Also I think girls with tattoos are fucking hot.
But there are other types here too—mainstream stars who frequently work with Vida’s company, the indie crowd, the underground BDSM people in their vinyl corsets and thigh-high boots. And Vida herself at the center of it all—mid-forties, deeply tanned, platinum blond hair coiffed short and stylish. She looks exactly how you’d imagine an aging porn star to look—sagging plastic surgery, careworn face, too much makeup—but you’d be dumb to discount her business acumen or intelligence because of the way she looks. There’s a reason even the most insulated, conservative Americans have heard of Vida: because she gets marketing and she gets content and she gets platform saturation.
I want to be her when I grow up.
“I like this party,” Tanner says, taking a sip of his craft beer. “And hey, I’m not the only black guy here.”
He’s right about this crowd being more progressive than most, although it’s still not ideal. “We’re going to make it so all the parties are like this, but better,” I tell him. When I hired Tanner two years ago, he was frank about all of the problems he saw within the industry—including the inherent racism embedded in the very foundations of mainstream porn. So I told him that if he came and worked for me, we’d fix it; we’d cultivate diversity without all the weird taboos and fetishes normally present in interracial sex work. And so I managed to snag an incredibly talented filmmaker right out of art school, and he managed to make a believer out of me.
He shrugs. “It’s L.A.,” he says, as if that’s all the explanation required.
I am going to say something else but stop when I see her.
She’s here.
My fingers tighten around my glass, and my stomach starts flipping over like a gymnast on the uneven bars, swoop, swoop, toss, spin—
“Breathe,” Tanner coaches. “Everyone has to run into their ex-girlfriend for the first time since a breakup. You’re just getting it out of the way now.”
But it isn’t Raven that I see laughing out by the pool. It’s not Raven with the glass of scotch and the long caramel hair and the smile that could power the whole goddamn Valley if she wanted it to.
It’s Devi Dare.
The balcony is lit up against the night, and the pool sends blue-white glimmers dancing across her face. She wears some sort of shimmery gold halter top that drapes low, exposing the smooth bronze skin of her sternum and teasing me with the hidden curvature of her tits, and leaving almost her entire back bare.
With her short black shorts and ankle-high gladiator heels, she doesn’t just look fuckable, she looks beautiful, and I wish I had a camera right now. I want to film her here, laughing and golden with the sparkling grid of the city behind her, and then I want to take her to a beach and see what she looks like against a backdrop of inky sea. Maybe we could drive up north, find an empty stretch of highway, and I could film her walking on the dark asphalt. With that shining gold top and those fuck-me heels, the contrast of her with a desert highway would be so stark and so gorgeous and thought-provoking. The kind of shit you see gif-ed on Tumblr.
And then she turns and sees me through the floor-to-ceiling window. There’s a moment where her eyes narrow, as if trying to make out my face in the dim interior of Vida’s living room, and then her face blossoms into the kind of smile that makes me want to give her everything in my wallet. If my stomach was swooping before, it’s a tornado now, whipping up emotional debris and lust and all the fantasies I’ve ever had about this woman, and I only barely remember that I’m supposed to be Worldly and Zen Logan in time to give her a flirty grin in return.
As she turns back to her friends, I realize my highway film would be all wrong. Devi is the living antithesis of asphalt. Devi is energy and health and vibrancy. She’s sunshine and butter-yellow flower petals and the sweet earthy smell of cinnamon and cloves. I was right before, with the ocean idea, or maybe the desert in the dark, when the night flowers are in bloom—
“Thinking about who you’re going to fuck?”
A sharp voice jolts me out of my directorial reverie, and I blink to find Tanner gone and Vida Gines standing next to me, a bright pink drink in her hand. She arches an eyebrow at me as she cants her head toward the massive windows, indicating the balcony outside. “I saw you making eyes at Devi.”
Worldly and Zen, I remind myself. Vida doesn’t need to know that I’m mentally comparing Devi to the flowering night desert. Be casual.
“Devi’s fucking hot,” I say, taking care to keep my voice casual. “Lots of hot girls here.” And then for good measure, I take a drink and look casually around the room. Casual Logan, that’s me.