Floating City (27 page)

There was a moment of silence; then Analise started talking on the phone again. “Hello? Yes, hi! Yes, it's me—you recognized my voice? Oh, Lord, that's so lovely in this day and age. Thank you. I'd like two tickets, but they have to be in the box—my client can't see very well and his hearing is not so great. Of course, five hundred sounds reasonable. Just hold them at the box office and I'll have a car come by in an hour to pick them up.”

When Analise hung up, Kimberly asked in a sullen voice who was getting to go to a Broadway show.

Mercilessly, Analise shook her head. “The tickets are for Brittany, and not for Broadway—the Met.”

Kimberly looked puzzled. “They're going to a museum?”

“To the
opera
,” Analise said.

Her cutting tone made me fear for Kimberly's future as an escort, which snapped me awake. All of this was so sudden and novel, such a peculiar and fascinating new revelation about this remarkable person I thought I knew. This wasn't some happy little clubhouse for rich kids.

“I think maybe I should take off,” I said. “You guys are—”

Analise frowned. “Oh, don't worry so much. No secrets here.”

No secrets? It was
all
secrets. “I can't just sit here unless they
know that I have certain professional obligations regarding confidentiality and—”

Analise launched into a fairly precise version of my standard predisclaimer disclaimer: “Although Sudhir is not currently engaged in a formal study, he is a university researcher,” etc. It was impressive. She even parodied my formal diction. And of course, neither of the two women blinked a false eyelash. She was their boss. What did she expect them to say?

Letting out a sigh, I reached into Analise's cigarette box myself. If you can't beat 'em . . .

Jo Jo winked at me. “Long day?” she said. I shrugged a little, acknowledging that it had been, and Jo Jo scooted her chair over closer to me. “Analise told me what you do—gangs, drugs, women of the night. You must have an exciting life.”

At this point, she actually batted her eyes. She wasn't trying to be subtle.

“I'm in bed by nine,” I said.

“Why are we
so
interesting to you? It's just sex. Sex and money—oldest things in the world.”

“Yeah, except it's a
lot
of money. And you're already rich. You're white, you take vacations around the world. I bet you have maids.”

“Of course,” Jo Jo said.

“That doesn't mean anything,” Kimberly said. “Everybody has a cleaning lady. Even my cleaning lady has a cleaning lady.”

“Still, you have so many other options.”

Kimberly took over. “You seem pretty judgmental for a sociologist. I'm not sure why anyone talks to you when you say shit like that.”

Fascinating, I thought. On the lower economic rungs, the reaction to direct questions like mine is much more humble. But Manjun didn't have a cleaning lady. Angela didn't have a cleaning lady. “Objectively, you
have
other options,” I said. “Most of the women I study don't.”

“Whatever,” Kimberly said.

Jo Jo said things were complicated, launching into a meandering history of her family that went back to the American Revolution. “I went to Yale,” she said. “Got my degree, came to New York, tried the nine-to-five thing. No, thank you. Jesus, that was a living hell. So my dad cut me off. He says it's good for my character.”

She cackled.

With Analise, she was making ten thousand dollars a month.

“Are we fucked up? Probably. I take Vicodin, snort coke, get drunk off my ass. But who doesn't? I don't see a lot of psychological masterpieces out in the straight world.”

Listening to them made me think about Angela and the problem of the “soft” assets she didn't seem to possess. Relative wealth and the accompanying sense of privilege gave these women something cultural that was important for succeeding in this world—simple nonchalance, a sense of entitlement that nothing could threaten. The critical difference was that it came so naturally, while Angela and Carla and even Margot had to make an effort. I could relate. Just as I had learned about wine and opera to look like less of a fool in Harvard's eating clubs, those women had to study the ways of the rich men they wanted to attract. But Kimberly and Jo Jo were like creatures from another planet, exuding a sense of privilege so serene it seemed to justify itself. My first thought was that money could never buy this, but then I realized that
only
money could buy it. My Columbia colleague Shamus Khan captured its essence in a study of the boarding school elite:
ease and privilege
.

