Let me tell you a little something about Jellwagger. He really didn’t want to have his cock blown to smithereens. Now that may sound obvious, right? Even if you’re of the female persuasion, surely you can at least semi-relate to how he was feeling as this gargantuan weirdo rammed his precious .38 into Jellwagger’s spine. Like the asshole had whispered, the .38’s slight downward angle guaranteed that one trigger pull would send iron and hell-fire through Jellwagger’s torso and out of his pussy-deprived pee-pee. Therein lies the whole tragedy of the scenario. Not just that his genitalia—hell, the whole crotch region in general—would blast open into a pit of powder-burned blood and shredded cartilage, but that he’d lose his manhood before he’d effectively become a man. Yeah, I know the dude’s thirty-one, but when you’re a guy, you’re never really considered a man until you have sex. Jellwagger had never had sex in his life. Yes, you read that right. He’s all of nine years away from becoming a real-life honest-to-God forty-year-old virgin. In a way, being a real-life thirty-one-year-old virgin felt more shameful than being a made-up forty-year-old virgin like Steve Carrell’s character. At least that guy had a ton of excuses. Firstly, he was a made-up guy. He wasn’t even real, so who cares about his problems? Secondly, even if he was real, dude had a ton of excuses, like all those action figures he had. Remember how he actually had the figure for the Six Million Dollar Man’s boss? I mean, hell. Forget all those other figures. Just owning the action figure for the Six Million Dollar Man’s boss will repel every female on the planet.
Jellwagger didn’t have that excuse. He hadn’t collected action figures in twenty years. So how, you simply must be asking, could he have survived in the world’s Second Sin City that is Los Angeles and not have mated with at least one female? This is a great question, so great that Jellwagger would have probably been at a loss for words had you the privilege of asking him directly. The most he could’ve probably come up with was that he’d been too dedicated to Exit the Danish, his action adventure screenplay about a lone hero, who could only be played by Bruce Willis, traveling to Greenland to liberate the Inuit from Danish colonial rule. He’d started the first draft during his senior year in college eleven years ago and had been noodling it to death ever since. Other than that, he just didn’t go out that much. He wasn’t much of a party guy, that Jellwagger. Hence his near paralysis when he came solo to the Napa Valley Grille in Westwood Village to have a few drinks while girding himself to hit on a woman a million light years out of his league. Simply put, he’d never done anything like this before. It just wasn’t in his nature to get drunk at a bar and hit on women. The thing about Jellwagger, right? He took rejection hard. I mean real hard, the way a window takes a wrecking ball, but harder. Now take that, and compound it with a guy coming up behind him, jabbing a pistol into his spinal column, and saying that one false move on poor ol’ Jellwagger’s part would mean he would exit the world the way he’d entered it: a virgin. Bottom line? This wasn’t a very auspicious start to finding a girlfriend.
As it turned out, though, all Jellwagger had to do was listen to the gun guy and he wouldn’t get hurt. The gun guy kept one hand clasped on Jellwagger’s shoulder with no more than an inch separating them. The hulk stood at an angle with his back facing the people sitting by the front window so that no one could see the gun. To them, it just looked like some very well-dressed colossus had come up to the shabbily dressed loner to pat him on the back and have a good time while guiding him down the bar to the hot redhead and the barely legal blonde. Within five minutes, Jellwagger and Carla Houde were sitting across from each other at a small table in the dining room while the gun guy and blonde sat a few tables away.
Right away Jellwagger became furious with Carla. He didn’t show it or anything. Working at a law firm for four years had made Jellwagger the world’s primo expert at internalizing his emotions, especially the negative ones. This was especially important during occasions, like this one, that he didn’t want to sabotage. What pissed him off, though, was how Carla was such a show-off when she ordered her wine and starter course. Unbelievable. You should have seen how she was asking about their wine list and if they could recommend a region or a color for vegetable soup and then for the baby pizza appetizer. Oh, and which one would go well with the lamb? And on and on. For a second Jellwagger thought he’d throw up the two pints of Blue Moon he’d thrown down too fast while waiting for the carrot top. Speaking of Blue Moon, that’s what he ordered. He hated switching beers mid stream because it messed with the aftertaste of the first beer as well as the taste of the new one. As for food, he didn’t care. The baby pizza sounded good. He’d loved pizza since birth. For the main course, they had something that sounded like steak. When he asked the cute waitress to be sure, Carla said: “Order whatever you want. It’s on me.”
