AREA 47

SECTION 89:

COURTNEY, Chapter 29

The Three Misfiteers.  Courtney, Peach, Kathy.  All for one, and one for etc.  Lauren’s apartment, sans Lauren.  Courtney & Byron separated by the Continental United States, Peach & Philip hit on each other as disastrously as a mid-air collision (crash & burn, and search for the flight recorder), Kathy & Bob disunited by a little lover’s spat.

Peach was swallowing boysenberry Yoplait yogurt by the kilogram, trading equally juicy gossip with Courtney, furiously forgetting Phil.

Courty listened indulgently, as an epic poem germinated in the back of her mind.  Her autognosis was zip: Reed was in LA; there was no aching void, merely a highly agreeable aftertaste.  Poetic powers fully returned, mind back on the level beam; it was like waking up from a dream, or walking out of a movie——as if the mere presence of the man was a drug——away from him she sobered up.  If this was love, it defied understanding.

Kathy was refolding her laundry; no matter how the service did it, it was always wrong.  Where did she bring her laundry, to refold it?  Into Lauren’s living room, where three acres of white carpeting were now covered by little, dainty piles of this and that, and those, and . . .

Peach said, “And guess what?  You know Eddie Eddie?  He’s trying to catch Bigfoot, he has scientists up in Canada, setting traps so he can have him for his zoo in Nashville.”

“Old news,” Kathy said, folding an orange silk blouse the right way.

“You didn’t let me finish.  Eddie Eddie has a new girlfriend.  And you’ll never guess.”  Peach pause.  “Guess!”

“Girl Bruce,” Courty suggested, choosing a famous transsexual.

“Closer than you think,” Peach said.

Courty said, “If that’s close, I quit guessing.”

“Harlot!” Peach said, and then scooped down into the container for another mouthful of yogurt.

Kathy instantly snapped, “You’re crazy.”  But then she stopped refolding, and appeared thoughtful.

Peach was excited.  “No, it’s true.  Well, it MIGHT be: there’s a hot item in Citizen about it.  Two pictures of them together, holding hands!  You’ve met her, what do you think?”

“I didn’t meet her,” Courty said, “I just was there when she sang Missionary.  I don’t know her at all.”  But Courtney couldn’t help thinking about the encounter, and the rest of that splendid day when Reed had given her the engagement ring.  She looked at it now, frowning.  It was late Friday afternoon, the day had gone easy, she was nowhere near exhausted.  Her next booking was Monday morning.  Why didn’t she fly out and see Reed in LA?

Kathy said, perfectly seriously, “Maybe she’s curious.  You know.  They say that when Eddie Eddie got his plastic surgery to pretty up his face, that, well, it wasn’t the only part of him that the Doctors made better.  You know . . .”

Courtney and Peach both laughed at once.

“That’s gross,” Courtney said.

“I heard that too,” Peach said, pausing archly, and declaring with a dramatic flourish: “They narrowed his nose, and lengthened his . . .”  She just left the word unsaid.

Kathy giggled, but Courty said authoritatively, “You’re quite wrong, that wasn’t the operation he had at all.  It was the other one.”  Courtney pause.  Sadly: “Still soprano, after all these years . . .”

The telephone rang, interrupting the girlish laughter.  Courtney reached to answer it, and hung up as soon as the guy started talking.  She unplugged the telephone.

“Again?” Kathy asked.

Courty nodded and then shook her head.  “I just changed the number.”

Peach said, “Call the police!”

Courty said, “Reed called the police twice.  They said they can’t do anything.”  Courty held her arms across her breast and shivered.  “I get a creepy feeling about this guy.  How does he keep finding my new numbers?  He tracked me down at Reed’s apartment, and here, this is the third number.”

Nobody said anything for a long moment.  Peach said, “At least he’s not sending you samples of his sperm.”

Courtney had to smile at that.  Some nut kept sending Peach anonymous love letters with little sandwich baggies of semen.

“Is he still doing it?” Kathy asked.

“I don’t know.”  Peach shrugged.  “Eileen goes through all my mail; she pulls out all the weird stuff.”

“Reed wanted to get me a bodyguard, and move me into a special apartment, hire a bulletproof limo to drive me and Michael around New York . . .”  Courtney shook her head.  “We got in a little fight about it.  You know, Reed has a temper sometimes.  But I just can’t live like that.”

“Well, take the limo, at least,” Peach said.

Kathy said, “I’ll take the apartment, you can have the limousine, and Peach can have a fling with the bodyguard.”

Peach pointed a warning finger at Kathy, over on the floor with her clothes.  “Watch it!”

Kathy just demurely moved her blouses on top of her pants.

Lorna Carlsson poked her head into the front doorway for a moment.  She was her average sensational self.  “Hello, Party People.  What’s happening?”  Lorna was a successful Nordic blond model, nearly as hot as Julie Dayton, and she was reportedly earning upwards of a million dollars a year, what with perfume contracts, her own line of clothes, and other side-lines such as endorsements.  Why she still lived here with the run-of-the-runway Preferred girls was a mystery, since she hardly ever socialized.  She was the most famous girl in the building, and seriously considering a career in film; there was no shortage of offers.

