Plus One (8 page)

Alex was still stewing, staring off into the middle distance when his phone buzzed. It was Figgy—she'd been conked out that morning when he'd gotten the kids ready for school.

“Ach,” she said roughly. “I think I'm allergic to our house. I feel like my head's going to explode.”

“There's some grapeseed extract in the cabinet—mix it up with some warm water and honey. Don't sneer at the holistic juju—just do it.”

“Ach,” she said again, dubiously. “You'll get the kids at one?”

Alex swallowed. “One? What's at one?”

“The kids—they're out today at one, remember? The flyer in Sam's backpack?”

“Shit,” Alex said. Teachers at the kids' school insisted on communicating vital information via flyers that invariably came home smudged with banana or lost amid a jumble of worksheets. Figgy made it a habit to go through their backpacks when she got home and the kids were asleep. “Why can't they email like regular people?”

“Public school—hello?” she said. “I'm not even sure they have computers. Anyway, they've got some ‘staff development' thing this afternoon and the kids are out at one.”

Alex sighed. The TestiCure presentation was at two. Kanter wanted him to get started on materials for the shaken-baby spot, but right now he felt no particular desire to do Kanter's bidding. “I could cut out early,” he said. “What've you got today?”

“Lunch with Herb, the studio guy? With the crazy eyebrows and the teeny-tiny Korean wife? I'm supposed to go and make nice—Jess says they're about to sign off on the deal.”

Alex coughed. “That was fast. How's it looking?”

“Who knows? The schedule's crazy—we're looking at no hiatus and six-day shoots and the network wants outlines in a week. I'm already having panic attacks. And today I'm supposed to be at Mr. Woo at noon to eat lettuce cups with a guy with a private plane.”

Alex leaned back in his chair and tried to imagine what sort of deal they were talking about. The metrics were mysterious, but Alex knew the proportions were outsized; he understood Figgy stood to earn more in her signing bonus than Alex made in an entire
year. “All right—fuck the grapeseed. Take two Benadryl and go make nice. I'll get the kids and see you at home.”

“Thanks,” she said. “Wish me luck.”

“Luck,” he said. Alex put down the receiver and gathered up his things. If he ducked out now, Kanter might worry Alex planned to ambush him at the TestiCure meeting. Let him sweat it a little. He'd hit a taco truck in Echo Park and make the carpool line at school by one. At least he was needed somewhere.

• • •

Over the next few weeks, Alex felt himself disengage from work, the commitment and interest he always took for granted suddenly gone. Maybe it was the way Kanter had shut him out of the cookbook pitch, or maybe it was the fact that Figgy's deal had closed; whatever the reason, his own work now felt like a hobby he'd outgrown long ago and had somehow forgotten to give up.

Alex was fiddling with his phone one morning in line at Interlingua, the fair-trade coffee joint on Sunset staffed by baristas who approached the preparation of a latte with the precision of Swiss watchmakers. Dressed in tweed waistcoats and newsie caps, the staff looked like officers in a steampunk army, even as they spoke to the customers like Malibu surfers. No one said, “Here or to go?” Instead, they asked, “Hanging out or taking off?”

Alex looked up and saw a familiar figure crossing the courtyard, dressed in a fuzzy plaid shirt and skinny jeans that gave his legs the silhouette of a seabird. It was Huck, Katherine Pool's Plus One.

“Well, well, well,” Huck said, gently punching Alex's shoulder. “If it isn't Dead Shoe Walking. Come sit—me and my boy Brandon got the hookup, get you a soy cap before this line moves a step. Come.”

Alex followed Huck back to a table in the corner, where his
friend Brandon was deep into what sounded like a well-rehearsed rant about oil reserves and the International Monetary Fund. With his shaved head, aviator sunglasses, and a multi-pocketed jacket, he looked ready either for a runway in Milan or a military operation in Croatia. “You shoot?” he asked.

“Sorry, what? Shoot, like guns?”

“Yes, shoot like guns. Bang bang,” Brandon ran a hand across his stubbly head and turned to Huck. “Don't tell me you've brought another hippie to the man table. Haven't we had enough patchouli up in here?”

