by Denise Dietz
Too bad the nest of dark hair between her legs didn’t match her platinum Farrah-Fawcett-curls. Too bad her brains were as thick as her ankles. Too bad he had taken her to bed and kept his slightly altered promise ‑‑ a job on his first movie rather than a part in his first movie.
“I’ve got my reasons,” he said. “First, call Sol Aarons.”
“Ya wanna see him?”
“Yes, you idiot! Set up a meeting!”
“Oh-oh-okay,” she stammered. “For when?”
“Yesterday! Move your butt, sweetheart. Tell Sol ASAP.”
I won’t show the monster, Victor thought, so he doesn’t need a name!
Christ, was he a genius or what? A genius whose resurrected erection threatened to burst through his jocks.
He focused on one of the extras. Tall. Lovely blue-green eyes. Long, red-tinged hair. And a mouth that looked as if it could suck a corpse until a formerly flaccid body part became dilated with blood.
Victor beckoned, then pointed to his director’s chair.
Leisurely strolling toward the chair, the extra’s motions were lithesome; no scurry, no fear.
Interesting, Victor thought, drumming his fingertips against his jeans. Inside his head, he heard his D-Train To Hell soundtrack.
Chapter Nineteen
Leaning across Andre, gazing through the small porthole, I thought about singing Good Morning Starshine from the musical Hair. Only it wasn’t morning and there were no stars.
Our plane was sandwiched between Houston and Heaven, and I wondered if God cut the crust off clouds. If only I could have traveled by bus, with Cat Sands and Charlie Daniels, because, to be perfectly honest, airplanes make me hyper, tense, high-strung. Which movie plot served up the tainted fish that caused the flight crew and half the passengers to flounder between life and death? Knock, knock, who’s there? Juliet. Juliet who? Juliet the fish so she can’t land the plane.
I’d purchased some books on magic and witchcraft, thinking I’d study up for my role as the possessed teenager. I’d begun reading them in New York and figured that, during my flight, I’d memorize incantations to call up and/or ward off demons. That would chill me out, right?
The plane roller-coastered and all the fasten-your-seatbelt signs lit up. Consumed with an almost epileptic fear, I jostled Andre’s script.
He gave me one of my mother’s patented martyr-sighs and said, “Frannie, try to relax. Visit the cockpit and ask Peter Pan Pilot if he’ll teach you how to fly.”
“Very funny. And while we’re on the subject, would you like to explain where cockpit got its name?”
“Grow up,” he mumbled.
Time for a change of subject. “You’ll have your part memorized before the first rehearsal, Andre.”
“Not if you keep interrupting.”
“Switch seats with me,” I said, thrusting my witchcraft book inside my purse. “I’ll look out the window and count the stars.”
Andre didn’t respond; probably hadn’t even heard me. He’d been doing that a lot lately. I could say: Ohmigod-the-apartment’s-on-fire! and he’d say: What’s-for-supper-Frannie?
As we shifted, I wriggled my butt provocatively. Andre didn’t rise to the bait, didn’t even give my tush a conciliatory pat.
And yet, recently, he’d been in a great mood. Galveston Dinner Theatre, also known as GDT, had softened the blow of his soap opera demise. The fiancée bit hadn’t been necessary; GDT’s owners were overjoyed to hire a bona-fide Tee-Vee star. They’d scheduled Bus Stop for their first production, and Andre would perform the lead role of the naïve cowboy, Beau.
Coincidentally, GDT’s resident director was an old friend.
“Remember Richard Dean?” Andre had asked while we were shrouding our furniture with sheets, definitely a WASP tradition. Mom would have “protected” the furniture from day one, even the barber chair. With plastic. That way, the plastic gets dirty while the furniture stays clean, and usually the plastic stays clean because nobody wants to sit on it. The only exceptions to what I call the “Rosen plastique” are Mom’s kitchen, Daddy’s workshop, the basement’s washer, dryer, freezer, Ping-Pong table, and ironing board (for Mom’s cleaning lady), my bedroom ‑‑ now a guest room ‑‑ and the patio barbecue.
