Gap Year - 65. Chapter 65

March 7, 2004

Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)

New York, NY

Will

“I brought some shrooms with me,” Travis said as we drove up to the museum.

I smiled. “That should make the art totally kick-ass,” I said. “We have to take about half what we’d normally do. We can’t be losing our shit in here.”

He laughed even as we divided up the nasty fungi. “Maybe a little less,” he said, pulling some back. We got sodas out of the mini fridge and swallowed the magic mushrooms.

“Nasty,” I observed unnecessarily.

“Worth it,” he said. We hopped out of the car and strolled into the museum, handing the reception people our tickets. We walked over to the coat check area and got rid of our jackets, then went wandering around trying to find Darius. We finally found him standing in front of a cool painting, talking to Bellona, JJ, and Zanie.

“Hey,” I said, and gave Darius a man hug. “You look good!” Darius was wearing a black jacket with lightning bolt patterns cut out of it, revealing his red shirt underneath. “I’d call this cool but tasteful.”

“Why thank you,” Bellona said, beaming at my praise. I gave her the obligatory cheek kisses, then turned to introduce her to Travis. “Travis Buck,” she said as she smiled at him. I was kind of surprised that she knew him.

“Yes ma’am,” Travis said, making all of us giggle. “My mom said to say hello.”

“Please return the greeting,” Bellona said, and with that they turned their attention to our outfits.

“It wasn’t supposed to look like that,” JJ snapped at me, then realized he was in front of everyone and settled down.

“The shirt and the shoes didn’t look right on me, so I got some help fixing them up,” I said. Bellona looked at me, non-verbally asking me to explain. “This shirt was short-sleeved, and it made me look like a wimp.”

“So it looked perfect on you,” Darius joked, snickering.

“Whatever,” I said to him, then turned back to Bellona. “Travis had a similar problem with his shirt.”

“I was going to comment that his shirt looked a bit too avant garde for Miranda Buck,” Bellona said almost gleefully, happy to launch that little dig at Travis’s mom. “Who helped you out?”

“Patrick Christian,” I said. “The shirt Travis is wearing was supposed to be part of his ready-to-wear collection, but he opted to bail us out and let Travis debut it.”

She nodded in approval, which was a huge compliment. “I will have to track him down and tell him that he did an excellent job,” she said to me, then turned to Travis. “And I must say that it looks perfect on you.”

“Thanks,” Travis said shyly.

“And how did he modify your shirt?” she asked.

“He took off the sleeves and the collar, making it look more rugged,” I said. “He also added a few of these holes to make it look more badass.”

“As if,” Darius joked.

Her hand reached out and touched the bruise on my side, only it was so cold it made me jump a bit. She then studied my face and saw the bruise there as well. “Are you alright?”

“I had a bit of an altercation, but I’m fine,” I said. “I think the bruises were what Patrick used as his inspiration for the modifications.”

“I had originally thought this would be a contest between Jeremy and me, but it seems that Patrick Christian has muscled into it and beaten us both,” she pronounced. JJ smiled, but I could tell he was seething underneath his plastic exterior.

“I’ll let him know you said that,” I said. Travis and I took that opportunity to escape from them. We took the elevator up to the top floor, and as it rose I felt the shrooms kick in. I looked at my watch and smiled. Mushrooms took about thirty minutes to kick in, and it had been just that long. “It’s starting,” I said.

“No shit,” Travis said. We got off and I led him in to see Van Gogh’s Starry Night. “This painting is fucking huge.”

Normally when I took mushrooms, the first part of the trip made me really mellow, almost tired, so we sat on a bench in front of this masterpiece, just bullshitting quietly. “Dude, those spiralling patterns make me feel like I’m about to be sucked into a vortex,” I said. We laughed at that until we got some odd looks, then settled down. The second stage of my mushroom highs was this phase, the tripping balls phase, where shapes came alive and walls seemed to sway and change appearance.

“Dude, this is freaking me out,” Travis said. “I think that painting really is trying to suck me in. It’s like a portal to another universe.” It was better when you were on mushrooms to avoid situations where you might lose it, and if I thought I was going to be absorbed into Van Gogh’s alternate reality, that might happen. We got up and wandered around the gallery.

“This is my favorite painting here,” I said, as we stood in front of the Jackson Pollock I’d spotted when I’d been here with Grand. “See how it’s all blurry back here?”

