Chapter 8: Beware Fashionable Women

Chapter 8: Beware Fashionable Women

Chrisleen didn’t know what to make of it when her boyfriend of five months slid the slim cardboard-sleeved album across the table to her and said: “I’ll be the D.J. And you’re the main attraction, honey.”

They had just finished a grandiose meal of clam chowder appetizer that was a little too lukewarm and fishy for her, followed with Alaskan lobster tail that was a little too chewy for her, a baked potato that was too starchy for her diet, and ending with a lemon cream cake that was a bit too tangy sweet. All this because she had turned down the usual salad, because she wanted to try something different tonight. What a choice. Not to mention the fire pit she didn’t want to sit near because it was too warm, and the swiveling window she wanted closed because the ocean breeze was too breezy and the seagulls standing attentive for food outside on the ledge scared her. Only the white wine, which she had two glasses more than moderately full, pleased her. Dinning with her man, Nash, might have been the only other pleasure as well.

It was a Wednesday night and the two had met around eight for a dinner at a cozy dim restaurant right off Pacific Coast Highway in Santa Monica, a deceptively rickety and peeling baby blue faded shack of a place that served some of the best seafood on the coast. Chrisleen and Nash were celebrating their five month anniversary, or so the reason. Their anniversary was actually the upcoming Saturday, but Chrisleen had a photo shoot booked that day and wasn’t sure when the shoot would wrap. It wasn’t actually a photo shoot, but more of a modeling audition with different ranges of photography, if she qualified. She made it too complicated for Nash to understand (though he was a photographer himself, but not in the specific field). All through the confused conversation, Chrisleen squirmed in her seat, itching around the new tattoo she had recently gotten above her ass crack that was now peeking out over her low cut jeans. It was the first of many body marking she would soon have. The rest of her body was the figure of a Calvin Klein goddess model in capri jeans and wearing only a snug white ribbed tank top that held her bulging firmness in its perfect place, though obscurely revealing the nub on the hill. Her black gloss needle nose high heels pinned the carpet as she made Hawaiian fruit basket colored silk shirted old men stare over the shoulders of their elderly wives, crossing eye paths with young jealous glittery dressed women turning to see what distraction their boyfriend or date were disposed of during that longing moment that wasn’t for them. Though her style was slightly off with cupped shoulder length gloss black hair that curled above her shoulders in resemblance more towards a helmet than a hairstyle, still, Chrisleen was definitely considered a fashionable woman, a walking billboard that almost everybody couldn’t pass without some type of notice.

“And stop itching that tattoo,” Nash finally mentioned. He was annoyed with that little monarch butterfly and its tribal markings that kept fluttering up her thoughts the whole evening, among other things.

“I’m supposed to be putting lotion on it,” she said, “but I left it in my car.”

“You have that ten gallon Louis Vuitton sitting next to you and you left the lotion in your car?”

“If want to be sweet, sweetie, you’d go get it for me.”

“We’ll be leaving soon.”

“So, is this my anniversary gift?” she said. “This CD?” She held the sleeve like holding a dead fish by the tail. She turned her head to look at the cover. “Or is it a DVD?” Chrisleen was somewhat educated underneath her glitz. “This is Audrey Hepburn, isn’t it?” she said. A red skinned Audrey Hepburn, with arms cut-off, centered the cover in black dress standing eloquent between dotted line white silhouette cutouts of her figure doubling on each side.

“It’s a CD, Chrisleen.”

“Beware Fashionable Women” she read on the cover. “Are you sure this is not one of her movies?” The Hepburn image was from her film, Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

“No, Chrisleen, it’s an album,” he said. “Beware Fashionable Women is the name of an independent band from Sherman Oaks.”

“Never heard of them,” she said. She shrugged her shoulders and dropped the album lost in her bag; totally dismissing the obvious band name that Nash thought was also a fitting label for her. Instead, she asked: “Is there anything else?”

“Maybe next month, Chrisleen.” replied Nash. “Saving up for a big one next month. Next month.” Nash knew better to say less and didn’t reveal more. “Listen to the album and you’ll find out.”

“Really?” Her eyes widened to blue scuffed cue balls. “Like something from Sherman Oaks Galleria? A big six month anniversary surprise? Like a nice one-hour spa treatment and a new handbag?” She suddenly dug into her purse as if she thought there was a roll of cash flattened in that album sleeve. “If that the case, I’m gonna listen to it when I get to my car.”

