Big Egos Read online

  “Not exactly,” I say. “Let me put it this way: When you look in the mirror, you see a reflection of yourself, right? Not just who you are on the outside, but who you are as a person. But other people probably see you as someone completely different. And that’s just as real to them as what you see.”

  Nat just stares at me with a glazed-over look.

  “Okay, how about this,” I say. “What matters isn’t how you see yourself. What matters is how others see you. The trick is to make them see what you want them to see.”

  Of course in high school, teenagers often get preoccupied with who they appear to be in the eyes of others as compared with who they think they are, so your identity is really a matter of opinion.

  “Is this more of your dad’s bullshit life lessons?” says Nat.

  “Hey, I’m just trying to answer your question and explain why you never get laid.”

  “Great. Not only do I almost get my ass kicked by the goon squad, but now my best friend is capping on my nonexistent sex life.”

  “FYI, I’m the one who saved you from the ass-kicking,” I say. “Again.”

  That shuts him up.

  “Any more questions?” I ask.

  “Yeah. Can I borrow some money?”

  CHAPTER 10

  It’s just past eleven o’clock in the evening, late September, with the sky clear and the moon waxing its way to full and the look of a party that’s waning when I walk in the door. I’m wearing my navy blue suit with a white shirt, royal blue tie, black oxfords, and black wool socks. I’m clean, trimmed, pressed, and polished. I’m everything the well-dressed private detective should be. Everything, that is, except I’m not holding a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

  The problem with parties is that they’re usually made up of people.

  Not that I don’t like people. I like people just fine. But when you gather a group of them together in one place and mix them with alcohol, there’s bound to be trouble. And trouble and I are too well acquainted to just ignore one another.

  I walk up to the bar—a modern, half-moon-shaped back bar with a sink, tap, hanging beer glasses, a full complement of liquor bottles lined up like soldiers in front of a beveled mirror, and four double cross-back brushed metal stools, three of which are occupied.

  Frank and Joe Hardy are chatting up Nancy Drew at the bar, the three of them sitting close enough they could be conjoined triplets. Nancy is a cute little number definitely worth more than a glance or two. Speaking of glances, she gives one to each of her suitors, packaged with a coy smile as she plays with her hair and runs a delicate, pale hand along one of her thighs. You don’t have to be a detective to know that before tonight becomes tomorrow, the three of them are going to end up investigating one another.

  “Good evening, Mr. Marlowe,” says the bartender, polite and proper in his black shirt and his black tie and his white smile. “What can I get for you?”

  “Bourbon sounds good,” I say.

  “And how would you like your bourbon, sir?”

  “Any way at all.”

  The bartender grabs a bottle of Jim Beam off the shelf and in the mirror I see myself and the reflection of the room behind me, where Columbo and Thomas Magnum play a friendly game of eight-ball on the billiards table while Kojak sits by, sucking on a lollipop and ribbing both of the other detectives in fun, waiting to challenge the winner.

  Off in the corner behind the three sleuths, Mike Hammer and Harry Callahan are drinking beers and brewing up a batch of testosterone, their voices growing louder and their faces turning the color of ripe tomatoes. Though I’m betting it’s more from their short fuses than from the alcohol. Both of them have the look of a man it would pay to get along with and right now, neither one of them is taking out his wallet. Sooner or later, one of them is going to take out his fists instead.

  I’m guessing sooner.

  The bartender sets my bourbon down in front of me, on the rocks. I thank him with a nod and go to see what the rest of the party has to offer when I notice movement out of the corner of my eye. I turn to look and catch Sherlock Holmes dressed in a camouflage of greens and browns disappearing behind two six-foot-high potted ferns. A moment later, I don’t see any sign of him.

  I never understood the English way of doing things.

