Sapphire and Shadow (A Woman's Life) (8 page)

“How’s that?”

“You fooled around with them, and then you killed them. No ties, no pain.”

Arlene nodded, the mound of fluffy red curls bouncing around her head like springs that had suddenly been compressed and then released.

“Truer words were never spoken. If I had left Sam on a high point instead of wallowing in this valley of neglect, I might be thirty pounds lighter.” She helped herself to a slice of French bread and buttered it generously as she continued to philosophize. “Food isn’t as good as sex, but at least it stays with you a while.” She patted her hip and laughed lustily. “A long while. C’mon, Johanna,” she lifted the younger woman’s chin with her finger tip, “no man is worth brooding over. With the lights out, they’re all the same.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

Arlene drew her carefully penciled eyebrows together. “You mean you never—?”

Johanna shook her head. It wasn’t chic to admit it, but Johanna had never cared to be chic. “Never.”

Arlene stared at her as if she was trying to comprehend this information. Food and gossip were temporarily forgotten. “Really?”

“Really.”

“Oh my God, I could be dining with the last of a dying breed. You’re practically extinct, sweetie. A virgin wife.” She giggled, then saw that Johanna was hurt. Arlene hurried her next words. “That’s rather refreshing, actually, considering the jaded world we find ourselves living in.” She leaned closer, scrutinizing Johanna’s face. She knew of several men in their immediate sphere who would have wanted this woman in their beds, whatever the price. “Never even once?”

Johanna raised her head. “No.”

“My dear, how do you stand it?”

“I don’t need ‘it.’” She tried to curb her annoyance. She knew Arlene meant no harm. “I need Harry. I need the way he was. I want love, Arlene, not sex.”

“Well—“ Arlene drew out the word as she considered Johanna’s statement. “When you can’t get what you want, you take what you can.” She caught their waiter’s eye and lifted her empty glass aloft. The young man nodded and retreated.

Johanna suddenly felt sober as she shook her head. At least her mind was clear. The rest of her body wasn’t in focus yet. “Sorry, that would be selling out, settling for it. And I don’t do that kind of thing.”

“No, apparently not. A pity. When you want your sheets warmed, let me know. I know of at least three candidates who would offer you a good size chunk of the moon to be able to nibble on your, um, ear,” Arlene amended when she took stock of who she was talking to. “And other parts thereof,” she couldn’t resist adding.

Johanna had the last of her drink, then set the glass down. “You take them.”

“Oh, I would if I could, Johanna, I most certainly would if I could, but with me, they only want the ear, to talk, to complain and to get sympathy. I’d switch with you in a minute.”

She paused to consider her last statement. She thought of Harry in place of Sam. Sam might not be loving, but he wasn’t unkind. And there was something brutal about Harry. “Well, maybe not.”

Johanna laughed sadly as she played with her salad. “I didn’t think so.”

Chapter Nine

There had been a time when she looked forward to attending parties like this one, Johanna thought. Then it had been an experience akin to stepping into Wonderland. She had been fascinated by the glitter, the wealth, the power that churned within these gatherings of the finely dressed chosen few. The beautiful people. But she had found all too soon that they weren’t so beautiful after all, not beneath their carefully made-up faces and their expensive designer clothes. They were greedy, grasping and cruel. Not all of them, but enough.

Perhaps it was like this everywhere, although she couldn’t remember feeling this way in the little town where she had grown up. Perhaps, she mused, that was the problem. She had been too cocooned, too sheltered, too untrained to be able to handle the sort of life she was living now.

Maybe these types of goings-on did exist elsewhere, but they seemed more pronounced when they involved Hollywood persona because the people were all larger than life, or so their publicists would have wanted the rest of the world to believe.

Johanna glanced at her husband as they entered, together for once. She smiled but felt like a hypocrite. Everyone there, she felt, knew that their union was a sham.

Harry still cut a resplendent figure in his tuxedo. Ten pounds lighter than his sparse frame should actually be carrying and with a haunted look to his eyes, he was still a very good-looking man. And charm, when he wanted it, could ooze through his very fingertips. There was a magnetism in his eyes, when they weren’t glazed over, she thought cynically, that held his audience, male or female, right where he wanted them.