“Kind of,” Travis said.

I led him up close to it. “When you get here, you can see all the details, and all the layers, all the strings of paint that he used to get that look.”

“Fuck,” he said, and all but ran out of the gallery, hyperventilating a bit. I followed him, kind of worried and kind of annoyed since he’d dissed my favorite painting at MOMA.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“It’s like all those strands of paint suddenly turned into worms,” he said, still a little freaked out by it. We laughed, then wandered around to see more stuff, being careful to move on if something was freaky. There were photographers there, of course, who snapped pictures of us. I hoped I didn’t look like I was completely wasted in them.

We worked our way down to the lower levels, and as we did I noticed that I’d shifted into the third phase of my mushroom high. This was the phase where I was fun and playful. We walked into a gallery and saw Patrick talking to Karl Lagerfeld who had about five people with him, all of whom respectfully stood back from the conversation. “Patrick is all by himself, while Lagerfeld has a whole entourage with him.”

He chuckled at that, then freaked out when I walked toward them. “What are you doing?”

“I’m going to say ‘hi’, then I’m thinking we can bail,” I said.

He nodded. “This has been a blast, but I could do with a change of venue.”

I walked right up to Patrick and Karl, getting annoyed looks from the entourage, like I was going to hurt him or something. “Well hello there,” I said to Karl.

“You are a vision of beauty, but I am used to that,” he said, as he gave me a hug along with kisses on the cheeks.

“This is Travis Buck,” I said, introducing him.

“You two are not only incredibly handsome, you are dressed to show it off,” he said.

“My brother and Travis’s mother picked the basic outfits, but Patrick made them really work,” I said. “Bellona dressed up Darius, JJ dressed me up, and Miranda Buck dressed up Travis.”

“And then Patrick modified your outfits? How?” Karl asked. Patrick jumped in and explained what he’d done, while Karl nodded approvingly. “And what did Bellona say?”

“She said that Patrick was the winner tonight, beating out both her and JJ,” I said, grinning proudly at Patrick. “She wants to talk to you.”

“I would say this has been a very successful night for you,” Karl observed to Patrick, then summoned a photographer. “Take a picture of me with these handsome men on either side.”

Travis and I stood on either side and posed. I giggled when Karl playfully pinched my ass. He really was fun. We got a few pics with Patrick, then walked into another gallery, only this one had live art. There were six raised disks, about three feet across, arranged in a circle. Three dancers were performing on every other one. The music was some new age piece, and the dancers were undulating in time to it, gently rising up and then gently descending in time to the tempo. After a few minutes, they’d all gracefully jump to the next disk and start all over again. “Dude, the way you deal with these people, you’re impressive,” Travis said.

The shrooms made me more playful than I otherwise would have been, and also more creative. “You want to be impressed, watch this,” I said. I strode forward and hopped onto one of the disks, and began to emulate their movements, only with a little more flair. Two of the dancers smiled at me, while the other gave me a dirty look. I was in my own little world, so I was shocked when I saw JJ jump up on one of the disks. He was awesome, because he still had his grace and coordination from skating. I was trying to blend in with the other dancers, but JJ was trying to show all of us up, and he pretty much did. It was so typical of him to get into the competitive part of it, determined not to just do well but to win. As if that wasn’t a big enough surprise, Darius jumped up on the last empty disk, only unlike JJ and I, he just did his own thing. He kind of danced in place with small steps while pretending like he was playing the drums. We finally got tired of performing and stepped down, only to be overwhelmed by the applause. I realized at that point that we’d drawn quite a crowd.

Darius walked up to me in his cocky way. “Good job,” he said, and fist bumped me.

“JJ was the best of all of us,” I said, smiling at him, which seemed to change his mood.

“Yeah, but you led the way,” JJ said. We ended our mutual admiration society after that. JJ went over to bask in Zanie’s praise, Darius went back to be a dutiful escort to Bellona, and I wandered through the crowds, thanking people who complimented me, until I got to Travis. That whole process of dealing with a crowd of people all trying to get my attention made me claustrophobic.

“These people are starting to freak me out,” I said a bit urgently. We went back down to the front, got our coats, and found the Maybach waiting for us.

“Dude, that was incredible,” Travis said as soon as we got into the car.

“Where to?” the driver asked pleasantly.