“Hi,” Courty said; adding: “Nada.”  Courty gave her a friendly smile, but a chill seemed to descend on the room.

Lorna walked in, carrying a translucent bag of about ten videocassettes.  She looked around at the clothes all over the carpet.  “I’ve forgotten your name.”

“Kathy Martin.”

Lorna said, “That’s right.”  She posed in a superior way that was a snide put-down to the three other models.  “Peach,” Lorna said, “I finally saw The Next Change.  You should get an Oscar.”  She looked long and significantly at Peach and then walked out slowly.  On her way, she said over her shoulder, “You’re catching up, Courty.  Amazing, isn’t it, how a silly haircut can attract such attention.  What is the name of the haircut again?  A half-assed?”

Courtney just watched her walk out into the hallway, regally, haughtily.  “What’s with her?” she quietly asked.

“I don’t know,” Peach said slowly.  “She’s schizo.”

“I never knew you were in The Next Change,” Kathy said.  “I saw the movie, but I don’t remember seeing you.”

Courtney laughed for a short second.

Peach said, “Oh, yes you do remember!  Mary Welsh’s boobies were not abundant enough for American audiences, so when Renfree ripped off her dress they cut to close-ups of me.  It’s me on screen for about fifteen seconds of the love-scene.”

A comfortable silence descended.

“Let’s put on some delicious trash, and party,” Peach suddenly said.  “We can hit some of the clubs!  Scene Dis.  The Cave.  Or maybe Studio 47.  What do you say, Courty?  Oh, I forgot!  I’ll be right back.”  Peach sprang up.

“I want to get some work done this weekend.  Starting tonight.”

“Work?” Peach said, as if it were a dirty word.

“I want to do some writing.  I’ve got an idea for a long epic poem I’d like to work out.”

“I’ll be right back,” Peach promised, and sped out to her apartment.

After a moment, Kathy said, very quietly, “I need to talk to you alone sometime.”

“OK,” Courty said.

“When there’s time.”

Courty nodded.

Peach was back before Courtney and Kathy could go anywhere with the conversation.  Peach had the latest U magazine in her hand; she went to the end, and flipped hurriedly back a few pages.  “Here,” she said, throwing it open on the coffee table in front of Courtney.

Half-page picture of Courty and a dance-club-native famous-for-being-famous dude, apparently dancing together.  A paragraph of text under it.  Mini-headline: live-in lovers.

Courtney bent over to look.  “Alberto de Cicco?  Wait a minute, I remember when I wore that, this was taken at the Red Flash Palace a couple of weeks ago, I was dancing with Reed, see, that’s Reed’s arm, there, out of the picture.  How can they say I’ve moved in with Alberto?  I’ve never even talked to him.”

“I’m shocked!” Peach said, acting stern.  “You really should be more communicative with your live-in lover.”

Courty pushed the open magazine aside.

“Oh, and Alex and Kiki are history,” Peach said, going back to her yummy yogurt to finish it.

“Lancôme?” Courty asked.

“Yeah, yeah.  She caught him getting it on with a little girl, a teen-ager——and I mean just barely a teen-ager!  The way I hear it, Kiki caught them in her bed.  And the little girl had a mouth.  She said——”

“Peach!” Kathy objected, primly refolding the last cashmere sweater.

“OK, Kath, I’ll wait: put your fingers in your ears.”

“Peach,” Kathy said, laughing, “you get more Graphic every time you tell it.  And the girl gets younger, too.”

“I’m just remembering it better,” Peach said.  “Anyway, can you just imagine that fat bull elephant seal and some tiny, skinny little girl being smothered under all that——”

“Peach!” Courty and Kathy objected simultaneously.  And then all the girls laughed, because Peach had been pushing for precisely that reaction.

“Anyway, they’re huffing and puffing, in flagrante delicto . . .”

“Peach,” Kathy wailed.  “Please.”

“PEACH!” Courty said, so sternly that she stopped everything and achieved silence.  “I’m sure she was On Top.”

Peach smiled and nodded her head, acknowledging the witticism, and took a sustaining mouthful of boysenberry to help carry her through the story.

“Hey,” Kathy said, coming at last to the final laundry items: two fancy, lace anklets, little feminine footnotes, one a sharp pink, the other a lemon yellow.  She held them up.  “They don’t match!”

Courty said, “Oh, you mean they’re homosoxuals?”

Peach almost spat out her mouthful, she laughed so hard.  Some drooled out the side of her mouth, and she had to hold her head quickly over the coffee table so she would drip over it instead of Lauren’s comfy couch.  She was utterly convulsed.

Balled-up sox came flying at Courtney from Kathy’s direction.

Courty was laughing at Peach, and Kathy was still giggling.

A fourth audible feminine laugh came from just outside the open front door, in the hallway.

The girls looked, still laughing.

A girl took a single step forward, and stood in the open doorway so they could see her.  “’Xcuse me.  I’m lookin’ for Kathy.”