She supposed it was the memory of that, and nights of tenderness and pleasure, that kept her where she was, hoping, praying. Johanna alternated between despair and optimism when she thought of the future. Mostly, she thought, despair.

Johanna saw people staring at them as they entered the vast hotel ballroom. Harry knew how to make an entrance, she thought, even when he walked silently into a room. Heads would turn, conversations would pause. Once that had been because he was the bright young director, the lightning-witted genius who could make a turnip cry or laugh at will, let alone a performer. Everyone wanted him to direct their picture, everyone wanted to be seen with him.

Now, Johanna knew, the conversations stopped because fresh speculation would begin. Was he straight tonight? Would he make a fool of himself? How long before he’d fall on his face, or find a woman to seduce? And how long would it be before he destroyed himself completely? She had no doubts that bets were made as to the length of time it would take.

Part of her heart ached for Harry, her Harry, the old Harry. And part of her felt that he was getting no less than he deserved. She prayed that perhaps the scorn of his peers and sub-peers, as he had begun to call them, would finally shake him up like nothing else could.

Alicia Martin, her hair done up in a winged hairdo that seemed to wantonly defy gravity, her bosom nearly exposed in its entirety in a sapphire blue gown that bore a designer’s name and price, glided toward them like a shark cutting through the water to get to its prey. In her cool, regal manner she simultaneously nodded at Johanna and dismissed her. Her attention, for whatever reason, was entirely on Harry. She offered him both cheeks to be kissed.

As he kissed her, she took hold of both of his hands in hers. “Harold, darling, we were beginning to think that perhaps you weren’t going to come.”

His gaze lingered over her exposed breasts, then he cast a belittling glance at Johanna.

Johanna wondered if he had managed to do a line or two of powder before they came, even though he had promised her, contemptuously enough, that he wouldn’t.

“Johanna,” Harry informed Alicia, “was having second thoughts about coming tonight.”

“Second thoughts?” The scarlet nails fanned out along the tanned expanse of breast.

Harry was talking about her and staring at Alicia. Johanna felt her temper rising.

“Second thoughts?” Alicia repeated, pouting prettily. “Should I be offended?”

Johanna knew Alicia didn’t give a damn what she thought about the woman or her party. She wasn’t in the business of caring what wives thought. Only studio hierarchy mattered and it seemed that Alicia hadn’t decided whether or not Harry was down for the count.

She’d be damned if she’d stand there like a mute. “It’s just that Paul—“ Johanna began.

“Yes, yes, terrible tragedy, wasn’t it?” The dead did not matter. They didn’t make policy or money. Alicia linked her arm through Harry’s and was already leading him away. “But life is for the living, isn’t it?” she laughed wickedly into Harry’s face as she slowly rubbed her bosom against his arm.

“—has only been dead a couple of days and I thought it wasn’t appropriate to attend a party just yet,” Johanna finished, determined to get the words out. For whatever good it did, she thought ruefully. She hated Alicia Martin, hated this party and hated herself for not saying no to Harry. He certainly wouldn’t have missed her if she hadn’t attended.

Maybe that was why she had decided to come after all.

“Talking to yourself, sweetie?” Arlene came up behind her. She was dressed in a black sequined floor length gown that made her bear a striking resemblance to a sparkling Franklin stove.

Johanna sighed as she turned toward her friend. “I wasn’t when I started out. But it seems no one wants to listen.”

She cast a damning look in Alicia’s direction. The woman was still clinging to Harry and laughing up into his face as if he was saying something very witty. Johanna had no doubts that Harry probably thought it was.

“Not about anything sad, you know that.” Arlene looked around the room, apparently absorbing everything. It was her chosen avocation. There was nowhere that she would rather be than in the center of a party. “They all carry their own little Greek tragedies around with them, or so they think. Much more like pathos or last week’s soap opera. ‘As The Stomach Churns,’ how’s that?”

Johanna laughed. “I think I’ve heard that before.”

“Well, I said it with more flair,” Arlene declared with conviction. “Now, let’s go and ogle some great looking men.”

But Johanna made no move to join the woman. “Where’s Sam?”

