“What is that? How much is that?”
“Let me tell you what it includes. For starters, you get individual career counseling, priority admission at high-demand workshops, pre-printed mailing labels—”
“Is it free?”
“Hold on. You also get fifteen percent off of a professional headshot consultation—”
“Yes, but how much does it cost?”
She smiles stiffly. “It’s nine hundred and ninety-eight dollars for the first year.”
“I just wanted to sign up for the workshop with the commercial agents.”
“You can do that, but that’s going to cost you seventy-five dollars, which I could just put toward your membership. Twelve more workshops like that and you’ll have your membership, and the classes will basically be free! You’ll get unlimited use of our Macs and printers, a copy of our ‘Taking Charge Actor’s Handbook.’”
“No, thanks. I can only afford one workshop.”
“I don’t think it’s a valuable use of your time or your money. You’ve got to see yourself as having your own corporation. It’s called Becca Inc. You have to spend money to make money. These headshots, for instance, really aren’t going to be much use to you.”
“I like my headshots,” I say.
“If you don’t put your absolute best foot forward for the industry, I have to wonder how you feel about yourself.” She pulls a calculator from her desk drawer. “We could work out a payment plan.”
“I just want to sign up for the Saturday audition thing next week.”
“All I can tell you is that you’re lucky there’s even room. And that’s because of the holidays. The workshops with the good people, anyway—I mean, everyone we bring in here is good, but with the really well-known agents, those workshops fill up right away. In an hour sometimes. Last week one filled up in twenty minutes.”
“Danielle.” (Danielle, who are you? Where are you from, you little snake?) I take a deep breath and sit taller. I’m even shaking a little. But I know when someone is trying to take advantage of me, and after so much waitressing, I’ve learned how to stand up for myself. When I say her name I feel that I’m taking the power back. “Danielle. It’s a risk I’m just going to have to take.”
“Okay.” Her shoulders slump, and she reluctantly prints out a sheet of paper and hands it to me without making eye contact. “Tara will take care of you at the front desk.”
When I get to the lobby, I hand the sheet of paper to Tara. “Do you take credit cards?”
“Sure,” she says. I feel a little sick as I hand over the card.
As I’m leaving the building, I pass Juice Man, who’s on his way in. He’s on his cell phone and does a double take when he sees me. Who is this omnipresent man?
“Are you following me?” he asks, grinning.
“I was going to ask you the same thing,” I say. He laughs and continues his conversation.
“See you later,” I say under my breath.
ON SATURDAY, I’m back at ECS. This time I’m in Studio Three, a mock TV studio, facing the panel of four agents and twenty other actors, ranging from ages twenty to late sixty. I’m wearing my seventy-five-dollar shirt, jeans, and a pair of flat boots that Marisol insisted I buy, telling me they looked so good that it would be “irresponsible NOT to get them.” I glance at the advertising copy, even though I’ve memorized it.
“When I graduated from college, my mom gave me a bottle of Di-Arrest. Some graduation present, huh? I was about to go backpacking in Europe. ‘Trust me,’ she said. Whatever, Mom! But, boy, was she right. Thanks to Di-Arrest, I had a super time, and diarrhea never stopped my fun, especially when I met Paolo! Grazie, Di-Arrest.”
I look up at the four agents I’m auditioning for and await their reactions.
“I guess I’ll start,” says the guy who looks like a former actor. “There’s something very dark about you. I can’t put my finger on it. It’s like you’ve got this cute face, but inside you’re a dark person.” He shrugs and rests his chin in his hands.
“Okay.” I’m really not sure what to do with that. I look at the next agent, a woman built like a football player with Miss Piggy–style hair.
“Hi, I’m Marie,” she says in a cloying voice. “You’re nervous, but you’ve got a good smile. I won’t call you in, probably. Good luck.”
Good luck to you, too, Mama Marie, I think. This is the advice I paid seventy-five bucks for?
