On the stroke of eight I rapped on the glass door and stood back, clearing my throat nervously.
The door swished open and the ex-holo star beamed at me. “Conway, how nice of you to come. And you’ve brought something; how sweet. Do come in.”
I passed her the bottle of Chardonnay and stepped into the lounge; the lighting was low and so was the music, something classical and… dare I say it… intimate?
I managed to drag my eyes away from Carlotta; she was not so much dressed as wrapped. In fact, sprayed on might be a better word to describe her faux chamois costume, a scant spiral of flesh-toned material which wound round her breasts, crossed her flat stomach and by some miracle managed to conceal her crotch. She was holding a long-stemmed champagne glass, and by the abstracted glaze in her eyes I guessed she’d been drinking for quite a while.
She swayed across to a bar and deposited the wine.
I looked around the long lounge. The first thing I noticed, much to my relief, was that we were not alone. Three guests stood chatting at the far end of the room, and standing beside them was the young woman I had yesterday assumed was Carlotta’s daughter. I wondered at the rivalry that might exist between the two women, for the younger was as beautiful, if not more so, than the older.
“Can I get you something, Conway?”
“Ah… a beer would be nice.”
While she poured an ice cold wheat beer, I looked around at the artwork on the walls. They were, I saw, stills taken from various holo-movies; it was half a minute before I realised that the women depicted were all Carlotta, in a dozen or so very different roles.
“I see you’re admiring the shots,” she said, passing my glass. “They’re the work of Ed Kalcheck, and needless to say they’re all originals.”
“Kalcheck?” I asked.
“The holo-movie director, of course. He directed most of my movies, and occasionally selected shots which he felt worked on their own merit. My favourite is this one,” she went on, indicating the shot of herself against the backdrop of a harbour, the full moon lighting her face. “It’s from the award-winning Charisma, of course, where I played a telepathic double-agent. I thought it my finest performance. You must know it – the telepath is tortured by the subjective truth she divines in the human soul. Her decision to turn against her former pay-masters symbolises her despair at ever learning what she craves: objective truth.”
“Ah...” I said, colouring. “Yes; yes. A great film.”
She swept on, “And of course you must recognise this one...” indicating a woman whose expression seems torn by anguish. “It’s from Winter’s Children, where I played a woman with the ability to look into the future, at the tragedy that awaits her.”
“Of course,” I said. “A classic.”
“I thought so too, Conway.”
She led me around the room, giving me not only a potted filmography of everything she’d ever appeared in, but a good indication of her personality. I wondered if breathtaking beauty was always accompanied by a monstrous ego.
I glanced over at the other guests; they were chatting away as if oblivious of our presence. I recognised none of them as locals, and wondered if they, like Luna, were off-worlders.
“But I’m not the only celebrity here tonight, Conway,” she laughed brightly with, I thought, a stab at false modesty.
“Oh…” I looked across at the guests, hoping at last to be introduced.
“I mean,” she said, laying an exquisitely manicured finger on my forearm, “you. I saw Opener of the Way, you see. It’s a stirring film, Conway. I thought–”
“It bore no relation to what happened,” I interrupted. “It was sensationalised–”
“But surely, Conway, it was sensationalised in order to attain a greater metaphorical truth?”
I snorted at this. “It was sensationalised to get a greater share of the box-office takings,” I said. “It misrepresented the characters and motives of my friends, and trivialised their past traumas. As for how I was portrayed...”
She laid a hand on my arm, her touch electrifying, leaned close and whispered, “Well, perhaps during my stay here I will get to know the real David Conway, yes?”
I smiled, and mumbled something.
“Anyway, what do you do with yourself these days, Conway?”
“Ah...” I opened my mouth, shrugged, and smiled stupidly. How I hated questions like these. In the months following the opening of the way, five years ago, reporters from across the Expansion had hot-footed it to Chalcedony to ask me similarly inane questions, expecting me to have made fabulous wealth, and be living in some palatial beachfront mansion. I think they were disappointed with what they found; a reticent, middle-aged beach-bum who liked nothing more than reading books and relaxing in the company of a select group of friends.
I decided to be honest. “I do nothing, other than read, and walk, and enjoy drinking with friends.”
Her reaction surprised me. I had expected her to be disappointed. “Do you know something, Conway? That sounds like the perfect sort of life, to me.”
I nodded. “I’m happy.”
“Happiness...” she said, and a faraway look came into her eyes.
I glanced towards the far end of the room. “Ah… who are the other guests?” I asked.
Luna returned to the present with a grim smile. “The three upright and handsome gentlemen are all my ex-husbands, Conway.”
I opened my mouth, tried to think of a suitable response, and failed.
“The blonde Nordic type is Bjorn Hansen, the explorer. I married him when I was far too young, just eighteen, and lived to regret the fool I was. To his right, the balding black man is Rudolph Carter, the banker.” She leaned close to me again. “I was twenty when I made that mistake. He was a sadist, and one of the finest. Physical and psychological – an expert. Needless to say, it didn’t last long.”
I stared at the group, aware that there was something strange about them, which I couldn’t quite put my finger on. “And the last one?”
“The tall, dark Latino is Edward Rodriguez, the actor. Another catastrophe. How was I to know he preferred boys, and only wanted me as a trophy?”
The odd thing, I thought, was that while we’d be talking about them, only the length of the room away, not once had they glanced in our direction. Seconds later I realised another odd thing: they all appeared to be roughly the same age, in their thirties – and yet if Luna had married Hansen when she was only eighteen...
Luna trilled a laugh. “I can see that you’re confused, Conway! Come on, I’ll introduce you.” She knocked back her drink and moved, unsteadily, towards the trio of failed husbands. I took her elbow, lest she trip on the plush carpet, and steered her across the room.
She paused before the group. “Now, which one of you... you detestable bastards will admit–” she hiccuped “–that you’re a bunch of self-centred, arrogant, talentless nothings?”
I looked away, knowing that I must have appeared the epitome of embarrassment.
I glanced at the girl, who stood a couple of metres away, demurely nursing a drink – but she failed to return my look. I wondered, briefly, who among the three men was her father: she appeared in her twenties, with raven hair and mocha skin: Rodriguez, then?
I glanced back at the group. Amazingly, not one of Luna’s ex-husbands deigned to be baited.
Luna laughed again, crossed to a small, matte black console mounted on the wall, and touched a sensor panel.
Instantly, the three men winked out if existence.
The girl remained, turning and smiling at Luna.
“Holo-projections...” I said to both of them.
Luna waved, a little drunkenly, at where the trio had stood. “I like to keep them around, Conway, to remind me of my failures – to remind me to be more careful in future, to never act impulsively in matters of the heart, to be... to be wary. Oh, Christ, how I wish I’d had the ability to see into the future, Conway. Wouldn’t that be a blessing?”
I said, uneasily, “I’m not sure. If one could see one’s mistakes, and yet be unable to do anything about them...”
“But,” she said, leaning close to me and almost toppling, “but that’s just it, Conway. If you could see your mistakes before they happened, then you’d be able to stop yourself from making them, yes?”
I hesitated, not wanting to get into a debate about determinism with an unhappy and obviously distraught woman.
As if seeking refuge, I turned to the girl and said, “What do you think?”
The girl stared at me, through me.
Luna laughed again. “She doesn’t think anything, Conway. She is stupid. You see, that’s me when I was twenty-five. I’d just divorced Rodriguez and was at the height of my fame.” She reached for the wall.
And the girl, like all the others, vanished at the touch of a switch.