?"

"Come have breakfast with me and Gina and Ed and Anekee," said Larry. "Can you? I need your advice."

"Look, Larry," I started.

"My grandma's house, okay?"

"Larry, really, look...."

"If you can," said Larry. "I know it's Sunday, but, please...."

* * *

"Gina, this is my friend, Lawrence," said Larry, introducing me to yet one more incredibly attractive woman, with flowing wavy brown hair and olive skin.

"Oh, you were Lori's husband?" said Gina, as I took at seat at the breakfast table.

"I was," I said.

"It's very nice to meet you," said Gina. "Pardon while I check on Emma." I watched, as she walked into the kitchen.

"We have an idea that ties a lot of things together," said Larry, breaking my trance.

"Models Talk dot com was still available," said Larry. "But not anymore."

As Larry droned through a short speech about empowering beautiful women to have a place to show that their minds are as beautiful as their bodies, a blonde bombshell swished from the kitchen out onto the balcony. Her chest arrived first.

"Lawrence, I'd like you to meet my friend from Italy," Larry said, alone in standing as the blonde came to the table. "Anekee, this is my primary advisor, Lawrence. We went to school together. He is a banker."

"A real American capitalist pig?" said Anekee, in a thickly-accented voice. "Since you're Larry's friend, I will shake your hand, but watch out... I bite."

"Anekee will be the face of Models Talk dot com," said Ed, leaning back in his chair.

"I'm sorry, what?" I asked, first to Ed and then to Anekee. I found it very difficult to break my eyes from her. She may have been 25, though she carried herself as someone who had seen enough of the world to have grown weary of it.

"She said, 'be careful, I bite,'" said Gina, rejoining the group on the balcony and taking a seat next to Larry. Ed motioned with his hand to a spot near him, which Gina ignored.

"I apologize," I said, as I looked from Anekee to Gina. "What are we talking about?"

"Models who chat, but not strip... for men to pay for the talking," said Anekee. "The mind is much sexier."

"Some people can only think of one thing," said Gina, looking to Ed.

"It will be provocative. Lurkers can do what they like, but I will debate and force them to think," said Anekee, reaching for a basket of croissants, bread and crackers. She placed a croissant on her plate and passed the basket to Ed, who scooped several pieces of bread and crackers onto his plate and kept the basket moving.

After I passed the bread basket to Gina, Ed handed me a platter of cheeses and vegetables.

"Beautiful womens, for making the eyes hunger, but not stripping," said Anekee. "Men pay for brains and also am getting the beauty."

"Like the statue in the foyer," Gina laughed. "That could be your logo."

"Ewa can chat in Polish about the music industry, and Ane can write about... well, anything, really," said Larry. "And other models can join to make money by being smart. It isn't a freak show or just about what you see. It's about what's inside."

"Lonely men will pay for beautiful women with brains," said Ed. "It's surefire."

"Well, that may be what you're advertising, but that's not what the men will...," I said.

"Who cares what they do in the privacy of their cave?" said Ed. "As long as they whip out the VISA or MasterCard."

"As a business model, it'd probably make money," I said. "What's the name again?"

"Models Talk dot com," said Larry.

"Don't you think that's a problem?" I asked. "I mean, switch the 's' to the second word, and what woman would want to be associated with that?"

"Huh?" said Ed.

"Oh," said Gina.

"The lurkers are stalking anyway," said Anekee. "Hidden thrills to keep them paying."

"You'll have technical needs, so we'll be looking at either an IT vendor contract or hiring bodies. And unless these models are all in one location, this'll need this to be self-administering," I said, looking across the table to Anekee. "You're in Italy, right?"

"Milan," replied Anekee.

"Milan, California... system compatibility... yeh, there will be a lot to do and I doubt anyone here has the skills that will be needed, so this will have to be fleshed out before choosing whether to hire bodies or contract for the construction of the site." I looked to Gina, as she placed cheese onto a slice of bread. How does Larry draw these incredibly beautiful women into his life?

"I think I can find someone," said Ed.

"No," said Larry. "I will find someone."

Gina smiled and took a small bite from her bread.

* * *

"The white zone is for immediate loading and unloading of passengers only," intoned a voice over the terminal loudspeakers. "No parking."

Ralphie held the door to the Lincoln open, as first Lori's parents, then December, and, finally, Larry and Lori stepped out to the American Airlines terminal at Los Angeles International airport.

"Let's do it here," said Lori, thanking Ralphie, as he set her duffel bag on the curb.

December threw herself into Lori and held tight, as Lori wrapped her arms around her. December leaned her head up and Lori gave her a gentle kiss. "Good luck, Baby."

"It's just training, Dee," said Lori. "Yer coming to Nebraska for the Nationals, right?"

December pulled Lori into a long, deep kiss. "You better believe it, Soldier Girl."

Lori turned to her dad, who stepped up, smiled, and hugged his daughter. "Good luck, Sweetheart. Your mother and I are very proud of you."

"Thanks, Dad," said Lori, hugging her father, who held her in his arms and then stepped back, alongside his wife, who then threw herself into her daughter's arms.

"We are so proud of you," said the mother. "... So proud.... No matter how you do."

"I know, Mom," said Lori, wiping at her eyes.

Larry slowly stepped up and Lori reached out and pulled him into her embrace.

"Thank you, Bix, for making this possible," said Lori.

"That part was easy," said Larry, tearing up. "This is the hard part."

"You're gonna see me in a month," she said, as his tears fell onto her shoulders.

"Hey!" yelled December, from alongside the Lincoln.

Larry and Lori looked up from their embrace, as Ralphie and December unrolled a professionally-printed banner, reading, "TEAM LORI LEWIS. GO SOLDIER GIRL! NEXT STOP, LONDON!"

"We gotta have something you can see when we're in the stands," said December.

Lori laughed and wiped away tears.

* * *

Anekee and Larry sat on either side of the toddler, who was closely examining the plastic train before her. The child looked up to her mother and then to Larry, reaching to touch his nose before returning to the train.

"Nine years we've known each other and finally we can spend an evening together," said Larry, smiling to the child, who peered up occasionally.

"The Ed one, he will steal from you and cheat," said Anekee. "Just to warn."

"I know. I'm firing him," said Larry, watching the child move the train along the wood floor towards her mom. He held his hand flat to the floor and the child used his arm as a rail bridge, the train climbing up to the elbow before she let go and let the toy tumble to the floor, as she giggled.

Larry, his eyes on the child, smiled, and the two repeated the action.

"Is he useful?" asked Anekee, gently stroking her daughter's hair.

"He knows a lot about investing, but I don't like him anymore."

"She grows tired," said Anekee. "The nanny can take over and we spend time alone," said Anekee, laying on her side, propped up on an elbow.

* * *

Gina, standing at Emma's bedside, in the suite, held her arm for Emma, who sat up on the edge of her bed. The two walked to the kitchen table, where they sat together.

"Brød?" asked Gina.

"Nej," said Emma.

"Larry is a nice grandson," said Gina.

"My grandson is odd."

"He loves you more than anyone in the world."

"His heart is full for me; empty for my son."

"Are you sure, no food?"

"No, I was just worried I had forgotten how to walk."

* * *

Larry leaned in close to his father's ear, whispering. "Little girls, in pink ballet outfits. They'll be standing with the Mayor, as he cuts the ribbon...."

Calvin's jaw moved slightly.

"... with big Chamber of Commerce scissors...."

* * *

"She's asleep," said Anekee, taking Larry by the hand. "Come." Anekee guided Larry to his computer room, with its single wooden chair, twin bed and plain wooden desk on which sat Larry's ancient desktop PC and webcam. Anekee closed and locked the door.

* * *

Lori, her duffel bag on her shoulder, followed a woman in her 30s and in a yellow windbreaker into a long dormitory hallway, before arriving at room 211.

"Dining hall opens 6, 10, 4 and 8, with two hours for breakfast, lunch and dinner," said the woman in the windbreaker. "Meal and training schedules are in a packet on the table. Curfew... yeh, for you, I don't think that's going to be a problem."

"Which is dinner? Four or eight?"

"Eat early, eat late, it's up to you," said the woman. "Curfew is eleven. Blood testing is random and universal, so watch your substances." The woman handed Lori the key to her room. "Welcome to the Olympic Training Center."

"Feel like I never left the army," said Lori, dropping her bag with a heavy thump.

* * *

Anekee, wearing only panties, lay on her side on the twin bed, the soft weight of her breasts spilling onto the pillow she had propped under her shoulder to support her upper body. One hand gripped Larry's enormous, flaccid penis, occasionally squeezing.

Larry lay next to her, wearing only a tee-shirt, his head near her feet. His hand rested on her calf, as they talked.

"I think it will be a success," he said.

"Your advisor is right," said Anekee, as she squeezed and hoisted Larry's penis. "Much is technical. It must be easy for the log on or no woman will come back."

"True," said Larry, running his hand over Anekee's leg.

"Don't we feel like an old married couple?" said Anekee.

They both laughed.

* * *

"The sun is too much," said Emma, holding Gina's arm. "Too bright." The two took a slow, veering turn, away from the balcony doors to instead walk towards the studio.

* * *

Ralphie stepped into the entryway of Larry's apartment, as Anekee and Larry played with a small child.

"To the airport?"

"Thank you, Ralphie," said Larry. "I'll help with the bags."

"No need," said the nanny, entering the living room from the bedroom. She and Ralphie moved the suitcases, car seat, stroller and other items out, as Larry and Anekee continued playing. The child looked up to Larry and smiled.

* * *

"So you can let me inherit the whole mansion and turn it into a park," said Larry, leaning close to his father's ear, "or you'll just have to pull through. The only way you'll ever be able to yell at me again is to live. I don't care.... it's up to you."

* * *

Lori Lewis was alone in the pool and, aside from her coach, who Larry had paid to fly out with her, was alone in the entire aquatic center. As she touched the wall of the pool at the end of eight laps, the coach clicked a stopwatch. Lori, breathing deeply, stood in the water, hanging onto the wide, blue floating divider between lanes.

"Pushing up against Adlington's times," said the coach. "You could take this thing."

Lori climbed out and shook her legs. "One more," she said.

* * *

Larry sat at his computer, with a chat window open.

<lotterylarry> is typing...

<lotterylarry> wrote, "i need your help on a web project for anekee. it'd sorta be like the forum u built years ago, but different. i can pay anything. it'd be a full-time job w/ u working for ane."

<omar_bball> is typing...

<omar_bball> wrote, "anything for anekee."

* * *

"Dude," said Ed, over speakerphone, as Larry lay on his bed. "Can I go to Denver with you all?"

"It's Omaha and I'm not buying you an airplane ticket," said Larry, breathing in the scent from the pillow Anekee had laid on.

"Fly?" said Ed. "C'mon, dude, you got a frickin' limo. You'd save a ton just running the car out and back.... You, December, Gina, Lawrence, me... the movie people."

"Maybe all of them, but not you," said Larry, hanging up.

* * *

Lori and her coach carried their trays to one of the scores of tables in the vast cafeteria. The two sat down at a table opposite a pair of buff, young blondes.

"Hey," said Lori, as she and her coach sat.

"Coaches have to be accompanied by athletes," said one of the blondes.

"That's me," said Lori.

"You're competing?" asked the second blonde.

Lori and her coach exchanged glances. "400 and 800 freestyle," said Lori.

"How on earth did you qualify... for the... Nationals?" asked the first.

"San Diego."

"But you're, like, so... old," said the second.

* * *

Larry and Ralphie sat in the driver's compartment of the Lincoln, looking out towards the Queen Mary. A string of lights hung far above the three illuminated red-and-black smokestacks.

"So what's your plan for life?" asked Larry.

"I go home each night, park the car in the garage, kiss the missus and forget about the world," said Ralphie. "If I can do that every day, life's good."

"So, it's like, wake up and make it through the day?"

"I don't like the alternative," said Ralphie.

* * *

Lori broke through the water, as her coach stared at the stopwatch.

"The form is suffering."

* * *

December typed as subscribers vied for her attention.

"Gonna go see my soldier competing to get into the Olympics!" she wrote, as a subscriber with the ID <tit_fiend> urged her to pull her breasts out of her top.

* * *

My phone buzzed.

I ignored Larry's call, as I had every other call from him that day.

I dialed my voicemail. "You have... 12... new messages... and... 3... saved messages.... First message... 'Lawrence, yeh, this is Larry. Will you come with me to Nebraska and be part of Team Lori? It's all on me. Please....' To hear this message again...."

* * *

"Look," said one of the buff, blonde teenagers from the cafeteria, walking past Lori and her coach, as swimmers drew up to their starting blocks for a practice heat. "It's that old lady."

"Discipline," said the coach.

Lori grunted.
Chapter Twenty-Three – Closing Doors

"No, Ed," said Gina, as she sat at a small telephone table, with an ancient rotary-dial, black Bell telephone. "I don't want to be pressured to do that anymore." Gina listened, and repeated the word "no" several times, before saying "goodbye."

"Is all well?" asked Emma.

"Ed thinks he owns me, and we are not even going out," said Gina. "I said yes to driving to Nebraska, but only because you said you will be okay, and Larry is going."

"You have to cheer for me," said Emma. "His friendship with Lori is the best thing ever to happen to my grandson."

"Ed will expect, expect, expect."

"Borrow my hearing aid and tell him it doesn't work," said Emma.

"When he turns on the charm, he's hard to ignore."

A solid knocking came from the main doors to the suite. Gina crossed the living quarters and, on her return, escorted Lena Martins and the emissary from the Royal Ballet, who wheeled in an exquisitely-made steamer trunk.

"It would... have been... really great," said the emissary, "if the... chairlift... worked."

"Remind me to give you the key, so they can use the lift when they leave," Emma told Gina.

"Mrs. van der Bix," said the emissary.

"Not Mrs., if you please," said Emma.

The emissary stammered.

"She never married," said Gina.

"I am sorry."

"I suppose I am, too," said Emma. "Think of all the sex I missed."

Gina laughed.

The emissary pointed to the exquisite trunk. "First, a gift," said the emissary, motioning like a game show host to the trunk, as Lena set about to open the trunk, from which she pulled out a folded projection screen and an ornately-crafted folding table, on which the emissary placed the ancient gray-metal projector. Lena handed the emissary a box, which, when opened, contained four identical clear-glass bulbs.

Lena slid open a drawer of the chest and produced a metal film canister, which she carried to the projection table. After carefully placing the bulb into the projector, the emissary took the film can from Lena and threaded the 16mm film.

