The Fame Game

by Rona Jaffe

Well, get her! She was sitting here in this bar with all the television people and a big director twice her age was talking to her about books and movies as if she was an educated person! Shee-it … I mean, wow! She sipped the new drink. Somebody had put money in the jukebox and it was playing “Lemme Live Now.” It was like a dream come true. She would have paid somebody to put her record on now! That was her voice there, and here was her body here, having a drink or two with this groovy guy, and oh, wow, who had ever heard of a gold ballpoint pen! She made up her mind to buy one just like it tomorrow, and a leather-covered notebook too, and write down little things in it.

  He tore out the page and gave it to her. “Where are you staying?”

  “The Chelsea Hotel.”

  He nodded approvingly. Then he wrote that down in the little notebook, and put it away in his pocket. “I’m not going to do television forever,” he said. He sipped his Scotch. “Eventually I’m going to do a new kind of musical, using techniques of film and the total environment of the discothèques. Have you been to Schwartz’s Lobotomy?”

  She shook her head no. It sounded like a delicatessen.

  He looked at his watch. “Known to the regulars as the Lobe. We have time to get something to eat before it opens, if you’re not doing anything.”

  “I have nothing to do for the rest of my life,” Silky said cheerfully. At that moment it seemed as if she didn’t.

  He took her to a French restaurant where she didn’t know what she was eating, which didn’t matter much as she hardly ate a thing. She had half a glass of wine. Then they took a cab to the Village, to an ugly-looking warehouse with a lot of trash piled up outside. Inside it was like another world. There was a big room with a round balcony hanging in the center of it, suspended by big things that went right through the ceiling and led to by a catwalk. The balcony, suspended by the foundations, was the only thing in the room that was not shaking. The walls, ceiling and floor were covered with moving patterns of psychedelic colors and flashing lights, and the whole room was shaking like a bowlful of Jell-O: the floor they were trying to stand on, the walls, the ceiling. The tables were just tiny silver boxes, and they were shaking too, so the drinks were anchored to them with rubber plungers, but the liquid kept splashing out anyway on to the customers’ clothes. The music was deafening, and the room was evidently wired to vibrate to the sounds. People were trying to dance and stand up at the same time, and most of them looked seasick. Silky could smell pot in the air. She wondered if pimply Marvin took Tamara here, and she hoped he did so they could see her with Dick Devere.

  “The ultimate in masochism,” Dick said.

  “What?”

  “This place. It’s my theory that all discothèques are experiences in masochism for the people who go there, and the reason this one is so popular right now is because it’s the most sadistic. Look there.”

  He led her to the side of the room where there was a long line of people waiting to get into a small room with a sign over it: De-vibration Chamber. That room wasn’t shaking at all. There were chairs to sit on in the room, and admission was a dollar. The room was so small that only six people could go in at a time, which was why there was the line. The people waiting to get in looked sicker by the minute. Silky didn’t feel too well herself.

  Then he took her back to the center of the room. He refused a table and he didn’t want to dance; he just stood there watching professionally, taking it all in. Once in a while he would nod to himself. She didn’t see how he could use any of this on his show but she supposed he had to know about everything that was going on. She felt like they were two outsiders, just standing there. It was a funny feeling, but kind of nice. They were out of it, but special. It was like everybody else was out of it and they were in.

  “That’s the V.I.P. balcony,” he said, pointing. “We can sit there if you feel sick, they’ll know me. You see, the celebrities can come here and watch and not have to be tortured. It’s the only way the management can make them feel like they’re celebrities.”

  There were shades all around the hanging balcony in front of each of the tables, and some of the celebrities had pulled their shades up so they didn’t have to watch anything at all, in case that made them sick. What a laugh, Silky thought. It costs fifteen dollars a couple to get in here and then they don’t even look at it.

  “Okay,” Dick said. “Let’s split.”