“I wasn’t worried,” he said.
“Spoken like a true stalker,” Carla said under her breath but still within Jellwagger’s hearing range.
Jellwagger looked at the waitress to see if she’d heard. If she had, she didn’t show it. He ordered the steak with the fancy French name. “I heard what you said,” he said to Carla after the waitress brought him his third Blue Moon.
She sipped her fancy wine before saying, “I’m sorry about Neckman.”
“’The fuck is Neckman?”
She took another sip before nodding in Andre the Giant’s direction. Jellwagger couldn’t help laughing.
“Dude’s name is Neckman?” He laughed some more before saying, “Is that his first name or his last name for Christ’s sake?”
“Dunno.”
“You never asked him?”
“He doesn’t know either.”
“What kind of asshole doesn’t even know if the name people are calling him is his first name or his last name. Jesus!”
“Look who’s talking, Michael Johnson Jellwag.” Carla took a sip of her wine, paused, and then snorted it through her nose as she broke down in hysterics. She laughed for a minute solid while her face turned redder than her hair. Finally she calmed down and coughed for a bit. Then she broke down again. Jellwagger was getting pissed, and not even four years of working in a law firm could help him internalize his emotions this time. “Oh calm your skinny ass down, bitch. I’ll bet you get a lot of people laughing at your name. Who’s ever heard of Jellwag? It almost sounds like it should be Jellwagger.” She smiled and wrinkled her little pointy nose, which Jellwagger would have considered cute in other circumstances. Right now? He just wanted to cut that frickin’ thing off and feed it to her. “Seriously. Jellwagger. That’s a cute name. It sounds like you’re saying whacker. That’s what you do a lot, I bet. Whack off. Someone as lonely as you, I can only imagine.” She munched on her baby pizza. Jellwagger looked down at his own pizza and couldn’t stand the sight of it. He wanted to pick up that entire little pie and smack Carla in the face with it. She reached across and slapped his arm. “Bitch, would you calm down? I’m just having fun with you. I think I’ve earned it after being stalked by your desperate ass for a week.”
“I’m not a stalker.” Jellwagger’s eyes were stinging with water. God damn it, of all the times to cry, it had to be in front of a gorgeous madam. He took a big gulp of his Blue Moon, which helped calm his nerves, as did Carla reaching over again to pat him on the arm.
“Damn, bitch,” she said. “Relax. I’m not going to turn you into the cops. You think I want to get in trouble?”
“I’m not a stalker,” he said. He turned to see if Neckman had seen him crying. The brute was engaged in a conversation with the blonde. “I just… I was going to see if you wanted to go out with me.” There! Thank God he got it out! No matter how she answered, Jellwagger already felt a million pounds lighter.
“Obviously the answer is no,” she said with that same smile.
“And for your information, you’re not exactly original. People have been calling me Jellwagger forever.” He felt sick.
“Jellwagger… Can I call you Jellwagger since everyone else does? You’ve been stalking me. You might have another word for it, but the rest of humanity calls it stalking. How did you think I’d answer? If you’re trying to find a date, surely there’ve gotta be better ways. I mean God damn.” She thought for a moment. “Have you ever tried speed dating?”
“Don’t get me started.” He took another gulp. “Why did you say you’d get in trouble with the cops?”
She refilled her glass. “Let’s just say L.A.’s finest would be less than thrilled with my line of work.”
“And what sort of…?” Jellwagger’s Blue Moon was halfway to his mouth. He put it down and turned to look at the blonde. Then his head snapped back around to Carla Houde. “No fucking way. You’re a...”
“Guess again, bitch.”
“Then what? What’s the big deal?”
“Let’s just say you were right about Stefania. And you were warm with me, but I’m on a different side of the money, if you catch my drift.”
“No fucking way. That. Is hot.”
“I’m not a customer, weirdo. I’m the one who collects, if you catch my meaning.”
“So you’re a madam.” She sipped her wine. “You’re a madam. Why can’t you just say madam? Why do women always do that? Play mind games with you and shit. You could’ve just said you were a madam or that you ran a whorehouse or whatever, but no. All this frickin’ innuendo and shit.”
“Keep your voice down. And I would prefer it if you didn’t refer to my girls as whores. They’re escorts. And yes, lots of times that’s all they really are. If the client wants more than a date, then I leave it up to my girls to make that decision. But they are under no obligation to, and if they say yes, the client will have to pay more. Do you understand me, Jellwagger?”
