The Informers - Bret Easton Ellis [54]
Well, have you gotten all my letters? I can’t remember how many I’ve sent—maybe four or five? Not a single letter from you, Sean. I’m shocked. No—just kidding. I’m not shocked, not really, I guess. I understand that your mood might be such that you wouldn’t feel much like writing. But see, I’d like to know just what your mood is.
Love,
Anne
• • •
Nov 10 1983
Dear Sean,
How are you? Your long silence has not unnerved me (should it?). I figure that your life is what it is and I can fully understand you not having the energy or inclination to write. But I hope you don’t mind the onslaught of letters from my direction.
It’s interesting to me what I want to write about to you. I could be telling you all the details of my sexual adventures and bragging about my latest conquests. But that stuff seems pretty silly. I mean, it sounds cool but in reality it’s awfully unoriginal. After a while it’s like, so what? Drugs and alcohol and the sex that stems from them are pretty damn common (well, a bit more out here, but still) wherever you happen to be. It’s all lost a lot of glamour for me. It’s fun but that’s all it is. I don’t know at what stage you are emotionally or how your life is going or how much karma you have and where it’s at but I feel pretty good about where I am. I mean, out here it’s kind of fun coasting around, meeting all these totally gorgeous guys (they’re stupid but oh so cute. Jealous? You shouldn’t be) and hanging out with all these rich, spoiled Beverly Hills kids in clubs and going to the beach and going to sleep every day on Valium, dressing up, staying out all night dancing and drinking and whatever at someone’s house on top of Mulholland. It’s all fun but it’s kind of getting boring. But I met this guy…
He’s head of production at some studio out here and we were introduced at one of my grandfather’s infamous bashes and we became friends. He has a Ferrari 308-GTB and we drive out to the desert, to Palm Springs, and go to his house and talk. Sean, the man is fascinating. His name is Randy and he’s thirty years old and going out with this model who’s off in New York this week for a shoot and he’s been all over the world—as we say: a total intellectual, very distanced and existential in the best sense of the word. I told him all about myself and about New York and Camden, about my life, and I let him read some of my stories. He liked them but was honest enough about them to tell me he didn’t think they were very commercial. Anyway he told me he’d love to read some more of my stuff. He also told me that he knows three vampires who live in Woodland Hills but out here you learn to take the good with the bad.
Randy is just one of the many interesting people out here whom I’ve met.
Just read this fabulous screenplay. A remake of Camus’s The Stranger with Meursault as a bi break-dancing punk rocker. Randy showed it to me. I loved it. Randy thinks “basically unfilmable” and that filming an orange rolling around a parking lot for three hours would draw a bigger audience.
Well, I hope you do manage to write me, but if you don’t … well, what can I say?
Love,
Anne
Nov 20 1983
Dear Sean,
I have to tell you more about Randy (remember? the studio exec?). He and I went up to his house on Mulholland, where we sat on his patio and watched the sunset. The moon was full and already visible as the sun was going down. Everything was so still and all there was was Randy and myself and his Ferrari, the wind, the Jacuzzi, the deepening colors of the sky. We shared a joint (yes, I smoked a little of it) and I thought of how lovely and relaxing it was to be away from everything and everyone. It helps me think more clearly, feel more clearly. Especially out in Palm Springs, where I am completely surrounded by desert—it’s so comforting. You figure it out. I’m sure there is a Psychological explanation for it. But I feel so mellow, so peaceful,