  It was midnight, and he took her to an ice cream parlor on Third Avenue and bought her a sundae about ten inches tall. She would have rather had an Alka Seltzer, and she just played with the sundae, pretending to eat it. Which was just as well, she thought, because fudge sauce made her break out. The sundae cost three dollars and fifty cents and she was glad he didn’t seem to notice that she had hardly touched it. He must make a lot of money, she thought, or else he’s really a gentleman.

  She was feeling much better now that they were away from the Lobe, and she tried to remember that groovy thing he’d said there, about discothèques being sadistic or maso-something, and try to get it right so she could say it to somebody sometime and impress them. But he kept talking, saying more groovy things, and she was too busy trying to keep up with what he was saying now to keep her mind on what he’d said an hour ago. Sha—being out with him was like being out with ten people!

  And then he took her to the Chelsea and told the cab to wait. Maybe she had bored him, she thought, beginning to feel very depressed. He didn’t even hint to come up, he just told the cab to wait. She wondered if he was going to kiss her good night or anything, but he just took her hand and held it a long time and looked at her.

  “I had a wonderful time,” he said.

  “Oh, I did, too,” she said. “I really did.” She thought for a moment of asking him up, but she realized they had turned the room into a pigsty, and Leroy and his girl friend and Cornelius and Ardra would be sleeping on the floor, and he would probably run out of there in horror. “I’ll get those books,” she said.

  He smiled. “I envy you, reading them for the first time. Good night.” And then he went away.

  She pretended to be walking to the elevator and then when she saw the cab had pulled away she sat down on a chair in the lobby so she could be alone to think. She didn’t know what to make of him. She had thought all evening, until the end, that he really liked her. He certainly wasn’t shy. Maybe he thought she was repulsive. Maybe he wouldn’t go to bed with a black chick. Maybe he was gay. No, she was sure he wasn’t gay. Maybe he had a jealous woman at home. She’d have to get up her courage and worm it out of Mr. Libra in the morning. Boy, she was stupid! She should have asked him something about himself instead of letting him talk about all those arty things at dinner. But she had been so flattered and interested it hadn’t mattered at all about his private life at the time. Maybe the way he acted was just the way people on a date acted in New York when they were his age and sophisticated. She thought that was probably it. He respected her. Wasn’t that a gas! He respected her!

  When she got upstairs everybody was having a good time, playing their records and the television set all at the same time, and nobody even asked her if she had had a good time. The girls pretended she hadn’t even been out. Only her own little brother Cornelius finally asked her if she’d had fun, and she was so glad somebody had asked that she almost cried. Honey was in bed, not asleep yet, and Silky noticed that all the girls had taken off their television make-up, except Honey, as usual. She began to cream her face and finally she turned to Honey and said as sweetly as she could: “Hey, do you want some of this?”

  “What for?” Honey said, in a very mean voice.

  “To take off your make-up.”

  “Kiss my ass,” Honey said, and turned over and pulled the covers over her head.

  “What’s the matter with her tonight?” Silky asked the others. Nobody answered her. She felt her heart go up in her throat. Dick was right; they were jealous of her. But they had been her best friends for ever and ever—they couldn’t just stop l
iking her. She turned to Cheryl and Beryl, who had always been her best friends.

  “What do you say I call down for some fish and chips?”

  “Didn’t he feed you?” Cheryl said nastily.

  “Sure, but I thought … it might be fun.”

  “We’re not hungry,” Beryl said flatly. She turned the volume up on the stereo set.

  “I don’t know what you’re all so mad about,” Silky yelled over the noise of the record. “He’s never going to call me again.”

  “Why not? Did he find out how frigid you are?” Tamara yelled back.

  “It’s not always like that,” Silky yelled.

  “Oh yeah? Did he pay you for balling him? Is that why you want to buy all us poor niggers fish and chips?” The other girls laughed.

  Something in Silky snapped. “You don’t know anything!” she screamed. “You take Marvin for everything you can get. What would you know about going out with a nice guy?”

