Phantom Angel

by David Handler

  “No, it’s not. It’ll never be over. That’s our curse.”

  She looked at me curiously. “Was it a priest who did it to you?”

  “I’m Jewish.”

  “So, like, it was a rabbi?”

  I shook my head. “I ran away to Hollywood three weeks before I graduated from high school. When I was down to my last twenty-three cents a real nice guy named Larry offered to buy me a meal. Then he introduced me to his friend Steve. Next thing I knew they were both doing whatever they wanted to me in a motel room. My dad found me there three days later, drugged and dehydrated.”

  “How on earth did he find you?”

  “He was the best detective on the NYPD.”

  “What is he now?”

  “Dead.”

  “Do you…?”

  “Do I what?”

  “Get nightmares?”

  I nodded. “All the time.”

  “Me, too. I hate going to sleep. If I could just function twenty-four hours a day without sleep I’d be so much happier.”

  “Me, too.”

  “How about … sex? With someone who you like, I mean.”

  “That takes time, but I’m getting there. You?”

  “Whenever John touched me I’d cringe and get all tense. I couldn’t tell him why. I just told him I’ve always been shy and I—I…” She trailed off, breathing in and out. “I don’t usually talk about this.”

  “I don’t either.”

  “I mean, we hardly even know each other, Bingo.”

  “It’s Benji.”

  “Oh, right. Sorry.”

  We were on the Verrazano Bridge now heading over the Narrows toward Brooklyn. Off in the distance, the lower Manhattan skyline was shrouded in a cloud of steamy, putrid smog.

  “Talk to me about R. J. Farnell.”

  “Are you sure you’re not playing me?”

  “Why would I want to do that?”

  “People do all sorts of things for weird reasons.”

  “I’m not playing you. What you see is what you get. You told me I don’t know anything. What don’t I know?”

  Boso took a sip of water and gazed out at the skyline for a moment. “Well, just for starters, there is no such person as R. J. Farnell.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “THERE’S NO R. J. FARNELL?”

  “There’s no R. J. Farnell.”

  “Okay, maybe we’d better start from the beginning.”

  “Ya think?” Boso chided me, shaking her blond head. “Listen, meeting Morrie’s the first big break I’ve gotten since I came to New York, okay? I mean, he’s like a major, major producer. And he promised he’d put me in Wuthering Heights, okay? Hire me as the understudy for Isabella, Edgar’s sister. If I’d do a sort of favor for him.”

  We’d crossed over the bridge into the Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn by now and were cruising the Gowanus Expressway.

  “What kind of a favor?”

  “He told me he was playing an elaborate prank on a friend, which is something that rich New York guys do, I guess. What do I know? I’m just a little girl from Dumbfuckistan. And, let me tell you, when that man phoned me up I was so excited. All I’ve ever wanted to be my whole life is an actress. Except for when I thought about being a massage therapist. And don’t laugh. Not the sleazy kind. I mean somebody who helps people with chronic pain. I think anatomy’s real interesting. Did you know that giraffes and mice have the same exact number of bones in their necks? Nineteen. Guess how many we have. Go on, guess.”

  “I really have no idea. How did Morrie—?”

  “Seven.”

  “How did he get your phone number?”

  “I auditioned for a role in the chorus. Me and everyone else. There were people lined up all the way around the block.”

  “A cattle call, sure. Been there, done that.”

  “Wait, you’re an actor?”

  “I was. Did a couple of episodes of Law & Order, a week on a soap.”

  Boso looked at me in astonishment. “Who are you, my brother from another mother?”

  “You’d like my mother, actually. She used to be a pole dancer.”

  “What happened to your acting career?”

  “The phone stopped ringing. And my family’s business needed me.”

  “Don’t you miss it? You must.”

  “We were talking about you, remember?”

  “Right, okay. No need to get touchy, Mr. Sensitive.” She gazed back out the window. “I couldn’t believe it when my cell rang and it was Morrie Frankel on the other end.”

  “Did you leave your headshot there after the cattle call?”

