Undead L.A. 2 (15 page)

“I've got a bag of clothes in my trunk from last month's shoots,” she said. “I'm willing to drive there right now and shower on set if you tell me honestly why Jezzabella isn't doing this. Deal?”

“You cannot repeat this…,” Benjamin started. Samantha grinned ear to ear.

There's nothing I love more in the whole wide world than getting my way
, she thought.
 

“Deal.”

“She got spooked by the HIV crisis,” he confided.
 

“But she wasn't even on the quarantine list,” Samantha exclaimed, pulling into traffic. “Or was she?”

“She wasn't,” he said flatly. “She spent the last few days reading porn gossip sites and freaking herself out. She quit the business and moved back to her parents’ house in Oregon. She left the model house this morning.”

“Wow,” Samantha hooted, her voice curling into a silky laugh. “What an idiot. Tell them I'll be there in fifteen minutes.”

“Will do. Call me back when you get on set.”

He hung up before she could respond. Samantha no longer had to fight back her elation. She burst into a laughing fit so intense that tears of joy spilled down both sides of her face. She'd hated Jezzabella long before she got cast in the biggest role the porn business had to offer in the last decade. People kept telling Jezza that she was the new Cherry Haze, that she was the clear contender for Best New Starlet. Every year during the AVN Awards show, the previous years’ starlet would pass the crown to the new winner. Samantha would rather swallow glass than give that arrogant bitch her tiara. Now she knew she wouldn't have to anymore. In the entire history of the trade magazine, they'd always leaned towards rewarding girls who promoted the image of the industry in positive ways, brought in mainstream attention, and were generally reliable—no small list of accomplishments in the jizz biz. Even if Jezzabella made a complete one-eighty and came back with a hundred fresh scenes, she'd never live this down.

Traffic came to a halt as several police cars with their lights still flashing blocked the road ahead. Two cops in uniform were arresting a homeless man, while several people filmed the incident with their cellphones. One cop had his knee on the vagrant’s head, while the other twisted his arm at an unnatural angle up and behind him. The homeless man thrashed wildly in an attempt to free himself, as if he couldn't feel his limbs any more.
 

“Great,” Samantha moaned, veering off onto a side street in search of a clear path to Figueroa. “All I wanted to do was cut across to Alameda, not take a tour of fucking tent city.”
 

The road up ahead was completely blocked by homeless people pushing shopping carts and wandering in the street. They seemed totally oblivious to her as she laid on the horn and revved her engine, threatening to run them down.
 

So this is Skid Row,
she thought.
It's a different world down here, tucked away in the shadows—a place the wretched and useless and addicted losers came to be forgotten.
 

Samantha realized the feeling growing inside her wasn't fear, but contempt. She'd literally sold her ass to survive, and didn't have patience for anyone who wasn't willing to do the same. She spied a dark alley that led to the next street over and gunned her new Mercedes into it. Darkness swallowed up her white luxury vehicle as she barreled like a bullet down the narrow corridor towards the light at the other side. She was more than halfway there when she saw him—a sad old man missing half his teeth, bundled in dirty rags and staggering in her direction. His blood-smeared face flashed past her vision for a single, blurry moment as he turned towards her, his unshaven face, droopy raccoon eyes ringed purple, with the alcoholics telltale-red bulbous Rudolph nose, hands raised, eyes wide and solid white. Samantha jerked the wheel to the right and heard the sound of metal scraping on brick as she collided with the side of the alley, sheering off her passenger side mirror in the process. Her reaction had been instinct more than anything, but she realized as she slammed on the brakes that she had hit the homeless man despite swerving into the wall, clipping his left leg and sending him flying up and over her car with a series of loud thuds before he came crashing face down in a puddle-filled pothole behind a Chinese restaurant. Fear gave way to rage as she realized the damage she'd done to her new car.

If he's not dead he's gonna wish he was
, Samantha thought as she threw open her door and charged out to confront the obviously dope-addled bum.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she demanded as she stormed over to him. The man was making low groaning sounds like an animal, as he attempted to push himself back up on his feet. Samantha was no doctor, but she could easily see that his left leg was broken in several places with the bone sticking through his ragged torn slacks. “You could have killed both of us!”

