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The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque
The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque
The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque
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The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque

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The memory of my wife faded. The past ceased to exist. Women came and went through the revolving door of the blogosphere. I met many women online, including a precocious tart by the name of Sandra. That was a mistake I shall probably live to regret, of course, but I couldnt help myself. God forgive me, she was the best of the lot: exquisite, mature beyond her tender years, remarkably precocious in her sexual proclivities, and as dumb as the day was long. You would not believe the extent to which she would go to exercise the outrageous fantasies buzzing around her infantile brain, an attribute that I am ashamed to say I found irresistible. I shall make no excuse for my lapse in judgment, except to tell you that the interlude during which we were in flagrante lasted barely a moment in time. But, as Nabokov suggested, while it lasted the candle burned ever so brightly.



Of all the women I met in chat rooms and on threads, while there were the usual fringe benefits, most were less than expected, less than advertised, and well below the standard I had set for myself. I cannot complain, though, for my ladies-in-waiting went out of their way to satisfy my needs, which had become, for lack of a better word, excessive. The great restaurant had become the deus ex machina and the focal point of my adventures. I spared no expense, and a good time was had by all. But it wasnt enough. And then I met Donatella, and everything changed.

LanguageEnglish
PublisheriUniverse
Release dateSep 26, 2012
ISBN9781475949780
The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque
Author

Barry Arbiloff

BARRY ARBILOFF lives in Palm Beach and New York, and is currently working on his fi fth novel.

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    The Man Who Dined at Le Cirque - Barry Arbiloff

    Copyright © 2012 by Barry Arbiloff.

    All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

    This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

    iUniverse books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

    iUniverse

    1663 Liberty Drive

    Bloomington, IN 47403

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    1-800-Authors (1-800-288-4677)

    Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

    Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

    Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

    ISBN: 978-1-4759-4977-3 (sc)

    ISBN: 978-1-4759-4979-7 (hc)

    ISBN: 978-1-4759-4978-0 (ebk)

    Library of Congress Control Number: 2012916887

    iUniverse rev. date: 12/05/2012

    Contents

    Acknowledgments

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    Acknowledgments

    When I first thought about writing a quirky thriller about the dark side of the World Wide Web, I wasn’t sure there would be enough material to do a short story, much less a full length novel. I was wrong. You could spend a lifetime surfing the Web and not come close to seeing even a small part of all there is. It took two years, and I barely scratched the surface, but I did manage to cobble out a story that I hope others will find compelling as well as informative.

    The Internet is a new paradigm in the way information is shared. In the cloud, the accumulated knowledge of almost anything you can think of can be downloaded in less time than it takes to boil water. In chat rooms, forums, and on threads, millions of lonely people interact in a desperate attempt to solve the great mystery that defines who and what they are, and what they want or need. Things, worthless and otherwise, are bought and sold or exchanged—sometimes for profit. In the virtual world everything is possible. The problem is that what you see is not always what you get, and what you get can be more than you bargained for.

    It is with appreciation that I pay homage to friends and fellow travelers who provided the intelligence that I used to put flesh on my characters and a twist to the story. I would like to thank Adele Golden, Gloria and Herb Gilden, Ron Friedman, Kathy Couchells, Suzanne Bezahler, Marsha Squires, Maxine Phillips, and Gary Langbaum for offering insight and suggestions that were most helpful, especially at a time when I was fumbling for ideas. Tribute to Gladys Newmark for introducing me to the wide world of threads and chat rooms, which gave me more material than I needed to finish two books; and to Irwin Sandler for posing on a cold night in the courtyard of One Beacon Court, so we could work out a format for the cover.

    I am indebted to an old friend, Joel Krieger, for his insight and candor, and for a tale he told a long time ago, which gave me the idea for the story. I kept the narrative consistent with the underlying theme of the story Joel told me, as I believe it is relevant to how people interact in both worlds, real as well as virtual. I added inventions of my own, of course, but only to permit my characters to exist freely in a world of their choosing.

    Honor to Troy O’Brien and L. Newton. Troy, my graphic designer, rearranged a fuzzy iPhone photograph of the Bloomberg Pedestal and Tower, and turned it into an interesting rendition of an impressionist painting. Newton, my line editor (I was never told his first name), reminded me in an offbeat way of something Bob Gottlieb said: that you can’t say someone died on page forty-four and then say you had lunch with him on page sixty-eight.

    I decided to use the great restaurant as a staging ground for the book when, the year before, during Restaurant Week in New York City, while surrounded by eye candy in the form of a beautiful room filled with beautiful people, I had one of the best meals I’ve ever had. It was quite an experience. There was so much going on that, by the time the appetizer was served, a wonderful Caesar Salad with a perfectly formed sunny side up egg, the story my friend Joel had told me was rearranging itself in my head. By the time I finished the desert, a mouth watering tart fashioned of pastry as light as a cobweb, I had the beginning and end of a tale of two worlds. Without delay, I went home and started writing the book.

    Finally, though there was a price to pay, kudos to my wife for her creative ideas and her unflagging willingness to correct my spelling, which has always been, continues to be, and will always be, abominable.