“Richard Dean,” I repeated. “Didn’t he once appear on your soap? As a doctor or something?”
“Close. Veterinarian. Remember that dumb dog who slobbered all the time? When Trish slipped on dog drool, they fired the mutt and stuffed the vet’s story-line. Anyway, he…Rick, not the dog…owns a duplex in Clear Lake City, not far from Galveston. Rick lives in one half, the other half’s vacant. I can have it for utilities and ‑‑”
“We’ll split expenses, right?”
Startled, he said, “Won’t your crew be based in Houston?”
“Yes, but they’re shooting my scenes south of Clear Lake City. If I stay with you, I can bank my per diem. Isn’t that a good idea?”
“Yeah, sure,” Andre said, but it sounded like frankly-my-dear-I-don’t-give-a-damn.
“Honey, let’s talk about this,” I had pleaded, meaning the Night of Wine and Roses, knowing he’d know what I meant.
He said, “What’s for supper, Frannie?”
When I tried to bring it up again, he said, “Forget it, Frannie.”
However, I couldn’t forget my psychic’s prediction: Everything will begin to happen in a festive atmosphere. Be careful. There are negative forces possessive toward others and jealous of your success.
I pictured Mrs. Carvainis levitating a few inches above the plane’s wing, her gold tooth challenging the sun.
Our flight attendant could have doubled for Wheel of Fortune’s Vanna White. Leaning across Andre, her breasts shaded his eyes like a visor as she looked into my eyes and asked if I wanted steak, chicken, or fish for dinner.
“Definitely not fish,” I said, but she was indulging in airline humor. My menu options were peanuts or peanuts…and booze. Daddy had given me some emergency grocery money, so I handed Vanna a twenty, pocketed the change, and slurped a couple of vodkas. On the rocks.
Andre looked up from his script.
“Slow down, lil lady,” he drawled. “I don’t wanna haf’ta’ carry y’all through the airport like a piece of gol-dang luggage.”
“Y’all is plural,” I said, “and I’m not Wendy. I hate flying.”
Defiantly, I pressed Vanna’s buzzer and ordered another Smirnoff. Had they been hedge clippers, her breasts could have trimmed Andre’s hair as she leaned over to hand me the miniature bottle. This time, I could make out the letters on her nametag: FAITH.
I finally un-stressed. To have faith is to have wings.
Chapter Twenty
Three days later, I watched insects spatter the windshield of my borrowed stick-shift. Richard Dean, who looks like Shakespeare’s Puck, had impishly bestowed a name upon his old, dented, yellow car. Yoda the Toyota. Cute.
Before lending me the car, Rick had given me a quick lesson in how to clutch, then complimented me on my hand-foot coordination. I didn’t bother telling him that my flexibility came from years of dancing the hokey-pokey, the bunnyhop, and the hora. Weddings and bar mitzvahs were especially big on the hora, an Israeli circle dance where the music increases, speed-wise. Most people corkscrewed their feet, but practice makes perfect and I’d had way too much practice. Charlene, Marlene, and Mark, from my mom’s side of the family, were married, engaged and significantly-othered. All, of course, had been bar mitzvahed and bas mitzvahed. Meanwhile, Daddy’s side of the family included dozens of first, second and third-rate cousins.
Clutching the slippery steering wheel, I tried to remember the directions to the Forever Asmodeus get-acquainted party without sneaking a peek at the piece of paper buried inside my purse. I had driven my father’s car all over Long Island, from Great Neck to West Babylon, but Texans speak a foreign language, including the words North, South, East, West. New Yorkers never give directions that way. If one is not driving
into Manhattan via the Queens Midtown Tunnel or Paul Simon’s groovy Fifty-Ninth Street Bridge, directions pinpoint shopping centers, churches, synagogues, a McDonald’s or three, and stoplights. Example: “When you get to the McDonald’s on the corner, don’t do anything. Go to the next stoplight and hang a left.”
