Total Sarcasm

by Dan Ames

  “Yes, I’m looking for Archer DeLoof,” Mary said.

  “Do you have an appointment?”

  “No, but I’ve got this.” Mary whipped out her private investigator’s license, which she’d put neatly into a leather flip case.

  “You’re a cop?” the woman said. Now that she was closer, Mary saw the age in the woman’s face that apparently dozens of plastic surgeries hadn’t been able to erase. She upped her age estimate to mid-fifties.

  “What the badge says,” Mary replied. Technically, not a lie. Her “badge” said private investigator.

  “I’ll see if he’s around, but I think he’s on a shoot,” the woman said. “What’s your name?”

  “Mary Cooper.”

  “Okay, I’ll be right back.”

  The woman sauntered halfway down the hallway. Mary thought she looked like a carnival worker heading back to her shift at the cotton-candy stand. The woman turned right and disappeared down another hallway.

  Mary walked away from the reception area and went to the first poster at the beginning of the hallway.

  It showed a woman with her hands cuffed behind her and the title Hard Time.

  Probably a Martin Scorsese film, Mary thought. Maybe written by Penny Marshall. Starring Tom Hanks.

  Off to the right, there was a small office with giant, white, dry-erase boards upon which someone had charted out production calendars. There was also a stack of production books. Mary ducked inside the room, grabbed a production book, and slipped it into her purse.

  Just as she got back in front of the movie poster, Fat Lips appeared with a man in tow. He had on jeans, a black T-shirt, and black Doc Martens. His hair was long and swept back, black shot with gray streaks.

  Mary pegged him at late thirties, early forties. He had a goatee and hoops in each ear.

  “Let’s talk in my office,” the man said.

  Mary followed him as Plastic Queen took her seat behind the bar.

  His office consisted of a glass desk and two modern chairs made of white plastic. The desk was stacked high with DVDs, thumb drives, and cables. The cables led to a giant Mac computer. An oversized couch was on the other side of the office, and Mary had a sick certainty that many young girls had tried to use it as a launching pad for their careers.

  It nauseated her to think about it.

  “So what can I do for you,” the man said.

  “Are you Archer DeLoof?”

  The man ignored her.

  “Let’s start with your name,” he said. Mary groaned inwardly. He was going to be one of those guys.

  “Mary Cooper,” she said. “Who are you?”

  “Vince Buslipp,” he said. “I own the place.”

  “Oh,” Mary said. “I had asked to see Archer DeLoof.”

  “Yes, Gia mentioned it, but Archer is out on a shoot right now for Blast Zone,” he said. He looked at his computer. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m investigating the disappearance of a young woman named Nina Ramirez,” Mary said. If Buslipp had a reaction, he hid it well. Or did he seem just a little too interested in what was on his computer screen?

  Mary pressed forward. “I’ve been led to believe that she and Archer DeLoof were close.”

  “I don’t know anything about that,” Buslipp said. He seemed disinterested and bored. Mary noted his pale skin and the red around his eyes. Buslipp looked like a guy who rarely missed a party.

  Buslipp said, “Whatever pussy he’s getting on the side is none of my business.”

  “And who says the porn industry has no compassion for young women?” Mary said.

  Buslipp ignored her comment, tapping away on his computer.

  “So do you have any way I can get in touch with Mr. DeLoof?” Mary said. “Maybe his cell phone? Or an address for where he’s filming? Anything?”

  “Nope, and even if I did, why would I help someone to go interrupt one of my employees while they’re working?” he said. “Kinda bad for business, don’t you think?”

  “So, do you know Nina Ramirez? Ever met her?” Mary asked, ignoring Buslipp. Instead of ExtReam Productions, he should call it ExtReamly Rude.

  “Look, honey,” Buslipp said. “I let you waltz in here and ask your questions. Now, unless you want to get in front of a camera and suck someone off, I think we’re all done here.”

  “My chance to be in a masterpiece,” Mary said. “Exciting. What’s its working title: Slitizen Kane? On Golden Shower Pond?”

  She got to her feet.

