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Sparkle (4)
Rodrigo didn't have books. Not a single one. I had been at his apartment before to cowork -- the staple past-time of urbanites who toil on largely solitary projects and like to pretend they still have some semblance of a social life -- but you don't notice these things when you're working. You notice how clean a space is. You notice if someone has air conditioning or heat, depending on the season. You notice their wi-fi speed. You notice the number of outlets. You notice the kind of coffee they serve and how they make it.
Rodrigo's apartment was pristine, he seemed like one of those people who left apartments and made the building managers wonder whether anyone had ever actually lived there. He had a network so airtight, you'd think he was running a satellite unit for the Department of Defense. His wi-fi was impeccable; he had eight outlets on a long strip under his couch so the cables didn't need to stretch all over the apartment when people came over to work. His coffee was a delightful Ethiopian brew, French pressed and he always seemed to have brownies and other treats even though he didn't strike me as having much of a sweet tooth.
I'd noticed all this. But I'd never thought about the books. I hadn't looked. I hadn't had reason to look. Now I had reason. As I walked in the door -- with nothing under my coat -- the books suddenly became very relevant. The alleged quote from John Waters scurried across my mind: "If you go home with somebody and they don't have books, don't fuck them." I scanned the place for books. Any books.
For nine seconds anyway. After he closed the door behind him, I let the coat fall to the floor and soon we were on the floor, too.
Afterward, noticing the bipolar California autumn day had cooled considerably, he wrapped me in a blanket and cooked me breakfast, somehow knowing that my favorite food in the whole wide world is bacon and I like it best in the late afternoon. He set up a little table for me, fed me, cleared the table, set up my laptop, got me an ashtray, and poured me some coffee. He let me write for hours without bothering me, stopping by now and again to empty the ashtray and refill my coffee -- with just the right amount of sugar.
At nightfall, he turned off his computer and asked me to join him on the couch. He turned on the television and began to scan his digital archive of movies. The man has more movies than I have books. I wondered briefly, with some disdain, whether he was one of those L.A. characters who couldn't say anything without alluding to a movie ("it's how dad did it, it's how America does it, and it's worked out pretty well so far." Yes, he was) and I was judging him because I am one of those characters who can't say anything without referencing a book, and these conversations never end well.
I don't really watch movies. My interest in film is limited to Fellini's art cinema era and campy post-Depression film noir, with the occasional really bad action or apocalyptic movie -- the bigger the explosion, the better.
Books, meet movies. Stretched out on the couch with my back against his chest as The Bourne Identity began to play, I wondered how many movies I'd seen that were better than the book. I could only think of two: Death in Venice and A Clockwork Orange -- the latter only if we were talking about the original version of the book with the incongruous last chapter.
There is no way I could have known that one day I would add my modest handful of Luis Buñuel, Federico Fellini and Raymond Chandler-inspired class of flicks to his huge repository, or that one day my shelves would surround his furniture. All I knew is that I was getting involved with a man who didn't read. Clearly, this would never work out.
I'd had this feeling. When we first started talking about dating, I'd done my best to sabotage the effort. On our first date, I'd taken him to a diner at an ungodly hour -- because that suited my schedule, and who cares if he has work the next day? Undeterred, he delivered an incredible monologue about his love of diner coffee, suggesting that the terrible, watered down and simultaneously burned-tasting dark liquid was the
