Gotham (6 page)

She sets the tray on the counter next to the yoghurt and starts pouring. The three of us follow dumbly, Na
ti working his way down from punchiness, Smokey going for the safety of silence, me processing and so far coming up short. There are agendas here, and I don't know them yet.

‘This is good,' Na
ti says, sipping from the first glass poured. ‘You know I like this shit.'

‘I do,' she says, rather than ‘yes'. Na
ti Boi would say ‘I do', as would Smokey, but it's not mimicry. It's the chess game these celeb shopping sprees must become when they hit a snag, and unanticipated prickliness.

When I reach for my glass, I notice Na
ti's credit card is next to it on the counter. Smokey has put it down to keep his phone in one hand and glass in the other. It's a simple card, blue rather than gold or platinum, the kind anyone might have.

‘So, your credit card's still in L L Luttrell?' My recorder's still humming in my hand.

‘Yeah.' There's a tone to it that's bordering on surly—I've seen something that wasn't my business, I've put into play a name that he's outgrown. Then he changes his mind and smiles. ‘I ain't done the paperwork yet. I been
busy. There's forms and shit. Smokey can fill them in for me, or Aaron, but I got to sign.' His free hand does a squiggle in the air. ‘That's prolly the limit thing, too. I could get a different card with a concierge and shit, but I got to slow down enough to sign the form one day.' He nods. He likes the sound of what he's said. It might even be true. ‘One of those black cards'd be nice. Amex Centurion, like the King of Monaco. They ain't even shiny. That'd be cool.'

He is picturing a deluxe life, private jets, a card with powers as strong and mysterious as the Matrix. I read an article on black credit cards and Prince Albert once, and my guess is the card's about half as good as Na
ti's imagining. That's still a deluxe life though.

‘Or you could do what Martin Sheen does. He works as Martin Sheen but he still lives as Ramon Estevez. Passport, credit cards, all that.'

‘Yeah?' He takes another sip of his drink.
The light green foam touches his thread of moustache and he licks his lip. ‘He could get his ass kicked back to Mexico with shit like that.'

Smokey lifts a finger from his glass to catch Na
ti's attention. ‘I'll show you something later, LyDell. Some of Martin Sheen's work.'

‘I'll take a look at his shit now if they got it in Bloomingdale's,' Na
ti says with an expansive gesture that forgets the credit card, says all this is his.

At the other counter, Andie coughs, but it starts as a laugh that escapes before she can catch it. Na
ti glares at her. She reaches into one of his Big Brown Bags, intently rearranging the folded garments. She presses her mouth to her sleeve and gives another small cough, no hint of anything else to it this time.

‘Prolly shit anyway,' Na
ti says. ‘Martin Sheen. There's a lot of shit in here. Too many old Italian faggots gettin' it all wrong this
season. Not just them. Anita Clark. I was very disappointed there. I didn't say that at the time.'

It's a monologue. We're not expected to buy in. Somewhere among the discard piles on the furniture around us is the work of Anita Clark, rejected before I arrived.

‘Sold too much shit to the Obamas,' he says. ‘That's what it is. I know where she was from, but she done lost it now, what she had. She all dried up inside. She all Hamptons now. Next year she'll do goddamn boat shoes. She whiter than Ralph Lauren now.'

‘This drink is good, LyDell,' Smokey says, tapping a fingernail against his glass. ‘We could sit and enjoy our drinks while we wait for Aaron.'

Na
ti brings the glare up again, but stays silent as he works it through.

‘I'm gonna sit when I want to sit,' is what he decides to say. He drinks another mouthful. ‘But
this is good, yeah. You did good with this…' He takes a look—it's not as sly as it's supposed to be—at her name tag. ‘Eloise. Some people go to town with the kale.'

She almost says something, but sticks with smiling and nodding. It's the first part of a silence that builds to awkwardness. Na
ti sips his drink again.