The Juliette Society(47)

I don’t believe in fairy tales anymore. I know better than that.

Happy endings are shit for the birds.

And the dream?

I’m living it now.

I know that.

The end remains unwritten.





15




Everyone’s been in a situation like this.

You’re at a party.

You’re just standing there – or sitting – minding your own business, taking in the scene. Or maybe hanging out with a friend, talking about dumb stuff that only you and her know or care about, laughing at your own private jokes. And, out of nowhere, this guy approaches you.

You don’t know who he is, neither does your friend. You don’t even remember seeing him before. But it’s possible you might have caught a glimpse of him when you first arrived and thought nothing of it. You might have even smiled in his direction. Not really meaning to. And he misread it as a signal, took it as his cue.

Now he’s right there, standing in front of you. He says, ‘hi’ and introduces himself, because to him a party is where you’re supposed to meet people. And he’s decided he wants to meet you. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you want to meet him. In fact, thirty seconds in his company is more than enough to make up your mind that you don’t. You’ve only just become acquainted on a first-name basis, but you already know everything and anything you could ever want or need to know about this man. And you’re already trying to work out how to get away.

This is that party.

Dickie is that guy.

Dickie works in concrete. Ready-mixed. He’s been in construction and aggregates all his working life. He’s the Chairman and CEO of one of the world’s biggest building material supply companies. Concrete is his life and he is so very passionate about the subject. He’s trying to convince me that the first recorded uses of cement are as important to world history as the discovery of fire. That his métier in life is as significant to the cultural development of humanity as archeology, medicine and philosophy combined.

But he’s no Mother Teresa. Dickie has offices in every conflict zone around the globe. He’s making enough concrete to rebuild countries faster than they can be destroyed. ‘War is big business,’ he tells me.

Anna is talking to Dickie’s pal, Freddie, a hedge fund manager. She’s all giggly and she looks like she’s enjoying herself. Dickie might be filthy rich but his conversation skills are as dry as the business he’s in. Dickie is boring the pants off me.

If I was wearing any pants, that is. If I was, Dickie would have bored them off me by now.

But I’m not.

This is what I’m wearing: a black floral lace band that covers my eyes, white knee-high stockings, red slingback stiletto pumps and, wrapped around me like a blanket, a floor-length cape – ruby red to match my favorite lipstick. This time I’m not wearing my underwear.

Anna is wearing a filigree metal mask shaped like a butterfly and an emerald green cape that she’s draped around her curves like a fur. Together, we look like two phases of a traffic signal.

The masks and capes are part of the door policy for this little soiree. Not leather and denim. Masked and anonymous. Because this is a themed sex party. An Eyes Wide Shut party.

This is worlds away from the Fuck Factory. This place is different. It’s exclusive and elite.

I wonder what Kubrick would make of this. Stanley, not Larry. He crafted a meticulous fable about the intersection between sex, wealth, power and privilege, his last masterwork, the longest single shoot in film history, a movie like every movie he made, where every detail, every nuance of its construction and staging is there for a specific reason. A movie that he put so much passion and work into that it killed him and he never got to see how it was received.

Which is probably for the best. Because the one thing Stanley Kubrick probably did not foresee is that the very people he made the movie about would take the story literally. The conspicuously wealthy few whose power and privilege gives them free reign to live by their own social, moral and sexual code, one that just doesn’t apply to the rest of us; who think decadence is something you can buy with the flash of a credit card, or pick up in a showroom, would mistake it for little more than an elaborate commercial for a high end swingers club, little more than an excuse for a place like this.

We’re in the living room of a large, tastefully decorated private house filled with antique furniture and reproductions of fine art. It’s somewhere in the country. Exactly where, I don’t know, and neither does Anna, because we were driven up in a car service arranged by Bundy and we both dropped off on the way up, rocked to sleep by the sound of the engine, the trail of blinking tail lights ahead of us, and the gentle motion of the car as it swung around the curves of winding country roads once we left the city. And the next thing I knew, Anna was touching my shoulder and shaking me gently, saying, ‘Catherine… Catherine… wake up. We’re here.’