“On the way to your audition meeting tonight, right?” It didn’t sound right at all hearing himself reiterate her excuse she explained earlier. This was a different late audition from the one on Saturday. Two different shoots, too much to explain the nuances of why it was at a photographer’s ocean side abode in Malibu.

Chrisleen was too distracted to notice Nash’s monotone sarcasm. She was too involved with looking over the album cover again like it was a winning ticket to Hawaii. She tossed her eyes up at Nash. “Your so sweet,” she said. She leaned across the table grazing her chest over their half-eaten sea food and creaming a spot of desert on the tip of her shirt, and gave Nash a delectable soft suckle that make somebody’s glass explode fifty feet away at the bar. Nash pulled away when he heard the shattering.

The two parted ways when they reached Chrisleen’s boxy, lipstick red lust, 325i Beamer coupe that was a little dusty on the pretty, but flawless as the 1991 year when it had first hit the showrooms, except for that seeping fuel line that she couldn’t afford to get repaired, if she ever noticed.

In her back seat, 8 by 10 photos of her in an arrangement of colors and poses were scattered about, most of them oddly creased, while others had cue stick sized holes. Nash noticed, but it didn’t matter to him anymore. Even if it did, Chrisleen would have had a fondling excuse that he would have to accept.

She gave him a quick peck goodbye before she explained that she was already late for her appointment. Nash smiled in return, not showing any of his gritting teeth. Chrisleen scratched the bottom of her back with an edge of the album sleeve before she slid into her escape.

The last part he saw of her was through the glass sunroof to view her delicate French tipped fingers pull out the CD and slide it into the center console as she tried to back-out at the same time, nearly driving the side view mirror into his gut. She didn’t notice that, either. When she drove away, Nash did notice that one of her taillights wasn’t working.

It was still early, a quarter to nine, as Nash returned to the bar and was poured a Patron and lime on the rocks. He slid his last hundred-dollar bill in front of him, which would eventually dwindle to nothing but tip before he left.

Meanwhile, Chrisleen was already bobbing her head to the first track of the CD as she turned onto Pacific Coast Highway heading north. She was ready to decipher the message to figure out what next month’s anniversary surprise would be. The big one. Nash knew she would figure it out from the ten-track album. She wasn’t as idiot as she was beautiful, which was part of the reason their relationship had lasted as he kept dreaming, willing to play gullible, until tonight.

The opening track was a jumpy tune, having The Beach Boys like upbeat surf guitar sun rays curling into ocean waves with a do-op backing chorus. She was really warming into it as she cruised along the dark ocean coast that was spotted with dreamy beachfront property she imagined herself in someday, with her future husband, the owner, of course. But as much as she was not thinking about Nash, there was one repeating line in this song that struck her like those continuous smashing waves in the distance: “This is rock bottom . . . This is rock bottom . . . This is rock bottom . . . ” Chrisleen was definitely not thinking diamonds. The song continued to poke: “just because you bleed doesn’t mean you’re human.” Her pencil thin eyebrows scrunched as her eyes drew sharp. She was a bit confused. She looked at the CD cover that titled this first song: “Rock Bottom.”

Next song was titled “Obligatory Tattoo,” which made it clear and obvious where this album was heading. Guitar and bass chords became ominous, thicker, enter piano keys trembling, swelling underneath in the emotion, much like Chrisleen’s nerves, clenching. James Bond shooting gun barrel to blood beginning. She would soon realize that Nash was taking continuous aim at her in such a fashion, with each song an attack. The song entered into a swing beat, a tap dance on the piano with charm in the vocals that seem to smile lyrics of harsh disgust in tattoos, especially hers, the obligatory tribal fashionable butterfly. Thinking about it made the tattoo itch. As she attempted to scratch around the darn thing, forgetting to lotion it, she jerked the steering wheel to maneuver a curve in the rocky hillside but in doing so, swayed towards oncoming headlights. Both hands grabbed the wheel into control with more than efficient time to avoid the collide. She sighed relief as she curved around the hill, then insulted some graffiti she saw on a rock.

