Hart g y,
Amity says. “Which one did you want to sleep with?”
“I can’t believe it. You play that game too?” I ask, laughing. “Well, being a white boy from the Midwest, I kind of have a thin for dark, exotic men.”
“Don’t tell us Jesse Jackson!” Amity yelps.
“All right then. Gary Hart, but only when he has a really tan.” ‘
“What’s wrong with Jesse Jackson?” Jackie asks. “I think he’ sexy.”
“Mrs. Jesse Jackson,” Amity mocks dreamily. “Jacq Jackson. Jackie Jackson. JJ.”
“And if he wins,” Jackie decrees with a jutted chin, I’ll be the First Lady, and it’ll be a White House full of ice-cold Stoly and fat doobies, and Kevin Bacon and Daryl Hannah will come to dinner and Corey Hart will sing for us. Corey Hart.”
“Wouldn’t President Jackson rather have Eddie Murphy and
Rae Dawn Chong come to dinner while Aretha sings?” Amity asks. I’ll determine the guests,” Jackie proclaims.
“So you’ll be a queen, like Nancy Reagan?” I ask.
“Speaking of queens,” Amity jumps in, “Queen Noor is coming to Dallas later this month.”
“Who’s that?” Jacqueline asks, throwing down an icy shot of vodka.
“The Queen of Jordan,” Amity answers, taking the bottle from
Jacqueline and filling her little shot glass.
“Where’s that?”
“It’s in the Middle East, right, Harry?” Amity says. “Right,” I say. “It’s not a peninsula though.”
Jacqueline complains, “I just was trying to explain what a peninsula is. When you have like this piece of land that juts “
“OK, Jackie that horse is never going to get across the finish line! Forget about peninsulas, girl. You and me need to be taking our lessons from the queen,” Amity tells her, getting back to business. She downs her vodka and shudders as if she’s having an orgasm. “She was an American girl, a Princeton grad, architecture, and she knew exactly what she was doing. God, I wish I could have concentrated in school. I just wanted to fuck the professors.”
Of course I immediately think of the professor story Randy told me. And realize, in her own way, Amity is confessing the truth. We laugh and snort our Stoly. Jacqueline snubs her cigarette out and lies down on the hardwoods. “So how is she the Queen of Jordan Almonds?”
Amity’s eyes flash with intrigue. “The king divorced his first two wives, and his third was killed in a helicopter crash, so they say.”
“What do you say, Amity?” I ask, fascinated that she always seems to have a take on things.
She’s been reading Wired, the biography of John Belushi, and
she’s taken to raising an eyebrow, one of his famous moves. It makes whatever she says seem more significant. “Those divorces were getting too expensive. He did something to that helicopter!” Left brow high.
“Sugar in the gas tank?”
“Probably, man,” Jackie says, doing leg lifts. “Who’s gonna know? Who’s gonna check it out? He’s the king.”
Amity continues with her lesson. “Lisa Halaby, the American girl, was his architect on a project, and she worked some kind magic on him and got him to marry her. She worked it big time.” “You’ve been doing your homework,” I say.
Amity looks at me with mysterious conviction. “Harry, it’s a fairy tale life. I love fairy tale lives.” She stands up to head for the kitchen and accidentally releases a little fart. “Oops,” she regally, like Queen Noor. “The queen has spoken.”
Jacqueline and I lose it.
In Amity’s white Ford Granada that is nearly as old as Volkswagen, Amity and I head down Northwest Highway Northpark Mall. Even though it is gray and rainy, Amity with her sunglasses on. She points out the many Mercedes, Ja and BMWs zooming around us on the four-lane road.
“A person’s car is a reflection of his lifestyle,” she says ously. Then she yells, “And look at this piece of shit we’re in! People are going to think we’re homeless!” She laughs screams and swerves
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