Girl Act Read online

  We hung up and I got dressed without showering and walked Shadow up Hillhurst past the spot where I had first met Sam and up into Griffith Park. Life’s strange. One day it’s fun and pleasant, the next it’s maddening, and the very next it’s dreadfully sad, and the next—well, a person just has to wait and see what it will bring. There was going to be a memorial, before his brother took Sam’s body back to his parents.

  I waited until after the Tennis Actor and I had celebrated his success at booking the doctor TV show. Rumor had it that possibly a ‘permanent’ TV role offer was due in the coming months. I waited until after we had made out and after I had sat on his lap, looking at his cute actor face. He wasn’t Mr. Darcy, but he was mighty attractive and mighty enjoyable to be with. Then I told him about Sam’s death. He was upset right away, troubled that he, too, might have overlooked something in Sam’s demeanor.

  “Should we ask everyone we know if they’re faking happiness?” he asked. I was wondering the same thing. Who do you ask first? And when do you ask? We lay in the pitch dark, talking about how long we both imagined we’d live, and about how old age might turn out for each of us. Would we have false teeth? Would we live in nursing homes? Would we die tragically? It was getting really depressing and bleak in my bedroom, as we built our own dark murky sleepless night.

  Around four in the morning I said, “I’m going to die screwing, no matter how old I am,” figuring why not picture the best way to die.

  “How do you know?” he asked.

  “It’s just a hope,” I said.

  “Does that exist at the end of life?” he asked.

  I sat up. There were only two ways to get us out of our gloomy funk, one was to go to sleep, and the other was putting his Tonka truck in the tunnel between my legs. I opted for number two. So I got up, took off my clothes, pulled a black wig (a mix between wicked-witch/gothic-whore) out of my closet, and put on a mustard colored pair of spiked twenty dollar high heels and returned to the bed room.

  “Scene one: woman vampire enters bedroom, sees naked man,” I stopped and he quickly stripped, “Man is fast asleep, snoring loudly,” I said in the voice of a wanna-be director. He snored loudly, but kept one blue eye open.

  “She, the vampire climbs on the bed, straddling him, so he cannot move,” and I did just that. “She sucks his neck…” I was interrupted by, “No hickies, I’m on TV,” —killing the mood.

  “Maybe she was a vampire who kicked ass. Yeah, that sounds better,” I said as I dove in for a kiss on his lips and pulled him to the side; now he was on top of me. Wow, with one great, swift movement, I slapped his ass. He felt it. It was war now, the best kind of erotic war there can be, even when…it’s not true love.

  So funerals/memorials in general are yucky (I know that’s a 3rd grade word, but sometimes it says it all) and not something I like to have to go to, but Sam’s was the most satisfying memorial I think I’ll ever attend in my life. Okay, so I don’t know the future, but still, that’s what I believe. His army brother stationed in DC, called everyone Sam had ever walked a dog for. He had arrived in LA for one mission only, to take Sam’s body back home, but had agreed to a memorial in Griffith Park before.

  The Tennis Actor had to meet his acting mentor first, only because he was now really being considered for a regular part on the doctor TV show, but promised to cut out early to meet me at the memorial.

  The directions his brother gave were: bring all dogs on leashes and drive up Vermont Avenue, park anywhere possible, and walk over to the gathering. First I raced over to Hollywood Boulevard and into Hollywood Toys & Costumes, the number one shop where I love to buy wigs, and bought a black bandana to go around Shadow’s neck for the memorial.

  I wore a black dress and black DKNY sneaker heels. I piled my hair up on my head, wore no makeup, except deep blue eye shadow and mascara for a dramatic affect. Yeah, well, I’m into theatrical colors for my eyes. Go figure. And of course I took along a few doggy bags, in case Shadow or some other dog did what they usually do.

  The park was packed when I arrived, but I squeezed my Volvo in a space that miraculously appeared and we headed over to the gathering—thirty plus four-legged paws. Dogs were everywhere as if this was a movie. Shadow and I found our way to the top of the pack. A friend of Sam’s, who I didn’t know, began reflecting on his bigheartedness and loyalty. I recognized Sam’s brother, in an army uniform. He and Sam shared the same forehead, and nose, but otherwise looked different.