  “I guess you would,” Tamara yelled, her face getting purple with rage. “You only go out with big white directors, you ass-licker. Why don’t you fuck old ape-face Libra?”

  “Yeah, yeah,” Beryl said. “Climb up a tree with him.”

  “Silky fucks Libra, Silky fucks Libra,” they all began chanting. Her brother Cornelius just stood there looking stupid. Silky ran into the bathroom and slammed the door. She was shaking. It was like a nightmare. She realized it wasn’t just her date with Dick tonight, although that had been the last straw because he had so obviously singled her out to take her out in public with him to a fancy place where his friends might be. No, it had been coming for a long time, only she had been too stupid to notice it. It had really happened at the show today, when the Satins realized Silky was their star. They had to realize it because everybody else realized it. But it wasn’t her fault. They had let her be the lead singer. She had pretended she hadn’t even wanted to be. She hadn’t asked for more money than they were getting, or a different costume than they were wearing. It hadn’t been her idea to stand in front of them at her own microphone; the lead singer always did that. She hadn’t flirted with Dick Devere. She hadn’t done a damn thing. And that was the shit and piss of it. She didn’t have to do a damn thing—it was all going to happen to her just because God had given her this voice and she could sing. She wanted to run out into the street, but she didn’t have a place to stay. Was this what being a star was going to mean? Having Mr. Libra treat her like trash all day and then having the girls treat her like a hated enemy every night? Oh, my God, Dick … she thought, and she realized she missed him. He was the only person who understood her. She wished she knew his number so she could call him. She pounded the sink with her fist and looked at her face, ugly now with rage, and all the make-up off, in the mirror. Without her wig, with her short, straightened hair all smashed down, she looked like a boy. If he saw her now he wouldn’t like her any more either. She was nothing to look at. But he hadn’t seemed to care about how she looked. He thought she was a nice person. He would understand. She couldn’t stay here with them, not after what they had said to her.

  She wiped off the last of the cold cream with astringent and combed her hair so it didn’t look so much like a horrible crew cut. Then she went out of the bathroom. The girls continued to ignore her. Cornelius, who had always been a cry-baby depending on her to settle his fights, was just looking at her trying to figure out what the fuss was all about. Silky picked up her purse and her jacket and walked out of the room.

  Downstairs in the lobby phone booth she looked up Dick Devere in the phone book and called him. Her hand was shaking so much she could hardly get the dime into the little slot, but she felt icy cold inside. He answered after two rings.

  “Yes?”

  “It’s Silky. I’m sorry to bother you, but you were right.” Then she burst into tears.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked. “What is it? I can’t hear you. What happened? Oh, the hell with it, have you got a pencil?”

  “Yes,” she sobbed.

  “Take down my address and come right over here. I’d come get you but I’m not dressed.”

  She found an eyebrow pencil in her handbag and scribbled his address on the wall. She remembered it anyway from the phone book. Then she got a cab and went to his apartment, which was not too far away, and by the time she got there she realized with surprise and triumph that she had done quite an extraordinary thing, because this was really what she had wanted to do all along.

  Dick Devere lived in an apartment in a brownstone. Silky pushed the buzzer next to his name, and went upstairs. He opened the door, dressed in a white terry-cloth bathrobe, and she could see the apartment was dark. He put his arm around her and cuddled her head to his chest, casually locking the door behind her with his other hand.

  “There, there,” he said.

  It was so dark she couldn’t see how awful she looked with all her make-up off and her face swollen from crying. She could hardly see him either, just a white glimmer in the light from the street lamp outside the big window. “There, there,” he kept saying, patting her, and he led her into the bedroom and right to bed.

