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cheriedies · 5 months

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Fame is Forever

Valerie

Driving home from the second casting call of the week, I was thinking about all the names I was going to call my agent once I got to my house phone. “Another useless side character! How long does this moron think I have until I sink down to the D list”. I suddenly pushed the breaks of my Chevy when I noticed I was about to run a red light. As if to punish whatever external force was keeping me from moving on, I started aggressively honking into nowhere. “That’s it, something’s gotta change”.

In my room, I covered all windows with the velvety curtains as if to conceal what I was about to do. What if this is not fair? Were there any rules written to begin with? I abandoned my plans to call the agent and made a call to the local library instead. It’s not every day that they receive a request for references on occult rituals, but I managed to convince the librarian that I was with UCLA’s anthropology research team. Valerie’s still got it.

Sat atop a pile of unwashed clothes in the corner, I lit a cigarette but never actually smoked it. I fidgeted the Lucky Strike in between my fingers for a bit until the butt burnt my thumb. This seemed to snap me back to reality and I crawled back to the telephone; that way I could carry some of the clothes with me to use as cushioning. Having dialed Maria’s number I sunk back into the remnants of the pile.

“If it isn’t my favorite transplant,” the East coast accent teased me from the other end of the line.

“Same goes to you.”

“You back from Grapestein’s already?”

“Well what do you think? Marty keeps shoving me these minor roles. Actually calling this crap a role is too generous. Already forgot what the plot was even about”

“Aren’t you being a little harsh on him?”

“Marty? Only reason I’m still with his agency is cos I owe him money.”

“Not him, Grapestein.”

“What do you care defending the old fuck? Oh that’s right, that’s how you ended up in his last picture.”

“At least he’s predictable.”

“I don’t think there’s much my 27 years of getting around could do for me, Maria. Not compared to the thrill he’d get from a debutante. You know, we’ve been there.”

“Val, you can be so bitter sometimes. You really should fight for something good. You said it yourself, we’re getting old. Me, I’m thinking of tying the knot to get some peace of mind.”

“You didn’t tell me you were seeing someone.”

“Of course I’m not. But I really should find me some producer, they have the upper hand anyways. Directors can be so pissy.”

“That’s a noble quest you’re embarking on. I’ll be at mine, tying cherry knots instead.”

“Well, call me when you have some news alright? Love you.”

“Right, love you.”

Maria always cut the conversation short when she felt that I was getting depressive. She didn’t like being sidetracked by negativity, though she still always made sure to check up on me. This made her a real friend. “Can’t keep the line busy for too long anyways,” I murmured to myself “the library could call back any time now”. This, of course, was a lie – it would take at least 2 business days until they could put together a list of the requested references.

The next couple of days had a motion blur filter applied to them. Any post production department would kill to be able to edit the way I saw my hallways spiral with colors that weren’t even on my wallpaper. I measured time in wine bottles, turning the proseccos and rosés into sparkling hourglasses. Time passes much faster when it’s made out of grapes than sand. As much as I was burning with anticipation (or alcohol) for the phone call, I was ultimately more anxious about having a somewhat tangible solution to my suffering.

As I was taking the last gulp from the bottle, the telephone rang like a stubborn messenger, and the message was clear. I was out of time.

I slid down the wall with my notepad clutched against my chest, smiling crookedly. The only thing I’d written down was a number with Dr. Marmont next to it. Though I must have already heard about him, it wasn’t that long ago that he got kicked out of my faculty, the library person reminded me. Bingo. An old guy with a hurt ego is exactly what I need to get all the information. I was too out of it to note the books and their excerpts that followed, and quite frankly reading all of that would require much more effort than getting to the source himself. In a surge of newfound purpose I reached back for the phone and put it next to me on the mauve carpet floor, and a couple of “THE Valerie Laliberte from Belladonna of Madness?”s later, I was set to meet Dr. Marmont at midnight.

Touching myself up in front of the gold rimmed mirror I slid my cat eye sunglasses on. It wasn’t a matter of hiding from the paparazzi, Maria and I got ourselves in enough trouble in our early days that a suspicious meeting with a stranger would phase absolutely no one. It was more about feeling protected. At any moment, I could disconnect myself and retreat behind the black lens. I locked the door behind me and set my fate in motion.

Dr. Marmont was waiting for me outside his beat up Toyota Starlet. The white paint corrupted with rust. To make sure I didn’t look too desperate I lit a cigarette and made my way slowly to him, one heel in front of the other, like a pantheress approaching her pray. The pray in this case was too stunned to bolt away. And when I blew my smoke in his face, he had no choice but to submit.

I left the scene with a flask of ayahuasca infusion and a crumpled paper with directions in my snakeskin clutch, stories of Amazonian women in my mind. Dr. Marmont, or just Lawrence for me, spent most of his career trying to prove that the Amazons used a particular ritual to climb the ranks of their tribes, involving the psychedelic concoction to invoke spiritual help. Generations of women gained undisputed admiration and devotion by means of this well-kept secret, and I was up next. The Hollywood tribe was about to succumb to its next supreme.