  “So just to be clear, do you or don’t you know Nina Ramirez?” she said.

  “Never heard of her until now.” He turned and started tapping away on his computer. “Please leave. Now.”

  “Okay, porn boy,” Mary said. “I’ll shut the door so you can spank your little monkey in private.”

  She slammed the door shut.

  And hoped she had a bottle of hand sanitizer in the car.

  8

  Eight

  Mary wanted to drive through a car wash with the windows down to cleanse herself of the scum layer from her visit to ExtReam Productions.

  It wasn’t that she had anything against pornography per se in theory, as long as no real harm came to anyone involved. And therein lay the problem. It attracted a lot of damaged women and then exploited them. And she knew there were some porn films where people did get hurt. Mary had a big problem with that.

  The way that piece of shit Buslipp had talked to her made her skin crawl. She saw his viewpoint of women perfectly clear: objects to be exploited.

  She pulled into the parking lot of a department store and took the production book she’d lifted from ExtReam out of her purse.

  Mary had seen this before and knew they listed the crews by name, with contact information, and important addresses for the shoot. Unfortunately, there were several addresses listed, without specific dates attached to them.

  She found Archer DeLoof halfway down the crew list. There was no phone number for him specifically, but there was for the production’s line producer.

  Mary put her Bluetooth earpiece in place—talking on cell phones while driving in Los Angeles would cost you at least a hundred bucks. No thank you, Mary thought. Can’t write that off.

  She dialed the number and when the voice of a harried woman answered, she said, “Where are we shooting today? I need to drop off stuff for makeup.”

  Mary heard noise in the background and someone speaking. She held her breath.

  “Warehouse one.”

  Mary sensed the woman was about to disconnect the call so she spoke quickly. “Okay, been there a bunch of times, but what is the street address again? I get turned around so easy. I’m used to Ohio—“

  “2987 Olympic.”

  “Thank—”but before she could finish, she heard the dial tone.

  Mary pulled into a Ralph’s parking lot, turned around, and headed back toward Olympic. Ten minutes later, she pulled up in front of a warehouse. There was a gravel driveway in front of the place and a weed-choked section of old blacktop.

  “Glamorous,” she said to herself.

  She parked and went to the main door of the warehouse. It was a steel deal, with no window, no doorbell, and no sense of a welcome.

  Mary knocked on the door and waited. She pulled on the handle, but it remained locked.

  She’d heard it was easy to break into the porn industry, what the hell?

  Suddenly, the door opened, and two men stepped from the building, almost crashing into Mary.

  “Oh sorry,” one of them said, a young guy in jeans, a T-shirt, and Vans tennis shoes.

  They held the door open for her, and she stepped inside.

  It was a mess, with thick electrical cables strewn everywhere, lights on black metal tripods, and the general look of a town hall meeting gone to chaos.

  At the back of the building, Mary saw a cluster of people and walked forward.

  There were four people standing around a small camera mounted on a contr
aption that looked like a giant mechanical arm. Mary could see the foot of a bed in front of the camera, but not much else.

  One of them men near the camera turned to her.

  “The fluffer is here!” he called out. Mary looked over her shoulder. She had no idea what a fluffer was, although the term sounded familiar. For whatever reason, the people on set seemed to think she was one.

  A large black man, naked, walked out from behind a curtained partition.

  “Over here,” he said to Mary.

  Mary approached the small group near the camera. “Uh, I’m actually here looking for Archer DeLoof,” she said.

  “Aw fuck, you’re not the fluffer?” a man behind the camera said. He was a middle-aged man with a big beer belly and a white goatee.

  “No,” Mary said.

  The beer belly rolled his eyes. “Then who are you?”

  “I told you,” Mary said. “I’m the one looking for Archer DeLoof. Now where is he, Chubby?”

  The man’s face turned red. “How’d she get in here?”

  “Fucking guys must’ve left the door open,” one of the other men said, a lanky man in black jeans and a long-sleeved, black shirt.

  “Get her outta here,” beer belly said.

  “Archer!” the guy dressed in black yelled out.

