Death Before Facebook

TOWN.
    Pearce typed out G CON —“get Confession”—and then went to “Out on the TOWN.” But in the end it was disappointing; nothing new, really. The latest topic, “TOWN Without Pity,” had some merit if you liked to observe the maunderings of self-righteous assholes. Predictably, all the politically correct, put-you-in-the-wrong types were posting here. Living in New Orleans instead of L.A., Pearce had never met them, but he knew who they were: guys with scrawny shoulders and dirty blue jeans, women with fifty pounds they didn’t need and scrunched-up, toady little faces. There were those types, the PC ones, and then there were the Henry Clays, those who’d missed out on dynamic careers as diplomats permanently assigned to the Bureau of Tempests in Teapots. They were always posting the sort of little gem that was meant to defuse but made you want to rip their throats out: “I can really see Lefty’s point, Bilious, but I just wonder if it isn’t time to put this behind us and quit fighting among ourselves. After all, what’s really important here?”
    Out-self-righteousing the PCs.
    Back to “Out on the TOWN.” At least Lenore hadn’t posted today. One of the worst things about Geoff’s murder, as far as Pearce was concerned, was the ready-made stage it gave Lenore. Privately, he called her “the TOWN crier.” If Lenore had a problem, the whole TOWN had to be consulted, and if she didn’t she was going to make one up.
    So far they’d seen her through unwed motherhood. “Should I Have an Abortion?” was the topic she’d posted in Confession. The woman had no shame. That was followed by “Lamaze or No?” and a seemingly endless stream of self-involved dramas having to do with whether she should tell the baby’s father the kid existed, what she should name it, and of course, how much motherhood meant to her, she’d known, of course, she’d been told, but she really couldn’t have imagined…
    Right Firm grasp of the obvious. That was Lenore.
    Pearce had helped to get “Out on the TOWN” going; that had been fun (though at the time, the way he felt it seemed more like a necessity—he had to talk to somebody, even if it wasn’t really talking). But it was fun because it was an opportunity to use his mastery over his subjects. He always enjoyed that.
    However, the thing it had become wasn’t his cup of tea. These people were serious. They were sorry Geoff was dead and they were seriously trying to do something about it (in their lame little ways, of course). They actually thought they could solve a murder just by yakking electronically at each other. All of which might be amusing if it wasn’t such bad taste to display wit in the face of grief, and wit was Pearce’s forte. His baby had turned into an ugly duckling.
    Disgustedly, he typed EXIT . He might as well use his computer for what he’d bought it for.
    He opened a file called “Regrets,” possibly a chapter in something, he wasn’t sure yet, but definitely an exercise he needed to do right now. He typed 1967, and the very sight of the four digits excited him, conjured up the scent of patchouli oil and pot smoke; the sounds of throngs shouting “Hell no, we won’t go!”; the touch of a thousand skinny girls in peasant blouses, with center-parted waist-length hair. The most beautiful of them all was… he couldn’t bear to think of her, not yet, not without setting the stage.
    He rummaged through his vinyl records—he still had all of them, along with his old-fashioned stereo. The CD player would come, as soon as he sold a novel or two. Or his screenplay. That was probably what he should be working on—everyone knew it was easier, quicker, and worth more money. But lately, he’d been working on this other thing, this “Regrets,” whatever that was. That was the way writing worked for him; it bubbled up and couldn’t be stopped. If it wanted out, he released it.
    Bob Dylan was what he wanted, something along those lines. But what he found was better—the Jefferson Airplane,
Surrealistic Pillow
. He found “Today,” the cut that, of any song in the world (except maybe “Light My Fire”) was the most evocative of 1967, of the way he’d felt about her. It began like this: “Today I feel like pleasing you.”
    He poured himself another bourbon and settled down to write:
     
    She was older than I was, but not by much. Twenty-nine, I thought, maybe even thirty, which excited me in an odd sort of way, because of