  I’m a crybaby, I just can’t help it. I started sobbing, but I wasn’t the only one. The dogs barked and that fit so well with who Sam was and how we would all remember him. Barking for Sam! Bow-wow-wow!

  I glanced at the girl who had been Sam’s girlfriend for a very short time, the last person to kiss him. I didn’t know what I would do if I was her or how I would handle the future. She was wearing a long multi-colored skirt and a white-t shirt with Sam’s face on it. In the picture he held two scrappy dogs. I liked it. As the ceremony began to wind down, I ambled a few feet away with Shadow, wanting distance. Soon it would be over—everyone and all the furry paws would leave the park. The spot would be empty, without a trace of what had been lost.

  I remembered hearing a renowned older actor talking about Katharine Hepburn’s memory of her brother’s suicide. The story goes that she went to New York City with her fifteen year-old brother, a trip designed to cheer him up and a chance for her to visit family friends. The last thing her brother was quoted as saying to her was, “You’re my girl, aren’t you? You’re my favorite girl in the whole world.” And then he went upstairs to bed. The next morning, he was found hanging dead.

  I don’t know why I remember his words quote un-quote; I guess I imagined being with her when it happened. She found him! As an actress, she was powerful. My favorite K-Hep films are Morning Glory, The Philadelphia Story, Adam’s Rib, Suddenly Last Summer and On Golden Pond. She died without Botox or plastic surgery—her face was her original face. Not many actress pass away un-nipped and un-tucked.

  Back to suicidal tendencies—I remembered being sixteen and filled with miserable thoughts of self-loathing, feeling like an outcast, a total misfit. If I hadn’t found acting, I don’t think I would have made it to seventeen, but a chance meeting with a play called A Streetcar Named Desire changed that. I read it line-by-line in an hour and then over and over again. I wanted to be the character Stella, but I felt more like the character Blanche and it haunted me. Would I end up manless and living in the past like Blanche, or would I end up with a man who was an untamed sexual brute, like Stella got with Stanley? Would I be anything? Those kinds of worries, those heavy, heavy feelings; I know them. They are not strangers. Go figure! I guess acting is for those who feel too much everyday, I don’t know. I just know that’s why I’m an actress.

  I looked up and the Tennis Actor was staring down at me. He had arrived. He was wearing a black Nike jogger’s outfit, his hair gelled and slicked back. He held out his hand and I grabbed it. Shadow was barking at him, like he always did, as if he had not seen him in months and was overjoyed. The crowd was thinning, people heading back to their homes, to their jobs; it was just after nine-thirty in the morning.

  We strolled with Shadow up into the park toward the observatory (the famous location used in the film Rebel without a Cause). The Tennis Actor told me about various types of suicide he’d read about, like the male model who took sleeping pills, the pretty European female model who jumped off a balcony (actually he said there had been two who did), and about a well-known songwriter whose music graced several cool films and had allegedly stuck a knife in his own chest. FYI, suicide is not a sexy topic. In my opinion, it’s creepy, twisted, and disheartening, but I listened; he had to tell me his morbid stories. In Hollywood, it’s hard to tell if a story is just a story, or a rumor made into a story. Anyway, death is like that, it gets you thinking about more death, and so on and so on.

  Luckily, being a movie buff and an actress, I knew the one key element that
was missing: a scene change. I stopped; he turned and stared at me.

  “Hey, want to practice French kissing?” I asked, then added in a breathy voice, “Ooh la la,” the only French I know, as I traced the outline of his lips with my fingers.

  “Bisous, Ma Poule, Ma Cocotte, Je t‘adore, Je ne peux pas vivre sans toi…Mon tresor,” he said in the worst French accent possible.

  Maybe he watched porn in French? Maybe he had Googled online how to ‘woo’ a French woman? I don’t know. Not understanding French, I had to act ‘as if’, so in my dictionary it translated to, “hey, baby, let’s make out using our tongues,” and we did just that, while Shadow sat on the ground by our feet, licking his paws.