  “Yeah, I did. And he told me an associate of his had recommended me.”

  “Was it Vicki Arduino?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “What was the favor Morrie asked you to do?”

  “Pretend to be this guy Farnell’s executive assistant. Drive out to East Hampton and rent a fancy house for a month. He gave me an outfit to wear and the keys to a killer Porsche. Plus a briefcase stuffed with cash. It was kind of fun, actually. I got to act all bitchy with the realtor. Plus Morrie let me housesit out there. I swam in the pool and worked on my all-over tan, which I need for my modeling. A real tan is so much better than a salon tan. When you know it’s real you project that it’s real.”

  “The realtor has a signed lease agreement. Who signed it?”

  “Morrie did. He talked to her on the phone, too, British accent and all.”

  “Did he ever show up out there?”

  “Yeah, he came out once, on a Saturday, and took me to lunch at this super-fancy place in Sag Harbor called the American Hotel. A whole bunch of people kept coming over to our table and saying hi to him. Don’t ask me who any of them were. They all seemed rich and super impressed with themselves.”

  “Did they ask Morrie what he was doing out there?”

  “They did. He said he was visiting a new backer. Me they ignored. I was just there to look nice. I had the seasonal mixed greens, which turned out to be arugula drowning in citrus-herbal vinaigrette. Morrie had clams and a steak and huge piece of strawberry shortcake. He sprays food when he talks. He’s a really disgusting eater.”

  Not to mention a major league bullshit artist. The great Morrie Frankel was paying us good money to find someone who he was fully aware didn’t exist—because he’d made him up. What in the hell for? “Tell me about that phony Web site for the Venusian Society. Did Morrie set that up himself?”

  “Not even. He isn’t tech savvy.”

  “Is Leah?”

  “Who’s Leah?”

  “His assistant.”

  “I wouldn’t know. I’ve never dealt with her. Just Morrie. And he…” Boso suddenly let out a gasp, her eyes widening as she stared out the windshield ahead of us. “Oh, lord…”

  We were descending into the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel, which burrows its way under the East River into lower Manhattan. She didn’t speak the whole time we were down in the tunnel. Or breathe, near as I could tell. Just sat there rigid with her fists clenched until we emerged back into bright daylight amongst the impossibly tall towers of the financial district.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I hate tunnels,” she gasped, inhaling deeply. “I always think they’re about to cave in right on top of me.”

  “How are you with the subway?”

  “Hate it. I need to be in the fresh air and sunshine. Hey, listen, I don’t mean to be rude but where are you taking me?”

  “Not to worry. You’re in safe hands.” I steered us uptown on West Street, skirting alongside of the Hudson River toward TriBeCa and the West Village. “So who set up that phony Web site?”

  “Petey. He’s the webmaster for sweetgirls and babesalone. He works downstairs in the computer room.”

  “You mean at the Crown Towers?”

  “Yeah. He’s very shy, but a total wiz. Pretty much the brains of the outfit. Although don’t let his cousin, Little Joe, hear you say that.
Little Joe thinks he runs things.”

  “Are you talking about Joe Minetta, Jr.?”

  “Yeah. He thinks he’s some kind of rock star because his dad owns the company.”

  West Street becomes Eleventh Avenue once you hit Gansevoort in the West Village. I took that uptown past the Chelsea Piers—home to Silver Screen Studios, where I filmed my guest shots on Law & Order and also auditioned for a Mucinex commercial that I didn’t get.

  “By ‘the company’ you mean the Minetta crime family. You do know that you’re working for the mob, don’t you?”

  “You make them sound like bad people.”

  “They are bad people.”

  “No, you’re wrong. The guys I work for are, like, total sweeties. They went to Seton Hall together. They’re frat boys. And the girls are real nice, too.”

  I took Twelfth Avenue past the Javits Center and Hell’s Kitchen, or Clinton as people now prefer to call it. When we reached Midtown I hung a right onto West 57th and maneuvered us toward Lincoln Center, where I ditched the Brougham in one of those garages that charge by the half hour. Morrie Frankel was still paying for my time. And, for all I knew, Sue Herrera had put out a BOLO on me. She seemed like the vindictive type.