  As I walk down the hallway, the door to a bathroom opens in front of me and out stumble Shaggy, Fred, Daphne, and Velma in a cloud of smoke, laughing so hard they can barely stand up. I’m guessing they weren’t smoking tobacco. They look at me and stop laughing, their faces contorting to suppress their mirth. Fred puts a finger to his lips, then they tiptoe past me back toward the bar, letting out an occasional snort of laughter along the way.

  I don’t see any sign of Scooby.

  When I turn around, Monk is coming down the hallway toward me, wearing light brown tweed pants, a dark brown tweed jacket, and a plaid shirt buttoned up to his throat with no tie. He takes measured steps, avoiding the seams in the tiled floor, and reaches out with a single index finger to touch the top right corner of each piece of art as he passes.

  When he reaches me, he gives a nervous smile and a single nod and presses himself against the wall until he slides past and slips into the bathroom, closing the door with his foot.

  I stare at the door a moment, contemplating my next move, then I take my drink and escort it the rest of the way down the hall.

  In the great room, I find the rest of the guests, though as I suspected the party is either sparsely attended or running itself out. Or both.

  Sam Spade is sharing drinks and cigars and a spirited discussion with Lord Peter Wimsey and Auguste Dupin, until Inspector Jacques Clouseau stumbles into the three of them, knocking their drinks from their hands and somehow managing to set Dupin on fire.

  At least this party still has some life to it.

  Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot sit in a pair of matching leather wingbacks, drinking brandy in snifters and reciting “Ten Little Indians” together and giggling like a couple of kids.

  “Seven little Indians, all chopping sticks. One chopped himself in half, then there were six.”

  Over on the couch, Stephanie Plum is surrounded by a quartet of Ellery Queen, Joe Friday, Dick Tracy, and Charlie Chan, all of whom are vying for her charms. While it doesn’t look like any of them has a chance of getting more than a good slap, I’d put my money on Tracy. One, I’m thinking he’s more Plum’s type. And two, he’s got the right first name for the job.

  The rest of the cocktail party guests include Spenser, Angel, Shaft, Sonny Crockett, and Rico Tubbs, the last two of whom are wearing suits and jackets that have no business being out in public. Meanwhile, Nick Monday, apparently the host, walks around the room shaking everyone’s hand before he disappears down the hallway toward the bar.

  I look around to see if I’ve missed anyone. Other than Nancy, Stephanie, Daphne, and Velma, this party is heavy on five o’clock shadows and aftershave. Even if you throw in Miss Marple, who’s old enough to be my grandmother, the odds aren’t in favor of any man making good use of anything but the palm of his hand.

  Except for Frank and Joe Hardy, who just walked through the room toward the back of the house with Nancy Drew leading them like a couple of pet Labradors.

  I wander over to give my regards to Spenser and Spade, my bourbon tagging along. After making some small talk and watching as Chan and Queen bow out of the Stephanie Plum Sweepstakes, I finish off my bourbon, then head back down the hallway to give the ice in my cocktail glass some more company.

  The bartender stands alone behind the bar, looking polite and lonely. Kojak is now playing eight-ball against Magnum while Columbo walks around in his trench coat with a drink in one hand and the other hand pressed to his forehead like he feels a migraine coming on. Hammer and Holmes are wrestling on the floor next to an uprooted fern as Dirty Harry backs Monday into a corner with his fists and a sardonic grin.

  “Do you feel lucky?” says Callahan. “Well do y
ou, punk?”

  I head over to the bar and hand the bartender my drink with the lonely ice and turn to see if Holmes can get out of the headlock Hammer has him in. My money’s on Hammer. Logic and astute observation might be helpful when solving a crime, but they’re not much good in a bar fight with a violent misanthrope.

  Just as my ice returns with a full complement of bourbon, Ace Ventura walks into the room, sits down at the bar next to me, and orders a Pink Squirrel. When the bartender informs him he doesn’t have any crème de cacao, Ventura asks for a Funky Monkey. Again, the bartender explains, no crème de cacao.

  “Fine,” says Ventura in a huff. “Just give me a Greyhound, then.”

