by Abby Chance
“Process it or not,” Peter said. “The word in the Valley is that there are two murders attached to it. I rather doubt it, because Jimmy is a world class wuss. Still, I’m glad you were here. I don’t like guns, don’t own any and have no plans to buy one.”
“I looked you up on the net, you’re a known hunter,” said my Dad.
“You have your most accurate weapon here?” answered Peter.
“I only use a pistol, I don’t hunt.”
“Then come along.” He looked at me, “you’ve got dinner handled?”
He took his bow and a quiver of arrows and they left.
Of course I asked. His cabin had a fifty yard range down its side. Apparently, Peter out shot my Dad shot by shot from fifty to ten yards. Then they drove down to the Stater Brothers market and brought home a watermelon. He took his katana from his cabin and sliced the watermelon in six perfect pieces.
Okay her name was Frankie and except for glasses she was incredibly pretty, sexy and I endorsed my brother’s choice. Actually told him how to get her nipples hard.
“Will you agree that I can keep her safe?” Peter directly addressed my Dad.
“This isn’t the World we live in,” said my Dad. “Up here, yeh, you’re the Alpha Male, and you aren’t even an Alpha Male. You’re a Beta who decided to live on his own terms. You’re an artist and people like Jimmy can’t compete, she’ll be a star in L. A. It’s not as primitive as you make it. Can you do this to the Jimmys of Hollywood?”
“That’s been handled. Of course I can’t. Dillon Michaels can and he has been employed to do so.”
“How long have you been shooting a bow?” Dad asked.
“My dad started shooting when Richard Greene was Robin Hood on TV. He was seven when he got his first bow, at thirty pounds. For my seventh birthday, I was given a bow and lessons. You haven’t seen the worst of it; I have a compound that shoots an arrow at eighty pounds with less effort than the forty-nine pound bow you saw. I can down an elephant with it. The bow you saw killed a bison, the largest land animal in this hemisphere.”
“What about the sword?”
“Rich, bored, learned how.”
What was nice was that my dad and the man I loved actually liked each other.
Pauley’s barbecue was interesting and both casting directors seemed to take a bit of an interest in me. I called Dillon and told him about the barbecue so they both had my picture on the pile on their desks Friday morning. The other two couples were a producer and director; the director was actually working with Rachel developing a third remake of a novella by Eugene Manlove Rhodes called Paso Por Aqui. It was first made as a silent film in 1927. The 1948 remake was an independent film called Four Faces West, a classic Western, starring Joel McCrea and Frances Dee.
Rachel drove me into work Monday morning. I had the lines down and I was pretty sure I could do it all right, except for one small rough patch. The show, Clara and her Sisters was a hit; Clara was a married rich woman, her sisters were also ‘sisters’… as in nuns. One was a grade school principal; the other a high school teacher and the show revolved around half-baked schemes to raise funds for the schools or the nunnery where the sisters lived. Mother Superior was a featured character; they had tried two other characters: a janitor and a teacher, but neither caught on. My character, a ditzy novice, Sister Anne Victoria or Vicky, was the third attempt to get another character into the mix.
The problem I was having was that Vicky had a joke, I was told it was to be a running gag about the Mother Superior’s cat. The line was: “The Reverend Mother calls her pussy Jude because training it is a lost cause.” I was raised a good, little Irish Catholic girl and, though I didn’t have any problems with the line, I couldn’t prevent a blush that gave it away. When I told Harvey, the director, he had the make-up man fix me up so the blush, if it happened, wouldn’t show.
They shot three shows, and I was in two of them. Everybody seemed to like what I did, and when I saw myself, I thought I really captured the character. The question, as they explained it to me, would be whether the character had a high enough ‘Q’ score when the surveys came back after the first show. If Vicky got a high enough ‘Q’, she’d be written in as a regular cast member. Since the show ran on Wednesday night, I would only have to wait two days to find out if I was a permanent cast member.