Ordinarily, I could deal with compass directions and Houston-style humidity. But Yoda’s air conditioning was on the blink, and even with all the windows open, I felt sluggish, as if I was trapped inside an esoteric, George Lucasonian sauna.
The car radio worked…one station…Golden Oldies, or Oldie Goldies, or Songs Goldie Hawn Might Have Sung, or whatever the heck the retrospective was called. Its DJ promised commercials on the half hour, time and weather every fifteen minutes. Judy Collins sang about making her entrance again with her usual flair, sure of her lines.
Send in the damn clowns, send in Frannie Rosen. Sweat streaked my makeup, my nose flaunted a sunburn, the traffic was bumper to bumper, at least ten of the bumpers stated GUNS DON’T KILL, PEOPLE KILL, Yoda’s transmission groaned in protest, the road’s white dividing line wavered in the heat, I wasn’t sure of my lines, and Jeremy Glenn would be at the restaurant: Victor Madison’s Guest of Honor.
Swell!
On TV, Jeremy clobbered bad guys into submission or car-chased them into oblivion. But he needed no weapons to subdue bad girls. He simply charmed them to death.
Once upon a time Andre had charmed the socks off me, not to mention the rest of my clothes. His melt-Oscar smile, however, was wearing thin. Tonight he rehearsed in Galveston.
I’d met a few Bus Stop cast members and crew. Prominent among the stage hands were twins, Bambi and Fawn. They shared angelic faces and what my Uncle Lars would have called Scandihoovian-blonde hair. Four mammary protuberances stretched their elastic halter tops while a couple of rounded butts threatened to split the seams of their cut-offs. My mother would have baptized them Goyim Slut One and Goyim Slut Two. Andre thought they were adorable.
He and I hadn’t consummated our safe arrival. By the time we’d completed the long drive from the airport to Rick’s duplex, I was what my Australian pal Gordon would have called “pissed as forty cats.”
Entering the living room, staring at its fireplace, swigging from my umpteenth miniature vodka bottle, I’d sung who’s afraid of the big bad demon, the big bad demon, the big bad demon. Andre had swept me up into his arms, navigated the stairs like Rhett Butler, deposited me on the queen-size bed, and exited stage left.
Ever since, Andre had spent the majority of his time at Bus Stop rehearsals. I had spent the majority of my time sunning myself on a redwood deck, re-reading my dog-eared copy of Forever Asmodeus, and petting Rick’s dog Ginger, whose name had been inspired by the Gilligan’s Island movie star, or as my psychic would say, “Gilligan’s ecktriss.”
The party locale ‑‑ a seafood restaurant ‑‑ was supposedly ten minutes from Rick’s duplex, fifteen max. I had been driving for twenty-five minutes!
Braking Yoda at a stoplight, I fumbled inside my purse and retrieved my directions.
Chapter Twenty-one
Woodcock’s Wharf roosted on the edge of the Gulf, amidst seafood retail shops and tourist-oriented bars. When I arrived, the setting sun looked like a huge, newly-minted penny.
After curbing Yoda, I strode through a parking lot covered with finely-ground seashells. Then I introduced myself to the cop who stood by the front entrance. Security was as tight as my mother’s pink panty girdle. A few Jeremy Glenn groupies grouped, but most were bivouacked outside his Houston hotel.
I passed my identity quiz with flying colors and the cop waved me inside. Taking a deep breath, actually several deep breaths, I climbed a flight of stairs and walked into a large room.
A plate-glass window framed seashore and nightfall. To my left was a polished mahogany bar. An authentic jukebox squatted against one wall. At the far end of the room, a piano bar was flanked by a dozen brown-cushioned stools.
Thirty cast and crew members, maybe more, mingled, but all I saw was Jeremy Glenn. Straight white teeth. Dimples that deepened when he smiled. Dark hair, professionally tousled. His eyes… I spun an imaginary color wheel and the imaginary arrow landed on cobalt blue.
He wore khaki slacks and a Denver Broncos-blue golf shirt. Short sleeves revealed bronzed forearms and an almost Herculean dedication to weight lifting. Snakeskin boots added another couple of inches to his over-six-feet height.
