Bobby left this morning holding a boarding pass for a British Airways Paris-to-London shuttle. Our instructions: arrive at the Ritz, appear in fashion show, poison pool with LiDV196# caplets, let our photos be taken, order drinks in the Ritz bar, wait twenty minutes, leave laughing. Gossip that Jamie Fields might be dating Victor Ward while Bobby Hughes is away might be-as per Bobby's notes-"an excellent distraction."
A montage of Jamie and Victor walking along Quai de la Tournelle, staring up at the turrets of Notre Dame, looking out at barge traffic on the Seine, Jamie trying to calm me down as I freak out, clawing at my face, hyperventilating, wailing "I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die," and she maneuvers us to a walled-off area somewhere on Boulevard Saint-Michel and we end up shooting my breakdown again, near Quai de Montebello, where I'm fed more Xanax. Then a cab takes us to Boulevard Saint-Germain and we're sitting at a sidewalk table at Les Deux Magots, where I concede, "I'm just wearing uncomfortable socks I bought at the Gap." I blow my nose, laughing miserably.
"It'll be okay," she says, handing me another Kleenex.
"Don't you want me, baby?" I'm asking.
Jamie nods. "Even though I think you tipped that cabdriver a hundred dollars?" Pause. "Sure."
"No wonder he whistled at me."
At the room we always share in Hotel Costes our bed is already turned down and sprinkled lightly with confetti and I place a.25-caliber Walther automatic on the nightstand and while I'm f**king Jamie she positions herself so that it's easier for me to look at the videos flashing by on the TV screen, to which with both hands she keeps directing my attention, because even with her eyes closed, Jamie says, she can sense my yearning, can feel the need radiating out of my eyes, the unbearableness of it. She might have felt a spark, she might have wept. I might have said "I love you."
Afterwards, slouching in a chair across from the bed, naked, smoking a cigarette, I ask her, "What was Bertrand talking to you about?"
"Where?" she asks without pausing. "Who?"
"At Natacha the other night," I say, exhaling. "Bertrand. He said something to you. You pushed him away."
"I did?" she says, lighting a cigarette dreamily. "Nothing. Forget about it."
"Do you remember him from Camden?" I ask.
"I think so," she answers carefully. "Camden?"
"He was Sean Bateman's roommate-"
"Baby, please," she says, her breath steaming. "Yes. Bertrand from Camden. Yes. At Natacha. Okay."
After I put out the cigarette, washing another Xanax down with a glass of champagne, I ask, "Is Bertrand involved?"
"Is Bertrand involved?" she asks, repeating the question slowly, writhing on the bed, her long tan legs kicking at the sheets.
"Is Bertrand involved in the 'Band on the Run' project?" I ask.
"No," she says clearly. And then, "That's Bobby's game."
"Jamie, I-"
"Victor, why were you in London?" she asks, still staring away from me. "What were you doing there?" Then, after a long pause, closing her eyes, just the word "Please?"
Breathing in, answering without hesitation, I say, "I was sent to look for you."
A long pause, during which she stops kicking at the sheets. "By who, Victor?"
"By a man who said your parents were looking for you."
Jamie sits up, covering her br**sts with a towel. "What did you say?" With a trembling hand she puts out the cigarette.
I breathe in. "A man named Palakon offered me money to come and find-"
"Why?" she asks, suddenly alert, gazing at me maybe for the first time since we entered the hotel room.
"So I could bring you back to the States," I sigh.
"This-" She stops, checks herself "This was in the script? This Palakon was in the script?"
"I don't know anymore," I say. "I've lost touch with him."
"He... told you my parents were looking for me?" she asks, sitting up, panicking. "My parents? That's crazy, Victor. Oh god, Victor-"
"He offered me money to find you," I sigh.
"To find me?" she asks, clutching herself "To find me? Why did you do it? What are you talking about?"
"I had to get out of town, I had to-"
"Victor, what happened?"
"I came on the QE2," I say. "He offered me money to sail across the ocean to find a girl I went to school with. I wasn't even going to come to London. I met a girl on the ship. I was going to Paris with her." I stop, not knowing where to go with this.