  He turns to look at me with a big grin and shrugs. “What are you gonna do?”

  “Maybe next time order a real drink,” I say, holding up mine as an example.

  “Whatever,” he says, then holds his finger and his thumb in the shape of an L on his forehead and calls me a loser in twice as many syllables as necessary.

  I’d put my drink down and teach him a lesson, but that’s not my style. Plus I’ve grown fond of my bourbon. So I just smile and take a drink and wonder if Dirty Harry would consider redirecting his anger.

  Ventura spins around in his chair to survey the room, then spins back to face me.

  “So is everyone in here a douche bag?” he says. “Or did you just win an award?”

  His pupils are dilated and his skin looks like it’s stretched a little too tight across his cheeks. His left eye twitches once. Twice.

  “Hmm,” I say.

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means, hmm.”

  The bartender arrives just in time with the Greyhound, which Ventura proceeds to down in three gulps before slamming the empty glass back on the bar.

  “All righty, then!” He wipes his mouth, gives me the finger, then turns around and bends over and says, “It was nice to meet you,” with his butt cheeks before he stands up and walks out of the room.

  Holmes calls out “Uncle” and Kojak scratches on the eight-ball as I watch Ventura disappear down the hallway. I turn back to the bartender, order another Greyhound, and take a sip of bourbon as I wait for the bartender to mix the drink. Once he’s done, I palm a capsule into the Greyhound, then take it and my bourbon and go in search of the pet detective to see if he’d like another drink.

  CHAPTER 11

  “Do you have a second?” Angela stands just outside my office, leaning in as if she doesn’t want to make a commitment. Which is the story of her life. She’s broken up more times than Elizabeth Taylor and Henry VIII combined.

  “Sure,” I say. “My place or yours?”

  “Mine.”

  “I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

  It’s the last week of September, which means it’s the end of the quarter and everyone’s putting in extra time writing up reports for the new releases, including me.

  I turn back to my computer, where I’m reading some of the complaints we’ve had for The Fox Mulder, based on the character from The X-Files. While it tested well and was listed among the Top Television Characters requested among men aged 50-59, apparently it’s causing some undesirable behaviors, including paranoia, obsessive behavior, obstinacy, self-importance, and a predilection for pornography. One customer apparently ran up more than five hundred dollars’ worth of charges on Internet porn sites during his experience, claiming he just couldn’t help himself.

  It’s not often we release a clunker. Each Big Ego goes through a testing phase that prevents something like a Fox Mulder from hitting the marketplace, but apparently this one managed to slip through. Still, for every Fox Mulder we have solid releases like The Dalai Lama, The Orson Welles, and The Princess Leia. When it comes to hits versus misses, our track record is better than most Hollywood movie studios.

  Say what you want, but we’ve never put out anything as bad as The Adventures of Pluto Nash.

  In addition to the rare miss like The Fox Mulder, we occasionally get complaints of headaches, blurred vision, separation anxiety, and nausea. Most people aren’t prepared for the experience of being someone else and it can create a feeling of imbalance, not unlike being on the ocean or experiencing some airplane turbulence. It takes a bit to get used to. After the first few experiences, the nausea for most people goes away, though we have had an occasional report of vertigo. And while depression isn’t as much of an issue as it used to be, we offer serotonin boosts and psychiatric customer support as part of every Ego package. You should see the legalese that’s included in your purchase.

  I’ve never personally experienced any of the side effects some of our customers have reported and, to my knowledge, neither has anyone on my team. When used properly, Big Egos are a safe and effective way to have a reality-shifting experience without the long-term cumulative effects of hallucinogenic drugs like LSD or mushrooms or mescaline. And it’s far superior to any virtual reality technology or role-playing game. You don’t need a headset or 3-D goggles or a gaming platform. You are the platform. And unlike virtual reality, it’s not a simulation.

  Of course, part of the popularity of Big Egos is that we’re offering something that people want. The ability to become someone else. To walk in someone else’s proverbial shoes. To not only see what life is like through someone else’s eyes but to feel it. To live it. To experience an existence that doesn’t belong to you.