Gina went around the room, closing the drapes to the studio, bringing the room to near total darkness. Gina and Lena carried the sofa near the Victrola so it joined a second, as the emissary erected the sparkling-silver projection screen, opposite the sofas.

"Lena, sit with me," said Gina, motioning to the sofa they had carried. They made themselves each instantly at home, as the emissary ran the projector and adjusted the frame, before turning the projector to "fan" and awaiting the next, clearly important step.

Emma sat on the sofa with the two women, between them, and waited.

Lena turned to Emma, who sat upright, and unmoving. She turned to the emissary, standing at the projector's side, awaiting a next step.

"And, yes, begin," said Lena, and the lamp of the projector glowed.

A black-and-white film, shot inside an elegant theatre, showed a troupe of dancers, in simple costume, performing their work, bathed richly in glorious lighting, photographed at masterful angles and captured on film still vivid in its crispness, despite having been shot 75 years earlier.

Dancing in the center of the production, and clearly the center of the film, was Astrid Ullagård, then, and finally, Principal Dancer, as she was for each of the years Harald Lander convinced her to return to their shared apartment in Købnhavn, where they ate cake at the teahouse visited by the Royal Family and rode bicycles past the King's castle.

"It is amazing," said Lena, "that Miss Lewis... she is Astrid."

"It's the shoulders," said Emma.

"What?" asked Lena.

"Lori has big shoulders," said Emma. "So did my mother, but they only made her look cold and stern. Unlike Lori, my mother did not know how to smile."

A few feet away, alive on screen, Astrid was master, and, with her closing bow, a soul unleashed, a flower in full blossom.

"It's uncanny," said Lena.

For fifteen minutes, images flickered, as the projector gave a crackly orchestral soundtrack that filled the room. On completion of the first reel, the emissary turned the projector to fan and silently stopped the take-up reel and threaded the film to rewind.

"Sunshine, please, Gina," said Emma.

"Of course, Emma Mathilde," said Gina, stepping up and walking to one wall. She gently pulled open heavy inner drapery that left delicate, full-length, faint yellow outer drapes, glowing from the afternoon sun.

The emissary lifted the reel off the projector and placed it into the opened film can, covering the can and placing it into the opened drawer.

"No more, thank you," said Emma.

The emissary stood next to the steamer trunk.

"No more?" asked Lena.

Gina stepped forward from the window, and stood alongside the Victrola. She wound the handle and dropped the needle onto Enrico Caruso.

"Thank you, Gina," said Emma. "I would much rather hear Italian music, then watch a film of my mother."

* * *

"I wish I had been there," said Larry, pouring a glass of lemonade from a pitcher Gina had prepared. He sat back in the upright lounger on the balcony, sipping lemonade.

"Bitter soda never tastes sweet," said Emma. "If it had been my father on screen...."

"They left the films and the trunk," said Gina. "A courier will come for the films in one year."

"Send the films to Lena," Emma said. "The courier can collect them from her."

The three looked out to the bay, where a pelican hovered and then plunged with a splash into the water.

* * *

"Hal-lowww," said the man carrying a camera on his shoulder, as he entered the foyer of the studio with Lena. "Tres... Tres von Sommerberg.... The director... from Denmark."

"Gina Milan," said Gina, "Miss van der Bix's assistant. Do you have the contract?"

Tres looked at Lena. "Contract?"

"This is a film, correct?" asked Gina. "Do you shoot film without agreements?"

Lena and Tres convened to a whisper. "This now is Larry's production. We expected he would have documents for us to review," Tres said, smiling weakly.

"Please have a seat, while I confer with Miss van der Bix," said Gina. Tres and Lena sat on the sofa next to the Victrola, as Gina walked through the French doors into the living quarters, where Emma was having coffee. "I'm going to have them sit for a while," said Gina, pouring a cup of coffee for herself.

Stepping back through the French doors ten minutes later, Gina approached the filmmakers. "I'm very sorry," said Gina. "There are no contract documents. You will have to return tomorrow."

"We have a production crew of eight people, flying in tonight," said Lena, standing.

"We have a ten-day window for a seven-day shooting schedule," said Tres. "I beg you, not a whole day."

"I see," said Gina, motioning for the two to again sit. "Excuse me," she said, closing the French doors. Ten minutes later, she again entered the studio. "Miss van der Bix will be with you shortly."

"What about Miss Lewis? Can we shoot her scenes?"

"Miss Lewis is training to qualify for the Olympic team."

"For the marathon?"

"Swimming."

"May we speak to Larry?" asked Lena.

"Perhaps when he is here," said Gina, walking to the Victrola, winding the crank, and dropping the needle on The Charleston, which filled the studio, as she stepped through the French doors.

* * *

Emma sat immobile in a director's chair Gina had brought inside from the balcony and set such that about a third of Emma was still in soft shadow, but she mostly enjoyed a warm, rich natural light that gave the appearance of a resting angel.

"These records," said Emma, lightly waving to the Victrola, "they shatter spectacularly," said Emma, as Lena filmed. "I threw many at my mother the night she found out about Calvin." Emma swept an arm across the studio. "All over the floor. She roared more about records then my heart, my body, my future. How could I ever tell her what those boys and men did as they pulled my arms and legs? Carrying a child was enough for her to call me a dula."

* * *

A nurse entered silently and checked Calvin's monitors, as Larry stayed close to his father's ear.

"His vitals are better these last few days, so whatever you're doing," said the nurse, "keep it up."

The nurse left.

"I know at the beach that time I tried to kill you, but I promise, this time, it's not me," said Larry. "Anyway, I'd be okay with you living. We both pretty much hate each other, so it's no big deal if you make it. That's the only way you'll be able to yell at me again.... By living, you know."

Calvin's jaw was motionless. His cheek did not twitch.

"Why am I paying cash for you, Dad, if you're not gonna even try?" said Larry.

* * *

December typed into the chat box on the "Miss Milkshakes" live site, as her stream showed her in a silver tube top, sitting at her computer.

<sitko_bladich> wrote, "why the long face, baby"

<miss_milkshakes> wrote, "go away sitko or ill iggy u."

<luvdec> wrote, "lift 'em out"

<brstfan> wrote, "incredible size r they real?"

<sitko_bladich> wrote, "mr. magnum would make u feel better"

<boobimsa> wrote, "my god"

<miss_milkshakes> wrote, "yer done we re over I m done with u"

<luvdec> wrote, "can you pull em out?"

<sitko_bladich> wrote, "wrong answer baby i say when we're done"

<westernsrule> wrote, "ud look good in a cowboy hat"

<miss_milkshakes> wrote, "i got me a soldier sitko, we r done done done."

<luvdec> wrote, "oh ya pull em out."

* * *

Lori climbed out of the water, the only swimmer in the aquatic center. The coach held open a towel, which she silently stepped into. A few moments later, the towel dropped to the pool's edge, the coach held open an ankle-length, fuzzy-lined body windbreaker, with Woodrow Wilson Swimming printed on the back.

Lori and the coach walked into the night's air, each gasping slightly as they walked with their heads looking up to a sky of stars brightly glowing above them.

* * *

Larry sat at his grandmother's kitchen table, watching Gina swish and circle through the kitchen, preparing vegetables and a spiced sour cream dressing for Emma. Each time Gina passed Larry, she would smile or acknowledge him. His phone rang.

"Hello, Lawrence," said Larry. "You never call me. Must be important."

"It is, Larry," I said, as I sat in my living room, looking to the ocean. "It's something I've needed to say for awhile."

"That you want out?" said Larry.

"What?" I said, stunned. "How could you know?"

"How about this," said Larry. "You stay with me for the next couple of months, long enough to fire Ed and go with December and me to the swimming trials – and maybe London – and I'll give you a million dollars, and you can leave."

"You would pay me... a million dollars... and after London, I would be done?" I said. "The London Olympics will be completely done by the middle of August...."

"Stick it out til Oct. 1, okay? Everything's pretty much on autopilot, like you've said. Then you're done. A million bucks, okay?"

* * *

"I can draw up exit agreements," said Emily, mustard on her fingers and a glob of pastrami dangling from her French roll. "But a million dollars? For what? How can that be justified?"

"Do I have to justify it?" said Larry, eating a pepper.

"If there is discernible labor, then an exit agreement that includes severance has tax flexibility," said Emily, reaching for napkins. "If the figure is high and the work low or non-existent, authorities are more likely to view the million as a gift, and then you'd pay $350,000 in tax."

"Even if I take the hit, just draw them up," said Larry. "One for a million, Lawrence exiting on good terms; the other, a cold brush off, that I use to dump Ed with ten grand to get rid of him."

"If he takes the money, he accepts the terms," said Emily.

Larry sipped his Diet Coke.

"Ideally, though, you still want a signature showing the person accepts the agreement," said Emily, picking up an asparagus spear with her fingers and nibbling it to nothingness. "This place is good," she said, licking her fingers.

"Oh, and one other for a million, for someone else," said Larry.

"Lori?" said Emily.

"Yeh," said Larry. "So she has something waiting for when she gets out of the army."

"You're a pretty amazing friend," said Emily, asking the waitress for a box.

"So's she," said Larry. "And it doesn't feel like real money, anyway."

"Believe me," said Emily, "a million dollars... that is real money."

"Maybe, but not to me," said Larry. "I mean, three actual dollars are the only real money that I put in. And those came from Lori, so, really, it may as well be hers...." Larry picked up the last piece of his pastrami sandwich, as Emily sipped her soda. "So how are things for you and your mom?"

"Interesting you should ask, as she just sold her shop," said Emily. "Some movie people came and offered to buy her entire store. She didn't believe it at first, but then a director came with a bunch of money and bought everything."

"Oh," said Larry, "what's she doing now?"

"Nothing," said Emily. "She's totally bored. She's watches TV with my brother's kids all day. Hope she finds something soon. She's driving all of us crazy."
Chapter Twenty-Four – Emptiness

Gina Milani sat with her hands folded on her lap, in a wingback chair pulled to the far side of the mirrored main studio of the Scandinavian's suite, as Lena Martins adjusted the clip-on mic on Emma's blouse and a second crew member applied powder to Emma's forehead.

"Great. Really great," said Tres von Sommerberg, standing beside a camera operator, near where Gina was seated.

* * *

"It isn't going well," said Dr. Bosch, to Larry, as the two stood alongside Calvin's gurney. "He just is not responding as I would hope."

"W'ull," said Larry, "just like with my grandma, whatever you need to do...."

* * *

"Ready, old woman?" said the young blonde, walking past Lori.

As eight swimmers stepped to their block for a trial heat, Lori kept her eyes focused forward.

* * *

"Ewa Sonnet?" I asked, with my notepad and pen in my lap, as Ed and I watched cable.

Ed flipped the station, pausing for a soccer match. "Just don't get the soccer thing," said Ed, under his breath. "She's up for a meeting. I could take that one."

I jotted "mtg" next to her name. "Just email the contact info and I will follow up."

Ed kept flipping, stopping at a Humphrey Bogart film. Adopting a stiff lip, Ed attempted to impersonate the voice. "Sorry, but... I don't do things that way."

"This may be odd work, Ed," I said, "but it's still a job, okay. If anyone is representing themselves on Larry's behalf, it will be with my approval."

"Do you know how to whistle? Just pucker up and blow."

* * *

Emily sat on a tall stool and her mother on a low chair, as they each worked their way through several take-out cartons from East-West Xpress.

Inside Kashabara's, the place was nearly empty, with the two women gathered around an atomic-theme coffee table heaped with food, two purses, keys and a pack of cigarettes.

"To the last night of rent," said Ms. Kashabara, as she poured chicken panang over her rice, and picked up her chopsticks.

* * *

Larry stood alongside his father's gurney. Calvin lay motionless.

Two nurses lifted and adjusted the father's splayed frame, checked monitors, and exited.

Neither Larry nor Calvin reacted to any of it.

* * *

Lori stared ahead, as she gripped a pull-up bar in her dorm bathroom. She regularized her breathing and slowly descended and rose.

* * *

Tres, his index finger lightly touching his lips, listened intently, as Lena held the camera and posed questions. Gina, upright in a wingback chair, watched the filmmakers circle Emma, who sat on the center sofa of the studio.

"It is right that Harald Lander sat where I sit now, and my mother danced for him, as I wound the Victrola and my father placed the discs," said Emma. "We had many visitors and at such times, my mother seemed happy. The maestro stayed here, but we had many visitors who stayed a week or more. The King sent emissaries. The Ambassador dined with my parents when he was in California and asked my mother host receptions here. None saw it as their duty to take Astrid Ullagård as a secret lover, so I am unwilling to believe the Maestro impregnated my mother. She was sour, but not rotten."

* * *

"After I give up my keys, I will have nothing," said Emily's mother, as she swept the empty floor of her shop.

"But mom, they gave you so much money," said Emily. "Why take on more debt?"

"Because the bank will loan it to me," said Ms. Kashabara. "Before I paid my balance with the movie money, my bank never called me back. Now, they offer a line of credit."

"Mom, you cleared everything you ever owed," said Emily. "You could do something for your future."

"I am!" said the mother. "I am capitalizing on my credit. Do you know how rare it is for a woman my age to have that kind of credit line? Access to capital, my daughter, equals opportunity. Banks speak only one language."

* * *

I closed my notebook, notes and doodles next to each of the names of Larry's models.

Ed stopped at "Lonely Island." We both watched in silence as a shark circled in the clear water.

* * *

Larry stepped into the Lincoln and Ralphie closed the door behind him. As the car pulled away from Long Beach Memorial, Larry lay back in the leather seat and looked at the ceiling.

His phone buzzed. "LORI," read the screen.

"Hi," said Larry, putting the call on loudspeaker.

"Hey," came Lori's voice.

"Doing okay?"

"Yeh, okay," said Lori. "You okay?"

"Yeh, I guess," Larry said. "I miss you."

"Yeh," said Lori. "Miss you, too."

"Not like you, to miss someone," said Larry.

"It isn't like normal here," said Lori. "A lot of people are ready to crack here."

* * *

"Be right down, hunny," said December, over the intercom.

Larry stood outside her building, with its single-tone paintjob. December came outside, and a moment later, he and December stepped into the Lincoln, which had drawn a small crowd of kids as spectators. Ralphie closed the passenger door. Larry rolled down the window and was handing cans of soda to hands reaching towards the window, as Ralphie got in to the drivers compartment.

