Glamourpuss
Page 29
Jerry had called something up on his computer. “I had to write the breakdown today. Cyrinda regains her memory and shoots Simon six times. Self-defense. I’m so sorry, Alex. You were an incredible Simon. I loved writing for you.” He made no effort to halt the tears now.
“Jerry, you do a great job. They don’t deserve you. I know you’ll find something better. I’ve really got to get back home now. Are you going to be okay?” The crying combined with the electrical equipment made me worry about the danger of shock. I couldn’t imagine how things could get more awkward.
Then Jerry stood up. “Thank you for everything.” He put his arms around me and I hugged him back, feeling every rib. He moved his hands over my shoulders and down my chest. Hey, wait a minute. “Oh, Alex, you have such a… delicious body.” He looked into my eyes for a second, then clumsily clamped his mouth over mine. I gripped him where biceps should’ve been (my fingers touched) and gently broke us apart.
“You’re upset, Jerry…” I offered stupidly. He turned and bounded up the stairs like a gazelle with cerebral palsy, still sobbing. I followed him to his room, where he’d crashed onto the bed. “Jerry. Please…” I kept my distance. Touching him would not be a good idea, for either of us.
“Just go, Alex! I’m…” The rest was lost facedown in the pillow. I’m not sure how many nights he spent weeping — needlessly, as it turned out. Weeks later he was offered the co-head writer position on One Life To Live. He put his Marina condo on the market (the sale irrevocably finalized mere days before the Northridge earthquake in January), relocated to New York, came out, found romance with a very attractive OLTL costume designer and moved into the guy’s enormous rent-controlled Upper West Side pre-war apartment. They spent the rest of the Nineties and beyond enjoying an A-list Manhattan-Gay lifestyle, absolutely and enviably fabulous, apart from their insistence on adopting a string of needy infants from a variety of hellholes across the globe.
I went downstairs. The computer was a more sophisticated version of my parents’ Macintosh desktop, so I knew how to turn it off. I looked at Jerry’s walls just a little longer before getting in my car and driving home with all the windows rolled down, the chilly night air reminding me how much I preferred L.A. weather to scorching Texas. With or without a paycheck.
✽✽✽
My first impulse was to leave town for an extended vacation the night I finished my last episode, but Connie convinced me to stay for all those roles I was now eligible for. Twelve auditions and seven callbacks later, I’d booked nothing.
I spent a lot of time working out and hired a personal trainer twice a week. I read everything I’d been meaning to for the past year and ordered postcards of myself to send to casting directors. Sometimes I watched Hearts Crossing, but it seriously was just not as good after Cyrinda remembered it all and Simon tried to kill her again and she shot him… yup, six times. Without Simon to administer daily doses of wonder drug to keep him queer, Ollie lapsed back into heterosexual society and reunited with busty, besotted Gwen. After a brief investigation, Sean was released from prison to find both his ex-girlfriends engaged to other men. Most of the other characters were embroiled in an uplifting summer storyline about crack babies. I wasn’t sure what Simon’s patsy chemist was up to, because I switched over to Trinity Broadcasting Network whenever Anna Ford showed her rotten face. Allison provided me with a footnote much more interesting than anything now being written for the show… she told me Ray Lanville had begun casting his runes in the direction of Cary Rietta, X-rated sketches and all. Cary freaked out and his manager brought in the FBI. Allie told me they had Ray, a word processor at a prominent real estate office, under surveillance.
Most everyone had been terrific during my final shows. Megan threw me a little farewell party in her dressing room with a cake from Sweet Lady Jane and presents. Kick-ass ones, too: an all-region VCR and high-end new TV from Allie and Phalita, Shakespears Sister import CD singles from Nori Ann Marshall, and… from Brent Bingham, a really beautiful shirt from Barney’s (I know) with a note: “To a totally cool & talented actor and good friend. Good luck! God bless!!! BB” I was touched. Especially since his name had been evoked and his Christianity questioned by Clean Airwaves repeatedly for weeks. Anna Ford stopped by for a piece of cake and to say goodbye, which took some balls, if you asked me.