Since we didn’t have a broadcast TV in Sugarloaf – Peter was against TVs on general principle – we were staying on in Glendale. Peter’s parents used the Glendale house as their town house, the house they used when they had to be in the LA area on business and couldn’t really commute to Santa Barbara. Rachel had to spend the week at Warner, and Harrison had two meetings with producers about roles in upcoming productions.
So we were sharing the house, and there was no way the rooms were sound proofed like in Santa Barbara. Every night, Peter really pushed all my buttons trying to get me to make some noise. I got licked from behind my knee to behind my elbow with all stops in between covered and kissed. He got his hand between my legs and was so slow and gentle about it all that I had to put a pillow over my mouth because I couldn’t help what was coming out. Of course, he had to hold it while all this was going on, so when he finally gave up and slid inside me, it was quick and pretty much a full load. Coupled with licking my nipple, I almost swallowed the damn pillow.
My TV debut was a little party. Peter cooked a platter of steak and Paul and Anabelle joined us.
“You nailed the character,” said Harrison, “but I was pretty sure you would. Dillon will get you work off this alone, whether or not they pick up the character.”
Everybody else said something nice, but when you’re in the room with an Oscar winning actor, his comments are the ones you tend to remember.
I didn’t have to wait long. Dillon called Thursday morning with the news that Vicky had just scads and buckets of ‘Q’ and I had to come in to sign a contract for the season. The ‘season’ was actually going to be shot over the next two weeks and the amount I was getting paid to do it was almost obscene. In any case, I was going to have to stay in Glendale for another two weeks and Peter and I still had three fairies to do for the book.
I signed the contract on Thursday and went to work on Friday. It would have really been hard if I had any kind of a major role, but Vicky was just being developed, so my lines were minimal. Gertrude Castor played the Mother Superior, and she was one of the best comediennes around. She helped me a bit with my timing and even told me how to steal a scene with her. It was a friendly show without any backstabbing and the scene stealing was worked out for the benefit of the show. I was the new kid, and everybody helped me out.
That weekend, we drove up the mountain and even spent a few hours working on a fairy. Basically, we wanted to bring the Mustang back so I’d have a car and he would be free while I was working. Rachel and Harrison were going back up to Santa Barbara, so once again we’d have the house to ourselves.
After dinner on Saturday, Peter slid behind me and put his arms over my stomach, kissing the back of my neck and under my ears. I put my arms over his and sort of hugged myself. It was turning me on a bit, but I wasn’t in the mood yet for it to get too hot or heavy. My cabin was open to the edge of the forest on one side, which gives it a nice view from the side of the great room. I was looking out into the forest and being held with kisses, sending thrilling little messages down between my legs. It wasn’t anything I wanted to change for a while. Things had been moving very fast lately. A month ago, I had been on the edge of eviction, broke and pretty much desperate. Now I was being held and loved by the most wonderful man in existence, and I just wanted to freeze time for a while.
I turned around and threw my arms around his neck so I could pull him down to my kisses. And eventually, he carried me into the bedroom where we stripped each other, folding into each other’s arms, kissing and touching. He moved his fingers lightly inside of my arms and I was shivering with it. It was nice to let it out, knowing that only Mic
key, the squirrel, would hear me.
Monday was work. I know a lot of people don’t think acting is work; well, they’re just wrong. Just try being someone else. It’s work, it’s constant concentration and the words aren’t even yours, you have to memorize them. Just try it sometime. In a way, it’s like being an artist’s model. You have to keep concentrating on not moving and you can’t let your mind wander. An actor is the same way. I had to keep total concentration on being Vicky; there was no room for Martha in the equation, and that was exhausting.
Peter – I guess because he grew up with it – knew I’d be exhausted. He fed me. Put me in bed, stripped me and then massaged me with talcum powder on his hands until the knots got loosened, the tension sagged and I fell asleep.
