by Stephens, L.
“Ava, wait!” Janice called after her. “Don’t go in there!”
Ava heard her, but showing her mom this man was far more important than stinky Janice or playing hide and seek. After she got past the door with the red light, she ran as fast as she could before stinky Janice could stop her. Ava thought that stinky Janice would just want the perfect man for herself and not her mommy, who really needed him.
The sounds of people in the distance confused her. They were breathy and quiet with loud grunts as flashes went off and illuminated the dark corners of the studio. Ava noticed there were people gathered around with their backs to her. Some were clothed and some were not. She could sense her mother was close but couldn’t see her.
“Mommy?” Ava called out.
“What the fuck?” a man’s voice bellowed.
Ava shuddered. Swearing was not good, especially loud and in a scary voice. Her eyes bulged and darted around, not sure where to look. She was like a proverbial deer in the headlights. She wanted to turn and run, but she was frozen, hoping that if she didn’t move no one would see her.
“Who the fuck let a kid on my set!?” the man screamed.
Her face flushed with heat, and her eyes filled with tears. Ava didn’t know what was going on, but she knew it wasn’t good.
“Mommy?” Ava asked again in a low whisper.
“Lynne!” the man yelled as he stormed past Ava. “I told you not to bring her here!”
The sea of naked and partially clothed men in front of her parted, revealing her mom kneeling naked behind them with another woman who was also on her knees. Ava tilted her head. She didn’t know what was going on. Nothing was right, and her mother reached a hand to her, her face petrified. The men in front of her covered themselves and started scrambling around the set, Ava’s view of her mother was blocked, and she was alone and the most frightened she had ever been.
“Ava!” Lynne yelled from behind the men.
CHAPTER 12: MEAL TICKET
Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.
― Dalai Lama XIV
Speaking of moms, Sarah had a fucking doozy. While she had never walked in on her mother having an orgy in front of a bunch of people, their relationship was way worse than that.
The call from her agent came within ten minutes of leaving the audition. They wanted her to come back in for a meeting with the director. Pamela had told her agent she was practically a shoe-in, unless the director had objections which they rarely ever did, unless they had someone else in mind, usually someone they were trying to get naked. Within the space of a two-minute phone call, Sarah had gone from feeling unwanted and destitute to all-powerful and in control.
Now, Sarah was sitting in her silver 2008 Toyota Prius as traffic slowed to a halt on the 101 freeway south heading to downtown. She loved that car. It was pretty cool when she first got it. She was eighteen and driving a brand-new hybrid complete with the stickers that allowed her to drive in the carpool lane without someone in the passenger seat. The stickers were pointless because she never used any highways with a carpool lane, but at the time they were pretty cool. She was doing her part for planet Earth and looking stylish to boot, but now, ten years and one hundred and fifty thousand miles later, she felt like an Uber driver, not that there was anything wrong with that. It wasn’t a money thing. She could get a new car if she wanted. She actually had her eyes on a Tesla, but she couldn’t bear to part with her beloved “Donna” which she had named after her favorite Beverly Hills 90210 character.
Sarah felt good. It was Friday, not that actresses got excited for the weekend. Their lives were mostly governed by auditions, and once you got to a certain level, you were going for three or four a week if you were lucky, as opposed to when you started and you tried to go for three or four a day. Nevertheless, she was excited for the weekend. She had a new opportunity on the horizon, a new opportunity to get her hopes up, which in her line of business was basically everything.
Sarah listened to the local radio station, KPCC, as traffic crawled along. The traffic was jammed all the way back to the middle of Hollywood. That was the problem with auditions and living near the city: you were always stuck in traffic. She would definitely have been better served buying a house in Sherman Oaks, like all her other friends, but she got way more bang for her buck on the edge of the city. When she had bought the house, she had been assured it was in an up-and-coming area, but five years later she still wasn’t sure exactly when that would be.