  She thought briefly about her vow while he was undressing her, and then she didn’t think about it any more because he was kissing her. It was lovely, and she thought maybe she loved him. He knew just what to do and it wasn’t at all like those boys when she was a kid who just shoved it in. Oh, my God, he was divine … Was this what sex was like? If she had known this was what it was all about, she would never have been able to give it up. She’d heard plenty of talk about all these things he was doing, but nobody had ever told her how groovy and wild and really marvelous feeling it felt. So this was what all the older girls did with their boyfriends! And it was a good thing he knew what to do, because he was enormous. She certainly hadn’t expected that.

  He really knew everything there was to know about loving, and she was sure sex wasn’t always like this, that what was so fantastic was him, what he was all about, what he was thinking, how he felt about her. He was a real man. She didn’t think there was anybody like him in the whole world. I love you, she thought, I love you, I love you. She thought he was whispering “I love you” too, but she wasn’t sure.

  When it was over they curled up together with their arms around each other. Her eyes had become accustomed to the darkness and she could see him. He looked happy. She knew she was happy.

  “Silky,” Dick whispered.

  “What?”

  “I can’t sleep like this, you’ll have to get over on the other side of the bed. Do you feel better now?”

  “Yes,” she said, and reluctantly inched away from him.

  “Good,” he said, and a moment later he was asleep.

  She couldn’t think much about that because she felt too marvelous. This had been one of the biggest days of her life. He certainly didn’t have a wife or any girl living with him. I wonder if I have a boyfriend now, she thought, looking at him, and she wished more than anything in the world, more even than to be a star, that it could be true.

  She didn’t see the girls until the next day in Mr. Libra’s office, and no one mentioned the fact that she had been out all night, or asked her where she had slept. Silky hoped the girls would think she’d had to rent a room at the Y, or go back uptown to Harlem. She tried to look martyred, but she was bubbling with happiness. The truth was, she realized regretfully, the girls really didn’t know much about her, how she thought, what she dreamed. They knew she wanted to sing and they knew she read books, but actually she had never had a private conversation with any of them. She’d just gone along with what they wanted, sharing their jokes, kidding around, trying to be part of the gang. She realized now that none of the others had tried to be part of the gang at the expense of their own wants; they’d balled any guy they wanted and spent their money on their own clothes and make-up and perfume and gone their own way. She was the one who’d worked in that restaurant while they were out balling, she was the one wh
o sang lead and carried the group. She was the one who’d had to memorize all those lyrics while they just went “ooh, ooh, ooh” in back of her. She wondered if they were sorry they had driven her out of their room into the night, and then she began to realize that she would never really know if they were sorry because she was their meal ticket and they had to be nice to her or there would be no Silky and the Satins. She’d always considered herself a cool and tough little chick, but now Silky realized there were depths of toughness she hadn’t even reached yet. A year ago, when they started the group, she never would have believed they would be treating each other the way they were now, or that she would be able to accept how important she was and how much they needed her. And who was she? She wasn’t even sure she was a good singer. She’d never taken a lesson; people just seemed to like her voice and her delivery. Maybe she was a fake, and she’d conned the girls into believing she was necessary to them.

  Mr. Libra was telling them that he’d hired someone to work up an act for them and that they’d begin to do bookings in small clubs out of town. Then they’d come back and do another Let It All Hang Out Show. The reaction to the show they had done the day before had been excellent, and now the clubs were willing to have them. They were going to need more costumes, and he was going to let them have two rooms instead of the one they now had.

  Silky breathed a sigh of relief. Two rooms was better than one, but what she really wanted was a room of her own so the girls couldn’t pick on her. She’d left Dick in the morning and he said he would call her, but he hadn’t said anything about her coming to live with him and she certainly wasn’t going to ask. If she did, she might lose him. When their meeting was finished, she asked Mr. Libra if she could have a word with him. The girls gave her a look that could kill and left.

  “Well?” Mr. Libra said.

  “Mr. Libra, I hate to tell you this, but things have gotten real bad between me and the girls. They seem to hate me. I think they’re jealous. They’re making me miserable and it’s bad for my work. I think I should have a room of my own. I’ll pay for part of it out of my allowance.”