Arlene pretended to frown. A second chin puddled beneath her first. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Seriously—“

“Seriously,” Arlene answered solemnly. Then she relented as she gestured vaguely to a far corner of the banquet room toward a cluster of people who were making more than their share of noise. “He’s over there somewhere, probably still with that platinum starlet from Spanky’s Holiday breathing all over him. Dora McDaniels I think. Poor ditzy thing thinks if she gives Sam a little action, he can get her a part in Harry’s film. Life never changes, does it?”

Subtly, Arlene guided Johanna toward a table covered with trays of food. In the center of the long table was a sculpture of a nude female.

“Oh, I don’t know.” Johanna shifted her eyes from the sculpture and scanned the table. Maybe having an hors d’oeuvre wouldn’t be a bad idea after all. “I think it does.”

“Maybe.” Arlene helped herself to a plate full of something that looked like pigs in a blanket. Many pigs. “Trouble is,” she popped one into her rounded scarlet mouth, “it changes for the worse.”

Johanna shook her head. Beneath her wispy bangs, her brow furrowed. “I don’t like to think that.”

“Neither do I, but it’s true.” Arlene stopped eating. “Are you planning to stop the party by breaking into a rendition of Tomorrow and making us all weep into our handkerchiefs?” The hors d’oeuvre hovered an inch away from her mouth.

Johanna guided Arlene’s short fingers to complete the action. Lips met food with satisfaction. “You forgot how to weep a long time ago, Arlene.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” She saw someone across the room and sighed. “I weep every time I see a young guy in tight pants walk by and know I can’t have him.”

Johanna handed her plate to an attendant behind the table and shook her head when he tried to offer her more. “If he’s wearing tight pants,” she turned back to Arlene, “then he’s probably gay.”

“Maybe.” Arlene popped two heaping crackers into her mouth and they slid down in an amazingly fast time. “But I’m not prejudiced. Besides,” she spread another healthy slab of cheddar cheese over a tiny cracker, “it would certainly be fun finding out. Hold it,” she called to the waiter who walked by.

“Arlene, you can’t,” Johanna hissed, not exactly sure what her friend was capable of.

“I’m just getting another glass of champagne, Johanna,” Arlene said innocently, her small eyes disappearing into her face as she grinned. “Relax a little.”

The tall, handsome waiter smiled broadly at the two women and lowered the tray to accommodate Johanna’s reach. She accepted a glass, winding her slender fingers around the stem, almost for support rather than having something to drink.

Arlene watched the waiter as he moved away from them. “Just look at those hips, will you?” Her sigh was audibly loud. “Where do you think they get all those gorgeous men from to act as waiters?”

“The unemployed actors line,” Johanna said simply, sipping her champagne.

The drink was bitter and not at all pleasing. Alicia was skimping again. Quantity instead of quality, Johanna thought. But she didn’t set it down. She wanted to have something to do with her hands instead of just knotting them together.

She looked around the huge room for Harry. It wasn’t hard to find him He was now in the center of a crowd. Probably pontificating. The crowd was made up mostly of young women. Once, he had been in the center of crowds of men, men who listened when he spoke. Now he talked to women who pretended to listen and hoped that they could get something out of it.

“Has he left you unguarded again?”

Johanna turned as she heard the deep baritone voice to her left. “Hello, Marty.” She nodded at the assistant producer her husband had convinced to link his name with this movie. She wondered if her smile looked as forced as it felt.

“You know,” Marty slipped an arm around her shoulders, “Harry might be a movie genius—“

“The operative word here is ‘might,’” Arlene said into her glass, but loud enough for Johanna to hear.

“—but he certainly doesn’t seem to know how to appreciate the finer things in life. Now if you were mine, Johanna—“ Lazily, he let his fingertips glide along her bare back.

She raised her eyes to his face. The meaning of his words were very clear. It was an open invitation, any time, any place, anywhere. She felt revolted. “But I’m not, am I?”

“My loss.”

She patted the smooth, handsome face. “You’ll get over it.” She saw the star of Harry’s ill-fated fiasco coming their way, a woman with ivory skin, flowing blond hair—her own—and a figure that was only out done by her insatiable appetite for good looking men. “In about five minutes, I’ll wager.”

Marty looked at her quizzically as she took a step backward, safely away from his arm. Then he saw Tracy and his smile broadened. “Business,” he murmured, taking his leave.