Huck rolled his eyes and gave Alex a smile. Brandon, Alex learned, spent most mornings here holding forth on his theories of imminent social collapse and personal development, typically ending his monologues with a pitch for Operation: You, a paramilitary training seminar he ran out of a luxury hunting lodge in Colorado.

“Shooting practice and deep-dive seminars by day, wine pairings and spa treatments by night,” Brandon said. “Do you some good, boyo. Identify obstacles blocking your path, take 'em out. Therapy with firepower. You're looking at the Tony Robbins of paramilitary personal development.”

“Wow,” Alex said, forcing a smile. “Send me a link.”

Alex finished his cappuccino and ordered another. Minutes stretched by. Alex was dimly aware that he was well on his way to being very late for work. Still, he made no move to go. The busboy brought over a plate of cinnamon sticky buns. Alex looked around at the patio. Every table was filled with bearded guys with band stickers on their laptops and ladies with tasseled boots and filmy peasant blouses. Who were these people? Didn't they have anywhere to be? They nodded meaningfully and spoke slowly, in no particular hurry. All over the city, Alex could sense computers booting up, conference calls starting, emails flying. Not here. Alex broke off a piece of sticky bun and popped it in his mouth.

“Dude, you ever been to a Korean spa?” Huck leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “It's an experience. Let's go hang some dong.”

• • •

Climbing into Huck's Audi, Alex slid his seat forward and did a drum roll on his thighs. “How long does this dong-hanging typically take? I probably should get to work at some point.”

“Seriously?” Huck said, swiveling his steering wheel with the heel of his palm. “We can't put a clock on this. Take a personal day.”

Alex settled back into his seat. “So what might that involve, generally?”

“Hit the Gem Spa, get a massage, then I dunno. I gotta cook tonight—maybe we hit Malcolm's for some protein.”

Alex frowned and nodded. He considered putting a call into the office, and then stopped himself. He'd play hooky, full on—no need to spoil it with a tense exchange about a fictional childcare crisis or trumped-up tummy trouble. He left a message for Figgy that something had come up and she should pick up the kids.

Gem Spa was a four-story co-ed spa in a downtown building once occupied by a department store. Thankfully, the dong-hanging portion of the experience was brief, limited to the few minutes it took for Alex and Huck to stash their clothes in a locker and change into the Gem Spa shorts and T-shirt and head up to the
jimjilbang
, a windowless floor where napping housewives were splayed out on slabs of heated jade. Along two walls were doors leading to specialty saunas, one lined with salt crystals, another coated with ice, another containing an enormous pit of chalky, orange clay balls. Alex noted that he and Huck were the only Caucasians in the place.

“This is amazing,” he said, wiggling into the ball pit. “I feel like I'm in some sort of seventies future. But Communist. Like a
North Korean
Logan's Run
.”

“I know, right?” Huck said. He motioned to a flat screen mounted on the wall of the sauna, tuned to a subtitled Korean soap opera. “Awesome, it's
Honor Bride
. Guy in the silk poofy hat is a ghost. Super intense.”

Alex squinted in the heat and tried to make sense of the show, which from what he could tell revolved around a princess, an opera singer, and a magical cantaloupe. They watched until droplets of sweat began leaking into Alex's eyes.

“Huck—can I ask you something?” He jiggled back and forth on the top layer of balls, dry heat radiating across his back. “How do you have
time
for this? With me, anyway? Don't you have a whole crew….”

Huck turned toward him. “Most of the guys in our position are too busy with their…” he rolled his eyes and spoke in a self-important bluster “…
projects
—photo exhibits and screenplays and artisanal, organic whatever-the-fuck,” he said. “You give a guy a little room to breathe and they trip out, I'm telling you. I wish
I'd
had someone show me the ropes.”

Alex nodded and shifted his weight, clay balls rattling under his back. “So what're Bing and Penelope doing while we're here in this…ball pit?”