The radio program that was doling out statistics about the city’s homeless crisis suddenly stopped, and Sarah looked down to see that a phone call had taken over the small screen in the middle of her console. There were only three letters that indicated who it was but those three letters burrowed their way into the pit of her stomach, making her want to drop a giant fart right then and there. Sarah sighed, reached over and pressed the answer button on the screen.
“Hi, Mom,” Sarah said blankly.
“Hiya, Sare Bear!” Mom said in a chipper tone. “How you doing?”
“Ah, you know, the usual,” Sarah said, trying to keep calm.
Her mom was way too chipper. Sarah knew something was coming. Her mom’s favored way of communicating was by text message or by extremely long winded, guilt trip laden emails at two in the morning, reminding Sarah how much she had done for her.
“Sitting in traffic, huh?” Mom asked with a cackle. “I don’t miss that at all.”
“I bet you don’t,” Sarah said as she frantically looked in her side mirror, trying to change lanes as if that would change anything.
There was an awkward silence but that was common. Every phone conversation pretty much went exactly the same: a couple opening salvos followed by an awkward silence, followed by the crux of the phone call. Sarah was waiting for it. There was no reason for her mom to call her other than to remind her to do her daughterly duty and pay her money, her monthly thank-you for thrusting her daughter into a life of sleazy producers and even worse directors.
“I just spoke to Pamela!” Mom said, breaking the deadlock.
Fucking Pamela, Sarah thought. She knew she was probably just trying to mend the bridge between daughter and mother by calling her and telling her the good news, but their relationship wasn’t built on love. It was built on a pile of money, and telling Sarah’s mom that there was possibly more cash coming was like throwing a lit match onto the pile.
“Yeah, fingers crossed,” Sarah said, pitching her voice up an octave or two to sound excited.
“Oh, while I got you,” Mom said casually. “You get a chance to make that deposit?”
Bingo, the fucking deposit. The monthly “remember me” payment that Sarah had been paying for the last twenty years. It was supposed to be ten percent, and for a while it was, but now her royalty checks from Sunshine High and Giselle Can’t Escape were so small she just sent it all to her mom and hoped when they finally became too small to help, she would already be dead.
“Yes, mom,” Sarah said. “I’ve told you a hundred times, it happens automatically.”
“Okay, okay,” Mom said quickly. “Don’t get snippy. I’m trying to be nice here.”
“Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace,” Sarah whispered. “Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.”
“Sarah,” Mom said stiffly. “You can’t keep blaming me for you mistakes, okay. It was your choice not to do the reunion movie. It was your choice not to apologize to Norman.”
“What are you talking about?” Sarah said, exasperated. “That was years ago. There was no reunion. Sure there were talks, but nothing ever happened, and as far as fucking Norman is concerned, that guy tried to fuck your underage daughter!”
The negligence and fantasy that Sarah’s mom lived in on a daily basis was one of the main reasons their relationship had fallen apart, not to mention the constant drinking and pill use that fueled the negligence and fantasy. Sarah looked at the clock. It was
5pm in L.A., which meant it was 8pm in Tampa, so she knew her mom was well and truly lit. She didn’t need to look at the clock for that. Any given day her mom was shit-faced by lunchtime.
“Now, Sarah, you got another shot at it,” Mom said brightly. “Don’t blow it, okay? You’re so talented but sometimes, hon, you cut off your nose to spite your face, and it’s a really beautiful face.”
Sarah took a sip of her iced coffee in an attempt to wash out the taste of yet another abhorrent compliment shit sandwich her mother had served up. It was always the same: talented but something negative followed by telling her she was beautiful, and she always changed the negative to fit the narrative she was trying to force on her.
“Alright,” Sarah said with a sigh.
Sarah knew this conversation was null and void. It was just her mother doing what she always did, reminding her only daughter that everything she did, she did for her, everything she sacrificed, she sacrificed for her and that she was the best mother she was ever going to get.
“Sarah?” Mom said in a sing-song voice. “You still there?”
“Yes, mother,” Sarah said quietly. “I’m still here.”