“Found” then started off easy like a lazy Corona sunset, allowing her heart rate to settle, a little. She was still listening as the lyrics eased: “Drink you like water…Breath you like air…” beginning romantic enough, until it completed with “Our chemistry puts a hole in the atmosphere.” The Beach Boys blossoming warmth instantly died within her. Now she sensed the up-tempo, down beat cyanide sarcastic cynicism with simple thought lyrics, similar to that of Weezer. But this band added a gruesome touch with: “there’s blood leading from the bathroom to your bedroom door.” Suicide, perhaps. “Found the blood on the bedroom floor.” That was Nash’s blatant touch of wishful thinking, thought Chrisleen. Disgust fumes rose inside her. Angered. She cranked open the window to relieve her short breath constricted lungs of convulsive fury. Her blood pulse rocketed much like this song near its end, as if somebody opened the door and gasped at her death. Then Nash’s laughter as he looked down upon her. Chrisleen’s hair tornadoed wildly in the night air. “As if.” She wrung tight the steering wheel wishing it was his neck.

She didn’t want to listen anymore and tried to turn off the stereo, but the knobs spun into her hands. She tried to eject the CD, but it was stuck, change it to radio, but no luck, the stereo did not comply. She scorned at the thing: “Fuck you, Nash!”

She mashed the pedal screaming out of Palisades Beach and peeling into Topanga, passing under yellows turning red and zagging around wandering cars cruising the easy current of the night air. Chrisleen was on fire to make Nash pay dearly for what he was doing to her. She was going to give that photographer an enlivening night, thanks to Nash’s antics. She was just sculpted meat to them anyway, and tonight she was going to let the photographer season her to his every fantasy. That would get Nash tilted, she thought. She did not know that the photographer, Mr. F. Rodgers, would not tolerate such an insult, which would inevitably destroy Chrisleen’s rising credibility in the fashion industry, leaving her only to the homemade bedroom video market.

As Chrisleen lost her mind to this unscrupulous revenge, the song “Girls On Fire” flickered guitars, a blissful chorus, and swayed seemingly consoling vocal flames to “set all the girls on fire.” It was as warped and delightful as Chrisleen’s giddy face. What happens to anger when insanity glee sets in? “Help me set all the world’s girls (on fire) so that I could be alone.” The song and Chrisleen were tangled in a twisted convoluted dream reality. An obvious asylum package on spinning wheels, head to stereo.

Her body felt a moment of weightlessness as the Beamer bumped over a hill, then caught the road again, forcing the downhill momentum to speed the automobile sixty-eight miles per hour around another curve. The number flashed LCD red above the posted 45 mile per hour speed limit sign. She didn’t care. She was going with it without breaks and handling the bends masterfully. That was until blue and red lights spun bright in her rearview mirror and reflected onto her dilating owl eyes. She slammed the breaks, swerved, regained control, and eased to a stop near a rockslide warning sign. “Your Allegiance” was playing. The drums popped strong, the guitars tore like a Jimi Hendrix inspired anthem and the electric keys played in sync to the flashing lights of the patrol car pulling to a stop behind the Beamer. A bright spotlight lit and jerked towards the driver’s side, reflecting off the Beamer’s side mirror into Chrisleen’s face. As the patrol car’s door clicked open and a black boot stepped to the gravel, the song in the Beamer repeated: “Your allegiance is required.”

Chrisleen turned the key and shut down the car, killing the music as well. The officer approached as a growing silhouette in the white light. Chrisleen casually pulled a brush out of her bag with one hand and pulled down the visor mirror with the other. She started to brush her scattered hair; black hair that was dyed too thick to get tangled and only needed a bit of taming to reset into that curved helmet form. She tossed her brush aside and licked her lips to give them a little gloss. She was ready for him.

“License and registration, please,” said the uniformed patrol officer. He was leaning into the window with his flat brim hat that he quickly removed and set to his chest when he saw her stretching her white shirt down to reveal deeper cleavage over twin curvatures. When he shyly blushed a glance below her face, she knew that she had got him, but wasn’t certain. She cautiously caressed her hand over his bristly cheek and continued down. The officer did not restrain her movements. He stood up and leaned crossed arms on the roof of the car and thought things over.

When she was done, the officer kindly decided not to write her a ticket. And if he were cocky enough to do so, she would blackmail him for whatever he was worth, for she would always remember his tarnished wedding ring and the scar he had on his left inner thigh.

