Famous by Blake Crouch Page A

same—a
crowd moving together in waves like a field of wheat. More bars.
More light. And this constant thumping…boom, boom, boom, boom.
    At last, I see the music source. Atop a large
column in the center of the dance floor, DJ SuperCasanova stands
behind a shelf of keyboards and turntables and ear-shattering
speakers. He’s this white guy sporting a sequin suit and a sequin
top hat, and you can tell he loves his job.
    I push my way through the crowd and claim one
of the few vacant tables.
    I sit there, taking it all in. On the table
beside me, a woman has stretched herself out flat on her back and
pulled her shirt up over her bra, to expose her bellybutton. One of
the men lifts two shotglasses from the table and holds them up.
    “Tequila or tequila?” he asks and bursts into
laughter.
    He straddles the woman, pours a shot very
slowly onto her sternum and watches ravenously as the liquor trails
into her bellybutton.
    “Oh yeah!” the woman cries out. “Suck it!
Suck it!”
    So he sucks the tequila from her naval and
runs his tongue up and down the tats on her stomach, lapping up the
liquor and making her belly glisten—much to the delight of their
company.
    When he finishes, the woman climbs off the
table and another girl assumes the position.
    More drinking of liquor from orifices ensues,
nipples are exposed, and I’ve got to tell you, it’s all fairly
entertaining to behold.
    When I tire of watching the youngfolk beside
me, I walk to the nearest bar, order an Absolut, one ice cube, no
lime, and return to my table.
    I sit there sipping my drink and watching the
multitude of dancers. People in LA certainly know how to look good.
Nearly all of the men are tall, tan, muscular, possess perfect
hair, and have this superficial charisma down cold. For instance, I
watch this guy talking to this girl on the outskirts of the dancing
mob, and even though I can’t hear what they’re saying, I can read
in his face that the only thing he cares about is the possibility
of fucking her brains out a little later. I mean, she’s chattering
away, and he just keeps nodding and flashing these smiles that
aren’t really smiles, and looking around every now and then to make
sure something more fuckable isn’t in the vicinity. Real gentlemen,
these LA guys.
    And the women. Jeez. Every pair of knockers
in the place would win the blue ribbon where I come from. There’s
just a bunch of beautiful people in this room, and what I’m
realizing now is that’s what it takes not to be lonely out here.
You must have the right clothes, body, hair, smell, accessories,
and personality. Oh, but when I say personality, I don’t mean you
have to be genuinely interesting or original. Personality in the LA
sense means you must be able to maintain a conversation which
suggests you’re worth hooking up with because you possess all of
the required embellishments.
    I saw a television program once about the
whole dilemma of attracting a mate. And there were these pitifully
normal-looking people who kept saying things like, “eventually,
beauty gets old and people are going to want someone who’s actually
intelligent and unique and has more to offer than a hard body and
nice boobs.” I hear those lonely people talking while I watch this
crowd of vibrant people, and I’m thinking yeah, hold your breath.
People may tolerate friendship with plain, interesting people, but
they certainly don’t want to fuck them, and believe me, fucking is
the end result of all this light and makeup and music and alcohol
and drugs and dancing. This is all about finding someone to fuck.
It has to be. I mean, the group at the table beside me is only a
few millimeters of fabric away from doing it. And the
dancing—grinding, rather—is pretty much dry humping. I really feel
sorry for those bland people, sitting at home, angry and jilted,
waiting for all these beauties to come around and realize how interesting they are.
    After I finish my drink, I walk into the
crowd. I am