I smiled at her extra-sweetly. I’d called the reporter from Interview a while ago and told him I was okay going on-record with the name of the AIDS-phobic bitch in the cast I’d discreetly avoided identifying over lunch. I felt more concerned about not mentioning I’d just been canned (Connie had insisted I “not tip it”) — oh, well… when the issue came out in nine days, there’d still be almost three weeks of on-air Simon left.
Fired up by what they perceived to be a righteous victory in the war on depravity, Clean Airwaves intensified their assault. Their next target was Roseanne and its “coarse humor, teen sex and lesbianism.” Big mistake. Efforts to alienate sponsors and enlist quality-television groups backfired horribly. Roseanne Herself took personal offense and went on The Tonight Show. “Have you seen these two?!” she squawked at a giggly but noncommittal Jay Leno. “They’re like the Judds — the broke, inbred version.” She then invited them to “kiss my ass… censor that, Eunice!” Clean Airwaves’ 15 minutes were up. They faded into a mere local nuisance, subject to frequent ridicule in Sara’s popular new Paseo del Rio column, “A Girl’s Gotta Eat.”
The summer wore on and Dino & Muffin became a major Top Ten hit and was put on the fall schedule. Trevor never called me, got the lead in a TV movie and started appearing all over town with a 21-year-old cutie-pie film actress (and dyed-in-the-carpet sister of Sappho, to those in the know) — could Scientology be far behind? I honestly hoped it would never come to that. I also wondered how long it would take The Hollywood Kids (or some other equally cheeky and resourceful media gossip correspondent) to come across a certain Advocate Men back issue and give retired penis pin-up model “Randy Northcutt” the nationwide exposure he’d somehow avoided thus far. I was proud of the fact that no one would hear it from me (or Sara… or my mom… I made them promise).
My downstairs neighbor went to Thailand (of course) for ten days and asked me to water his plants and take care of his cat. A search for extra litter inevitably devolved into a snoop-session — all I discovered hidden in his Louis Quatorze armoire was an electric butt-plug still in the box (maybe he’d done his Xmas shopping early), a family-size jar of something called Elbow Grease, various flavors of Orville Redenbacher microwave popcorn and one lousy magazine featuring a tumescent Asian coverboy… hardly a surprise for a publication entitled Kung Pao Pork. I stayed caught up with friends and relatives and toyed with the idea of asking out that nice, hot-as-fuck Officer Carvajal. Sara and Nate made plans to visit me in late August. I was determined to have a job by then… any duration or embarrassment quotient acceptable and appreciated.
I was clandestinely perusing Dramalogue when the phone rang. Fully reverted to the trendy Desperate Actor mode, I snatched it up on the first ring. It was the Executive Director of GLAAD. As I debated hanging up, he wanted to know if I’d consider joining them for “a special project,” and said he was sorry I was off the show. To which I expressed what I thought was a little well-deserved skepticism. He told me I was an excellent actor and asked if I’d come in the next day for a meeting. “I think we’re both in favor of the same things,” he said. I capitulated, a sucker for polite guys with deep voices.
At 3:00 p.m. the next afternoon I showed up at their office attired in a coolly L.A.-formal dark blue jacket with matching pants, socks and Italian loafers. I wasn’t some dumb blonde TV himbo about to be fancy-talked into becoming an activists’ puppet, not me. I waited patiently, legs uncrossed, until a female intern with that Bud Bundy haircut showed me into a small chaotic office with a VCR/monitor unit and a desk entirely covered with magazines and torn-out daily calendar pages. “Nick will b
e right with you,” she said. Oh, well. I was bound to run into another one sooner or later.
I reached over and picked up a soap mag dated after my demise. I hadn’t kept up with press reactions to my departure. Just too depressing. Phalita was on the cover, sizzling as usual. A “tour of HC’s heartthrob’s new Bev Hills love-shack”? Been there, done…
“Mr Young?”