“You need to decide what makes you different,” says the next agent, a weasel-like man. “Anyway, I really only work with the ethnic market, so I don’t know how I can be helpful to you except to tell you that you hit the notes, you got the tone, but I get the sense that you don’t really know who you are.”
“Um, okay.” Ethnic market? Can he really say that? I shoot Marisol a glance as she bites back a smile.
“I’m going to be honest with you,” says the next man, a guy from Ace, the best agency here. “I only work with models. So I don’t mean this to be an invitation—please don’t call me. Seriously. But I disagree with these guys. I think you’re excellent. You’re totally relatable—a breath of fresh air. Get in front of as many people as possible. You might want to take a class in commercials just to get comfortable with the camera. But I think if you have the guts and the gumption to hang in there, you can do this. You might have to wait a while, though.” He winks at me, and, without thinking, I wink back. He chuckles.
“Next!” says Danielle.
I see the man who works only with “the ethnic market” light up as Marisol steps onto the stage. I high-five her, and as I turn around, she pinches my ass. I yelp a little.
“She loves it when I do that,” she tells the panel confidently. They all laugh.
Marisol begins, “When I graduated from college…” I can tell that she’s nervous, but as I watch her on the monitor, her eyes are sparkling. When she says, “Some graduation present, huh?” she looks like she’s talking to me. This dumb line of copy feels real. Marisol’s a natural. A Girl Next Door with Leading Lady potential.
“That’s what I’m talking about! You’re going to be a hot commodity,” says the weasel. Marisol beams.
On Thanksgiving, Marisol and I go to In-N-Out and order hamburgers double-double animal style, and sneak them into the movie theater. I wish Raj could join us, but he’s gone home to Michigan. I miss him in a way I didn’t expect.
A week later I wake with a start. The garbage trucks are making a racket outside, and they yank me from a dream in which Alex and I are on a ski trip and he’s introducing me to the instructor as “his lady.” For the briefest second, I forget how much I hate him. I check my phone to see if I have any calls, texts, or e-mails from agents. Not only are there no messages from agents, there’s a reminder that today is the Jones concert—the day I was supposed to see Alex. No wonder I was dreaming about him. Is he still going? I wonder. Did he sell the tickets the same way he sold Ruby?
I roll over and pull the blanket around me, hoping that I’ll tip back into the world of sleep, but my foot is itching like crazy. It had been bothering me all week, and I kept hoping that it would just stop, but when I confessed my situation to Mama Bear, she told me to google athlete’s foot. I had a clear case.
It’s not only my itchy skin that keeps me from sleeping. It’s also the fact that rent was due three days ago and I haven’t paid it because I don’t have enough money. I stick my foot in the air, hoping the elevation will somehow help, and reach into my nightstand drawer where I keep my tips. I take out the cash and count it again slowly, praying that somehow this time it will add up to the eight hundred dollars I need to pay rent. The grace period for rent is four days, and I’ve been counting on it, trying to squeeze in as many shifts as I can. But they let me go early yesterday, even though I was supposed to have a double. I actually begged to stay, but Gloria told me that Chantal and Jimmy deserved the work more than I did.
Pablo gave me three awesome scones on my way out the door, but I have a
feeling that the landlord won’t accept payment in scones, even if they do have apricots in them, and he won’t take a partial payment either. Last month, when I accidently put seven hundred and eighty dollars under his door, he returned the entire amount to me with a note that explained the rent needed to be paid in full or else it was considered delinquent.
I text Marisol my issue. I promise her scones, and fifteen minutes later she’s at my door, wearing her kimono and bunny slippers and carrying two mugs of coffee. Her face is soft with sleep.
“Here you go.”
“Thanks. I made some, too.”
“But this is the real stuff. The best. Now let’s brainstorm.”
I take a sip of the coffee and scratch my foot through my sock. “I’m sorry, I know this is disgusting. I have athlete’s foot.”
“Yuck. Do you know where you got it?”
“The bear suit. Apparently last year’s Baby Bear had athlete’s foot.”
“That’s gross.”
“It gets worse. He also had jock itch.”
