Chocolate Chocolate Moons Read online

  “Sorry, Ruby. All booked.” Ruby’s face drops.

  Solaria looks at me standing next to the desk.

  “Pay no attention to her,” Ruby coos. “She is about to leave.”

  “Leave? She looks like she’s waiting for you to let her in.”

  At that moment the red door opens and CC, whose complexion is filled with blotches, hair matted to her head and clearly needing all the beauty money can buy, enters. Solaria and Ruby, who know who she is, greet her.

  “Right on time,” Ruby tells CC. “We can’t keep Colorful Copies of Mars Media waiting.”

  “Thanks for the last-minute appointment, Ruby. So many preparations for the Mars Malt gala. Even the smallest moon wants coverage.”

  Solaria looks in my direction again, tilts her head, and smiles. “Aren’t you forgetting someone, Ruby?”

  Ruby glares.

  Solaria turns to me. “Aren’t you the mother of those beautiful twins, the Lunar Tunes, who are performing at the Mars Malt gala? Wasn’t a picture of you, your husband, and daughters on the cover of Stardust magazine?”

  “That’s right,” I answer.

  All eyes leave the little screens and look at me.

  “I knew I recognized you.”

  Ruby’s jaw drops like a high school guidance counselor who finds that a student she tracked to Rockpit Community College got a scholarship to Harvard.

  “You have the most beautiful complexion, Mrs. Summers,” Solaria says, savoring her zing at Ruby’s snobbishness. “Doesn’t she deserve a complimentary calobox treatment and two large boxes of your famous Polar Dust for her talented daughters?”

  I brighten, raise one eyebrow, and look at Ruby. “She just told me there were no large robes.”

  “Get me one of your deluxe soft silver sheets, Ruby. I’ll personally wrap Mrs. Summers in a toga.”

  Solaria fashions me a Roman-looking toga. She wraps my head in a matching towel creating a stylish looking turban.

  CC watches. “I know you. We met at Nirgal Palace. You looked familiar there and you look even more familiar here. What was your name again?”

  “Molly Summers.”

  “That doesn’t ring a bell. What’s your maiden name?”

  “Molly Marbles,” I mumble.

  “Aah!” CC yelps. “From Armstrong University. You’re Drew’s old girlfriend. I knew I knew you. How come you never said anything? Didn’t you recognize me? Does he know you’re here?”

  “Yes to the first question; no to the second. I saw no point in opening up the past.”

  Ruby starts to open the pink door. A client approaches her. “You really should develop a line of togas and turbans called ‘The Molly’ for your boutique.”

  Ruby, who won’t look me in the eye but doesn’t miss a beat, says, “Already on order. How many would you like?”

  Once inside, Solaria and CC are given navy blue robes with white collars that are adapted from one worn by Elizabeth of Queens when she went shopping at Parliaments in Manhattan to buy a truss for her hernia. Then three attendants—one with red hair, one with brown hair, and one with blond hair—lead us in three different directions for our individualized procedures.

  I am led by the red-haired attendant to my first procedure: foot reflexology. “We believe in starting at the bottom and working our way up. The hairstyle is the last thing we do,” she says. “Would you like some vanilla water with a vanilla bean in it?”

  I think of Jersey, because it is the only thing I ever ate or drank in her house. “Yes, thanks. Vanilla beans are my one of my favorite snacks,” I say facetiously but sounding sincere.

  “Then I’ll put two beans in it,” she chimes.

  One client, slightly heavier than the rest, who sits alone, comes over and whispers “Have you ever heard of Rose’s Spa?”

  “Yes, when I was waiting in the lobby. What is it?”

  “It’s a gravity-free spa and a retirement community in space for people who love to eat. Some call it Rose’s Heaven.” I make a mental note.

  My foot treatment makes me feel like I am walking on air. Now I’m starved. I look for a table. Then I hear, “Yoo-hoo, Molly! Over here!” in Flo’s familiar twang.

  Flo sits on a puffy pink cushion, her long twiggy legs with painted golden toenails curled under her. I walk past women drinking water and swallowing pills. “I’m surprised that Ruby let you in. She doesn’t let anyone in who’s overweight.” I sit.

