About Tinseltown
Los Angeles is a place nobody is actually from. If you’re beautiful, or just different and have something to offer, then you come to L.A. It’s America’s foster home for those corrupt oddballs with a gimmick, someone with a quick ace up his sleeve, and those too gorgeous for their own good. You’d think I’d be right at home in a place like that, born in a city that adopts all the lovely kooks and crazies of the world, but never seems to really give birth on its own. You’d think a lot of things, even that a blue girl in Los Angeles isn’t such a bizarre thing nowadays…and maybe never was. You’d be right; I’m L.A.’s albino baby with an impeccable fashion sense. And then there’s Elliot.
When I met Elliot, he wasn’t Old Hollywood or New Hollywood, but belonged there nonetheless. If merely for being anti-Hollywood, he was a part of it. I loved him for every fault and foible. And it was with great pride that I realized I was one of them. We may seem like opposites, but maybe we are really two of a kind. Because that’s how it is in Tinseltown.
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. This book, and parts thereof, may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without express written permission. For information, e-mail info@vagabondagepress.com.
Tinseltown
© 2012 by Erin Ward
Vagabondage Press
PO Box 3563
Apollo Beach, Florida 33572
http://www.vagabondagepress.com
First digital edition in the United States of America and the United Kingdom,
February 2012
Edited by N. Apythia Morges
Front cover photo by Nuno Silva.
Cover designed by Maggie Ward.
Dedication
I dedicate this story to my parents:
For my mother, who introduced me to erotic fiction, a genre of writing that has taught me that when it comes to love and sex, there are no limits.
But mostly, for my father, who loves much and demands nothing. I have never felt so loved for being the person I am.
Tinseltown
Erin Ward
My favorite color is orange, because it’s electric and alive. I think black is the best color on a man, and red on a woman. I believe green has become cliché. It’s as trite as new, stoned, horny, money. And I think that yellow—though a racist insult—is just about perfect for this city…this city of sunshine and glam, bronzer and bleach. Except me, that is. I’m just a blue girl from West Hollywood.
I’m not really blue, not exactly. I’m white, too white for this city. Pigment is important here, the darker the better. Having it means you’re healthy, or even better—young. It’s weird enough being albino, let alone albino in Los Angeles. It’s a tan city, a blond city. I’m not blond either. No, my hair is white too. But in a city where blond strives to be almost exactly the same thing, it might as well be. My eyes are tinged pink, though my irises are a light blue, like clear water and cloudy milk…with a touch of blood. I wear big hats a lot for protection. I wear big sunglasses and sometimes veils. Even the latter doesn’t make me stand out all that much. Nothing stands out all that much here, and that suits me just fine.
I work in L.A., in film and fashion, with the trendy and up and comings. It’s not a place to be shy. It’s not a place to show fear. I’m certainly not shy here. And I don’t fear this city. Los Angeles is a place where everyday freaks like me are to be expected, even beloved. Because of this, I can get dressed in the morning wearing whatever I want, because I know all too well the body I’m putting clothing on. Nothing could be more out there than that. I like to wear clothes reminiscent of the time periods that came before me. I like form-fitting linen suits and perfectly tailored pencil skirts. I like high collars and dipping necklines. I wear big, tilted hats, feathers, and full red lips, and I put a whole new spin on the phrase arsenic and old lace. In fact, I make my living being inspired by vintage anything. I learned quickly that despite all the Botox and miracle potions meant to keep everyone young these days, it’s really only the story that never gets old.
Los Angeles is a place nobody is actually from. If you’re beautiful, or just different and have something to offer, then you come to L.A. It’s hard to offend people here by being yourself. You either succeed or you scrounge about and go insane trying. It’s America’s foster home for those corrupt oddballs with a gimmick, someone with a quick ace up his sleeve, and those too gorgeous for their own good. And if you don’t have that, you’d damn well better be talented in some way comparable. You’d think I’d be right at home in a place like that, born in a city that adopts all the lovely kooks and crazies of the world, but never seems to really give birth on its own. And you’d be right; I have never felt safer…even if I’ve always known there was something missing. You’d think a lot of things, even that a blue girl in Los Angeles isn’t such a bizarre thing nowadays…and maybe never was.
