I never walk in the hills. It’s too dangerous, the roads too narrow, the people too incautious, the path too circuitous to define a destination.
She rides up and down on a wave, sometimes silent and swaying, sometimes oddly lucid, sometimes desperately demanding I stop so she can hover in place and gag, wait to throw up.
“You’re so skinny,” she says. “Jealous.”
And then, “Are you really homeless? That’s so funny.”
She laughs at nothing. “Weird.”
“I can help you.” She decides at one point. “Do you want a job? You can work for my company. Alphaspire. It’s a tech conglomerate. Ha-ha.”
On the next street she doesn’t remember who I am. “Where are you taking me?” And we have to stop and wait for her to remember who she is and where we are going.
And all the time I’m thinking, How can she have this life and not want to live it? How can she be so rich and want to be out of her mind?
“I used to be like you,” she says when she remembers herself. “I mean, I was middle class but now I’m rich—ha-ha!”
I was never middle class, but middle-class people always like to believe they’re poor.
We reach the upper levels of the hills. The houses here are so big, it’s frightening. Castles off long, circuitous drives with gates under arches like hollowed-out caves. The kind of houses that are so big, you can’t believe that anyone could ever live in them. And they look empty. They have a haunted aura. When the underpasses in this city are crammed with souls and longing, these great big houses are like totems to the ghosts of wealth.
One house is etched along the sky above us. To even call it a house feels absurd. It’s a network of towers and turrets and Los Angeles ridiculousness, a leftover set from David O. Selznick. She sees me noticing and says, “That’s my landlord. She has more money than God—no, Satan. Satan would be the rich one, right? She has this garden—I’m not kidding—she has a garden designed after the nine circles of hell. I saw it in Architectural Digest.”
A light comes on in a far window, as if her landlord can hear us. I will never see a garden like that, not even in a magazine.
It takes us ages to wrap around it, but finally we reach an intricately carved wooden gate. It looks like it was taken from a church, wrenched from God’s hinges and stuffed inside a wall of concrete.
“This is it!” She squeezes my elbow. “Hey, do you want to have a drink with me? Do you want a drink?”
I haven’t had a drink in a long time. It’s such an expendable expense. And even though I’m on edge, even though I feel wary of her, like she might switch and swing on me suddenly, I think, When will I have this chance again? I remember a time when I had a job and a place to live, how I used to say to myself, You need to go out more! You need to do more! But instead I stayed in. I tried to save money, but it spent itself anyway. Now I am never invited anywhere.
“Hey, we can talk about the job, huh? Maybe I can help you.” I am half sure it’s drunken bullshit, but it’s the best offer I’ve had all year. Maybe all my life.
I take a step toward the gate, then feel a chill. I have never been inside a house like this and I imagine myself crossing the threshold, looking out over the city like it’s something I can see all at once. And my chest aches, and I can’t breathe. I’m scared.
“Come on.” She throws her arm around my shoulder. “Let’s have a drink.”
I lick my lips. “Okay.”
She unlocks the gate and shepherds me into a courtyard. An enormous fountain gurgles at the center. It’s lit from below, so it glows with an extraterrestrial tint. The house beyond it is this modern glass concoction. It looks less like a house than a work of art. You can see inside, all the tight lines of furniture, like a game of Tetris, perfectly stacked.
“Wow,” I say.
She frowns. “Not this one. It’s down below. This is where Graham Herschel lives,” she says like I know who that is. “I haven’t met him yet but he’s so fucking hot. He’s, like, this scion. I heard his wife is totally bonkers, though.”
She leads me along the side of the house, then down a steep, crooked stairwell until we reach another house, surrounded by a long, dark porch encased in trees, underneath.
“It’s kind of a weird place,” she says. “But I couldn’t pass up the chance to live at the Herschels’。 They’re, like, the cream of the cream or whatever. We’re talking billions.” She fumbles with her keys, hoveringly lucid, unlocks the dead bolt. The door creaks open. “Take off your shoes.” She sniffs and then steps inside, slips off her heels.