  “Well, Solaria Andreas, sponsor of the Mars Malt gala, rescued me. She saw my picture on the cover of Stardust magazine. She insisted Ruby let me in.”

  “That must have gone over big. Ruby is the biggest snob on Mars.”

  I remove an egg-and-anchovy sandwich on a thick slice of ciabatta bread from my bag and take a bite.

  Eyes wide with horror turn in my direction. I take a tiny bite, chew and swallow. One client puts her hand to her forehead and requests smelling salts. I turn away and take a few more bites.

  “Did you know that I was at the Andreas mansion yesterday to make sure the food for the Mars Malt gala would be up to code?” says Flo.

  “No, I didn’t know.”

  “Solaria called Tasters and Spitters and they sent me. What a menu! It was nonstop spitting. That’s why I needed to come to Ruby’s. I’m so exhausted I can hardly open my mouth.”

  An attendant with pea-green hair looking like one limp overcooked strand of linguini approaches and looks down at me. “Ruby provides lunch. You didn’t have to bring…” She pauses and points a bony finger. “…whatever that is.” She walks away.

  I turn to Flo. “Why are so many Martians obsessed with being so thin?”

  “Thin? I don’t think I’m thin. Slender maybe. Lean, lanky, stylish. You must mean ‘evolved.’ No one here is thin. Only people from Earth or Earth’s moon think Martians are thin. Earth’s moon is the armpit of the solar system, a ball of floating cellulite. It should be liposuctioned out of the sky!”

  I restrain a wince, because I will not give Flo any satisfaction.

  “How did Martians’ attitudes toward dieting begin? We’re all from the same stock.”

  “I guess it started when Mars became independent from Earth and began competing with it. Because of Mars’s lighter gravity, we are taller and thinner than Earthlings, and we were winning all the solar-system beauty contests. Our grandparents born on Earth wanted us to keep our edge. They were always dieting and always complaining about dieting.”

  “I know how they feel,” I say, remembering taunts of “Molly Marbles, round as a marble, fat as a moon.”

  “When Freedom Plan foods were developed, people thought the problem had been solved. But for many, the plan wasn’t restrictive enough. People dieted even though they ate Freedom Plan foods. Many rebelled. There were riots. The Capitol was covered in corned beef that was not lean.”

  “Not lean? Even I know that’s bad!”

  “People traded calories on the black market. There were illegal trans-fat and triglyceride parties. People binged on junk food. Children threw bagels at schools and cream-cheesed all the windows. It was food anarchy! Times were desperate.”

  I adjust my toga to cover my Doric column–looking legs.

  “About thirty years ago, Dr. Habeas told Dr. Corpus that he had discovered a way to reduce the sense of taste and reduce food cravings. They said taste was the lowest of the five senses and reducing it would enhance the four ‘higher’ ones. No one waited for studies to be done. Everyone wanted freedom from diet slavery. Everyone here at the spa has been genetically altered except you and that other off-planet person, Colorful Copies.”

  Just as she says Colorful Copies, CC, who is in a cubicle on the other side of the spa, screams. “You people are incompetent! I’m going to sue!”

  “What happened?” I shout.

  “Her rainbow-colored eyebrows just came off in a facial. No problem. Ruby has experts that have fixed far worse,” says a passing attendant.

  Then Flo points to the ta
llest and thinnest woman who sits reading The Chronicles of Narcissism, Volume One: The Wardrobe.

  “Who is she?” I ask.

  “Winner of last year’s Miss Skin and Bones award. Isn’t she beautiful?”

  “Everyone at the Culinary would think she needs a doctor.”

  “Shhh,” she whispers.

  “What’s the problem? The Culinary serves salads.”

  “Yes, but just thinking about salad dressing makes my esophagus curl.”

  I finish my sandwich and hand the empty wrapper to the attendant, who wears latex gloves.

  She holds it between two extended fingers and says in obvious pain, “I can’t believe you ate the whole thing.”

  I turn to Flo. “With everyone wanting to be super thin, the supplement businesses must have sent your economy flying.”

  “My father owns the Sirloin Steak Supplement Co. He believes it’s only a matter of time before we evolve further away from our animal beginnings.”

  “Is that a fact? Well, I think I would rather be an animal than a vegetable or a mineral.”