Soon it was over, the red and blue twirling ceased, the spotlight dimmed into darkness, and the patrol car slowly grumbled off the gravel, made a u-turn, and vanished. Chrisleen rolled up the window to shut out his world. She wiped her lips dry.

She started up the car and the music continued right where it had left off, saluting proud: “Your allegiance is required …You know we’re doing this for you, whether or not you want us to.” Chrisleen cracked into tears. She didn’t know what she was doing anymore. For once, she felt lost. She realized her way of pleasuring men to sway her way was not much of a promising plan. It would only last so long. And whatever she had at the end of it all would not be considered an achievement, not in the way she wanted it, at least.

The Beamer continued north towards its destination, though the driver was no longer going to engage in that earlier thought of seduction. She had had enough when she realized how low she let herself become just to get out of a ticket, whether it would have been a DUI or reckless driving, it didn’t matter. It wasn’t what she wanted to do all through her career to survive. Her changing her mind at that moment actually saved her career, as mentioned Mr. F. Rodgers was not that type of artist. This photo shoot might now actually turn out great for her, a true business partnership and connections to other serious professionals of the same sort.

All the while the guilty inner song of “The Great Corruptor (of Youth)” was playing over her thoughts with an imprisoned force of electrocuting guitars, damming drums, and a lyrical jester exalting introductions to an alter conscious authority that slammed her boost in self-confidence and beat it into nothing but more tears by resounding harshness like: “I’ll keep you begging,” “You’re not ready,” “I give you value,” and the one that made her gut wrench when she heard: “I am inside you.”

Chrisleen wanted to change at that moment but this song stuck in her mind, which soon convinced her that she had no other alternative, she was trapped in her nature to use her seduction for gain. She really wasn’t going to change after all. Even if she did, it would only be temporary, like holding her breath or not blinking. She had corrupted herself, and knew of no other quick way to get what she wanted without using her sex appeal. She felt she had no sure talent without it. She didn’t want to wait, hope, and struggle like most. The only other choice for her was to raise cock-fighting roosters on her parent’s deep woods shack back home in Arkansas. Nobody knew about that branch of her life, not even her new accent. Life is reborn and previous acquaintances are forgotten when you come for fame in Los Angeles. The media industry lures dreamers out here and then often crushes hope into harsh reality.

She now felt imprisoned in her own body, stuck following a wicked path she couldn’t stray from, like the highway that forced her to keep between the lines. She didn’t want that and squealed the wheel to the right, bumping over roadside rocks, then pounced to the left, crossing the double-yellow line into oncoming traffic again. A set of approaching headlights were a ways down, but she let them approach until a moment before a bend in the road, then looked at the stereo and jerked herself back into the lane of life. It was the calm, gentle sunset, palm tree swaying sound of “I’ll Be The DJ" that convinced her to stay strong a little longer, seeming to understand her frustration as the vocals floated in: “You drive the car like a woman on a mission” and soon relating, “I guess that’s just how you express your aggression as you drive the car in the wrong direction.” This was sung on perfect cue seconds before the possible collide as if Nash and BFW were there to save her life.

This song was about an angry girlfriend at the wheel and her boyfriend, sitting passenger, being the D.J. The music spoke his mind, for there was no way of communicating with her in regular conversation, much like tonight, the music was speaking Nash’s mind to Chrisleen. “You won’t listen, so I’ll let the music speak for me…”

Her mind started to settle, saddened, as she looked at the empty seat next to her. Nash was there now. Chrisleen almost moved her Louis Vuitton to the back seat in order for Nash to have some extra leg room. Instead, she reached into her bag and pulled out her cell phone. She wanted to call him and apologize for everything, anything, to listen, but the phone was too heavy to ask to be worth that much. What was happening to her, she did not know, but held dearly in thought to the song’s gruesome romantic suggestion of: “I wish you’d crash the car into the nearest cedar tree. The force will fuse your skin and mine into our seats. And when they find us, your body would be apart of me. We’d be together for the rest of all eternity.” It was fortunate that Nash wasn’t there or the two would already be mush and metal in the rocky bluff below. Chrisleen wasn’t about to do it alone and die alone.