The man shook his head and screamed in rage, causing her to flinch reflexively. Samantha's heart raced as she looked around. There was no one watching. No witnesses.
 

If I leave now maybe no one will ever know,
she thought.
Besides, he's just a homeless person. Who the hell cares what happens to him?
 

A stab of guilt shot through her at how callous she'd become. There was a time when she cared more about other people, but after living in Los Angeles and selling herself for money she'd grown coldhearted.

What's wrong with me? When did I become such a bitch?

“All right asshole, consider this your lucky day,” she said, walking over to him. “I'm late for set but I'm not gonna leave you here. I'll drop you off at the hospital, but after that you're on your own. Considering you probably just cost me a few grand in repairs, you should be grateful. Come on, let's go.”

She reached down to help him up when the smell hit her. It was like rotting meat left out in the sun mixed with sewer water. The man turned his face towards her, his white eyes foaming with wriggling maggots. Samantha let out a scream of pure terror at the sight of him. He lunged towards her mouth first, closing the short gap between them in an instant, and sinking his rotten teeth into her wrist just above her hand. Samantha shrieked as he chomped down, breaking the skin and grinding bone on bone. She jerked her hand back in horror, bright red streaks of blood drooling over her pale white skin. She fell hard on her ass, feeling the gross wetness of the dirty street seep into her designer jeans.

“You motherfucker!”

The man crawled towards her, scarlet dribbling over his cracked lips, a low unearthly moan coming from his awful mouth, and Samantha found herself crab walking backward as fast as she could, the loose gravel on the wet asphalt tearing into her delicate palms as she scrambled to escape her attacker.

“Get away from me, you fucking freak!”

He tried to stand, but his damaged leg made a loud cracking sound and he tumbled back to the dirty street. Samantha didn't waste any time. She bolted back to her car and locked herself in. The phone rang and she saw that Benjamin was calling her, but she couldn't bring herself to answer it. She fumbled with her keys, blood running in sticky rivulets down her forearm. At last the car started. She threw it into gear and gunned it the rest of the way down the alley, shooting out into traffic on busy Alameda and nearly sideswiping a truck full of landscaping equipment. Her thoughts raced as she wove in and out of cars, desperately wanting to put as much distance between her and that
thing
as possible.

Should I call the cops? Do I report it? What if they don't believe me? What if they put me in jail for hitting him and taking off? But my life was in danger; at least I think it was. Plus if I call it in there is no way I will be able to make it to set. I'm not going to fuck up my one chance to crossover and be like Sasha Grey.

The phone rang and rang as she drove, but she didn't seem to hear it anymore. There was a dull throb behind her temples threatening to blossom into a full-blown migraine.

***
 

Benjamin jammed on his brakes and swerved to the left without looking, narrowly avoiding slamming into the back of an older red Toyota Corolla that had cut him off with no warning, and dropping his cellphone in the process. He'd been distracted, reading a series of panic texts one of his clients was sending him about buying out their contract, not wanting to shoot any more scenes for fear of catching AIDS. He'd received several emails and texts like it over the last few days before the crisis had died down. United Testing Services had revealed just that morning that the spread was contained to three performers, one of which was a gay male actor, and that the quarantine was officially lifted, ending the production moratorium. Over the last few days the media had jumped in with both feet, plastering headlines about porn being brought to a standstill as an “outbreak” of HIV “brought the industry to its knees” on every newspaper and website, not to mention the hourly updates on nightly news. He'd gotten calls from the Huffington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the LA Weekly every hour as well; all desperate for updates to keep the story going.
 

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation used the infection as the perfect opportunity to harp on their condom legislation, holding their own press conference and inviting the media to speak to former porn stars who'd been infected with the disease—the vast majority also being gay men. The only trouble was, no one knew for sure whether or not the infections occurred on set during filming since there was no clear way to tell. To make matters worse, the “gay side” and the “straight side” of porn had been split for over a decade and lived by totally different rules. For one thing the gay side didn't use regular monthly testing for venereal diseases including HIV, since so many of their performers already had it and were being treated for it. Instead many of them chose to use condoms or worked out viral load details before the scene. The straight side of the business was fastidiously tested in a repetitive cycle to prevent the spread of any potential diseases, but every now and then… well… shit happened. Still it was way better than dating in the general public.