My head snapped up like a roughly treated marionette’s. Only one man in the world sounded like that. It was. “Nick?! Omigod. What’re you doing here?” This was the biggest surprise I’d ever had… with the possible exception of the first time I ejaculated. A tempest of conflicting emotions spun into a cyclone deep within me, then attacked my brain. Potential tears of happiness boiled away in disbelief and resentment that he could’ve come to L.A. and not even called me… and that was in turn dwarfed by a feeling of relief and hope so intense my muscles seemed to have turned to gelatin. I stared at him, his Kevin Kline’s-Texan-cousin beauty, those blue eyes destined to haunt me through as many Trevors and Hearts Crossings as there could be until the end of time. He was in jeans and a comic-art t-shirt that read I DON’T MIND STRAIGHT PEOPLE AS LONG AS THEY ACT GAY IN PUBLIC.
I made no move to get up or do anything, the memory of Barney’s co-starring role in Nick’s previous L.A. engagement suddenly burning me like acid-reflux from a Red Onion buffet flauta. Nick leaned on the corner of his desk, smiling. “I wanted to surprise you.”
“Done.”
“I started here about a week ago. Volunteer stuff. I got laid off in Austin. What they refer to as downsizing.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Aw, it was time for a change. I’m collecting unemployment. Don't tell ‘em Vanessa’s back there forgin’ the forms for me. Getting ready for the California bar this fall. The folks here think they’ll be able to get me set up somewhere working in the fruit-field.”
“But not like a migrant worker,” I interjected, wondering if this whole thing had been a ruse between Nick and GLAAD to get me down here to see him, and if so, what that might mean. He shook his head, mildly amused.
“And you,” he said, still smiling and tapping me on the shoe with one of his cowboy boots. “You’ve been causin’ all sorts of trouble… scandal-boy.”
“That’s why I’m in this business,” I quipped.
“I know GLAAD was giving you a pretty hard time for a while. But if you’re not too pissed off, we’d like you to be the keynote speaker at a media conference in Chicago this October.” So the meeting was legit.
“I don’t know if I’d have anything too incisive to say,” I replied. “I mean, during everything that happened, I never felt that political. I was only trying to do my job. I guess I’m saying I don’t know what the moral of the story is.”
“You were always honest about who you are,” he said.
I nodded, nonplussed, then picked up a pen and gestured at Nick with it like a lecturer. “And we must keep that in mind no matter what reactions we get from others.”
“See? You’re a natural. Just as long as you don’t let that network off the hook too easily.”
“Those cunt-warts.” Nick smiled at my foul mouth. “Maybe I’d be interested…” I began, still feeling spacey at Nick’s being three feet away from me, much less the prospect of working on a culturally relevant out-of-town project with him. Nick’s phone beeped.
“Nick, your roommate’s on line two,” someone intercommed.
“Scuse me a sec.” He picked up. “Hi… yeah. I bought some cat food last night. It may still be out on the balcony, come to think of it… No problem… Tuna’s good. She’s definitely into tuna. I’ll see you a bit later.” I heard him hang up but I wasn’t looking at him. My gaze was riveted on a section of the tile floor that I could make swim in and out of focus by relaxing my eyeballs. The best thing to do was end this quickly and get out. I could have Connie call them later and tell them I wouldn’t be participating.
How could he? How the fuck could he?! He didn’t even know what he was doing to me. That was how pathetically askew our perceptions of each other were. “To-Bel,” Nick said. I forced myself to look at him. “Just pretend he’s Brent,” Mini-Kyle Chandler helpfully suggested. Mini-Jeff Stryker popped in with a nasty chuckle: “Why not? You got the exact same chance of either one of the macho cum-rags endin’ up between your highfalutin pussy-boy ass-cheeks!”
Nick said, “I’m staying with a friend from undergrad down in Redondo. Real sweet gal, but she doesn’t know a thing about cats.”
I didn't even bother to let my wheels go through a single spin before blurting, “What about Barney?”