“You sound like you’re pitching your services to me. I don’t want a whore. I want my first time to be with someone I respect.”
Carla’s wine didn’t come out of her nose this time, but her laugh carried throughout the whole joint. Jellwagger checked to see if Neckman was watching. He wasn’t, but Stefania was. And she was smiling. “I knew you were a virgin. God, I can spot you bitches from a million miles away.”
The waitress came back over, collected their starter plates, announced that their main courses would be out shortly, and asked if there was anything else they needed. Jellwagger ordered another Blue Moon. He watched the waitress walk away, stared at her gorgeous little ass for a few seconds longer than he would’ve had the gall to sober, then whipped his glare back around to Carla. “Why the fuck am I here? You accuse me of stalking, but you won’t turn me in because that would mess up your stupid company or whatever.”
“Did my getting here earlier than normal surprise you?”
“Who cares?”
“I knew you were expecting me at eight o’clock or later. I had to throw you off your game. Then you could sit there on your stupid bitch ass and be really obvious staring at me and wonder why I came so early considering I only live a couple minutes away. That made it easier for Neckman to threaten your dick with extinction.” She giggled into her wine glass.
“Fuckin’ A,” Jellwagger said. “You’re tanked off your ass. Why am I frickin’ here?”
“Oh boo hoo, poor you,” she said. “And I’m not drunk.” She picked up the wine bottle to refill her glass, but only a few drops trickled out. “Oh shit, no!” The waitress came over with their entrees.
“And is there anything else you need?” the waitress asked.
“Another bottle of this, stat,” Carla said.
“And another Blue Moon for you, sir?” The waitress nodded at Jellwagger’s glass, which was still over half full with the foamy stuff.
“Smart-ass,” he said to the waitress without looking at her. This time he only stared at her ass peripherally. Carla smiled, tried to contain her giggle, but failed. “Oh what the fuck now?”
“Don’t even pretend you aren’t checking her out, bitch.” She took a deep breath. “Okay listen.” She breathed some more and folded her hands on the table. “Listen, Jellwagger. Are you listening? We need to get down to business. I have a proposition for you.” The waitress came back over with another bottle. Carla waited for her to go away before saying: “I want you to work for me.”
“I’ve already gotta job. Next!”
“Shut the fuck up. You’re not listening. You can keep that wonderful job doing data entry and still work for me. The hours are very flexible.”
“How do you even know what I do to begin with? What do you know about data entry?”
“Nothing, and I don’t want to. When you were stalking me, you made the stupid-ass mistake of driving, like, thirty inches behind my car. Dude, I could see your license plate in the rearview mirror. So I told Neckman to look up your car for me. That’s how I got your name. And then I used that to find out everything about you. I may not get along with the cops, but I’ve still got connections where it counts. At least enough connections to write a bio about your dumb bitch ass.” She cleared her throat and stared at her hands. “And I know your dad died not all that long ago. I’m sorry about that.” Neither of them said anything for a moment. A group of thirtysomething women at a nearby table blew up with laughter. “How did he die?”
“What do you frickin’ care?”
“I’m only a year older than you. And my dad’s still alive. If he were to die now, it would really fucking suck. So I can’t imagine what you went through.”
“What do you--?”
“Spy on my ex-husband.”
He looked up at her and took a long pull from his Blue Moon.
“There, I said it. Just spy on him, would you? That’s it. It’s easy.”
“Why not get Neck-fuck over there to do it?”
“Patrick knows him.”
“His name’s Patrick, for Christ’s sake?”
“Patrick Dinner.”
“Oh my God! His last name’s Dinner?”
“First of all, you must know his name if you were snooping around your firm’s files looking up information about me. And secondly, who? The fuck? Are you? To make fun of someone else’s last name?”
“So what do I do?”
“Just follow him like you followed me. And here’s a free tip, okay? From me to you. When you’re following him in your car, consider a wide berth so it isn’t. So fucking. Obvious!” She refilled her glass. “I want you to start tomorrow.”
“And why am I doing this?”
“Just start tomorrow. I’ll give you the information you need, including his home address. I think I should know where he lives. It used to be my house, the fuck.”
“So this is just some revenge thing?”
“No, cock sucker. It’s not some revenge thing. I want to see where he spends his nights. I want to see where he goes, who he sees. You will tell me all of these things. What kind of cell phone do you have? Does it have a camera?”
“How the hell would I know?”
