Sellevision (26 page)

“Hey, Buddy,” Rocky said, as Max appeared in front of him wearing one of the white robes, hair still damp. Rocky himself was dressed in a white shirt and black-and-white checked pants, the kind chefs wore. “You ready?” he asked.

“As ready as I think I can be,” he told him.

As Rocky led Max over to the lit set, Max asked him, “So how long have you been doing this?”

“What, making porn? Ah, I don’t know. Five years, six maybe.” He steered them around some large black plastic crates.

“So you do, like, all kinds of movies?” Max asked.

“Well, any kind of straight or bi thing. I don’t do just guys. It’s, you know, not my thing.”

Max wondered,
Well then, why are you about to have sex with me in front of a camera?

Seeming to read his mind, Rocky answered the unasked question. “But you know, I don’t
mind
it with guys, and if the guy’s handsome and not slutty, not some old pro, then it can be fun. You know, like this, with you.”

Max felt flattered.

They arrived on the set of
Pizza Parlor Pussy
. Ed greeted them and told Max, “Go ahead and take off your robe, make yourself comfortable.” Max noticed that Shaun, the fluffer, was lurking nearby.

“So here’s what I want you to do,” Ed began. “Rocky here’s gonna be standing over there by that pizza oven. What I want you to do is come up behind him and start taking off his clothes, getting him excited. You don’t actually have to do anything except touch, play around with each other. I really just want to see how comfortable you are.”

Max did not feel comfortable. This was, he realized, a large mistake.

Rocky got into position and opened the oven door.

“Let’s go!” Ed shouted, “And . . .action!”

Max exhaled and stepped onto the set. The lights were so bright, everything beyond the set was immediately plunged into darkness, just like on Sellevision. Then he saw the camera. It was trained on him. Max was on a set, in front of a camera. He wasn’t in a dark sound booth doing a voice-over audition. He wasn’t miserable, in his apartment watching MTV. And most importantly, he wasn’t on radio.

Max looked into the camera and a smile spread across his face. Then he looked at Rocky, who was pretending to slide a pizza into the oven. He could see the muscles in Rocky’s back flexing beneath the crisp white shirt. Max took a step forward. And then another. He reached his hand out and gently touched the nape of Rocky’s neck.

Rocky turned. The smile left Max’s face, was replaced by something else. Despite the sheer power of him, Max could see there was a softness in Rocky’s green eyes. He was
attracted
to Rocky. Max took a step closer and unbuttoned the first button on Rocky’s shirt.

Rocky took Max’s hands in his, pressed them to his chest. “You’re trembling,” he said gently.

“A little,” Max said softly, still looking into Rocky’s eyes.

“Here, let me help,” Rocky said, unbuttoning his own button. First one, then the next, then the next. Max slid his hands across Rocky’s exposed chest, felt the strength that was in those muscles.

The shirt fell to the floor.

Rocky unbuckled his belt, slowly. Then unfastened his pants. He slid them down his thighs, stepped out of first one leg, then the other.

Max and Rocky stood naked before each other. Rocky extended his arms, and Max moved into them.

Rocky ran his fingers across Max’s back, then pulled him closer. He took Max’s face in his hands, cocked his head slightly, and kissed Max on the lips. A gentle kiss, but a real one.

He turned Max around so that Max’s back was against his chest. Rocky slid his hands across Max’s chest, then down his flat stomach. Max closed his eyes and arched his head back against Rocky’s neck. He moaned softly.

“
Cut!
” Ed shouted.

Max’s eyes startled open.

There was applause from the crew.

Rocky let go of Max and stepped back. “That was
great
, buddy,” he said. “Man, you’re really good. I was really getting into it.” He gave Max’s neck a playful squeeze, the way buddies sometimes do with one another.

Ed approached enthusiastically, extended his hand. “Max, you are nothing less than brilliant. I mean, you could just
feel
the intensity, the raw sexuality. The whole room was frozen. Max, my man, you were born for this, the camera
loves
you. And obviously, you don’t have any problem with the camera,” he said, winking.

