Cult Classic(53)

Clive opened the folder as he neared us and began thumbing through pages. I could make out blocks of passport-size photos, clipped to the corner of each page like homicide files. I caught sight of Willis. Even pressed into one dimension, one could not miss Willis. Meanwhile, Clive was glowing.

“Are you wearing glitter on your face?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.

“What? Oh,” he said, swiping at his cheeks, “Chantal was testing out new pigments this morning.”

“On your face?”

“They’re vegan.”

“Are they for children? I’m asking.”

“Lola, sometimes love is letting the other person put glitter on your face.”

“Wonderful. Lesson learned.”

“Crap,” he said to the folder, “I forgot Vadis’s list in the meditation room.”

My ears perked up.

“Okay. What exactly goes on in the meditation room?”

“Isn’t that self-explanatory?” asked Clive, the little scar on his chin shifting as he smirked.

“Not particularly, no. I mean, I think meditation is the process of clearing your mind, but you seem to have assigned it some freakish meaning. Because the minds in that room aren’t clear, are they? They’ve got my disembodied head floating through them. One woman’s ‘meditation’ is another man’s ‘let’s drive Lola insane for sport.’”

“Not for sport,” Errol grumbled.

“Sorry, as a business model.”

“It’s just a room, Lola. But it’s in use at the moment. It was originally built as the women’s entrance and then, I think, used for Torah study? We thought it a fitting place to focus on your Memory Pathways. Don’t look at me like that, it’s not sacrilege.”

“You’re the one who put a coffee bar in a shul.”

“And a crystalarium closet!” Errol piped in. “With a hundred-pound crystal!”

“Oh, where’s that?”

“Off the conference room.”

“What kind of crystal is it?”

“It’s an amethyst geode.”

“An amethyst geode!”

“Don’t be a jerk,” scolded Clive.

“She’s not being a jerk,” Errol said, defending my honor.

“See?” I said. “Not a jerk.”

Clive changed the subject, pulling out his phone.

“Check this out,” he said.

He pointed at an app on his screen with a little bowler hat in the middle. I wondered at what point this was a copyright issue or, at minimum, an overcommitment to symbolism. I also wondered if an app wasn’t jumping the gun for a start-up cult. Clive pressed on the cube. While it gathered its programming wares, a little elevator glided up and down the screen. Clive explained how members could match with other members interested in concentrating on the same packages, exploring the same relationship terrain, how this would deepen the exclusivity of the Golconda by registering if a user had screenshotted the menu, how it would use biofeedback to track emotion. But the best part would be the location services.

“There’ll be a map,” he continued, “akin to the one you’re sticking pins in, that we’re gonna design over the automated one, ideally something more localized.”

“You mean like what every car service and food delivery app on the planet already does?”

“It’s also a means of generating user data.”

“You really are the crown prince of print journalism.”

“Mock it all you want but my Silicon Valley friends are into it. We’ll do Chinatown first, then the rest of Manhattan, then the whole city, then the whole world.”

“Where are you getting all this money?”

“Lola, I’m not having the stock options conversation with you.”

“I’m not asking you for money, you demon. I’m not even part of this.”

“Aren’t you?”

I blinked. I was part of the machinery that had turned this place into a new age funhouse. Not that I expected to be compensated, not when the people who actually worked here didn’t expect it. As far as everyone was concerned, I was being given the gift of a lifetime.

The kid on the ladder was cleaning the elevator cable, making a slow, adoring, sensual motion like he was milking it. He, too, was probably doing this for purpose, not payment.

“Hey!” I shouted, my voice echoing. “Hey!”

“Please don’t do that,” pleaded Errol.

“Why won’t they ever look at me? It’s like they feel guilty.”

“They don’t feel guilty,” Clive assured me, amused by the suggestion. “They have to maintain focus.”

“Right. On me.”

“Speaking of which, who did you see this evening?”

“Oscar,” I said, still staring at the kid. “I saw Oscar.”

“Oscar!”

Clive seemed overjoyed. The reason I’d never introduced the two of them had less to do with protecting Clive from a superfan and more to do with protecting Oscar from being turned into an acolyte. Clive was a geyser of questions about how long I’d spoken to Oscar, how I felt parting ways with someone as “plugged in” as Oscar. As far as he was concerned, Oscar was the one that got away. But if I only dated people Clive liked, I’d have sex once a decade.