At class that night I confirmed with Li and Myles that they were still planning on making it to our place on Saturday afternoon, and promised them that there’d be a home-cooked dinner. Of course they both said yes, as any rational person does when presented with the chance for a free (and hopefully decent) meal. I think they were probably looking forward to seeing where I lived, since they both had this image of me as some sort of jet-setting gazillionaire. I didn’t know if they knew I was married to Emmy De Lascaux, since it’d never really come up, but maybe they did and were hoping to meet a real-life rock star, too.
At work on Friday, Angela sent me a text asking when I was going to get home. When I asked why, she replied, “Don’t forget you're mine this weekend, and this weekend starts when you get done with work”.
Smiling, I texted, “I see how it is. You just want me for my body.” Then, a moment later, “I’m OK with that.”
A winking smiley face emoji was Angela’s reply, so I sent, “I’ll be home by 5 or so”.
“C U then”, Angela sent back, with a kiss emoji.
Thinking about how lucky I was to have two loving, beautiful women in my life, I sent Emmy a text to tell her I was thinking of her and I missed her.
“Angela told me you have a project for school you need to work on.”, Emmy replied a few minutes later. “I miss you very much.”
“I miss you, too”, I sent back. “I have to go to San Jose end of next week, but maybe I can come to New York for a couple of days afterwards.”
“I would love to see you”, Emmy sent back. “Even if it’s only for one or two days.”
“How much longer will you be in New York?” I asked.
“Another month, I think,” Emmy said. “This album is taking ever so much more studio work than any we have done before.”
“Are you happy with what you’ve done so far?” I asked.
“Yes, very much. It is amazing! We are rising to a completely new level.”
“I can’t wait to hear it”, I said. “Call me tonight when you head to bed. I want to hear your voice”, I sent. “But I have to get back to work now. I love you and miss you”.
“I miss you, too, very much”, Emmy sent back as we finished our text convo.
That made my day quite a bit better, and in my good mood the afternoon flew by and soon enough it was time to head on home.
Jake caught me on my way out. “Judging by that smile on your face, I’d have to guess you’re headed back to New York to see your wife again,” he joked.
“No, not this weekend,” I said. “I’m just happy it’s Friday, that’s all.”
“Sure,” he said, his tone making it clear he didn’t believe me. “Well, have fun,” he said. “See you on Monday!”
“Have a good weekend, Jake,” I replied. “But not too good. There is a cap on the employee legal aid plan.”
Laughing, Jake said, “I’m not the one who drives like her ass is on fire.”
“What can I say?” I asked, shrugging.
Angela met me at the door of the condo with a kiss and instructions to change into casual clothes. “We’re going out for dinner as soon as you’re ready. Wear jeans or something like that.” Then, thinking about it for a moment, “Those faded Levis of yours. I love the way they look on you.”
Angela was wearing a very snug pair of gray stretch jeans with a few artful rips here and there, and some cute low-heeled ankle boots. She had on a sort of black long-sleeved top that left her midriff bare, all the better to show off her sculpted abs.
Keeping in mind the way Angela was dressed, I wore the jeans she liked with a pair of Chuck Taylors, and a white T shirt and white denim jacket to finish it off. The weather was still warm, but it could get cool in the evenings, especially if we were going near the coast.
As we left the condo Angela grabbed her black leather jacket, thinking the same thing I had, that the evening might cool off if we were out late.
In the garage, I went to head to the X6, but Angela grabbed my hand and pulled me to her little convertible. “I’m driving tonight,” she announced, as if daring me to contradict her.
“I’ve been looking forward to a ride in your new car,” I said, giving her hand a squeeze. This seemed to be the right answer, judging by the pleased smile I got in return.
Instead of heading west towards Santa Monica, which I’d somehow gotten into my mind as our destination, Angela drove us east on city streets all the way to Downtown. She parked in an unremarkable pay lot, and took my hand to guide me to our destination. We turned a corner and I took in the unexpected sights. This was an old part of Downtown that I’d never seen before, the building fronts dating back to the early 1900s. Glancing around, I spotted the name of the building we were passing- The Bradbury.