  I take a slice of strawberry shortcake from my bag and scoop some whipped cream into my mouth. Flo’s jaw drops. “Are you eating face cream?”

  “Face cream? It’s whipped cream. This is strawberry shortcake.”

  “Doesn’t look short to me. I had a strawberry once. But cake is not permitted.”

  “No cake? You had birthday cake when you were growing up, didn’t you?”

  “A large egg-white omelet with candles on top. Except for potatoes I was allowed to choose my own vegetable toppings because it was a special occasion.”

  I have no words. This is the longest conversation I have ever had with Flo. I understand her a lot better, and my feelings toward her soften. She’s really not such a bad egg white.

  Eventually I emerge from Ruby’s Spa. And I do look great. In fact, better than I have in my life. My skin glows, my hair bounces, and I have two boxes of Polar Dust for the twins. I also have a month’s supply of supplements. And since I won’t be eating them, I now have the perfect gift for Jersey and Trenton.

  29

  CC WITH NEWLY refurbished eyebrows arrives for the Mars Malt gala. Katie Racket, Barbara and Lourdes Bottled Waters, Sensuous Signals of Venus and the Ringling brothers from Saturn Satellites follow. Workmen make last-minute adjustments. Solaria’s catering firm delivers enough food to feed Jupiter.

  Neils Bohr and the Bohrs are ten minutes early. They are dressed in black and carry black boxes filled with relics and documents, including those left by real estate agents dating from the time of Noah that said after a slight drizzle new beachfront property would become available.

  They are followed by Max Plank and the Planks, looking like a marching band of paraphernalia. They were not in a good mood because they had to scrub their opening act with guest performer Marion Brando, the famous transvestite from Venus who does the famous yell for his/her lost poodle, “Stella,” because someone forgot to pack his/her desired prop, a streetcar.

  Cortland and I arrive with Becky, Lois, Flo, and Billings. Billings, who is not a music lover and can hardly believe the girls have gotten this far, is bug-eyed about being in the Andreas mansion. He embarrasses everyone by dropping cards like Hansel and Gretel’s bread crumbs that say “Little Green Men Pizza.” He says he’s doing it so we can find our way out.

  Cortland carries a small green cube containing sound tracks. Flo and I direct two antigravity cases that float next to us brimming with makeup and accessories. Becky and Lois each carry a carefully wrapped gown. Finally we find a sign that points us toward the dressing rooms. We are all relieved to see that the backdrop for the performance, a floor-to-ceiling holograph of Monet’s Water Lilies superimposed on a painting of Earth’s full silver moon, has been perfectly installed.

  Neils and Max stand like taut rubber bands ready to twang. “Here comes vacant lowbrow commercialism,” Neils smirks crossing his arms and giving the twins the once over. “No edge. Unresolved earwax.”

  Max puts his hand to his mouth and yawns. “Two blond poems on the interconnectedness of mass and void. Do you think they can sing?”

  Neils rolls his eyes. “Not relevant; their work has nothing to do with serious avant-garde art and its politics like ours. All they do is pander to melody.”

  “Melody? It’s the lowest common denominator. Pure ear candy. Our work has higher aspirations. We use the musical scale as a metaphor for man’s rise and fall, filled with sound and fury signifying the illusion of everything aimed at the easily intimidated. They aim for the top ten on the hit parade. Serious art critics who are read by important collectors and museum curators are not concerned with the sentimental and melodramatic. They go for the pretentious not the popular.”

  Neils puffs out his chest. “Well then, we should be a shoe in, we’ve got plenty of pretention. But they are pretty. Maybe even beautiful.”

  Max puts his hand to his throat and gags. “Did you just say the B word? I can’t believe you actually said the B word. Beautiful has nothing to do with serious art.

  “Right! What was I thinking? The judges at the Venus Biennale better not learn we’re sharing a stage with them. If they knew we came for the money and record contracts, we would be lucky if we got a gig with Ayn Rand’s band. In this context, winning could be as bad as losing.”

  That evening the guests enter the ballroom. Heels click on a clear plexi-bridge suspended over a pool filled with darting lighted robotic sea creatures and women with flowing hair in topless mermaid costumes. Everyone becomes everyone’s best friend for fifteen seconds.