  A younger man in gray dress slacks, a checked shirt, and a gray vest scurried forward from the back of the building. He had a walkie-talkie clipped to his pants that were already riding low and a cell phone earpiece dangling over his shoulder.

  “What?” he said, at both petulant and clearly subservient.

  “She says she’s not the fluffer, and she’s looking for you,” the guy with the belly said. “Get her the fuck out of here, now please.”

  Archer DeLoof looked at Mary. His face seemed older than the preppy slacker outfit he was wearing. Glasses shadowed his brown eyes, and he sported a beard struggling to take hold along his somewhat handsome chin. Mary thought he could actually be pretty cute if he let go of his lame accoutrements.

  “What do you want?” he said. “How’d you get in here?”

  “Nina Ramirez. I need to talk to you about her,” Mary said, ignoring his question with obvious disregard.

  DeLoof shot his eyes back to the men around the camera, who seemed to be debating about the proper angle of the upcoming shot. The black man was still looking at Mary.

  “I’ve got one minute for you,” DeLoof said to Mary and guided her to a spot about twenty feet from the camera.

  “Look, I’m working here,” he said. He looked back at the group around the camera. “I can’t really talk now. What the hell do you want to know about Nina? If you’re related to her, or a friend or something, you should know she dumped me, not the other way around.”

  “She’s missing,” Mary said.

  DeLoof blinked twice, rapidly. “What do you mean, missing?”

  “You know, no one knows where she is. That kind of missing.”

  “Archer!” someone called from the set.

  DeLoof looked toward the group around the camera, then back to Mary. “Look, I have no idea where she is. She broke up with me, said she was looking for something else. Someone told me she hooked up with a guy named Trey. He’s some kind of agent supposedly. That’s all I know.”

  “What’s his last name?”

  “No fucking clue,” he said.

  “Do you know the name of the agency he’s with?” Mary said.

  DeLoof had already started to walk away, albeit backwards.

  “No, but it’s some fancy place right on Ocean. That big, white office building. Nina pointed it out to me once, you know, before.”

  Mary knew the building.

  “Okay, you need to leave now,” he said. “I have to get back to work.” For a moment, it looked to Mary like he might have something else to add, but then he turned and jogged away.

  “Hey, what’s a fluffer?” Mary called out after him.

  He didn’t answer.

  But the naked black guy waved to her and then pointed at his overgrown member. Then she remembered what a fluffer was.

  Mary waved back then pointed at her own private area.

  “Yeah, I need a fluffer too!” she called out.

  9

  Nine

  “Oh, that’s bullshit,” Aunt Alice said. “Porn stars don’t have agents. It’s not a real profession, sort of like private investigators.”

  They were sitting on Alice’s back patio. It was a wooden deck with a small glass table and two padded chairs. An open bottle of chardonnay sat between them. Alice’s backyard was small, but the grass was freshly mown, and flowers bordered the small space. A hummingbird feeder sat at the rear of the property.

  “What do you mean they don’t have agents? And how would you know?” Mary said. “You landed all those lonely, horny hitchhiker roles by yourself?”

  “If it weren’t for hitchhikers, you’d never get a date,” Alice said.

  Mary nodded, not disagreeing.

  “There’s big money in porn, though,” Mary said. “It makes total sense there are agents for that stuff too. I mean, if there’s money to be made in any kind of film endeavor, there’s going to be all the hangers-on. Agents included.”

  “That’s a fair point,” Alice admitted. “Leeches don’t tend to be very discriminating.” She took a sip of her wine. “Speaking of not being very discriminating, did you ever get in touch with your boyfriend?”

  Mary twirled the wine in her glass. “No, apparently he has gone undercover.”

  “Gone undercover or gone into hiding?” Alice said. “You know . . . from you. Isn’t that what happens to most of your boyfriends? Kind of like a Mary Cooper Ex Protection Program.”

  “Ah, I always find a way to track ‘em down,” Mary said. “They don’t get out that easily.”

  “So what do you mean he’s gone undercover?” Alice said. “He’s a homicide detective. They don’t go undercover, right?”

