The ship came into port, stopped, and the doors opened. A mass of people poured out of the great ship, and Adam knew Mimi would be pretty fucking impossible to find now. If she even got off the ship.
The cruise was over, and people were unloading from the harbor into cars, and taxis, and some even started walking. There were hugging people, seeing each other, or overtired parents with their hyper-excited children still running around the harbor. Or the silent drunk students whose partying had gone a bit too far and now, hungover, they were going back to their everyday lives.
Adam tried to look around. He would have liked to call for reinforcements, but Bran hadn't let him.
He saw nothing so alarming about Mimi's condition and said, "I have friends here. I'll tell them to keep an eye on things. Mimi will be found."
Damon had already disappeared with his vampires for what must have been their honeymoon. And planning the coronation. Adam had only overheard when the originals had gone around in a big vampire pack saying they wouldn't be attending the coronation party, as they no longer supported the vampire monarchy. Besides, they'd be more proper kings than Salvatore, the eternal playboy.
Adam couldn't find Mimi anywhere.
Bran said, "Don't worry, she'll find her way home. Big girl already. Give her some independence. She's fucking strong if she got such an excellent reputation at the fight club. She'll be fine."
They had to get off the ship, and Adam had arranged for Mimi's things to be delivered to the house as well. He knew Sark had been beaten, and well, he had seen it himself. To that, Adam was pleased because there was, in fact, a warrant out for Sark's arrest, so that would keep him busy for a while. That, too, was thanks to Mimi's network or the fleas.
Adam and Bran left the ship and headed back to the house. Adam tried to linger in the harbor long in case he saw Mimi, but no. They drove off, and Bran threw a party, a werewolf party Adam, too, would have to attend.
Adam knew he could attend, but he wouldn't fuck, and he wouldn't drink. He would probably sit in a corner, thinking about Mimi and trying to find solutions to things. He knew he would probably report it to Magnum and to Mimi's own network. That would be a pretty wonderful resource to find Mimi. Adam just didn't bother to say anything to Bran. They went to a house in Los Angeles. It would be a good place to have a party.
The California winter was mild, and I didn't so much recognize the places as I did some shops or stores. I could read. I hadn't been to California much, not even for gigs, and this part I ended up in was completely unfamiliar territory.
Silver madness kept me tightly in its grip, but the drugs had pretty much gone out of my system now, so something might try to come through. Still, I didn't want to. I didn't want reality without Damon; I didn't want to be single again. One divorced woman, a disappointment, a failure as a wife, and a burden only to Damon, and when he got the job done, he showed me who he really was.
So I let silver keep my mind in TV series or movies. In them, I wasn't so anguished. In them, I was functioning, able to do something, to feel why, and then each role changed in my mind because of being a pretender.
I had many roles, and instead of just taking one, like Sark's previous subjects, my pretender side would scroll repeatedly through the different options and mimosa, then throw vague visions, characters, and dreamlike scenes almost into my mind. And that pretender side couldn't find a suitable role.
The infection caused its own problems; the mimosa visions then added to that, so I searched and searched but couldn't find one. I don't know what I would have become if I had found a role I wanted to stay in.
I left the harbor area and wandered the streets, looking for the person who wanted to do the scenes, or I tried to operate on patients. My mania continued. On some level, I consciously let the silver come out, and I just didn't want to face reality. I was an ostrich. I buried my head in the sand.
I kept moving the whole time. I didn't even try to seek help or anything. My weight was about 25 kilos, and I was a walking skeleton, but California is a big city of millions; they have who knows how many skilled makeup artists and other stagehands, so no one actually saw that I was in terrible shape. They just assumed I was from a movie or a show.
I went to a lot of restaurants and their kitchens to try desperately to bake. Or make food; at one point, I was even a judge, and I was berating someone's food or shaking someone's hand, and I was a little surprised when the object of my handshake wasn't impressed that I, Paul Hollywood, was shaking his hand. Who cares?
I found a queue of people, then went to the start of the queue and waited for the queue to pass and for everyone to shake my hand; I was at the president of Finland. It was Finland's Independence Day reception, where he or she shook hands with all the guests. I didn't know anyone, but it didn't matter.
The time didn't matter. At the venue, I recognized nothing, and I didn't even really want to recognize anything. I subconsciously wanted to be in the silver madness, where my soul wasn't torn apart, but the pain would come through now and then if I heard a man call his girl baby or saw couples actually in love.
