The Sunset Strip Diaries

by Amy Asbury

  The article I wrote for the school paper ended up in a showcase in the office building. I was stunned. I wrote:

  It feels good to work on a newspaper. Proofreading it, cutting out misprints with an X-Acto knife, and pressing new letters in their places. Kids were watching me from the other side of the glass as if I were important. They were pretending to look at dictionaries. It is different from being on the literary magazine. I didn’t use to think so, but this is real. We sell ads, lay out the pages, do interviews, and actually report things. The literary magazine is heavily edited by someone who decides what is creative enough, what is ‘art’. I consider art to be a very personal thing- it has to be determined by each person individually. I don’t think the magazine has enough different viewpoints. I am witnessing a lot of censorship going on there. There is a very artistic guy named Roger, who is probably the most talented and creative guy at school. He keeps writing poems that the teacher finds inappropriate. Every couple of days he comes up with a new one and she shoots it down for being too racy. It sucks that he has to hold back his talent and censor himself, when those are his thoughts and feelings. I respect him because I want to write things that are raw and truthful and I don’t want to hold back either.

  Roger just wrote on the chalkboard above me, ‘I lost my spleen to a heartless surgeon.’ He must be referring to the teacher editing his stuff. Here is the conversation he is having with Mrs. Kego:

  Kego: “Roger, that is so graphic! If this were a college magazine-”

  R: “What’s wrong? Okay. I can change it to ‘the sheets are damp’…”

  Kego: “It’s so graphic! Couldn’t you veil it a little better?”

  ***

  I went to Razz and Michael’s and drove with them to The Strip every weekend, rain or shine. One night we sat around the red restaurant booth in their game room eating hot dogs, thinking of which cartoon characters we would be. They said Razz was Icabod Crane, Michael was Doonesbury, and I was Betty Boop. Then they all got ready, complaining that their hair had a wave in it or needed a trim. They decided whether to make their hair stick straight, a little poofy, or maybe just poofy on the bangs. They each did their makeup and piled on bracelets and necklaces and spritzed on colognes and perfumes. Sometimes I went over and just laid under the covers with Michael while Razz and their new bandmate Holly practiced songs on their guitars (they never ended up playing anywhere, from what I can recall). Holly had a bloated face and pretty bad skin. He tried to keep his skin covered with his hair, which was an outright disaster in and of itself. It looked like an explosion of burned straw.

  Michael and I thought of funny things that happened that week and laughed so hard we rolled up in little balls and held our stomachs, out of breath. One of the things we couldn’t stop laughing about was when some girl backhanded Razz in the mouth for being rude. He flicked her in the mouth, twice, and then once on her ear. He was so proud of himself and told everyone about his flicking, which was of course feminine and wimpy. We also couldn’t stop laughing about the story of Holly falling asleep in the middle of hooking up with a girl. She got pissed, smacked him to wake him, and it startled him. He jumped ten feet in the air and said, “Huh!? What?! Where’s the fire!?”

  A new guy came into the crowd named Stacy. I don’t remember if he was there before me and I just never saw him, or he was out of town for a while or what. He just kind of showed up one night. I know he was from New York and was a friend of someone’s, but no more details come to mind. He looked like Howard Stern, but with tons of makeup on. He wore super red lipstick, lots of pearls, crazy polka dot clothes, and platform boots. Michael always said he looked like Herman Munster and often did the impression of Herman getting mad and jumping up and down and saying, “Darn Darn Darn Darn Darn!” while the whole house shook (does anyone remember that? Just me? Okay then). Anyway, I detailed one of the nights with Stacy in my journal:

  Journal Entry 4/8/1991

  Stacy Star from Stars from Mars walked in the door with like, ten-inch platform shoes, red lipstick, and pearls. He is easily seven feet tall. I am surprised his head didn’t smack the door jam. Even with all that makeup and shit, he still sounds like a tough New Yorker, with a deep voice. Razz said, “Hey, ya big-nosed fuck! What’s up! Dude, does your nose get in the way when you kiss a girl?” Stacy looked at him without missing a beat and said, “Does it get in the way when I kiss YOU? …Well then.”