* * *

"Been nice hanging, dude, but I've got a date," said Ed. He stood, gave a wave and left my apartment, as the credits on the second-to-last episode of "Lonely Island" rolled.

* * *

Lori lay, eyes wide open, on the narrow bed of her dorm room, moonlight streaming onto the pillow from the open window. A white, fuzzy hand-puppet of a lamb lay limp on the pillow, next to a tiny stuffed pumpkin.

Lori reached to her cell phone, alongside the Lambchop puppet, and dialed, setting the phone on the sheep. A woman's voice answered over speaker

"Hi, mom," said Lori.
Part Five – Chapter Twenty-Five – Troubled Waters

"Dis is da boat you bought, Larry?" asked December, as she and Larry walked towards the dock in front of the family mansion. Before them was the motor yacht Larry had chased in his whitehall, a superyacht of white towering forty feet off the waterline, with "Dreamboat, Treasure Island, California" emblazoned on the stern.

"Yeh," said Larry.

* * *

Now felt as good a time as any to call Lori.

I'd been thinking about her almost constantly since she re-entered my life, as part of this crazy turn in Larry's world, and even though he was going to cut me loose, and she was going into the army, I could still at least try this one last time.

"What?" came her voice over my phone.

"Hi, Lori," I said, again inexplicably nervous, as I always am talking to my ex-wife, unable to think of what next to say.

"Lawrence, I got a lot going on," said Lori. "Unless it's something important, I gotta get back...."

"Lori, I can't stop thinking of you," I blurted out. "I've never wanted you more than I do now."

There was silence on the line.

"Ever since I saw you again, I haven't been able to get you out of my mind," I said. The light of the moon burned like fire, as I looked out to the ocean. "Larry's going to let me out of this thing, and so I'm closing up books, and I know you're closing things up, too. Can I go with you?"

More silence, broken finally by a question. "What do you mean, 'go with me?'"

"Wherever you're going," I said.

"Lawrence, I am going into the fucking US Army," said Lori. "I doubt there's tag-along quarters in Kandahar or Kabul or the forward operating bases...."

"Please, Lori, I just want to be back in your life again," I begged. "Larry's giving me a million bucks. We could create a new life somewhere, anywhere."

The outburst that followed Lori's silence was in that same tone she had used when she first left me.

"Is that all anybody wants now, is a tit to suck on?" she said. "Lawrence, you're nuts if you think that I'd let you take a bailout from my best friend, so you can ditch him for whatever hope you have about me, which I can promise is definitely not gonna happen."

"Lori, please," I begged, understanding the fullness of the definition for "pathetic," as I said each word. "You're all I can think of."

Lori hung up.

* * *

"Gina!" yelled Ed, from the sidewalk that separated the van der Bix mansion from the docks.

Gina Milani stood on the top floor at the stone railing, in the moonlight, looking out at Larry's enormous motor yacht, with its single cabin aglow.

"I miss you, baby!"

"Go away, Ed," she yelled.

* * *

December, wearing only a bikini bottom, set a small boom box on the plush couch near the fireplace of the main cabin. She pushed play and Frank Sinatra began crooning. "I thought we'd go old school for tonight's dances," said December.

"I have register tape for thirty songs, at $100 each," said Larry, in shorts and a tee-shirt. He sat back in the couch and used a remote to dim the lights. December cooed.

A single lamp in the far corner of the cabin glowed, as December straddled Larry, holding the back of the couch for support, as she brushed her breasts lightly across his face. "Thanks for letting me dance for you, hunny. I prefer to work for my money."

A phone vibrated on a coffee table near the couch. December looked, climbed off Larry, whispered "Lori" and answered her phone. Using Larry's torso as a cushion, December rested again him as she took the call. "Yeh, baby?" December's spare hand had dug into Larry's briefs and pulled out his enormous, limp penis, which she held as she talked on the phone. "Naw, just hanging out with Larry. He got a big boat. He's showing it to me. Yeh, a boat. Big," she said, squeezing his penis. "Like, crazy big."

Larry's phone buzzed. "GINA." He picked it up. "Hi," he said. "No. Just in the boat. Alone? No." Larry held his phone away from his ear for a moment, looked at the screen and returned to the call. "Ed's on the other line. Just a second...."

"No, baby, Ed's not here," said December.

"What, Ed?" said Larry, as December gave a strong squeeze.

"Ed's calling Larry," said December, not letting up her grip.

"Yeh, I'm in the boat," said Larry. "No, you can't come up."

"Go, Larry!" said December. "He's telling him, baby."

"No! You can't... fuck!" said Larry, pulling away from December, who released her grip. Larry slid on his shorts, as the sounds of heavy footsteps came from the deck, followed by knocking on the cabin door.

"Fuck!" yelled December, grabbing her bikini top and putting Lori on speaker, as Larry went toward the knocking, only to hear more knocking from the other side of the cabin.

"Go away, Ed!" Larry yelled through the locked sliding door on the left side of the cabin.

"Damn," said December, tying her bikini top and then reaching for her tank top.

"What's happening?" came Lori's voice.

"It's Ed outside the cabin," yelled December, as she picked up the phone. "And that girl, who helps the grandma...."

"Gina," said Lori, the sound of anger rising.

Gina slid open the door on the right side of the cabin. "Isn't this a nice, little vacation getaway?" she said.

Ed climbed across the front-facing windows, reaching the door Gina had slid open and finding Gina standing with her hands on her hips and with Larry and December barely dressed.

"I see," said Ed. "Maybe this is why Lawrence just wasted my evening running me through pointless questions."

"Don't you touch my girl, Ed!" yelled Lori, through the speaker.

"Jealousy doesn't wear well, even on a hero, swim chick," said Ed. "but it looks like your best friend already beat us to the punch."

"This is disgusting," said Gina.

"What the hell's going on there?" yelled Lori.

Larry, holding his stomach, said nothing.

"Ed, you have a lot of balls coming up here like you own da place," said December, before she turned to Gina. "And you...."

"No," said Larry. "No, please...."

"I don't know what you think I'm thinking," said December, squaring her shoulders, "but it's not what you think I'm thinking."

"Somebody tell me what's going on!" yelled Lori.

Larry fell to his knees and began vomiting.

"Oh my God!" yelled Gina, looking about and moving to grab a stack of towels.

"Oh, dude," said Ed, backing away, but not before Larry looked up towards him, spraying his flip-flops, feet and ankles. "Aww, gross, man!"

"Nevermind," said Lori. "I know what's happening."

"Oh, hunny," said December, as Larry continued puking.

Gina leaned in close to Larry, handing him a towel. He reached up and as he took the towel, Gina released it into his hand, whispering, "You'll be okay." She strategically tossed two of the towels onto the floor just in front of Larry before returning to the stack, grabbing several more towels and crossing the cabin to a sink area, where she ran water onto one of the towels. She returned to the spot next to Larry and offered him the wet towel.

* * *

I made my way to the only lit compartment on the enormous yacht now berthed in front of the van der Bix mansion, to find Larry slouched in a swivel chair, next to a large couch in the rear of the main cabin. Ed sat near the forward-facing windows. The air hung heavy with the smell of vomit. Gina and December sat on the couch, the women on either side of Larry.

"I don't know what's going on," I said, avoiding a pile of wet towels in the middle of the floor, "but Lori told me to find out." This could have been high school. This could have been Saturday night, sneaking beers at the suite. This could have been another disastrous drive with Larry, the only person I had ever known who could get carsick as he drove. "I can sort of figure it out, but why doesn't someone tell me."

"I just care about Larry," said Gina.

"You talk like you own him," snapped December.

"You didn't even look down when I was at the sidewalk," said Ed.

"Oh, God," said Larry.

"Excuse me, but has anyone ever heard of a private life?" said December. "Until everyone barged in, Larry and me were minding our own business."

"He was minding your business pretty well," said Ed.

"Please," said Larry, as he began coughing.

"Everybody stop!" I yelled. "This is Larry's boat. Let the man breathe."

The silence that followed made the sudden rumbling of the ship's engines all the louder, followed by a chorus of "What the...?"

Everyone in the cabin looked up, as hands in the night slid one of the cabin doors open. Two burly men entered, as the boat began to move on the water.

"Sitko! What the hell are you doing!" yelled December.

"Why look," said the bigger of the two men, "it's the man with the soda cans." Sitko Bladich stepped up to Larry and delivered a kick to the face, sending Larry bouncing back on the couch before he collapsed forward, onto the floor. Gina and December shrieked.

"I love that," Sitko said to his comrade.

"You fuckin' bastard," yelled Ed, standing, as the man with Sitko drew a long-bladed knife.

"C'mon, surfer boy," said the man with the knife, crouching. "Be a hero."

December and Gina scooted their way to Larry, Gina holding his bloodied face in her arms. December stood over him, protectively. "Dey're gonna send you back, Sitko, and never let you out!"

Sitko Bladich laughed. "We'll see baby."

The movement of the boat picked up.

"All of you's," said the man with the knife, "do likes dis guy, here." The knifeman pointed to me. "Hands up, like him, all wimpy and stuff. C'mon! All of you."

Sitko pointed to the couch. "All of you, onto the couch. Mr. Soda Cans and Surfer Boy, you too!" Sitko yelled as he instructed the man with the knife to watch the group. He stepped out of the cabin. Several moments later, a third, equally giant, man entered, also carrying a knife.

The engines of the yacht began to whir in a high-pitched sound, and it felt as though the boat was speeding along, but not yet in unprotected water.

"So what will you be an accomplice to?" I asked one of the knifemen. "Kidnapping? Murder?"

"Shad'dup," said the first knife-wielder, kicking me in the lower leg.

Sitko stepped back in. "We're going for a little ride, everybody, so I can see my girl."

"I am not your girl, Sitko!"

"Shut up, bitch!" yelled Sitko, stepping to December and striking her with the back of his hand. "Mr. Magnum's lonely and you're gonna make him happy."

"Don't hit the lady, scumbag," said Ed.

Sitko motioned for the second knifeman and the two closed in on Ed. Sitko moved behind Ed's back and held his arms, as the knifeman put the blade against Ed's throat.

"No blood, man," said Ed. "No blood."

The knifeman made a short, quick motion, slicing open a small slit, from which a steady trickle of blood oozed out. The knifeman let blood pool on the blade, which he raised in front of Ed's eyes.

"Do it now, Surfer Boy," whispered Sitko. "Make it easy for us."

Ed stopped struggling against Sitko's hold. The knifeman stepped back to join his counterpart, and Sitko shoved Ed forward, sending him to his knees, blood splattering all around him.

I watched Ed on his hands and knees for a moment. He appeared to have something in his hand, which he cupped close to his shorts.

Sitko crossed to December, grabbing her tank-top collar and yanking violently downward, ripping the shirt into pieces, letting it fall open as December grabbed the pieces she could save. "That's what I'm talking about," said Sitko, the sound of raw lust in his voice. "You're gonna make Mr. Magnum very happy tonight."

Sitko stepped to Gina and Larry, putting his crooked index finger under Larry's chin, slowly lifting Larry's face. "You shouldn't rub money in someone's face," said Sitko, before spitting directly into Larry's eyes. "That just makes people mad."

"Dis'll be your third strike, Sitko," yelled December. "Dey'll never let you out."

The whirring of the engines increased. From the flickering of lights outside the windows, it was clear we were still within eyesight of land. We could have been off Palos Verdes or San Pedro. It still felt like we were within the protected waters of the harbor.

Sitko stepped to Gina and moved his hand to her cheek. She recoiled, as he touched her. "Then all of us are gonna have a good time tonight." The engine cut out.

The two knifemen looked at one another and then to Sitko, who did not appear concerned. Sitko leaned in to Gina. "Stand up. Let's see what you got, girlie."

Gina sat frozen.

"I said, get up!" yelled Sitko, his hand open and cocked back to slap her, but Larry, alongside Gina, reached up and grabbed Sitko's wrist. The more Sitko tried to move his arm, the more it appeared that Larry would win a battle of strength. "Stupid," said Sitko. "Cut him, boys."

There was silence, and then bright light shined into the cabin.

Sitko turned and saw his knifemen raising their arms, their weapons falling from their hands. "What the fuck?" said Sitko.

At the instant that Sitko turned his head, December and Gina each leapt up, Gina sending her knee crashing between Sitko's legs and December hurling herself upwards, knocking the mountain backwards, just as Larry released his grip. Ed jumped on top of the fallen giant, flipping Sitko onto his face and grabbing an arm, pushing it high into Sitko's back and doing the same with the other.

Three state Fish and Game wardens, each holding automatic rifles, entered the cabin, as park rangers and game wardens rushed in behind them, moving quickly to handcuff Sitko Bladich and the two knifemen.

Ralphie followed the wardens into the cabin. "He's the owner," said Ralphie, pointing to Larry. "And these people are with him," pointing to me, Ed, Gina and December.

The game wardens moved the trio of kidnappers out of the cabin, each with a rifle aimed at their head. Larry took off his shirt, and offered it to December, who timidly accepted it and let the pieces of her tank top fall to the ground. Gina sat Larry on the couch and looked closely at where he had been kicked. She shucked her own blouse and wearing only a brassier above the waist, used her top to soak the blood from Larry's face.

"You don't look well," I said to Ed, as he watched Larry and Gina. I guided Ed to a chair near the window. Once he was seated, I stepped out of the cabin. Circling overhead were helicopters from local news stations, from the Coast Guard, from State Fish & Game, from the LAPD, and each shining a spotlight onto the yacht. Sitko and the other kidnappers were taken to the side of the yacht and shackled to one another and then to the railing, while wardens stood guard, never lowering their rifles.

A rope ladder was unfurled from one of the helicopters, and three men in olive green uniforms climbed onto the yacht. They moved towards the cabin.

"Mr. van der Bix?" said one, as I reentered the cabin. "Larry van der Bix?"

Larry looked up.

"There's no way you'd remember me," he said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a folded photograph, which he handed to Larry. "I'm glad we got here in time."

Larry looked at the photo of himself handing a check to the Governor of California, and all around them were uniformed park rangers, standing in front of a blue backdrop and a podium bearing the seal of the Governor of the State of California.

"You're glad," said Larry.

* * *

"No, baby," said December, into the phone. "Everything's fine. Why?"

The helicopters overhead continued shining their spotlights, as the yacht was brought in to LAFD Firehouse #5, next to the battleship USS Iowa. The spotlights filled the cabin, like a lightning storm, coming and going, illuminating all and wiping out all shadows, and then, just as suddenly, leaving the cabin in near total darkness.

