Devilcountry (5 page)

Tyra Banks is a hypocritical, finger-pointing
jerk who needs to be bitch-slapped into next week for the way she treated that
girl,
she thought.  It was actually Morris’s spirit
whispering into her ear.  He had green-lighted her show two years previous
and had made a killing off the syndication rights.  But in so doing,
Morris knew he had unleashed a monster.  He would now make good on past
mistakes.  He whispered it to her, gingerly and in her mind, it sounded
like her own voice telling her what needed to be done.  Yet it was
Morris’s soul speaking to her, from beyond.  Gently guiding her to a
better world.  An image of her father’s partner inexplicably came to her
as she had her vision.  In a moment that felt like a lifetime, she knew
she was the one to take on the most holy of quests.  This vision, mutely
translated to her through the TV screen, was the divining rod of truth her soul
required.

She would leave the confines of the house.
 She would take the $150,000 dollars she had saved turning tricks, and
would go back to school to study law.  She would open up a practice that
catered strictly to the legal needs of those working in the sex trade.
 She would become a champion of sex workers rights as well as human rights
abuses globally.  As her practice grew and became successful, she came to
feel a sense of appreciation for Banks because without her she would have never
found her path.  Nothing satisfied Morris more than knowing he had brought
joy into her world.  His soul rose above her, having experienced her entire
life’s quest and journey in the time it took to exhale his final breathy
adieu.

Morris was finally free.  

Back in the boardroom,
moments
after Morris had made his horrible outburst and triumphant exit
,
jaws were still gaped open
.  Within hours that felt
like seconds, assigned parking spots were re-assigned; the obvious faux-paux
was stricken from the record.  Morris was granted a “paid in cash” final
bonus, handed to him in a gym bag purchased at the gift shop not twenty minutes
before by an intern and was never mentioned again.  But, through the
carnage and through the horror, something had survived.  Something huge.
 The redemption alofts
its mighty wings like the Phoenix
and
Whoopi & Goldberg’s Mid-Morning Express
is
born.  
Morris’s final legacy.

On the first show, with Ken working the catwalk
and adjusting lights so as to accent perfectly the entire politically correct
splendor, he is nearly blinded by the golden hair of the first guest.  She
is a stunning creature.  Ravishing.
Early forties,
absolutely striking.
 They were live to the world.  There she
was in front of camera two, tasting pizza.  Bringing it gently to her lips
and sipping it like wine.  Could she tell the difference between New York
Style and the non-authentic L.A. version?  
Eyes agaze, a
hush over the studio audience.
 You could smell a greasy pin drop.
 

“This one is definitely from New York,
”  she
said with a smokey deep rasp as she wiped pizza
sauce from her nearly perfect lips.  Her
hair, long and
flowing like
rivers in daylight bouncing off the godly sun and into
America’s eyes.

A vision.

She was right!

Ken’s jaw dropped.  Ken hadn’t experienced
this kind of adulation since he got high with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and someone
else in the bathroom of Jerry’s Famous Deli.  She had chosen the authentic
slice of pizza that had been Fed-Exed earlier that afternoon from New York!

It was a miracle!
Ken
thought.  
What an amazing allocation of fossil fuels and manpower!
He
felt like a witness to history.

“…Come see Carin and try her tasty New York style
pizza at her three convenient locations …and don’t miss her new movie
KILL
ALL DA COPS
,
 a
new, gritty, New York police thriller available on DVD this Friday.”

Ken is stupefied.   And so am I,
watching the broadcast from my parents’ home in Northridge.
I,
too, feeling like a witness to history.

The Vision that I was allowed
to witness.
 All of it: Morris, Ken, Kareem, Jerry’s
Deli, the prostitute in Reno who would later save a decent part of humanity…The
TV I had purchased after I got fired from JFD, had brought it all to me. I felt
like an ex-hooker turned law student, basking in the glow of having just
slashed Tyra Banks’ tires.  I felt like a highly sexually satisfied, yet
thoroughly deceased, TV executive who felt at one with the cosmos. I felt like
I had scored 38,387 career points.

