Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis Read Free Book Online Page B

herself but probably shouldn’t. She was discovered dancing on the beach in Miami and has been half-naked in an Aerosmith video, in
Playboy
and twice on the cover of the
Sports Illustrated
swimwear issue as well as on the cover of four hundred magazines. A calendar she shot in St. Bart’s has sold two million copies. Abook called
The Real Me
, ghostwritten with Bill Zehme, was on the
New York Times
best-seller list for something like twelve weeks. She is always on the phone listening to managers renegotiating deals and has an agent who takes fifteen percent, three publicists (though PMK basically handles
everything)
, two lawyers, numerous business managers. Right now Chloe’s on the verge of signing a multimillion-dollar contract with Lancôme, but a great many others are also in pursuit, especially after the “rumors” of a “slight” drug problem were quickly “brushed aside”: Banana Republic (no), Benetton (no), Chanel (yes), Gap (maybe), Christian Dior (hmm), French Connection (a joke), Guess? (nope), Ralph Lauren (problematic), Pepe Jeans (are we kidding?), Calvin Klein (done that), Pepsi (sinister but a possibility), et cetera. Chocolates, the only food Chloe even remotely likes, are severely rationed. No rice, potatoes, oils or bread. Only steamed vegetables, certain fruits, plain fish, boiled chicken. We haven’t had dinner together in a long time because last week she had wardrobe fittings for the fifteen shows she’s doing this week, which means each designer had about one hundred twenty outfits for her to try on, and besides the two shows tomorrow she has to shoot part of a Japanese TV commercial and meet with a video director to go over storyboards that Chloe doesn’t understand anyway. Asking price for ten days of work: $1.7 million. A contract somewhere stipulates this.
    Right now she’s wearing a black Prada halter gown with black patent-leather sandals and metallic-green wraparound sunglasses she takes off as soon as she sees me approaching.
    “Sorry, baby, I got lost,” I say, sliding into the booth.
    “My savior,” Chloe says, smiling tightly.
    Roy, Quentin, Kato and Eric split, all severely disappointed, muttering
hey man
s to me and that they’ll be at the opening tomorrow night, but Baxter Priestly stays seated—one collar point sticking in, the other sticking out, from under a Pepto-Bismol-pink vest—sucking on a peppermint. NYU film grad, rich and twenty-five, part-time model (so far only group shots in Guess?, Banana Republic and Tommy Hilfiger ads), blond with a pageboy haircut, dated Elizabeth Saltzman like I did, wow.
    “Hey man,” I sigh while reaching over the table to kiss Chloe on the mouth, dreading the upcoming exchange of pleasantries.
    “Hey Victor.” Baxter shakes my hand. “How’s the club going? Ready for tomorrow?”
    “Do you have the time to listen to me whine?”
    We sit there sort of looking out over the rest of the room, my eyes fixed on the big table in the center, beneath a chandelier made of toilet floats and recycled refrigerator wire, where Eric Bogosian, Jim Jarmusch, Larry Gagosian, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, and oddly enough, Ricki Lake are all having salads, which touches something in me, a reminder to deal with the crouton situation before it gets totally out of hand.
    Finally sensing my vibe, Baxter gets up, pockets his Audiovox MVX cell phone, which is sitting next to Chloe’s Ericsson DF, and clumsily shakes my hand again.
    “I’ll see you guys tomorrow.” He lingers, removes the peppermint from full pink lips. “Until then, um, I guess.”
    “Bye, Baxter,” Chloe says, tired but sweet, as usual.
    “Yeah, bye, man,” I mutter, a well-practiced dismissal, and once he’s barely out of earshot I delicately ask, “What’s the story, baby? Who was that?”
    She doesn’t answer, just glares at me.
    Pause. “Hey, honey, you’re looking at me like I’m at a Hootie and the Blowfish concert. Chill.”
    “Baxter Priestly?” she says-asks