"On the TV? Dere? In Colorado?" said December. "Man, the news don't fool around."

Larry lay his head, wrapped in a towel, on Gina's chest, as she gently stroked his hair.

Ed looked up from swivel chair he sat in near the front windows, waving at times to the helicopters.

December sat on the other side of Larry, telling Lori the order of events, missing no detail, adding commentary and cooing towards Larry wherever he was part of the story. She smiled sweetly towards Gina, who seemed not to notice, as she tended to Larry.

The state official who had given Larry the photo stepped back in to the cabin. Ralphie followed him in. "Mr. van der Bix, we've transferred the attackers to local police custody and your employee has given us what we need to proceed with arrests. But we will need to hold your vessel as part of the investiga....."

"Keep it," said Larry, not moving from Gina's embrace. "I don't ever want to see it again."

"That's very generous, Mr. van der Bix, but I'm not empowered...."

"Tell the Governor," said Larry, as four Los Angeles city paramedics entered the cabin, carrying large plastic cases, which they swiftly set down next to Larry, pulling them open to reveal gauze, bandages and medical supplies. "Maybe the Parks need a boat."

"Him, too," I said to a paramedic, while pointing to Ed. "He took a knife cut across the neck." The paramedic quickly examined Ed's neck.

The three paramedics tending to Larry gently eased him away from Gina's hold. One peeled away the towel he held pressed to his face, now soaked with blood, and cleaned Larry's wounds with sterile pads and rubbing alcohol, and then an antibiotic ointment. As one worked on Larry, another began questioning Gina and the third questioned December, each asking calmly "Are you okay? Do you feel faint? How is your breathing? Do you want someone to hold your hand?" As each question was posed, the two paramedics looked closely at Gina and December, checking their faces, ears, eyes. "You'll be okay. Your friends will be okay. You did a good job."

December burst into tears.
Chapter Twenty-Six – Somebody To Love

The Long Beach Restaurant had only one table large enough for our group of eight, and space for the camera equipment that Tres von Sommerberg and Lena Martins had brought to capture the meal. There probably would have been more room if we had eaten in Ralphie's Lincoln, which was parked across three spots in the narrow lot, right next to a dental office and a McDonald's.

The filmmakers sat at the far end of the table, each switching hand-held camera duty – at times standing, other times seated, always shooting. Ed and Gina sat across from one another, next to the filmmakers, and December and Emily next to Larry and me. Despite the director's repeated verbal and hand motions that Larry sit at the head of the table, he held his place, across from me and next to December. Larry seemed to grow more annoyed each time von Sommerberg would wave his hand to the head of the table.

"W'ull, okay," said Larry, "so while we're waiting for the soup – which is good, you'll like it; kind'a hot, though – and I know, the whole kidnapping thing..., still, this is about Lori, okay?"

"I'm sorry, but I sort of object," said Emily Kashabara.

"A lawyer objecting," said Ed. "What next?"

"Can it, Ed," said Larry.

Ed looked surprised. I looked to him and back to Larry.

A pair of 20-something Asian servers, who easily could have been siblings, carried two orders of pad Thai, two large covered bowls of rice, a platter of wonton and egg rolls and a tray of beverages to the table.

"I know that you're paying us as one-third-time workers and, really, it is closer to a full-time salary," said Emily, "which, I, for one, really appreciate, but...."

"Yes," said Larry.

December reached across to the pad Thai and stabbed a plump shrimp with her fork.

"I don't particularly want to spend the July 4th holiday in Nebraska," said Emily.

"Is that because Nebraska is flat and you can't go bombing with all the young guys?" asked Ed.

"I beg your pardon," said Emily. "Look, Larry, thanks for the job, and I hope I've been helpful, but, really, I didn't sign on for a trip to Omaha. And it's no slight on Nebraska. I'll take a pass on London, too."

"Is it because of stuff at home?" asked Larry.

"I'd prefer not to air personal business at the dinner table, thank you."

December's fork crossed to the wonton.

Lena lifted the pad Thai platter, spooned noodles, chicken, carrot slivers, egg, peanuts, tofu, sprouts and shrimp onto her plate and passed the platter to Gina, who was watching the back-and-forth at the table like a tennis match.

"But your mom sold all her stuff, right?" asked Larry. "Didn't you tell me that?"

"Film people bought her out, but I don't remember telling you that. Did I?" Emily looked to her right, towards Tres, with his enormous lens pointed at her face.

Gina, having scooped very little from the pad Thai to her plate, passed the platter to me, as Emily stared at Tres and Larry.

"Film people," she said, quietly. "And, Ed, if I want to skateboard instead of going to Nebraska, frankly, I don't see where that is any business of yours." Emily turned to Larry. "So did you have any difficulty stashing the big furniture, Larry?"

"Most of it fit into the basement of the mansion," said Larry, reaching for an egg roll.

Emily looked directly into the camera. "You've made my mom into an even bigger paranoid nut case then she already was," she said slowly. "The Hollywood mafia put her out of business... she says that over and over, all day long." Emily sputtered and waved her arms. "Why did you buy my mom out of business. Her complete inventory? Why? Now, all she has is money, which she's using to borrow more then she ever owed before."

Larry, stirring his iced coffee, lowered his head. He wore the same look of contrition that he'd have after me and Lori fought early in our marriage over how long to let him sleep on our couch. "You don't have to go to Nebraska, Emily. And I'm sorry, okay." He stirred his iced coffee. "I mean, I think Lori'll have contract issues right up front, because who wouldn't want a piece of Lori Lewis, but, yeh, no, fine. Sorry about your mom."

I passed the pad Thai to Emily, who held the platter, looked at it, and passed it across the table.

* * *

Four of the fortune cookies on the table sat in their unopened plastic, as everyone rested in a satiated stupor, Larry picking at the Thai barbequed chicken with green chili and garlic and December picking at the last of the pad Thai with chopsticks.

"Well," I said, as Larry scooped the last of the chicken onto his empty plate, "if I am paying for airfare to Omaha, who is going with us?"

"Me, you, Gina, December, Lori's folks, Dave San Jose...," said Larry.

"Me," said Ed, holding his arm up.

"Emily?" asked Larry.

"No, really...," she said.

"That's okay," said Larry.

"Me," Ed repeated, his arm still raised.

"I'm not paying your way, Ed, so if you wanna go...."

"Not... what?" said Emily.

"No ticket," said Gina, who looked to Ed and then to Larry.

"Ed can have my ticket," said Emily.

"Non-transferable opportunity," said Larry, taking on the look one might learn in a class dedicated to teaching students how to cast steely glares.

"Thank, Emily, but I don't think we should be talking, quote-unquote, tickets," said Ed. "Myself, I suggest we have Ralphie drive, in his Lincoln. Gives us the freedom to pick up Lori in Colorado and make it in plenty of time to Omaha, which, I might point out, Barack Obama carried in the 2008 election."

"Dat's a pretty good idea," said December.

I watched Larry, as he placed three hundred dollar bills onto the check tray, for clues. He didn't appear pleased with Ed or the overall discussion.

"It would be really great if we could go," said Tres.

"No TSA security," said Ed. "No baggage claim and Lori gets to drive up in a stinkin' Lincoln."

"Yeh, baby," said December. "I like it."

"We'll see," said Larry, grimly. Larry grabbed one of the remaining fortune cookies. "Soon," read the slip, "someone will make you very proud."

Looking up, animated, almost as though another person, Larry cheerfully thanked the two servers, as one collected Larry's hundreds, and the other set down several empty cartons and began clearing the table. Larry thanked them for an incredible meal and everyone promptly chimed in, as Ed and Gina transferred food to take-out containers.

* * *

"Farmor!" said Larry, as he entered the private room where Emma had been a patient earlier, and now it was she who sat vigil at Long Beach Memorial. "Gina!"

"I could not play along until you told me," Emma answered. "No matter what is going on between you and him, Calvin is still my son."

"Should I stay?" asked Gina, in Swedish.

"Neither of you have to stay," said Emma. "You don't know my son, and Larry here hates him, so why don't you two just run off, and research burial plots. Sort of speed things along."

"Grandma!" said Larry,

"Wait! A foreign word... just a moment. Oh, yes... grand-ma," said Emma. "Stay if you'd like, but I would rather be here alone with my son." Emma looked up, squinting at the cardiac monitor as one would try to read time from a distant clock. "Just send your driver here after you get home."

* * *

"Larry?" said Gina, sitting directly across from Larry in the Lincoln.

"Yes."

"When I agreed to go to Nebraska with you, that means I am going to be with you."

"Uh, okay," said Larry.

"You understand, right?" asked Gina.

"Um... I think so."

"I'm there for you."

Ralphie pulled in front of the mansion and, a moment later, held the door for Gina, who stepped out first, and then Larry, who thanked Ralphie, as he closed the door. A gathering of kids swarmed around the car, and Larry reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of one dollar coins, which he handed out, one to each child.

"Thanks, Mister."

"Sure," said Larry.

"Can I have two?"

"No," said Larry.

Larry handed a coin to each open hand, and then turned to Gina. They said good night to Ralphie, who waved as Larry and Gina walked to the front door of the mansion. Larry and Gina walked in silence through the bottom floor, to the triple-bolted doorway. Larry pulled out his keys, unbolted each lock and pushed open the door. He threw on the light switch, filling the four-story marble stairway with a bright, warm glow.

"Oh, I have a key," said Gina, pointing to the wooden chair at the base of the stairwell.

"I didn't know it works," said Larry.

Gina motioned for Larry to sit on the exquisitely-crafted wooden chair as she bent over him and inserted a long skeleton key into the mechanism at the base of the chair, prompting a mechanical hum. Before Larry could get off of the chair, Gina gingerly sat on Larry's lap.

"Will it support two?" she asked.

"Guess we will find out." Larry toggled a metal lever next to the chair, and the apparatus began to glide up the mounted track set in to the stairwell. Gina wrapped an arm around Larry's neck. "Gina," said Larry, prompting her to turn her head to directly face him. Larry leaned up, just as the two passed through the second level, and kissed Gina on the lips. The chair continued its ascent, rounding the stairwell to the third level. Gina had both hands on Larry's head, the fingers of one hand dug deeply into his hair. They broke their kiss once the chair had reached the landing of the Scandinavian's suite, with the sculpture of pink alabaster calling out to be worshipped.

"Come," said Gina, taking Larry by the hand.

* * *

Gina sat on Larry's lap, her arm draped on his shoulder and her hand resting on his chest, as they sat upright, necking, to the strains of an oboe and Beethoven's seventh symphony, as all around them were the reflections of two people kissing.

* * *

"I approve," said Emma van der Bix, standing in the doorway of the suite with Ralphie, as Gina and Larry sat on the sofa by the Victrola, kissing. The two quickly disengaged.

"Please," said Emma, motioning with her hand, "don't stop on my account." Emma walked through the studio without casting a further glance at Gina and Larry.

"Night, all," said Ralphie, as he turned, and closed the door. The sounds of his footsteps on the marble receded to silence, as had the music.

Gina stood, flipped the disc, cranked the handle and set the needle onto the record. She sat down gingerly, looked at Larry, and, without a word, met his advancing lips. The two melted back into one another's arms.

* * *

"Are we flying or driving?" I asked Larry, who seemed distracted, as we talked on the phone.

"For what again?"

"Omaha, Larry. Remember? Nebraska."

"I know where Omaha is," said Larry. "On the Platte River."

"Lori?"

"Oh, yeh, right! Car's fine."

"Her folks and Dave want to fly, so there should be plenty of space in the Lincoln."

"That's great, Lawrence," said Larry, quickly. "Look, kind'a busy."

"What?" I said. "You're never busy."

Larry hung up.

* * *

Larry and Gina sat, eating breakfast on the balcony, their chairs close together. Emma, standing with Ralphie at the French doors leading to the kitchen, looked out to the two, who ate silently. Emma and Ralphie turned and walked off. The closing of the main doors could be heard in the distance, but neither Gina nor Larry gave any sign of having heard it.

* * *

Lori Lewis lay on her side, looking at a small, stuffed pumpkin. She dialed her cell.

"Hey, hunny," purred December's voice, over the speaker.

"Hi, pumpkin."

"We're leaving tomorrow in Ralphie's car, so you better get ready, cuz yer mine every night, baby," said December.

Lori smiled and continued looking at the pumpkin. A single tear fell to her pillow.

"Baby? You dere?"

* * *

Emily Kashabara, wearing black and carrying a tote bag, lowered her foot off her long board and pushed, continuing her effortless gliding. Ahead, standing idly, were four male skateboarders, two of whom wore black tee-shirts that read san pedro bombers. Emily dug the heel of her board into the sidewalk, stopping a few feet from the group.

"Dudes," said Emily.

"Dude," came the shared reply.

* * *

"Hal-lowww," came the voice from the door to the studio. Gina stood near the Victrola, changing the disc, as Larry crossed the room to open the door, through which entered Tres and Lena, with no camera in hand.

"Hi hi," said Lena, warmly, to Larry and Gina, who each smiled thinly.

"What we've got is really great," said von Sommerberg, "but it is not the story we came for. What is the best way for saying it?"

"Emma doesn't work," said Lena.

"But everybody else," said von Sommerberg, "is really great."

"Isn't this supposed to be a story about her family?" asked Gina.

"That is what the original patron wanted," said von Sommerberg. "But searching for the story now is the story."

"Since we are not shooting the original script, we sent the team home," said Lena.

"We can shoot the Colorado footage," said the director, motioning to himself and Lena. "The movie is now about Miss Lewis."

"She is a real hero," said Lena, looking around. "Is not Emma Mathilde home?"

"Oh, no," said Larry. "It's just me and Gina."

"May we wait to see her?" said von Sommerberg.

"We prefer not," said Gina. "There is work that we can only do while Emma is out, and our time is limited... so off you go." Gina made sweeping motions with her hands.

The two filmmakers left. Larry closed the studio door behind them. Gina cranked the Victrola, causing her chest to wobble in her tight sweater. She stood near the edge of the couch and, when Larry had taken a seat, she gently sat on his lap, wrapped her arm around his shoulder, and they resumed kissing.

* * *

December Carrera adjusted the webcam, and then she rolled her desk chair backwards, holding up two paper plates, one over each breast, reading, "See u soon!" and "Soldier Girl!"

* * *

Ed typed a response to the image of Anekee van der Velden, in a tight pink top and white skirt. "Happy Bday Ane! Looks like a great party!"

