American Psycho (2 page)

“Damn, damn, damned,” Price says as he opens the door. Coming out of the cab he eyes a beggar on the street—“Bingo:
thirty
”—wearing some sort of weird, tacky, filthy green jumpsuit, unshaven, dirty hair greased back, and jokingly Price holds the cab’s door open for him. The bum, confused and mumbling, eyes locked shamefully on the pavement, holds an empty Styrofoam coffee cup out to us, clutched in a tentative hand.

“I suppose he doesn’t want the cab,” Price snickers, slamming the cab door. “Ask him if he takes American Express.”

“Do you take Am Ex?”

The bum nods yes and moves away, shuffling slowly.

It’s cold for April and Price walks briskly down the street toward Evelyn’s brownstone, whistling “If I Were a Rich Man,” the heat from his mouth creating smoky plumes of steam, and swinging his Tumi leather attaché case. A figure with slicked-back hair and horn-rimmed glasses approaches in the distance, wearing a beige double-breasted wool-gabardine Cerruti 1881 suit and carrying the same Tumi leather attaché case from D. F. Sanders that Price has, and Timothy wonders aloud, “Is it Victor Powell? It can’t be.”

The man passes under the fluorescent glare of a streetlamp with a troubled look on his face that momentarily curls his lips into a slight smile and he glances at Price almost as if they were acquainted but just as quickly he realizes that he doesn’t know
Price and just as quickly Price realizes it’s not Victor Powell and the man moves on.

“Thank god,” Price mutters as he nears Evelyn’s.

“It looked a lot like him.”

“Powell
and
dinner at Evelyn’s? These two go together about as well as paisley and plaid.” Price rethinks this. “White socks with gray trousers.”

A slow dissolve and Price is bounding up the steps outside the brownstone Evelyn’s father bought her, grumbling about how he forgot to return the tapes he rented last night to Video Haven. He rings the bell. At the brownstone next to Evelyn’s, a woman—high heels, great ass—leaves without locking her door. Price follows her with his gaze and when he hears footsteps from inside coming down the hallway toward us he turns around and straightens his Versace tie ready to face whoever. Courtney opens the door and she’s wearing a Krizia cream silk blouse, a Krizia rust tweed skirt and silk-satin d’Orsay pumps from Manolo Blahnik.

I shiver and hand her my black wool Giorgio Armani overcoat and she takes it from me, carefully airkissing my right cheek, then she performs the same exact movements on Price while taking his Armani overcoat. The new Talking Heads on CD plays softly in the living room.

“A bit late, aren’t we, boys?” Courtney asks, smiling naughtily.

“Inept Haitian cabbie,” Price mutters, airkissing Courtney back. “Do we have reservations somewhere and please don’t tell me Pastels at nine.”

Courtney smiles, hanging up both coats in the hall closet. “Eating in tonight, darlings. I’m sorry, I know, I know, I tried to talk Evelyn out of it but we’re having … sushi.”

Tim moves past her and down the foyer toward the kitchen. “Evelyn? Where
are
you, Evelyn?” he calls out in a singsong voice. “We have to
talk.
”

“It’s good to see you,” I tell Courtney. “You look very pretty tonight. Your face has a … youthful glow.”

“You really know how to charm the ladies, Bateman.” There is no sarcasm in Courtney’s voice. “Should I tell Evelyn you feel this way?” she asks flirtatiously.

“No,” I say. “But I bet you’d like to.”

“Come on,” she says, taking my hands off her waist and placing her hands on my shoulders, steering me down the hall in the direction of the kitchen. “We have to save Evelyn. She’s been rearranging the sushi for the past hour. She’s trying to spell your initials—the
P
in yellowtail, the
B
in tuna—but she thinks the tuna looks too pale—”

“How romantic.”

“—and she doesn’t have enough yellowtail to finish the
B
”—Courtney breathes in—“and so I think she’s going to spell Tim’s initials instead. Do you mind?” she asks, only a bit worried. Courtney is Luis Carruthers’ girlfriend.

“I’m terribly jealous and I think I better talk to Evelyn,” I say, letting Courtney gently push me into the kitchen.

Evelyn stands by a blond wood counter wearing a Krizia cream silk blouse, a Krizia rust tweed skirt and the same pair of silk-satin d’Orsay pumps Courtney has on. Her long blond hair is pinned back into a rather severe-looking bun and she acknowledges me without looking up from the oval Wilton stainless-steel platter on which she has artfully arranged the sushi. “Oh honey, I’m sorry. I wanted to go to this darling little new Salvadorian bistro on the Lower East Side—”

Price groans audibly.

