Chapter 46
"Right this way," the waiter neutrally directed Richard and Lupe down the hall to their private dining room. He had specifically requested a private room as the nature of their conversation was going to be more sensitive than Lupe's bottom after he was done with her. Especially last night…Don't think about that.
Lupe trotted a few feet behind them as they made their way down the hall. She was hesitant to dine with his parents. As she put it last night as he massaged her miracle cream into her reddened thighs, she used to do his (still legal) wife's laundry and now she sold dirty drawings and Bakelite cocks. Richard understood her apprehension, but he found it all very trivial. So what if she sold Bakelite cocks? Lupe made good money from it, and that's all that anyone down here should be concerned with. Besides, there were much bigger fish to fry tonight.
Rollie, acting as a go-between, had arranged the meeting. Richard hadn't spoken to either parent since he had sold his shares. Fortunately he hadn't bumped into either one either, as he kept a very different – as in non-existent – social circle. But, as Rollie pointed out, he couldn't avoid his parents forever. It was a small city.
Richard paused at the door while Lupe checked her reflection in a compact. He could see the distinctive silhouettes of his parents through the door. "You ready?" Richard asked.
Lupe held up a finger and re-applied her burgundy lipstick. "I'm not going to be more ready." She had chosen a very finely tailored but conservative green dress. He himself had gone with one of the nicer suits that he still owned and hadn't worn since he left Dorothy.
It was times like these Richard wished that alcohol had an effect on him anymore. But he'd been sober as a judge for over a year now. Without any further ado he wrenched the door open. His mother and father turned to look at them, martinis in hand.
"Hello," came an artificially chirpy greeting from Lupe behind him. "Those drinks sure look…clear."
Richard chortled at her weirdly panicked greeting.
"And frosty," she continued, already nervously babbling. "Oh, do I like a nice frosty martini. Nice and…vermouthy." Lupe couldn't stand martinis and in particular couldn't stand vermouth. Richard would very much like to see her try and guzzle down a few now though to put her mouth where her money was.
"Please do sit," his mother offered after a moment. "It would be nice to put some matters to rest." His father said nothing but grunted and went back to his martini.
Lupe sat down said nothing until Richard also settled down next to her. A waiter appeared at the door and took Lupe's and Richard's order. Richard ordered water and Lupe a gimlet.
"So….how is business?" Richard asked after the waiter left.
His father grunted again. "Fine enough without your help," he harshly answered.
"Harold, please, let's not start any fights. We are here to put the past behind us and act civilized," his mother said in a calm but still disappointed tone. "Now, Lupe, tell us about yourself. What line of work is your father in?"
Lupe cocked an eyebrow, unsure as to what kind of bearing that had on anything. "They run a restaurant. A steakhouse. In Los Angeles," she haltingly answered.
This evidently pleasantly surprised his mother. "Oh. Is it successful?"
"It has been for ten years, or was, I'd imagine it still is." Lupe frowned slightly. She missed her family, he knew, even though she never talked about it. All the more reason to try to put mine back together, I suppose.
"Did you ever work in it?"
Lupe nodded. "As a waitress. I can't cook for beans, or beans, as Richard will attest to. I don't like it. I didn't like waitressing either, but I preferred it to cooking. Less sweating."
His mother was slightly uncomfortable at the idea of sweating and grimaced. She was also very, very uncomfortable with Lupe's current business venture as well, so she was a bit hemmed in, conversation wise. "Have you picked out a dress yet?"
Richard's father was resentfully eyeballing him over his martini. Richard maintained eye contact though. He wasn't going to let the old man cow him.
"For the wedding? Yes, I think so. It's very – "
"Shhh, shush," his mother cut Lupe off. "The groom isn't supposed to know about the dress until you get married, it's bad luck."
"No one gives a hoot about her danged dress," his father gruffly said. "Besides, it's not a wedding anyway, it's a farce. There's no pastor and his real wife is still alive. It's a play Richard wants to do because he's sore that Dorothy's a bust."