I succeed here because I’m an albino woman with an impeccable fashion sense. It’s that simple. I make people look, and what they see is often jarring, but can also be quite stunning. I’m cunning and soft spoken. I know these things about myself, because your personal conduct can tip the scales on someone’s first impression. I wear startling fashions that catch the eye, because when I was a girl, I’d rather my clothes draw a glance than my weird skin or hair. Now I can flatter that image. I can use clothes to accent those morbid features, make them seem revitalized, render them alluring. And even though it’s an oxymoron, I know my ghostly attributes invite life of all kinds and all walks. I love Victorian-inspired clothes, gothic pieces, because that kind of adornment makes the death in me look compelling and beautiful, fearless in full. I know what it is to hear, “Yes, death becomes her.”
You have to realize that when you come here, Hollywood becomes your overbearing mother, and you have to learn to break away to stand on your own in order to survive. She is overprotective and dangerous. She can be a good mother when she tries and wicked when she’s drunk. She keeps you sick, so to speak, and always needing her. She poisons you, just to keep you desperate and forever hopeful, because even a bad mother is loved. Sure, she’ll give you some condoms and dangle a little success and the promise of love your way to give you a taste of the high life, but the truth is that the lot of us are pressed to her saline tits so tight, we’re slowly losing vision. I know what it means to suffocate in hope. And I know what it means to swim. Mom needs therapy, kiddo. Don’t kid yourself; you’re the nasty little fucker in the corner who hasn’t showered in days. Unless you learn how to talk to her, manipulate her, maneuver her streets, speak her language, she’ll eat you up with her self-serving, goddess-like love. It’s as wild as nature. You have to give yourself up to the city, make yourself an offering to it, even if all you have to give is a continued desire to stay, a continued desire to suffer. A part of me will always suffer, and so I am right at home.
I may never leave; I’m L.A.’s albino baby. I look like a Vogue cover ad without makeup. I look like Marie Antoinette in full wig and powder. I look like Ophelia at the bottom of the pond. I look like I don’t fit in here. And yet, because I look like I don’t—I do. I know I do.
And that’s Tinseltown.
As time passes, you learn to see the strange, transplanted sort of beauty in the palm trees. They look like they’re on fire in the worst of the winds. And the smog becomes less as time passes. Or perhaps you just don’t notice anymore as the mundane nastiness becomes commonplace. You wait for the rain to bring it down on your car, on your lawn, on your manicured life in rivulets and fame. Maybe it’s just like L.A. sunsets, like everything else—grotesquely real or beautifully artificial.
But truth be told, the peculiarity of it all starts to become appealing, like a pair of jeans, factory worn-in. That something retro is a much more handsome garment, but that factory piece has no effort or pre-existing history to weigh on you. Thrift store finds smell like old perfume on lace and like moth balls, or old leather and aftershave, and wearing them leaves you somehow armored against having the occasional bite taken out of you by the hovering insects of the industry, by celebrity, by infamy. And yet, there is security in common trends, because everyone is following them, like a migration of birds. They all look the same; they all follow form. And as strange as it all sounds, you can’t go wrong, because sometimes it’s nice to feel a brush of the Old Hollywood, feel that excitement of limitless fashion, and then still sink into factory-provided comfort to ground yourself to the day.
But when I met Elliot, he wasn’t Old Hollywood or New Hollywood, but belonged there nonetheless. If merely for being anti-Hollywood, he was a part of it. He was like charm, like glamour, like something put on and wiped away, like glitter or a smile. Something about him always felt very in the moment and incapable of permanence, a man with some sort of gypsy mystery. He has a snobbish name, which felt ironic and alluring, because it made him sound like he went to an East Coast prep school, wore blazers and read Keats. And well, maybe he did read Keats, and he often did wear blazers, but that’s not the crux of it, because those things didn’t define him. Elliot was more or less homeless when I met him, damn near penniless, and maybe, in the end, almost limitless as well. He was like the city seemed to be—boundless—all things and able to survive, and so he seemed like the richest man I’d ever met. I find that the best comparison to the feeling of knowing him is when you’re reading a great novel and you fall in love with a character for their incomparable quirks. I once loved a couple from a book because the protagonist fell half in love with his heroine over her insuperable LEGO creations. And so it is true with Elliot. I loved him for every fault and foible. And it was with great pride that I realized I was one of them.
I first saw him at the Geisha House. He was running valet parking. And it was raining when I arrived, raining on our gold roads that lead to Emerald City. Emerald City, green like money, and that’s what I was…money. It seems that this particular gold road led straight to my door, straight to me; follow the yellow brick road, and I’ll save you from this weary world. Oh, but wasn’t it surreal? Entertaining even, pondering the roads covered in riches and carved with names? He looked good in valet black, even though it wasn’t his style. I didn’t know that at first, but when I found out, I could never picture him in fashionable black again. No I couldn’t, not him, a horse of a different color; we might as well have been in Oz.
