Crystal (12 page)

It was on the way to English that Crystal ran into Jim Dennison. He asked if she had a moment to discuss the poem she had given him. She said that she was in a hurry and that she would see him in the magazine office after school. She knew, even then, that she wouldn’t.

“
The Roger Hallen Show
?” Daniel Brown was in his shirtsleeves at the kitchen table. His dark, muscular arms were folded across his chest. “She going to sing or something?”

“No, she’s going to talk about what it’s like being one of the most exciting young models in America.” Loretta Barrett stirred her coffee by moving the spoon quickly at the top of the cup. “I’m sure he’ll ask her how she manages to balance her schoolwork with her modeling, that kind of thing. It’ll be wonderful for her.”

“And how much she get for being on his show?” Crystal’s father asked.

“Five hundred dollars,” Crystal said. “How do I look?”

“That’s all?” Daniel turned his head sideways.

“What they pay is the absolute minimum they can get away with,” Loretta said. “The prestige and publicity are supposed to be payment enough.”

“Do you really have to work tonight, Daddy?” Crystal asked. “You could come see me.”

“You got to be kidding.” Daniel smiled. “I’m going on
in to work at the hospital the way I usually do. I’m going to sit there on the third floor where the color television is, and when
The Roger Hallen Show
comes on and my baby shows up and the guys turn to me and say, ‘Hey, man, ain’t that your daughter?’ you know what I’m gonna say? I’m gonna look real close like I ain’t sure, and then I’m gonna say something like ‘Yeah, that’s her’ and make believe I’m reading a newspaper or something.”

“Get out of here, Daddy,” Crystal said.

“Ain’t no ‘get out of here,’” Daniel Brown said. “When Timmy’s kid got a scholarship to Fordham, and it was in the newspaper, do you know what he did?”

“He bought a copy for everybody,” Loretta guessed.

“A copy?” Daniel looked at Loretta. “He bought
two
copies, one for us to read and one for us to save!”

“We’d better get going,” Carol said. “Crystal you look beautiful.”

“She always looks beautiful,” Daniel said. “I told you beauty was in my genes.”

Loretta, Carol, and Crystal left. Daniel waited until he thought they were downstairs and then went to the front window and peeked out the curtains as they got into the waiting limousine.

Crystal watched Roger Hallen on the monitor behind the curtain. The makeup girl stood near her, sponge in hand. As Hallen ended the thirty-second spot for United Airlines the assistant director pointed toward Crystal and the makeup girl quickly touched the sponge to her upper lip to remove any traces of moisture.

“You’re beautiful,” she whispered.

The director held up four fingers as Hallen’s voice
came over the monitor.

“You see these beautiful girls on magazine covers, you see them on television; if you’re lucky you see them dashing around the fashion centers of the city. Tonight, we have a very beautiful, very charming young lady who’s making quite a name for herself—Miss Crystal Brown….”

The stagehand held the curtain for Crystal as the audience began to applaud. Roger Hallen stood as she went to the large desk he sat behind. He was shorter than she thought he would be, and she was more nervous than she thought she would be. Loretta had warned her that the chair next to Hallen’s desk would be uncomfortable. It was, the seat being slanted slightly forward.

“So, how’s the modeling business?” Hallen asked as Crystal sat next to his desk.

“Just fine,” Crystal said. A man with headphones, out of camera range, was holding up a picture of a can of dog food.

“I understand that besides being a model, you’ve written a book?” Hallen said, twisting a pencil between his fingers.

“A book?” Crystal shook her head. “No.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Hallen corrected himself. “I’m sorry, I got my notes wrong, you’re
planning
to write a book. Let’s sneak in a quick word from one of the sponsors, and then we’ll talk more about your modeling
and
the book.”

The offstage monitor showed a close-up of Roger Hallen’s face as the director gave hand signals. A screen at the side of the camera Hallen was looking at lit up and a message began to roll slowly. Hallen read it in a way that looked as if he were making it up as he went along.

“Dogs are man’s best friends, we’ve said that time and time again and I guess we’ve actually become dogs’ best
friends, too. I think the makers of Gro-Chow had this in mind when they created their new line of nutritionally balanced dog food.”