“Hey, wait!” I said, stopping short. Since we were still holding hands, this brought Angela to a stop, too. “We have to check this place out,” I said, indicating the two sets of double doors in the building’s entry.
“But we’re going over there,” Angela protested, waving in the general direction of across the street.
“It’ll be just a minute,” I said, pulling her along. “I have to see the inside of this place.”
The Bradbury was clean, the brickwork immaculate and the tile floors swept and mopped. 'Not at all like in Blade Runner,' I mused as we walked into the central area of the ground floor and took in the several floors of cast iron handrails and support columns the building was famous for. Angela took a quick glance around and that was enough for her, but I wasn’t in such a hurry to leave, imagining Roy Batty chasing Deckard up to the roof.
Finally, I had my fill and we left, but I made a mental note to take Stephanie there some day when she was up in Los Angeles. She'd love seeing it.
True to Angela’s word, our destination was just across the street and a couple of doors down. I’d heard people mention the Grand Central Market, but I’d never visited the place before. It was fairly crowded, mostly people from the many offices in the area getting something to eat after work. Angela knew where she was going and led me straight to the Latin American spice shop, where she quickly selected a few things and paid for them before I could even offer. Another stop got her some veggies and fruits from the produce stand, and then her shopping was done.
“What would you like to eat?” Angela asked. “My favorites here are the ramen place, the pupuseria, and the Texas barbecue.”
“Pupu what?” I asked as Angela tugged me along.
“Pupusas are the national dish of El Salvador,” Angela said. “They’re a bit like a cross between a tamale and a tortilla. Sort of.”
“Let’s try that, then,” I said. “I’m always up for something new.”
The line was surprisingly long, which I viewed as a good sign. As we neared the order counter, I scanned the menu board. “How big are they? I mean, is one enough? Should I order two?”
“Two,” Angela replied, decisively. “If it isn’t enough, we’ll try something else, if you’re still hungry.”
Figuring that was a solid plan, I ordered one carne asada and one pork and cheese, while Angela selected two with chicharron.
“Chicharron- isn’t that pork rind?” I asked, a little bit intrigued and a little bit horrified.
“Usually,” Angela replied. “But I think here they use, um, bellies of porks? Not the skin?”
“Yeah, pork bellies,” the guy behind the counter confirmed. “All the taste, but not nearly the grease.”
“You can try a taste of mine,” Angela said as we stood aside to wait for our order.
Looking around the crowded aisles of the large indoor market, it struck me that nobody was staring in our direction. Sure, we’d get the occasional glance, or a quick once-over or slightly longer lingering appraisal, but none of the outright staring that I’d grown used when out in public with Emmy. The people checking Angela and I out were merely looking at two young women. Maybe Angela was prettier than most, and I was definitely taller than most men, let alone other women, but that just made us slightly interesting. Emmy, on the other hand, stood out in any crowd and captured everybody’s attention. When we were younger that was purely as a result of her looks, but now that she was a famous celebrity, it only made it that much more of a constant.
With Angela, though, I felt almost invisible, and it was a strange but welcome feeling. Nobody was asking for selfies, or wanted to talk about how much whatever song meant to them, or anything like that.
When our order was ready we found a table in a sort of dining hall up a short flight of stairs from the main market. Looking out the big, open doors to one side, I spotted that famous old angled train. “I wish that thing still ran,” I said, pointing at the lower train platform. “It did when I was a kid, but we didn’t come up to LA very much and I just don’t think it was ever on Mom’s radar.”
“There’s a much bigger, more modern one of those in Bogotá,” Angela said, looking where I was pointing. “In Castellano it’s called a funicular.”
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“I think it’s the same word in English,” I said as we sat down. “If that one was still running, it would have been fun to ride.”
“Maybe they will fix it and we can all three ride it sometime in the future?” Angela said with a shrug.