“I’ll pay for a new phone for you. I want you to have a camera. Take pictures. You read me, Jellwagger? Start tomorrow as soon as you’re off work. It goes without saying that I’ll pay you. How does all this sound? Oh my God, this is getting cold. Let’s eat.” They both dug into their entrees, but Jellwagger didn’t care how cold his was. All he wanted right now was the comfort of his well-worn olive-green couch and a good early nineties Bruce Willis flick, like that one with Sarah Jessica Parker that took place in Pittsburgh. When they finished their dinner, and Carla was sipping a cappuccino while Jellwagger nursed his ninety billionth Blue Moon, she said: “I’ll pay you fifty bucks an hour. Sound too good to be true? That’s because it is. For the first twenty hours, I’m not paying you jack shit. That’s a thousand bucks of free work you’re going to do for me. You read me, Jellwagger? A thousand God damned dollars. And another thing: I want you to fuck Stefania. Tonight.” She looked him dead in the eyes and didn’t crack a hint of a smile. “I’ll be God damned if I have a virgin in my employ.” She slurped her cappuccino foam. “You read me, skinny bitch?”
Jellwagger was at a loss for words for the rest of the night. I’m not kidding. He nursed his Blue Moon but couldn’t empty more than half the glass because he was so God damned full. Carla, meanwhile, sipped her precious cappuccino and smiled at all the happy couples and coworkers peopling the rest of the dining room, including a couple sitting at Neckman and Stefania’s table. Jellwagger looked around and spotted the two smoking outside. They must have known this dinner was about to wrap because Carla picked up her tiny expensive black purse, whipped out her plastic, and used it to flag down the waitress. She smiled at him. “Aren’t you going to thank me?”
Deep down Jellwagger knew he should have been grateful. The tab easily had to have been two hundred bucks, probably more courtesy of that second bottle of red. But like I said, he didn’t say anything for the rest of the night. This included when Carla led him outside and told him Stefania would be driving home with him. “The least I can do is let you be deflowered in your own bed,” Carla said to Jellwagger as she and Neckman walked to her car.
The drive back into the Valley on the 405 was tortuous beyond words. A Mazda that looked kind of like Jellwagger’s had stalled in the center lane up near the Mulholland Drive exit, which meant that no sooner did Jellwagger pull onto the freeway than he found himself in the single largest parking lot mankind has ever known, winding its way up through the Sepulveda Pass like a colossal metal constipated serpent. At first Jellwagger tried killing the silence with NPR but quickly changed it when the talk turned to mothers who kill their children. Eventually he found his way to his trusty last resort: classical music. Mozart’s Requiem was playing. Perfect.
Two hours later, they reached Jellwagger’s apartment in Van Nuys. When they walked in, Jellwagger’s beagle and most loyal compatriot, Chump E. Chips, didn’t even budge from his curled position in the corner of the olive green and white sofa. You’d’ve thought he saw Stefania all the time.
I won’t go into the sex because, quite frankly, there wasn’t much to talk about. Stefania told him to strip while she stripped herself, they got into bed, and Jellwagger lay on his back while the blonde, ten years his junior but a million years older in experience, straddled him. He came in about ten seconds.
No sooner did Stefania climb off him and start getting dressed than Carla and Neckman walked into the bedroom. Jellwagger shot up. He really wanted to say something like “What the fuck!” or “Judas H. Priest on a Popsicle stick!” You know, anything to voice his outrage. Reading Chump the riot act would’ve been more than appropriate as well. Did it not occur to that little brown- and white-patched bastard that Jellwagger may not have wanted these three total strangers in the place? So much for the whole loyal compatriot thing. But again, like I said, voicing anything was out of the question, as he wouldn’t find the power of speech until the following morning. Carla and Neckman obviously knew that because they never addressed him.
“What the fuck took you?” Carla asked Stefania.
“Traffic was a bitch.”
“He’s wondering how we got here so fast,” Neckman said to Carla while smiling at Jellwagger.
“Helicopter!” Carla shouted as if Jellwagger’s orgasm had made him deaf and dumb. “Yes, I own one. We landed at Van Nuys Airport and took a cab.”
“Speaking of which, the meter’s running,” Neckman said. “If I’m going to do this…”
“Let him put something on first,” Carla said. “No man, no matter how much of a bitch he is, should get his ass kicked in the nude. Slap on those tidy whities, Jellwagger, so Neckman can teach you a lesson. And not the face, okay, Neckman? I don’t want him spying on Pale Cock looking all fucked up. Just bruise the ribs a bit.” Neckman took off his sports coat and rolled up his sleeves. “Neckman’s going to kick your ass now, okay Jellwagger?” Carla yelled. “But don’t worry, he won’t do anything permanent! Now hurry the hell up and put something on!”
