Page 27 of Dirty Diana
I find her asleep on top of a bed she’s made out of Barry’s duffel coat. I give her a gentle nudge. “Wake up. Guests are here. And I have weenies.”
With her eyes closed, she smiles.
—
Half an hour later, the gallery is packed with people and buzzing with conversation. “What’s that?” a young woman asks, peering indecisively at the tray I’m holding. She’s roughly my age, with long braids and wearing a silver-beaded dress that ripples over her like water.
“Cauliflower samosas lightly fried with a tamarind chutney dipping sauce.”
I recognize her from an opening I worked last spring. It was a group showing of recent Santa Fe Art Institute grads. Her pieces were all stunning, elegant cameos made from intricately cut paper. “I love your work,” I say, offering her a cocktail napkin.
“Thank you.” She takes a delicate bite. “I’m just glad it’s not my stuff tonight, I can sit back and enjoy the party, you know? No pressure.”
“Totally.” My voice comes out too chummy, like of course I can relate—me, half stoned in my dirty khakis, surviving the cutthroat career of a cater waiter. I give a peppy “Enjoy!” and leave to find Alicia.
She’s in the kitchen refilling both her serving tray and a big glass of red wine.
“Eat something,” I say, by way of warning. Red wine makes her weepy.
She stuffs an eggroll in her mouth and hands me one. “How great is this party? Ten points if you make out with someone in the coatroom.” Our sophomore year of college, Alicia went to a frat party in Albuquerque one Saturday where she overheard a bunch of guys rating the wildest places they’d had sex and assigning each other points. She’d found it disgusting, if unsurprising, and later it became a joke between us. I told her I once gave someone a hand job on a Ferris wheel, and she sighed like that was the most mundane place a person could possibly go for a hand job. For a while, I thought she forgot about the joke, but then one Christmas she hooked up with an actor dressed as an elf at the Dillard’s Santaland during business hours. They dated briefly but she grew bored and neither of us has managed to top that one, points-wise.
“Fifteen points,” I say, “if you get me Jasper’s number.” It comes tumbling out and I immediately regret it.
“Done!”
“I’m kidding. No, don’t.” I sweep the bangs away from her face. Her eyes are alight with mischief. “Seriously. Don’t”
Barry rushes in, briskly clapping his hands. “Friends! Less chatting, more serving!” Alicia takes a swig of her wine, grabs her tray, and evaporates into the crowd.
I’m searching the kitchen for the mini plastic spoons to stick in the tiny tiramisus, when Barry hisses, “Diana!”
He’s ghostly pale. An enormous cockroach is crawling near the toe of his loafer. “I felt itthrough my shoe.”
“Deep breath. It’s just a bug.” It is not just a bug, it’s enormous. It parts its wings and slices two long, spindly antennae through the air. “Step on it!”
“We can’t kill it!” He hands me a plastic cup. “Just lure it in here and then take it outside.”
“Lureit in?”
He nods.
“Barry.”
I inch toward the cockroach, slowly, the cup in one hand, a paper towel roll in the other. Barry grips my sleeve.
“Don’t miss!” he hisses.
I shake him off my shoulder and kneel on the floor, then sweep the roach into the cup and cap it with the paper towels. As I do, an antenna peeks out and Barry and I scream. He runs to open the back door and shoves me through.
In the parking lot, I crouch down and shake the cup until the roach scampers onto the asphalt. A cold wind whips through my shirt.
“That’s bighearted of you.” A man’s voice makes me jump.
He moves into the light of the streetlamp, and I immediately recognize the Art-Throb himself. He’s tall and slender, and he looks a little sheepish, like maybe I’ve caught him avoiding the party. He’s dressed in a gray suit and crisp white T-shirt, and he’s undeniably good-looking, with dark brown eyes and thick black lashes.
I straighten, dusting the gravel from my palms onto my apron. “My boss is the bighearted one. I wanted to crush it.”
“Smoke?” He holds out a battered blue tin with something hand-rolled inside. “They’re some kind of herbal thing to help me quit. They’re terrible.”