  We tried to cut through the Bel Age Hotel parking lot to find a place to park later that night, and some guy wouldn’t move his car. Holly, the New Yorker that he is, jumped out of the car to fight the guy and security broke it up. He should probably change his name from Holly to something like Carmine. Not too long ago, the front of the Bel Age was full of screaming girls because New Kids on the Block were staying there. They are real popular with teenagers right now. Well, normal teenagers, anyway.

  CHAPTER TEN

  Sucker

  I was over at Razz and Michael’s one day for a barbecue, when a very hot guy walked through the door with a twelve pack of beer. He had long, silky black hair with the top part dyed dark blue. He was super confident with great skin and sexy eyes. I thought, Oh no…I didn’t think I would be meeting HIM. It was one of the guys from Tryx: Roxy DeVeau. My pupils turned into cartoon hearts.

  I knew exactly who he was because I had his picture pinned on my wall at my grandmother’s house and had been staring at him constantly since 1989. I know, I know. It is stupid. But back then, Tryx was a group I had heard about before to getting to Hollywood. They were very colorful and had a really cool look that I dug. I appreciated their creativity and I also thought they were really attractive. I realized at that moment that the reason that none of the other guys I had met in Hollywood, no matter how cool or ‘famous’ they were, were a threat to my relationship, because I wasn’t truly attracted to any of them. I thought a few were cute, but there was no one that worried me. There was no one that I thought “oh shit” about. Except this guy.

  Next thing I knew, I was chatting with him while shaping ground beef into hamburger patties over the sink. Later he asked me to help him do his eyeliner before we all went out; he wanted me to hold his eyelid open so he could line the inside of his eye. I got nervous, and pounded so much beer that I was lightheaded. I thought, I wish hadn’t beat up Tricia so I could tell her about this; she would shit her G-string. I calmed myself down by thinking, He won’t want me. There will be someone prettier, someone better. I won’t even have to get into that situation.

  I was wrong! Roxy started hanging out with us every weekend, so I saw him a lot. He started to flirt with me and we had major tension. He kept trying to get me to kiss him. I said no. No, no, no. I knew if I gave in, two things would happen: 1) He would lose interest and 2) I would lose my boyfriend. It was a lose/lose situation that I had the sense to foresee, but still, it was painful. I lusted after this guy hard. He didn’t make it easy on me. He was always pulling me onto his lap or trying to pull me into corners to “talk.”

  Razz knew I actually liked Roxy. He flipped his hair and raised a plucked eyebrow into an arch. “You dig him, don’t you?” he said in a drawn out voice. “Please. I could tell. I know you. He is a pretty sexy guy, huh? Look, he digs you. You dig him. Why don’t you just go with your feelings, you know?”

  I said, “No! Don’t let me near him! Be my friend!”

  He said, “Listen, I am your friend. And you are my friend, okay? You come over here and you don’t fuck anybody. I like that.”

  Holly, who had a bad stutter and a thick New York accent, really made fun of Roxy, especially the part in his hair. He always said, “I haven’t seen a part that big s-s-s-s-since Moses parted the Red Sea. Tell him to bring his b-b-b-b-big Dumbo ears over here. But tell him to stop scamming on all of our women. It’s not cool.”

  One night Roxy gave me his leather jacket to wear on The Strip, which was unheard of, because popular Hollywood guys always wanted to appear single. This way, they could g
et a lot of girls to think they had a chance with them and buy tickets to their shows. It was not unlike a stripper who pretends she is single so the guys think they have a shot. They are selling a fantasy. Anyway, I was secretly giddy to be wearing a Tryx jacket over my bright yellow dress; it was like wearing the hot quarterback’s letterman jacket or something. A small part of me thought…What if this leaks back to Jimmy? This is kind of public…and another part of me told that part to shut the fuck up.

  I thought I was in the clear as far as wearing that jacket. We got separated in the crowds and parties later that evening, so I wore it home and of course looked through every crevice of it. His wallet (empty- no surprise), was inside and so were his keys- I knew he would have to come get that jacket if he wanted those items back. I found his ID, which said his real name, Brian Charles DeVeau, and a Florida address. I stared at it like a psycho- I probably sniffed the damn thing, knowing me. The next day Jimmy showed up at the door and I panicked, throwing the jacket in my sister’s closet and burying it with her pile of dirty underwear and socks.