“Times Square,” I said. “To that diner where everyone sings.”

“Ellen’s Stardust,” he said, then put up the privacy screen.

“I would never be brave enough to do that in front of a crowd,” he persisted.

“Well the mushrooms helped until the end, when I was in that sea of people and I felt claustrophobic,” I said. “Besides, I was too busy trying not to fall off that disk to pay attention to anything else. I don’t really remember anything about it.” I’d been living in the moment and had no specific memories of ‘dancing’.

“Lucky for you it was taped,” he said, smirking at me.

“Terrific,” I said sarcastically, wondering if that would end up on some news program and would make me look like an ass.

“Not sure what I could do to top that,” he said, shaking his head.

“You’ll think of a way to impress me,” I said, winking at him. “All you really have to do is take your pants off.” We laughed about that until we got to the diner. We had to wait in line, which was unpleasant because it was pretty chilly. I told the driver to park the car and join us, but he was all into watching out for the car, so it ended up being just the two of us.

“So what’s this place?” he asked me.

“It’s a diner, only the catch is that the waitstaff take turns singing songs to entertain us,” I said.

“Are they good?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Most of them are.” He looked skeptical. “Dude, this is Broadway. There’s tons of talent here.” He nodded. We finally got a table, and it took me a bit to stop shivering. There was a solid line of booths with small tables in front of them, along with chairs on the other side of the tables. I took the chair because it seemed less comfortable, and I was trying to make this fun for Travis. Behind the booth where Travis sat was basically a narrow walkway that the singers could walk down as they sang. There was a similar set up of booths and tables on the other side.

We sat there eating, enjoying the singers and the food. “Singers are good,” Travis said.

“Most of them are. I wasn’t impressed by that last number,” I said. Some chick sang the Phantom of the Opera theme.

“I thought she did pretty well,” he said.

“I’m probably not being fair to her. It’s not her fault I don’t like Andrew Lloyd Webber,” I said.

He got a mischievous grin, then hid it almost immediately. “I gotta hit the bathroom.”

“I’ll be here,” I promised. I sat through two songs and Travis hadn’t come back, so I started to worry. I was just about to go track him down when I was distracted by the emcee.

“Ladies and gentlemen, tonight we have a guest performer all the way from California, who begged us to let him perform so he could impress his friend. Travis Buck!” Immediately the music for “Surfin’ USA” started blasting, while Travis jumped up on the walkway near our booth and started belting out the words to the song:

If everybody had an ocean
Across the U.S.A.
Then everybody'd be surfin'
Like Californ-i-a
You'd see 'em wearing their baggies
Huarache sandals too
A bushy bushy blonde hairdo
Surfin' U.S.A.

You'd catch 'em surfin' at Del Mar
Ventura County line
Santa Cruz and Trestle
Australia's Narrabeen
All over Manhattan
And down Doheny Way

Everybody's gone surfin'
Surfin' U.S.A.

We'll all be planning that route
We're gonna take real soon
We're waxing down our surfboards
We can't wait for June
We'll all be gone for the summer
We're on surfari to stay
Tell the teacher we're surfin'
Surfin' U.S.A.

Haggertys and Swami’s
Pacific Palisades
San Onofre and Sunset
Redondo Beach L.A.
All over La Jolla
At Waimea Bay

Everybody's gone surfin'
Surfin' U.S.A

He had a beautiful voice, and his nasally California accent was perfect for this song. I was stunned at how he played to the audience, but whenever the lines with the surf sites came up, he wandered over to me and I sang them with him. Fortunately I was far enough away from the mic that people couldn’t hear my awful contribution. He got major applause when he was done, especially from me. I was standing up, cheering and clapping for him like an idiot, but I didn’t give a shit.

He walked back to the table and I gave him a massive hug, then we took our seats before the next person sang. “Impressed?” he asked in his cocky way.

“I am totally impressed,” I said. “I had no idea you were so talented.”

“I’m a good singer and a great surfer, so that song works for me,” he said.

“Yes it does,” I agreed.

“You know, sometime this summer we should take a couple of weeks and go check out all of those places,” he said.

“That sounds like a blast,” I said. “The only one that might be tough is Narrabeen, since our summer is winter in Australia.”

“They don’t have wetsuits down under?” he asked.

“Touché,” I replied, laughing.

