07.13.2008 / EP. 22
Out For a Good Time
Lin sauntered from the Excalibur Hotel and without difficulty found the gamier side of Albany, the combat zone. He’d dyed his hair and eyebrows for the visit.They were a dusty blonde, as though modelling for a shampoo. With his slim Asian facial features and pale complexion, the combination won him lots ofattention.
It took Lin an hour and visits to three clubs. He settled on a crowded upscale lounge with plenty of seating for conversation, dark to conceal detail, decibels for privacy, and a large dance floor for passion. He sat back and before long discovered what he was after.
He found Raylene and Sylvia, out for a good time. Raylene seemed early 20s going on 18, slim, pale with dark orbits about the eyes, overdressed – she’d no doubt say – in camisole and short skirt. Her bare shapely legs stretched to eternity and beyond. Sylvia, in contrast, presented a perfect hourglass figure. Her blonde locks tumbled across eyes green as the ocean. Blonde, yes, but with hints of red, she presented the unlined shining countenance of a waif of 15. She was innocence and tramp yoked together. Handsome men swarmed about them.It was the conversation of the principal competitors that drew Lin.
Raylene fingered her camisole disingenuously. “Bell, I don’t know that I want some today,” she said.
“It’s the greatest,” Bell replied, opening his fist in front of her. Lin couldn’t see what it held. “You remember last time. You and Sylvia bought this yellow bird, you hooted and joked all night, had a grand old time.” Bell, shaking his Rastafarian dreads, posed something tiny between his fingers. “One of these yellow Rejuv birds each, you live a long time. I feel rhyme coming on.” He posed theatrically. “Rejuvena-tion, she fun. Juv health, treat self. Rejuv be for you, that true.”
“Yes, well,” said Sylvia. She omitted, out of discretion, the word that rhymed, and continued, “Rejuvenation, that too old, been sold. Young girl, sweet pearl, for sure needs no cure.”
“Hey, listen to that. These girls know Rejuvenation is old and never had the power they need. Pay no attention to Bell. He’s a scrawny rooster.” Lin heard this pronounced in a booming bass that shook the air. The voice emerged from a giant, who had a friendly right arm draped about Bell’s shoulder. “You girls like extra kick, you take what’s sitting in my pocket.”
“I hope they aren’t all going to rhyme,” Sylvia whispered to Raylene.
“Half the price of Rejuv too,” Bass continued. “And I give you a discount on the next buy. Try a pair. What be more fair?”
Raylene and Sylvia exchanged pained glances.
“And what’s in your pocket?” Sylvia asked. Raylene lifted her camisole a shade. All male eyes followed.
Lin didn’t wait. Six men surrounded the young women. Bell and Bass were selling drugs and the other four were waiting to enter the bidding. Lin pointed at Bell and kept his finger poised.
“White Gold, Resurrection with a kick, Rejuvenation that swings, Immortality that rockets you away,” said Bass. “That’s what you find in my pocket. Reach in and feel for yourself.”
Raylene and Sylvia were visibly unattracted by this offer. Lin observed this at the same time as Bell noticed Lin. He looked the question. Lin crooked his finger in invitation. Bell figured the girls were playing, and two sales weren’t worth the effort. He hiked the three feet that separated him from Lin. “You like my style?”he asked. But Bass and the other four men soon joined him. Raylene and Sylvia, disappointed in their reduced audience, wandered across as well.
Lin cut to the chase. “I’ll buy two from each of you, and,” he added, seeing Raylene and Sylvia had joined the group, “another two for these love-magnets you’ve cast aside.”
The men had their wares on the table faster than the wobble of a cesium atom. “Make it eight from each gentleman, for a little information,” Lin said.
“Police,” was Bell’s reply.
“Quite the opposite.” Lin took a wallet out. It was stuffed with cash. “You don’t record conversation over music so loud. I’m from Hong Kong and need a rundown on the goods for sale.” Lin ordered Champagne for all. His tip to the waiter calmed Bell’s mind; no policeman was that generous. And this Asian character was right about the recording. They were safe. Score from him and I retire for the night, Bell thought.
The four men explained the longevity discovery, the drugs that allowed you to live to 200 but hadn’t made a difference to human happiness. All of which Lin knew. A couple of the drugs were legal, the others black-market spin-offs. The spin-offs were just as effective but cheaper. The black-market drugs also packed a pleasure punch, ultra powerful in some cases, which hiked the price back up. Maybe one or two were addictive, but no one could tell, because people upped their intake all the time, daily, monthly, quarterly, hoping against the evidence to live forever. The idea was one pill adds years to your life, so two adds more, and three triples it. Right?
Wrong, Lin knew, but he offered no opinion. He saw someone else working the crowd, likely selling another drug of the same ilk.
“Of course, there’s Young Again,” said Bass, following Lin’s regard.
“Addictive,” Bell warned. “Stick to what we give you.”
“We love it,” said Raylene. “It thrills and comforts and makes you so sensual.”
“At the same time,” Sylvia added.
Bell: “You imagine the world is safe and wonderful.”
Bass: “The danger is the thing’s a fraud. You want to like the world and down the road you sell your soul for a dose. Bell is right. Buy from us.”
Bell: “At least you get addicted to the best.” They all laughed, except Lin. Lin was debating with himself. “What a pack of lies,” he said. “Who would believe a word of it?”
Which provoked protestations of good faith and another round of drinks. Sylvia ended up stroking Raylene’s belly, eyes closed. The guys had their arms around each other. Lin learned what he needed to know. It had cost a small fortune, but goodwill was spread liberally around. He had cell numbers for Bell, Bass, the four others, Sylvia and Raylene. A bonus as to the latter, Lin thought. They weren’t dizzy ciphers by a long stretch. Lin couldn’t place them in the pantheon of American character types. Their glances were sharp, comments ironic. They were determined, cynical and iconoclastic beyond their years. Lin couldn’t guess where they stood on the political, social, psychological or intellectual spectrum. He had no idea what they felt, or whether they let themselves feel at all. Nor did he care.
