"I really wouldn't call that flirting, baby," I tell her. "Don't get ruffled."
Lauren's nodding slowly as Damien, swigging a martini, shouts out, "Why don't you titillate me literally, baby," and the girls explode with laughter, fawning over him, and the entire room is humming around us and the lights of cameras are flashing behind every corner.
"I know you have a keen sense of the way people behave," Lauren says. "It's okay, Victor." She tosses back what's left of her jumbo-sized drink.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"About what?" she asks. "Your Bravery-in-the-Face-of-Doom nomination?"
"I'd be thrilled if you moved on to soda pop, baby."
"Do you love Chloe?" she asks.
All I can say is, "You look very Uma-ish tonight."
In the interim Damien moves over to us and Lauren lets my hand drop from hers and while I light a cigarette Alison spots Damien and excuses herself from Heather Locklear and Eddie Veder and prowls over, hyperventilating, and hooks her arm through Damien's before he can say anything to Lauren, refusing to look at me, and then she plays with his hair and in a panic Damien pushes her hand away and in the background the "cute" magician performs card tricks for James Iha, Teri Hatcher, Liv Tyler, Kelly Slater and someone dressed disconcertingly like Willie Wonka and I'm trying to be cool but my fists are totally clenched and the back of my neck and my forehead are soaked with sweat.
"Well," Damien says hollowly. "Well, well... well."
"Loved you in Bitch Troop, darling," Alison gushes at Lauren.
"Oh shit," Damien mutters under his breath.
"Nice dress," Lauren says, staring at Alison.
"What?" Alison asks, shocked.
Lauren looks directly at Alison and, enunciating very clearly, nodding appreciatively, says, "I said nice dress."
Damien holds Alison back as JD and Beau walk up to Damien and they're with some white-blond surfer wearing nylon snowboarding pants and a faux-fur motorcycle jacket.
"Hey Alison, Lauren," I say. "This is JD and Beau. They're the stars of Bill and Ted's Homosexual Adventure."
"It's, um, time for dinner," JD says tentatively, trying not to notice Alison vibrating with rage, emitting low rumbling sounds. She finally looks over at Damien's falsely placid face and sneers, dropping her cigarette into his glass. Damien makes a strangled noise, then averts his eyes from the martini.
"Um, great," Damien says. "Dinnertime. Fantastic. Here, Beau." Damien hands Beau his martini glass. While we all watch, Beau stares at it and then very carefully places the glass on a nearby table.
"Yeah, great," I say, overly enthusiastic, unable to stop staring at the cigarette floating in the martini. "Hey, who's this?" I ask, shaking the surfer's limp hand.
"This is Plez," someone says.
"Hey Plez," Damien says, glancing quickly at Alison. "How ya loin'?"
"Plez is a snowboarder," JD says.
"And he won the world half-pipe championship," Beau adds.
"And he's a messenger at UPS," JD adds.
"Cha cha cha," I say.
Conversation stops. No one moves.
"Cha... cha... cha," I say again.
"So-o-o, dude-what are you doing in Manhattan?" Damien asks Plez, glancing quickly at Lauren.
"He just returned from Spain, where he was shooting a video for Glam Hooker," Beau says, patting Plez on the head.
Plez is shrugging amiably, eyes half-closed, reeking of marijuana, nodding out.
"How brill." I'm nodding too.
"Total brill," JD says.
"Not to mention fagulous," Beau gushes.
"Totally brill and totally fagulous," JD adds.
Chloe appears and her hand's freezing as it clasps mine and looking at the floor I'm thinking my god someone will have to do a lot of vacuuming and Lauren offers Baxter a tight smile and the gravity of the situation starts to become apparent to most of us as Bridget Fonda and Gerlinda Kostiff pass by.
"Let's, er, eat." Damien claps his hands, knocking himself out of some kind of reverie, startling all of us out of our own respective silences. Alison looks so drunk and is staring at Lauren with so much hatred that the urge to sneak away is almost overwhelming.
"The way you said that was so, um... debonair," I tell Damien.
"Well, I just think we should sit down before the nonessential personnel arrive at eleven," he says, shoving Alison away from the rest of us, at the same time holding tightly on to one arm.