Jellwagger took an extra second or two putting his underwear on, trying desperately to think of something to say to stop this nonsense. What would Bruce Willis do? It didn’t matter. He just barely got his underwear on but didn’t have time to let go of the waistband before Neckman punched him in the ribs several times. Jellwagger bent over, dropped, and curled up, getting the closest view of his brown shag carpet he’d ever had. He couldn’t breathe and figured this view was going to be his last, an incredibly depressing thought that brought tears to his eyes.
To be continued...
Jellwagger didn’t have that excuse. He hadn’t collected action figures in twenty years. So how, you simply must be asking, could he have survived in the world’s Second Sin City that is Los Angeles and not have mated with at least one female? This is a great question, so great that Jellwagger would have probably been at a loss for words had you the privilege of asking him directly. The most he could’ve probably come up with was that he’d been too dedicated to Exit the Danish, his action adventure screenplay about a lone hero, who could only be played by Bruce Willis, traveling to Greenland to liberate the Inuit from Danish colonial rule. He’d started the first draft during his senior year in college eleven years ago and had been noodling it to death ever since. Other than that, he just didn’t go out that much. He wasn’t much of a party guy, that Jellwagger. Hence his near paralysis when he came solo to the Napa Valley Grille in Westwood Village to have a few drinks while girding himself to hit on a woman a million light years out of his league. Simply put, he’d never done anything like this before. It just wasn’t in his nature to get drunk at a bar and hit on women. The thing about Jellwagger, right? He took rejection hard. I mean real hard, the way a window takes a wrecking ball, but harder. Now take that, and compound it with a guy coming up behind him, jabbing a pistol into his spinal column, and saying that one false move on poor ol’ Jellwagger’s part would mean he would exit the world the way he’d entered it: a virgin. Bottom line? This wasn’t a very auspicious start to finding a girlfriend.
As it turned out, though, all Jellwagger had to do was listen to the gun guy and he wouldn’t get hurt. The gun guy kept one hand clasped on Jellwagger’s shoulder with no more than an inch separating them. The hulk stood at an angle with his back facing the people sitting by the front window so that no one could see the gun. To them, it just looked like some very well-dressed colossus had come up to the shabbily dressed loner to pat him on the back and have a good time while guiding him down the bar to the hot redhead and the barely legal blonde. Within five minutes, Jellwagger and Carla Houde were sitting across from each other at a small table in the dining room while the gun guy and blonde sat a few tables away.
Right away Jellwagger became furious with Carla. He didn’t show it or anything. Working at a law firm for four years had made Jellwagger the world’s primo expert at internalizing his emotions, especially the negative ones. This was especially important during occasions, like this one, that he didn’t want to sabotage. What pissed him off, though, was how Carla was such a show-off when she ordered her wine and starter course. Unbelievable. You should have seen how she was asking about their wine list and if they could recommend a region or a color for vegetable soup and then for the baby pizza appetizer. Oh, and which one would go well with the lamb? And on and on. For a second Jellwagger thought he’d throw up the two pints of Blue Moon he’d thrown down too fast while waiting for the carrot top. Speaking of Blue Moon, that’s what he ordered. He hated switching beers mid stream because it messed with the aftertaste of the first beer as well as the taste of the new one. As for food, he didn’t care. The baby pizza sounded good. He’d loved pizza since birth. For the main course, they had something that sounded like steak. When he asked the cute waitress to be sure, Carla said: “Order whatever you want. It’s on me.”
“I wasn’t worried,” he said.
“Spoken like a true stalker,” Carla said under her breath but still within Jellwagger’s hearing range.
Jellwagger looked at the waitress to see if she’d heard. If she had, she didn’t show it. He ordered the steak with the fancy French name. “I heard what you said,” he said to Carla after the waitress brought him his third Blue Moon.
She sipped her fancy wine before saying, “I’m sorry about Neckman.”
“’The fuck is Neckman?”
She took another sip before nodding in Andre the Giant’s direction. Jellwagger couldn’t help laughing.
“Dude’s name is Neckman?” He laughed some more before saying, “Is that his first name or his last name for Christ’s sake?”
“Dunno.”
“You never asked him?”
“He doesn’t know either.”