“—but we couldn’t get reservations. Timothy,
don’t groan.
” She picks up a piece of the yellowtail and places it cautiously near the top of the platter, completing what looks like a capital
T.
She stands back from the platter and inspects it. “I don’t know. Oh, I’m so unsure.”

“I told you to keep Fin
landia
in this place,” Tim mutters, looking through the bottles—most of them magnums—at the bar. “She never has Fin
landia
,” he says to no one, to all of us.

“Oh god,
Tim
othy. Can’t handle
Absolut
?” Evelyn asks and then contemplatively to Courtney, “The California roll should circle the rim of the plate, no?”

“Bateman. Drink?” Price sighs.

“J&B rocks,” I tell him, suddenly thinking it’s strange that Meredith wasn’t invited.

“Oh god. It’s a
mess
,” Evelyn gasps. “I swear I’m going to
cry.
”

“The sushi looks
marvelous
,” I tell her soothingly.

“Oh it’s a
mess
,” she wails. “It’s a
mess.
”

“No, no, the sushi looks
marvelous
,” I tell her and in an attempt to be as consoling as possible I pick up a piece of the fluke and pop it in my mouth, groaning with inward pleasure, and hug Evelyn from behind; my mouth still full, I manage to say “Delicious.”

She slaps at me in a playful way, obviously pleased with my reaction, and finally, carefully, airkisses my cheek and then turns back to Courtney. Price hands me a drink and walks toward the living room while trying to remove something invisible from his blazer. “Evelyn, do you have a lint brush?”

I would rather have watched the baseball game or gone to the gym and worked out or tried that Salvadorian restaurant that got a couple of pretty good reviews, one in
New York
magazine, the other in the
Times
, than have dinner here but there is one good thing about dinner at Evelyn’s: it’s close to my place.

“Is it okay if the soy sauce isn’t exactly at room temperature?” Courtney is asking. “I think there’s ice in one of the dishes.”

Evelyn is placing strips of pale orange ginger delicately in a pile next to a small porcelain dish filled with soy sauce. “No, it’s not okay. Now Patrick, could you be a dear and get the Kirin out of the refrigerator?” Then, seemingly harassed by the ginger, she throws the clump down on the platter. “Oh forget it.
I’ll
do it.”

I move toward the refrigerator anyway. Staring darkly, Price reenters the kitchen and says, “Who in the hell is in the living room?”

Evelyn feigns ignorance. “Oh who is that?”

Courtney warns, “Ev-el-yn. You
did
tell them, I hope.”

“Who is it?” I ask, suddenly scared. “Victor Powell?”

“No, it’s not Victor Powell, Patrick,” Evelyn says casually. “It’s an artist friend of mine, Stash. And Vanden, his girlfriend.”

“Oh so that was a
girl
in there,” Price says. “Go take a look, Bateman,” he dares. “Let me guess. The East Village?”

“Oh Price,” she says flirtatiously, opening beer bottles. “Why no. Vanden goes to Camden and Stash lives in SoHo, so there.”

I move out of the kitchen, past the dining room, where the table has been set, the beeswax candles from Zona lit in their sterling silver candleholders from Fortunoff, and into the living room. I can’t tell what Stash is wearing since it’s all black. Vanden has green streaks in her hair. She stares at a heavy-metal video playing on MTV while smoking a cigarette.

“Ahem,” I cough.

Vanden looks over warily, probably drugged to the eyeballs. Stash doesn’t move.

“Hi. Pat Bateman,” I say, offering my hand, noticing my reflection in a mirror hung on the wall—and smiling at how good I look.

She takes it, says nothing. Stash starts smelling his fingers.

Smash cut and I’m back in the kitchen.

“Just get her out of there.” Price is seething. “She’s doped up watching MTV and I want to watch the goddamn MacNeil/Leh
rer
report.”

Evelyn is still opening large bottles of imported beer and absently mentions, “We’ve got to eat this stuff soon or else we’re all going to be poisoned.”

“She’s got a green streak in her hair,” I tell them. “
And
she’s smoking.”

“Bateman,” Tim says, still glaring at Evelyn.

“Yes?” I say. “Timothy?”

“You’re a dufus.”

“Oh leave Patrick alone,” Evelyn says. “He’s the boy next door. That’s Patrick. You’re not a dufus, are you, honey?” Evelyn is on Mars and I move toward the bar to make myself another drink.