  While I was sitting on the couch talking to Jimmy, I felt like that jacket would come walking out of the closet itself, just to haunt me. I tried to calm my guilt and tell myself I was in the clear. Then the doorbell rang and I felt my armpits shoot sweat. Shit! I held up a pink fingernail toward Jimmy and smiled a weak smile as if to say, Just a minute, this is probably someone selling vacuum cleaners. Let me just get rid of them so I can continue spending time with you, the love of my life.

  I opened the door a sliver and it was Razz, with his hair in a scrunchie and a striped shirt that was hanging off one shoulder. He was chewing.

  “We are down the street eating hamburgers in the car. Roxy wants to camp out because he thinks you want to see him! Go out there.”

  “No! Get out of here!” I hissed through clenched teeth. I wanted to drop a piano on his head and squash him.

  I went back in the house and Jimmy kind of laughed and said, “Do youuuu want to tell me what’s going on?” He promised he wouldn’t get mad. I thought...Oh shit…here it is.

  I said, “It is totally lame- it is nothing. It’s going to sound worse than it is-”

  He sounded like a dad catching his kid having a huge party.

  “I can’t imagine. Just tell me the story.”

  I was brief. I told him I was holding this guy Roxy’s jacket for him real quick, but we suddenly lost contact and I didn’t want to just throw it somewhere because it had his keys in it. Jimmy was quiet. He sighed and rubbed his eyes. Then he looked up at me and said:

  “You would never hold my jacket. Never. You don’t hold people’s jackets. I know you. Second, why would you keep that jacket with you, unless you wanted him to come get it?”

  Shit. What was with all of the psychology? Had Jimmy been hanging out with my shrink? He had me figured out. Was I that obvious?

  “I know what it looks like…” I said, as he calmly stared at me and crossed his leg, bracelets jangling and boot buckles clicking. His bright blue eyes were piercing mine like lasers. I could swear that if I looked closely at his pupils, they said Lying Ho!

  Later that night when Jimmy was gone, Roxy rang the doorbell. I looked out the peephole and quickly ran and ripped his picture off my wall, yellowed and full of Scotch tape. My mom was walking out of her room because she heard the doorbell. I jumped ahead of her, flew out the door, and slammed it behind me, nearly knocking ten crucifixes off my grandmother’s wall. I knew my mom would totally find a way to tell Jimmy if she saw something fishy and I couldn’t let that happen. Roxy’s car was running and the passenger door was open so I quickly got in, despite the fact that I was wearing Joe Boxer shorts with little ants all over them and a pink pajama top with an ice cream cone on the front. I didn’t even have shoes on! I thought he wanted to talk in the car or something but no, he drove me to Razz’s.

  When we arrived, Holly was sitting on the couch in a black Ramones shirt, having spasms from alcohol. Michael was spinning a basketball on his finger, talking about how much he thought he looked like Pete Burns from Dead or Alive. Razz was playing Gene Loves Jezebel on the stereo and talking on the phone in his pink sweatpants. Roxy and I went onto the patio to talk.

  He got right into it: “People tell me you like me, but when I see you, you ignore me.”

  “I stay away from you because I don’t want to start liking you.”

  “Really start liking me? I like you, okay? But you won’t believe anything I say.”

  “I could imagine us together for about ten minutes and then never seeing you again. Then I would get all attached to you and get all psycho- I don’t want you to hurt me.”

  “I would not do that to you,” he said. “The way you keep someone around is not to sleep with them right away. So, you don’t have to! I just want to kiss you.”

  We were standing there amongst potted plants and the fluffy white Persian cat with little bells on her pink collar. I knew the situation could go terribly awry, and I mustered willpower from every pore in my teenaged body not to make out with the guy. I think the main thing keeping me sensible was the fact that I was sober. Goodness knows what would have happened had I been pounding beers. I told him flat out that I just didn’t trust him and he was pissed.