The red light on the camera went out, and a taped commercial began to play on the monitor. The director came over to the desk in response to Hallen’s beckoning.

“I thought she wrote a book,” Hallen said, nodding toward Crystal. He pulled a book from a table behind his desk.

“The next guest wrote the book, a thing on the changing values of family life,” the director said with a shrug.

“Look, tell her the show’s running behind schedule or something.” Hallen handed the book to the director.

“Fine.” The director took the book, tossed it to an assistant, and ran his finger across his throat.

“We’ll talk about your modeling career,” Roger Hallen said, “and then I’ll say that you’re thinking about putting it all down in a book and I’ll say I’m looking forward to reading it.”

“Okay,” Crystal said.

“And call me Roger, okay?” He had a warm smile.

“Fine, Roger.”

The director cued Hallen back in just as the red light came on the camera directly facing them.

“So, what’s it like being a young model—how old did you say you were?”

“Sixteen,” Crystal said.

“Sixteen? They didn’t make sixteen-year-old girls like you when I was sixteen!”

The audience laughed.

“And I didn’t make any sixteen-year-old girls when I
was sixteen, either!”

There was whistling and larger applause.

“I guess being a model can be pretty exciting?”

“It’s very exciting, Roger,” Crystal said. “It’s like a dream come true.”

“So are you.” Hallen rolled his eyes toward the studio ceiling. “Let me ask you something. Be honest, now. When did you first discover you were a very beautiful girl?”

Crystal opened her mouth and nothing came out.

“Okay, let me change that.” Hallen shifted his position, obviously pleased with himself. “When did the boy next door first discover he couldn’t look at you and breathe normally at the same time?”

There was more applause, and Hallen laughed with the audience.

“I thought I was okay-looking last year,” Crystal said.

“Okay-looking?” Hallen rolled his eyes again and there were more whistles from the audience. “There were guys all over the country slowing down their pacemakers the moment you walked out here.”

“You’re nice,” Crystal said.

“What’s absolutely the best thing about being a glamorous model?”

“I think it’s seeing your pictures in print and thinking that you’ve done a good job,” Crystal said. “It’s very rewarding.”

“You know, I think there are more and more opportunities for Black girls in modeling, wouldn’t you say?” Hallen asked.

“I hope so,” Crystal responded, remembering Loretta’s admonishment not to contradict Hallen.

The rest of the interview took six minutes and Crystal found herself kissing Roger Hallen and walking off the small set to a round of applause. A moment later, the monitor showed a tiger jumping into a gas tank.

“You were wonderful!” Loretta was waiting backstage. “Absolutely wonderful!”

“That thing with the book really threw me,” Crystal said.

“It worked out fine,” Loretta said. “Do you know how many close-ups they had of you?”

“I was afraid to look at the monitor,” Crystal said.

“Plenty,” Loretta said. “Carol was in the front row. I’m sure you didn’t see her, but she’ll be in the lobby when we get there. I think you just turned on your afterburners, young lady. You are on your way!”

As they left, Crystal saw the assistant director offering a tissue to the author of the book Roger Hallen thought
she
had written.

“She’s at St. John’s Hospital in Queens,” Loretta said. “She asked for you but I don’t think you should go. Very frankly, I think Rowena’s got herself into a very bad emotional state, and I don’t want you to get into one, too.”

“I won’t,” Crystal said. “But maybe I’ll drop by to see her after school.”

“What time do you plan on being there?”

“I’ll be out at two-thirty today,” Crystal said. “I guess I can get there by three-thirty.”

“You’ll call me afterwards?”

“Sure.”

The subway ride from Brooklyn to St. John’s Hospital was a long one. On the way, Crystal thought about getting a private tutor. It was a good idea. She knew that she was slipping way behind in her work, and she didn’t know how she was going to catch up. A private tutor could work with her at home, perhaps. At any rate, it wouldn’t be as embarrassing as not knowing the answers in school.