But that was my take. What did Jo Jo and Kimberly think separated them from other women? I wondered. If another woman wanted to work for Analise, what qualities would she need?

Jo Jo began with confidence. “Basically, she can't be . . .”

She stopped, struggling to find the right words.

“Jo Jo doesn't want to be insulting,” Kimberly said.

Jo Jo sat forward. “Here's what I mean,” she said. “I was at Za
nies the other night. The club was kind of empty. I was waiting for my date—he got caught in traffic. I saw this girl get dumped by this guy. Really weird. He just threw down the money and left. I knew what was going on. She was from an escort service. I could tell. So I went up to her and tried to calm her down. Said I knew what that feels like. After about an hour she says she wants to leave her agency and asked if I can help. You know what? Not a chance. Why? She was, like, this working-class girl. Fucking Julia Roberts. What the hell does she know about the ballet or fine art? I mean, you are
never
just sucking someone's dick. Sometimes you don't even do that. They have to feel comfortable with you in public.”

“And you have to know when to shut your mouth too,” Kimberly added. “Those girls, the Puerto Ricans and white trash, they sleep on fucking bunk beds. Our guys aren't going to trust their reputations to some chick who hangs around the hotel looking for business.”

Jo Jo seemed a bit disappointed in me. “So that's it? That's what you do for a living? Spend all your time talking with girls like us?”

“I don't meet a lot of people like you,” I said. “Usually just Puerto Ricans or white trash.”

“Funny,” she said.

I didn't reply.

“Anyway, it's not that fucking complicated. We like money, and this is a fast way to get it. What's the big deal?”

I thought of Manjun, and how eagerly he tried to show me the divine in his degraded neighborhood. The poor I'd studied always seemed to need to rationalize their behavior, even if it was to make
Scarface
-style boasts about how little they cared about social norms. They had to make peace with their god somehow. Here it was the opposite. Not only did Analise and Kimberly and Jo Jo never feel pressed to justify their actions, they seemed to feel that victory was found in
refusing
to justify them.

Another mystery to explore.

•   •   •

T
he next time my phone rang, it was a friend telling me that Analise was in the hospital. I made some calls and finally reached J.B., who was still in California trying to become the next Harvey Weinstein. Some old guy got drunk and started beating on Brittany, who locked herself in the bathroom and called Analise for help. Analise tried to help and the client turned on her, giving her the beating he'd wanted to give Brittany. “Fucking Brittany,” J.B. said.

“Analise should have called the cops,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, right.”

J.B. didn't get back for two days, but maybe business really did keep him, because he looked very upset when he finally got to the hospital. Usually he acted like a weary tour guide waiting for the last group to take their pictures of a monument; now he looked stunned by the sight of the monument burning down. “I couldn't have done anything,” he said. “There was no way I could stop it.”

He said it as though he'd already said it to himself a thousand times.

We were standing outside the hospital, waiting for visiting hours. He lit a cigarette as I shivered, my hands shoved deep in my pockets. It was late March, when a blast of cold seems so unkind in the face of the coming spring, and all I had was my professorial corduroy jacket. My sympathy was stifled by the knowledge of what he'd really been doing out in LA. While taking a break from failing at making feature-length indie movies, he was putting his cash into porn films and partying late into the night with his new porn friends. I knew Analise wanted him to quit going out to LA, where he only seemed to lose their money. To which he would respond: “Look what
you
do! What right do you have to judge
me
?”

“She could at least appreciate how hard I work,” he said.

I mumbled something.

“The real problem is my family. I mean, she's in the hospital. That could get the wrong kind of attention.”

That sounded like a canned phrase, perhaps one he had heard in his childhood:
That could bring the wrong kind of attention, son.
From previous conversations, I knew that what he meant was attention from the media, which would inevitably get to the one person in the world he most feared.