The waiter came up and gave me the check. “You’re good,” he said to Travis.

“Thanks,” Travis said shyly. I tossed some cash on the table and as we made to leave, another dude stopped us.

“I taped his performance,” the guy said. He was kind of sleazy in a paparazzi kind of way. He showed me a miniature video cassette. “It’s yours for $50.”

“Sold,” I said, then pulled out the money and traded it for the tape.

We walked out of the restaurant and got into the Maybach. I told the driver to take us back to the condo, then put up the privacy screen. “That’s probably a blank tape,” Travis said.

“Probably,” I agreed. “I figured it was worth the risk.”

“Good call,” he said.

“You could do theater or movies,” I said to him, so impressed by his talent.

“So could you,” he said.

“There is no way I could do movies,” I said, shaking my head.

“Yeah there is,” he said. “We’ll go up to Burbank and hook you up with one of those companies that makes pornos.”

I laughed. “I guess I have the equipment for it.”

“It is so much more than that,” he insisted, getting all serious. “You are really good at sex. I mean really good.”

“Ya think?” I asked.

“I know,” he said.

“As soon as we get back to the condo, I’ll show you my skills,” I said, chuckling. We got back to the condo and I did just that, all night long.

March 8, 2004

New York, NY

“Fuck!” I yelled. I ripped myself away from Travis, ran into the bathroom, and projectile vomited into the toilet. I moaned when I realized I hadn’t made it far enough, and I was going to have to clean it up when I was done. This was the downside of mushrooms for me. The next day, I felt like shit. I collapsed on the floor, willing my stomach to get under control, only to sit up abruptly and puke again.

“Move!” Travis shouted, pushing me away from the toilet so he could vomit too. When he was done, I flushed it, but the room was nasty from my inaccurate aim. We knelt there, side by side, puking like we were in a relay race, until we realized how hilarious that was and started laughing. We finally got our laughter and stomachs under enough control to drag ourselves into an upright position. He turned on the shower, while I used a towel to wipe off the floor and the area around the toilet. Dealing with that made me puke again, but after that I was able to join Travis in the shower.

On my way, I grabbed the mouthwash and took a swig. As soon as I got in the shower, I handed it to Travis and he mimicked my maneuver. With our breaths not nasty, I kissed him, and that fueled our hormones. He made love to me under the rainshower bathroom nozzle, in a very slow and surreal way. We got out, dried off, then strolled back out to the bedroom and simultaneously glanced at the clock. “Fuck,” Travis said. “It’s almost 11 and I’m supposed to leave at noon.”

“You’ll make it,” I said. We slowly went through the motions of getting dressed and packing up our clothes. That took us until 11:30. When we walked out into the main area, I found Darius there smirking at me because I was so hung over. “We need to go.”

“Fine,” I said. “We’ll take you to the airport,” I told Travis.

“Thank you all for coming to visit and for making this a memorable weekend,” Zanie said with both sincerity and snarkiness in her voice.

“It was my pleasure,” I said, and kissed her on the cheek. We went through a brisk goodbye process until the only thing left was for me to deal with JJ.

“I’m sorry I treated you like shit,” he said, stunning the crap out of me.

I smiled and gave him a big hug. “I think sometimes you forget that we’re on your side, and we have your back,” I said, gesturing to Darius.

“Maybe,” JJ said, making me laugh. I followed Darius and Travis down to the car and got in, making sure to snag a window seat.

“No breakfast for you,” Darius said, giving me shit. The thought of food roiled my stomach. I hurriedly rolled down the window and leaned out so I puked out into the street, ignoring the people who stared at me, most of them laughing. I sat back in my seat and rolled up the window. “You’re as bad as Dad.”

“I didn’t get puke all over the side of the limo like he does,” I said, hoping that was true.

“Is it okay if I hitch a ride back to LA with you?” Darius asked Travis.

“Sure,” Travis said, while I sat there glaring at Darius.

“I told you this meeting at Escorial was important, and you’re not going to back me up?” I demanded. Darius started giving me a dirty look, then he realized how pissed off I was, so he mellowed.

“Look, you figured all of this out, and you know the deal,” he said. “I’m behind you 100%, and if anyone asks me, I’ll tell them that.”

“So you’re basically giving me your proxy?” I asked.

“That’s what I’m doing,” he said confidently. He got a little nervous when I gave him my evil, scheming look.