Rocky walked off the set. “See you later, buddy. Hey, maybe we’ll work together sometime, that could be pretty cool.”

Max just stood there, stunned. And then he looked down.

Wood
.

Someone handed him a robe.

He caught a glimpse of Shaun, sitting off to the side, completely engrossed in his magazine.

eighteen

“I
’m sorry, Peggy Jean. But confrontational group therapy isn’t supposed to be pleasant. Achieving mental health is never a picnic.” Peggy Jean was sitting in her case manager’s office having just come from a humiliating group therapy session. She had asked Ms. Guttel, a woman so masculine that Peggy Jean had at first called her “sir,” to excuse her from future grouptherapy sessions. “Absolutely out of the question. You’re a very sick woman and group therapy plays a primary role in recovery.” Then the hateful man/woman glared and said, “Don’t think that just because you’re some fancy-shmancy Home Shopping host from TV that you get special privileges, because lady, you’re just another alcoholic, plain and simple.”

“
Sellevision
,” Peggy Jean spat. “
Not
Home Shopping Network.” Then she stood and abruptly left Ms. Guttel’s office.

It was getting worse by the minute. How could her husband have put her in such an awful place? She tried to imagine Elizabeth Taylor staying there and she couldn’t. Dear Lord, why hadn’t he sent her to Betty Ford instead? This was no place for a celebrity.

“I can channel Tammy Wynette,” said a raspy voice from behind Peggy Jean. She turned to see a haggard old woman with a wart on her nose like a fairy-tale witch. The wart had a hair growing out of it.

Peggy Jean backed against the wall. “Please don’t speak to me,” she said to the witch. Thankfully, a nurse appeared, taking the witch by the arm.

“Well, Peggy Jean, I see you’ve met Mrs. Creenly. She’s a new patient.” Peggy Jean slid away and went into her room. More than a crème de menthe, more than a Valium, she just wanted to close her door.

And then it hit her. It hit her like a baseball bat across the face. She really
did
want a crème de menthe; she did want a Valium. The feeling was powerful, overwhelming. She sat on the edge of her bed and rocked. What was she supposed to do when cravings hit? What was it they had told her?
Feelings are like the weather, they will pass. Let go and let God. Feel the fear and do it anyway
. Or was that last one for something else?

Just that morning in group therapy she had said that her real problem was not alcohol or pills, her real problem was that she was being stalked by some crazed person, jealous of her fame.

An awful man sitting across from her had said, “Look, honey, denial ain’t a river in Egypt.”

Somebody else said, “You may have a stalker, but you’re not facing the fear, you’re drinking it away. You’re pill-popping yourself into oblivion.”

Peggy Jean had said that she wasn’t like “the rest of you people,” that she was only “trying to smooth her nerves out a little, for the
camera
.”

Leslie, the group facilitator, reminded Peggy Jean that she had made an attempt on her life, that when she had been discovered by her husband, she was intoxicated.

“I don’t remember any of it. I was in a state of complete mental collapse.”

One of the patients, a woman too pretty to be an alcoholic, sneered at her. “It’s called a
blackout
. We’ve all had ’em. And normal people don’t have blackouts. Hate to break it to you but only we alcoholics get them.”

Peggy Jean was aghast. “You people are” She used a word she’d learned recently. “. . .
projecting
your own problems onto me. I shouldn’t even be here.”

She stood to leave but was told by Leslie that leaving was not an option. “I’m sorry, but you need to confront these issues.”