“Good,” Mom said sweetly. “You get a chance to make that deposit?”
Sarah looked at the screen in the center of her console for a moment and then reached over and pressed a button to end the call. She didn’t feel bad about it. Her mom wouldn’t remember, but Sarah knew there would be a long email or text message waiting for her when she woke up in the morning. It wouldn’t be about hanging up on her, it would be all about her mom’s sacrifice and how Sarah owed it to her to make herself a star again because that’s all that really mattered—seeing sacrifice pay off as success.
Sarah could see the downtown skyline in the distance, and she didn’t need any more negativity in her life. It was all sunshine and rainbows as far as she was concerned. First on the agenda was no more talk radio. She pressed a few buttons on her phone and the speakers started playing “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac.
† She’s a woman in L. fucking A., what else she supposed to play at a time like this? †
CHAPTER 13: FRIENDSHIP
“Hey, come here for a second,” Daryl said to Jake as they stood in the massive foyer of Max’s mansion. “I gotta tell you somethin’.”
Jake strutted over to Daryl and took off his sunglasses, hanging them on the neck of his shirt. Daryl stood stiff, waiting for Jake to get close, before unleashing a fiery right hook to Jake’s upper arm.
“Owww!” Jake hissed as he recoiled, holding his upper arm. “What the fuck you do that for?”
“You fucking hung me out to dry in there, you know that?” Daryl hissed back. “Are you fucking blotched out of your mind? You fucking drove us here, bro. You think I want to die in that fucking piece of shit you call a car? Why didn’t you fucking tell me?”
With the interview over, Daryl had dropped the niceties in his communication and reverted to his usual, casual way of speaking.
“I’m sober as a nun, you fucking cunt!” Jake said dismissively, massaging his shoulder. “Why you trying to break my arm? I fucking jerk off with this fucking arm man! Believe me, I need all the strength I can get to lift this bad boy up!” Jake gestured at his crotch, and Daryl tried not to laugh, but it was too funny, and they both started giggling.
“Fuck you, bro!” Daryl chuckled. “I did that little worm a favor. Every time the lights go out he knows what coming.”
“Well, sucks for you, brah,” Jake shot back, pulling out his phone. “I’m gonna have to call your mom up and see if she’s got some free time.”
Daryl folded his arms and looked deep into Jake’s soul.
“Rewind,” Daryl growled with a nod of his head.
“I said,” Jake started pulling up the contacts of his phone.
“You better be kind and rewind,” Daryl said, balling his hands into fists. “I’m not going to be aiming for your shoulder this time.”
Daryl wasn’t going to hurt him. Jake knew that even though time and oceans and jail cells may have gotten between them, their mothers were still off the joke table.
“What!?” Jake asked incredulously. “I was just gonna say, I’m gonna call up your mom and tell her how much of a dick her son’s being to her favorite person in the world. You’re going to get in trouble, brah!”
“Yeah, fuck you, dingus!” Daryl said with an eye roll. “But seriously, man, you couldn’t back me up in there?”
“I heard the whole thing. You did fine,” Jake said as he dismissed Daryl with a wave of his hand.
“What the fuck you talking about?” Daryl asked. “You were passed out the whole time.”
“No, I wasn’t and when was the fucking last time I passed out on blotch?” Jake said opening his eyes wide to show he was bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. “Max needed to see you were legit. So, I just hung back and gave you time to operate.”
“So, he was comparing me to a dude sleeping in a chair and now I’m legit?” Daryl said as he walked away to inspect one of the marble statues of a scantily clad Greek goddess that surrounded the foyer. “That’s fucking stupid, guy.”
“Trust me, I know Max,” Jake said as he started scrolling through his phone. “It’s the little things.”
“He wasn’t quite what I expected,” Daryl said in a low voice. “You’ve been talking this dude up for as long as I’ve known you. He seemed kind of lame.”
“Ah, he’s getting old now,” Jake replied, looking up from his phone for a nanosecond. “He used to be a lot more fun.”