After several reloads, the FaceBook page showed four more comments to the photo, one from Anekee, reading, "Where's Larry?"

Ed typed. "Don't know. He knew the time for this," typed Ed, submitting the reply.

Anekee posted another shot of her, eating a slice of birthday cake.

Ed unbuckled his belt and unzipped his jeans.

* * *

Emily Kashabara and the four young men stood on their boards and looked down one of the countless steep roads in San Pedro and the Palos Verdes peninsula. Emily stepped off her board, reached into her tote bag and pulled out a helmet and pads.

"Wuss," said one of the Bomber Boys.

"I make my living using my brain," said Emily, strapping on the helmet. "I'd like to still have one when I get home tonight."

* * *

"Why me?" asked Larry, when he and Gina broke for air.

Gina, her fingers still dug into his hair, smiled gently. "What do you mean, silly? 'Why you?' "

"I mean, why not Ed, or someone else cool like that?"

Gina leaned in and gently kissed Larry's lips. "When I was small, all I wanted was to be at home with my parents, and then my dad and mom started fighting. It was off to my aunt's. Then my grandparents. Finally, I spent a year living with a friend of my mother." Gina kissed Larry's cheek, and whispered into his ear. "A loved one cares about family." She sat up and looked into Larry's eyes. "You're a good man. I like that in you. A lot."

"Tell that to my Dad," said Larry. "He'd disagree about my love of family."

"You don't care for your father, yet you still go to see him and you've told the doctors to be heroic if they need to save him." She kissed him again. "The man I give myself to will be someone who cares. Someone who would never abandon a loved one. Even if they don't love them."

"Wait," said Larry, shaking his head. "Give yourself to?" He slid back into the sofa, causing Gina to lose her balance, and topple onto his chest. Instinctively, his arms caught her, and – wrapped in his arms – she snuggled into his chest.

* * *

Emma entered the studio with Ralphie. They paused, on seeing Gina, on Larry's lap, both asleep. Emma lifted the needle from the 78-rpm record and placed the apparatus in up position. "Cof-fee?" Emma asked Ralphie. He nodded and the two walked towards the kitchen.
Chapter Twenty-Seven – The Stinkin' Lincoln

Ralphie looked at the ten suitcases of varying sizes, camera equipment, cloth totes and Larry's two paper sacks, and then peered into the completely empty, cavernous trunk of the Lincoln. Inside the passenger cabin, Gina and Larry loaded soda cans into the two refrigerators. As Gina placed sandwiches, fruit, potato salad, yoghurt and other items into one unit, Larry opened the safe in the other, placed three bundles of hundred-dollar bills with the remaining bundle, closed the door and spun the dial. He then placed all of the sodas into the cooler, except for the loose cans in the bag, to which Larry added five loose, cold Cactus Coolers, and a warm six-pack of Fresca.

An enormous camera lens peered into the cabin, focusing first to Gina and then Larry, each of whom vehemently waved the camera away.

"Hello, my hunnies," said December, climbing in to the cabin, smiling to Gina, and taking the seat directly across from the two. "This may get kind'a tight," said December, as I climbed in and sat beside her. Tres and Lena climbed beside me, and Ed took the flip seat at the fixed window.

"All y'all comfortable?" asked Ralphie, bending in to the cabin. With no words spoken above the slight grunts and a grumble, Ralphie closed the door, entered the drivers compartment, raised the screen, and started the vehicle.

"Save my seat, Boss Man," December told me, hop-'n-scooting across, to wind up next to Gina. "I'll be over here if you need me."

* * *

"I'm thinking Vegas would be a good spot to camp for the night," said Ed, as Ralphie pulled in to a brightly-lit Chevron station, each island glowing. "Rooms a' plenty.... All you can eat buffets.... Swimming pools... movie stars... cheap liquor."

"Not gonna lose an entire day just to stay in Las Vegas," said Larry. "I want Ralphie to make Grand Junction."

"Where is Grand Junction?" asked Lena.

"Colorado," I said.

"Is that close to Las Vegas?" asked Tres.

"A couple of states over," Larry said.

"Two thousand kilometer," said Gina. "Maybe 1800."

"Two thousand!" exclaimed Tres von Sommerberg, as Lena, holding a snapshot camera, captured video of the reaction.

Ralphie opened the cabin door. "A moment of convenience, before the next stretch," he said, holding the door for everyone, except Larry and Gina, who stayed in the car, after Ralphie closed the door and cleaned the windows.

* * *

The desert air whipped Lena's blonde hair as she and Tres von Sommerberg stood in the cabin, through the sunroof, the red light glowing atop the camera on Lena's shoulder. Two pair of wide eyes and a giant lens took in a panorama of light, as she photographed the Lincoln slowly making its way up the Vegas strip.

* * *

"Welcome to Caesar's," said a tall blonde behind the main counter.

Larry slid his VISA card and the clerk's face brightened. "Mr. van der Bix. Welcome back. You are eligible for a number of discounts."

December stepped forward.

* * *

"Tres and I will be shooting," said Lena, as we all stood near the main elevators. Several bellhops held luggage caddies. "No need to worry about us tonight." A bellhop, with one caddie, followed the pair.

As the elevator opened, me, Ed, and December followed a bellhop in. As we waited for the elevator to close, I looked at Larry and Gina, waiting with the second bellhop, their caddy holding three pieces of luggage and several paper sacks.

* * *

"There is something I do have to tell you," said Larry, as the elevator climbed to the penthouse. The bellhop stood rigid and silent, as Gina reached for Larry's hand.

"Tell me tonight," said Gina. "Over dinner."

"Uh," said Larry, "it's, um, well, I don't know if I'd call it dinner conversation."

Gina, holding Larry's hand, stepped closer, so she was face-to-face with Larry. She leaned forward and gently kissed his lips. "We can have dinner in our room."

"W'ull," said Larry, looking down, "just that, um, it doesn't work, is all, you know."

Gina, speaking more quietly, told Larry, "Let's wait until we're alone."

The elevator door opened and Larry spilled out, with Gina quickly following him. The bellhop maintained a polite distance, with the baggage caddy, until all three arrived at the end of the wide, wood-paneled hallway.

"Sir. Madame," intoned the bellhop. "The Emperor's Suite."

Gina pushed open a pair of double doors, gesturing with her hand for Larry to follow. Gina walked slowly into the room that Larry had been in, with Ed, December and Carole. The bellhop raised the lights.

As Gina slowly walked through the suite, she whispered "wow," several times.

Larry reached into his pocket, pulling up several crumpled, hundred-dollar bills and a handful of gold coins. He dropped a stack of coins into the bellhop's open hand and said thanks. When Gina returned to the main foyer, she and Larry were alone. She walked directly to him, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him wetly.

Larry fidgeted like a knitting octopus during the kiss, saying "I don't get hard, Gina," almost immediately after their lips parted.

"Please, Larry, while we are alone kissing, put your hands on my body," said Gina. "As I give myself to you, I want to feel you receiving my gift."

"But... it doesn't...," said Larry, as Gina pulled him by the hand to the window overlooking the Strip. She looked out the window, her back to Larry. She turned her head, and pulled him forward, so his hands slid over her belly and hips and up to her breasts. His hands filled. Gina turned so the two could look at one another. She put her hands onto Larry's. His palms traveled her body, and when his fingers found their work, she put her hands onto the window frame.

"This is about much more then sex, Larry," said Gina. "I am giving myself to you, and you're giving yourself to me. This is a gift we give to each other and a gift we each receive. Sex is only one way to bring pleasure to one other. It is all part of something larger."

Their fingers intertwined.

* * *

A knock at the door interrupted Larry and Gina's necking. Larry opened the double doors and Tres, his camera's red light glowing, silently entered the Emperor's suite. Larry walked back to the sofa and sat next to Gina.

Lena followed Tres in, carrying two cases of equipment.

"Las Vegas is really something," said Lena, setting the equipment cases onto the wood floor. "Oh, I'm sorry," said Lena, taking long, deep breaths. "We don't mean... to interrupt.... Tres!"

Von Sommerberg appeared a moment later. "It's really something, this suite."

"Yes, well, we have not filmed the pool," said Lena.

"Ah," said the director.

A knock sent Lena to the front door, and she returned with Ed, in a suit, and December, in a gown.

"Pardon the interruption," said Ed.

"We're gonna meet Lawrence downstairs for a show," said December. "Wanna come?"

Larry and Gina said no from the couch.

"Yeh," said Ed. "Can see you're both a little busy."

Gina and Larry sat, motionless.

"Well," said December, "do what'cha want. You'll find us at da tables, later."

"Sure you don't wanna come, baby," said Ed, to Gina.

"Busy," said Gina, slipping her hand into Larry's. "And don't call me that."

"Bye, hunnies," said December, pulling Ed by the arm. "C'mon, Ed, let's go."

"The pool? Or a show?" Lena asked Tres, as they followed Ed and December.

"Thanks, bye, don't come again," said Larry.

"Where were we?" said Gina, leaning into Larry, on the couch. "Oh, yes," she said, rolling so her body was atop Larry's. He wrapped his arms around her.

* * *

Larry said thanks as he put a stack of gold coins into the palm of the room service attendant. He pulled the room service cart into the foyer, closed the door and wheeled the meal into the dining room, where Gina had laid out a twin table setting, lit candles and stood, waiting, next to her chair. Larry crossed to her, looked briefly into her eyes, smiled, as did she, before he felt her arm brush into him as she took her seat. He helped her slide the chair slightly forward and she turned and grasped his forearm as he turned. Gina ran her fingers up Larry's arm, and she appeared surprised when her touch revealed long, toned, wire-like biceps. "Oh," she said, as her fingers slowly traveled up and down the bicep, and the gentle tapering into non-assuming tanned, toned forearms.

Larry transferred items from the cart to the table, as Gina sat waiting. Once emptied, Larry rolled the cart away, sat at his chair, smiled to Gina as he placed his napkin on his thigh and reached for his cutlery.

"May I say, 'Grace?' " asked Gina.

Larry looked at her for a moment. "Um... sure." He folded his hands on his lap.

"Larry...," Gina whispered, her hands resting on the table, palms up. "Your hands." Larry quietly reached his hands across the table and rested each atop Gina's. "Oh, glorious and merciful God," said Gina, head bowed. "Thank you, that you have blessed us with this beautiful meal, for so many among us are hungry. And you give us the gift of one another, when so many among us are alone. There is so much misfortune, Lord, and so many who long for togetherness. Thank you, God, that this meal shall give us strength. We are grateful, Lord, for these precious gifts." Gina looked to Larry, as she spoke. "And please bless this man, Lord, for he is a good soul, loyal to his family, generous and kind." She again lowered her head. "And bless the friends we travel with, some confused, some troubled, but each good in their heart. In Your name, precious Lord, we ask this, amen."

Gina kept her hands in place, and held her head bowed, as Larry sat silently, unmoving. "Oh," said Larry, "uh, amen."

Gina slid her hands from the table and smiled to Larry. "Thank you," she said. "Most people don't go for it when I ask to say 'Grace.' Your grandmother says I am a loon."

"My grandmother thinks everyone is a loon," said Larry, lifting a silver dome, revealing a steak dinner. Gina uncovered ravioli. They switched platters. "I'm really grateful, by the way, that you're helping take care of her. I mean, not at the moment...."

"It feels like the right place to be," said Gina, offering Larry the basket of bread, which he took. "It's charming living as the tutors did. And you're very generous for what little work I do."

"You spend whole days with her," said Larry. "I couldn't have someone who doesn't like being with my grandma... or who she didn't like."

"I like her," said Gina, accepting the bread basket back from Larry and offering him a plate of butter. "It truly does not feel like a job."

Larry smiled. "I don't feel the same... pressure... like when it's with other people," he said, pouring milk into a glass.

Larry took up fork and spoon and methodically cut a ravioli in half, ate both halves, and then moved on to the next. After consuming a quarter of the serving, he put his cutlery down, wiped his mouth and looked to Gina, who had cut her steak into squares.

"I don't believe in pressure," said Gina, "If something is right, it's right. The couple will know."

The two ate in the silence of candlelight, in no rush, each looking to the other.

Gina extended her fork, several steak cubes skewered on it. Larry leaned such that he could bite the cubes off. A few moments later, Gina guided Larry to a spot on her plate to deposit a serving of ravioli, soon joined by several more deposits.

* * *

Larry and Gina leaned into one another as they sat on a wide, leather sofa. Gina raised the remote, flipping channels on the big screen unit mounted across the room, over the crested wooden mantle above the video fireplace.

"That's 'Little Big Man,' " said Larry, and Gina set the remote in her lap, as Dustin Hoffman smiled. She leaned into Larry's chest, as Hoffman, and his native-American wife, obviously made love under the watchful eyes of her two sisters, who expressed with giggles the expectation that Hoffman service the women of the family.

"Maybe something else?" said Larry, as Dustin Hoffman groaned.

Gina reached for the remote, and handed it to Larry. "I'm not a prude, you know," said Gina.

"Wha-t?" said Larry. "I didn't say...."

"I don't prefer sex before marriage, but I'm not a prude."

"You... don't...?"

"Most guys can't take that," said Gina. "Like Ed. So unable to handle it."

"Why marriage?" asked Larry,

"Marriage means you are making a choice," said Gina, cuddling. "Two people who give themselves to one another are set free by marriage. Because you belong to one another, you don't feel the insecurity that single people live with every day. The husband and the wife perform their duties as a gift. It's never just about sex."

"So, you have... never..."

Gina nodded.

"Ever?"

"Not yet."

"Wow," said Larry, as Gina's body slid into a more natural fit against his.

"We can touch and pleasure one another," she said, lowering her head onto his chest, and resting her fingers on his arm. "That's the gift we can give and we each can receive, while we decide about the big stuff." Gina kissed Larry's neck.

Larry wrapped his arms around Gina, and she burrowed into his chest.

Larry's phone vibrated. "LORI," read the screen, visible on the table in front of the couch. Larry looked to the phone and let it ring.

"She means a lot to you," said Gina.

"She means everything to me."

"Did you two ever have sex?"

"No," said Larry. "Not like sex sex."

Gina said nothing.

"The summer before our senior year in high school... we would... go... driving."

"It's okay," said Gina, picking up the remote. "That was a long time ago." She flipped past a psychic line, a phone sex service, a golf match showing a close-up of Tiger Woods, before stopping at a black-and-white film.

"Please," said Larry. "I gotta tell someone."

