We were told to slate our names for the camera, which basically—I had always thought from working at the agency—just meant saying your name. Apparently not. These girls had moves I’d never seen before: say name (with enthusiasm!), rotate right, rotate left, complete a full turn, flip hair, look back toward camera, do sexy/pouty face, then flash a big smile and say name again (this time with a more resonating, sexy sound to it). I was screwed. There was no way I could remember all those steps.
But if there was anything I did have in my arsenal that just screamed Old Navy, it was large, straight, white teeth. I’ve never had braces, and I’ve been told my teeth look like the ones that sit on the dentist receptionist’s desk. I apply Crest Whitestrips religiously, if for no other reason than it is one of my many ritualistic procrastinations from writing.
When it was my time to “slate,” I said my first and last name (which I sincerely have a hard time pronouncing) and did a quick twirl in my sneakers. This was not executed as delicately as I had hoped. The tennis-shoe twirl made that terrible, running-suicides-on-the-basketball-court screeching noise. In an attempt to recover, I flashed the most gigantic smile I could muster. This, no doubt, did not read “Old Navy,” but rather, “borderline personality disorder.”
The camera operator explained the premise of the commercial. Mr. T—yes, as in The A-Team—was also starring in the commercial, and he would be manning a “T-Machine”: a magical apparatus that transforms boxy T-shirts into form-fitting ones. “From boxy to foxy!” the art director chimed in. The camera operator told us to walk “as if on a runway” to the corner of the room, and, at the end of the imaginary catwalk, act as if our ill-fitting T-shirts had been magically reincarnated into sexy little tops.
This had gone from bad to worse. The twirl was embarrassing enough. Now I had to strut along an imaginary catwalk in an ensemble better suited for pushing a jogging stroller? It’s hard to be sexy in a pair of tennis shoes. I have a newfound respect for that girl in the Shape-Ups commercial.
These models’ slates were just the beginning. During the actual audition, they strutted their stuff like it was fashion week in Milan. They had the flouncy stride, the hip pop, the tossed-back smile/laugh at the turn, the swooshy walk back with the sexy, over-the-shoulder grin at the end. While waiting my turn, I considered my options. I could just walk out. No, speed walk out. My purse was on the other side of the room, though. I’d have to cross in front of the current auditioner and pass the camera. I’d probably trip over some vital cords and take the whole apparatus down with me. Not a good idea. Maybe I could just pretend to pass out? But that’s almost more embarrassing. I was suddenly snapped into action when someone called, “Next!”
The only close cousin to the runway walk while wearing sneakers is the power walk. So I stalked along the imaginary runway, swinging my arms beside me like a middle-aged mom summiting a neighborhood hill. When I reached the end, it was time to engage in some T-shirt transformation theatrics. I had no idea what to do. I tugged on my imaginary ill-fitting top (which, in my case, wasn’t imaginary) and made a frowny face. Then (god this is so hard to write) I held my hands in front of my shirt and did “spirit fingers,” twinkling my digits as if they harnessed the magical power of the T-Machine. I then opened my hands so my palms faced up as if to say, “Voilà,” like the ladies on The Price Is Right do after revealing what’s behind door number four. Finally, I did the only other thing I knew to do: flashed my giant, crazy-person smile. I looked at my friend, who was looking at her feet—and suppressing a great deal of laughter.
When I returned to my place in the line-up, I waited for the final few girls to complete their turns. I marveled at their unsqueaky twirls, their poise, their appropriate wardrobe selection. After everyone was done, the art director stood and thanked all of us for coming in. He then told us they would get in touch with our agents, and we were free to leave. Most of the models took their time leaving the casting room, some swinging by the director’s chair to say a personal thank you for letting them audition. I power-walked to retrieve my purse, taking care to avoid eye contact with anyone in the room. With my bag firmly wedged under my now-sweaty armpit, I was finally able to enlist my ensemble for its proper use—and sprinted to my car.