Richard scowled. "So now you've got opinions on all the latest gossip, do you?"
"No, I give even less of a dang about it than I give about her fool dress. It's foolishness, the whole thing, but it's really none of my business," his father grumpily said. "Are you spending a lot of money on this school yard game of yours?"
Richard grunted as well. "What business is it of yours?"
"Knock it off," his mother said, a bit more firmly this time. "Richard, apologize to your father for selling your shares."
"No," Richard flatly denied. "It won't be authentic, and what's the point of that? I'm not pretending to apologize, just like I'm not pretending to get married. I like having my own business, just like I'm sure you like having your own. I don't have to answer to anyone."
His father's scowl softened, but didn't disappear completely. "Well I have nothing to apologize for!"
"That's keen because I didn't come her for one," Richard nearly shouted, remembering very crisply why it was he happy to sell his shares and leave. "You didn't do anything wrong!" Aside from convincing me to come here in the first place.
Lupe squeezed his hand under the table but said nothing.
"Harold, Richard, the both of you, for goodness sake," his mother chided them. "You two can't get sore over business, you came down here to be ruthless and cold masters of industry!"
Richard sighed. "I'm not sorry I sold my shares. I didn't want to make guns and I wanted to explore my own ideas. However, I am sorry I didn't tell you about it in advance. Not that it's an excuse, but I had several other large problems at the time and I didn't want to deal with a direct conflict with you as well. I should have told you, it was yellow of me to keep it a secret."
"Was that so hard?" His mother sighed and sipped her martini. "Honestly, you two are so much more alike than you know. Both stiff-backed and arrogant. And look were it had gotten you, hm? Feuding with the last person who should be feuding with." At that his mother elbowed his father in his ribs.
His father grunted. "Your mother and I…would be happy…to attend your…wedding," he managed to grouchily sputter out.
"That's wonderful," Lupe quickly rushed out. "Honestly it is, it would be so sad if you didn't come."
"Yes, yes it would," his mother agreed just as quickly, less either of the men present get a negative word in edgewise. "You haven't any family here, have you dear? That's why it is extra important for us to come. I do want to make it clear that we don't hold your…former position as a domestic against you, that's not the sort of person I am, nor Harold. A person shouldn't be ashamed of hard work, no matter what it is."
Lupe smiled warmly, so warmly Richard could tell it wasn't a polite farce and that she was genuinely relieved by his mother's reassurance. "To be fair I wasn't great at being a maid. I'm much better at my current job."
"Ah, yes," his mother awkwardly said. "I don't hold that against you either. I imagine that's challenging to…procure your merchandise."
Lupe nodded eagerly but had the good sense not to discuss her merchandise. "It is. I understand that this is an unexpected development in your son's life. It is also not what I expected to happen. So thank you for understanding."
His father grunted. "I don't understand why this boy does a danged thing he does, but it isn't my business to."
That was the closest to a blessing Richard was ever going to get, and the fact that his father hadn't mocked him for apologizing meant that their relationship, while not recovered, was officially on the mend. Richard untensed his shoulders and reached for the menu. "So what's good here? I haven't bene here since they changed owners."
Would you kindly imagine a page break here?
Dorothy sullenly fidgeted with her lighter while sitting in the lobby of The Luckier Duck. Even though she had lived there for the better part of a year it didn't feel like home. She reckoned a hotel would never feel like a home to anyone, except maybe for Annette.
Damn Annette. Almost as bad as the whore.
The staff of The Luckier Duck all knew her, of course, and were polite to her face but Dorothy knew the truth. They laugh at me. They all laugh at me. Richard. The whore. Annette. Richard. The whore. Annette…
She had been having sour thoughts as of late.
Very sour thoughts.
