a horrible prada nightmare

ust before going to bed I put a load into the washing
machine, including a shirt by Prada. I wake up in
the middle of the night bathed in sweat. Did I or didn't
I check the care label in the Prada shirt? I try to
get back to sleep but the only thing I can think of is
'Prada'. 'Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada,
Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada,
Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada,
Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada,
Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada, Prada,
Prada, Prada'. It seems as if there are no other
words, as if everything is Prada. As if nothing exists
apart from Prada. As if the only reality that remains is
a Prada reality. There's no escape. All is Prada, Prada
is all.
With an almighty bang – Prah–Dah! – I find myself in a
sweeping lounge–like space. The rooms with their
grey sofas, ebony coffee tables, giant stone ashtrays
and beige walls stretching on and on and on. I keep
on walking, from room to room to room. It seems as
though the rooms are endlessly repeating, so much
do they resemble one another. On purpose I turn first
left and then right in order to make sure I'm not simply
walking in circles. There is no one to be seen; it's
as if the space has shrugged off all life, freed itself of
humanity. A deserted lounge with all the lights left
blazing. Old school disco balls cast their mirrored
reflections through the rooms. Everywhere there are
cocktail and champagne bars, armchairs and deeppile
carpets. I take a seat at one of the bar counters.
Suddenly Miuccia Prada appears from behind a wall
of liquor bottles and pours me a vodka champagne.
She drinks nothing herself but stands looking me
over from head to toe. She starts interrogating me in
Italian. I can't speak Italian; the only word I know is
'Prada'. "Prada," I answer her, "Prada." "Miu Miu,"
she replies. All I can say is "Prada." An argument
ensues: when Miuccia says "Miu Miu," I reply
"Prada," when I say "Prada" Miuccia says "Miu Miu,"
when Miuccia says "Miu Miu," I reply "Prada." I'd like
to say something else but it's as if someone is doing
the talking for me, as if I no longer have a voice of my
own. "Basta!" Miuccia says, and gives me a dirty
look. Coquettishly she plays with the rings on her fingers.
"I was an active Communist once, and in a way
I still am, you know. I just have an exquisite offbeat
sensibility, creating clothes that look simple – even
plain – but that are incredibly luxurious. I'm just
inventing a new form of inwardly directed luxury."
When I look up she's suddenly wearing an enormous
pair of Gucci sunglasses. She disappears behind the
wall of liquor bottles from whence she came.
I take a last nip of my vodka champagne and suddenly
Rem Koolhaas pulls up a stool next to me at
the bar. He looks identical to the pictures of him by
Wolfgang Tilmans in Index Magazine. The same polo
shirt, the same bags under his eyes. He starts reciting
his own quotes from the Index interview. "Do you
know that in the past week I've been swimming in
Lagos, in Milan, in Switzerland, in Rotterdam, in
London, in L.A. and in Las Vegas?" "Incredible," is all
I can manage. Koolhaas continues "That means
seven cultures, seven typologies of bodies, seven
typologies of movement, seven typologies of exhibition,
of introversion, of hygiene; seven typologies of
smell." I recognize his polo shirt as one by Prada.
I want to ask him if his shirt is indeed a Prada polo
shirt, but he gets in first. "In New York I ran round the
reservoir in Central Park and Jackie Kennedy was
there, and sometimes you were trailing Jackie and
you would pass her and smell her..." I say
"Guggenheim." Rem says "Prada," and when I reply
a little more forcibly "Guggenheim," he grabs me by
the lapels and shouts in my face "Prada!" before
resuming "Part of our proposal was to eliminate the
Red Stripe."
The lounge–like space around us seems almost
instantly to have changed into a huge box of building
blocks resembling pieces of Swiss cheese.
"Prahdah," Rem whispers conspirationally in my ear;
"Prahdah!" Music swells and suddenly, like a Jack–inthe–
box, Madonna leaps out in her dusky pink urbancowboy–
look outfit screaming in a hysterically
aggressive manner: "Mussiiiiccccc!!!!" Each time I
attempt to ask Rem an interesting question she
pushes between us, shouting "Mussiiiiccccc!!!!" And
then suddenly she's swapped her pink urban–cowboy–
look outfit for a sort of Pierrot suit festooned with
red ribbons. And all the while she keeps screaming
"Mussiiiiccccc!!!! Mussiiiiccccc!!!! Mussiiiiccccc!!!!"
like a mad thing. On closer inspection the red ribbons
turn out to be Prada Sport Red Stripes. Rem, too, is
suddenly attired in an identical Pierrot costume with
red ribbons. The deep pile carpets have been knotted
from Red Stripes; Red Stripes are bloody everywhere!
I see my reflection in one of the mirrors and
I'm wearing a cowboy hat bristling with red ribbons.
"Mussiiiicccc!!!"
Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston turn up and
launch into a live a cappella rendition of that wonderful,
no that awful, duet 'When you believe'. All the
while Madonna keeps screaming hysterically
"Mussiiiicccc!!!" Mariah Carey lies down on the floor,
next to one of the many building blocks that look like
Swiss cheese. She just carries on singing; "We are
not afraid. There's no hope left anyway." Whitney's
skin color keeps changing; when I look at her one
minute she's albino and the next moment she's pitch
black. Mariah is still lying on the floor, expressionless.
Whitney lies down on top of her and starts to caress
her. I look for Rem, but he's disappeared. Madonna
vanishes through a hole in the ground with a big
cloud of smoke. Whitney starts eating out Mariah's
pussy. I can't bear to look and walk out. In another
room I chance upon a cruising Tom Ford in a Prada
Sport suit. He says "Gucci is Prada after a dose of
Viagra. It's a new form of outwardly directed luxury."
He tries to lure me into the gents but in the meantime
we pass long tables at which immigrant workers sit in
serried ranks behind sewing machines, stitching
away. Suddenly Tom Ford's wearing a Helmut Lang
outfit and in a flash I realize that all those immigrant
workers are other designers who must stitch Prada
Sport labels on their own clothing. Everything has to
be festooned with Red Stripes, just like Madonna's
Pierrot outfit. Miuccia stands at the end of a long
table and calls from a distance "I really do hate to
see stars walking around in clothes by me that have
nothing to do with their personalities." She comes up
to me and shouts "Basta! Basta! with glitter and
glamour, that's what I said after my latest show. It's
time to be normal again."
And suddenly Madonna's back, this time in a rubber
– no, this time in leather – SM outfit complete with
riding crop from her Erotica period. "I don't think you
know what pain is