Like Visiting Day in Jail
My Blackberry de-dinks. It’s a text from my college friend Dave who is in LA for work. He says he and our other friend Matt are coming to see me. To see what this box is all about.
I’m excited about this. In three years, no one has ever come to see me in the box, though everyone always talks about how they want to come. This is probably because the majority of my friends live either by the beach or in the eastern neighborhoods of LA, both of which are only five to fifteen miles away but, with LA traffic, can be an hour-plus trip. It is noteworthy that my first friends to visit me at The Standard live in New York, a six-hour flight away.
I’m on the phone when I look up and see them standing at the front desk. They are leaning on the counter, pretending to be on their phones, pretending not to notice me. I scream and wave, which is not allowed, but I can’t help myself. Fortunately, the concierge is too focused on Facebook to notice. I hang up and call Dave’s phone while they sit on a couch in the lobby and pass it back and forth. We joke that it’s like visiting day in jail. Dave asks if he would get in trouble if he pressed his lips against the glass and gasped, “I’ll wait for you!” like they do in the movies.
The only other person who’s ever recognized me while I was in the box was the art director at another LA magazine I had written for. He sometimes deejayed at the bar at The Standard. My Blackberry buzzed, “Lilibet, is that you in the box?” My eyes shot up. I scanned the lobby. I couldn’t find him. I wrote back, “Yes it’s me in here! Where are you?” But by that time, he was out of sight, already in the bar, tucked into the deejay booth.
Dear Mr. Retoucher
Pam said I needed professional headshots. I had plenty of friends who were very handy with a camera, but she wasn’t having it, so I made an appointment with a photographer named Brian. Brian took photos at his house, in his backyard. There was a female assistant there, too. She didn’t do much but make me feel slightly better about not getting raped or kidnapped by this complete stranger who had lured me into his house with the promise of “making me look beautiful.”
I did three different “looks,” which I knew from working on the other side of the lens meant “outfits.” I insisted on doing my own hair and makeup for the shoot, which ended up being a bad idea. As it turns out, professional cameras and midday backyard lighting are not the most forgiving.
When I got the pictures back, it was a mess of flyaway hairs, uneven skin tone, and dark circles under my eyes. As a pretty photogenic person, I was horrified by the results. How was I going to get any auditions with these disasters?
I immediately called a girlfriend who was an actress.
“I hate them,” I said. “I look like Charlize Theron in Monster.”
“There is no way you look like Charlize Theron in Monster,” she said.
“Yes, there is,” I said.
“Just get them retouched, they’ll be fine.”
Retouching. Genius.
After sending the pictures to Pam, she agreed with the retouching idea. (I didn’t press her for specifics.) I emailed the three photos I hated the least to a photography lab in Hollywood, along with the following instructions:
Hi, please see attached jpegs for retouching.4
For the first image, “Lilibet Photo 1,” please touch up the lines around my eyes and even out the skin tone. Can you whiten the whites of my eyes? If so, please do so, they look a little blood shot.
For the second image, “Lilibet 2,” please fix the flyaway hair, and can you make the lips a touch (just a touch) pinker? Or redder—just a bit more color?? Not sure if you can do that.
Lastly, for the third image, can you remove the zit to the right of my mouth, and clean up the lines around my eyes? A
lso, if you can, could you make my teeth a bit whiter? And, again, if possible, give my lips a TINY bit more color??
Please email me back to let me know if this is possible and also to give me a quote on price and how long this will take.
THANKS
Lilibet.
After clicking on my Sent Mail tab to make sure the attachments went through, I reread the message. It was sort of horrifying. Could I have been any more nitpicky? Why didn’t I just tell them to give me a new nose and a new set of boobs while I was at it? Maybe highlight my hair and shave off a few extra pounds? Had I become like the image-obsessed girls I used to represent? Freaking out over a few fine lines and flyaway hairs?