“It’s a date,” I said, smiling at the thought that Angela was planning on a future with Emmy and me. Sure, she’d said as much, but it was the little unconscious confirmations of the commitment that I found very reassuring. We’d jumped into the whole ‘household of three’ thing really fast, but I was becoming more and more comfortable with the idea that it could work out long-term.
I noticed Angela kept checking her watch as we ate, so I asked her, “Are we on some sort of schedule?”
“Yes, but we’re doing fine,” she said with a smile. “No hurry.”
“What’s next on the agenda?” I asked, curious.
“It’s a surprise,” Angela said. “I hope you like it.”
“Well, this was a surprise,” I said, indicating the market and the pupusas. “And I’ve enjoyed all this so far.”
“I have a whole weekend planned out,” Angela said. “And you promised I get to pick what we do.”
“Yes, I did, and so far it’s been great," I said, giving her a thumbs-up.
After we finished the pupusas (which were pretty much as Angela had described- like a really thick corn tortilla stuffed with whatever ingredients inside, or maybe a disk-shaped tamale) we went back downstairs for some ice cream cones.
Walking back to the car, I asked Angela how she’d ever found out about the Market.
“When Antonio and I first moved here to Los Angels from Miami, I bought a guidebook,” she said, but I had a hard time paying attention to anything but the sight of her pink tongue delicately licking the ice cream. How ridiculous was it that I was getting turned on by a sugary dessert?
“Since I had nothing to do during the days but work out, that left me plenty of time to use the book to explore while Antonio worked,” Angela continued.
“That’s actually a great idea,” I said as I finished off my cone. “Do you still have the book?”
"Yes, and my plan for Sunday is to check off something I’ve wanted to do for a while now,” she answered, tossing the rest of her cone into a trash can as we passed. “I’m looking forward to it.”
Once again, Angela didn’t tell me where we were going, and getting on the 101 North really didn’t narrow it down much until she got off the freeway at the Sunset exit but turned north and then west on Hollywood Boulevard. As we made our way west past the Capitol Records Tower, I pointed out the giant record store on the left.
“See that place?” I asked. “Back in high school, Emmy took me and a couple of our friends there. She spent thousands of dollars on CDs that day,” I said. Remembering back, I said, “Some porn photographer tried to get her to pose for him.”
Looking at the front of the store, since we were stopped at the light, Angela’s brow wrinkled. “He was trying to get a school girl to pose?” she said, appalled.
“Yeah. Emmy was real polite to the guy- took his business card and everything. The name of the guy’s studio was ‘The Cathedral’ or something like that,” I said as we pulled away.
“Maybe ‘The Abbey’?” Angela asked.
“Yeah, something like that,” I said, shrugging.
“David Abbott is a world-famous photographer,” Angela said. “He does some nudes, but he’s not porn- if that was him.”
“Huh. Well, Emmy might still have the guy’s card, for all I know,” I said, pulling out my phone for a search. I found David Abbott’s wikipedia page, and sure enough, he did seem to be some sort of big deal in the art photography world. Sure, a lot of his pictures seemed to be sexy women, but just as many, if not more, were of street scenes, dancers, or portraits of what you would call ‘ordinary people’.
I kind of regretted jumping on the ‘Eww, he’s a porn dude’ bandwagon at the time. Maybe Emmy’s bid for fame might have started earlier if she’d actually contacted the guy five years back.
As a result of focusing on my phone, I failed to notice that Angela had turned off Hollywood Boulevard and into an underground parking garage.
It turned out to be that strange Classic Hollywood/Egyptian temple-themed shopping mall (yes, every bit as weird as it sounds), but that wasn’t our destination. We walked right through it and onto Hollywood Boulevard again, smack dab in the middle of the area where all the people dressed like superheroes and such pose for photos. We brushed right by all of them, and almost immediately turned into the entry courtyard for the Chinese Theatre.
I’d never been there, but how could you not recognize it? Angela walked right up to the will-call window and got our tickets- as she’d said, she had all this mapped out in advance.