That was when she burst into tears and somebody handed her a box of tissues. She looked at the box and sobbed even harder. “I can’t use these tissues. I can only use the ones with lotion in them.
Don’t any of you people understand how close the camera gets?
”

Peggy Jean got up off the bed and went to the sink. She splashed her face with cold water and looked at herself in the mirror. “My name is Peggy Jean Smythe
and I’m an alcoholic and a drug addict
.” It rang true. She walked over to the nightstand and looked at the small pile of letters that people had sent her. She sat on the bed and then picked up the stack of letters. Debby Boone, Bebe Friedman, Adele Oswald Crawley, Trish Mission, and Leigh Bushmoore.
I have friends. People love me. I am somebody. And isn’t it true, doesn’t everybody have tiny little hairs all over their body?

Peggy Jean could hear the sound of patients gathering in the hall on their way to the elevator for lunch. Maybe the cafeteria would have the green Jell-O again today. And this thought momentarily perked her up. Of course, she’d have to face all those awful people from group therapy. But she’d just eat and leave as quickly as possible.

“Hi, Peggy Jean,” said one of the awful people who attacked her earlier, the pretty one.

Peggy Jean said an icy, “Hello.”

The woman came right up beside Peggy Jean and entered the elevator with her. “You were great in group today. You really got in touch with some feelings. It’s hard at first but it gets easier.”

Peggy Jean looked at the woman, who was suddenly being friendly. “Hmph.”

“I sure hope they have patty melts today, I could really go for a patty melt,” she said.

Mmmm, Peggy Jean thought, so could she. The hospital food had really started to grow on her.

“My name’s Debby, by the way. I know it’s hard to learn all these new names.”

Peggy Jean gave her a little smile. “I have a friend named Debby,” she said.

“Really?”

Peggy Jean nodded. “Yes, the singer Debby Boone. Actually she’s been a tremendous help to me through my crisis.” Just then Peggy Jean noticed the witch woman staring at her from the other side of the elevator.
I bet that’s exactly what Zoe looks like
, she thought.

Peggy Jean and Debby sat together at a table.

“Oh well,” Debby said. “It may not be a patty melt, but I guess turkey loaf will have to do.”

Peggy Jean took a bite of turkey loaf and wondered what her family was having for lunch. Maybe Nikki had made them a nice chicken salad. Or maybe something festive, like stuffed tomatoes. “This is actually quite tasty,” she told Debby. “I wonder if I could get the recipe. My family would love it.”

Debby nodded with her mouth full.

“And I bet it would make great sandwiches the next day.”

Debby asked, “How many kids do you have?”

“Three. Three little boys, four if you count my hubby!” She pierced a lima bean with a prong of her fork. “And you? Do you have any kids?”

A pained look spread across Debby’s face. “I have two children, Hope and Charity.”

Peggy Jean smiled. “What lovely names. How old?”

“They’re thirteen, twins.”

Peggy Jean paused her fork in midair. “How wonderful. They must be very beautiful. I mean, you’re so pretty yourself.”

Debby lowered her head. “Thank you.” Then, looking Peggy Jean in the eyes, “Actually, my girls aren’t just twins, they’re conjoined twins.”

Peggy Jean leaned in. “Con
what?
”

Debby nodded her head, resting her fork on her tray. “Conjoined. They share major organs; they each have one leg, one arm. They share a chest and they have one vagina.”

Peggy Jean bit her knuckle.

“I started drinking right after they were born. It’s very stressful because they’ve never gotten along, and well, there’s nothing I can do about it because they basically have one body.”

Peggy Jean would not be able to finish her turkey loaf. “My Lord, you poor thing. No wonder.”

Debby began to cry softly, reached for a napkin. “If only they got along—but they don’t, they just scream and fight all day.”

Peggy Jean shook her head in disbelief. “I don’t know what I would do, I honestly have no idea. I don’t know that I could bear the grief.”

Debby dabbed at her eyes with a corner of the napkin. “The only good thing is, they just got a movie deal from Streistar for their life story. So at least they’ll have some money for college. Or whatever.”

Peggy Jean placed her hands on Debby’s shoulders. “There’s always a silver lining.” And then, alarmed, she blurted out, “I forgot to say grace!”

The two women left the cafeteria and Peggy Jean thought,
Well, if she can survive all of that
. . .