  6

  ROLE

  I sat in the Tennis Actor’s agent’s office in a fancy building on Wilshire Boulevard that A-list actors walk in and out of after signing ‘crucial’ deals or bitching about the lack of work or the kind of roles they want. A really expensive, modern building, with an ultra stylish lobby, where only the top-name directors and producers go in and out, signing ‘major’ deals or bitching about the lack of work or the kind of work they want.

  He was signing his contract for the series regular role he had officially booked on the doctor TV show. I was there to keep his hand steady as he signed his name four or five times (more paperwork when it’s a network contract).

  To be envious is to be human, in my opinion. There he was, doing what I had come to Hollywood to do—signing to a fat money-paying-contract. I was just a tagalong in the fancy A-list agent’s plush office. His older, balding, four-thousand-dollar-suited agent winked at me and offered me a bottle of Smart water and some chocolate from Switzerland.

  “Your guy’s got talent; the show will last at least five years. Then, it will go into rerun heaven, cha-ching, cha-ching,” he said, like I was planning on living off the Tennis Actor. Like I needed to know that a Beverly Hills mansion with an enormous pool was coming, along with other lofty amenities.

  The Tennis Actor gave one of those ‘acting for the sake of acting’ lines: “My character’s great, I hope he gets used and abused by the writing team.”

  I felt the urge to fall out of my stiff grey leather chair and play dead on the carpet in front of them.

  “Just you wait. The viewers at home, women and gay men, will tune in every week, just to see what you do next. You’re the wild card on that show,” his agent said and they both laughed the same laugh.

  We wandered outside into the Los Angeles weather, always sunny and warm, give or take a few days of rain. I took several pictures of him in front of the fancy A-list-agent modern building, and he took one of me with my white-rimmed sunglasses, that later I realized made me look like a freak in shades. Drat.

  He had been invited to a Hollywood Hills party by one of the leads on the doctor TV show and he wanted us to go. That meant a new dress and his treating me to a half-day at a spa, which included not only a facial and a full body rub, but a waxing of my pubic hair. Bare down there, is the style in LA these days. FYI, it hurts the first time and makes you look like a plucked chicken between your legs, but after you do it once, you go again because growing it back is not worth the hassle—and most LA lovers actually prefer it bare. Go figure.

  It was his day/his celebration and he quote unquote wanted to spoil me, but I felt more like my ‘messy’ self was being over hauled, so I’d look good on his shoulder in front of his new, soon-to-be ‘TV friends’. I was too tired to ask him what kind of dress he was shopping for. I mean, it’s one thing to buy a dress together; it’s another thing for a guy to pre-select it. Oh, well.

  Los Angeles is filled with great spas. This one was over in Koreatown, and designed like a hideaway next to a golf course. I walked in and was given a locker key. I promptly stripped, tossed on a robe, and headed for my facial. Who knew I had blackheads and whiteheads? Fortunately, they were removed one-by-one. My face looked blotchy and patchy, but very pure, as if everything—even the emotions—had been lifted. As for the full body massage, front and back, I laid there as a ‘pity me’ ball of nerves and was gradually rubbed into a ‘princess’ state of awareness, as if anything I wanted was in reach if I’d just reach for it. Way wonderful!

  The last stop was the waxing. I got my legs waxed, armpits, and then my pubic area, which was not overgrown so it only took a quick second for her to pour the wax over all of it, wait for it to dry, and then yank it off. Ouch, but a good ouch!

  There I was, spanking new and ready to ‘party’ into a new role, a new life. Maybe I was becoming his girlfriend and this was how he was going to be treating me. There had never been any talk about the ‘boyfriend/girlfriend’ thing. We were just hanging out, sleeping together, and no one said “I love you,” ever.

  I arrived at his Silver Lake apartment. Shadow was staying with my neighbor who had recently broken up with her girlfriend and needed a dog to hang out with—which worked out perfectly. The Tennis Actor/now TV regular money maker was waiting for me with a large Barney’s shopping bag. A fancy box was inside, and I didn’t even have time to sit down; he wanted it opened right away. The dress was red, not my color, had slits, was tight and required my breasts to be pushed upright. Never mind the designer, it was a ‘name’ the partygoers would recognize.

