Confessions of a Hollywood Star (14 page)

Ella’s eyes turned to the bathroom door. “I’m afraid to look in there.”

I didn’t see how it could be worse than the bedroom.

“I’ll toss you.” I took a coin from my pocket. “Heads I do in here, tails you do it.”

Armed with brushes, cloths and disinfectant, Ella went into the bathroom looking like Indiana Jones being lowered into a pit of snakes.

She was out again in under five seconds.

“I can’t,” she said, her face contorted with disgust. “There are
hairs
in the shower and the toilet’s filthy.”

“Hairs?”

Ella nodded. “You know…” She looked like there was a skunk loose in the room.

“Oh,” I sighed. “You mean
hairs
.” This job was like being a housewife, only you didn’t even get a card and a bunch of flowers for Mother’s Day. “I don’t suppose there’s a hose in the cart.”

“You and your rites of passage,” muttered Ella. “Next time, let’s try one of the other ones. Like getting married. At least people give you presents.”

I took a deep breath to prepare myself for tackling the bathroom. “You’d still end up having to clean the toilet,” I said.

The Longest Day

T
he thought that while I was scrubbing toilet bowls and emptying ashtrays, Carla Santini was swanning around the movie set, batting her eyelashes and simpering inanely at Bret Fork, would have been a galling one if I’d had any time for thought. But I didn’t. Drudgery doesn’t really lend itself to thinking. Do this … then do this … then do that … over and over until if it weren’t for the exhaustion and pain you’d think you were a robot.

By the time the last hygienically sealed glass was put in place, the last spread smoothed down and the hall vacuumed, our shift had been officially over for more than two hours.

“Can you believe that people used to work at least fourteen hours a day, six days a week?” asked Ella as we limped into the supply closet to put our cart away.

I shut the door behind us. “No.” There wasn’t a single part of my body that didn’t hurt. “Even my nails and hair are aching in sympathy.”

Ella sighed as many a sweatshop worker must have sighed before her. “I can’t decide what I hate most about this job. It could be cleaning the bathrooms.” Ella wrinkled her nose. “Or it could be how disgusting some of the sheets are.”

It was true that there was a lot to choose from, but as far as I was concerned there was no contest. “I know exactly what I hate most. Mrs Seiser.”

Mrs Seiser was a combination of the Gestapo and the speaking clock. Every time you turned around there she was watching you with her beady eyes, pointing out everything you hadn’t done, everything you’d done wrong and how much time it’d taken you to do it in. If you so much as leaned against a wall for a few seconds to catch your breath she acted like she’d found you asleep in one of the beds. If she gave me a nickel every time she told me that she was running a hotel not a summer camp, I’d have more money than I was likely to make in a week.

“I don’t even have the strength to take off this stupid housecoat.” Ella removed her bag from the shelf where she’d left it and hung it over her shoulder. “All I want to do is get home before I collapse.”

“Me too.” All I could think of was the bath I was going to have the minute I got in. I didn’t care if both the twins had the worst case of diarrhoea in the history of Dellwood, New Jersey, I was barricading myself in and soaking till I looked like a raisin.

Ella locked the door after us and we started down the hall. “I’ll go and get the getaway car while you put this back in the office.” She handed me the key. “I’ll meet you out front.”

Ella strode into the lobby. She was obviously in a semi-catatonic state and oblivious to the world around her because she didn’t look twice at the man coming into Bergstrom’s as she was going out. I, however, being an actor, always have a part of me alert no matter how many toilet bowls I’ve cleaned. I recognized Charley Hottle instantly, and no sooner did I recognize him than I turned around and went back the way I’d just come. I was suddenly wide awake again of course. Adrenaline coursed through my veins; my cells tingled. Ella disappeared, but I stayed at the entrance to the hallway, my eyes on Charley Hottle as he spoke to Mrs Seiser and waited for his messages. I had his room number imprinted on my brain (65), so as soon as he turned from the counter I raced up the stairs to the second floor. I had to hope that he really didn’t recognize me from the other day, but if he did I’d just have to talk fast.

Maybe I should have gone after Ella and not approached Charley Hottle at the end of a long, hard day. I was tired and I knew I didn’t look my best. But a great actor has to be able to overcome such minor negativities. A great actor has to be ready to go on even if her hair is limp and she smells like disinfectant.

I was strolling casually down the corridor as Charley Hottle appeared at the top of the stairs.

I gave him a smile.