She lowered the remote and put her hands on his shoulders.

"I would drive, and, uh... she would, cuz, you know, the car was the only place we could..., the only place we were.... Those're the only times I... got...."

"Excited?" said Gina.

"W'ull, hard, yeh," said Larry. "A doctor said it was my heart."

Gina sat up. "What about your heart?"

"Oh, um, it beats in an irregular rhythm, and so I take pills each morning for the rate and the pace, and so it did't really work before, and now I'm taking the opposite of Viagra, so... I've been diagnosed with a big heart....

"What about all the coffee and soda you drink?" asked Gina.

"I'm not supposed to, but I haven't felt like there was anything to stick around for," said Larry.

"What about, Lori?"

"Oh, she eats good stuff," said Larry.

"Don't you want to be around when she's old?" said Gina. "And maybe other people?"

Larry took a moment to answer. "I don't want to go before my grandmother. But, otherwise, I don't know...."

"It's okay about when you and Lori were kids," said Gina. "That's pretty innocent."

"The accident wasn't," said Larry.

"What accident?"

"We were in San Francisco and as I was driving, Lori was going to work on me and, it happened before so I knew what was coming, but... it was unlike anything ever."

"The orgasm?"

"The incredible pain," said Larry. "I drove off the road and it was so bumpy down the hill that Lori got thrown from the car."

"Oh my God!"

"I smacked into a tree. Lori had to pull me out. That's why I don't drive. And so when Lawrence and Lori got married after that, I never went looking. Just sort'a, you know..."

"Oh, Larry," said Gina, reaching for his hand. "Let's go lay down."

"No, really...."

Gina looked directly at Larry, leaning in close so their eyes were only inches apart. "Larry, I'm tired, and we're going to lay in bed, as a couple, and fall asleep. You'll be okay." She looked towards the table. "Do you want to call Lori back before we lay down?"

"No. It's okay."

Larry allowed Gina to lead him into the bedroom. "Stand still," said Gina, who then proceeded to undress Larry, leaving him standing in his boxers. "Now you undress me." Gina stood still, moving only to make it easier for Larry to remove her top, and to step from her skirt. She stood in a bra, panties and stockings before him. "What you see is the outside, Larry. It will change with time, but what matters is what is inside."

Larry stood, motionless.

"Do you like what you see on the outside?"

"You have an amazing body," said Larry.

"Thank you," said Gina, smiling. She turned, and with a glance over her shoulder, said, "Unfasten me." Larry unhooked the two fasteners on her bra, and she smiled to him before removing and folding her bra and setting it on the clothing placed on a valet at the foot of the bed. She peeled off her hose and set them on the pile.

"Let's go to bed," said Gina.

Long minutes later, with Gina's head on his chest and his left arm wrapped around her, Larry whispered, "... something larger...."

* * *

"Why does this always have to happen in my room?" asked Larry, as Ed, December, Lena and Tres filed in to the foyer. Larry closed the door.

"Cuz you're the one with da big suite," said December.

"To those to whom much is given, more is expected back," said Ed.

"... 'much is expected,' yes?" asked Lena.

"Huh?" said Ed.

"The quotation from President Kennedy?"

"Oh, I have no idea," said Ed. "I thought it was from 'Wall Street.' "

Gina emerged from master bedroom, in a flowing cotton dress, with a sunflower pattern, carrying a golden yellow Dior bag.

"Good morning," said Gina.

"You look beautiful, Gina," said Ed.

"Thank you, Ed," said Gina.

"Looks like you two are having fun playing house," said December.

Larry looked downward, slightly.

"Yeh," said Ed, flatly. "He'll find out pretty quickly."

"Oh, c'mon, Ed," said December. "Be happy for 'em."

"Where's the camera?" asked Larry.

"Ralphie packed it," said Lena. "He says to arrive in Denver tonight, we should be on the road in exactly two hours.

"Today, breakfast is on me," said December.

"She won $1,700 playing poker last night," said Tres. "Really amazing."

"Good cards and a table was full of dopey men," said December.

"What is the way for saying it?" said Tres. "She... is skilled."

December laughed, as she studied the room service menu.

"She's got skills, fer sure," said Ed.

"... she's got skills... fer sure," repeated Lena.

* * *

The Emperor's Suite was well-appointed for hosting banquet guests, with a main dining table that comfortably sat eight, with ample space for platters, goblets, heavy cutlery and tankards. Looking out from where I sat, next to December, near the head of the table, to Larry, Gina and Ralphie, at the other end, was to gaze upon mountains and plains of platters, plates, pitchers and vases. Larry was surrounded by glasses of iced decaf, milk, V8, and several juices, creating a wall around him, whereas Gina had two small vases of daffodils on either side of her, creating the aura of a sunrise, and Ralphie was where the valley smoothed out, with his single cup of coffee and a thin pair of motorcar gloves folded, resting atop a gold fabric napkin.

"December," called out Larry, from across the plains and mountain peaks. "I know this is your meal you are sharing with all of us, but could I ask something?"

"Sure, hunny, what is it?"

"May Gina say 'Grace?' "

"Dat would be beautiful, hunny," said December, looking then to Gina. "Do you want to say it now?" On Gina's nod, December asked, "wit' da hands?" On a second nod, December tapped a glass with a knife. "Hey, everyone, put out your hands and hold with the person across from you... Ralphie, you come here with me, okay?"

Ralphie stood and walked, standing at December's shoulder, lightly resting both of his hands atop her left hand, which she set on her right shoulder. "Okay, hunnies."

Larry extended his hands, palms up, and Gina covered his lightly, as it was across the table; Lena and Tres, me and Ed, and Ralphie holding December's hand with both of his.

What seemed like a genuine sneeze — a deep, retching, wet sneeze – sent Ed's hand ripping out of mine, and despite his effort to cover himself, capture it in his hand and turn his head, I still caught a spewing mist of droplets from the sneeze. Ed placed his hands, one now wet, into mine.

"Quiet, sweeties!" said December. "Okay, hunnies, go ahead...."

"Merciful and compassionate God," began Gina, "we thank you, that you have blessed us with this beautiful meal, for there are so many, God, who are wracked by hunger...."

"... got dat right," whispered December.

"... and you have blessed us with one another, God, when around us are so many good people, the displaced, whose biggest desire is that they, too, can offer a meal like this to friends and family."

"... amen, sister..."

"... and God, as You alone know all our destinies, please, in Your mercy, God, give these souls together tonight more than houses in which to live, but homes where their lives are full and rich, God; with family who hear them, love them, and embrace them; and friends, true and caring... that You would hear us, God, and comfort us, God, it is in Your glorious name that we ask these things... Amen."

On Larry's whispered, "amen," Gina looked up to him and smiled warmly, before she delicately removed her hands from the table.

Hands and arms across the table whipped and returned, as Ralphie gently gripped December's hand, with a smile, as he returned to his chair, next to Gina and Larry.

"Dat was nice," said December. "Okay, it's time to eat!"

* * *

Larry and Gina each smiled warmly to Ralphie, as he returned to his seat.

"Enjoyed your prayer words, miss," said Ralphie. "Well-spoken and heartfelt."

"Thank you, Ralphie," said Gina.

"Glad you came up to join us," said Larry.

"A kind invitation, since they assigned security to watch the Lincoln," said Ralphie.

* * *

Ed leaned forward and, as the two women on either side of him engaged in a systematic survey of food on the table, he drew his chair closer to mine. Spoons and serving forks scooped and grazed the feast. Across the table, Larry was eating a piece of fruit and staring into space.

"Man," Ed whispered to me, leaning his chair slightly towards December for better broadcast. "Dude!"

I moved slightly toward Ed and leaned in.

"Dude," said Ed. "Do you, like, figure it's like brainwashing?"

"What?" I said.

"I mean, you know the dude."

I slid my chair towards the head of the table. Ed met that movement and moved a second time, which I met. December, spoon in hand, looked at each of us sternly, as she continued her table survey.

"I'm sorry," I said. "What?"

"We gotta look out for the client," said Ed, "and, okay, we all choose our squeeze toys, but should we be asking whether this obvious power she has over the client causes him to act in deleterious ways? on trusts? legal obligations? on the conduct and solvency of the operation?"

* * *

"If there was just one place in the whole world you could go...," said Gina, a slice of toast with jam held in her fingers. "Where would it be?"

"If I didn't have to drive?" said Ralphie, with a chuckle.

"Anywhere."

"Heaven," said Ralphie. "Wouldn't you?"

Gina's face twisted in the glow of delighted surprise.

* * *

"Boys, I got eatin' ta' do and yer cramping my style," said December, caught in a pincer move, as me and Ed shifted our chairs to either side of hers. December turned to Ed. "Move it, Big Boy," she ordered, and he scooted his chair behind hers.

* * *

Ed had just moved his chair behind December, to sit next to Lawrence, as Ralphie answered Gina's exclamation, of "Why?"

"What if I don't make it otherwise? Sure would want to see the real thing at least once and not just the travel-agency pictures. After that, oh, I don't know. Never been to our nation's capitol. Hear Washington is pretty in the springtime."

* * *

"I think we ought to at least talk about this with Emily," Ed said to me, in a hushed tone.

"Everyone has the right to choose who they love," I told Ed. "Go back over there."

* * *

"Do you suppose they're dancing?" asked Gina. Ralphie and Larry pointed towards Ed, who had been smacked across his shoulder, as he pulled his chair past December.

"He does do a lot of dancing," said Larry.

"He is always dancing," said Gina.

"No, I mean he goes out dancing a lot. He did with Anekee," said Larry.

"The girl from Italy?" asked Gina. "Why does this not surprise me?"

"Well, right now, it looks like someone lost," said Ralphie, reaching for his gloves, as he stood. "Good morning, all. I will be with the vehicle."

* * *

Ed made his way back to his spot at the table and though he had been smacked, he refilled his plate, grabbed several strips of bacon and poured a bowl of corn flakes.

Larry stood and looked straight ahead.

"Everyone," bellowed Larry, and the entire table quieted. "If you gotta sneeze, Ed, go ahead... do it...." said Larry. Ed vigorously shook his head. "Okay, Ralphie's downstairs.... The car's packed.... Lori's waiting for us to pick her up today... let's all get up, and let's get moving," said Larry. "Okay?"

Surprisingly, Larry's effort to lead appeared successful, as everyone marched their way out of the suite, to checkout and, finally, to the Lincoln, in short order.

Soon, Ralphie was closing the door to the passenger cabin.

Gina sat on the jumpseat adjacent to the two refrigerators, unbagging a variety of beverages and placing them in the coolers.

Lena got into her seat and Ed passed very close to her as he got into his, next to the window. "My God, Ed," Lena whispered. "Could your jeans be any more revealing?"

Ed chuckled, as I took my seat, next to Lena.

"Movieman," December said to Tres, "you sit over dere," pointing next to me. "I'm sitting with the hunnies. More room over here." By the time December had reached for a diet Coke and sat back down, Ralphie had pulled the Lincoln onto the strip.

"How far is Denver from Las Vegas?" asked Lena.

"About halfway across the country," said Larry.

"How can one country be so big?" asked Tres. "Where are we finally going again?"

"Nebraska. Pretty much half way across the country."

"This will be a long drive," I added.

"My God, the distances," said Lena.

"We are going 2,500 kilometers... for a sporting match," said Tres. "Really amazing."

"Really something," said Lena.

"Hopefully we do 1000 miles today," said Larry.

"Incredible," said Lena.

"Get comfortable," said Ed, as Gina quietly scoffed.

"It's a good thing the hunnies packed food," said December.

"Should we call Lori?" asked Gina.

"Team Lori!" cheered Ed, looking towards December.

Larry picked up his cell from the cup holder next to him, dialed and put the phone on speaker.

The phone rang. Larry held it in the center of the cabin, as though a surprise party were to erupt on her answer.

"Hey, this is Lori," came a recorded voice.

"Gimme dat," said December, quickly taking Larry's phone and, after the beep, talking quickly. "Hey Baby! Guess where we all are?" December signaled with her hand, in a circular movement, prompting silence. She gave a look of displeasure and everyone gave out loud whoops. "Yeh Baby... we're on our way to get'cha... So save yourself up for tonight, cuz I expect you to be nice and ready, okay?" She passed the phone to Larry. "Here you go, hunny."

"Lori?" Larry said, tentatively. "Hey, sorry I didn't pick up, last night. Hey, was that a beep? Anyway, okay, w'ull, see you soon." Larry handed the phone to December. "I think it cut me off."

December didn't take the phone. "Dat's yours, hunny."

* * *

Lena, Ed and Tres stood in the middle of the cabin, the sky roof open, watching the scenery of Utah roll out before them. Tres had the camera on his shoulder. Lena and Ed, to give the director room to film, were backed together against the end of the sunroof, just inches apart. Lena, in jeans and a loose blouse that flapped wildly in the wind, turned such that she couldn't help but back into Ed's pelvis, where she stayed for almost a minute, as von Sommerberg panned.

Tres then smiled, gave a thumbs up, and handed the camera to Lena, who held the camera, either to help steady it, or steady herself, as together the two filmmakers lowered the camera into my hands. I handed the camera to Larry, who held it in his lap, as first Lena and then Ed ducked back into the cabin, before Tres finally lowered himself into the cabin and closed the sunroof.

"Wow, Ed," said Lena, in a whisper anyone could have heard.

* * *

"We're getting off the main road," said Tres.

"Ralphie probably needs gas," said December, "but good timing, cuz I need to go!"

The Lincoln passed a sign, welcoming visitors to Beaver, Utah (pop. 2,650) and pulled in to a Shell Oil station, across from a fast food joint.

"Burger King works for me," said December. "Royal chambers, here we come."

Tres and Lena giggled.

"What?" asked Ed.

"We call it royal chambers, too," said Lena, still giggling, "because we have a queen."

I watched as Tres, Lena and Ed got out, leaving Gina and Larry still inside with me. Larry looked unhappy. "Everything okay?" I asked.

Gina smiled and leaned towards Larry, who sat stiffly.

"Right," I said, climbing out of the Lincoln. "Excuse me. Royal chambers and all."

"Take your time," said Ralphie. "I'm gonna add fluids." I walked towards the Burger King and, turning, saw Gina and Larry slowly following.

* * *

"This is really amazing," said Lena, seated next to Ed in a Burger King booth. "The open space just goes on and on," she said, eyes soaking in the vast landscape of desert reds and oranges and browns encircling them in all directions, broken only by transecting strips of black asphalt.