“Boy next door.” Tim smirks and nods, then reverses his expression and hostilely asks Evelyn again if she has a lint brush.

Evelyn finishes opening the Japanese beer bottles and tells Courtney to fetch Stash and Vanden. “We have to eat this now or else we’re going to be poisoned,” she murmurs, slowly moving her head, taking in the kitchen, making sure she hasn’t forgotten anything.

“If I can tear them away from the latest Megadeth video,” Courtney says before exiting.

“I have to talk to you,” Evelyn says.

“What about?” I come up to her.

“No,” she says and then pointing at Tim, “to Price.”

Tim still glares at her fiercely. I say nothing and stare at Tim’s drink.

“Be a hon,” she tells me, “and place the sushi on the table. Tempura is in the microwave and the sake is just about done boiling.…” Her voice trails off as she leads Price out of the kitchen.

I am wondering where Evelyn got the sushi—the tuna, yellowtail, mackerel, shrimp, eel, even
bonito
, all seem so fresh and there are piles of wasabi and clumps of ginger placed strategically around the Wilton platter—but I also like the idea that I
don’t
know, will
never
know, will never
ask
where it came from and that the sushi will sit there in the middle of the glass table from Zona that Evelyn’s father bought her like some mysterious apparition from the Orient and as I set the platter down I catch a glimpse of my reflection on the surface of the table. My skin seems darker because of the candlelight and I notice how good the haircut I got at Gio’s last Wednesday looks. I make myself another drink. I worry about the sodium level in the soy sauce.

Four of us sit around the table waiting for Evelyn and Timothy to return from getting Price a lint brush. I sit at the head taking large swallows of J&B. Vanden sits at the other end reading disinterestedly from some East Village rag called
Deception
, its glaring headline
THE DEATH OF DOWNTOWN
. Stash has pushed a chopstick into a lone piece of yellowtail that lies on the middle of his plate like some shiny impaled insect and the chopstick stands straight up. Stash occasionally moves the piece of sushi around the plate with the chopstick but never looks up toward either myself or Vanden or Courtney, who sits next to me sipping plum wine from a champagne glass.

Evelyn and Timothy come back perhaps twenty minutes after we’ve seated ourselves and Evelyn looks only slightly flushed. Tim glares at me as he takes the seat next to mine, a fresh drink in hand, and he leans over toward me, about to say, to admit something, when suddenly Evelyn interrupts, “Not there, Timothy,” then, barely a whisper, “Boy girl, boy girl.” She gestures toward the empty chair next to Vanden. Timothy shifts his glare to Evelyn and hesitantly takes the seat next to Vanden, who yawns and turns a page of her magazine.

“Well, everybody,” Evelyn says, smiling, pleased with the meal she has presented, “dig in,” and then after noticing the piece of sushi that Stash has pinned—he’s now bent low over the plate, whispering at it—her composure falters but she smiles bravely and chirps, “Plum wine anyone?”

No one says anything until Courtney, who is staring at Stash’s plate, lifts her glass uncertainly and says, trying to smile, “It’s … delicious, Evelyn.”

Stash doesn’t speak. Even though he is probably uncomfortable at the table with us since he looks nothing like the other men in the room—his hair isn’t slicked back, no suspenders, no horn-rimmed glasses, the clothes black and ill-fitting, no urge to light and suck on a cigar, probably unable to secure a table at Camols, his net worth a pittance—still, his behavior lacks warrant and he sits there as if hypnotized by the glistening piece of sushi and just as the table is about to finally ignore him, to look away and start eating, he sits up and loudly says, pointing an accusing finger at his plate, “It moved!”

Timothy glares at him with a contempt so total that I can’t fully equal it but I muster enough energy to come close. Vanden seems amused and so now, unfortunately, does Courtney, who I’m beginning to think finds this monkey attractive but I suppose if I were dating Luis Carruthers I might too. Evelyn laughs good-naturedly and says, “Oh Stash, you
are
a riot,” and then asks worriedly, “Tempura?” Evelyn is an executive at a financial services company, FYI.

“I’ll have some,” I tell her and I lift a piece of eggplant off the platter, though I won’t eat it because it’s fried.

The table begins to serve themselves, successfully ignoring Stash. I stare at Courtney as she chews and swallows.

Evelyn, in an attempt to start a conversation, says, after what seems like a long, thoughtful silence, “Vanden goes to Camden.”

“Oh really?” Timothy asks icily. “Where is that?”

“Vermont,” Vanden answers without looking up from her paper.