From the Memoirs of a Non-Enemy Combatant: A Novel Read Free

friend I knew from Manila, where she’d modeled my first show. She was letting me use her place while she was away in Thailand doing a skin-whitening campaign for Oil of Olay. Dasha was a stunning, dark beauty, but at twenty-six she was already considered too old for the New York market. So whenever fashion week came around, she purposely booked a high-profile job abroad. Since there was an unquenchable thirst for dark-haired white girls in Southeast Asia, it was there that Dasha madeher living. In fact, before I left Manila, her face had been plastered on billboards along the South Super Highway for some new cosmetic band-aid that wrapped over one’s nose.
    I had Dasha’s address written down on the back of her modeling card, right next to her hips, waist, and bust. The cab let me out in front of her building on Ludlow Street, one of those glossy high-rise structures that loudly pronounced itself against the old-world tenements of the Lower East Side.
    The doorman greeted me as I stepped into the lobby, my luggage in tow. He was a friendly Hispanic who kept a nice trim mustache. I introduced myself as Dasha’s friend, and he in turn handed me a spare set of keys. “Wait a sec,” he said at once, “I almost fuhgot.” He produced a folded note from under his station and gave me a little wink, as if something had been understood. “Have a good night, guy,” he said.
    “Thanks, guy,” I said, repeating him. Both cabbies had also called me “guy.” I was quickly learning how to converse with New York’s working class.
    Boy,
    Welcome. Here is your key. Top lock is broken. Please don’t overwater the ficus. And don’t mind Olya, she’s cool.
    Ciao,
Dasha
    P.S. Make sure Olya doesn’t overwater the ficus either. I already told her, but she’s so forgetful you know?
    This was the first I’d heard of Olya. But I wasn’t at all bothered. Only when I was working did I demand complete solitude.
    On the tenth floor at the end of a long carpeted hallway, I knocked on the apartment door and waited. When there was no answer, I let myself in. All the lights were off and the blinds were drawn. I left my things in the kitchen and went to the bedroom, where I found Olya, topless, wearing nothing but her panties. She was fast asleep on her back with her legs in a side twist. Olya had a fantastic blond bob, though her body was rather pale and hollow and lacked the healthy luster of her hair. Her breasts were small and anticlimactic. In the corner of the bedroom was the ficus, sprouting from a pot of muddy water.
    I thought about covering her, but she had the sheets and comforter lodged between her legs. If she woke up with a complete stranger hovering over her, who knew how she would react? I reasoned the best course of action would be to reenact my entrance and make a lot of noise. This would surely rouse her, I thought.
    Silly, I know, but I went through the motions once again. For the second time I knocked on the door. When I felt certain she wasn’t getting up, I inserted the key into the lock, jiggled the door handle, dropped my suitcase in the kitchen, and slammed the door behind me. I called out, “Hello?” Still, there was no answer. “Hello?” I said again, much louder.
    “Who’s there?” said Olya. She had a calm, throaty voice.
    “I’m Boy. Dasha’s friend. You must be Olya?” I called into the room.
    “One minute, baby.” She began to cough, then hack a little. Waiting in the kitchen, I was greeted with the pleasant smell of a cigarette being smoked in bed.
    Olya came out in a red oriental robe, pinning her hair up with bobby pins.
    “You’re her friend from Asia?” she asked.
    “The Philippines.”
    “That’s the one I always forget.”
    Olya opened the fridge, removed a bottle of San Pellegrino, and guzzled.
    “She mentioned me?” I asked.
    Olya belched. “’Scuse. She said something. You’re staying a few days, yes?”
    “About a week.”
    “Eh? A week?”
    “Is something