He didn’t give me one back, probably because he didn’t actually look at me.

“Hi,” I said.

He nodded as he marched past me.

Now I understood why private eyes and spies always disguise themselves as maids and waiters and things like that in movies. Because no one sees them unless they want something or have a complaint.

“Mr Hottle!” I turned and went after him. “Mr Hottle, if I could just have—”

He didn’t look back as he got to his room. “If it’s about that lamp, it was like that when I moved in.”

“It’s not about the lamp. It’s—”

“I’m busy,” he snapped. The door shut in my face.

I knocked politely but firmly. “Mr Hottle, if you’d only just listen—”

The door opened so suddenly that I nearly knocked on his nose. “No, you listen,” his eyes moved to my nametag, “Lolla. If you don’t leave me alone I’m going to file a formal complaint with the manager.”

“But Mr Hottle, you don’t understand.”

Charley Hottle couldn’t possibly have had a worse day than I had, but he wasn’t in any mood for negotiation.

“No, you don’t understand. I’m trying to make a movie here, and all you’re supposed to be doing is making the bed. You and I have nothing to discuss unless I need an extra towel or you forgot to empty the rubbish bin.
Comprende?
”

Comprende?
Was I a less important person because I made beds instead of Hollywood movies? Didn’t I breathe just like he did? Didn’t I bleed? Wasn’t I human?

Apparently not. He was about to slam the door in my face again when Mrs Seiser suddenly entered the scene, stage right.

“Lola!” She had a small parcel in her hand and was steaming down the corridor like a runaway train. She was in full Gestapo mode. “Lola, what are you doing here?”

Even though Mrs Seiser had probably made a few beds in her time, Charley Hottle was overjoyed to see her. “Mrs Seiser! What did I tell you about keeping your staff out of my hair?”

Mrs Seiser disarmed when she spoke to Charley Hottle. “Thank heaven I forgot to give you this downstairs,” she purred. “I had no idea she was up here bothering you.” She picked up her submachine gun and turned back to me. “Go and wait for me in the office, Lola. You and I have a few things to discuss.”

Everybody always says that there are two sides to every story, but in my experience most people only listen to one.

“But Mrs Seiser – I—”

“You heard me. Now!” She put away the submachine-gun and spoke to Charley Hottle again. “Mr Hottle, I am so sorry. The only excuse I can make for her is that she’s new. I’m sure you know how hard it is to get good staff nowadays.”

I slunk downstairs. I could see Ella waiting in the car outside Bergstrom’s as I walked to the office. She was sound asleep.

I was meek and apologetic when Mrs Seiser came back to the office of course.

“It wasn’t what you think,” I said. “I saw Mr – what did you say his name is? Hottle? I saw Mr Hottle drop a dollar and I just wanted to return it, that’s all.”

Mrs Seiser didn’t believe me. She said she was very disappointed in me. She had higher hopes. I’ve learned in life that you’re always disappointing someone, so that part didn’t really bother me. The part that bothered me was when she docked me half a day’s salary for breaking one of her rules.

“I hope that will teach you a lesson,” said Mrs Seiser.

“It has,” I said.

Next time I’d make sure I didn’t get caught.

My Life Is A Bruce Springsteen Song

B
ecause my mother has no qualms about inflicting her lack of musical taste on her innocent children, I know every song Bruce Springsteen ever wrote by heart. And since working at Bergstrom’s, I knew I was definitely living one. Only it wasn’t “Born to Run” or anything like that – something fast and upbeat and full of hope. It was the one about working in a factory and having your life destroyed by the tedium and mindless subservience of your job.

I sat at the dinner table like a ghost (only forcing my hands to lift my fork from my plate to my mouth because I knew I needed whatever crumbs of nourishment I could get). Around me, the mindless chatter and laughter of the living, sheltered from the harsher truths of the universe, surrounded me like fog.

“Mary! Mary! Mary!”

The way Paula was shrieking suggested that she’d been trying to get my attention for several minutes. I turned my head slowly towards her. Every movement of any muscle in my body was a painful effort.

“Guess what we did today?” asked Pam.

Not only does manual labour fatigue your body, it also fatigues your mind. I now understood why most of the great ideas and discoveries of mankind were made by middle and upper class men. Who else would have the time and energy required to think? Not some guy picking cotton or chipping away at the bowels of the earth from dawn to dusk. Not some woman scrubbing floors and clothes until her hands bled. After two days slaving away at the plantation known as Bergstrom’s Travel Lodge, I was pretty much beyond caring about anything. Demoralization (as well as aches, pains and calluses) came with the job. If I’d had any time to think, I was too tired and dispirited to bother. I asked Gracia what made her get up every morning and go to work – day after day and year after year – and she said it was all the bills she had to pay.

