D.W. looks at me. "Well, just make sure you don't get rid of Dianna the way you got rid of Amanda. That might be rather ... obvious.”
For some reason, we find this hysterically funny.
VIII
I'm in a car and Dianna's driving way too fast and I know something bad is going to happen and sure enough, the car flies off the curve, launching itself over a cliff. We're airborne forever and below is a giant slab of cement and even though this is a dream and we're going to die, I can't believe I haven't woken up yet. Dianna turns to me and says, "I just want you to know that I love you. I really love you," and she grabs me and hugs me and I can't believe that I'm having a dream and I'm actually going to die in the fucking dream, which isn't supposed to happen, and I say, "I love you too," wondering what it's going to feel like when we hit the cement. We plunge down and down and I'm going to die in this dream and doesn't that mean you're supposed to die in real life? And we hit the cement but it doesn't feel as bad as I imagined it would, we just sort of squish through it and tumble out into this other place that is corridors and blue light.
Okay. Now we're dead, but we have to make a decision about whether or not we want to go back. I don't know what to do.
"I'm going back," Dianna says.
"What about me?" I say. "Should I go back?”
“I wouldn't if I were you, darling," she says. "Your face is kind of ... messed up.”
She laughs meanly.
If s probably eleven a.m. and I do wake up, curled in the fetal position, wearing one of Dianna's silk negligees with my white Gucci jacket on top and no underwear. Dianna is on the other side of the bed, lying on her back, breathing heavily through her mouth, and in between us is a small Frenchman, whose name, I think, is Fabien, whom we picked up last night on some other yacht. There's a spilled bottle of Dom Perignon on the carpet. I roll off the bed and crawl toward the bottle. There's still some left in the bottom, and I sit up and polish it off sloppily so champagne dribbles down my chin. I look over at the small Frenchman, who might actually be Swiss, and note that he is wearing blue Ralph Lauren boxer shorts and has too much hair on his chest.
My thoughts: I hate the French, so why should I go to Saint-Tropez?
I get up and stumble out of Dianna's cabin and into my own stateroom, which is littered with clothes (mostly tiny see-through Prada pieces with the labels prominently displayed) and Louis Vuitton luggage. I kick a small hard-sided suitcase out of the way and lurch into the bathroom, where I sit on the toilet and take what feels like an endless crap. As usual, the toilet doesn't flush, and my shit, light brown and in the shape of a large cowpat, sits there defiantly.
"Fuck you," I say to the shit. I look in the mirror and pluck some eyebrow hairs, even though there's supposedly a makeup artist on board who takes care of these things, and while I'm plucking and thinking that one of these days I'm probably going to need Botox, I'm also wondering if I did anything with the small Frenchman, but I'm quite sure I didn't because it isn't the kind of thing I WOULD do.
I've only HAD four boyfriends. Officially.
Dianna, on the other hand, will fuck anyone. I didn't know that about her.
And, I realize, I didn't want to.
Why am I here? For that matter, why am I anywhere? I go upstairs, reeling from the sudden impact of relentless white light. I'd forgotten about the white light in the south of France, so blinding that you always need sunglasses, and even then, it reveals too much. The captain, Paul, a good-looking Australian who is always wearing khaki shorts and a navy-blue polo shirt with the name of the boat, Juniper Berry, discreetly stitched on the pocket, is fiddling with some instruments. "Good morning," Paul says, like he's surprised to see me but is prepared to ignore whatever went on the night before. "Oh, your husband called. Hubert? He says he can't make it today, but he's going to try to get here tomorrow.”
My HUSBAND is coming? Did I KNOW about this?
I am so hungover, I can only nod numbly. After a few seconds I manage to stutter, "Are there any more cigarettes?”
"You smoked the last one an hour ago.”
I just stare at him, realizing that is probably some kind of JOKE that I don't get and never will, and I say, "I think I'll just go and buy some.”
"There are photographers outside.”
"Paul," I say wearily. "There are always photographers outside.”
I walk down the gangplank clutching my Prada wallet, still barefoot and wearing the negligee and the Gucci jacket, which, in the bright sunlight, I see is stained with large patches of what might be wine or raspberry puree or even vomit. I suddenly remember that I have no money because I'm in France and foreign money confuses me, so I stop and ask one of the photographers, all of whom have huge telephoto lenses in hopes of getting a topless shot of Dianna Moon (and maybe me, but I'm not as famous as Dianna is in France), for beaucoup d'argent.
I smile fakely, and the photographers are so surprised they don't take any pictures.
"Comment?" says one, who is short with floppy gray hair and bad teeth.
"Pourfume, " I say badly.
"Ah, pourfume, " they say, and nudge one another jocularly. One of them hands me twenty francs and winks at me and I wink back and then I set off, walking down the red carpet that lines the sidewalk of the harbor in honor of the festival, thinking: Every day this carpet gets dirtier and dirtier and I get more and more polluted, and why is Hubert coming, he's doing it on purpose. Again.
I wander into the narrow streets of Cannes, which are filled, predictably, with French people, all of whom seem to be smoking. I pass a small cafe filled with gay men, who, unlike gay men in New York, have long hair and are trying desperately to be women. One of them looks at me and says, "Bonjour. “
And that's when I realize I may or may not be being followed.
I turn around.
A small girl with long blond hair, clutching three red roses wrapped in cellophane, stops and stares back at me.
I glare at her and move on.
I find a tabac and go in. More French people smoking and laughing. Near the entrance, a Frenchwoman says something to me which I automatically tune out, although I believe she's asking me if I want a croissant or maybe a ham sandwich, so I snap, "Je ne park pas Franqais. " Then I ask the man behind the counter for Marlboro Lights, and once outside, I light up a cigarette, fumbling with the awkward French matches and I look up and there's the little girl.
Again.
"Madame ... , " she says.
"Vous etes un enfant terrible, " I say. Which is basically all the French I can remember that has anything to do with children. She says, "Vous etes trds jolie. “
I begin walking quickly back to the boat. "Madame, madame," she calls after me.
"What?" I say.
"You would like to buy a rose? A lovely red rose?”
"Non, " I say. "]e n'aime pas lesfleurs. Got it? Get it, kid?" And I can't believe I am being so mean to a small street urchin, but I am.
"Madame. You come with me," the child says. "No," I say.
She tries to take my hand. "You come with me, Madame. You must come with me.”
I shake my head, holding the cigarette up to my lips.
"Come, Madame. Come. Follow me.”
"Non, " I say weakly. And then for some reason, standing on the crowded street in the middle of Cannes during the film festival in the terrible heat, I begin crying, shaking my head, and the small child looks at me and runs away.
Another evening, on the—what?—third or fourth day in the south of France, and Dianna Moon and I are riding in the back of an air-conditioned Mercedes limousine with The Verve blaring as we crawl along the crowded streets of Cannes toward the Hotel du Cap, where we have been invited to have dinner with prominent movie people. Dianna won't stop talking, and I keep thinking about how, when Hubert and I first started secretly seeing each other, my phone was tapped.