“And here we are. We have to get popcorn. And sodas. And what are those chocolate candies? With mint inside?” Angela said as we neared the concessions counter. We were still early enough to miss the bulk of the crowds, so our line was short. Angela did as she’d promised, and soon enough we had two Cokes, a giant tub of popcorn and a box of Junior Mints. Somehow this all made me feel like a kid again, out on a date. Secretly, inside, I loved it. Just going out and having ordinary person fun was so refreshing after so many years of limousines, thousand-dollar dinners and so on.
The theatre was showing a re-run of the first Harry Potter movie, but in giant-screen Imax format, way bigger than life. I’d never really been that much of a Harry Potter fan, but I didn’t think the actual movie was the point. Angela picked us out a couple of seats in the middle towards the back, which kinda defeated the purpose of seeing the movie on such a ginormous screen, but again- I think the actual movie was secondary.
The theatre was just as spectacular inside as the photos make it look, with the giant columns, the ornate ceiling thing (I don’t even know what to call it), and the classic heavy curtains across the silver screen.
Angela had flipped the armrest between our seats up and out of the way so we could cuddle, and that was perfectly fine by me. We ate our popcorn, drank our sodas, ate our Junior mints, and snuck kisses and did some groping. In between, we might have caught a bit of the movie, too.
Yes, it was perfect. Angela had hit a home run on her first day of the weekend’s plan, and I was looking forward to the next two days.
But as it turned out, Angela wasn’t done. “If you think you might need to use the bathroom any time soon, now would be a good time,” she said as we exited the auditorium and into the lobby. “There aren’t any bathrooms where we’re going next.”
Back in the car, Angela plugged in yet another destination on her phone, and we were off again into the beautiful Hollywood night. She’d dropped the car’s top and the night air felt good, but I was glad for my denim jacket.
Angela steered us north into ever-smaller Hollywood Hills streets, bypassing a set of road barricades that said “Locals Only”. Eventually she found a parking spot and put the top back up. She grabbed a little backpack from behind the seat and handed me a flashlight.
“There aren’t any street lights,” she explained as we ducked through a small gap in a stucco wall and went around a locked gate. I’d figured out by this point that we were walking up to see the Hollywood sign up close, but Angela directed us away from the hiking trail, keeping us on the paved access road.
“This is better,” she said, and who was I to disagree? Clearly she’d been there before, and I never had, so I was happy to leave it up to her.
We passed a few other couples and small groups, mostly walking down from the top. Angela and I walked at a casual pace, hand in hand, not in any sort of hurry. The night was cooling off a bit, but even so, I was plenty warm with the exercise. The walk up the paved road was a bit over a mile, so about half an hour at strolling speed. The road led to the communications towers on the top of the hill, so we were actually looking down at the back of the sign rather than up at the front. Still, we had an incredible view, with the reservoir just to the right and Downtown off in the distance to the left. We stood there without speaking, just holding hands and admiring the view for a while.
“Thanks for bringing me up here,” I said at last, lifting Angela’s hand so I could kiss her knuckles. “This is really special.”
“I’m glad you like it,” Angela said. “I like it up here a lot, too.”
I wrapped her up in my arms, her back to my front so we could both keep looking out at the view. After a while I said to Angela, “You’re going to have a hard time topping this evening. The next couple of days will have a hard time measuring up to this.”
She leaned her head back against my shoulder and smiled up at me in the moonlight. “I’m glad you’ve enjoyed this, tonight. I have one more big surprise for you when we get home, and I hope you, um, I hope you like it,” she said, faltering a bit, unsure of herself.
“I’m sure I will,” I assured her, giving her a squeeze, getting a contented sigh in return.
Just as we were about to start down, my phone rang with an unusual ringtone, which I quickly recognized as a FaceTime call.
“Hey, Emmy!” I said as I answered the video chat. "I don’t know if you can see this through the phone, but we’re up above the Hollywood sign!” I said, turning the camera around to show her the view.