But despite this, I made an effort to rally for the sake of my sisters. I felt that their innocence should be protected for as long as possible. They’d learn the truth about the world soon enough.

“You discovered life on Mars?”

There was a stereophonic sigh from the other side of the salad bowl.

“We went to see the movie,” said Paula. “Oona May took everybody in day camp.”

“We met Lucy Rio and Bret Fork, too,” chipped in Pam.

“We even met the director,” added Paula.

Of course they did. Somebody had to – and it was definitely starting to look like it was never going to be me. The life of a chambermaid was so hard and unpleasant and so soul-destroying that I couldn’t even muster the reserve of energy I’d need to pursue Charley Hottle. Not that I’d had any chance to. Even though Ella and I never left at four (like we were supposed to), since the time he slammed the door in my face the closest I’d come to Charley Hottle was seeing his name in the register. And since the time Charley Hottle slammed the door in my face, Mrs Seiser watched me like a hawk with its eyes on a baby rabbit. Any time someone from the movie company was around, she appeared behind them like a spectre – or maybe a witch – and made sure I didn’t get near them.

But a good actor can, of course, feign an enthusiasm she doesn’t actually feel. “Wow… That must’ve been exciting.”

“It was,” chimed in Pam. “It was really cool.”

“And guess who else was there?” crowed Pam. “Carla Santini and a bunch of her friends.”

[Cue: thud as heart drops to feet.] “Carla Santini?” Why was she always on the set? Didn’t she have anything else to do?

Karen Kapok groaned in a way that I’m pretty sure I’ll always associate with motherhood. “Oh, God, just when you think it’s safe to have a conversation…”

“Yeah,” said Paula. “She’s in the movie, too. She said to say hi.”

I could see Carla smiling graciously at my sisters, the coven all tittering inanely behind her.

“What a lovely person she is,” I murmured. “Mother Teresa is an Inquisition torturer by comparison.”

Pam bit a carrot stick in half. “She said she’ll see you at the party.”

“What party?”

“How should we know?” demanded Paula. “She said you got an invitation.”

“Well, I didn’t.”

My mother gave me a scornful look over a forkful of salad. “I told you you had mail. I can’t open it for you, you know. It’s against the law.”

The only things that should be against the law are Carla Santini and her parties (not so much social occasions as publicity stunts).

“You’ll have to excuse me,” I sweetly replied. “I’m afraid the drudgery of my servitude make things like mail irrelevant – since I barely have the strength to read it.”

“Do you want Pam to go all the way over to the phone table to get it?” asked my mother. “Since you probably don’t have the strength to make it across the kitchen either.”

I waited till after the dishes were done before I casually picked the ivory-coloured, linen envelope embossed with silver stars from the phone table and took it to my room. Then I lit some candles to scare off the evil spirits that would be released when I broke the seal on the envelope and sat on my bed. I opened the invitation slowly, as though it might explode (though a slow poison would be more Carla Santini’s style). The invitation was also embossed with silver stars – they probably cost more than a maid at Bergstrom’s makes in a week.

You almost have to feel sorry for Carla. It’s like she was born in totally the wrong time. This is a girl who should’ve been hatching plots in seventeenth-century European courts or in ancient Rome or Egypt. There isn’t a power-hungry monarch who ever lived who wouldn’t have given her a job.
Carla, I need to start a war between King Mubble and King Hopstadter. Do you think you can do something? Of course [coos Carla] I have twenty minutes before lunch
. And think of all the fun she would’ve had ruining lives and cutting off heads – all the while acting like she had nothing on her mind but what pearls to wear to dinner. I’m serious about this. Expensive clothes and cars and having every tiny little thing you want for even half a second are nothing next to real power. I mean, anybody can
buy
things, all you need is the money. What does Carla Santini care if she gets another eight-hundred-dollar pair of shoes, when deep in her heart she must know that she was born to manipulate and control people and events? Imagine how deliriously happy she’d be if, when she got into bed at night, she could say to herself:
I brought down two governments and threw five hundred peasants off their land – now that was a good day!
instead of:
Bought another dozen dresses and a gold bracelet today – what a bore
.