Nick folded his hands and looked down at them a moment before answering. “Barney’s not here.”
“Oh.” I was pushing it, but I was also way too tired for games. So I asked him what happened.
He shook his head, looking past me, then, as he met my furiously measured gaze: “I guess sometimes you just wake up and all of a sudden everything looks different. I tried… but, uh…” Big sigh. “California’s not a good place for Barney. So he’s staying in Austin. Without me.”
What was I supposed to say… congratulations? I remained quiet, nodding my head almost imperceptibly. Nick got up and sat behind the desk. He started absently arranging the mess in front of him. “I know you’re probably real busy, Alex. Maybe we could get together and talk about the conference — and all — over dinner. Tonight?”
✽✽✽
I stepped out of the shower and went into the kitchen for a swig of seltzer and an immediate shot of Tropicana Twister (“Flavors Mother Nature never intended!”). I still had no idea what to wear tomorrow for my meeting with — get this — Gus Van Sant. Oh, shit. The package. I put on shorts and dashed downstairs and found it at the front door. It was the script, as promised by Tim, my film rep at the agency who’d left the most delightful message on my machine while I was at GLAAD.
Gus Van Sant and his producer wanted to meet me at 11:00 a.m. regarding their new movie. Not read me, not audition me… meet and discuss. Tim said they’d seen me on the soap and especially liked the Interview piece and would messenger me a script. I’d have to read it later, though.
I doffed the shorts, selected underwear and started dressing. Then stopped to spread styling gel evenly through my wet hair. I’d just turned on the dryer when I heard the knock. I shut it off and listened. My imagination? No — there it was again. I went out, used the peephole, then opened the door. “Hey — how’d you get in?”
“Your neighbor was coming home. The Chinese fella.”
“I think he’s just visiting.”
“Those directions were perfect. Still not really used to finding my way around the big city. This is a fantastic apartment.”
I closed the door and gestured to my hair and lack of pants, my shirt tastefully hanging just below briefs-level. “It’ll be a couple minutes, Nick.”
He looked at his watch. “Sorry. I’m early.”
I looked into his eyes with the utmost solemnity. “Early? Nowhere close. You’re so fucking late.”
“Am I?” he asked, confused, thrown… worried.
I nodded gravely. “Totally… outrageously.”
He stared at me for a moment, then: “Unforgivably?”
I considered the question, trying to give it the weight he should so be attaching to it, but four years of drama school and 169 soap opera episodes failed me, and I couldn’t help cracking a smile, blowing it. “Almost. But not quite.”
I could only savor the relief in his eyes for a split-second. Because then he kissed me.
THE END
Music that influenced Glamourpuss
Belinda Carlisle - Heaven Is A Place On Earth
Divinyls - I Touch Myself
Book of Love - Pretty Boys & Pretty Girls
Bananarama - Dream Baby
Fleetwood M
ac - Storms
The Smiths - Big Mouth Strikes Again
Stacey Q - Two of Hearts
Tracy Chapman - Bridges
Paula Abdul - Straight Up
Cocteau Twins - Heaven Or Las Vegas
Shakespears Sister - You Made Me Come To This
Depeche Mode - Route 66
Dead Or Alive - Brand New Lover
Cyndi Lauper - Hole In My Heart
New Order - Bizarre Love Triangle
The Go-Go’s - Our Lips Are Sealed
Eurythmics - Sex Crime (1984)
Bananarama - I Heard A Rumour
Taylor Dayne - Tell It To My Heart
Talking Heads - Girlfriend Is Better (Live from Stop Making Sense)
Pet Shop Boys - Always On My Mind
Madonna - Like A Prayer
Edie Brickell & New Bohemians - Black and Blue
Fleetwood Mac - Sara
Heart - What About Love
Julee Cruise - Rockin’ Back Inside My Heart
Billy Idol - Daytime Drama
Jane Wiedlin - Rush Hour
Shakespears Sister - Stay
Bananarama - I Can't Help It!
Erasure - Stop!