  He had me strip and put it on. I think he just wanted to see my breasts smashed like the ‘red carpet’ actresses’ are at every award event or movie premiere. He wore a John Varvatos smoking hot charcoal grey suit, looking handsome, and lean. He rented a sleek silver Porsche Panamera, since he was waiting to buy a new car once the checks started arriving. I would say that it was wild, standing in the red dress and slipping on the matching heels, and that I felt a mix of not being myself, but suddenly ‘playing’ a role—of the sexy girlfriend or lover, depending on which label he was going to use introducing me.

  “I’m celebrating booking the TV gig tonight,” he said over and over again, as if convincing himself or instructing himself. Go figure. I just smiled and nodded in agreement.

  The party was one of those ‘Hollywood’ parties where the staff has to sign a non-disclosure contract. As in, they never saw drugs of any kind on the property, or in the nose or mouth of any of the ‘big name’ guests. If I thought drugs were sexy, then I’d probably have enjoyed the party.

  Okay, so pot’s boring. When I was in high school, I tried it a dozen times, and it made me sleepy and really dim-witted. Cocaine? Oh, I tried it in college, twice, and it just made me want to take off my clothes and screw the end of an umbrella, (which I actually did). Heroin? Never. That stuff’s too brainless for words; I’d never try it.

  Heroin (Thank God) was absent at the party. Nine thousand dollars worth of marihuana was at the party; an Oscar-winning actor had brought it to share. How cool is that? Beats me! And the cocaine was not spread out on the marble kitchen counter top—but placed in a silver bowl on the marble kitchen countertop, with baby spoons and rolled-up twenties for snorting it. So Hollywood! I only knew the price of the pot, because someone had whispered it to the Tennis Actor and he, in turn, whispered it to me. Coincidentally, I knew no one else to whisper the pot price to. As for the price of the cocaine, probably half a paycheck for the lead TV actor, otherwise known as the host. The staff was made up of three guys in black and white and a funky female chef in all white, who hung around smoking joints in the kitchen.

  The music was provided by a female DJ, and pretty-party-people were everywhere, dressed in expensive clothes. I was introduced to blah, blah and the Tennis Actor went off to mingle (actually, he wanted to get high). I didn’t stop him. Only in Hollywood can you party like a rock-star, free of the fear of getting caught if you’re on private, very private, property. With security at the gates—gotta love that.

  I wandered off, searching for a room with books, or art of some kind that I could focus on. He had beat me to it; the movie actor in his late forties, sitting in the den with a book open and bottle of red wine in his powerful hand. T
he room was over stuffed with teak bookshelves. The walls were antique white, covered with impressionist paintings, a plush couch, etc, etc, you can imagine it all, on top of a large Persian rug.

  “Come in and shut the door,” he said in his movie star voice. I did.

  “Lock it,” he added. I turned and stared at him.

  “I don’t like the noise, 97 percent is bullshit,” he said. So I attached the latch, in this circa 1970s house.

  “You got enough cleavage hanging out to nurse a litter of stray dogs,” he said. I glanced down at my pushed up breasts spilling out of the expensive red dress.

  “I’m wearing the newest milk-titty-dress,” I said, mocking it and myself.

  “Can’t blame the dickhead for buying it. You know, it’s how we’re wired,” he said, giving me the impression that he had bought the same type dress for more than one woman.

  “Did you see me when I arrived?” I asked, and he grinned. I had caught his eyes on me as I first entered the party with the Tennis Actor. It wasn’t a flirting look, just a look of eyes-on-eyes in a crowded room filled with pretty people trying to be noticed.

  The party blared behind us, the door locked, I was thinking about it being locked, when he said. “Sit down.” I sat across from him, and he passed me the bottle of wine and told me how he used to do drugs; how drugs had been as important to him as banging women, until he almost died of an overdose. I nodded. I had heard the rumors about him. LA is filled with rumors; if you stay long enough and you get lucky, you acquire one of your own.

  He went on about the Hollywood machine, the movie business, about greed and about ‘sellout’ actors—actors who took jobs just to pay the mortgage or to keep their lifestyles, even when they hated the part. I liked his voice; I had always liked it on the screen. He moved his hand, motioning me to come closer.

  “I want to read you a poem,” he said.