       1   

    Bergdorf Goodman on Fifth Avenue and Fifty-Seventh Street in New York City is the center of the universe for ready-to-wear haute couture. My wife shopped at Bergdorf’s every day of the week, except on Tuesday. On Tuesday we had lunch at Le Cirque, at our favorite table, the one by the window near the sidebar with the fancy books.

    Helen died on her thirtieth birthday. It happened on an agreeable Tuesday morning—in Bergdorf’s, in the handbag kiosk (on the first floor). We were supposed to go to Le Cirque to celebrate; she went to Bergdorf’s. The Birkin had arrived. I was on the other line when a salesperson called to give her the good news. I had no idea what a Birkin was until I heard him mention the name Hermés and the word pocketbook in the same sentence. Helen said that she had been waiting over a year for the Noir Togo with the Palladium hardware, the thirty-centimeter handbag, which I subsequently discovered was a must-have accessory among women of a certain class. She called it a bargain at $12,400. I had never seen her so excited. She kissed me on the cheek and ran out of the house. Her blouse was hanging out of her skirt, she was dragging her coat, and I was once again reminded of the power of wearing apparel and accessories to cause titanic shifts in the female persona. That was the last time I saw my wife alive.

    Five minutes after walking into the store, while she was waiting for the manager to bring out the bag, a car on Fifth Avenue ran a light. The man driving the car lost control, and the car went through the window and slammed into a display case stacked with Birkins. The case came down on Helen’s head. She was dead before she hit the floor. I went downtown to the medical examiner’s office to identify the body and passed out when I saw the remains. I shall never forget that experience as long as I live.

    Helen and I had been married for ten years. We loved each other, but we were not lovers. Our marriage was rarely consummated in the customary manner. Helen was afraid of sex, and I was afraid of her. There were brief interludes when passion gave way to pleasure, of course; I’d be lying if I said otherwise. But those good moments were rare by any standard. My wife considered the relationship between a man and a woman inviolable, but not in the usual way. Sex, she believed, was for procreation and not gratification. Fucking, she had a habit of saying, is the Devil’s work. The first time she said it, I thought she was pulling my leg. But she wasn’t. The notion had been drilled into her head by her father, which was the reason why she believed that intercourse was so painful.

    Our honeymoon was a disaster. Like most young men, I fumbled; like most young women, she had no idea what I was doing. She squirmed and cried out as I plundered her virginity, but in spite of the pain, to her credit, she remained steadfast in her obligation to the grand bargain. As we later discovered, her plumbing was defective. Her vagina was, medically speaking, prematurely atrophied: penetration was impossible, with or without a lubricant. The pain was such that neither of us had the slightest desire to suffer the effort. I am trying not to be indelicate, of course, and I am cringing as I write this, but there is no other way to put it. Eventually, we consulted with a specialist at one of the prestigious teaching hospitals in New York. After a thorough examination and all of the required laboratory tests, he put his arms around both of us and said that we were in the best of health. Then he told us to give it time, and he escorted us out of his office. So much for his advice.

    I didn’t know what to believe. At first, I thought I was at fault, but that didn’t make sense. I was good-looking, healthy, and more than willing. Everyone thought I had a marvelous personality and all the attributes that any woman could possibly want. It’s true that I was intimidated by women, but so what? No one is perfect. My psychiatrist said I had an Oedipus complex. He said that I harbored a repressed desire to kill my father and possess my mother. Jake, my best friend, said he was full of shit. I wasn’t sure what or whom to believe. The truth was probably somewhere in between the two extremes, although I never gave it much thought. Either way, as I subsequently discovered, my inhibitions had very little to do with Helen’s inability to become an active participant in the boudoir.

    How Helen and I ended up together is a mystery. We were opposites in every respect. The only thing we had in common was that both of us were well made, young, and exceptionally good-looking. My IQ was off the charts; she was barely able to read and write. She was the youngest sibling of a fire-breathing, God-fearing, Bible-toting lunatic who took the Good Book literally; I was the only son of a successful architect—a hard-drinking, womanizing atheist and conservative activist. She came from a shack in a swamp in a backwater parish, in the southern part of Georgia. I was brought up in a penthouse on Park Avenue, in the rarefied atmosphere of the rich and famous.

    We met at an after-hours club while I was in basic training at an army base in Georgia. I was on a weekend pass. She was moonlighting as a waitress. I wanted to kill time; she wanted to earn a few dollars to pay for new finery. Had her father known that she was working in an after-hours joint, he would have crucified her. I met the man once, and once was enough.

    Helen and I fell madly in love the moment we met. We were both kids, but one look was all it took. When I saw her for the first time, with golden-blonde hair and the biggest and bluest eyes I had ever seen, I became light-headed. My heart was beating so fast I thought it would push through my chest. Three weeks later, an old preacher in Opelika married us.