St. John’s didn’t smell like some hospitals she had been in. It was clean and fresh and the nurses looked good in their crisp white outfits. There were younger girls in pink-and-white striped outfits, whom Crystal figured to be nursing assistants. She could easily imagine herself doing that kind of work. Just helping people, not being anything special. She watched two girls talking. They were a little older than she was, maybe eighteen. They looked happy together.

“Visiting hours are not until four, it’s ten minutes to four,” the heavy, white-haired lady at the reception desk said. “Are you over fourteen? You have to be at least fourteen to go on the wards.”

“I saw the sign,” Crystal said.

“Do you have school I.D.?” the woman asked.

Crystal showed the woman her school I.D.

“Haven’t I seen you someplace before?” The woman pulled her glasses to the end of her nose and peered at Crystal over them.

“I’ve done some modeling work,” Crystal said. “You might have seen me in a magazine.”

“Well, isn’t that nice.” The woman smiled pleasantly. “I
thought
I had seen you somewhere before!”

“I’ll wait over here.” Crystal started walking toward the leatherette couches.

“Oh, you can go on up,” the woman said. “Your friend’s in room two-twenty-seven.”

There were two nurses at the reception desk on the second floor. They were watching a small television set. One of them glanced toward Crystal and beckoned her over.

“Visiting hours are—Who are you visiting?”

“Rowena,” Crystal said. “I think she’s in two-twenty-seven?”

“Are you a model?” The younger nurse—a tall, red-haired girl with freckles that seemed concentrated around her nose—leaned forward.

“Yes,” Crystal said. “How’s Rowena doing?”

“She could be doing better,” the red-haired nurse said to Crystal. “What kinds of things do you model for?”

“Perfume, other stuff,” Crystal said.

“I’ll look for your picture,” the other nurse said. “You can go in now.”

“What’s wrong with Rowena?”

The two nurses exchanged glances. “She tried very hard to hurt herself,” the older nurse said. “She cut her wrists and took some pills.”

“What?”

“Are you sure you’re over fourteen?” The red-haired nurse stood up.

Crystal fumbled through her bag and took out her I.D. again. She showed it to the two women.

“Don’t stay too long,” the red-haired nurse said. “And why don’t you stop by the desk on your way out, okay?”

Crystal nodded and started down the hall. She felt nervous, almost afraid. Loretta had just said that Rowena was ill. She didn’t say that Rowena had tried to kill herself.

The room was fairly large. There were two beds. The one near the door was empty. Rowena, incredibly pale, was in the other. Crystal stood in the door for a long moment, then entered. She went as quietly as she could to the bed.

Rowena’s eyes were puffy, but they were open. Crystal
stood near the bed. There was an I.V. going into Rowena’s left arm. Both of her wrists were bandaged. On one wrist was the plastic identification bracelet all patients wore.

“Hi.” Crystal spoke softly.

Rowena moved her eyes away from where Crystal stood, without moving her head.

Crystal heard a doctor being paged. The sound of the intercom seemed to come from a great distance. Traffic noises drifted from the street below.

“How are you feeling?” she asked.

“Stupid,” Rowena said. “Stupid and ugly.”

“You don’t look ugly,” Crystal said.

“Yes, I do.” Rowena’s voice cracked as she spoke. “I’ve been ugly a long time. I know that. I know that.”

“That’s not true,” Crystal said. She put out her hand to touch Rowena’s, then moved it away quickly from the bandages.

“You look at the pictures, and they say that they’re okay, but you know they’re ugly.”

“Hey, Rowena, don’t talk like that. You’re going to be okay,” Crystal said. She could feel the tears stinging her eyes. “Honest.”

“Crystal, I feel so bad.”

“Oh, baby.” Crystal put her hand against Rowena’s cheek. “Please get all right.”

“Could you tell my mom I’m in the hospital?” Rowena asked. “Don’t tell her what happened or anything, just tell her…tell her I’m sick. Okay?”

“Okay. Sure.”

“The phone probably isn’t working. We always used to
have a joke, me and Mom. We’d try to figure out what worked most, Dad or the phone.”

“I’ll go see her,” Crystal said.