I felt drunk.

I knew what I had to do.

I would venture to where this pizza place was.

I wanted to meet this Carin
person
,
her hair captivated me
.

A strange feeling entered.  
A sadness
.

Why isn’t my life going so well?  I
thought.

Why am I so alone?

Why did he leave me for that cougar slut who
lives in the hills?  God I am so sick of pizza, I just want one artsy
role…a supporting role…and not somebody’s aunty (burp).  It’s
gotta
be chowengin…and (hiccup) fon-kee…baby…oww…my head
hurts…I want to go home.

Weird thoughts.  I felt some kind of
connection.  Very unthreatening, familiar.  Like Cousin Freddy’s
salon on Canon.  That smell…

It grabbed me up.  Dressed me.  Told
me to find her, work for her. Get a job. Sure, it would be like all of the
other crappy jobs, but this one will be different.  It will be a different
kind of crappy.  Now go…
        

This vision was strong…I must investigate.

Where was it again?

Beverly Hills????

Devilcountry????

Shit…

COUSIN FREDDY

The
last time I had descended into Beverly Hills, or Devilcountry, was when I was
thirteen.  Two days before my
Bar Mitzvah
to be precise.  My
father took me to get my hair cut from Cousin Freddy.  This was the death
of my childhood and the beginning of my manhood.  He had a salon on Canon
Drive. Essentially, those of us who grew up
Valley,
stayed Valley.

We never spoke of my cousin Freddy.  Freddy
lived the life.  The life we all dreamed of.  My mother loved her
Cousin Freddy but hated his lifestyle.  He was from her side of the
family.  He had a Corvette, a man purse, Diner’s Club, hair dryer
holsters, tons of chicks, and the clap-- twice.

My father worshipped Freddy.  And by
default, so did I.  There had been rumors Cousin Freddy was the model for
Warren Beatty’s movie
Shampoo
. But I’m sure there were a couple dozen
cutters floating around the city at the time
who
could
make that claim.  Cousin Freddy lived the life, Beatty was a pretender,
but both of them probably banged Julie Christie.  To really be able to do
those things that Cousin Freddy could do to a woman, that was the gift.
 To give to her something she could not do for herself?  You could
write your own ticket. Cousin Freddy was an absolute genius with scissors.
 Women flocked to him.  They would enter through one door, and in a
Dr. Seussian-esque episode they would exit out another, looking fabulous and
groovy.  
All with a light, gentle, post-coital look on
their face.

The hair salon was my father’s paradise.
 To be part of the king’s entourage was the dream for my father.
 Forty hours a week as the branch manager for the Glendale office of
unemployment benefits had done it’s job.  This was my father’s escape.

It was an arduous trek.  Thirty-five
minutes through the Sepulveda pass.  At the time of my
Bar Mitzvah
,
the entire slope bordering on the west side of the freeway was a landfill that
would soon have trees planted over it.  It was “Garbage Mountain” to us. A
striking irony because it became some of the most valued real estate in the
country. It served as a troubling scarecrow.  We all stayed out.
 Yet, here we were, father and son, driving in my father’s ’66 Malibu 283,
two-stroke power glide, two door classic.  Headed for Hell.  I stared
up at the harsh November sun, that carried with it heat from a place cooler,
yet hotter.  
A cool inferno too abysmal to imagine.
 The parking always sucked and would end with my father yelling,
“GODDAMMIT!” as he pulled into a pay lot.  But through its gates lay the
spoils of a successful hunt.  I was honored my father would allow me safe
passage through his personal kingdom.  There were
Playboys
on the
coffee table as you waited.  And the girl on the cover would sometimes be
in a nearby chair, waiting to get blown-out.  I never picked an issue up,
but I studied the cover as it was facing the other way, pointing at somebody
else.  
I could absorb it upside-down
,
it didn’t matter
.  Puberty took care of the rest.