“What, he used to touch your balls or something?” Daryl said as he checked how many handfuls the statue’s tits were.
Daryl heard the footsteps and pulled away from the concrete boobs he was fondling. He swiveled around to see Donald striding over to him, carrying what looked to be a cigar box.
“Gucci fucking Oxfords,” Daryl mumbled to himself. “Of course, this mother fucker knows how to dress.”
He approached slowly, every muscle flexing, enhancing every movement. Everything Donald did was menacing.
† Well, Gucci fucking Oxfords aside, everything else about Donald was
menacing. †
Daryl found himself reacting on a primal level. It was like he was back in jail, puffing up his chest and straightening up his torso to match his foe.
“Easy, buddy,” Jake muttered.
With his free hand, Donald pulled an envelope from his breast pocket and handed it to Jake. Jake didn’t open it or inspect it, he just shoved it in the front of his jeans, and Daryl made a mental note to ask him later how much he was getting for this mess. In his best Deal or No Deal pose, Donald presented the box to Daryl with both hands.
“Inside this box is a GPS tracker and detailed instructions on where to be and what to do tonight,” Donald said with grim intensity. “As Mr. Michaelson said, the cargo hold is off limits, so don’t even think about looking inside.”
Daryl nodded and tried to take the box from Donald but he kept a tight grip on it, creating a tug of war. Not one to take part in games, Daryl grew frustrated and removed his hand from the box, leaving Donald holding it.
“You going to give me that?” Daryl said puffing up his chest even more. “Or should I just go?”
Donald slammed the box into Daryl’s chest. It hurt him but Daryl acted like it was nothing.
“Is that all you got big man?” Daryl wheezed. “Cause I haven’t got all day.”
“Donald, don’t be a fucking dick,” Jake cut in, trying to ease the tension. “He’s doing Max a favor.”
Donald finally dropped the box, and Daryl caught it as he tried to catch his breath, while not looking like he was trying to catch his breath.
“My number is in the box. Call me to confirm the job is done. I’ll come meet you with the rest of the payment. Do not come back here, ever,” Donald said, using his hand to point the way out of the house. “If you have any more questions, direct them to Jake.”
“Jake?” Daryl asked, bewildered by the lack of care anyone was putting into this.
“Have a nice night,” Donald called over his shoulder as he walked away.
“What the fuck have you got me into, man?” Daryl said as he rubbed his throbbing chest.
“Don’t worry, they like to be vague,” Jake said as he started walking to the door. “It’s their thing. They think they’re spies or some shit.”
CHAPTER 14: BURT REYNOLDS
Jake and Daryl walked out of the large doors to the even more aggressively large parking circle that stood at the front of the mansion. A vintage Ferrari and next year’s Bentley were parked in stark contrast next to Jake’s 1977 Pontiac Trans Am. Jake’s car was an American classic to be sure, but in the condition it was in, it could only be classified as a classic piece of shit. The iconic Firebird decal was long gone, and what once was black was now a dark gray from sun damage. Rust holes in the hood added a unique aerodynamic quality. Clearly, this was not the Bandit’s mint condition Trans Am, but Jake loved it. It was his giant “fuck you” to society. Thanks to Max’s little jobs that Jake did from time to time, he could afford a pristine version of this car, but this personified him to a tee.
Nothing got him hornier than pulling up outside of an exclusive nightclub in Hollywood in a huge cloud of exhaust, as wannabe actors and models of both sexes waited in line, looking on in disgust as a crappy car pulled up outside their Mecca of all things superficial. Jake would jump out of the car through the window like he was a Duke from Hazzard County, tossing his keys to the valet before high fiving all the security and strolling in like he owned the place. Meanwhile the beautiful people standing in line looked on like idiots with their mouths agape. The only thing Jake was superficial about was women. He never denied that, but he never treated anyone different based on whatever his or her deal was, mostly because in the future he might want to fuck them, and thus his mantra was, “Don’t fuck up today what you could fuck tomorrow.”