  A lot of people aren’t really who they want to be.

  They live the lives they choose to live rather than the ones they imagined. They don’t go confidently in the direction of their dreams. They eschew Thoreau’s advice and instead live vicariously through the lives of others. Rather than talking about themselves, they talk about other things. Other people. People whose lives are more interesting and exciting than their own.

  Celebrities. Movie stars. Professional athletes.

  They sit around tables in coffee break rooms or outside office buildings smoking cigarettes and talking about television shows and movies and sports. Talking about them as if they had nothing else to talk about. Focusing on the lives of other people rather than on their own existence.

  When they get home, they sit around and watch reality television shows and celebrity gossip programs. They read online magazines like People and Sports Illustrated and the National Enquirer. They surf the Internet for news and updates on all the latest entertainment and sports news, spending endless amounts of energy and attention on people they’ve never met.

  When they get together socially, they talk about their favorite episodes or moments from television sitcoms. They quote their favorite movies and lines from their favorite shows and pearls of wisdom from their favorite characters. They listen to the rhetoric of talk-show hosts and regurgitate their ideas.

  This is their idea of originality. This is how they define themselves. Not by their own actions and thoughts and deeds, but by those of people they see on television and hear on the radio and read about on the Internet.

  Oscar Wilde once said: “Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.”

  Although his quote occurred during the death throes of the nineteenth century, it’s as relevant today as it was back then.

  We’ve become a society of voyeurs, coveting other people’s lives to make up for the fact that our own lives are dull and uninspiring and filled with ennui. So it only makes sense that Big Egos would become so popular. It’s the perfect product at the perfect time.

  I finish reading the reports on The Fox Mulder disaster, then I walk out of my office to see what Angela wants to talk to me about.

  “I want your hairy body on top of me.”

  Kurt is listening to his voice mail on speaker again.

  Sometimes I wonder if these are women he’s actually been with or if he’s just getting callbacks from a sex-line number. Except I’ve seen Kurt in action. While he might have shopped in the bargain bin
for good looks, when it comes to confidence, Kurt paid top dollar.

  And like I always tell Nat, women dig confidence.

  Slurp, slurp, slurp.

  The sound is coming from Neil’s workstation. Three slurps, then a short pause followed by more slurping. Which means it must be juice box time.

  Every Monday morning, Neil brings in five organic, single-serving juice boxes and puts them in the refrigerator in the break room. He puts them in the same location, on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator on the far left-hand side, lined up single file front to back with the labels facing forward. No one is supposed to touch his juice boxes. Not even to move them in order to make room for something else. He’s made this very clear.

  Then, every morning starting precisely at 10:15, Neil drinks one of his juice boxes. It takes him ten minutes to drink most of it, then he spends another five minutes slurping the container until it’s empty. And it always takes him exactly fifteen minutes. Not fourteen minutes and fifty-seven seconds. Not fifteen minutes and five seconds. But fifteen minutes on the dot.

  Slurp, slurp, slurp.

  I glance up at the clock. So far this morning, he’s been slurping for two minutes.

  My guess is he slurps the same number of times during those five minutes, but no one in the office has ever bothered to keep count. Vincent tried once but lost track and gave up. We all just assume it’s the same number of times each day.

  “How’s it going, Neil?” I ask, stopping outside his workstation.

  He doesn’t turn around and say anything or even acknowledge my presence, just continues his ritualistic emptying of his juice box.

  Slurp, slurp, slurp.

  “Okay then,” I say. “Good talking to you.”

  I walk past Vincent’s workstation, where he’s reclining in his desk chair with an Entertainment Weekly over his face. I don’t always find him like this with a copy of Entertainment Weekly. Some days it’s Rolling Stone. Other days it’s Sports Illustrated. Every now and then, it’s a Playboy.

  At least he’s keeping himself well-read.