Rob Carey came in to watch me a lot. He wrote a lot of double entendre and malapropisms for Vicky and we seemed to have a style between the two of us, with his writing and my delivery. For example, Vicky was talking to a couple of contractors, and they were there to fix the furnace, so I said, totally straight faced, “Wouldn’t be a good idea to put more installation in the attic.” When the scene ended, he walked over and kissed my cheek.
“Perfect,” he said.
I got through the first week basically collapsing into bed, getting up, showering, going to work, coming home and collapsing into bed. This technique works best when, after you collapse into bed, someone gently massages you to sleep. Luckily, I had someone who not only did that for me, but held me safe and warm all night long too. I mean, if you really must act, that is the best way to do it.
That weekend Peter and I stayed in town. Pauley and Anabelle had a Disney party on Saturday, and most of them had caught me twice on the show, and said some nice things. The trades liked me too. I’d gotten a couple nice reviews; one even compared me to Judy Holliday: “…and she has the likable vulnerability of Judy Holliday.”
Dillon came to the party. He said that he had gotten a couple cat’s paws on the initial round of resumes, but nothing he’d recommend. Pasadena Playhouse was in the beginning stages of a production of Born Yesterday and he sent them my resume with a copy of the best review.
If you are a famous person and happen to be in Lincoln, Nebraska, you’ll be mobbed. If you are a famous person and happen to be in New York City or Los Angeles, the waiters will be just as nasty, the cashiers just as snotty, and the average person just as dismissive as if you were a nobody. The difference is the fact that in Los Angeles or New York, a bunch of people will follow you around to record your every bowel movement in a photograph that will be available when you check out at the supermarket. So, if you ever go to Lincoln, Nebraska, you will be mobbed.
Peter had actually lived with this his entire life, but for me it was a new experience. An actor in LA is like a lettuce picker in Salinas during growing season. Some are quick with the knife and make a good buck on the piecework; some play in the basements of churches and collect food stamps to eat. I knew this; I’d been on the other end, taking a shot in the tit to pay the rent. I guess the best were like Harrison. He packed his lunch box, went to work, make the whole damn world believe in someone who didn’t exist and never had, and then went home and waited for someone else to ask him to pack his lunch. But that was so much easier when Granddaddy dug up some oil. The same actress who played Terrible Tara was playing Sister Anne Victoria, the audience and the response were legions apart, but what the actress did was essentially the same.
Saturday night, Peter put me to bed and started to massage me, but I’d had a day off, so I massaged back. Then I put my mouth on his neck, which I knew was a turn on and, well, what can I say? When the woman really wants to take the lead in sex, touch all the right places and get him under her, the whole definition of “weaker sex” sort of gets transposed. I exhausted him, twice, before I let him go. And even then, when I turned away to sleep, his hands were snaked over and under me, and I knew I was safe and warm and loved.
Sunday morning I woke with an orgasm. Peter’s hand was between my legs, his thumb on my clit and his fingers rubbing the inside of my pelvic bone while flicking my G-spot. I was squealing before I knew it was morning. Sort of transference of dominance from the previous night; I was helpless. He took complete advantage of this, placed me firmly on my back and demonstrated the advantages of the missionary position for both parties involved.
In the mountains we were early to bed, early to rise types. If we watched anything, it was old movies because Peter firmly refused to pay for TV of any kind. My cabin had an old TV and a VHS player.
Peter put together a version of Eggs Benedict with corned beef hash and Béarnaise sauce.
The second week was just as exhausting as the first; worse, in fact. Rob started writing an extra scene for me and everyone seemed to approve. We finished the ‘season’, which is thirteen shows, on Thursday. If the show got picked up and I went through this again, I’d say, ‘the season wrapped.’ But just a couple weeks in the business didn’t give me full copyrighted use of all the jargon.