One stall selling fur ball keyrings made me depressed, so then I was suddenly a Bambi who'd lost her parents. Of course, the dog lovers or even the owner didn't appreciate me trying to go count the Dalmatian spots. Or find 101 Dalmatian dogs and try to write the number of each dog to make it 101. If I heard certain songs, ABBA Songs, I started singing and living Mamma Mia in musicals, always less than ten minutes at a time.
I was quick when someone was always trying to catch me. I don't give in to terrorists; Jack Bauer is not that easy.
I hurt myself pretty damn bad running up against a pole in a train station, repeatedly trying to find the right train to take me to Hogwarts when I was Harry Potter.
Or I might stand on a beach where there was water and fucking the water really hard; I was Percy Jackson and fucking cranky to my daddy, Poseidon.
I tried asking different men which one of them was the angel on the highway or where Charlie could be. Was I Charlie's angel? Anyone who looked anything like Michael Landon got my attention, whether or not he was American.
And then I attacked quite a few people and scratched their faces with my fingernails after I was convinced they were lizard aliens and Diana was somewhere nearby.
I stopped at one of the fruit stands and broke every round of fruit that was the least bit big. They were the alien movie eggs containing those face huggers and they don't take them here.
At the zoo door, I stopped and swallowed and wondered if I was really ready to go to Jurassic Park. When I heard some kind of racket, I was pretty sure there were velociraptors somewhere, ready and waiting.
I searched every little shop, obscure store I could find, gizmo, gremlins, but couldn't find any. Then, when I saw a big enough truck idling, I tried to get it to move homes.
I might go to a store or even get lost in a factory and ask how it's made, or I might try to find a cake shop or a bakery or enter a cake-making contest or some chocolate contest.
I always told Bill Clinton in a pretty firm tone I would not suck his dick. I tried to see where Lassard was when he was supposed to give another speech so the whore in the speaker's box could suck his dick.
I tried to find the one who had disappeared without a trace. Or solving cold cases. I started looking for Scully to prove that UFOs exist.
TV shows and movies came to mind, and the days went by as I wandered around southern California, sometimes going long distances at vampire speed, sometimes just walking. Now and then, I felt the need to make a scene, but for some reason, no man would take me on.
I spoke Finnish sometimes while trying to read the news on the radio and once in a while, the sea weather and weather at the observatories.
I found a good place where there were a bunch of men, willing, a little older, but yes, the director would pay me if I could get them to fuck me.
I had found one retirement community, a nursing home almost, and there were quite a few men sitting outside; well, I went and started propositioning them, then I did something else, and pretty soon, I unzipped some guy's pants and started getting their dicks erect.
Unfortunately for me, quite a few had strong blood pressure medication and were not that healthy for an erection, so my efforts were quite modest, and then when the nurses called the cops on me.
I was having a hard time, but I couldn't do anything about it. Eventually, one cop caught me and actually got me all the way to jail. There were people there watching me. I even twisted the bars apart a bit, but I couldn't quite fit between them yet.
I was Modesty Blaise or some character of Sex and the City or even American Pie; I didn't even know I was in jail all the time; I was just in the middle of different shows.
It was safe to be there, no heartbreak, no hot, inflamed spot in my soul where Damon had once sometimes inhabited.
I tried to ask where I could find Ridge Forrester when I was Brooke, and I loved Ridge more than anything, but somehow, at that point, I was very sad because I knew Ridge was no longer with me. He took Sally Spectra and broke up with me when we would never be.
I tried to get to the top chef final, and no one understood. I tried to tell them that the president was in danger and I was Jack Bauer, or where the fuck was Guillermo, and I should get to the bake-off. Finally, they called some doctor to come and see me, but I knew I didn't want Bill Clinton when he wanted me to suck his dick.
Adam was sitting in the living room, coffee cup in hand, watching Bran fucking women; Bran had invited Magnum to fuck, too, so Adam couldn't help Mimi with Magnum. Adam had stayed at the party for another day or two. The party had lasted a week, and he hadn't been drinking or fucking. Bran had tried very hard to send girls to Adam's house.
Still, Adam was so furious that no one dared to approach him, so finally, Bran said, "Fine, you don't have to have a party; Charles will probably be here soon; I know he's in California, so he'll appreciate a party. You're just ruining the atmosphere here."
Adam grunted, still not going anywhere, as he sipped his black coffee and watched the party go on. It was good to actually see this party from this angle and see what the fucking debauchery was going on. No wonder the Mimi went off and dashed off every time they had a party.
"Oh, where are you, poor Mimi?" Adam thought.