Read Page 26

"I'm leaving," he screams. "I... am... leaving!"

I start laughing, not knowing what he means. "Well, where are you going to go?"Advertisement

"Away! " he shouts.

"Don't tell me," I shout back at him. "Merchant banking?"

"No, Bateman. I'm serious you dumb son-of-a-bitch. Leav ing. Disappearing."

"Where to?" I'm still laughing, stilt confused, still shouting. "Morgan Stanley? Rehab?What?"

He looks away from me, doesn't answer, just keeps staring past the railings, trying to find the point where the tracks come to an end, find what lies behind the blackness. He's becoming a drag but Owen seems worse and I've already accidentally made eye contact with the weasel.

"Tell him don't worry, be happy," Owen shouts.

"Are you still handling the Fisher account?" What else can I say to him?

"What?" Owen asks. "Wait. Is that Conrad?"

He points at some guy wearing a shawl-collar, single-breasted wool tuxedo, a cotton shirt with a bow tie, all by Pierre Cardin, who stands near the bar, directly beneath the chandelier, holding a glass of champagne, inspecting his nails. Owen pulls out a cigar, then asks for a light. I'm bored so I go for the bar without excusing myself to ask the hardbody I want to cut up for some matches. The Chandelier Room is packed and everyone looks familiar, everyone looks the same. Cigar smoke hangs heavy, floating in midair, and the music, INXS again, is louder than ever, but building toward what? I touch my brow by mistake and my fingers come back wet. At the bar I pick up some matches. On my way back through the crowd I bump into McDermott and Van Patten, who start begging me for more drink tickets. I hand them the rest of the tickets knowing that they are no longer valid, but we're crushed together in the middle of the room and the drink tickets don't offer enough incentive for them to make the trek to the bar.

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"Skanky chicks," Van Patten says. "Beware. No hardbodies."

"Basement sucks," McDermott shouts.

"Did you find drugs?" Van Patten shouts. "We saw Ricardo."

"No," I shout. "Negative. Madison couldn't find any."

"Service, damnit, service," the guy behind me shouts.

"It's useless," I shout. "I can't hear anything."

"What?" Van Patten shouts. "I can't hear anything."

Suddenly McDermott grabs my arm. "What the f**k is Price doing? Look."

As in a movie, I turn around with some difficulty, standing on my toes to see Price perched on the rails, trying to balance himself, and someone has handed him a champagne glass and drunk or wired he holds both arms out and closes his eyes, as if blessing the crowd. Behind him the strobe light continues to flash off and on and off and on and the smoke machine is going like crazy, gray mist billowing up, enveloping him. He's shouting something but I cant hear what - the room is jammed to overcapacity, the sound level an earsplitting combination of Eddie Murphy's "Party All the Time" and the constant din of businessmen - so I push my way forward, my eyes glued on Price, and manage to pass Madison and Hugh and Turnball and Cunningham and a few others. But the crowd is too densely packed and it's futile to even keep trying. Only a few of the faces are fixated on Tim, still balancing on the railing, eyes half closed, shouting something. Embarrassed, I'm suddenly glad I'm stuck in the crowd, unable to reach him, to save him from almost certain humiliation, and during a perfectly timed byte of silence I can hear Price shout, "Goodbye!" and then, the crowd finally paying attention, "Fuckheads!" Gracefully he twists his body around and hops over the railing and leaps onto the tracks and starts running, the champagne flute bobbing as he holds it out to his side. He stumbles once, twice, with the strobe light flashing, in what looks like slow motion, but he regains his composure before disappearing into blackness. A security guard sits idly by the railing as Price recedes into the tunnel. He just shakes his head, I think.

"Price! Come back!" I yell but the crowd is actually applauding his performance. "Price!" I yell once more, over the clapping. But he's gone and it's doubtful that if he did hear me he would do anything about it. Madison is standing nearby and sticks his hand out as if to congratulate me for something. "That guy's a riot."

McDermott appears behind me and pulls at my shoulder. "Does Price know about a VIP room that we don't?" He looks worried.

Outside Tunnel now, I'm high but really tired and my mouth tastes surprisingly like NutraSweet, even after drinking two more Stolis and half a J&B. Twelve-thirty and we watch limousines try to make left turns onto the West Side Highway. The three of us, Van Patten, McDermott and myself, discuss the possibilities of finding this new club called Nekenieh. I'm not really high, just sort of drunk. pqdm.com