It was a unisex place and all the girls coyly
smiled at me as I sat there with my head freshly shampooed, a towel over my
shoulders, and the top of my shirt wet from the sink water.  They were all
so beautiful.  They loved making eyes with whoever you were.  I was
thirteen.  All they had to do was look at me and I could cream.  My
father yelled at me to come over to where they were watching some football
game, attempting to carve out a little niche of manliness in the corner of some
girlie place.  I’ll never forget the smell.  
Sharp
and pungent like some nymph had farted.
 Once you got used to it,
it all made sense.  Any other aroma and the spell would be broken.

“David,” cousin Freddy said to my dad as he
started to sculpt my ‘doo.  “David, look at the girl by the cashier, she’s
an actress.”  I pulled my head to the left to see. ”Keep your head
straight, Craig.” My dad sat, staring.  She wasn’t his type completely,
she was too tall but still he stared at her tight, svelte, ample frame.
 Her hair was stunning.  “I might get a date with her tonight! Can
you believe it? She just broke up with her director boyfriend.  Beat the
shit out of her and threw her out.  Asshole.  God! Look how foxy she
is!  Hold still, Craig.  Felicia, go wash her hair.”  Freddy
barked at his shampoo girl Felicia.  
A Pretty, homely,
twentysomething who had fantasies about Simon LeBon.
 Felicia
walked to the cashier and brought the blond over to where Rob was cutting my
hair.  “Hey, gorgeous!  Felicia’s
gonna
wash
you up and then we’ll see what we got. Okay?”  

“Okay.” the girl said.  It was a beautiful,
throaty tone.  I couldn’t see anything because my head was straight down,
but I could see her legs and feet wedged into three-inch heels and that was
enough to bonerize me.  “I’ve got a totally huge audition today, so you
gotta do me good, Freddy,” the voice said.

“Oh, I’ll do you good.  Now get over there
and wash up.”  They walked past me and I could make out the faintest of
images, the outline of a leg, and the bounce of her hair.  Her smell was
unbelievable.  I was lost by the fragrance.  

The whoosh and whir of Freddy’s blades helped
put me into a trance.  It got blurry.  I could sense my hair being
reformulated, re-cast.  Like Excalibur! I closed my eyes.  I could
see the voice of the woman who had just come in, springing to life, a gorgeous
frame takes shape, rising from the lake, gliding over me, whispering truths in
my ear, passing the unbreakable sword to me. Manly shit.  

My father considered this to be my true rite of
passage and not that whole Torah-reading crap.  Here I was ushered through
the gates, past the shampoo boys and armchair girls and allowed to be groomed
by one of the top hairstylists in Beverly Hills.   A strange wisdom
passed onto me that day.  Was this Torah?  
The real
Torah?
 What had she whispered to me?  I can’t remember.

When we got home, my mother screamed at my father.
 “HE LOOKS LIKE A GIGOLO!!!  HOW COULD YOU TAKE HIM THERE?  WHY
DON’T WE JUST DRIVE HIM OVER TO CHATSWORTH AND STICK HIM IN A PORNO
?????!!!!!!
”  

They fought well into the night.  Somehow
my hair had started yet another fight between my parents.
It
covered everything
,
I blocked it out
.  I
sat on my bed.  Imagined her voice.  Fleshed out her body.  She
filled my head.  Walking with Felicia.  Sometimes she’d be naked,
sometimes
fully-clothed
.  All other sounds wiped
clean.

After a time my trance was penetrated. “YOU ARE
NEVER TO TAKE HIM THERE AGAIN!”   It was my mother’s final utterance
of the evening, followed by door slams and muffled tears.  I cried too at
bringing so much pain into the house.  I vowed to never return into that
shitpit known as Beverly Hills again.  It had created such disharmony in
my house and the houses of so many others.  Even out in the Valley showbiz
ruined marriages, turned friends against each other, and made the city I grew
up in an untrustworthy place whose warm and sunny exterior only cloaked the
cold and distant world within.  
We were all separated by
manicured lawns, gated apartments and car-culture
.  Blue skies and
perfect smiles hid it all.  After high school I insured my never returning
to Devilcountry by going completely bald.  But then Carin came to me,
reaching out through the airwaves…beckoning my return.