The Blue Room: Vol. 1 (6 page)

          “The truth is, though,” my
mom smiles. “Despite everything. Despite the hardship, the difficulties, the
motels...I wouldn't have had it any other way.”

          “That's crazy.” Of course
she would have. She could have been a star, a diva, a millionaire. She could
have had it all, made it big. Instead she made that one huge mistake.

          “Having you...” She beams
up at me. “That was my dream. That was worth it. And I wouldn't trade you for
all the stardom, all the fame and fortune, all the success in the world. I got
my dream coming true. Every time I look at you, I'm reminded of that. But I
want you to have it easier than I did, Staci. I want you to have
everything.
Love and success. A family and a career. And I worry that Hollywood, LA,
that world – it's not the place to get that everything.”

          Maybe she'd rather me to go
to law school, business school, med school. Something safe. Something that
would put me on the track to success.

          But I've always known that
I have to sing. I've always known that my future, my fate, is onstage. It's in
the Atussi blood.

          “Promise me something,” she
whispers, and I know whatever it is, whatever she wants, I'll make that promise
to her.

          “Of course, Mom. Anything.”

          “If you find a man – make
sure he's a good man. Don't settle for anything less. He can be poor, he can be
shy, he can have too-big ears or be a little bit awkward at remembering your
anniversary. But make sure he's a
good
man. One who treats you right.
And if you can't find one that you like, promise me, honey, you'll take up with
no man at all. Never take up with a man who isn't good – you promise me that?”
          I think of Terrence, again, and I'm almost ashamed of how far I
almost let things go, how stupid I almost let him make me be. I think of him,
and once more my thighs clench together involuntarily in memory of the pleasure
he gave me. I remember screaming his name in my dreams and I blush.

          But I say nothing. I take
my mother into my arms and kiss her, hold her, make her the promise that I’m
also making to myself.

          “I promise, Mom.”

          I mean it.

Chapter
6

         
I
don't have too long to stay at my mother's side. My return
ticket was for 5:30, and I know I have to get a good night's sleep at the Blue
Tower if I want to do a halfway decent job at the club tomorrow. Not that I'm
sure whether or not I want to. Doing a good job means that a lot of men will be
clamoring to spend the night with me – and I'm not sure I'm ready for that yet.

         
Could
I do it? If I
had to. If it was the only way I could keep my cover. My virginity was just a
concept, after all  – sex was just an act, wasn't it? And Rita – I had to find
out what happened to her. If she was even still alive. If she needed my help.
If Rita was in danger somewhere, I'd have to do whatever it took to get her out
safely. And if that meant making men like Angus happy, I guess that's what I'd
have to do.

          The idea still fills me
with revulsion – and anger. What is it about a woman's body that made the most
powerful men – because the powerful were always men, aren't they? – lose all
control like that? What is it about this skin, these bones, this collection of
flesh that I live and breathe in, this part of myself, that men thinks belongs
to them, just because they want to do things to it? Don't I have more to offer
them than my pound of flesh?

          I want to be sick. I don't
doubt what Terrence says – that the Blue Room is one of the most powerful
places in the world. It's where deals are made and broken – over bodies like
mine. Over the backs of women like me. I retch the whole plane ride home,
thinking about it.

          No, I decide. If I'm going
to have sex, it's going to be for me, because I want to, because I love and
trust someone. Not because some rich guy with a hard-on thinks I owe him one
just for existing while male. My mother is right. I'm better off with no man at
all than with a man who treats me like a piece of meat.

          But could I pretend? Just
for a little while? Just if it meant getting Rita home safely?

          I try not to think about
it. I tell myself I don't have to decide just now. That I'll be able to hold
the wolves from the door just a little longer.

          By the time I get back to
the Blue Tower, I'm exhausted, physically and emotionally. My day off hasn't
exactly been a vacation. I make my way to the service entrance, and am
surprised to find the maid I knew that morning looking at me in shock.

          “What are you doing here,
miss?”

          “Going...home?” I venture.

          “Miss, the Blue Room girls
take the guest entrance – like everyone else.”

          “But we're...service,
aren't we?” I mean, we get the luxury, the amenities, the perks – but we're
just working girls, after all.

          “Terrence is insistent. All
our girls live like guests, here.”

          The public entrance. The
shiny new lobby. Terrence wants us all out in public. Pretending to be famous
actresses, movie stars, society ladies. Pretending like we're not glorified
prostitutes. But that's all LA is, isn't it? Pretend.

          So I strut into the front
lobby, my head held high, and pretend like I own the place.

          All the while, I wonder.
Do
they know
? The other people here – the businessmen drinking in the lobby,
the matrons with their tiny Maltese dogs sitting and waiting to check in – do
they know who I really am? What I really do? How much I don't belong here with
them?

          When I get to my room, I'm
surprised to find that someone's been in. There's a whole bunch of files that
weren't here before, all in beautifully monogrammed stationary. “Breakfast.
Manners. Exercise. Language Skills. Facial. Waxing. Sauna.”

          Apparently, they want me to
learn conversational Mandarin and Arabic, fluent French, art history, and the
political history of the Balkans. It's a better education than I ever got at
Briar Valley Community College, that's for sure.

          I'm almost excited.

          The menus, though, make my
heart sink. Prescribed diets – all carrot sticks and celery – with precise
times to eat and drink every day of the week. Eyebrow tweezing is scheduled, as
are scrubs, waxing, and something unappetizingly referred to as a “mud rub”.