“From now on, double underwear and no thongs,” Marisol says, taking a seat at my little kitchen table.
“Too late.”
“You have jock itch?”
“Well, the pharmacist thinks it’s a yeast infection due to stress and possibly exacerbated by the bear suit.”
“You’re a little…fungus fairy, aren’t you?” Marisol picks up the medicine and reads the back. “This is going to help you. And if it doesn’t, there’s a free clinic on Sunset.”
“Where am I going to get the forty bucks by the end of the day?”
“Forty dollars isn’t that much. I wish I had extra money to give you,” she says as a little line has creased her brow. “But I’m so broke, too.”
“It’s okay,” I say.
“We’ll think of something,” she says.
“I don’t know how you do it,” I say. “I don’t know how you don’t worry.”
“It’s all going to work out in the end. I know it is. You need to believe it, too. And of course I worry, but it’s just fear.”
“Where do you get your confidence?”
She shrugs. “I’ve got this commercial shoot next week, so I know money’s on the way.” After our auditions at ECS, Marisol had two agents fighting over her. She had a bunch of auditions and booked a cereal commercial. She’ll get five hundred dollars for the day and possibly tens of thousands of dollars in residuals. She’s got the perfect amount of quirk.
“You’re really talented, Marisol.”
“Oh, please. It’s all luck.”
“That’s not true. I saw you on the monitor. You’re such a natural. I can’t believe you’re going to make five hundred dollars in one day.” She smiles and I have to tamp down a flicker of jealousy. I slip on an oven glove and take out the hot scones from the oven. Pablo made me promise that I wouldn’t put them in the microwave.
“Okay, let’s think,” Marisol says. “Is there anything you could sell?”
“My bed?” I put the scones on a plate.
“You need a bed,” Marisol says, breaking off a steaming piece of scone.
“I wish I could play an instrument. I’d stand on the corner somewhere in a velvet skirt with an open guitar case or whatever.”
“Damn, this is good,” she says with a full mouth. “I can’t do anything like that either. Hey, let’s do a Shakespeare scene by the Echo Park Lake. It’s like Shakespeare in the Park, LA-style.”
“Logistically complicated. Besides, we’d have to memorize the scene. We don’t have that kind of time.” I refill my coffee and top off Marisol’s. Without thinking, I look up to see if anyone else needs coffee. I’m waitressing even when I’m not.
“I wish I knew someone who could give us advice.”
“Marisol, that’s it.”
“What is?”
“We’ll set up an advice booth,” I say.
Marisol beams at me. “On the Venice Boardwalk. With all the other street performers.”
“Two dollars for a solution to your problems,” I say. “That’s such a deal!”
“I’m going to find us the perfect outfits,” she says. “We’re going to be so good at this. We’ll probably make hundreds.”
“Then we could get more oysters,” I say.
“And the jeans that you truly deserve,” she says.
“MARISOL, DO YOU think we need a license? Like for street performing or something?” I ask.
“If anyone asks us for a license, we’ll just play dumb,” she says, and sets up the two folding chairs and the TV table we brought in the back of her car. “Remember the fine art of making shit up?” I nod. Marisol motions to a dreadlocked white dude playing a bongo drum and laughing to himself. “I mean, do you think that guy has a license?”
“I don’t know, maybe?”
It’s an unusually hot day for December in LA. We’re wearing what Marisol deemed 1970s therapist outfits, including non-prescription eyeglasses. Mine are black and cat-eyed, and Marisol’s are tortoiseshell and take up half her face. We decided to go with an old Woody Allen therapist look. We fast-forwarded through Annie Hall and Manhattan for fashion inspiration. I’m in high-waist pants and a blouse that ties at the neck, and Marisol’s in a long-sleeved, calf-length dress with a high, ruffled collar. Marisol tapes a poster board sign to the table. It reads ADVICE: TWO DOLLARS A QUESTION. I tape a “tips” sign around a coffee can, in case someone feels like paying us above and beyond our fee. All we need is twenty customers and I’ll be able to pay my rent.