The whore was crafty. She carried a gun. The whore's guilt made her carry a gun because she feared justice for stealing Richard away from his wife. The whore was hard to enact justice on. A knife, a few lightbulbs, a darkened hallway, that's all it should have taken. But the cunning whore anticipated her. Dorothy wouldn't put it past the whore to have made some sort of Faustian pact for her charms and cunning. Not that the whore would know who Faust is. Uneducated. Common. Crude. Degenerate.
And Richard! Dorothy was done with him. If he didn't want the divorce so much she would have gladly given it to him. He doesn't deserve me. He's an animal. A pervert. A junkie. A degenerate, like his whore.
The janitor gave Dorothy a very subtle side-eye as he pushed the floor waxer past. They all think me licked, she brooded while staring at the lowly janitor in his stained and ripped overalls. I'll show them. They'll know I'm not a joke. They'll know to not get in my black books. I'll give the whore her due.
"Golly gee, what's got you so down in the dumps?"
Dorothy sharply turned her head towards the inappropriate cheer. Robert. That vile man. If hadn't succumbed to his base urges and propelled Richard to violence then none of this would have happened. Richard would have grown bored of the whore by now and everything would be normal and right. She said nothing but instead scowled at Robert.
Robert, however, couldn't take a hint. "Ah, I know what it is, Dorothy told me. Your sweetheart is got his eyes on another broad, I remember now. Well I tell you what, I got my own beef with him." Robert chuckled to himself, and then started to laugh. "Big beefy beef!"
Dorothy stopped being annoyed long enough to notice his odd behavior. Had someone put her into a coma she'd have a lot more to say about it than that. "Can I help you with something?"
"No, no, no, I'm dandy like candy, beefy candy," Robert rambled as he sat down next to her on the sofa uninvited. "I can help you though, I can, I can turn that frown upside down!" Unprompted and giving no regard to being in public in the middle of the day, Robert took a hypodermic needle from his pocket, full of glowing blue fluid. Before Dorothy had the time to say a word he jammed the needle into her arm and pressed the plunger down.
Dorothy belatedly tried to pull away, but the ADAM was already inside of her body. "No! What have you done!" Dorothy shrieked at him. Having seen the dramatic changes ADAM had brought to Richard firsthand, good and bad, she had sworn off the stuff.
"Relax, this is expensive stuff," Robert dismissed and gave her a condescending pat on her shoulder. "It's a real whizz-bang, I should almost thank your ex-husband for inadvertently introducing me to it."
A rush of blissful incandescent energy surged through her body. Dorothy exhaled rapturously as the miracle marvel ransacked her senses. It felt wonderful. Ecstatic. No wonder people like this stuff, she giddily thought and slumped back in her chair.
"A real humdinger, ain't it? It's good for what ails you. Whatever ails you. I think I know what ails you. It's your dog of a husband. He ails me too. But I been practicing, I think I have a cure for the ailment," Robert rambled.
However, in her new state of enlightenment, Robert's wandering prose made sense. Dorothy nodded, knowing but not knowing at the same time. She wiggled a little in her seat, savoring the new electric fluidity that the ADAM delivered to her limbs. "Do you?"
"I been practicing," he repeated himself. With a gesture from his hand the heavy wooden coffee table slid across the floor several feet, startling a person in line at the reception desk. He then began to explain his plan to Dorothy, which she found to be equal parts just and dangerous.
Dorothy's mind was racing but in an orderly and productive way. I'll give the whore her due. And then Richard. And then Annette. And then Robert. Yes, I'll get them all their due. They think they can mock me, use me for their entertainment, use me for their plots and their clever-clever plans…
Robert couldn't hear her internal dialogue, so he blabbered on. "That's the brilliant part, don't you see? As long as I am 'defending myself or someone around me' I can do whatever I want, that's why Richard is a free man now."
Dorothy nodded. Give the whore her due, she repeated to herself, again and again, as the ADAM warmed her up better than a hot bath and a glass of champagne.