“That is beautiful!” Emmy explained. “Angela told me about her plans for this weekend. I am glad it is working out.”
“Hi, Em!” Angela said when I turned the camera on her. “We miss you!”
“I miss you two very much, also,” Emmy replied. “I wish I could have gone up there with you two.”
“We can come back up here when you get back to LA,” I said. “I guess Angela comes up here a lot.”
“I love it up here,” Angela confirmed.
“I am enjoying being here,” Emmy said, “But I do miss Los Angeles. There is a feeling of space there that is completely missing here. And of course, I miss being with you.”
We continued chatting as we walked back down the road to where we’d parked, mostly about how the recording was going, and about how Lee was such a taskmaster, making sure everything was absolutely perfect. Emmy and Jackson didn’t resent it, she was quick to point out, but it was very tiring.
When we got back to the car we said we loved Emmy and couldn’t wait to see her. Angela apparently had made plans to fly to New York on Tuesday, which made sense since I wasn’t going to be home much for the rest of the week. I promised that I’d see if I could bolt out of San Jose on Friday night, too, and with that, we hung up.
“You don’t mind I’m leaving early for New York, do you?” Angela asked.
“Of course not, Ange. But thanks for staying here with me this weekend. This has been a lot of fun.”
We were quiet on the drive home, each lost in our own thoughts. That was fine, it was nice and companionable nonetheless. I had my left hand on Angela’s leg, feeling the muscles shift and tense as she drove. Angela wasn’t a particularly fast driver, nor reckless, but she did seem to feel that traffic laws were merely vague suggestions that held little bearing on how one should behave behind the wheel. I chalked it up to her South American upbringing- just another one of her many charms.
Back at the condo, Angela told me to wait in the living room while she got my present from her room (which was, at this point, just for storing her stuff that she hadn’t unpacked yet).
She came out with a large, flat package wrapped in unmarked kraft paper. Shyly, she handed it to me and I could tell from the feel what it was, but I was surprised anyway when I peeled the paper off.
Angela had enlarged and framed a print of the photo I had taken that night, over a month before- the one of her nude, leaning forward against the railing of the balcony with the city lights in the distance. She was looking back over her shoulder at the camera, and the light from the fireplace to one side made her stunning curves somehow mysterious and tantalizing, rather than explicit.
It was a truly amazing photo, and I could hardly believe that I’d gotten so lucky to have taken an image of that quality.
“Do you like it?” Angela asked, self-consciously.
“I don’t just like it,” I said, “I absolutely adore it. This is amazing, Ange. I have one question, though- is this for me in specific, or for Emmy and me?”
“Um, well, for you, I guess? Why? Does it make a difference?”
“If it’s just for me, I’m going to take it to San Jose and put it up in the bedroom there, so I have something to look at when I’m up there by myself,” I answered.
Angela smiled at that, pleased that I appreciated the gift so much. And really, I did. It was unbelievably sexy, but elegant and artistic at the same time. It certainly was classy enough for public display and wouldn’t look out of place in a fine art gallery, but this was for my personal enjoyment alone.
Setting the picture aside, I swept Angela into my arms and gave her a big thank-you kiss, and she hugged me back with enthusiasm. Angela’s muscles weren’t merely window dressing, either- she had a really nice and strong hug when she wanted to.
Since it was late and we were both fairly tired, we took a quick shower instead of a soaking bath that night. We still had a little bit of soapy fun and still took the time to towel each other off, but it was clear we both just wanted to climb into bed and snuggle until we fell asleep.
I’d learned that Angela loved being the little spoon, and since I was a good eight or nine inches taller than her it worked out well. I loved the feeling of holding her in my arms, too, so it was a win for everybody involved.
Once we’d settled into our comfy positions, I asked, “What’s the plan for the morning?”
“We sleep in,” Angela murmured, already drifting off. “No workout tomorrow. Then we meet your car friends in Malibu.”
That was fine with me- It had been a few weeks since I’d gotten our with the crew, and I liked that Angela enjoyed riding with me when I drove.