On his own, he wore tweed with suede elbow patches. He wore blazers, with T-shirts underneath, with torn jeans and work boots. He dressed a little bit like an old man and a little kid, a staunch professor with a cigar crossed with little junior in his animated tee. He had the get-down-and-dirty streak of the blue collar and the poise of the white. The look was professionally rebellious in a way that I loved. Educated, he carried himself as if he were a well-bred preppy with a trust fund. He had the attitude to match that iconic figure of overprivileged youth, just not the pocketbook. It occurred to me once or twice that he might have refused them, refused it all; he was not the type to be rescued. He had tattoos here and there, dancing over him, but only on places he could hide. He was a prickly pear, so suave and rude, sweet and grainy; I instantly didn’t know if I wanted to slap him or fuck him right there in the driveway.
The first real thing that endeared me to him was that he made bad seem very cute, and he made strange sexy, which made me feel sexy. He smoked flavored cigarettes, and only flavored cigarettes…chocolate mint, dark chocolate orange. He carried around a square metal tin of flavored Camels in his back pocket, or breast. It made his age smell ambiguous, that old pipe scent suddenly the very sweet and edible scent of youth. It made odd a twisted romp in the sheets. He made kink seem as necessary as breathing. I could about taste his company in the air, in the room; it made no pretenses. It was rich, and older, and brought about that flavor, whatever that intrigue is for older men, that appetite—yet, without the whole old man package—just a polished maturity…at play.
And the first time he took me out, the next evening, after exchanging numbers at the bar, it was to the back garbage bins behind the local bookstore…dumpster diving for stripped books. And just about all his books were coverless, and he singed his place into the top right corner of his pages. He wrote in his books, down the margins, and drew little pictures, too, that were sometimes dirty. I was fascinated; I always had problems even dog-earing mine.
“What do you drink?” He asked.
“Are you offering?”
“If it’s under six bucks, I am.”
I raised an eyebrow. “I’ll have a whiskey sour.”
The bartender was nearby, so Elliot just pointed to me as if he’d heard. My drink was set in front of me moments later.
“You don’t look like you belong here,” he told me.
“Nobody really knows me here,” I smiled, like I was very clever and a little wicked.
“You’re that glam-rag fashionista from WeHo...Veronica Drake?”
I just looked at him and nodded, blinked. It took me a second, but I smiled.
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard a straight guy say fashionista…not in a downtown bar.”
He laughed. “Would I have bought you a drink if I wasn’t into you?”
“Maybe. I’ve had people who hate me buy me drinks.” I said it jokingly, with one sarcastic eyebrow raised. It was sad but true; people were always willing to pay a little for a lot. The whole “buy a girl a drink” game was based on that very prospect.
“And here I was trying to flatter you.” He shook his head. “You suck the smooth right out of a guy, don’t you? Balls of steel, you have.” He smirked, taking a sip of his own drink—I didn’t think he really wanted an answer. Truth was, I suck the smooth out of most men.
“I don’t have balls at all,” I teased with a quirk in my lips, feeling the need to lighten my attitude a little—behavior that I attributed to him even then.
“I don’t mind metaphorical balls on my women, but if you have anything more substantial under those skirts, I’d appreciate a heads up…at least until you get a few more drinks in me,” he teased, a gleam in his eyes.
I laughed outright, somewhat surprised. Few people had the right combination of quirk and gusto to surprise me anymore.
“Habit. Sorry. It’s old hat. Consider me all woman. Truth is, I can’t decide if you remind me of my grandfather or my little brother. I can’t determine if I find the ambiguity bothersome, or if I want to fuck you for it,” I said, surprised at how lighthearted it came out.
It was, of course, meant to be disarming. After all, I was a bit startled; few men found my look attractive. I was often creepy looking, even to myself. I ran my tongue over my bottom lip thinking of something else to say to soften my words, something not quite so bald. I had thrown down the gauntlet. It was a set-up to either make him run or commit.
“And you look like a powdered debutante,” he said, sipping a beer.
And as it turned out, I was the one disarmed.
“You have to dig for the classics,” he said. “That’s all they throw out, bargain shit and classics…and calendars.” He held up a word of the day calendar, and I frowned.