Raj texts me: Turned in Hotel California. Ninety-eight pages of thrills and chills!
Me: CONGRATULATIONS! We need to celebrate!
Raj: Not yet—I just need to finish all the rest of my work. I have to write a web series pilot BY TUESDAY.
Me: Do you have an idea?
Raj: Kind of.
Me: Maybe I can help? Can you hang out for a little while? I haven’t seen you since you’ve been back!
Raj: Yeah. Where are you guys?
Me: In Venice. On the boardwalk. We’ve set up an advice booth!
Raj: I feel like I need to see this. And I DEFINITELY need some writing advice. You’re my secret weapon, ha-ha!
Me: Yes! Please come!
Raj: Send your coordinates. I’m on my way.
“Raj is coming,” I say after I text our location.
“Nice,” Marisol says, studying me.
“What?” I ask.
“You’re blushing!” Marisol says.
“I am?” I put a hand on my cheek. I feel warm.
“You’re blushing so hard. You like him!”
“Maybe I do,” I say, feeling that same flutter I felt when we were hanging out at Hotel Uno. Oh my God, do I like him?
“This is great news,” Marisol says. “I’m going to touch you up.” She whips out a lip gloss palette. “Let’s define this lovely pucker of yours.” She paints my lips with the tiny brush. “So remember, with the people who come to our booth today. They’re not customers. They’re clients. Go like this?” She rubs her lips together, and I copy her. She holds up the compact to show me.
“I think we have our first client,” I whisper, as a young guy in a Princeton crew T-shirt and running shorts approaches us. He has red hair and a soccer player’s body. He smiles at us.
“Oh, I just love a redhead,” Marisol says.
“So, hi. I actually really need some advice,” he says, catching his breath. Marisol and I spend about fifteen minutes discussing his roommate situation with him until we arrive at the conclusion that he shouldn’t break his lease. He gives us our two-dollar fee as well as a five-dollar tip. He also gives Marisol his number.
“That was easy,” I say.
“That was wonderful,” Marisol says.
“Only seventeen more clients to go.”
Twenty minutes later, a man in his mid-fifties wearing a tracksuit approaches us. “So, what’s this? How does this operation work?” he asks us in a
weird accent. He’s standing a little too close. His rests his hairy sausage fingers on Marisol’s kitchen table.
“For the price of two dollars, you ask us a question and we’ll give you advice,” Marisol says.
He smiles as he stuffs two dollars in the jar. “Here’s a question: How come my girlfriend won’t let me eat her pussy?”
“EW!” I shriek and cover my face. “It’s not that kind of advice.”
“I paid my two bucks, I want an answer.”
“Go away,” Marisol say. “You need to get out of here! Go away.”
He walks off, laughing. “That was worth two bucks.”
I take out a Sharpie and add “No Dirty Talk!” to our sign. When I take my seat again, Raj is walking toward us with three iced coffees in a tray. He waves and I wave back, feeling brighter at the sight of him. It’s like one of those California breezes that sweep through my apartment.
“Raj,” I say as he hands me the cold drink, “thank you.” Our hands touch, and his fingertips are pleasantly cold.
“So let’s talk about this web series assignment. What’s it about?” I ask. “Come on. Hit me with it.”
“All right, here goes. It’s called Can You Watch My Computer?”
“Okay,” I say.
“You know how when you go to a café, people are always asking if you can watch their stuff if they go to the bathroom or have to move their car or whatever—”
“Sure,” Marisol interrupts.
“So, I’m thinking this guy asks this girl, ‘Can you watch my computer?’ But instead of just sitting there for ten minutes, all this stuff happens, and she has to, like, do ninja moves and stuff to keep his computer safe. And it gets really weird and then he comes back and he’s like, ‘Thanks’ and she’s like, ‘No problem.’” Raj throws his hands up in the air as if to say, That’s all I got.
“That’s funny!” Marisol says.
“Yeah, what’s wrong with that?” I ask. “You might need to work on the ending a little.”
Hello, Sunshine Page 14