Love Minus Eighty (18 page)

Not that it mattered to Lorelei. Kilo was leaving everything to Lorelei’s biological mom, who had a new family and wanted nothing to do with what she saw as the spectacularly incestuous arrangement between her grandmother and ex-husband.

“So why do you want to see Sunali, if you don’t mind me asking?” She was being uncharacteristically polite. It was so difficult to reconcile this Lorelei with the psychopath dangling his things out a window (although to be fair, it was also difficult to reconcile the psychopath Lorelei with the one he’d known while they’d been together). Despite her new manners, he
did
mind her asking, but what choice did he have except to explain his very private story to her and a hundred others?

So he did.

When he finished, Lorelei stood without a word. Her lips were pursed in her best “Don’t fuck with me” expression as she dug into her closet and retrieved an umbrella. “Meet me outside the Damark Revival Clinic. I’ll take you in to see her. How soon can you get there?”

He got there as fast as the micro-T would take him, hopping off into a light rain before it had completely stopped. He hurried along the porous sidewalk, where puddles never formed, escorted by a few dozen screens—friends (or fans, or whatever you’d call them) of Lorelei. As the revival clinic came into view, he slowed so he wouldn’t be out of breath when he reached Lorelei. He could see her standing under a tear-shaped umbrella, half a foot taller than everyone who passed her. Hundreds of screens buzzed around her.

She met him with open arms and hugged him with all her might, evidently choosing not to notice how unenthusiastically he returned the hug.

“Come on.” She turned toward the entrance, held out her hand so naturally that he took it before realizing what he’d done. She led him through a sumptuous waiting room, past imposing security, both human and mechanical. Lorelei seemed different now that they were inside, less ebullient, older, and it took Rob a moment to identify what it was: her entourage was missing, blocked from entering the private facility.

Lorelei led him down a hall that reminded him of the lavish bridesicle hall sans the crèches, through an archway, into the room where Kilo Van Kampen was dying.

He hung suspended in a warm saline pool like a shriveled salamander. The cradle holding him was attached to the walls on a dozen strands that stretched like snot. A nurse and what looked like a couple of personal assistants hung back, while Sunali sat beside him in a chair that reminded Rob of a giant spider.

Kilo’s eyes rolled to follow him and Lorelei as they entered. His mouth hung open, his perfect white teeth glowing obscenely in the wrinkled mess of his face. Sunali turned, then leaped from her seat when she saw Lorelei. Rob had almost forgotten how curvy Sunali was, seemingly all hips and breasts, how sharp her cheekbones were.

“What are you doing here?” she whispered sharply.

“Well, I’m not here to visit Grandpa, that’s for sure,” Lorelei said at full volume.

“Mom.”

They turned in unison toward the cradle at the sound of Kilo’s weak, phlegmy whisper. It was bizarre, to hear this old
man call Sunali “Mom.” Rob wondered how it made Sunali feel.

She went to the cradle, reached into the thick, tepid water, and took Kilo’s hand. He and Lorelei watched in silence as she brushed stray strands of blond hair out of his face.

The irony. Rob wondered if Kilo got the irony in this situation.

Kilo swallowed, winced. “Throat hurts.”

Before his lunging nurse could get there, Sunali retrieved his dangling water tube and slid it between his lips. He sucked impotently, groaned as it slipped out of his mouth.

“Try to rest. You’ll feel better.”

“When?” Kilo asked.

“In a few hours you’ll feel better, is what I’m saying.” It was clear she was straining not to sound impatient.

“Just what I need. Platitudes.” He grunted, the sound rich with anger, betrayal. “It’s not fair.”

Sunali sighed heavily. “You’re such an asshole.”

“You’re an asshole,” Kilo tried to say, but ran out of breath and only mouthed the last syllable.

Sunali turned back toward Rob and Lorelei. “What do you want?” From her sharp tone, Rob realized it had probably been a mistake to come, but it was too late now.

“I’m so sorry to disturb you, Ms. Van Kampen. I asked Lorelei to bring me here.” He swallowed thickly, launched into his story.

As soon as she realized this was about a sister bridesicle, she softened a bit. She didn’t become warm, exactly, but she stopped looking angry and put-upon. It reminded Rob of war movies, where soldiers will do anything for a fellow soldier. Sunali worked her system as she told him someone would
contact him. Then she turned back to her son before Rob could do more than call out “Thank you” to her retreating back.