“What kind of asshole doesn’t even know if the name people are calling him is his first name or his last name. Jesus!”
“Look who’s talking, Michael Johnson Jellwag.” Carla took a sip of her wine, paused, and then snorted it through her nose as she broke down in hysterics. She laughed for a minute solid while her face turned redder than her hair. Finally she calmed down and coughed for a bit. Then she broke down again. Jellwagger was getting pissed, and not even four years of working in a law firm could help him internalize his emotions this time. “Oh calm your skinny ass down, bitch. I’ll bet you get a lot of people laughing at your name. Who’s ever heard of Jellwag? It almost sounds like it should be Jellwagger.” She smiled and wrinkled her little pointy nose, which Jellwagger would have considered cute in other circumstances. Right now? He just wanted to cut that frickin’ thing off and feed it to her. “Seriously. Jellwagger. That’s a cute name. It sounds like you’re saying whacker. That’s what you do a lot, I bet. Whack off. Someone as lonely as you, I can only imagine.” She munched on her baby pizza. Jellwagger looked down at his own pizza and couldn’t stand the sight of it. He wanted to pick up that entire little pie and smack Carla in the face with it. She reached across and slapped his arm. “Bitch, would you calm down? I’m just having fun with you. I think I’ve earned it after being stalked by your desperate ass for a week.”
“I’m not a stalker.” Jellwagger’s eyes were stinging with water. God damn it, of all the times to cry, it had to be in front of a gorgeous madam. He took a big gulp of his Blue Moon, which helped calm his nerves, as did Carla reaching over again to pat him on the arm.
“Damn, bitch,” she said. “Relax. I’m not going to turn you into the cops. You think I want to get in trouble?”
“I’m not a stalker,” he said. He turned to see if Neckman had seen him crying. The brute was engaged in a conversation with the blonde. “I just… I was going to see if you wanted to go out with me.” There! Thank God he got it out! No matter how she answered, Jellwagger already felt a million pounds lighter.
“Obviously the answer is no,” she said with that same smile.
“And for your information, you’re not exactly original. People have been calling me Jellwagger forever.” He felt sick.
“Jellwagger… Can I call you Jellwagger since everyone else does? You’ve been stalking me. You might have another word for it, but the rest of humanity calls it stalking. How did you think I’d answer? If you’re trying to find a date, surely there’ve gotta be better ways. I mean God damn.” She thought for a moment. “Have you ever tried speed dating?”
“Don’t get me started.” He took another gulp. “Why did you say you’d get in trouble with the cops?”
She refilled her glass. “Let’s just say L.A.’s finest would be less than thrilled with my line of work.”
“And what sort of…?” Jellwagger’s Blue Moon was halfway to his mouth. He put it down and turned to look at the blonde. Then his head snapped back around to Carla Houde. “No fucking way. You’re a...”
“Guess again, bitch.”
“Then what? What’s the big deal?”
“Let’s just say you were right about Stefania. And you were warm with me, but I’m on a different side of the money, if you catch my drift.”
“No fucking way. That. Is hot.”
“I’m not a customer, weirdo. I’m the one who collects, if you catch my meaning.”
“So you’re a madam.” She sipped her wine. “You’re a madam. Why can’t you just say madam? Why do women always do that? Play mind games with you and shit. You could’ve just said you were a madam or that you ran a whorehouse or whatever, but no. All this frickin’ innuendo and shit.”
“Keep your voice down. And I would prefer it if you didn’t refer to my girls as whores. They’re escorts. And yes, lots of times that’s all they really are. If the client wants more than a date, then I leave it up to my girls to make that decision. But they are under no obligation to, and if they say yes, the client will have to pay more. Do you understand me, Jellwagger?”
“You sound like you’re pitching your services to me. I don’t want a whore. I want my first time to be with someone I respect.”
Carla’s wine didn’t come out of her nose this time, but her laugh carried throughout the whole joint. Jellwagger checked to see if Neckman was watching. He wasn’t, but Stefania was. And she was smiling. “I knew you were a virgin. God, I can spot you bitches from a million miles away.”
The waitress came back over, collected their starter plates, announced that their main courses would be out shortly, and asked if there was anything else they needed. Jellwagger ordered another Blue Moon. He watched the waitress walk away, stared at her gorgeous little ass for a few seconds longer than he would’ve had the gall to sober, then whipped his glare back around to Carla. “Why the fuck am I here? You accuse me of stalking, but you won’t turn me in because that would mess up your stupid company or whatever.”