“The name is Maria DeLea,” Rowena said. “I always used to say she married my father just so her name would rhyme. But it makes it easy to remember. She lives on Bank Street in Jersey City. You can get the bus at the Port Authority. The fare’s only two seventy-five. Something like that. Anyway, she’s always home. She don’t go out or anything.”

“I’ll do it,” Crystal said.

“Just tell her that Rosa is sick, and see if it’s all right if I can come home.”

“You’re Rosa?”

“Yeah. Don’t tell anybody you’re seeing my mom, okay?”

“How come?”

“Where I come from, my folks and all, it’s not the greatest place, you know? That’s why anything that happens to me in New York, in modeling, it really isn’t so bad.”

“I won’t tell anybody,” Crystal said.

“Is my face clean?” Rowena asked. “I don’t have any makeup or anything on?”

“There’s a little liner around your eyes,” Crystal said. “You want me to make you up so you look like Rowena again?”

“No.” Rowena spoke softly. “Clean it all off, so I’m Rosa again.”

There were tissues near the side of the bed, and Crystal started cleaning Rowena’s face. She had cream in her purse and put it on first, then wiped it carefully off.

“When you get out of here we’re going to have a great time,” Crystal said. “We’re going to go down to Banana Republic on Forty-ninth Street and buy them out. You have a little lipstick on, too. You’d better leave it, because your lips look so dry.”

“I want all of it off.” Rowena’s eyes were closed.

“Okay, buddy,” Crystal said.

“I knew you’d come,” Rowena said when Crystal had finished taking the lipstick off. “Before…when I was just laying in Jerry’s place on the floor, I kept thinking about you. I kept thinking that I had you for my friend.”

“I am your friend,” Crystal said. “Now you tell me what we’re going to do together when you get well again.”

“I don’t know,” Rowena said. “Maybe just hang out?”

“Yeah, sure.”

There was a footstep behind Crystal, and she turned to see Loretta come in with a short, dapper man. Crystal patted Rowena’s shoulder as Loretta and the man went to the other side of the bed.

“How you doing, young lady?” Loretta asked.

“Okay,” Rowena said. “I’m feeling a lot better now.”

“This is Dr. Barber.” Loretta touched the man’s sleeve lightly. “He’s an old friend and he’s going to look out for you for a while.”

“I’m pleased to meet such a lovely young lady,” Dr. Barber said. He spoke with a slight accent. “I’m sure you are going to be just fine.”

“Jerry got a call from Miller Belts,” Loretta said. “They want you to do their new spring line. He told them you were busy and you’d talk to them in two weeks. You know what they did?”

“What?”

“They offered more money right away.” Loretta smiled. “Jerry told them you’d definitely be in touch.”

“What did they offer?” Rowena asked.

“They offered the same money for print as they did for the spots last year,” Loretta said, nodding in obvious satisfaction. “He asked me to handle the paperwork, if that’s all right with you.”

“That’s real good.” Rowena tried to force a smile. “I don’t know if I’ll be…ready in two weeks.”

“You’ll be ready.” Loretta leaned over the bed and pushed Rowena’s hair out of her eyes. “You’re going to have to get out of here and control Jerry. He was talking to another account about you on the phone today. You know the Nine West account?”

“Shoes,” Rowena said. “I did that last year.”

“Looks like they want you back,” Loretta said.

“Are you getting a lot of rest?” Dr. Barber asked. “A lot of sleep?”

“I don’t sleep much,” Rowena said.

“You have to get your sleep. I’m going to have a talk with the resident in half an hour,” Dr. Barber said. “We’ll have you back and working very shortly. Do you know that work is an excellent medicine?”

Rowena smiled.

“Look, we’d better get out of here,” Loretta said. “I’ve got a lot of good things planned for you, a lot of hard work, so we’d better let you get your rest.”

“Loretta?”

“He’s got stomach problems again,” Loretta said. “You know how Jerry’s stomach is.”

“Was he eating Chinese food?” Rowena asked. “I told him to stay away from Chinese food.”

“I’ll remind him.” Loretta leaned over the bed and kissed Rowena. “Meanwhile, young lady, you get some rest.”

