released a long, tobacco-infused sigh—had I eaten the damn cigarette?—and stared up at the cracked stucco on the ceiling. Must tell Mr. Zglagovvcini about that, I thought.
Speaking of whom.
“Meess Sasha?” Are you there, Meess Sasha?”
More knocking.
“Jesus Christ!” I yelled, rolling out of bed furiously. “I’m coming!”
At least I didn’t have to bother getting dressed—one of the few yet undeniable benefits of falling asleep in your clothes. Another blessing: It took only three and a half paces to reach the front door. My apartment—if it deserved such a title—was basically one room, with a sink and microwave at one end, my bed at the other, and a folding door in the middle that led to a bathroom with no actual bath and a towel rack that forced me to lean forward at a forty-five degree angle while doing whatever it was that I had to do. Such luxurious accommodation came with a price tag of eleven hundred dollars a month. The sympathetic real estate broker had told me this was cheap for Hollywood.
“I thought we were in Little Russia?” I’d replied, dumbly.
“Little Russia is in Hollywood, dear,” she’d said.
“But—”
“I know, dear, I know. It’s not like it is on television, is it? You’ll get over that. Eventually.”
I’d taken the place largely because it was close to Greenlit Studios, allowing me to cycle to work. The rent seemed more reasonable if it meant I didn’t have to buy a car.
“Meess Sash—”
To the sound of splintering plywood, I yanked open the termiteinfested front door. “What is it, Mr. Zglagovvcini?” I demanded, with more anger than I’d intended.
“Ah, Meess Sasha, you alive, good, good. Two things…”
It occurred to me that I’d never seen Mr. Zglagovvcini wearing anything other than tennis shorts, flip-flops (in lifeguard yellow), and an obviously counterfeited blue Ralph Lauren T-shirt (obvious because the horseman on the breast pocket is holding up an AK-47, not a polo stick). Presumably the favorable contrast between the LA weather and his native Siberian climate had convinced him to remain as close to naked as possible—within the local decency laws—at all times. I didn’t exactly blame him. Dad, who was raised on the drenched shore of the Irish Sea, had been exactly the same way when he’d taken me to LA as a kid. Except he hadn’t worn any kind of shirt. Just jeans and his old running shoes.
“Mr. Zglagovvcini,” I pleaded. “Can we do this some other—”
He raised both palms.
“Very quick,” he promised. “What would you say are the six things you could never live without?
I closed my eyes. Please tell me I hadn’t gotten out of bed for this.
“Look, I—”
“Six things. Answer carefully.”
“What are you talking about, Mr. Zglagovvcini?”
“It’s question for eCupidMatch.com.”
I began massaging my temples, which seemed only to make my head feel even worse. “Mr. Zglagovvcini,” I began, “are you seriously creating a profile for me on a dating website?”
“Noooo! Mrs. Zglagovvcini say I not allowed to go on such thing. She think I might run off with stripper. Me! With wrinkly old dick! So she taking care of it, only I have to get information from you, as she very shy.” With a shaking hand, he lifted up his reading glasses and studied a list. “Which you say describes you best: dreamer or schemer? If you eaten by cannibal, how you most like to be prepared?”
“Mr. Zglagovvcini, I really, really don’t want you to—”
A car horn sounded outside.
“Oh, that reminds me,” said Mr. Zglagovvcini. “The other thing I need to tell you: Your car has arrived. Driver says he was sent here by Meess, er… Gee Gee? Dee Dee? Maybe Zee Zee? Anyhow, whatever her name is, she didn’t want you turning up to her house on bicycle. She obviously knows you crazy woman.”
I couldn’t process what he was saying. My brain, like the CPU of an aging computer, had maxed out with the stress of running other applications (talking, standing up, keeping my eyes open) leaving me with a spinning wheel-of-death where thoughts should have been. “Whose car? Where? What?” I said, uselessly.
“Your car,” he repeated. “It’s here.”
He pointed to the window of the lobby, beyond which a white Rolls-Royce was waiting. It was gleaming in the sun. The driver waved as I squinted at him.
I thought I might black out.
9
“I Hope You Like Celery”
TEN MINUTES LATER, I was in a teak and leather capsule, being swept along the 101 freeway in total silence at eighty-five miles per hour. Yes, that’s correct: Teak. Being inside that car was like being