The Fame Game (20 page)

Then Fred called Mr. Libra and made an appointment. She coached Vincent carefully.

“He can be very rude, but don’t let him scare you. I don’t think he’ll catch on to your voice, because I’ve heard women who talk lower than you do, but just to be on the safe side don’t say much until he’s had a chance to look at you for a while, then he’ll believe his eyes, not his ears.”

Vincent could have told her that; he’d been keeping quiet for over a year now.

“If you get a chance to be a little sassy,” Fred went on, “don’t be afraid, sock it to him. He respects that. Besides, you’re very funny, and nobody ever gets mad at you.”

“You think I’m funny?” Vincent asked suspiciously.

“I mean humorous, darling. You have this great sense of humor. And you’re very sweet and everybody adores you. I’m going to clear out as soon as I can and leave you alone with him. He’ll make a lunge at you.”

“Oh my God!”

“Now, when he does, you escape … I’m sure you’re good at that by now. But flirt and let him think you’re not rejecting him altogether. When he gets up a good head of steam, giggle, so he thinks you’ve just been kidding about trying to evade his clutches. Then let him kiss you.”

“What do I have to kiss him for?” Vincent said. “You said he was this terrible old fossil.”

“You don’t go to
bed
with him, silly. You just let him kiss you, and fight him off when he tries to do anything else. If I know Mr. Libra, he’ll have his hand up your skirt before you can say one-two-three, unless you break his arm, and you’re not strong enough.”

“But if he gets …”

“Exactly. If he doesn’t have a heart attack he’ll realize that what we’ve pulled on him is probably the greatest publicity gimmick ever thought of by anyone but Sam Leo Libra. It’s a happening. He loves crazy things. Bonnie, darling, if you were just another model, he wouldn’t bother, but the bastard would like nothing better than foisting off a boy on the public and making them all fall in love with him as a girl.
He’s
not going to tell anyone you’re a boy. He’s too smart for that. You’d never get work as a boy; the fashion magazines are too up-tight about that. I’ve heard for years that there were boys modeling as girls, but nobody’s ever been able to find out who they were. It may be just a rumor. But Libra would just love to be the man who pulled it off. It would be his private joke, and he’d love it.”

“He sounds sick,” Vincent said.

Fred smiled cheerfully. “Aren’t we all?”

So, carefully coached, Vincent had met Mr. Libra, and everything went as planned, including Libra’s lover’s leap. He really did think Libra was going to have a coronary occlusion when he grabbed at Bonnie’s enormous clit, and he was afraid Libra would throw him out the window or choke him or something. But Libra, after a minute of stunned silence, had thrown back his head and roared with laughter until tears streamed out of his eyes.

“Fan-tastic!” Libra said. “Fan-tastic!”

Then he made Vincent sit there while he, Libra himself, typed out a paper that said Vincent was never to appear anywhere out of drag, that he was never to tell anyone he was a boy, that all his dates were to be supervised and chaperoned by Libra or his assistant, Geraldine Thompson, that he was not to have sex with anyone for a period of one year, and that during that year he was to be Sam Leo Libra’s client under exclusive contract and was never to grant an interview or speak to a columnist, except for exchanging pleasantries unless it was first cleared with Libra and either Libra himself or Geraldine Thompson was present.

Vincent knew perfectly well that he couldn’t go without sex for a whole year; that was unnatural. But he wasn’t going to tell Libra that. He would sneak out somehow. As for the rest of the contract, he was thrilled, even about giving Libra thirty per cent of everything he made.

“I know I’m going to have to watch you every minute,” Libra said to him. “I know you fruits. You’ll be down on your knees in an alley the minute I close my eyes to sneeze. But don’t think I won’t keep tabs on you. First of all, who do you live with?”

“My parents,” Vincent said.

“Where do they live?”

“Irvington, New Jersey.”

“Well, from now on, you live in New York, with Gerry Thompson. You can sleep on her couch.”

Who was this Gerry Thompson? Some hostile woman? He was afraid of her already. He didn’t want to live with a stranger. Maybe he could live with Fred. She had a lover, but they might find room for him in the corner or something. He wouldn’t even mind sleeping on the floor.

“I could live with Fred,” he said. “I know
her
.”

“You’ll like Gerry too. Fred’s too busy to take care of you. Fred doesn’t work for me. Gerry has to watch you if I tell her to.”