What had gotten into me? Who asks someone to pretty much renovate her entire face with a digital paintbrush? I wanted to write him back, to explain I really wasn’t like this, I promised. I don’t even wear makeup most days! I’m wearing sweatpants as I type this! I don’t even own an eyelash curler! (But that’s just because they scare me.)
But the retoucher responded before I could write him back:
Hi Libet5 thank you for inquire with us6
the price for image #1-2 are $35.00 each and for image #3 is $55.00
Huh. As it turned out, Ronnie the Retoucher was totally unfazed. Of course he was; this is Hollywood. He was more than used to this kind of thing. Plus, the fact that English appeared not to be his first language made me feel less embarrassed. It was like getting a bikini wax from an Eastern European woman as opposed to an American; in some abstract way, the language barrier created some distance.
I was relieved. The truth was, I did care how these came out. I did not want to look like Charlize Theron in Monster. I wanted to look good. After spending two years surrounded by models, playing frumpy to their fetching, this was hard to embrace.
4 This was the actual email.
5 Yes, he misspelled my name, even though the correct spelling was right there in my email address.
6 Also the actual email.
Metamorphosis
Tonight, about an hour into my shift in the box, somewhere in the space between reading and online window-shopping, I decide I want to find out who came up with this concept. I email a woman in The Standard’s design department, and she writes back, promptly, “I’m sorry but we don’t give out background information on design details or concepts at the hotels to anyone, including press. André and his design team came up with the concept for each of the hotels.”
I search “André” and “The Standard.” André Balazs. He owns several hotels and, according to Wikipedia, went to Cornell and Columbia. And, according to Google, he’s dated Uma Thurman and Chelsea Handler, among others. But I’m not really interested in that. I’m interested only in this: He is a man. Of course he is a man. This manufactured reality could only be hatched from the head of a man. Men like to think that women lie around on their living room floors wearing itty-bitty white shorts and tiny white tank tops, always looking pretty, never making a mess.
If this André actually saw me at home he would see someone Swiffering her floor and picking at the pores on her face.
But that is a luxury of being a Box Girl. I get to transform. One moment I’m a writer in a bleach-stained shirt, the next moment I’m slithering across a mattress in short white shorts. Standing next to the box before my shift, molting my clothes—my sweater with the holes in the elbows, my jeans that smell like mildew—I get to slough off that me. I get to become another me: blonde me, tall me, long-legged me.
Out There
A girl reads a book on a couch in the corner of the lobby. She bites the skin on the side of her nails while she does this and has checked her phone three times in the last minute.
A guy waits for his car, wearing tight, citrus-colored jeans, rolled at the ankles. His black hair is slick on the sides and is spiked into a shark’s fin. With the boat shoes and striped tank top, his look is sort of Hollywood-meets-The-Hamptons.
Three British women walk beside a bellhop who is pushing their luggage—seven suitcases total. “I slept well, but I’m still quite tired,” one of them says.
A girl, about my age, walks toward the box with her parents. Her dad is wearing a baseball hat and a zip-up jacket. He looks like a Classic Dad-dad, like someone who orders a lot of stuff from L.L.Bean. Her mom is wearing an Hermès scarf under a blazer and expensive-looking flats. The daughter points at me, and I quickly look down. “This is the thing I was talking about,” she says.
I am constantly watching the people in the lobby, wondering where they are coming from, why they are here, how long they’ll stay. I make assumptions about them, pass judgments on them, silently criticize their wardrobe selections. All the while, I know they are doing the same to me. It’s strange because, in a lot of ways, being in the box is like being a writer. It isolates me and, at the same time, puts me on display. When me and my writing, or me and my thighs, feel like coming out of our little cave, all of my vulnerabilities are out there for the public to pick apart.
I Am Not a Beagle
Tonight the box is filled with dozens of colored balls that illuminate if you toss them. It’s like the ball pit at Chuck E. Cheese’s, minus the pee smell. I’ve carved out an area for my myself and my computer.
The door opens. It’s the concierge. Oh no, not again. Do I have too much stuff in here? How could he even tell with all these balls?