  “Let’s walk,” I said.

  Boso wouldn’t budge. “Where are you taking me?”

  I grabbed us two water bottles from the cooler in back, then reached for her gym bag on the floor at her feet. There was something inside of it that was surprisingly heavy and clunky. “Here, you may want this,” I said, placing the bag in her lap.

  “Why should I go anywhere with you?” she demanded.

  “I’ve been sitting in this car for hours. I think better when I stretch my legs.”

  “What’s there to think about?”

  “How we’re going to get you out of this mess that you’re in.”

  “I’m not in any mess.”

  “Trust me, you are. So just shut up and walk with me, okay?”

  She shut up and walked with me. She was at least two inches shorter than I am. Maybe even three. It felt kind of nice to walk with a girl who didn’t tower over me. We headed west on West 66th Street. After one block Boso no longer had to wonder where we were going—we’d run smack into Central Park, which was crowded with people seeking relief from the heat. There was deep shade and coolness to be found in the park. Young mothers were out pushing their double-wide all-terrain strollers. Vendors were selling cold drinks and Italian ices. I steered us toward the Sheep’s Meadow. Every guy who walked in our direction eyeballed Boso as he went by. She was eye candy. A tanned, toned blonde in a cropped, skin-tight tank top and spandex shorts. She seemed oblivious to their stares. The male of the species, I supposed, had been staring at her for as long as she could remember.

  “I’m not in any mess,” she said to me with great insistence, her gym bag thrown over one shoulder. “So I’m a webcam girl. So I take my clothes off. Maybe that seems sleazy to you or whatever. But to me it’s just an acting gig.”

  I led her in the direction of the Mall. When we reached the Bandshell she came to a halt, her jaw stuck out. “Hey, wait, this is where I met…”

  “Farmer John. I know.”

  “I’m not going back to him.”

  “What are you going to do? Because you can’t go back to the Crown Towers.”

  “You promised you weren’t kidnapping me.”

  “I’m not. I’ll take you back there if that’s what you really want. But you’re not safe there, trust me.”

  “Why should I?” she demanded.

  “Because I have no reason to lie to you.” I resumed walking. Grudgingly, she tagged along. “How did you end up there anyhow?”

  “I answered an ad. Went to an office on Canal Street where some middle-aged woman took a bunch of photos of me. Next day she called me back and I went to a studio on East 36th Street, where I did some swimsuit shots with a photographer who said he’d shot spreads for Paris Vogue and was in contact with the top modeling agencies. His name was Gunnar and he had this serious German accent. Told me he was always on the lookout for girls to model for, like, Vicky’s Secret and the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition. He said I was very natural and all-American.”

  “Did he pay you?”

  “No, but he didn’t charge me either. And that’s epic. After I left John I crashed in Cobble Hill with a girl I knew from an acting workshop. That’s where I was when Gunnar called me to do another shoot. This time I met him at an apartment on East 64th Street. He said he wanted me on a bed wearing a black velvet thong and nothing else, but that I’d be lying on my stomach so you wouldn’t be able to see my boobs.”

  “This would be the Cassia gallery that’s on sweetgirls.”

  “You saw it?” She glanced at me shyly. “I was okay with it once I relaxed. Gunnar made it all seem fun. Not slutty or whatever. Just kind of flirty. And there’s nothing you can’t see in any slick fashion magazine. He seemed real pleased. Told me he’d show the photos to some people he knew at a modeling agency.”

  We’d reached the Bethesda Fountain and the Rowboat Lake. Strolled our way around the lake in the direction of the 72nd Street Boathouse.

  “And then what happened?”