There was a slightly abrasive quality to the new girl, and she did not share the looks, style, and quiet glamour of the other girls.  Actually, Kathy Martin had the only quiet look; Peach was all-fired-up sexiness, Courty was fierce allure on a more intellectual plane; the new girl was completely unsubtle, a raw youthful hunger that exerted a gravitational field all its own.

The laughter quieted down.

“Oh, hi, you must be Liz,” Kathy said.  “I didn’t know when you were coming.”

Liz nodded.

Kathy introduced Liz to the Regulars, and vice versa.  Kathy looked hopefully toward Courty, as Peach went into the kitchen to clean up.  “Is that offer of an apartment for a few days still good?”

“Absolutely,” Courty said.  “I’m sure Lauren would want you to sleep here.”  Pause.  “Even if she comes back tonight, it’s no problem.  I’ve got the keys to Reed’s place.”

Kathy began to gather her clothes together; she arranged it so that she would only have to make two trips.

“You got a nice pad here,” Liz said.  “Courty.”  Liz looked intently and directly at Courtney, in a way that made her feel uncomfortable.  Courtney looked away.

“Well, come on, Liz, I’ll show you your new apartment.  I’m not completely moved out yet, but most of my things are in boxes.  I’ll have everything out in a day or two.  You don’t mind, do you?”

“Nah.  Nice meetin’ ya.”  Liz was still looking at Courty.

Courtney looked back and nodded.

Peach came out of the kitchen only after they had left.

Courtney looked at the strange expression on her face: an explosion of silent amusement so strong that Peach was biting her finger, and her eyes were huge saucers of excitement.

“What?”

“You won’t believe this!”

“I already don’t.”

“You won’t believe this.  I need some more yogurt.  I don’t believe this!”

“We’ve only got plain.  What is it that I don’t believe?”

“Plain?  Gack!”  She squealed, and U-turned.  “You won’t believe this.  Where is it?”

“Bottom shelf, behind the——”

“Found it!”  Peach streaked out, throwing herself next to Courtney, slamming the unopened pound and the spoon down, grabbing Courtney’s hands, and sticking her mouth right almost inside Courtney’s left ear.  “She’s HER!”

Pause.  “You are authorized to speak complete, intelligible sentences.”

“Oh, YOU!”  Peach pushed her.  “That’s her!”

Pause.  “Complete, but unintelligible.”

“Aaaaaaaaah!”  Peach pushed Courty over, and wrestled her, both girls giggling so wildly that they toppled over onto the carpet between the couch and the coffee table, pushing the coffee table aside.

“Don’t be a dope!” Peach shouted down at Courty, “it’s . . .”  She noticed that Liz and Kathy had returned, and were staring at the spectacle from just inside the apartment.  And this caused a fresh explosion of uncontrollable giggles to completely possess Peach.  She crawled off of Courtney.

Kathy looked at her skewed and displaced ‘pile’ of clothes, that had been knocked aside and partially unfolded by the coffee table.  “I think we missed hearing a good joke,” she said to Liz.

“Don’t feel bad,” Courty managed to say.  “I missed it too.”

“We need to talk,” Peach whispered to Courty, as the four girls arranged themselves comfortably on the furniture.

“Please take a number,” Courtney quietly spoke back.

“Like, I’m not really a model or anythin’,” Liz said.  “Alex Lancôme is takin’ some pictures of me——I don’ really understand it too good.  Anyway, I needed a place to stay, so he’s puttin’ me up for awhile.  That’s my story.”

Courty looked at Peach with that dopey Oh Now I Get It expression on her face.

Liz said, “Anyone wanna joint?”

“My friend!”  Peach sprang up, and plopped herself down next to Liz.  “I haven’t gotten wasted in AGES.  I want to get totally Dead, and then go dancing.  I Love to dance when I’m stoned.  Come on, all you guys, let’s do it!  Let’s all go.”

“Sound’s good to me,” Liz said bringing a joint out of her pocket.  Liz lit the joint, and took a giant-sized inhale.  Speaking so as to exhale as little as possible, she said, “This is hash.”  She offered it to Peach, who was gaping.

“Hashish?”

Liz nodded.

Peach paused for a moment, and then stood up and went to the front door and closed it, and turned the deadbolt.  She sat back down and accepted the joint.  She smiled wildly and inhaled.

The joint of hash came around to Courtney.  “There goes my epic poem.  Up in smoke.”  She stared at the joint for a second.  “Aah, mark it down to research.”

Kathy pulled at her arm.  “Before you get too out of it, I want to talk to you.”

“Oh, sure.  Here.”

“Oh, I can’t.  I can’t!”  Kathy waved her hands fearfully.

“That’s cool,” Courtney said and passed the joint back to Liz.  As she saw the smoke exhaling out of her mouth, Courtney realized that she had done it all wrong.  She was supposed to hold the smoke in her lungs as long as possible.  But Kathy had distracted her, so she forgot.  She wasn’t exactly a pro at smoking drugs.  Well, next time around.

COURTNEY, Chapter 30
 

Copyright 2005 Area 47