    Abstinence was something I had not anticipated, but I never said a word to Helen. I was much too young and too much in love to risk speaking my mind. Young men usually swallow their pride to prevent getting on the wrong side of a relationship with women they think they are madly in love with. What they don’t know is that women do not respect weakness. Jake said that women have to be ruled with an iron fist. For all I know, he may be right. There was a time when I thought I was doing the right thing by keeping my mouth shut. How is it at all possible for a man to have the slightest respect for himself if he has presumed to find pleasure even in the very sense of his own humiliation? The quote is attributed to Dostoyevsky. He was right, of course.

    I thought I could suppress my emotions, but Helen was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. The image of her white, dovelike skin caused an immediate reaction in which every sensory receptor in the lower portion of my body was aroused. It took days for me to recover if, by happenstance, I came upon her while she was removing her clothes. I can still smell her scent, see the almost invisible fuzz on her thighs, and in my dreams feel the gentle slope of her hips, breasts, and buttocks. The combination of her looks and my desire was lethal. Lust ruled my life. My heart pounded when I looked at her. I trembled when we touched. A napkin on my lap was sufficient to cause an erection. The positions she assumed at any given moment, even while making toast, were enough to set my genitals in motion. The sight of her underwear hanging in the bathroom lit a fire in my loins. In the mornings and evenings, when she dressed and undressed, I would sit on the end of the bed holding myself, a towel over my lap, and a whopping erection just out of harm’s way. Half the time I was so worked up I had an orgasm when I brushed my teeth.

    There was a time when I had to carry a briefcase for fear of exposing myself. I am reminded of an advertisement for Viagra, in which the voice in the background says that you should see a doctor if an erection lasts more than four hours. I had an erection for weeks at a time. When I told my urologist, he said that it was nothing my right hand couldn’t cure. I didn’t know what he was talking about, until he made a motion with his hand. So I took to masturbating, but it only exacerbated the longing. The more I did it, the more I had to do it. My right hand became a close associate.

    I ached for the pleasure that other young men and women shared. My prostate grew larger, and I experienced intermittent headaches. I couldn’t eat or sleep. I had an overwhelming urge to urinate, especially at night when I watched tattooed ladies on television making cupcakes.

    I could have paid for pleasure, and maybe I should have. God knows, other men did. My urologist prescribed antibiotics and massaged my prostate. My psychiatrist filled me with antidepressants and listened in almost complete silence to my innermost thoughts. Three days a week he sat by my side, stretched out in this great armchair with a platform for his legs, occasionally nodding his head, perhaps to let me know that he was still awake. Except for infrequent references to Freudian doctrine, which I did not understand, the man hardly spoke. When the alarm clock on his desk rang, signaling the session had ended, we were both relieved. Fortunately, the good doctor kept me supplied with antidepressants and antianxiety medication. Abstinence became the rule rather than the exception, and my right hand became a substitute for all that I longed for.

    I was not unique in the pursuit of unrequited love. Nor did it serve a purpose for me to think of myself as empowered in the absence of the unconditional love of my wife. Not to mislead you, in spite of our differences, there were happy times. Helen and I managed to salvage the relationship by redirecting the energy of our divergent passions in the pursuit of (dare I say) the finer things in life. We had more than most. We were in the best of health. She became a pampered woman and found happiness in the department stores. I listened to classical music, designed buildings, wrote unsuccessful novels, and ate the best food money could buy.

    So it came to pass that we became partners in what outwardly seemed to be the ideal marriage. We shared many worthwhile pursuits. I remember with fondness dining in the best restaurants in New York, especially Le Cirque, where all the difficulties I alluded to previously were subordinated to the extraordinary gratification of eating exquisitely prepared food by culinary artists without peer. I still loved Helen in my own way, but I would be remiss if I didn’t tell you that our differences were monumental. As in all things, with the passing of time, her image tarnished. I was less inclined to allow my emotions carte blanche, and I learned to cope with our differences, and life became marginally tolerable. Which reminds me of something Tolstoy said: Real love does not consecrate marriage, it ruins it. I’m not sure what Tolstoy had in mind, but I am now quite convinced that there cannot be true love in the absence of a relationship consecrated by the pleasures of the flesh and nurtured by mutual respect. I don’t see how it’s possible, although I do think about it from time to time. These are thoughts that keep me awake nights.

       2   

    At the tender age of thirteen, when I was at Boy Scout camp in Monticello in Upstate New York, I happened upon a partially undressed woman. As I watched her remove her clothes, which she did slowly and undoubtedly for my benefit, for she was certainly aware that I was watching her, I entertained my first erection. Naturally, I had no idea what it was. Days later, it happened again in the latrine. I was taking a shower when it happened, and I was frightened, so I went to see the camp doctor. We had a man-to-man talk. He took the time to explain what was going on, and although I didn’t understand a word he said, I was greatly relieved. On that day, I learned that truth is rarely what it seems—that what is real and what is not may be two sides of the same coin.

    The gods had granted me a new lease on life when Helen passed away, or so I thought. I hesitate to say that, for a brief moment in time, I was actually relieved, being inordinately comforted by the realization that I was free at last to indulge myself in the pleasures of the flesh. As it turned out, I became inconsolable. The outside world ceased to exist, except for the occasional sounds of movement and what I thought were voices filtering in through the windows and walls of my imagination. During the day, I took hot baths and stared at

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