  Planetarium Jewelers, “the jewelers to the stars,” lent Solaria an emerald necklace that matches her dress, a flowing pale green chiffon gown that shifts with her body. Her blond hair is swept up, with one piece dangling down her back.

  She greets Drew and Kandy and leads them to a front table. Sandy would have preferred that Drew sit in the back with the rest of his staff, but he doesn’t object, because Kandy, a former Miss Universe, is sitting where everyone can see her. Craig arrives and is seated on the other side of Kandy.

  Solaria’s parents, Salami and Lasagna Pastrami, are at the head table with other family members.

  Sandy sits with the ambassador from Earth, Pontius Nimbus. His wife, Vaporous Nimbus, is seated to his left. Her nude-colored dress matches her skin tone so well, it’s hard to see where the fabric ends and her skin begins.

  Across the table is Venus’s ambassador, who invited Sandy and Solaria to Venus last year because of Sandy’s success with the solar clock. Solaria was ecstatic because she got to stay at the embassy’s guesthouse and not the Hotel de Milo, where she had once slipped in the hotel’s theater before a performance of the Merchant of Venus when someone yelled “Break an arm!” and she did.

  The meal begins. Everyone gets an amuse-bouche of a warm oyster with hazelnuts and sherry butter on a slice of brioche. The soup is a clear broth with a generous portion of fois gras and a large truffle in its center. Sandy turns to Ambassador Nimbus. “Solaria got the chef from Mars’s best restaurant, Argon Forty, to make dinner. Critic Sagging Guts gave Argon Forty five mushroom clouds.”

  Vaporous Nimbus chirps, “Ooh, mushroom clouds! I love mushroom clouds.” This gives everyone a chance to stare at her hanging out of her dress.

  This is followed by tortellini of skate and crab with lemongrass and crab volute and a salad of baby bib lettuce with thin crisps of macadamia-nut flatbread. There are “oohs” and “ahhs” when the main course, whole roasted boned duck resting in a broth smelling of smoked hickory, mesquite and cherry wood arrives.

  The dessert, a dark chocolate beer mug with “Mars Malt: 200 Years” in white chocolate printed on the side, is filled with a tangy mousse made from Mars Malt’s version of Kriek, a sweet cherry beer. Finally the lights dim; a drum rolls and the orchestra plays “Hail to the Chief.” An enormous tiered cake with two hundred candles is placed next to Solaria’s father, who ri
ses. Everyone sings “Happy birthday, Salami Pastrami.” He rises, clutches his napkin, tearfully thanks everyone, blows kisses, and sits.

  The lights dim again. The room quiets. A spotlight shines on the MC for the evening, Jamie Faxx. “Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for.” He puts his hand to the side of his mouth and booms, “Heeeeeeeere’s Max!”

  Max, bathed in purple light, in a croaky battered voice accompanied by sounds from fuzz-toned instruments, sings “Dead No More.” Holos of dead animals float around the room like icebergs circling the Titanic. People close their eyes because their rocking motion, after such a rich meal, makes them queasy.

  When the band members chant “Art, mart, fart,” turn their backs to the audience, and let out an unfortunate sound, everyone groans except Ambassador Gingivitis, from Jupiter’s moon Io, the only true art lover in the audience, who—being from a world that is nothing but a floating rock, and trying to promote it as a sculpture center—insists it’s an offstage bagpipe.

  Sandy, who can’t stand it anymore, gets up and corners Solaria. He grabs her arm so hard, it leaves fingerprints. “This had better get better!”

  Jamie Faxx says, “Fresh from this year’s Documenta on Jupiter’s moon Calisto, let’s hear it for Neils and the Bohrs, who’ll perform ‘It’s More Blessed to Receive than to Give.’”

  Women rise and join a ladies’-room line that looks like it began a nanosecond after Eve left the Garden of Eden.

  Solaria’s assistants bring earplugs and eye masks and distribute them before Niels’s finale, “I Ain’t Got No Persecution.”

  Cortland and I are bathed in nervous sweat. Flo and Billings are twisting their napkins. We fear that by the time Becky and Lois perform, the audience wouldn’t know the difference between their performance and a kindergarten class singing “The Itsy Bitsy Spider.”

  Jamie Faxx manages a clever monologue that coaxes people to their seats.

  The room dims and quiets.