My Body(34)

When we finally arrived at the massive Spanish-style house in the desert where we’d be staying, we’d been in traffic for nearly six hours and were all exhausted and ready for bed. Sacha became frantic, trying to keep us awake. “Girls! Look how dope this house is!” he squealed when we entered the foyer, grabbing at us and ordering us toward the pool in the backyard. “Go for a night swim!” Outside, we found the prince and his pale fiancée in the Jacuzzi, along with some broad-shouldered man I’d never met before. We stood uncomfortably around the edge, admiring the house. A few girls changed into their swimsuits and got in the water. When I stripped down to the bikini I’d been wearing under my denim shorts, I felt the prince’s eyes land on my body.

“Okay,” he said, nudging his friend. “I’m always interested in something like this.” He pointed at me. “A girl like you, what do you want to change about your body? Like, what’s the thing you’re hung up on?” They both stared at me. I froze.

“I don’t know,” I responded, mentally running through the things I’d like to change about myself: a smaller nose, longer legs. He sipped his drink as his attention shifted elsewhere, bored when I didn’t play along. Despite being a little scared of him, I felt a strange sense of loss. Powerful men have always had that effect on me; they make me want to be noticed but also to disappear. I watched the prince as he laughed. The lights from the Jacuzzi lit his face from below, casting grotesque shadows.

I went back inside the house. The unshaven guy with the greasy nose I’d met in LA was blasting music in the kitchen and pouring drinks, wearing sunglasses and a pink hat that had oversized bunny ears attached. I let out a small laugh at the sight of him. He looked up and shrugged. “Care to join?” He seemed goofy and self-deprecating in a way that endeared him to me, or at least made me less afraid. I threw on a hoodie and sat on a stool, bringing my knees up to my chin.

“Have some chocolate,” he offered. “It’s mushrooms and maybe some MDMA, mostly just a body high.” He broke off a piece and popped it into his mouth. “It’s mellow. Trust me, you’ll feel great.”

I was apprehensive, but I knew it couldn’t be worse than more time with the prince. I bit off a small chunk and opened a bag of chips while he did a line of coke off the counter. He told me his wife and kids thought he was on a weekend yoga retreat in the desert.

“They have no idea. They think I’m recharging,” he muttered, and bent over to snort another line. “Did you know I recently slept with a girl who woke up before me in the morning and blow-dried her hair and did her makeup and then crawled back next to me to pretend she’d been asleep?” Spit flew out of his mouth. I thought about the girl and how much she wanted to impress him, to look naturally beautiful first thing in the morning.

I could barely keep my eyes open and my jaw was tight because I’d been grinding my teeth, from either nerves or the drugs, I wasn’t sure. Isabella came in from the pool and quietly said she’d found a room off the kitchen with a queen-size bed that we could share with Chloe. Hoping to leave unnoticed, we tiptoed off, found our bags piled up in the comically grand foyer, and carried them into the bedroom. The music from the pool got louder before we shut the door. Chloe face-planted onto the soft bed. Isabella brushed her teeth and I put on sweatpants, hoping we’d escaped.

But Sacha found us almost immediately. He opened our door. “What is this? Chloe!” he whined. “Chloe, wake up!”

Chloe was a party girl, but she was not one to be bossed around. “Too tired,” she muttered into her pillow. He scowled at me and Isabella, knowing we were even less likely to rally.

Then Kim, the girl Sacha had greeted so warmly at the restaurant in LA, suddenly appeared behind him in nothing but a black string bikini. He turned to her, his tone shifting. “All right,” he said seriously. “Remember what we talked about? I need you to go and do your thing out there.” She nodded twice quickly and, without speaking a word, swiveled around and skipped out of sight.

“Jacuzzi time!” I heard her sing out. Sacha looked exhausted. He rubbed a hand against the back of his neck and head. Silently, I shut the door, wondering what I’d just witnessed. Was Sacha Kim’s boss? Or were they cohorts? And what was she expected to go and do exactly?

I could not sleep that night, squished between Chloe and Isabella under a comforter that smelled stale and of someone else. I thought about the way the Jacuzzi’s changing pink and green lights lit up the prince’s face and how his body had appeared monstrous next to his tiny fiancée’s. I realized I’d felt safer last year sleeping in my car in a crummy hotel parking lot. Isabella and I had been wrong. This was no free ride.



* * *



At the Super Bowl, I was surprised to find that my borrowed Moncler jacket was unnecessary. We weren’t seated outside in the stands but in an indoor suite halfway up the stadium, complete with heating, a full bar, several attendants, and a lavish spread of food.

An Oscar-winning actor and his girlfriend stopped by, animating the back of the room a bit. Jho Low was quiet but beamed when the actor became loud and gregarious. The image of a king being entertained by a jester came to mind. I wondered how much Jho Low was paying him, and thought of our fees tallied in a ledger on some underling’s computer. Hours passed. People looked at their phones and slouched in their seats. I hadn’t realized how long the game would be, and after a glass of wine and several trips to the buffet, I was bored and exhausted. Jho Low himself seemed unenthused, staring vacantly. I wondered whether he even liked football.