  “I am not making promises, all right?” he said, his dark eyes flashing. “Look. I don’t want to tell you what to do, but you’re frustrating me. I think that you need to decide what you really want. I can tell this is bugging you. What I really think, is that you should just kiss me. Then you can decide. Do I excite you more than your boyfriend?”

  I turned red and told him he was going too far and that he should take me back home. I marched off to the car, but inside I was fantasizing that we would fall onto the sand on a beach and make out while waves crashed around us like the scene in From Here to Eternity.

  As we were driving, he said:

  “You are living a fake life.”

  I gave him the side eye as he continued: “You don’t do what you want. You are staying with this guy because you can’t imagine what life would be without him. What is wrong with doing what you really want? Look, I could get you to have sex with me, because I know you want to.”

  “What?” I said, looking over at him. Who did he think he was? “Do you think you have some magical powers or something? You couldn’t get me to have sex with you; I won’t even kiss you for God’s sake.”

  “I could. Believe me. I know you want to. But I am not doing that.”

  I got out of the car, walked back into the house in a huff, and slammed the door. Boy was he right. I wanted to sleep with him in an awful sort of way, I ain’t gonna lie. The guy was sexy. I also knew very well that it would be a stupid groupie thing to do, and it would surely end the relationship that I felt was keeping me out of trouble. I started thinking about the show Tryx was playing that weekend. I didn’t want Roxy to see me there and have his ego blow up as if I were some fan of his (if only he knew). I didn’t attend the show, but the next night I went to Ten Masa. Gerry Gittelson, the columnist for Rock City News, popped up out of nowhere and said he heard I was dating Roxy from Tryx. I immediately told him I was not, and prayed it didn’t get back to my boyfriend.

  Journal Entry 4/14/91

  I don’t want to give up Jimmy. I am scared of life. I am scared of being in another relationship; trying to figure out who’s safe and who’s not. I don’t want to ever be without Jimmy because then I will have to be on my own with all of these men and I will get weak for one of them and ruin my life. I will crumble without Jimmy.

  Speaking of Jimmy, he invited Cristabelle and me to the Cathouse again. We were in a VIP area that was roped off and surrounded by bodyguards. Stephen Pearcy of Ratt was there, he smiled at me. Tracii Guns from L.A. Guns and Taime Downe from Faster Pussycat were also there and they all played songs together. The night after that, Jimmy trashed his whole house and cussed me out, shaking the whole time. He doesn’t want me hanging out with t
he guys on the weekends. He is afraid I will hook up with someone, namely Roxy. He is starting to look like a chump to his friends, I think.

  Anyway, the next night I took Cristabelle and my sister out with me. We stopped by Brent Muscat’s house and he had dyed his bangs bright pink and was doing laundry. He said Jimmy was “weirding out” on him at Bordello so he started throwing cigarette papers at him. I was embarrassed for Jimmy because he was a fan of Faster Pussycat, but I went and put my arm around Brent in front of Holly and Razz and said, “Cigarette papers. What a man!” and laughed. He smiled real big and hopefully felt taken down a peg.

  Razz said, “Come on, you know you are going out with Jimmy against your will.”

  I said, “I am not, Razz.”

  We all went to The Strip, which was very crowded. Bobby Berry and Pepper Sweet from the band Strawberry were in front of The Roxy with a ton of neon pink clothing, colorful plastic charm bracelets and lots of clown makeup. Bobby’s stage name is actually “Boppin’ Bobby Gene” but Michael started calling him Bobby Berry and that is what we all call him now. Pepper and he were carrying huge orange and green water guns and TV cameras were following them while they tried squirting my feet. I shot them an evil look that said, “Don’t get my fucking shoes wet or I will slice your glittered balls off.” Bobby has black hair down to his waist and plucked eyebrows. He is actually really beautiful when made up- he does a good smoky eye. He loves looking at Cosmopolitan magazine- that is where he gets his beauty tips. If you listen closely, he has a Texas drawl- he says ‘y’all’ when he is buzzed. Sometimes we go to their place to drink beers before we go out. It is full of toys, Cap’n Crunch cereal boxes, cartoony stuff, and of course, lots of women's magazines. Bobby thinks if he does these face exercises from Cosmo every night, he won't age or something. He always does facial masks and moisturizes.