The drive to the airport was easy enough on a Sunday morning. We pulled up to their plane first. I gave Darius a big hug, then focused on Travis. “We didn’t get to talk at all,” he said.

I shrugged. “I had the best time with you,” I said, and gave him another hug. I didn’t kiss him because I assumed that his father would somehow be spying on our interactions here, next to his plane.

“So did I,” he said. “When will I see you again?”

“I’ve got some stuff to do in Paly, then I’ll make it down to LA in time to pick you up for the trip to Hawaii,” I said.

“You still want me to go?” he asked, surprised.

“I do,” I said. “Besides, if you piss me off, I can just fly you back to LA.” He laughed at that, nodded at me, then he and Darius headed toward Curtis Buck’s plane. I thought it was not a little annoying that the pilots didn’t help them with their luggage. When they were about halfway there, Travis stopped to answer his phone. The driver made to take me to our plane, but I told him to wait. Travis talked on his phone for about two minutes, and I could see how angry he was. He was clearly shouting at the person on the other line. He ended the call, said a few words to the pilot, then started walking back to the car. The driver got out to help them toss their bags back in, then they both got into the car looking annoyed. “We can go now,” I said to the driver, then looked to Travis for an explanation.

“That was my father,” Travis said, anger all but seething out of him. “He was pissed at me because we’re half an hour late, gave me all kinds of shit for being a fucking ingrate after he let me use his plane to come out here.”

“After which you told him you didn’t need him or his fucking plane, and hung up,” Darius said with a bit of a smirk.

“Yeah,” Travis said in an annoyed way, and that made the whole thing funny enough to get us all to chuckle. We got to our plane where the pilots were awesome, jumping in to help us with all of our crap and getting us aboard in no time.

When the doors were closed and we were all seated, I nodded at the pilot, his cue to get us on our way. We taxied out to the runway and only waited a couple of minutes before we were cleared. As the jets fired up and we began to pick up speed, I looked out the window and saw smoke. I zeroed in on it enough to see Curtis Buck’s plane burst into flames. “What the fuck?” I asked.

Travis and Darius both looked out the window and stared at the burning plane, even as our own aircraft jetted safely into the skies. “Holy shit,” Darius said, as we all looked at each other stunned beyond belief.

“He hates me, he’s always hated me, but I never thought he’d try to kill me,” Travis said, shaking his head sadly.

“Maybe there was some legit technical problem that caused this,” I said, grasping at straws.

He shook his head. “I’ve tried to be a good son, to do the right things. I just don’t get why he hates me so much that he wants me dead.”

“You want to spend tonight in Palo Alto?” I asked.

Travis shook his head. “I need to get back for classes on Monday. I already missed enough with my suspension.”

“Hey, why don’t you stay with me. We can find you room at the house,” Darius said, referring to his fraternity.

“Close to school,” I said, trying to push him in that general direction. He did not need to be alone right now.

“Thanks,” he said. “I’ll think about it.”

“You want to stop in Paly long enough to have dinner?” I asked.

Travis shook his head. “I don’t want to get involved in any more family drama today.” I was annoyed by that comment, because blowing up a family member was way worse than digitally tracking them, but I kept my thoughts to myself.

“The plane can drop you off then take us back,” Darius pronounced.

I told the pilot that was the plan then dragged Travis back to the bedroom. We didn’t talk, we didn’t fuck, we just lay in bed with me holding him tightly to show him that he was loved. We were both jarred awake as the plane landed. I was briefly annoyed that no one had told us we were almost there, then let that negative emotion evaporate. Darius had no idea what we were doing in here, and he sure as hell didn’t want to walk into a man sex scene. “Thanks for everything,” Travis said to me as we got up.

We walked into the main cabin and I got a sense of resolve. “I should go back with you guys,” I said firmly.

“No,” Darius said, just as firmly. “You have things to do here. You have to get this tracking shit worked out, and you have your first board meeting where you’re going to turn everything into a freak show.” He was smiling as he said the last part.

“This is about priorities,” I insisted.

“It’s also about teamwork,” he said. He put his arm around Travis’s shoulder. “I’ve got his back.” It was amazing how that gesture seemed to buck Travis up and pretty much allayed my fears.

“Fine,” I said grudgingly, gave them both hugs, and walked down the steps and into the car that was waiting for me.