“So what happens if your old man finds out?” I asked.

“Um, I'd have to dump her. No question.”

I was flabbergasted. “You're kidding me,” I said.

“Do you know who my father is? I used to spend summers working on the docks up and down the East Coast. Dad had invested a lot of money—importing, shipping, trading, all that stuff. When people got upset, you know, when things were getting a little bothersome, do you know what Dad did? Brought down some Hells Angels to beat the shit out of the strikers. Dad's
insane.
He'd probably go after Analise's whole fucking family.”

Now I was worried. “Could he really find out?” I asked.

“When you're doing international work, you need deep contacts in the law because half the shit that goes on your ship is never declared. You can't break the law on that scale without help. Somebody probably already called Dad. Man, it's going to suck when I see him. It's just going to suck.”

J.B. reached into his pocket for the last cigarette, crumpled up the pack, and threw it on the ground. He was wearing a dress shirt with thin pink stripes and a sweater thrown over his shoulders. He looked like JFK on a boat, steadying himself for the next wave.

“Wish my sister was here—she always knows how to handle things. But she lives in London with a fucking Paki who owns hotels.”

He noticed my existence and said, “Oh, sorry—I don't mean you.” I was supposed to understand that he meant
Paki
Pakis, not
an assimilated person like myself who understood important cultural intricacies like the Hustle and “Keep on Truckin'.”

“Kathryn knows how to take Dad on—because of the marriage she had to deal with a bunch of shit from everyone and now no one talks to her, so she doesn't give a fuck. She never backs down. And her kids, man, they
hate
the old man. And he hates them back, which is hilarious. You should see him fighting with these little five-year-olds like they were real people, getting drunk and calling them all sorts of nasty names. And they just stand there and laugh at him.”

Already, I was imagining a study on intermarriage among the wealthy. Did intimate contact with another race stiffen all their spines in this way? Genuinely curious, I asked J.B. how she would handle the situation.

He let out a big sigh, I'm not sure why—either from longing or disappointment in his own ability to cope with his father. He glanced up toward Analise's hospital room. “She'd be up there instead of down here smoking a cigarette,” he began. “And she'd be working the phones like a madwoman—she'd get my brother to fly out here, and he'd make my dad come too, and then when everyone was gathered she'd just come out and say it. 'Analise has been doing blah blah, making money blah blah.' And you know what? We'd all probably end up being fucking
proud
of Analise!”

Did his brother know? I asked

J.B. nodded. “I told him.”

So why not call him? If he could work magic on the old man, why not ask for some help?

He looked ashamed. “He's in Tokyo. I don't want to bug him.” But his voice was wistful, as if he really wanted his brother's help. I didn't know much about his brother, but I knew he was older and successful in his own right. I imagined J.B. had asked him for help many times in the past. Too many times.

He looked at his watch. “I better get back up there,” he said.

Thrusting his hands deep into his pockets, he headed down the sidewalk toward the hospital doors.

•   •   •

I
didn't see Analise the rest of that month. She'd gone to the Hamptons to convalesce; I was busy finishing up a semester of teaching. She finally returned to New York in May 2005, which I remember because school was almost out. When I went to visit her at her apartment, she opened the door with her bag already slung over her shoulder. “Want to help me run an errand?” she asked. We headed right out again.

She still looked slightly shaken. She had lost some weight too. We started walking west toward Chelsea and she fell into a desultory account of the days just past. The beach house was the perfect place to gather her thoughts, the sand got into everything, she told J.B. she didn't want to see him for a while, the social scene was crazy but she avoided that.

“How's he taking it?” I asked, steering her back.

“Junebug? He's pissed. Says it's all my fault—I should quit the business before something worse happens.”

“And what do you say?”

She cackled, giving me a glimpse of a more cynical Analise. “If I quit, where are you going to steal the money to launch your cinema empire?”