American Psycho

“Well, why not? Carruthers is out of town.”

“Might as well hire someone from an escort service,” he shouts bitterly, almost without thinking.

“Why?” I shout.

“Because she’s go

“No way,” I scream.

“Listen, I put up with it too,” Price shouts, lightly shaking his glass. Ice cubes clank loudly, surprising me. “Meredith’s the same way. She expects to be paid. They all do.”

“Price?” I take a large gulp of Scotch. “You’re priceless…”

He points behind him. “Where do those tracks go?” Laser lights start flashing.

“I don’t know,” I say after a long time, I don’t even know how long.

I get bored watching Price, who is neither moving nor speaking. The only reason he occasionally turns away from the train tracks is to look for Madison or Ricardo. No women anywhere, just an army of professionals from Wall Street in tuxedos. The one female spotted is dancing alone in a corner to some song I think is called “Love Triangle.” She’s wearing what looks like a sequined tank top by Ronaldus Shamask and I concentrate on that but I’m in an edgy pre-coke state and I start chewing nervously on a drink ticket and some Wall Street guy who looks like Boris Cu

I follow Price back past the bar and the dance floor, past the basement, and upstairs, past the long line for the women’s room which is strange since there seem to be no women at the club tonight, and then we’re in the men’s room, which is empty, and Price and I slip into one of the stalls together and he bolts the door.

“I’m shaking,” Price says, handing me the small envelope. “You open it.”

I take it from him, carefully unfolding the edges of the tiny white package, exposing the supposed gram—it looks like less to the dim fluorescent light of the men’s room.

“Jeez,” Price whispers in a surprisingly gentle way. “That’s not a helluva lot, is it?” He leans forward to inspect it.

“Maybe it’s just the light,” I mention.

“What the fuck is Ricardo’s problem?” Price asks, gaping at the coke.

“Shhh,” I whisper, taking out my platinum American Express card. “Let’s just do it.”

“Is he fucking selling it by the milligram?” Price asks. He sticks his own platinum American Express card into the powder, bringing it up to his nose to inhale it. He stands there silently for a moment, and then gasps “Oh my god” in a low, throaty voice.

“What?” I ask.

“It’s a fucking milligram of… Sweet’n Low,” he chokes.

I do some of it and come to the same conclusion. “It’s definitely weak but I have a feeling if we do enough of it we’ll be okay—” But Price is furious, red-faced and sweating; he screams at me as if this was my fault, as if buying the gram from Madison was my idea.

“I want to get high off this, Bateman,” Price says slowly, his voice rising. “Not sprinkle it on my fucking All-Bran!”

“You can always put it in your café au lait,” this prissy voice in the next stall cries out.

Price stares at me, eyes widening in disbelief, then flies into a rage and whirls around, pounding his fist against the side of the stall.

“Calm down,” I tell him. “Let’s do it anyway.”

Price turns back to me and, after ru

We wait for a sign and then the voice in the next stall finally lisps, “It’s okay with me…”

“Fuck yourself!” Price roars.

“Fuck yourself,” the voice mimics.

“No, fuck yourself,” Price screams back, trying to scramble over the aluminum divider, but I pull him down with one hand and in the next stall the toilet flushes and the unidentified person, obviously u

“That’s the spirit,” I say. We take turns digging our respective cards into the envelope until what we can’t get with the cards we press our fingers into and snort or lick off the tips then rub into our gums. I’m not anywhere near high but another J&B might give the body a false enough impression to kick in some kind of rush no matter how weak.

Stepping out of the stall we wash our hands, inspecting our reflections in the mirror, and, once satisfied, head back to the Chandelier Room. I’m begi

I’m feeling good and I shout out to her, “Hey, don’t you go to NYU?”

She shakes her head, unsmiling.

“Hunter?” I shout.

She shakes her head again. Not Hunter.

“Columbia?” I shout—though that’s a joke.

She continues to concentrate on the bottle of Stoli. I decide not to continue the conversation and just slap the drink tickets on the bar as she places the two glasses in front of me. But she shakes her head and shouts, “It’s after eleven. Those aren’t good anymore. It’s a cash bar. That’ll be twenty-five dollars,” and without complaining, playing it totally cool, I pull out my gazelleskin wallet and hand her a fifty which she eyes, I swear, contemptuously and, sighing, turns to the cash register and finds my change and I say, staring at her, quite clearly but muffed by “Pump Up the Volume” and the crowd, “You are a fucking ugly bitch I want to stab to death and play around with your blood,” but I’m smiling. I leave the cunt no tip and find Price who is standing again, morosely, by the railings, his hands gripping the steel bars. Paul Owen, who is handling the Fisher account, is wearing a six-button double-breasted wool tuxedo and he stands next to Price screaming something like “Ran five hundred iterations of discounted cash flow minus on an ICM PC took company cab to Smith and Wollensky.”

I hand the drink to Price, while nodding to Paul. Price says nothing, not even thanks. He just holds the drink and mournfully stares at the tracks and then he squints and bends his head down to the glass and when the strobe lights start flashing, he stands up straight and murmurs something to himself.

“Aren’t you high?” I ask him.

“How are you?” Owen shouts.

“Very happy,” I say.

The music is one long, unending song that overlaps with other, separate songs co

“Why aren’t you wearing a tuxedo?” Owen asks, behind me.

“I’m leaving,” Price shouts. “I’m getting out.”

“Leaving what?” I shout back, confused.

“This,” he shouts, referring to, I’m not sure but I think, his double Stoli.

“Don’t,” I tell him. “I’ll drink it.”