As they walked the long corridor to the exit, Lorelei slowed to a stop.

“What is it?” Rob asked.

She considered him for a long beat. “So now what? You put a block on me again?”

That had pretty much been his plan. He sighed, leaned against the wall with his arms folded, staring at his feet. He wasn’t sure what to say. Surely she wasn’t suggesting they get back together; what she wanted was a postrelationship platonic friendship. Normally that was very much Rob’s style of breakup, but he just couldn’t see himself laughing over a drink with Lorelei.

“Do you want to know why I did it?” Lorelei asked.

“I know why you did it. You wanted more attention.”

She looked off down the hall, shaking her head, her silky black hair swaying. “Eyes are never the goal.”

“Oh, I know the attention-hound party line. Living in front of witnesses compels you to live your life fully, to never let precious moments pass in wishy-washy beige dullness, etcetera, etcetera. So, you’re saying you decided the best way to live vividly in that moment was to jettison my personal possessions out a window?”

“No. I decided to break up with you before you broke up with me, and that seemed the most memorable way to do it.”

Rob looked up at her.

Lorelei shrugged. “What? It’s true.”

Rob put his hands on top of his head, incredulous. “Why would you think I was going to break up with you?”

Without taking her eyes off Rob, Lorelei worked her system. She called up a recording from one evening in summer, when Rob was playing his lute at the Beer Yard, a Low Town bar. The hallway vanished and they were watching Rob, evidently on break from playing, talking to Dougie, the owner.

“I mean, sure, if I fall in love with a woman who wants to stay in New York, I’ll stay, but—”

“That was the night before we broke up.” Lorelei shut off the recording. “You never used ‘we’ when you talked about the future—it was always ‘I.’ I never said I wanted to stay in New York, so who is this hypothetical woman you might fall in love with?”

He opened his mouth to argue, to explain what he’d been thinking when he made that comment, but realized he had no explanation. It was true.

How many times, lying in bed, had Rob interrogated himself about his motives for going out with Lorelei? She’d lifted him into High Town, paid his way, but at the end of each self-interrogation Rob cleared himself of the charge of using Lorelei. She was gorgeous, had rocket fuel for blood, was witty and modern-cool. He would have gone out with her if she was broke. But only for a while. The thing was, he’d always assumed Lorelei was on the same page. Part of the reason he’d gone out with her was because he’d been so surprised and flattered that she was interested in him. He never expected it would last, because he was certain she would eventually ditch him and move on.

When he didn’t answer, Lorelei nodded, satisfied. “Sooner or later you were going to leave me sitting at the side of the road, and I didn’t want to play that part, so I rewrote the script.”

She was waiting for him to say something.

“I won’t block you. I won’t stop talking to you. And I sincerely appreciate the help you gave me today.”

Lorelei broke into a beaming smile. “I’m a good friend. You might think I would make a shitty wife, and maybe I would, but I’m a good friend.”

Somehow Rob felt like he was betraying Winter a little by reconciling with Lorelei, that he was simultaneously betraying Lorelei by pretending he didn’t still despise her for what she did. What would his dad say, the first time Lorelei popped in to say hello? What would Veronika and Nathan think? Well, Veronika, anyway. Nathan would be thrilled. How many times had he asked Rob to introduce him?

“You know, I have a friend who wants to meet you,” Rob said.

“You want to fix me up with your friend?” Lorelei laughed. “He must not be much of a friend.”

She offered her hand, and Rob took it. They headed back outside, where a hundred of Lorelei’s friends were waiting to find out what had happened.

Nathan had made the entire outer wall of his condo one-way transparent so that he could watch people glide along Pierre Street, waiting for his first glimpse of Lorelei.

“I’m kind of nervous,” Nathan said, rolling his shoulders like an athlete getting loose. He sounded pleased about it, as if nervous was a good thing. Maybe when you were as cool and confident as Nathan, it was.

Veronika wasn’t nervous, she was miserable. Utterly, utterly miserable. She’d been dreading this dinner all week.