On Friday, we all went to a party at Jeremy’s in Malibu. The series was a solid number two as a comedy and the second week popped up to number one, though it did drop back in week three. The punch packed a punch; you could tell with the first sip, so the party broke up early for about half the participants. I later heard it finally ended about sunrise on Saturday for the rest of the crowd.
Neither Peter nor I really were into drinking a lot and we were part of what was called the AA group. Movie people were rather notorious for being a pretty hard partying group and that leaked down into TV. So this created a few AA groups among the actors, et cetera. After many years, it sort of became tradition that when the serious drinking started, the people who weren’t into it left. Because so many of them belonged to AA, they became known as the AA group, whether or not they belonged.
We ate at a seafood restaurant that was either in Santa Monica or Venice; it sat sort of on the border. The waitress there asked me to sign a menu and became the first person to ask for my autograph.
As with the previous Saturday, I was horny as all hell and just attacked Peter as soon as we got in the house. I noticed that his neck was really sensitive when I cried into it in Santa Barbara, and I could usually use it to coax a second performance out of him. I didn’t stand on ceremony and just jumped him. He usually took this as license to light up every erogenous zone he could find. The first time he chose my spine and ran his hands down it as I shivered with the thrills on top of him. The orgasm was a pretty big one and drained me long enough to get over on our sides and let him go to work on the insides of my arms and legs. I got a couple squeals out, then found his neck with my tongue again and turned him on his back again so I could really bear down and squirm around, getting my spot rubbed. This accounted for a couple orgasms before he came and I collapsed on top of him.
The next morning, I was half gone again by the time I was awake enough to realize it. Peter just went straight after it in the morning and I was squealing out an orgasm half asleep like it was a wet dream. This time, however, I got to his neck and climbed on top of him before he got his hand out, so I pretty much got even.
We had a quick shower and breakfast and headed back up the mountain in both cars. We were a bit behind on our fairies and needed to get back to work out in the woods.
We’d done a lot of shopping – or rather Peter had – in LA, so it took us a while to unload into both the cabins. With that and the drive, we sort of lost the light for the day and just sat next to each other, kissing before dinner. We hadn’t known each other as teenagers, so we’d never parked. I’d never straddled his leg to rub myself into cumming, never had my nipples go hard against the inside of my padded bra against his chest. He’d never tried to slip his hand under my blouse or felt my nylons against his hand as he tried to decide just how high he could get away with moving it. So we sat on the couch and did that for a while.
On Sunday, we went right to work and finished up the third to last fai
ry, one of the indistinct ones from the final plate. Before digital photography, the final three fairies would have taken a long time and a really talented photographer. They were probably a double and even possibly a triple exposure, so all sorts of different exposures, apertures and settings, along with some lab work would be needed to get some of their feel. But Peter was able to take the first one and get a really good copy the first night he worked on them. The cover story for the last three is that they were hummingbird fairies, too fast to get a good clear picture of.
We were actually done by Wednesday evening, but we’d worked pretty hard getting there. Tuesday night was the only time we didn’t just collapse in the bedroom at the end of the day. And Tuesday was pretty tame in the sex department; he turned me toward him, usually he held me from behind, and started kissing. One thing led to another, well, I don’t really have to tell you; by now you know what he does and how much I like it.
Thursday, Peter called Dillon in Burbank for a ‘family’ to work with: a mom, dad and two girls, sixteen and nine. Dillon arranged it for the weekend and asked to talk to me.
“Your show’s number one again this week and the critics are attributing it to you. Everyone would appreciate it if you could make it down for a couple days next week.”
I conveyed the show’s standings excitedly to Peter. He took the phone from me and said, “Tell Jerry that I will have a draft of Clap Your Hands ready on Wednesday. We both know I can deliver it electronically and I will, probably Monday or Tuesday, depending on how the family works out. Wednesday we can make a show of me giving you the hard copy and you can make a little announcement that the book will be Clap Your Hands by Peter Baker with Edi Malone. That will undoubtedly make everyone happy from the Redwood Forests to the New York Island.”