“Did my getting here earlier than normal surprise you?”
“Who cares?”
“I knew you were expecting me at eight o’clock or later. I had to throw you off your game. Then you could sit there on your stupid bitch ass and be really obvious staring at me and wonder why I came so early considering I only live a couple minutes away. That made it easier for Neckman to threaten your dick with extinction.” She giggled into her wine glass.
“Fuckin’ A,” Jellwagger said. “You’re tanked off your ass. Why am I frickin’ here?”
“Oh boo hoo, poor you,” she said. “And I’m not drunk.” She picked up the wine bottle to refill her glass, but only a few drops trickled out. “Oh shit, no!” The waitress came over with their entrees.
“And is there anything else you need?” the waitress asked.
“Another bottle of this, stat,” Carla said.
“And another Blue Moon for you, sir?” The waitress nodded at Jellwagger’s glass, which was still over half full with the foamy stuff.
“Smart-ass,” he said to the waitress without looking at her. This time he only stared at her ass peripherally. Carla smiled, tried to contain her giggle, but failed. “Oh what the fuck now?”
“Don’t even pretend you aren’t checking her out, bitch.” She took a deep breath. “Okay listen.” She breathed some more and folded her hands on the table. “Listen, Jellwagger. Are you listening? We need to get down to business. I have a proposition for you.” The waitress came back over with another bottle. Carla waited for her to go away before saying: “I want you to work for me.”
“I’ve already gotta job. Next!”
“Shut the fuck up. You’re not listening. You can keep that wonderful job doing data entry and still work for me. The hours are very flexible.”
“How do you even know what I do to begin with? What do you know about data entry?”
“Nothing, and I don’t want to. When you were stalking me, you made the stupid-ass mistake of driving, like, thirty inches behind my car. Dude, I could see your license plate in the rearview mirror. So I told Neckman to look up your car for me. That’s how I got your name. And then I used that to find out everything about you. I may not get along with the cops, but I’ve still got connections where it counts. At least enough connections to write a bio about your dumb bitch ass.” She cleared her throat and stared at her hands. “And I know your dad died not all that long ago. I’m sorry about that.” Neither of them said anything for a moment. A group of thirtysomething women at a nearby table blew up with laughter. “How did he die?”
“What do you frickin’ care?”
“I’m only a year older than you. And my dad’s still alive. If he were to die now, it would really fucking suck. So I can’t imagine what you went through.”
“What do you--?”
“Spy on my ex-husband.”
He looked up at her and took a long pull from his Blue Moon.
“There, I said it. Just spy on him, would you? That’s it. It’s easy.”
“Why not get Neck-fuck over there to do it?”
“Patrick knows him.”
“His name’s Patrick, for Christ’s sake?”
“Patrick Dinner.”
“Oh my God! His last name’s Dinner?”
“First of all, you must know his name if you were snooping around your firm’s files looking up information about me. And secondly, who? The fuck? Are you? To make fun of someone else’s last name?”
“So what do I do?”
“Just follow him like you followed me. And here’s a free tip, okay? From me to you. When you’re following him in your car, consider a wide berth so it isn’t. So fucking. Obvious!” She refilled her glass. “I want you to start tomorrow.”
“And why am I doing this?”
“Just start tomorrow. I’ll give you the information you need, including his home address. I think I should know where he lives. It used to be my house, the fuck.”
“So this is just some revenge thing?”
“No, cock sucker. It’s not some revenge thing. I want to see where he spends his nights. I want to see where he goes, who he sees. You will tell me all of these things. What kind of cell phone do you have? Does it have a camera?”
“How the hell would I know?”
“I’ll pay for a new phone for you. I want you to have a camera. Take pictures. You read me, Jellwagger? Start tomorrow as soon as you’re off work. It goes without saying that I’ll pay you. How does all this sound? Oh my God, this is getting cold. Let’s eat.” They both dug into their entrees, but Jellwagger didn’t care how cold his was. All he wanted right now was the comfort of his well-worn olive-green couch and a good early nineties Bruce Willis flick, like that one with Sarah Jessica Parker that took place in Pittsburgh. When they finished their dinner, and Carla was sipping a cappuccino while Jellwagger nursed his ninety billionth Blue Moon, she said: “I’ll pay you fifty bucks an hour. Sound too good to be true? That’s because it is. For the first twenty hours, I’m not paying you jack shit. That’s a thousand bucks of free work you’re going to do for me. You read me, Jellwagger? A thousand God damned dollars. And another thing: I want you to fuck Stefania. Tonight.” She looked him dead in the eyes and didn’t crack a hint of a smile. “I’ll be God damned if I have a virgin in my employ.” She slurped her cappuccino foam. “You read me, skinny bitch?”