“And I’ll be by in the morning to see you again,” Dr. Barber said. “Loretta insists that I take personal care of you.”

Loretta started toward the door. Dr. Barber moved around toward the end of the bed, looked at Rowena’s chart, nodded, and left.

“Take care of yourself, baby,” Crystal said.

“Okay, and don’t forget to do that favor for me,” Rowena said. She moved her arm and winced. Crystal kissed her on the cheek and left.

As soon as they were away from the room, Loretta took Crystal’s arm and moved her quickly down the hallway, away from Rowena’s room. “You’ve got the part!” Loretta turned Crystal around in the hall. “Joe Sidney called and said it’s yours. All you have to do is show up!”

“The movie?”

“
The
movie,” Loretta said. “And you’re going to be
the
movie star!”

“Oh my goodness!”

“He’s sending over letters of commitment in the morning. The financing is in two parts, so he needs signatures for two six-month periods. He said he saw the photos and he thinks they were great!”

“He saw the photos?”

“Jerry must have sent him a set,” Loretta said. “Anyway, I want you to get everything out of your mind except this role. The movie people want to see you sometime this week to discuss a publicity strategy with you. I think he just wants to see
how excited you are.”

“Oh.”

“You don’t sound very enthusiastic. Is there something wrong?”

“No, I guess not,” Crystal said.

“This thing with Rowena?”

“That a little,” Crystal said.

“Look, Crystal, Dr. Barber is a psychiatrist,” Loretta said. “He’s going to have a go at Rowena. I think she has mental problems, and I’m going to do my best to help her out of what Dr. Barber thinks is a state of temporary depression. Then, frankly, I’m going to suggest to her that she try another business. This is a tough business to start in, and I think it’s even tougher to stay in. What Rowena needs is to marry a postal worker and have lots of adorable babies.”

“What happened?”

“She’d been working with one of the agencies, Sue Charney or somebody, and then she left them and Jerry’s been handling her. Jerry told her she lost an account, but what really happened is he decided to drop her. That’s what happens when you let a photographer represent you. He has to balance your career with his own.”

“It’s not fair,” Crystal said.

“It’s hard, Crystal. But it’s fair. People have too much money tied up in these accounts to worry about everyone’s problems.”

“But I think Jerry and Rowena…you know, mean more to each other than just accounts,” Crystal said. “Sometimes when she talked about him, she just seemed to light up. It’s as if she’s not really alive unless he’s around.”

“Dr. Barber, would you excuse us for a minute?” Loretta
put her hand on the arm of the white-haired man. Dr. Barber nodded and walked down the hall toward the nurse’s station.

“Crystal, sometimes we confuse interest and attention with love,” Loretta said. “I think that Jerry was interested in Rowena, but I don’t think he ever loved her.”

“Does she know that?”

“Sometimes we don’t want to know that we’re not loved,” Loretta said.

Crystal felt the tears stinging her eyes as she turned away from Loretta. She felt the older woman’s arm around her waist as they walked toward where Dr. Barber waited, talking to one of the nurses.

“Do you want a lift to your hotel?” Dr. Barber asked Loretta.

“At least to Manhattan,” Loretta said. “Crystal, don’t get too upset over this. Rowena’s very emotional, but she’ll get over this. Trust me, you go home now and get some rest. Call Sue in the morning, and she’ll talk to you about registering with the Screen Actors Guild.”

They were in the lobby of the hospital. “By the way, what favor did Rowena want you to do for her?”

“Favor?” Crystal looked at Loretta. “Oh, to bring her some makeup.”

“Don’t bother,” Loretta said. “I’ll send some over by messenger. You know what I believe? I believe you can get sick just by visiting hospitals. Something to do with staph infections, I think. I read a study about that a few years ago.”

The bus rocked and jolted its way through the tunnel to Jersey City. Crystal stared through the dirty windows at
the busy, narrow streets and tried to imagine Rowena walking along them. She couldn’t. It was such a distant life from modeling. She and Rowena worked in the sweaty business of making glamour, and here were the people they made it for. The bus squealed to a stop, sending an elderly man against her shoulder.