1998: The three of us walk into the casino at Baden Baden, deep with the shades and long white cigarettes. “More Reservoir than Tarantino,” remarks Sterling, who’s looking dapper in her dark green, Dries Van Noten suit. I nod and flip back my hair. Fitz hands us each a wad of bills. I’m playing the part of The Gambler in my suave ass Vivienne Westwood, sporting my sling back heels and black lace tights hand woven into intricate pornographic patterns that run along the inside of my thighs. Outside it’s hot and bright and humid from all the water shooting into the air from the famous Baden-Baden spas, but inside the casino it’s cool and dry like a museum. Everything echoes against the marble floors and walls. The place is nearly empty. We saddle up to the glistening bar and slouch under the lights. I feel like an international criminal on the run. Fitz tells the bartender to bring us a bottle of champagne. He and I touch glasses and then tap Sterling’s, which is still on the bar. “Cheers, Dears,” she mumbles, and hovers over the top of the drink like a hummingbird. After the first sip her hand is steady enough to pick up the glass.

We head for the floor, feet sinking into the ancient red carpet that’s soaked through with a million conversations and exhalations, as well as microscopic bits of hair and skin and sweat. Fitz is the only one whose German is good enough for Poker. Sterling and I lose a few hands of Black Jack before moving over to the Roulette wheels. I’m transfixed by the old fashioned-ness, the spinning, creaking wood sighing reluctantly as the greased metal gears send it whirling. There are no blinking lights, computer soundtracks or hysterically ringing sirens, just a red faced attendant guy wearing black pants, a white shirt and an ill fitting black jacket. There a green casino insignia on the front pocket, the same one that graced the corners of the thick white cocktail napkins. He nods his head in an exaggerated, coked-up kind of way. When he hands me a stack of chips I notice that his fingernails are chewed down to the nub.

Time passes but we have no awareness of it, as the only windows in the casino are tiny portals just beneath the ceiling.

“Leaded glass,” Sterling reports, while she plays hopscotch with the patterns on the floor.

“What little light there is has gone green,” she says as a waiter serves her a martini from a silver tray. He addresses her as “Sir”.

“I feel like I’m in a New Order video,” she said, before berating the waiter for having run out of olives.

We throw our last Deutsche Marks on the wheel and stagger off to find Fitz. We wander around and around, getting hard looks from little old men as we drunkenly call out his name. I stop Sterling from going off on one of them, and we proceed to have one of our terrible fights, in which each accuses the other of being a fake and a liar. We pull out all the stops, using every name in the book, spitting on the floor and pulling at our hair, insane with emotion and alcohol. Finally, we end up in a bathroom stall, where Sterling digs out her works from her suit jacket and we shoot up and fall against the partition, sweating and laughing. The towel lady freaks out. She yells something at us in German and then we hear her scurry out the door.

I slide all the way to the floor and sit slumped against the toilet. My legs are spread and my skirt’s hiked all the way up to my crotch.

Sterling hands me a cigarette that’s already lit.

“We need to boogie,” I say through numb lips.

“I wish we could stay here forever,” Sterling says, dreamily.

“Bitch is getting her boss,” I say.

“We could exist, timeless, forever…you and me.”

I squint up at her. She’s calm and in control, the H having set her straight.

“God, Sterling, we’ve been through this. You’re a girl.”

“What if I became a boy for you?”

“A what?”

“You know, I was thinking. I’ll get an operation.”

“You’re on drugs.”

“I’ll get off drugs.”

“I like you as you are, c’mon what is this shit?”

“But I want you to like me more.”

“Sterrrrrr-ling,” I sing. It’s a song that she knows.

“No, TRUE, I’m serious. I want to be with you.”

“Sterrrrr-ling Fasssssssssss-bin-da.”

“TRUE, please.”

“You don’t really want to be a boy.”

“I’m willing to do what it takes.”

“No, I can’t get over it.”

“Maybe not at first, but you could train yourself to think of me as a… I don’t know, as your husband. Why the fuck not?”

“Flesh, Sterling. Flesh doesn’t lie. It’s irreducible. It’s the point where there can be no metaphor.”

“But I’ll get an operation.”

“But you’ll always be a girl and so will I.”

“Couldn’t you pretend?”

“Pretend……?” I close my eyes and see the roulette wheels, spinning off into infinity. I feel the Casino’s marble arches pressing down on me from above. It's a cool, smooth weight.

“No, I can’t pretend,” I reach up and push the hair out of her eyes.

“But it’s nice of you to think that I could.”


therealkidgod