Jellwagger was at a loss for words for the rest of the night. I’m not kidding. He nursed his Blue Moon but couldn’t empty more than half the glass because he was so God damned full. Carla, meanwhile, sipped her precious cappuccino and smiled at all the happy couples and coworkers peopling the rest of the dining room, including a couple sitting at Neckman and Stefania’s table. Jellwagger looked around and spotted the two smoking outside. They must have known this dinner was about to wrap because Carla picked up her tiny expensive black purse, whipped out her plastic, and used it to flag down the waitress. She smiled at him. “Aren’t you going to thank me?”
Deep down Jellwagger knew he should have been grateful. The tab easily had to have been two hundred bucks, probably more courtesy of that second bottle of red. But like I said, he didn’t say anything for the rest of the night. This included when Carla led him outside and told him Stefania would be driving home with him. “The least I can do is let you be deflowered in your own bed,” Carla said to Jellwagger as she and Neckman walked to her car.
The drive back into the Valley on the 405 was tortuous beyond words. A Mazda that looked kind of like Jellwagger’s had stalled in the center lane up near the Mulholland Drive exit, which meant that no sooner did Jellwagger pull onto the freeway than he found himself in the single largest parking lot mankind has ever known, winding its way up through the Sepulveda Pass like a colossal metal constipated serpent. At first Jellwagger tried killing the silence with NPR but quickly changed it when the talk turned to mothers who kill their children. Eventually he found his way to his trusty last resort: classical music. Mozart’s Requiem was playing. Perfect.
Two hours later, they reached Jellwagger’s apartment in Van Nuys. When they walked in, Jellwagger’s beagle and most loyal compatriot, Chump E. Chips, didn’t even budge from his curled position in the corner of the olive green and white sofa. You’d’ve thought he saw Stefania all the time.
I won’t go into the sex because, quite frankly, there wasn’t much to talk about. Stefania told him to strip while she stripped herself, they got into bed, and Jellwagger lay on his back while the blonde, ten years his junior but a million years older in experience, straddled him. He came in about ten seconds.
No sooner did Stefania climb off him and start getting dressed than Carla and Neckman walked into the bedroom. Jellwagger shot up. He really wanted to say something like “What the fuck!” or “Judas H. Priest on a Popsicle stick!” You know, anything to voice his outrage. Reading Chump the riot act would’ve been more than appropriate as well. Did it not occur to that little brown- and white-patched bastard that Jellwagger may not have wanted these three total strangers in the place? So much for the whole loyal compatriot thing. But again, like I said, voicing anything was out of the question, as he wouldn’t find the power of speech until the following morning. Carla and Neckman obviously knew that because they never addressed him.
“What the fuck took you?” Carla asked Stefania.
“Traffic was a bitch.”
“He’s wondering how we got here so fast,” Neckman said to Carla while smiling at Jellwagger.
“Helicopter!” Carla shouted as if Jellwagger’s orgasm had made him deaf and dumb. “Yes, I own one. We landed at Van Nuys Airport and took a cab.”
“Speaking of which, the meter’s running,” Neckman said. “If I’m going to do this…”
“Let him put something on first,” Carla said. “No man, no matter how much of a bitch he is, should get his ass kicked in the nude. Slap on those tidy whities, Jellwagger, so Neckman can teach you a lesson. And not the face, okay, Neckman? I don’t want him spying on Pale Cock looking all fucked up. Just bruise the ribs a bit.” Neckman took off his sports coat and rolled up his sleeves. “Neckman’s going to kick your ass now, okay Jellwagger?” Carla yelled. “But don’t worry, he won’t do anything permanent! Now hurry the hell up and put something on!”
Jellwagger took an extra second or two putting his underwear on, trying desperately to think of something to say to stop this nonsense. What would Bruce Willis do? It didn’t matter. He just barely got his underwear on but didn’t have time to let go of the waistband before Neckman punched him in the ribs several times. Jellwagger bent over, dropped, and curled up, getting the closest view of his brown shag carpet he’d ever had. He couldn’t breathe and figured this view was going to be his last, an incredibly depressing thought that brought tears to his eyes.
To be continued...