  “He was put on temporary duty with Vice,” Mary said. She sighed.

  “Why the big sigh?” Alice said, and then glanced at Mary. “Oh, I get it. It had something to do with you. What, you two get caught in a broom closet playing with his nightstick?”

  “I wish,” Mary said. “No, it seems Jake had a bit of a falling-out with his boss. My name may have come up a time or two.”

  Mary noticed Alice’s glass was empty. She refilled it, then topped off her own.

  “You know,” Mary said. “An LAPD detective in a relationship with a private investigator . . . Sometimes, that put him in awkward positions.”

  “Oh, I bet you put him in awkward positions all the time,” Alice said. “You’re probably a pervert.”

  “The indignation coming from you is precious,” Mary said. “Should we get the opinion of your yoga slash sex teacher? I bet you’ve begged him to teach you the downward doggy style.”

  “My lips are sealed,” Alice said. “Except to drink this wine. Because it’s delicious.” She took a sip, laying on the dainty, ladylike mannerisms a bit thick, Mary thought.

  “So are you going go talk to this missing girl’s agent?” Alice made the quotation marks with her fingers around the word “agent.”

  “No, I’m thinking the direct approach isn’t the best strategy,” Mary said. “So much hostility in the porn industry toward a woman who asks a lot of questions. Big surprise there.”

  “So what’s your plan?”

  “Well, I was thinking of going undercover too. Hell, if Jake can do it, I can too.”

  “You mean you’re going to pretend to be a porn star?” Alice said, her voice incredulous. “At your age? Wow, talk about a tough acting gig.”

  “What do you mean at my age?” Mary said. “I’m a total hottie. I could play a teenage babysitter. Or a gym teacher gone wild.”

  “Oh dear me,” Alice said, then started to stand up. “Let me get you a mirror.”

  “Oh sit down,” Mary said. The wine was hitting t
he spot. Maybe she felt a little fuzziness sprinkle its way across her forehead.

  “I like where this is going,” Mary said. “A porn star. I could pull it off. So to speak.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding, Mary. And you can’t pull it off,” Alice said. “What if they want you to audition? I mean, they’ll be able to tell you haven’t had sex in ages.”

  “I can look trampy if I have to,” Mary said. “They’ll think I’ve been ridden hard and put away wet. No problem.”

  “They say the camera adds ten pounds,” Alice said. She glanced at Mary’s body.

  “That’s perfect, I’m about ten pounds underweight,” Mary said.

  “Yeah, if you were six foot four,” Alice said.

  “I actually think I’ve got a better idea,” Mary said. “Instead of being an actress, maybe I’ll be a producer.”

  Alice snapped her fingers. “I’ve got the perfect idea for a film! It’s about a mature, older woman who lets herself get seduced by her incredibly hot Indian yoga instructor.”

  Alice looked wistfully toward the mountains. “The sex could be so hot . . .”

  “Maybe I’m not an American porn actress,” Mary said. “You know, maybe I was European.” She snapped her fingers. “Wait, I’ve got it—I was an Italian porn star, but now I’m in America, looking to produce a porno film here. You know, breaking into the industry. And I’m looking for fresh talent to star in my new film.” Mary clapped her hands together. “It’s perfect.”

  “I don’t know, sounds a bit thin,” Alice said.

  “No, it’s dead-on. But I think I might need someone else,” Mary said. “If I’m an actress turned producer, I need a director. I think it would be more believable if I had a director with me.” Mary glanced at Alice.

  “You wouldn’t work,” Mary said.

  “Why the hell not?” Alice said.

  “Jesus Christ, you look like an overgrown Girl Scout,” Mary said. “Maybe if I told them you were in charge of baking muffins for the porn stars between takes.”

  “Don’t give me that,” Alice said. “I’ve got Hollywood harlot written all over me.”

  “No, I need someone totally sleazy,” Mary said. “Someone that doesn’t have to act too hard to come across as being completely without morals. Someone totally inappropriate. With absolutely no shame.”