  “Gunnar wanted to shoot me on a yacht and pay me a thousand bucks for the day. Me and this Puerto Rican girl named Luze. She also goes by Tamaya and Angelique. So we drove out to, like, a yacht club on Long Island. These two guys were waiting there for us to sail the thing. They were pretty skeevy looking. I was glad Luze was along. I wouldn’t have gone out with them if I was by myself. I’m not that stupid. Gunnar shot Luze and me together at first, sunning ourselves on deck with our bikinis on. When he asked us to lose our bikinis I was okay with it. So was Luze. He had us hold hands like little girls. It was totally innocent, and real artistic. And then he shot me by myself. He wanted to see some of my gymnastics moves. I’m pretty flexible.”

  “You’re very flexible.”

  “I’ve worked real hard to be in the kind of shape I am. So I figured, hey, if someone wants to pay me for it what’s the harm, right? Luze was right there cheering me on. It was fun. And you want to know what I was thinking the whole time Gunnar was shooting me? I was thinking about my mother’s dirty, creepy asshole of a husband. How he’d be drooling over me and wanting me but can’t have me. Not anymore. Not ever. And that felt good in a weird sort of way.” She shot a worried look at me. “Does that sound crazy?”

  “Not to me.”

  “Gunnar placed both of my galleries on the Web sites. And they liked me so much they wanted to make me a webcam girl just like Luze. So I moved in across the hall from her in this big, beautiful apartment in the Crown Towers with a killer view of the Statue of Liberty. I mean, it’s gorgeous. And Luze is real sweet. She’s from Camden, New Jersey, and used to be in this real abusive relationship with a gangbanger. She’s much better off now.”

  “How many girls are living there?”

  “There’s four of us to a floor. And we have the top four floors. That makes sixteen, right? We’re in and out of each other’s places. We have a lot of fun together. Go shopping for clothes and stuff.”

  “How do you pay for the clothes and stuff?”

  “The boys give us credit cards and tell us to go knock yourself out. That’s sort of how we get paid.”

  “Whose credit cards are they?”

  She frowned at me. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “When you use a card does it have your name on it?”

  “Does that matter?”

  “It matters.”

  “Well, no, it says I’m little Miss So and So from Wherever, USA. I have a driver’s license that says it, too. And then I give it all back and the next time they give me a whole new set of cards with a whole new name.”

  “And you’re okay with that?”

  “Why not? I love to shop. We all do. We get to buy whatever we want. A lot of the time the boys give us lists of things they want us to buy for
them, too.”

  “Like what?”

  “All kinds of stuff. Fancy wristwatches, sets of golf clubs, cases of really expensive wine. One of the boys will chauffeur us around from store to store. We have a rockin’ good time. They’re real nice girls, all except for Little Mutt. She’s kind of stuck up.”

  “Why do they call her Little … No, wait, I don’t want to know. You said there’s a computer room downstairs?”

  “Yeah, that’s where Petey and the nerd squad hang. A lot of them live in the building, too. But, like I said, they’re pretty harmless. And the work’s super easy. I just have to hang out and be myself while the webcam follows me around. I do my morning stretches. I make myself a smoothie, take a shower. Big whoop, right? It’s good acting experience, actually. I’m getting real comfortable in front of the camera. And they haven’t asked me to do anything I’m not comfortable doing.”

  “Do you do private chats?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “What about parties?”

  “What kind of parties?”

  “The kind where a bunch of rich guys sit around and watch naked girls go down on each other.”

  Boso made a face. “Ugh, no. I’d never do that. I’m an actress.”

  “If you say so.”

  She glanced at me sharply. “Are you going to give me a lecture now?”

  “Nope, I don’t do lectures. But I will give you a forecast. Next, they’ll want you to do a girl-on-girl video.”

  “That’s just playacting. So what?”

  “Then they’ll want you to do one with a guy.”

  “I’m not a porn skank. I won’t do that.”

  “Yeah, you will. Luze will be there to cheer you on again. And you’ll end up convincing yourself it really wasn’t so bad. The guy was nice enough. And you were just ‘performing.’ Next you’ll take on two guys at once. You’ll need to get high to do that. You’ve got to be sky high to act like it’s fun to have two guys use you like a cheap whore.”