Christ, no one could be that perfect. Maybe the tousled hair was a toupee. Maybe the eyes were colored contacts. Maybe the bulge between his thighs was a rolled-up pair of socks.
“Frannie, yoo-hoo, over here, I saved you a seat.” Lynn Beth Sullivan indicated an empty captain’s chair, pulled away from a wood-plank table.
I smiled and walked toward her. Jeremy stood at the head of the table. As I passed him, our bodies collided and I dropped my purse. We both bent down to retrieve it…and bumped foreheads.
He helped me rise, his fingers loosening the white silk blouse I had tucked into my black Calvin Klein crepe evening pants.
Tall, I thought, he’s so tall, taller than Andre, and I wondered if, looking down, he could see the cleavage I’d desperately tried to enhance with a Victoria’s Closet underwire bra.
“Hello,” he said. “Any permanent damage to your head?”
I searched my brain for a scintillating reply. “It is better to be knocked over,” I said, “than knocked up.”
“Huh?”
“Sorry. I was paraphrasing Mae West, who said ‘It is better to be looked over than overlooked.’”
I knew my nose looked like a clown’s, but were my cheeks now patched with crimson? What’s black and white and red all over? My stupnagel cousin Charlene would say an embarrassed zebra, but she’d be wrong. Unless she took a wild guess and said, “Cousin Frannie.”
Jeremy’s dimples flashed. Then he turned and headed toward the piano bar.
I continued my trip around the table. Lynn Beth wore a yellow sundress and cork-soled wedgies. Sliding my butt over polished wood, I said, “What do you think of Jeremy Glenn, in person?”
“He’d baaaad,” she said, sounding like Mary’s lamb. “When he hugged me I almost fainted.”
A waitress materialized, jostling my elbow as she placed a platter of raw oysters on top of the table. Her name tag stated KELLY. She had the body of a clarinet. No breasts. No ass. Her expression was vacuous until she glanced over at Jeremy Glenn.
He’s baaaad, I thought, and bad is good.
Carafes of white and red wine garnished the table. I poured some white into an empty glass and washed down a few oysters.
“Yuk,” said Lynn Beth, drowning a shrimp in blood-colored sauce. “How can you eat that, Frannie? It looks like Asmodeus throw-up.”
I laughed. “What are you drinking, kiddo?”
She held up a toothpick, speared through a cherry and pineapple wedge. “Some kind of colada…virgin. Mommy would kill me if I drank wine.”
“Been there, done that,” I said. “Once I sneaked a few sips during a family celebration and got grounded for three weeks.”
“I’d probably get grounded for life. Mommy’s mad as hell tonight because Shelly didn’t come with us.”
Lynn Beth’s Mommy was still jarring, and I pictured Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford, insisting that her adopted daughter call her Mommy Dearest. “Sheldon Giglia?” I said. “Our assistant director?”
“Uh-huh. They had a big fight.” Lynn Beth twisted a ginger-colored curl around her index finger, then let it spring back to join the mass of hair that framed her face like a fancy bathing cap. “I hate it when Mommy breaks up with her boyfriends. Would you order me another shrimp cocktail, Frannie?”
I summoned Kelly, and saw Victor Madison chatting with Jeremy Glenn, who now stood near the piano player. I could have sworn Jeremy nodded toward me and Madison shook his head, but maybe my overactive imagination was acting up again.
The Prince
of Darkness wore black jeans, a black shirt with silver threads, and a black Stetson. Thanks to Cat and Bonnie, I no longer thought Clark Kent. But I remembered Samson’s apt description: His eyes seemed to flash black lightning.
A few more people sat at our table, and I excused myself to use the restroom, which had a mermaid on the door.
As I pressed my palms against the mermaid and opened the door, party sounds receded and I heard the now-familiar click-click-click.
Chapter Twenty-two
Standing in front of a wall-mounted hand-dryer, Bonnie drip-dried her wet hands. As I watched, she click-clicked the dryer’s start button, rejuvenating the warm whiff.