“I’m going to be a prisoner,” he mumbled.

“Damn right you are. One infraction, one slip, and
out
. I won’t have to throw you out, Miss Bonnie Parker; the public will throw you out. The public will
stone
you out. Today’s headlines wrap tomorrow’s garbage. Remember that.”

Vincent shivered. He could see it now: his face wrapped around a mound of decaying lettuce and eggshells. How horrible! But he was afraid of that Gerry, too. He didn’t know any straight girls except Fred. What could he say to her? Maybe she wasn’t straight … maybe she was a dike. That would be worse. If there were as many dikes as fags, she was bound to be a dike, because the world was so full of fags.

“I’ll miss my mother,” he said.

“You’ll see her as often as you want. But I want you to live in New York where I can watch you. Besides, you have to be close to your work. I don’t want you getting tired on the subway.”

“It’s a bus,” Vincent said.

“So, the bus, then. Who goes to New Jersey? Here’s the contract for your signature, and sign this paper. I’ll attach it to the contract. Bonnie, you realize how important this is. This is not a joke. I may laugh at it here, but I know as well as you do it is not a joke. It’s your life. Without me and this chance I’m giving you, you’re finished. Do you want to be rough trade on Forty-second Street? You’d last just about three minutes. Or do you want to stay in those bars—just another painted freak? Or is your idea of dreams of glory to be in the chorus line at the 82 Club? Believe me, Bonnie, there is a real world outside. The real world is not your friends in the gay bars you live in. The real world is
Hollywood
.” He paused significantly to let it sink in. “Do you remember when I asked you if you wanted to go to California?”

Vincent nodded.

“Well, I was kidding then, but I’m not kidding now. I can make you the top model in New York, Bonnie, and that means the top model in America. From there I can get you a motion-picture contract. You’ll be rich beyond your wildest dreams. You’ll be famous, loved. You’ll have a life. You won’t be anonymous, you won’t be forgotten. You’ll be able to choose your friends. You’ll travel all over the world. The real world, Bonnie.” He held out the contract and the sheet of paper.

Vincent took them gingerly in his hands and scanned them quickly. It was hard to make out the words because his eyes were full of tears of gratitude and happiness. “Which name do you want me to sign?” he asked. “Bonnie Parker or Vincent Abruzzi?”

“Oh my God!” Libra said, beginning to laugh again. “I don’t
believe
it!”

“What?” Vincent asked, hurt.

“Vincent Abruzzi! Oh, oh, oh, oh … Vincent Abruzzi! You sound like a truck driver. Sign both names, just to make it completely legal. Uh-oh, I just thought of something. Have you been to your draft board yet?”

“They rejected me,” Vincent said. “I have a heart murmur.”

“Then from now on,” Libra said, “there is no Vincent Abruzzi any more. Vincent Abruzzi is dead.”

That’s what you think
, Vincent thought. But Bonnie Parker nodded amenably and signed the papers.

CHAPTER NINE

On a Beautiful morning in late spring, Dick Devere went to David Webb, his favorite jeweler, and commissioned him to make a pin in the shape of a nightingale, of gold with enamel and diamonds. He was well known at the shop, having patronized them often in the past, and there were a few lifted eyebrows because everyone knew Mr. Devere was ordering another of his famous kiss-off pins. He always presented one to the girl of his choice when their affair was about to be over. The pin was always in a shape representative of the girl’s true inner life, and the amount of money he spent was commensurate with his guilt.

That same morning, in an expansive mood, Silky Morgan bought a new refrigerator-freezer for her Auntie Grace in Philadelphia, as a surprise. The Satins, also feeling expansive, went to the spring fur sales and bought their mothers white mink stoles (Cheryl and Beryl did not know that Silky had bought their mother a refrigerator, and even if they had they certainly would not have chipped in on that stuck-up bitch’s gift).

Sylvia Polydor, in Hollywood, feeling depressed, checked in for her first day’s work on the film that starred her as a hatchet murderess. She brought along a bottle of vodka and a water glass so she could console herself on the set.

