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It's an absolutely pathetic exit – me and him, stumbling out of the entrance.
Malicious laughter from a guy following us who would have never even gotten in if not for that blonde accessory hanging at his arm, something I would have really enjoyed telling him, but I'm actually trying to not get my fists or my lawyer involved into this.
Meanwhile Bateman is too busy throwing empty threats at Tunnel's bouncer to watch his feet and I know if I hadn't been holding him like a chick by my side the entire time, he would have fallen flat on his face already.
There's this weak attempt to wind himself out of my grip, but I'm dragging him away with force and he only shuts up as he has to press a hand on his mouth instead.
"Jesus Christ, Bateman, If you puke on me, I swear I will fucking kill you!"
The answer: A series of choking noises he tries his hardest to suppress, that are merely announcing the inevitable.
I don't hesitate to grab him at the collar of his suit, shoving him into the next alley, wet and only dimly lit, where he immediately throws up unrestrained.
It's for the rising turmoil in my own stomach, that I carefully avoid looking at the process of this, instead focusing on the darkness. And only then is my brain registering the motion on the asphalt next to us – some bum, or drug addict even, or probably both.
Half wasted on the floor and he reeks like piss as he opens his mouth. Dares to raise his voice, and finally my inner tension can go somewhere and I snap at him: "He is sick, alright? You can't see that? This dumb bastard is vomiting like an anorexic bitch at an all-you-can-eat buffet and you tell me to go elsewhere. Fuck you."
Whatever charitable ambitions I'm holding these days, they don't extend past Bateman, let alone to these miserable creatures that continue to plague the city.
Feeling barely any calmer, I hand Bateman one of my monogram handkerchiefs and he wipes his mouth, then nearly drops it onto the lap of this crackhead.
"How can you be such a lightweight," I mutter, rubbing my temples in the fruitless attempt to ease the dull throbbing.
"Shut uppp, Price. I'm 175 lb. 6ft. 8% body fat," he moans weakly, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and resting his entire weight on me, as if to prove his rambling right.
"Got a new trainer – changed my diet. Taking Anavar now. I think he's a fag, though. Definitely has been checking me out. But what else to expect from a guy Carruthers recommended?"
Bateman laughs dryly, the sort of sound at the verge of a cough fit.
What he desperately needs now is water and some Nuprin, and to shut the fuck up.
I don't hope to see him at the office tomorrow, because I'm fairly sure he will try to compensate for his hangover and bruised ego with an absolutely insufferable attitude.
"Yeah, whatever. Let's get the hell out of here."
I appreciate the following silence as I lead him towards a taxi, all of this happening rather smoothly now that he has stopped fighting it. Despite his muscle mass and the inch of height he has on me, I have no trouble stabilizing his body.
I'm taking this as another sign to keep using steroids, even though my hairline seems to have moved back a fraction of an inch, ever since.
Or maybe it’s been pure stress.
Hand on my forehead, I'm becoming vaguely aware of my own lack of sobriety.
The headache has still not disappeared, something to blame the Absolut for, but it was a Monday evening when all of this started and at least I know how to hold my goddamn liquor.
Why couldn't he just take a second gram like the rest of us on a bad day?
The last time I got kicked out of a club, I was still blond and faking my ID.
Then again. Out of a long list of strange behavior Bateman displays on a daily basis, this is hardly the most remarkable one.
I know VanPatten finds it off-putting.
Personally, I am more fascinated.
Which doesn't mean I don't question my sudden act of humanitarian help, as I manhandle him through the open car door like a cold corpse, or when I have to pay the driver double, because he expresses his worry Patrick might throw up on those shitty faux leather seats.
"Hey. You still with us?"
One or two friendly slaps to his cheek to get concision back into him, briefly.
But when Bateman finally calls me a bastard that should go kill himself, I know he's going to be alright and there won't be a need to deal with the ambulance at the early time of 3:15am.
Still, I resort to giving the driver my own address.
I'm sure he has bragged about his apartment at some point, like they all do, like I do, but we've never actually met up there.
Me and him and VanPatten and McDermott, circulating between work, dinner, the club.
A long established dynamic.
Static. Immutable.
I've known the man for barely one month. But then again, it might as well have been two or three years. Because now that I know his annual income, and his opinion on Huey Lewis, quoted off the Rolling Stone, and that we have shared line after line in the intimate proximity of a stinking toilet stall, we're already as close to one another as we'll ever be.
'The height of male friendship', I'm thinking sarcastically as he's slouching like dead weight against me on the backseat.
Adding to this, the fading traces of Eau the Toilette on his neck are hardly overshadowing this penetrating stench of J&B and tobacco and vomit in his breath.
I know Luis would have tackled this issue of a completely bombed Bateman in a heartbeat, but now that it's just the both of us, how else am I supposed to handle this situation?
Well. If I'm being honest, 99% of my colleagues I would have put in a random taxi to laugh at their misery the next day – dropped off somewhere in Brooklyn for an usurious price and a missing Rolex.
Because 99% of these bastards are like cockroaches that can't be killed off, anyway.
But him –
I glance over towards Bateman, his eyes closed and the face free of any tension for once.
Muster this face that I know way too well already, to do so.
But something about the smooth peacefulness of it, and the way his usually so carefully maintained hairstyle got messed up and has loose strands falling over his forehead now …
It makes him look younger than 24.
And he looks suddenly very lost to me, in that wide, black, overcoat.
'You're getting soft, Price,' I'm thinking to myself, turning away, unpleasantly touched by my own emotional upsurge.
And still I can't help but imagine, how he might have disappeared in some dirty side alley of NYC, shrouded and swallowed by billows of smoke to never be seen again, if I hadn't picked him up instead.
Patrick Bateman – another homicide victim in this depraved city full of junkies and faggots and nazis and nazi faggots that are junkies.
This city that likes to devour those who don't leave soon enough.