“It's ironic,” Benjamin had told a reporter from the New York Times, “with all of the talent pool tested with the latest cutting edge technology every three weeks for venereal diseases ranging from gonorrhea to chlamydia your average porn star has far more to fear from the general public than they do from her. My girls are tested by PCR DNA, which can detect the presence of HIV up to a week after infection, not the standard ELISA test you get when you go to your doctor, which tests for antibodies in your system that might take as long as six months to develop. When you go out to a bar and hook up with a random stranger you're taking a huge risk since most people never get tested unless they notice a problem, and symptoms often don't manifest until well into an infection, or in some cases not at all.”

Despite the sound nature of the argument, he'd received mostly incredulity from those outside the business he shared it with. No matter. He was used to not being well received, and it had never stopped him in the past. He'd fought his way up from being male talent in a cutthroat industry to the top of the food chain as the most powerful agent it had ever seen. He worked every day from the moment he got up to the moment he closed his eyes. Not that the multi-billion dollar smut machine hadn't given him his fair share, mind you. He had a gorgeous house in the Hollywood Hills where he took up residence, and another in Studio City where he put girls up when they came in from out of town. He'd nearly paid off the latter in full in less than three years by over charging them for rent. A car fanatic from an early age, he'd picked up a DB9, a Roush Cobra, and a jet black Rolls Royce Phantom with the curtains in the back windows instead of the traditional tinting that most people in Los Angeles opted for. He watched Lakers games from the floor of the Staples Center sitting courtside with the Kardashians, Justin Bieber, and even Jack Nicholson. Bringing his girls along guaranteed celebrities would approach him, the perfect introduction for his thriving
not-so-secret
escort agency. Not too bad for a guy who used to rob tourists visiting Piccadilly Circus, or let guys suck him off in the alley near the sex shop for a few pounds. America had been good to him.

The day began with a long drive from his palatial home in the Hills out to Canoga Park, taking the Hollywood freeway to the 405 heading north. From there he passed the Anheuser-Busch Brewery in Van Nuys where they made Budweiser; the familiar smell of lingering hops in the air, reminding him of toasted corn flakes. He'd connected onto the 118, hooking up and over on a thin bridge that shot him up into the air over a tangle of interconnecting freeways, and deposited him moving west towards Porter Ranch. Despite his best efforts to ignore his fear of heights he always recalled the story he'd heard about a motorcycle cop dying instantly after flying off the end of the collapsed bridge in the foggy morning hours after the Northridge earthquake in 1994. He tried not to look, but always caught a glimpse of the green posted sign they'd put up when they fixed it, naming the stretch of highway the ‘Clarence Wayne Dean Memorial Interchange' in the dead man’s honor.

Terrible way to go
, Benjamin thought,
free falling without warning to certain death. When my time comes I hope it is quick.

When he reached Topanga Canyon, the last exit for the top of the San Fernando Valley before crossing over the Santa Susana Pass and sloping down into Simi Valley—the city that became synonymous with the Los Angeles riots after the Rodney King police beating not guilty verdict was announced there—he turned left. Winding down the hill he passed Stoney Point Park, an outcropping of rocks and trails popular with hikers. To his right was an equally rocky terrain dotted with big houses with large windows overlooking the rest of Chatsworth and as far off as the smog would permit. The 'shoot house' he was headed to was nestled there, near the hidden aqueducts, overlooking the water reserve. It had belonged at one point to a former one-hit-wonder band from the 70's, earning it the nickname the ‘Captain and Tennille House.’ Benjamin couldn't drive this stretch of road without also thinking of the Manson family murders, the darker downside of the flower power generation, since the 500-acre Spahn Movie Ranch that was used to film old Westerns was just a stones throw over the hill. The now mostly defunct ranch was originally made famous as the murderous clan’s primary residence during their reign of terror.