Sam Leo Libra spent his morning at the Twenty-first Precinct station house, with his attorney, springing all the members of the King James Version, who had been caught with forty other revelers at a private marijuana party in someone’s penthouse. Because none of the King James Version had any pot on their persons at the time, they were let go, in the custody of Mr. Libra, who promised to take good care of them. He proceeded to dock his attorney’s fee from their allowances and gave them one of his famous blistering speeches, which reduced them to nervous laughter.

In Hollywood, Douglas Henry’s widow put flowers on her husband’s grave and then went to lunch with his doctor.

Arnie Gurney, in Las Vegas, woke up sixty thousand dollars poorer due to an unusually bad streak of luck at the crap table, and resolved never to gamble again. Then he went to his local loan shark and took out a large loan so he could win it all back just in case he changed his mind.

Elaine Fellin, full of ire, bought a new white Cadillac Eldorado with air-conditioning and stereo tapes, paid for it out of their joint account, and put it in her name. She told Mad Daddy it was her Mother’s Day present.

Mad Daddy had great respect for mothers, even Elaine, and said it was all right. He bought himself a much less expensive consolation present, for two Tastee Freezes and a box of popcorn—a fifteen-year-old girl named Linda.

Penny Potter had lunch with her mother and told her tearfully that her husband hadn’t slept with her for two months. Her mother took her to Gucci and bought her a crocodile handbag.

Mr. Nelson awoke with a frightful rash which his doctor diagnosed as chicken pox. Throughout the city, sixteen young hustlers either had or were going to get chicken pox before the week was through.

At four a.m. the Bottom of My Garden was raided and Franco lost his black Count Dracula cape in the rush to escape. He was sure it had been stolen, and he was right, because Bonnie Parker had it. One of her admirers wrapped it around her shoulders during the stampede through the back door. It looked darling on her, and since she didn’t know whose it was, she felt she was justified in accepting it.

Gerry Thompson, who was resigned to playing house mother to Bonnie, who was sleeping on her couch, was furious when she saw the Dracula cape the next morning, and gave Bonnie a lecture on mopping—a word she’d learned from Bonnie herself. Bonnie insisted that a nice man had given it to her so she would not catch cold in the pre-dawn hours. Gerry finally believed her. She knew Libra would kill her if he knew she was letting Bonnie go out at night, but on the other hand, she also knew that Bonnie never picked up anyone and was scrupulous about keeping her new career a secret. As long as no one knew she was modeling, no one would tell. Anyhow, once the photos started coming out in the fashion magazines, Gerry knew that all Bonnie’s old friends would recognize her anyway. She also knew that any fruits who realized what a trick Bonnie was playing on the public would be only too glad to keep quiet about it so the ruse could be a complete success. She only hoped none of the lady magazine editors were gay.

At the Cannes Film Festival, Zak Maynard screwed six girls and was done by three fags at an orgy at someone’s villa. He had a fine time.

In Chicago, Shadrach Bascombe gave a black eye to a girl who was trying to nail him on a false paternity charge. He had only slapped her, but he was strong. It did not make the papers, and the girl dropped her plan to shake him down. She didn’t want him to break her neck.

In New York, Ingrid the Lady Barber stopped off at her favorite supplier to get some more of the miracle ingredient she put in her special vitamin shots. The price had gone up.

Lizzie Libra told her analyst Dr. Picker about a fling she had had with Hatcher Wilson, a young black rock ’n’ roll singer who had brought his new hit record to Libra, hoping to change managers and get Libra to handle him. The record was number one that week. Lizzie, who had talked alone to the boy for a while, had sneaked right off with him to his hotel, telling her husband she was off to the analyst. When she returned she discovered that Libra had decided not to handle the boy. She was so aggravated that it almost gave her a trauma, she nervously told Dr. Picker. But still, Libra or no Libra, number one was number one. Wasn’t it?

Outside Libra’s suite, a fourteen-year-old girl named Barrie Grover, who was the president of the Mad Daddy Fan Club of Kew Gardens, spent a fruitless six hours waiting for Mad Daddy to appear. She had nothing better to do because it was final exam week, and she didn’t have an exam until tomorrow. She brought her books with her, but she was too excited to study at all. When it was time to return home for supper she left a passionate and funny note for Mad Daddy, which she slipped under the door. It was the hundred and seventeenth note or letter she had sent him since the day she first fell in love with him. She had received several printed replies from the television studio, the kind they sent to everyone, but she hoped that Mad Daddy would see this one in person and would write to her himself.