I climbed into the inconspicuous lavender gray caravan; it’s headlights peering into both eye’s iris. In the dashboard glow of the van’s interior, I fished the phone from my pocket and made a call. On the other end, the voice responded with news of distress. The driver and I thought about our face options: altruism, apathy, indifference, but then genuine concern rose into our cheeks. She turned the steering wheel to the east direction, then four blocks later, to the west direction where it stayed until the search and recovery team was assembled. One arose from sleep, the other from a shower, and the two originals, including myself, detoured from our quest, diverged onto a path full of flashing lights and raving sound.
I remember the pearl white lane changes and crimson brake lights that guided our fifty-five minute drive into the streets of downtown Los Angeles. The rest of the night went as follows.
-Sixteen year olds dressed down from dinner party attire.
-Carnival sounds, and blazing orange bulbs on spinning indigo saucers.
-A steel perforated gate and electric lime roadblock.
-The inside of an “open 24-hour,” International House of Pancakes.
-Valencia orange juice in a glass.
-Handprint bruises wrapped around our rescued companion’s neck.
-A lacquered black grand piano sitting in the lobby of a twelve-floor hotel.
-Fishnet stockings pulled up over thongs, and tucked under harlequin skirts.
-Stairs and an elevator, an elevator and stairs (semi-spiral).
-The frost-like charcoal eyeliner under a blonde’s eyes, her gilded locks falling just before her shoulders, elbows slightly bent into the cherry blossom pink dress that hung a foot above her knees. A bright yellow modish corset flowed from out of her dress near her hips and rested above her shoulder tops. Her translucent bubbly heels that looked like shoe molded out of boiling water rose with the giddiness of ten thousand school children on a first day of class.
-Her eyes catching my stare through the mirror.
-The drive home, completely dozed.