Rob walked into view, his pace glacial because of his cheap shoes. Then he paused, turned, and waited, wearing a stiff, very un-Rob-like smile.

Then
she
glided into view, partially obscured by screens buzzing around her like she was the queen fucking bee. She was wearing a green drape that trailed to a half-dozen tails at her thighs, partially obscuring a gold-colored system that was just barely high enough to cover her nipples.

“Oh, God, now I’m really nervous.” Nathan dragged a hand down his face, let it drop loosely to his side.

Rob and Lorelei were still talking; they’d made no move toward the walk-up to the lobby. Veronika could only hope they were discussing reconciliation.

“Don’t you want to hear what they’re saying? Maybe Rob is telling her all about you.”

Nathan frowned. “I’m not going to eavesdrop on their conversation.”

Veronika gestured toward the screens. “Two hundred people are eavesdropping on their conversation.”

“True.” He told his apartment to activate sound on Pierre Street. The hum and whoosh of passing vehicles lit the air, along with Rob and Lorelei’s low voices.

“I met him through Winter,” Rob was saying.

“Who?”

“Winter.” Rob waited, offering no more.

Lorelei suddenly made the connection, gasped. “Oh,
Winter
. How does he know Winter?”

Rob folded his arms, stared at the pavement for a moment. Finally, he lifted his head. “He went out with her.”

Lorelei looked positively delighted. Her eyes sparkled with an inner light that had to be system-driven. “He went out with Winter? Well, isn’t this bizarre.”

Now Veronika felt fully justified in hating her.
I’m being fixed up with the guy who used to go out with the woman my ex-boyfriend ran over because I was distracting him with my total bitchery? How bizarre, how modern!
She was an attention whore, right down to her rotten core.

Veronika watched Nathan gape at her gorgeous legs as she struggled to match Rob’s nonaugmented pace. Veronika snapped her fingers in front of his face; he pushed her hand away.

As they disappeared momentarily, Veronika wished she could freeze time. She didn’t want to live through the moments that would come after Lorelei’s grand entrance. She dreaded shaking the woman’s hand, hearing her voice, seeing Nathan fall all over himself to impress her.

Nathan told the front door to let them in, and seconds later Lorelei was inside, arms wide to hug Nathan, laughing brightly as Nathan whispered something in her ear. Rather than squeezing through the door after her, her entourage popped into existence inside the room, her higher-status followers assuming their proper places at the front of the crowd.

Maybe Veronika should pretend to get sick. Maybe she would get sick, watching this fiasco.

As Rob gave Veronika a hug, he gave her a quick look that said he was enjoying this about as much as she. At least she wasn’t alone in her misery.

“And you must be…” Lorelei paused ever-so-slightly, checking her screen because she’d forgotten Veronika’s name, or, more likely, because she wanted to make it look like she’d forgotten Veronika’s name—a little dramatic pause to establish that Veronika was short, and of little consequence in this performance. “… Veronika.”

Nathan led them into the living area, and the furniture cruised into place, a Polupu sofa rising to meet Lorelei’s perfect ass, a Bo Pu chair sinking to house Veronika’s frumpy one.

Lorelei and Nathan showed off their slick vocal stylings and fingerwork, but kept their side conversations to a restrained level in deference to their “just met” status. Veronika had trouble following the conversation because of the volume of her inner dialogue, and because she felt like a little mistake who shouldn’t take up much of anyone’s time by speaking.

As Nathan and Lorelei launched into the predictable “let’s
seek out interests we have in common” phase of the first face-to-face (“
Oh, I love Two Boots Checker Face, too!
”), Veronika had to escape.

She went to the bathroom, washed her hands for a long time, asked the house if it would unlock Nathan’s medicine cabinet so she could snoop (no), paced the bathroom, again considered feigning illness, and finally dragged herself back to the living room.

Nathan and Lorelei looked to be on their second glass of absinthe. Rob just looked miserable.

“This is so cozy,” Lorelei said, scrunching her shoulders.

“Yes, very cozy. Just the hundred and fifty of us.”

Nathan gave her a look. Veronika knew it was a rude thing to say, like an actor in a play pointing out the audience, but she hadn’t been able to help herself.

The cheery smile never left Lorelei’s face. “Just imagine how crowded it would be in here if you had friends who were interested in
your
life.”