          This isn't going to be
easy.

          On the top of the files is
a handwritten note, in a style so elegant it looks like calligraphy.

         
See me at once. 2
^nd
Floor, Room 202.

          Josephine Walters (Mrs.).

         
I begin to wonder about Josephine
Walters (Mrs.). At once, I form a mental image of her: something like the
formidable madam from
Gone With the Wind
and the stern matron of a
girls' boarding school. I immediately know she's behind all of this – from the
Mandarin to the tweezing. And, all of a sudden, I'm terrified.

          It's with great trepidation
that I force my way down the hallway and into the elevator. Whoever this
Josephine Walters (Mrs.) is, I have a feeling she isn't going to like me.
Mandarin and Arabic, let alone a 24/7 beauty routine, aren't exactly my forte. I
didn't exactly grow up going to finishing school. Sure, I'd have loved to learn
the socio-political history of the Balkans, but I was a bit too busy flipping
burgers to pay for our by-the-night motels to do more than scrawl out the
answers to my school assignments.

          I'm not, in other words,
high-class courtesan material.

          But the woman I see sitting
behind the desk in the sparsely decorated, briskly efficient office in room 202
hardly looks like a high-class courtesan
or
a frightening matriarch.
Small, wiry, with black hair pinned in a prim bun and square-rimmed black
glasses sitting neatly on her pert little nose, Josephine Walter (Mrs.) looks
like a businesswoman, not a madam.

          “Good evening, Miss
Atussi.” She shakes my hand as briskly as if I were here on a job interview.

          “You wanted to see me?”

          “Yes.” Her eyes dart to the
desk, and I see she's got my file before her. “I've just been going over what I
have on you. I see you have some college.”

          “An associate's degree...”
I say. “I wanted to go to a four-year program, but money...”

          She's moved on.
“Performance experience, that's good. Local plays. Amateur dramatics. Church
choir.”

          She raises an eyebrow.

          “Service experience, you've
got plenty of.”

          Flipping burgers, she
means?

          “I worked for a dentist
during college,” I said. Like somehow working for a dentist was more
respectable than flipping burgers. Like somehow flipping burgers was something
to be ashamed of – when I was applying to work as a prostitute.

          “So, you can work with
people.”

          “I mostly did filing,” I
say. “Calling in for records.”

          “I see. So fresh.” She
gives me the once-over and I don't even have the foggiest idea what she's
thinking. “So fresh and young. Stand up.”

          I stand up.

          “Walk.”

          I walk.

          “No, no, no.” Her voice is
low but clear. “It's all wrong. You walk too fast – too much energy. Too
bubbly. Like you're someone's kid sister.”

          “But I'm only...” I
automatically protest.

          “I don't care how old you
are. You're over eighteen, aren't you? You're a woman, not a girl. These are worldly
men we cater to here. Men who want women who know how to feel comfortable and
assured in their own skin. Who feel luxurious in their own bodies. You see the
starlets, the supermodels, these men take on dates to events, premieres, launch
parties? They may be young, but they've seen the world. They're self-assured,
confident, and sophisticated beyond their years. Not jejune girls-next-door.”

          I almost flush.

          “Well if they've got
starlets and models as girlfriends,” I can't stop myself from being sarcastic,
“I don't see what they need
us
for, anyhow.”

          Josephine Walters (Mrs.)
shakes her head. “I imagine a girl like you would know more about the
psychology of the opposite sex than that.”

          I'm not sure if that's an
insult or a compliment, so I force myself to keep my mouth shut. But I can't
bite my tongue. “I've been busy,” I said. “Earning money. Supporting my mom.
Doesn't give me a lot of time to date around.”

          “Then I'll summarize it for
you in a nutshell. Clearly you like things done quickly. Men at the Blue Room
–they want it here, and they want it all. They want the illusion. They may have
famous and beautiful companions outside of the Blue Room, but that's nothing,
nothing
,
to what they can have in here.  Here is where they can let their wildest dreams,
their most depraved fantasies, their most unorthodox desires come true. And the
girls at the Blue Room will satisfy these desires. They will go wherever those
men take them.”

         
Is that where Rita went?
Wherever some man took her?

         
“So, you mean sex.” I know I should
hold my tongue, but I can't. This place – this woman – are filling me with
rage.

          “Please! So vulgar!” She
raises her head at me. “This isn't Nevada. Prostitution is illegal here. We
would never,
ever
formally encourage our girls to sleep with clients.”

          I nod.

          “What happens between you
and our clients, romantically or otherwise, is between the two of you.”

          “I understand,” I say. I
read between the lines.
We want you to sleep with them, but if something
goes wrong, then it's your problem, kid. You're on your own.

         
Josephine Walters (Mrs.) smiles. “Men
come to the Blue Room because we offer them the best. We offer them a place
where they can get their needs and desires met. In other words, this is the
place where they can get what they need – and what they can't get anywhere
else.” Her lips are like rubies. “Clear enough for you, Miss Atussi?”

Chapter
7

         
I
'm sure what to expect next. My experience with Josephine
Walter (Mrs.) leaves me shaken. The way she speaks about the things I would
have to do – why, it was if she's talking about mergers and acquisitions:
something formal and businesslike and utterly expected! I can hardly believe
the meaning behind her words. Even after a few days in the world of the Blues,
I'm utterly bewildered by how...normal it all seems. Having sex for money, in
the world of the Blue Room, is a boring everyday occurrence.