“They're with their lovely and devoted nanny,” Huck said. “Today is dance class. Or sign language. Maybe percussion. I forget. Anyway, they much prefer the nanny to me or Kate. Mama Bear gets weird about it sometimes, but I keep telling her: Everyone's happy, why stress? Hakuna matata, right?”

• • •

Malcolm's Meat and Fish was a narrow storefront beside a nail salon on Virgil, the Edwardian script of the logo a clear signal to the local fooderati that this was not just a run-of-the mill butcher
shop. “You're going to freak,” Huck said, leading the way through the glass door. “Malcolm's a genius. Dude's not a butcher. He's a
consigliere
of meat.”

Alex stepped inside, a rich mineral tang heavy in the air. The boxcar-size store was immaculate and spare, the floors honed concrete and the walls chalkboard black. The glass case was a quarter filled, each item individually spotlit, the beef marbled and precisely trimmed, the poultry pink and succulent, the salmon fillets jewel-toned. Handwritten tags identified the farm, feeding, and preparation of each cut, along with the price, which Alex calculated as roughly 120 percent higher than anything he'd ever paid at his regular Armenian grocery.

“Huck! Homey!” came the call from Malcolm, bushy eyebrows darting in their direction. “How'd it go with the kalbi?”

“Amazing.” Huck pressed down on the gleaming glass case. “I did it with that rice wine marinade, like you said. Best ever.”

Malcolm seemed to know everything Huck had ever purchased here, referencing scallops and sausages like they were children dropped off in daycare. Alex hung back a few steps as the two traded firm and irrefutable opinions on spice rubs and wood chips.

Over Malcolm's shoulder, Alex caught sight of a young woman in chef's whites. She ducked behind the display case and slid a tray of hanger steaks through the sliding cabinet door. He watched her face through droplets of condensation. Pointy chin, blond eyelashes, red bandana knotted above her forehead, wheaty hair tied back in a complicated knot, a finely crosshatched tattoo of a cleaver on her forearm. There was something extra-terrestrial about her, something extreme-Nordic. Alex got a sudden picture of her on a rocky plain, in a knit sweater with a wolfhound at her side, the wind in her face and a dagger strapped to her thigh.

Alex took a step forward and tapped the glass, hoping to get her attention. She looked up and registered his interest, then motioned
to Malcolm. “
He
can help you,” she said.

She ducked toward the walk-in freezer, the bow of her apron strings dangling over a ridiculously high twentysomething rump. As he watched her recede into the chilly dark, he was suddenly aware of what she saw when she looked back at him. It registered in a flash: rumpled shirt, clumpy hair, baggy khakis. Not old, but not young. A cross between Bob Saget and a dollop of sour cream. Unthreatening, uninteresting, uncool, entirely
un
.

Outside, carrying a black cellophane bag heavy with $75 worth of rib-eye, Alex agreed that Malcolm's was indeed amazing. Then he asked about the woman stocking the case.

“That's Miranda,” Huck said. “She's got some kind of Tumblr feed or blog? Meatchick or Meatgirl, some shit like that. Why?”

“I just don't think I've ever seen a lady butcher.” Alex lowered himself into Huck's Audi and watched as Huck deposited their purchases into an icebox built into the dash. As he popped on his sunglasses and started up the car, Alex looked him over. Huck was about Alex's age, maybe a few years younger, but next to him, Huck seemed like a college kid.

“Can I ask you something lame? Where do you get your—clothes? For instance, those
trousers
?”

Huck laughed. “Why? You wanna do something about the daddy pants?”

“Kinda, yeah.”

“Hold on.” Huck pulled a quick U-turn, gunned the accelerator, and drove to a tiny sign-less storefront on 3rd Street with blacked-out windows. It could've been an auto showroom if not for the booming funk on the sound system and the steel racks of menswear. Alex wandered around, checking the tags on the sleeves of button-snap shirts and velour V-necks. Huck chatted up the shop assistant, a drowsy-eyed girl with tousled red hair. She sized Alex up, summed up what he needed—“French denim, stovepipe cut, distressed not wrecked”—and flashed Alex a wide
smile. He knew she was only being pleasant because she knew Huck. But niceness by proxy was still nice. Alex lapped it up.