Chapter 8 #3
Peter ultimately turned into a project, someone I might save, which is a terrible basis for a relationship, because I became less a lover than a caring parole officer, and he began resenting me furiously, and we broke up by “taking a breather” that resulted in no contact for a year and Peter finally transferring to a different nursing school in Barbados.
I’d romanticized our months together as passionate and anguished, but that was a stretch.
We were two mismatched people afraid of being alone, until common sense prevailed.
So I wasn’t the most experienced gay guy, and I’d certainly never sat across from someone as rich and sumptuously sexy as Luc, who was watching me clinically, as if he was about to either ravish or murder me (both of which I’d be good with, so long as things happened in that order).
I pretended not to have a clue about his family or their far-reaching investments, which Luc referred to as “the business” and “the things I’m involved in.
” We talked about the upcoming season at the Paris Opera (he was on the board) and the shows I’d recommend in New York (as I thought, I bet he won’t go to the half-price-tickets booth).
He was very well read, with favorites including French authors I’d barely heard of, but we bonded over gay writers, especially Brandon Taylor and Justin Torres, who I cherish.
Our conversation was elevated, with him touching my hand during a sidebar into Scandinavian horror movies (in which scarecrow-like cannibals dismember teenagers who’ve been trysting in fields—why do trysting teenagers never see this coming?).
This was just how I’d imagined people behaved at French cafés, although I’d visualized everyone smoking and daintily picking apart croissants with their fingertips, without leaving scattered piles of crumbs the way I did.
“I’m so sorry, but I have to get to the office,” Luc said, after over an hour.
He paid the check, and as we stood on the sidewalk he stroked my cheek, adding, “When can I see you again?” Once we’d exchanged contact information, he said, “I’m so glad we’ve met,” and he walked off purposefully, circling back a few seconds later and saying, “I forgot something,” as he put his hand on the back of my head and kissed me.
Then, without any further chitchat, as if he’d crossed off “put my tongue down the American’s throat” on his day planner, he was gone.
Back at the gym, the Tuxes were waiting in Tate’s office.
“This is unexpected but helpful,” said Reggie. “I’ve had your things moved to a hostel, so you can’t be traced to the safe house. How was the café? From the video feed Marcus hacked into, you guys looked chummy.”
“It’s so interesting that you’re his type,” said Brock. “It’s like he shops at Target.”
I’d been waiting for this wisecrack, as everyone hooted.
“For your information,” I said, “he’s already texted me about dinner tomorrow night at some place called Trouvailles.”
“Which is very major,” said Tate, “for the five people who can afford it.”
“I’m totally jealous,” said Timothy. “I brought him a towel in the locker room and he didn’t recognize me.”
“Or he was messing with you,” I speculated. “He’s very smooth.”
“Because you’re only in town for a week,” said Reggie, “you can ramp things up. The goal is for you to visit his home and, even better, his office, and plant these tiny recording devices that Dr. Huron sent over. So we can find out what he knows about the diamond—his whole family may be in on it, or maybe just his father. Get him to talk about it.”
He handed me what resembled an Altoids tin containing ten circular chips the size of Adderalls. (And no, I don’t store Adderalls in Altoids tins. Anymore.) “They’ll stick to anything, so leave them under a table or a desktop, as close to the action as you can.”
“How should I bring the whole thing up?” I worried. “Do I ask, ‘By the way, did your dad just pay hundreds of millions for an ancient diamond that might be able to alter the future? And did he also try to kill Reata Pershing?’ ”
“Perfect,” said Brock.
“We’ll claim your body at the morgue,” said Reggie.
“Are you gonna, like, fuck him?” Timothy wondered, and everyone looked at me.
“I’m an actor,” I said. “With an incredible instrument and technique. If I’m forced to, I will act sexual pleasure with a rich hot guy.”
“Pretend you’re me,” suggested Brock.
“Be careful,” said Reggie. “But follow his lead. See what happens.”
Just like in improv, where audience suggestions or another actor’s responses can cause revelations.
“You should put one of those little recording things up your butt,” said Timothy.
“So we can do a live podcast,” said Brock.
Pei-Sze and Mikaela drove me to a youth hostel in a more rundown part of the city, and handed me Dr. Huron’s backpack and yoga mat because, as Pei-Sze noted, “you’re on the clock.
” I checked in by myself and was assigned something between a cubicle and a shoebox, with enough room for a twin foam mattress atop a plywood platform.
There was a group bathroom down the hall, and everyone else was either a student with a Eurail pass, on their way to Ibiza or Slovenia or Berlin, all of whom asked if I had weed, or they were middle-aged travelers who’d quit their jobs or lost them and were seeking a spiritual rebirth until their unemployment ran out, all of whom had CBD gummies tucked into jars of memory-enhancing capsules.
My hostelmates were mostly American and overwhelmingly friendly, and I continued to pose as a hapless tourist, which I was, consulting other people’s well-thumbed guidebooks and asking the goth girl behind the check-in desk, who was the hostel’s sole employee, for directions.
The next morning a garment bag was messengered to me, with an additional large, glossy white cardboard box.
The bag sheltered by far the most expensive item of clothing I’d ever worn, a slimly tailored midnight-blue suit, and the box held a black cashmere turtleneck, swathed in tissue paper, along with shoes of an almost liquid midnight-blue suede.
There was also weightless underwear in a finely combed cotton and dark cashmere socks.
The costliest fashion, Brock had told me, can be the most ethereal, “because rich people won’t be doing manual labor.
” Everything fit perfectly, as if Luc either had a trained eye or had measured every inch of my body with a remote device.
A thick vellum card read, “See you tonight,” signed with Luc’s scripted initials.
I had a nearby stylist cut my hair, because my usual overgrowth would contradict my new outfit.
As I inspected myself in the hostel’s only full-length mirror, cheaply framed in a hallway, I had the aura of being costumed as a super-refined gigolo in a French film where at some point I’d be seen with my jacket slung over my shoulder, standing alone on a deserted beach at dawn, with a cigarette dangling from my lower lip, followed by the word “Fin.” Maybe I was being purchased, like the heroine of some softcore S he’d been seated on a tufted banquette and was just getting off his phone.
He took my face in his hands and kissed me lightly on the lips, as the ma?tre d’ held out my chair.
I was becoming the world’s most cosseted infant as hands wafted me into place, and the tall, thin tapers on the table, in sterling silver holders, were nothing like the squat, odiferous candles I foisted on customers at my day job.
“You look splendid,” Luc said, as we sat. “I hope I wasn’t being presumptuous, but I doubted you’d packed anything for an evening out.”
“Oh, was this from you?” I asked, fingering my lapel. “I thought the French tourist bureau just sends stuff to everyone.”
“I’ve been thinking about you.”
“Is that so?”
“I won’t be more specific, not just yet, but I was in the most tedious meeting, so I recalled you in that drooping little T-shirt.”
“So why was the meeting tedious? What exactly do you do for a living?”
I was going bold, hoping to steer the conversation toward the diamond.
“Really?” he said. “You’ve never heard my name? Or my family’s?”
“Remind me—do you own Luxembourg?”
I was verging on presumptuous myself, but he continued to smile.