"Bigger isn't always better," said Ed. "Sometimes; but other times, it's too much."

"Oh, humbug," spat Gina, walking away from the table, to the menu board. Larry got up a moment later, and walked to the counter, touching Gina's hand and standing with her as she ordered.

"Dude," said Ed, across the table from me. "See?" He pointed to Larry and Gina. "We should hash this out with our team's legal advisor, for the good of the entire enterprise."

"What enterprise?" said Tres, reaching for the camera, beside him.

"Oh, nothing," said Ed, into the camera. "Just looking out for the client's well-being."

"Client?" said Lena. "Larry? He's producing our film. Is he in some sort of trouble?"

"For the record, Larry van der Bix is not in any trouble and Ed is speaking horseshit," I said, raising my voice, as I held several French fries in my fingers as I spoke.

"That would directly affect our finishing this film," said Lena.

I dropped the fries. "There in nothing bad hanging over Larry's head," I said, as December walked from the other side of the restaurant, carrying a stuffed dolphin.

"What about Larry?" December asked, as she walked up.

"Cute," said Lena.

"For Lori," whispered back December.

"Nothing," I said. "Ed, you drop this thing for good, or I fire you here and now."

"If you are instructing me to disregard an ethical obligation to determine how best to protect the best interests of the client," said Ed, as Larry and Gina returned with a tray.

"For there being nuthing, it sure sounds like something," said December.

"What sounds like something?" asked Larry, taking a spot next to me.

"Nuthin," said Ed.

Gina sat quietly, her hands palms up on the table. Larry turned and silently rested his hands atop hers and she silently spoke words capped by an "amen," which Larry repeated, and the two proceeded to share a salad, onion rings, two burgers and a shake. Larry cast a scowl towards Ed. He then took a long breath, and he seemed to lighten up. He looked at Ed again, shook his head, and returned to the chicken salad.

It was difficult to reconcile this kid I grew up with, to the person beside me, eating a salad, seemingly free of ill will. Resentment had always been the spark that animated Larry van der Bix. Through the window, I saw Ralphie driving towards the restaurant.

"Fluids are topped and the tank's full," said Ralphie. "We should get a move on, if we are going to meet Miss Lewis tonight."

* * *

Larry told Ralphie not to let anyone into the cabin of the Lincoln until he or I opened the door. Larry reached in to the safe mounted into the refrigerator and pulled out a bundle of bills, which he placed into a cloth bag. Larry raised up off the seat and put the bag so he would be sitting on it. Larry then closed the refrigerator safe and replaced soda cans. "What's Ed's thing?" Larry asked.

"Larry, it's nothing," I said. "Can I open the door?"

"When I say 'yes.' We don't have time to play. What is Ed's thing?"

"He thinks Gina has a bad effect on you," I said bluntly. "Thinks we ought to talk to Emily about whether there are any legal risks to your investments or trust obligations."

Larry said nothing. As he began to form a word, there came a rapping on the window.

"Hey, open da door," said December.

* * *

"Why did Mormons settle here?" asked Tres, looking to the vast openness.

"Oh, I got dat one," said December. "So dey could get far away from da haters who didn't like dem having all dere women brides."

"But why here?" said Lena.

"Look around," said Ed. "Would you leave your nice house in Pennsylvania or Ohio to chase a bunch of religious zealots into the badlands?"

"But are they hated?" asked Tres. "Is it all about the polygamy?"

Larry's phone buzzed. "LORI." He picked it up, put the call on speaker and answered. "Hi... The car is full of people...."

"Team Lori!" yelled Ed, leading everyone in the car in hooting. Lori laughed on the other end. "Hey, everyone. You guys almost here?"

"Um," said Larry, "still in Utah, but we're almost in Colorado."

"Utah? Oh, man, I'm already checked out," said Lori.

I looked at Larry, who cast a scowl towards Ed.

"Ralphie's making good time," I said loudly.

"Lawrence? You came, too?"

"Me and Tres, too," said Lena.

"Oh, heya," said Lori. "Well, get here as soon as you can, cuz when they lock up the facility, it is, like, dead."

"We're not stopping til we reach Colorado Springs," said Larry.

"We ain't leaving you behind, Baby," said December.

"Okay, well, see you when you make it." The phone went silent. Larry dropped his phone into the cup holder. Larry sat stiffly. Gina gently slipped her hand onto his and a moment later, he seemed to melt, and he sat back, as did Gina, into the leather seat, the two of them becoming one.

"Hey," said Ed, across Lena and Tres, to me. "Maybe it's a good thing."

I looked to Larry, who had his eyes closed, and held both of his hands around Gina's.

* * *

Ed downed a Cactus Cooler, his second since Burger King, and set the can in a nearly-full plastic bag hanging from the door. "It's evil, what long trips do," said Ed.

"Are we in Colorado?" asked Lena. "So different from flat, little Denmark."

"Our tallest point is less then a thousand meters," said Tres, motioning to the hillsides of boulders and scattered, solitary trees. "And we are still climbing."

"Welcome to Colorful Colorado," read a large road sign, set into a stone frame.

"Maybe Ralphie can stop and let us welcome Colorado in our own way," said Ed.

"We will stop at Grand Junction," said Larry. "Buck it up, Ed."

* * *

"Aww, man," said Ed. "I'm dying here. Can you please have Ralphie pull over?"

Larry looked directly to Ed. "Lori's waiting for us," he said.

"Even Olympic swimmers go to the bathroom," said Ed. "I think she'd understand."

A road sign announced, "Fruita, 6 miles."

"In Fruita," said Larry, as the Lincoln approached a tunnel, carved into a butte.

"Really amazing," said Tres.

* * *

Larry raised his hand and motioned towards the driver's compartment. I turned and rapped on the smoked glass. The glass lowered.

"Stop as soon as you can," said Ed.

"Fruita," said Larry.

"Fruita...." The glass raised.

By the time the Lincoln pulled off Interstate 70, onto CO-340, Ed was shifting in his seat. Larry whispered to Gina, who held the cloth bag Larry had been sitting on.

"I won't be long," said Ed, as the Lincoln pulled into a grassy rest area, across from a restaurant called Rib City.

"This is Ed's stop," said Larry.

Ed carefully climbed over Lena and Tres, before he could back out of the cabin. "Ed," said Larry, motioning to Gina to hand Ed the bag. "Go to Rib City... Here's money to buy a mess of ribs."

"Ribs? Are you sure? Ribs is messy."

"And take your phone, so you can call when they're ready."

"Won't Ralphie get pissed? Ribs in the Lincoln?"

Gina held the bag out, jiggling it in her hand. Ed took the bag.

"And you got yer phone?"

"Wouldn't leave home without it," he replied.

As soon as he got out of the car, Ed ran across the rest area parking lot, to Rib City. Ralphie pulled up alongside a mounted Vietnam-era military helicopter.

Larry typed on his cell phone. When he appeared to have finished, I heard a beep behind me, from what sounded like it was Ralphie's phone.

The Lincoln glided away from the rest area.

"Is Ralphie moving the car?" asked December.

Larry said nothing. Gina leaned into Larry's shoulder.

"We are back on the highway," said Lena.

December pulled at Larry's sleeve. "Hey, dat's someone we left, back dere."

Larry picked up his cell phone from the cup holder.

"So what'd ya order? Okay, w'ull, bye." Larry hung up.

Larry leaned into the leather seat and closed his eyes. Tres and Lena looked at one another.

"Dat's it?" said December. "We're just gonna leave him?"

"He's got ten thousand bucks, a pink slip and a mess of ribs," said Larry.

"Dem's some mean jeans," said December. "You better not do dat to me!"

* * *

"Baby! Baby! Baby!" yelled December, frantically working her way past me and Larry, so she could break loose and run to Lori Lewis, a bronzed goddess walking towards the Lincoln. December leapt onto her body, and Lori caught her at the hips and held her for long seconds as they kissed deeply.

December's legs unwrapped from around Lori's torso, and she slid down, her arms wrapped around Lori's neck, pulling her into a deep forward stance, her arms around December's back and their lips locked. The two stood kissing, without any change in position for half-a-minute before anyone stepped from the Lincoln. I got out, followed by Gina and Larry, and the two filmmakers. After ending their kiss, December began groping Lori's body. "Oh, baby... oh... look how tight you are, oh yeh."

"Where's Ed?" asked Lori. "I thought he came, too?"

"Hunny ditched him," said December, grabbing Lori's ass in both hands. "Cold, if you ask me...."

"C'mon, pumpkin," said Lori, gently pushing December's hands away. "Let's get out'ta here."

Two young blondes, each carrying shoulder bags, trotted past Lori and December. "Good luck, old lady," said one.

"Hot, actually," said the other, as they passed.

* * *

Ralphie took the Lincoln through the crests and passes of the Rockies, and descending into the rolling sandy grasslands of western Nebraska. December missed most of the scenery, as her own eyes and hands were focused on her lover, as me and the filmmakers and Larry and Gina tried to keep up conversation.

The lovers gave themselves to one another, as discretely and completely as two rutting people would after having not seen one another in two months. December's first orgasms were almost muted affairs, but the long ride out of Colorado and entry to Nebraska was marked by December becoming anything but discrete as she ground and mashed into Lori's body.

"Oh my God," said Lena, at one point. "It's almost too much."

Half-an-hour into Nebraska, December and Lori were each asleep in one another's arms, the last glimmers of sunshine streaming in through the tinted windows, illuminating the intertwined bodies; the paleness of December's skin, against Lori's deep, rich bronzed tan.

"So will the movie ever be shown?" I asked.

"The movie?" said Lena, not breaking her view to the two women.

"Larry's grandmother? The dancer? That one."

"Only for the Royal Troupe," said Tres, "and anyone they think will want to attend. Maybe the Royal Family will be given a copy.... But they don't display failed projects."

"Oh, I'm sorry," I said. "I know you've worked very hard...."

"Right, it was really something," said Tres.

"It could have been really something," said Lena.

"Do you have... any other... projects?" I asked.

"My industrial holiday is complete this week and I am done with my vacation money, so I must return to my medical practice," said Tres.

"Your... medical practice?" said Larry.

"We are oral surgeons," said Lena.

"What about my investment," said Larry, as though waking from a slumber. "I mean, didn't I have, like, a million dollars or something in that?"

"One million and four hundred thousand in dollars," said Lena. "Almost ten million kroner which makes you a leading investor in Danish cinema for the calendar year. You will have quite a credit next year."

"What do you mean by credit?" asked Gina.

"A company that invests in the arts can claim a credit. It translates to real money," said Tres.

"You could set up a Danish arts company just for the credit alone," said Lena.

"We have lost money each of three years to create this film, even with Larry's investment," said Lena, "but the value of the credit keeps us profitable... barely, but we did not lose money."

"Only because the Dogme95 film style is cheap," said Tres.

"That's true," said Lena.

"So I don't get to attend an opening night, but artists will like me, huh?" asked Larry.

"And your credit," said Lena, "has a cash value of maybe half a million dollars, which is probably two years of patronage residency."

"Residency?" asked Gina.

"Arts Patronship Residency," corrected Lena. "Those who fund the arts, may live each season with rising artists, in a colony either in Copenhagen or Skagen. That is where artists propose their works. Our film commission came from Ingeborg's family, after we met them at a residency event five years ago."

* * *

From a deep sleep, Lori Lewis sat upright in the Lincoln. "Where's Ed?"

Larry also sat upright. The two were shoulder-to-shoulder.

"He's at a rib joint," said Larry.

"He okay?"

"He's okay."

"We going back for him?"

"No."

Lori lay back down and melted into December's body.

Larry lay down and melted into Gina's embrace.
Chapter Twenty-Eight – From the Platte to the Thames

As I settled into the first-class splendor of our return flight from London, I looked at my ex-wife, Lori, surrounded by well-wishers, shaking hands, being hugged, signing autographs and smiling more broadly then I had ever seen her smile, certainly more than at anytime in our brief marriage.

Larry sat in the seat beside mine.

To avoid having to talk with Larry, I dug out my iPod, inserted the buds and flipped to the NPR report from days earlier.

* * *

"T-h-i-s... is London, but unless your name is Gill or you served as a sergeant in the US army, London has been anything but jolly for the world's best freestyle swimmers. Indeed, the only ways to keep these Summer Games of the London Olympiad from being dominated by phenoms Baljinder and Jazz Gill involved flu medicine and curry, or that American in her thirties, who swam through the packs – and the pain – to keep up with those fabulous Gill Sisters."

* * *

Ed's insistence on a long stay in Vegas did cost us time in getting to Omaha for the Nationals, but Lori's first match was on Day Two of the meet and her mentor, Pat McCormick, met with officials several days earlier, to register Lori and get credentials in order for her and the coach and a press credential for the filmmakers.

Music trumpeted and basslines thumped between races in Omaha, and at peak television viewing opportunities, fountains of controlled flames spewed in a pyrotechnic display along one edge of the competition pool.

What stands out from those days in Omaha – even in the storm over the Army ass photo – was seeing my ex-wife as utterly perfect. Certainly, I'm no athlete and I cannot judge an Olympic performance, but each time my eyes recognized Lori L. Lewis, the woman I saw was the incredibly beautiful, deeply-tanned, long-limbed, muscular blonde, striding like a goddess, drawing huge cheers no matter her finish, and the sustained cheering on her world-record times in both the 400 and 800. Jumbocam shots showed her smile – that rare, delicate flower – as she stood on the winner's stand, or in the pool, or when the crowd broke into chants of "Arm-mee." Lori carried herself with a sense of lightness that I had rarely seen. For others, Nebraska was memorable for the photo that clearly was not of her but that came to be known simply as the "Army ass" shot.

* * *

"Before that one American could reach those fabulous Gill sisters, she had her own steep climb. Sure, she may have been one of 'Pat's Champs,' and a record-setter in high school, but that was literally decades ago. Californian Lori Lewis caught her big break on the road to London when finalists from regional trials failed a drug sweep. Lewis, a sergeant in the mechanized infantry, advanced to the nationals, but a display of fealty to her beloved Army nearly cost her the trip to London."

* * *

December and Larry, carrying trays laden with food and beverages, made their way to the "Team Lori" section. Tres and Lena followed them. With her parents, friends and the supporters who Larry had bought tickets for, "Team Lori" numbered nearly 50, many with hand-lettered signs, to supplement the banner that December and Gina would raise when Lori was in a heat.