“Hey, could you throw the balls around a little bit? Make them light up? That’s the point of the installation.” I cock my head sideways and scrunch my eyebrows at him. He cannot be serious.
He appears to be serious.
“Oh, okay, sorry,” I say, and spike a royal blue ball against the mattress.
“Awesome,” he says, and shuts me back in.
But I don’t want to sit here and toss a ball around for seven hours. If that’s the aesthetic they’re going for, they should have hired a beagle. I wiggle back down to my laptop, slithering through a sea of balls on my stomach, plying them out from under me as I go. A minute later, I retract my right knee and forcefully release it, sending a flurry of balls flying, the box ablaze in all their glory.
Only The Lonely
If this is hard to believe, I assure you, it’s even harder to admit: One time I cried in the box. And here’s the most embarrassing part: It was on Valentine’s Day.
That night, the back wall was painted in bright asylum white and scored with three thick black lines that stretched the length of the box. On top of each line was a series of white tiles with one block letter drawn on each in an art-deco font. A dotted string of lights illuminated the letters from below, like a marquee at an old movie theater. The squares spelled the phrase: “Only The Lonely.” It was February, so I guess this was some cruel nod to the holiday that bisects it. Thus it was appropriate, I suppose, that this was the decor the night I cried in the box—tears streaming, mascara running, shoulders shaking, snot dripping—forced to face the back wall, hoping no one would notice. People in the lobby probably thought I was pretending, playing along with the props. But I was actually crying big, dumb, untidy tears. Not because I didn’t have a boyfriend, but because I did, and he wasn’t around for that stupid, stupid holiday.
Pretend I didn’t tell you that.
I had feigned indifference, acted like I could care less about the stupid holiday. What a dumb, commercialized load of crap, I’m sure I’d said. Here’s a tip: If your significant other ever says anything remotely similar to this, don’t believe him or her. Maybe some people really do mean it, but I’d always err on the side of St. Valentine, just to be safe. Even my most black-hearted friends bleed mush when flowers arrive on their doorsteps. I know this because they will proudly post pictures of such gestures on Facebook or Instagram with the hash tag #lovehim or #bestboyfriendever.
It was our first Valentine’s Day together, and with a craziness that only a twenty-something in a brand new relationship can possess, I thought this meant something. But of course, like a
twenty-something in a brand new relationship, I didn’t tell him this. I expected him to read my mind, to just know.
I don’t know why I cared, really. I’ve never had a good relationship with the holiday, ever since Valentine’s Day my freshman year in high school. I had my very first boyfriend and, because of that, it was my first Valentine’s Day that mattered. School was cancelled because it was a snow day, so my boyfriend invited me over to his house. Before I had even taken off my coat, he handed me two pink carnations and a candle that looked like a mushroom. Then, before I could even say thank you, he dumped me.
The next day, I couldn’t go to school, couldn’t get out of bed. I learned why they call it heartache. Your actual heart—not the round-edged red one in the Hallmark window, but the one inside your chest with aortas and ventricles, that one—physically aches.
Pretend I didn’t tell you that, either.
The boyfriend that I was crying about in the box recovered, slightly, when an orchid the size of an adolescent showed up outside my apartment. I read the card while standing outside, still in my pajamas. It told me not to worry, that we had a lifetime of Valentine’s Days to spend together.
Pretend I didn’t—no, never mind. You can remember that one. His name is Peter.
Waitress
There are a few words or phrases in the “industry”—meaning “restaurant industry”—that make me cringe. “Industry” being one of them. Even more unpalatable is “Industry Night,” a mixer typically held on a Monday, so employees from local establishments can get together and enjoy three-dollar shots. It also never sat well with me when a restaurant employee, who had just arrived at work at 5:00 pm, said, “Good morning!” Worse still was when they’d refer to their days off as the “weekend” when it was nowhere near a weekend. “Have a great weekend!” the bartender would shout over his shoulder when finishing a shift on Monday, knowing he wouldn’t be back to work until Thursday.
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