“I didn’t know you were so fragile, but I’m the asshole. I didn’t think you’d break so easily” began the next song called “Parade.” She thought it was Nash’s voice, sensitive and heart, lamenting from the stereo. She listened to it intently, as if it was a personal message from him, by him, like he’d come to plead forgiveness for the cruel trick he was playing on her, as if this practical joke was over and he wanted to end it with a parade float of pink flowers and happy laughter. She started to smile and sway her head to the rainbow shine beat and imagined Nash on a floral float of merriment coming around a crowd filled corner under a blue sky sun with balloons drifting like the joyful rhythm of the tune. He takes Chrisleen’s hand lifting her aboard the float as it passes, to be together, and show their love in hand waves and blowing kisses to the crowd. A marriage parade, maybe? By the end of the song, the thought was wilted dead, nothing more than a busted garbage bag spilling dead grass and brown leaves. The song was just about a broken guitar.

She couldn’t breathe steady to this mean revelation. The burdening weight of a heavy chained heart was collapsing on her lungs. Tears fell as she gasped to defibrillate her breath. She pulled the car over, stepped out, crossed the road, and stood at the rocky edge of a bluff. She was at the edge of Malibu. The door was left open and the tender acoustic guitar and choir chorus beginning of “Courage” played loud. This was actually an inspirational song that made her step back from stepping off. Between somber verses of self let downs, she could relate with the rising uplifting chorus: “But you’ll be so impressed with my courage. And you’ll think that I am so brave. Courage to be some one else, somewhere deep inside myself. Courage to find happiness...” Chrisleen wouldn’t let this song turn sour on her. She only heard what she wanted to hear, the positive. Chrisleen just wanted to get rid of the hurt, not her life. This song made her spread wide smiling teeth to the sea. Her overworked body and mind was cooling down to the ocean air. Soon, she started to get cold shivers and hurried back to the car.

Chrisleen looked at the clock on the dash and saw that she was beyond late. She punched the gas kicking gravel. She drove and dialed, trying to call the photographer, but her phone signal kept dropping. She toggled the cell phone in one hand and steered with the other. Her eyes oscillated from road to watching for signal bars. There was a quiet pause in the music before the final song. That’s when she heard something trickle on her sunroof. She glanced up and saw a rainfall of rocks shower from above and now falling over her windshield. The last thing she saw through the dust clouded headlights was a falling elephant that she swerved to avoid, but couldn’t. The gray bolder hit the BMW broadside and spun the vehicle over the rocky edge. It was a hundred and twenty-three feet tumble to the dead brown brush bottom where the crippled car slammed to a stop.

The ocean waves were out of reach, but sounded like radio static in Chrisleen’s mind as she regained consciousness, barely. She slumped her head back and nearly impaled it on the broken rod headrest. Her head slid away to the side instead. Red.

Then a baby elephant exploded her back windshield, causing the CD to spin loud the final song: “The Big Yellow.”

This jingle was slow, like a Bing Crosby swinging on the moon in a Sesame Street or Muppets show tune with puppet stars having puffy smiles singing the chorus of aahs as they swing side to side in unison to the sparkling tempo. It’s about being given all the stars, but still greedy for “the big yellow,” and when one does get the sun, that person gets burned. A nice little anecdote and lesson to be learned. But a lesson too late for Chrisleen as she soon found her car in the middle of a burning Ring Of Fire. The hay like brush had caught a spark from something under the hood and the gasoline line that tore open fueled the embers into a blaze. She was stuck, unable to open her crunched door, and no strength in her even if she could. And the dash had smashed her legs, but she couldn’t feel them, and didn’t notice. She tried to use her cell phone but it still had no service. Instead, she used it to scratch around her tattoo she didn’t want to ruin. All the while, the happy puppet tune continued to sunshine sway like the licking flames outside her window.

Meanwhile, Nash stumbled from his seat at the bar, never moving since the first drink of Patron and lime. He had a grin on his face from a tickling feeling that suddenly overwhelmed his body. Something had happened, and that something was good for Nash. He burst a laugh, then quickly imprisoned it into an amusing cough. He looked around to see if anybody noticed his burst of madness. Nobody did. His wildly grin kept contained as he exited the restaurant. The night was too dark for Nash to notice the distant plume of smoke breathing inland. Nobody would notice until digging it out in the morning.