Larry carried plates, with sausages, bread, mustard, fried onions and potato salad. December carried a drink caddy and a bag of sides. Larry handed out plates of food. December distributed drinks. "Must have pølse!" said Tres, excitedly smearing mustard and onions onto a bread-wrapped sausage.

"I have to be in place to shoot Lori's heat," said Lena, wearing a press credential on a lanyard. She hoisted the camera to her shoulder and made her way down the stands.

December pulled her cell from the pocket of her oversized hooded sweatshirt. "Damn! Missed my baby's call," pouted December. She perked up. "A text... Oh! Do we have any ber-knock-u-lurs?"

Lena Martin held her press credential still, as two security guards examined her badge and, with a wave, allowed her to the pool area, where she set up in her designated spot, between an ESPN camera and a team from Univision.

On the opposite end of the pool, Lori Lewis, in green, and seven other swimmers drew to their marks, while coaches and officials argued, arms waving, with occasional pointing towards Lori, who stood at her mark, shaking first one leg and then the other. Several meet officials stood shoulder-to-shoulder behind Lori. Lena filmed.

"Dat's da suit I gave her," screamed December. "Yeh, ba-BEE!" shouted December, who seemed flushed, her face red. December began to chant softly, "yeh, baby."

"Are you okay?" I asked.

The big screen showed officials arguing, swimmers at their marks and finally the arm-waving ending and, seconds later, a gunshot sent the pack of eight swimmers into the water for the 400 meter finals.

Indignant grumbling around us turned instantly into a hush, as thousands of eyes in Nebraska, and across the country, watched Lori Lewis put in a flawless performance of superior strength executed in perfect form.

"Go, Soldier Girl!" yelled December.

Larry's feeble attempt to chant nonetheless got picked up all around us, and much of the bleachers joined in, chanting, "Arm-MEE!"

* * *

There was no "Army ass" photo. The magazine cover and newspapers that picked up an image that was purported to be of my ex-wife had an ass with the word "ARMY" in white against an olive-green bikini bottom, like the suit December bought for Lori from 'soldiergear.mil,' but it wasn't Lori's ass. I'd sort of know, having been married to her.

Ever since the Nationals, photographers have jostled with one another to shoot images of Lori's ass, because, as the head of FOX Sports said, "viewers like seeing this particular woman's ass, and we're going to oblige our audience."

* * *

Lena Martins' location matched the lane Lori was in, giving her a clear, straight-on shot of Lori's approach and turn. On each pass, Lena captured frames depicting Lori's backside, footage that Lena gave a blanket promise she would hold, until Lori had seen the films and given a release.

Lena looked up, from the camera on her knee, gazing wide-eyed at the thousands of people in the bleachers, at the pyrotechnics dancing in the distance, at the giant clock and scoreboard. At Lori. At the tiny word "Army" on her backside.

* * *

"Lori Lewis' next break was that a non-standard swimsuit that could have gotten her disqualified from the Olympic team did, in fact, past official muster, as the suit was manufactured by none other then her beloved US army. Lewis dual freestyle records stood, earning her a spot on the team, but would Olympics officials look past the non-standard item of apparel? Just another day for a champion who, at 36, endured taunts of being too old to compete. Lewis proved that if she's young enough to go into combat, she is young enough to swim with the best."

* * *

I paused my iPod. The enormous windows of the Boeing Dreamliner carrying us home from England disoriented me. I looked across first class, to Lori, who was laughing with her mom. The long drive to get Lori and the days spent in Nebraska helped clear my nostalgia and longing for my marriage, but nothing had lessened my desire for the woman who remained the most beautiful girl I had ever met.

* * *

"The English are cheering the Gill sisters, a pair who entered competitive swimming just two years ago, and show an odd dislike for all that goes with the life of competition. Jazz Gill smiled when she was stripped of a medal in the 800 meters, when officials sanctioned her for openly pushing Lewis to what became a medal-winning performance, despite her obvious agony in that race. Gill's own performance in that match-up with Lewis is now the stuff of legends."

* * *

"I know who you are," came the voice behind Lori at the Olympic Village sign-in. "You're the 'army ass' girl."

Lori Lewis stood almost a foot taller than the Indian-looking woman, with the thick English accent. She said nothing.

"Jazz Gill. My sister and I don't care," said Gill, "Myself, I like it. Bit of fun, really."

Lori looked at her coach, and then to Gill. She put out her hand. "Lori Lewis. USA."

"Right, yeh, I know," said Jazz Gill. "Well, anyway, ta ta."

* * *

"The Gill sisters are one and two going into the final in the 800s, Lewis' best event. Early on, the American showed she was in obvious agony in the water. Instead of leaving the Californian behind, the Gills turned swimming's most grueling race into a game of follow-the-leader, Baljinder Gill leading and Jazz Gill goading Lori Lewis along, with the pack far behind. In the end, it was Lewis who stood alone on the winners platform."

* * *

"Hey there, Army Girl," said Jazz Gill, as she and Lori climbed from the water after an initial 200 meter heat. "Want to pop by my mum's for curry tonight?"

Lori laughed, as her coach handed her a towel and then a long, faux-fur lined, calf-length windbreaker.

"Seriously. We're Indian. It's the real deal."

* * *

"Mum... Dad... Like you to meet some Americans."

"Oh my," said a diminutive dark-skinned woman in a sari. "You are Lori Lewis."

"This is my dad," said Lori, pointing to her father. "And my mom."

* * *

"George, leave some for everyone else," said Baljinder, as an older brother, with a long dark beard and bright tunic, shoveled chicken onto his plate, over a bed of rice.

"When you said curry, I thought you meant go out," said Lori, "but this is way better." Lori finished the last bit on her plate and went for thirds.

"We better all get back," said Baljinder, "or we're going to get in trouble."

"So worth it," said Lori finishing her rice. "So worth it."

"Take this," said the mother, to Bella and Jazz, holding a small bowl of rice.

"Oh, no, Ma," said Bella. "They might disqualify us for substances."

"It's not a substance," said the mother. "It is my flu preparation over rice."

"I'm gonna pass on the preparation, but thank you," said Lori, though her parents each took a small serving, after Bella and Jazz, at the mother's insistence.

* * *

The illuminated clock in Lori's room showed 3:40 am, as she sat on the toilet, holding her stomach, and experiencing a trail of fire.

* * *

"Aw, baby, you don't look so good," December said, as Lori wandered from the athletes' area, to the stands. Lori silently opened her arms and stepped into December's embrace, as people looked on.

* * *

"You've got to swim through the burn," said Jazz Gill, on the next mark over from Lori in the 200 meter finals.

* * *

Lori Lewis stood erect in military salute on the winners platform for the "Star Spangled Banner," a silver medal around her neck. After the final bars of the second rendition of "God Save the Queen," she made her way swiftly to a restroom, her medal bouncing on her chest, impressing upon her its heft.

* * *

December lay against Lori's chest, idly lifting and examining the three silver and one bronze medal that she insisted Lori put on.

"My sexy soldier," cooed December, as Lori closed her eyes.

* * *

"Swimming's boring," said Jazz Gill, passing Lori in the cafeteria line, to get to the breakfast cereal selection. Once Lori had caught up, selecting a box of plain corn flakes, Jazz turned to her. "I'm tired of watching Bella win the gold medals and coming in behind you."

"You took silver in the 100," said Lori, choosing plain yoghurt, and zucchini bread. "I mean, c'mon.... Yer complaining about having medals."

"Yeh, well, I'm bored," said Jazz, dropping a Kellogg's Frosted Flakes box onto her tray and a pint of chocolate milk. "Let's do something... brilliant... in the 800."

"Me, I'm gonna swim," said Lori, selecting a table.

* * *

Lori looked up from the starting block, as the London crowd chanted, "Arm-MEE!" She smiled and all I could do was watch as her image was projected on an enormous screen and on the hand-held devices all around me. All I could see was her smiling face.

* * *

"As the final wore on, the pain on Sergeant Lewis' face was obvious. Minute after torturous minute, it went on. Bella Gill left all challengers in her wake, but sister Jazz slowed and her swimming became like a protective dolphin, her actions in the water meant to give heart to an injured colleague. Despite the pain, despite the pack, Lewis stayed in it, holding herself to perfect form, executed with such mind-bending discipline that the agony displayed on her face seemed almost to belong to another person's body. Never did Lewis lapse in what may be the greatest performance of these London Games. While the truly fabulous Bella Gill did finish ahead of Lewis, it was that odd mixture of what the Gills say was their mother's homemade flu remedy and the antics by Jazz that resulted in the Gills being stripped out of their medals, and Lewis standing alone."

* * *

"You can beat me!" yelled Jazz, across to Lori, the next lane.

* * *

"Hunny's hurt!" shouted December, as the image on the big-screen zoomed tightly onto Lori's face, agony showing in her eyes. "It's those damn English girls!"

* * *

"What is she doing?" yelled Dave San Jose, as the screen showed Lori swimming and Jazz Gill, one lane over, seeming to lose her form. It almost appeared that she was deliberately slowing to keep pace with Lori.

* * *

"Beat... me!" yelled Jazz, to Lori, as they came off the wall together for the final lap.

* * *

"Seven minutes into that final, the Gill sisters proved how fabulous they are. Ultimately surrendering her own medal hopes by slowing down, Jazz Gill taunted Lori Lewis, staying with her as she swam through what Lewis later called the worst pain of her life. Gill picked up her pace only to keep she and Lewis ahead of the pack. Once out of the water, the real contest began, with Team GB arguing furiously that the Gills warranted medals. Lewis refused being bumped up to gold, saying she hadn't put in a gold medal performance, so she would stick with her fourth silver medal of the games. Olympic officials split hairs, opting to leave all scores in place, but – with the blessing of the Queen, herself – England accepted that the gold and bronze medals would be vacated. And how did those Gills sisters react? A smiling Jazz Gill told reporters that Lori Lewis was always welcome to have curry at their home and to swim the Mersey together."

* * *

Lori Lewis passed out seconds after touching the pool's edge, behind Baljinder and barely ahead of Jazz Gill and teenaged American teammate, Anna Chops.

* * *

December Carrero ran as fast as one could into a swarm of people. On being recognized by Lori's coach, she was allowed to be next to where Lori lay, poolside. Moments later, Larry, me and the filmmakers were standing with Pat McCormick, as a nurse cracked a vial of smelling salts under Lori's nostrils. She shook her head and opened her eyes. She smiled at December. Lori stayed flat on the stretcher, but on looking to the crowd and medical team, she burst into tears. December went to her knees and wrapped her arms around her. Lori's parents made it to their daughter's side.

"Silver!" yelled Lori's coach.

"Oh, Baby!" sobbed December, kissing Lori's face repeatedly, as cameras flashed and the crowd around Lori grew. She stood, grimacing, and walked, with December and Larry helping her, to the winner's platform.

"You are the champion I always knew you would be," said Pat McCormick, as she walked with Lori to the platform.

Lori Lewis climbed to the second tier, as Bella and Jazz Gill stood off in the distance, watching. Lori held her salute through the rendition of the "Star Spangled Banner," and stepped off of the platform.

Jazz Gill waved.

* * *

I stopped the iPod. Across the aisle, Lori continued taking congratulations from the Team Lori crowd, total strangers and the cabin crew.

"This is your captain speaking," came a deep voice over the speakers. "We have a lot of special people on board for this flight to Los Angeles, but please welcome Sergeant Lori Lewis on board."

A roar of cheers and applause rose from the cabin. Lori stepped to the curtain at first class, at the portal with the main cabin and waved. Another cheer went up.
Chapter Twenty-Nine – Deployed

Ralphie opened the passenger door to the Lincoln. "We're here, Miss Lewis." He left the door open, and made his way to the trunk.

Larry, Lori, her parents, and December all climbed out from the vehicle, onto the tarmac of the Boeing corporation's private portion of the Long Beach airport, where two C-17 Globemasters sat, each with their gaping mouths open. Hundreds of uniformed soldiers and hundreds more civilians conglomerated in the shadow of the two giants, hugging and weeping, as vehicles and cargo were loaded onto the transports.

Ralphie stood at the rear of the vehicle, alongside Lori's duffel bag.

Lori stood in her government issue boots and US Army uniform, belt cinched at her narrow waist, staff sergeant's stripes on each sleeve and US Army black, block lettering spelling out "LEWIS" on her chest.

"Okay, well, yeh," said Larry, to Lori.

"Thank you, Larry, for making my dreams come true," said Lori, wrapping her long arms around him. "I know you're gonna be okay."

Larry lifted his eyes to meet Lori's. "Probably."

"Just keep making dreams come true, Bix... just like you did for me," said Lori. "I was worried. I thought you'd become someone else, but you just became a better you." She kissed him. "It's that big heart of yours."

"Told you heart beats discipline."

December worked her way between the two and wrapped her arms around Lori.

"Take care of her," Lori, said to Larry.

"I'm gonna take care of him," said December.

"Don't get killed," replied Larry.

Lori laughed. "You guys haven't seen the last of me." She kissed December on the forehead, as her parents drew close. December and Larry stepped back together.

"We love you, Lori," said her father, embracing his daughter. "Please be safe."

"I will, Dad," said Lori, wiping away tears. "I love you."

"Oh, sweetheart," said the mother, as she hugged Lori. "We love you so much."

"I love you, too, Mom."

Whistles sounded and soldiers began to line up.

December threw herself into Lori's arms and pulled her into a kiss so long and passionate that soldiers around them stopped their farewells to watch the two women. Soon, cheers rose from all sides. When December pulled away, a huge cheer erupted.

"And there's more waitin' for you, when you walk off dat plane," said December.

Lori, her face red, smiled, hoisted her duffel bag and joined the lines of soldiers waiting to board one of the two C-17s.

Minutes later, as Lori marched up the enormous ramp, into the belly of the plane, she turned and waved. The five people standing next to the limo waved back.

When finally all troops had boarded, the waving was done and family members began walking to their cars, Ralphie stepped up to Larry. "Take everyone home, sir?"

"Yeh, Ralphie," said Larry, climbing into the Lincoln. "Thank you." The parents followed. Ralphie stood at the open passenger door, as December watched the enormous pair of cargo planes taxi to the airport's runway, and take flight.

"Come home soon, baby," she said, openly crying.

Ralphie offered a tissue. "Thank you," said December, at the door to the Lincoln. "It's funny how your whole world can change just like that." December stepped into the Lincoln.

Ralphie closed the passenger door and walked to the driver's compartment. "Just like that," he said.