Wane

The air was still moist from today’s rain, the rocks glimmering deceivingly under the barely visible moon. When Marmont mentioned how my predecessors climbed up hills to ask for help from above, I knew which would be the right one for my goal. I drove up to the Griffith Observatory on the last night of a waning moon, the purse unmoved from under my seat from the night I met with the professor. The thought of bringing it into my home made me uncomfortable down to the bone, and, quite frankly, I didn’t want to think about it until the very last moment.

I unfolded the instructions on the hood of my burgundy Chevy; a present from the studio after my first, and last, commercial success 8 years ago. I mentally went through every point stressed by the shaky handwriting. Waning moon: check, ayahuasca: check, mantra: …I paused. Despite going through all this trouble I hadn’t thought about what I was going to ask for. This, I had to be particularly careful with. I could not afford to flunk my last chance. I took out my lipstick and wrote it on my arm for the moon to see. I am fame. Fame is forever. It’s not temporary popularity that I was after, I didn’t want for the generations to come to walk all over my star-held name on the boulevard – I wanted to be seen in the night sky. Shine so bright to make the entire city fall to their knees, not just my current cult following. As I was, I had but a group of researchers at an observatory. I was thirsting for the whole world. I dropped my heels on the gravel and watched the paper get swept by the wind. I gulped down the flask and looked up to my destination, my eyes set on the Hollywood sign.

I carefully took a few steps towards the trail. It would be a long climb but the end justified the means. I forced my feet into the ground, the mud spreading like warrior paint on top of my glossy pedicure. “I am fame. Fame is forever”, I whispered to myself and began marching towards the 9 white letters.

Little shrubs sat like solemn guards on either side of the trail, steering travelers in the right direction. I felt the elderberry trees hugging my periphery, the black pearls sending my mind back to caviar sandwiches on my mother’s New Years eve table. My ribs suddenly turned to bricks and I folded in half. I heard her raspy voice scratching at the back of my skull – “Valeriya”. No, why was this coming back to me now? I had freed myself from the chains of my past the moment I came of age and became Valerie. Truth is, I wasn’t just an east coast girl chasing stardom in the western hills. I was running away from a place much more eastern, and a generation of migrants was chasing after me. I couldn’t let it catch up to me. I needed the freedom to forge my own destiny without my mother’s sickle around my throat, and fame was my way to do so. Fuck the damn shrubs.

I ran off the trail, frantically waving my arms to push away the branches and to lose my mother’s face with them. My satin dress clung onto my body, the sweat binding it to my skin. In the distance, a silhouette of a rabbit formed at a clearing. All alone, it turned its little head towards me and we locked eyes. I wanted to tell it all about me and how hard I’d worked to become the right me and how I wasn’t even the ultimate me and how me, I, was going to do all it takes to become her. I opened my mouth and before I could tell it anything, it was gone. Snatched by the neck by a coyote, just like that. A small puddle of blood reflected the c of the moon. I shrieked and sprinted away from the killing ground. The pine needles above my head were certainly going to plummet down and stab me if I stopped for even a split second. I covered my head with my hands and ran. No matter how many times I fell down and ripped layers of skin off my knees, I ran, ran, ran.

As the hill got steeper I kept losing my balance. I got on all fours and clawed my French tips into the all-American dirt to climb towards the sky. Every time I pulled my body up, my arms shook under the weight of my entire being, more so my internal baggage rather than my meagre frame. The dress got caught on something but it was too dark to figure out what it was and how to get it off and damnit I was already close to a flat spot on this forsaken hill so I gave myself a final lift and let it tear. I sat down for a moment. My intense heartbeat drowned out the noises of the night. It has been years since I last allowed myself to hear my own weakness and fear so loud and clear. I repeated the chant over each beat. I am fame. Fame is forever. Louder every time. I am fame. Fame is forever. My voice steadily grew into a howl. I am fame. Fame is forever. I shook the flask to see if there was any magical brew left. I thought if I drank some more in that instant it would surely cement my request. Empty. I angrily tossed it behind my back but still turned to collect it. I had to pick up every stitch, no evidence could be left behind. As I crawled closer to the edge the silver flicker had landed on, I slowly found myself towering over a man-made construction that contrasted the dusty browns of the hills. My powers came back to me with every breath I took.

I was not only at my goal, but I was above it. All the years of misery and rejection flashed in a supercut before my eyes. The embarrassing auditions I went to only to find out the role had been assigned to somebody else all along. The degrading parties I could only get through when I made it snow in the bathroom stall. The countless drunken nights on my bedroom floor. Marty. Fucking Marty. “Need to find me a new agent when I hit it big. Find? They’ll be crawling to me when they realize who they’re dealing with,” I said to myself. At that point I began laughing frantically. The idea of me standing on a podium while every important person in Hollywood, the size of a bug relative to me of course, crawled, pleading in a high-pitched voice to get my attention made me roar. I looked down on Los Angeles. “You hear that? I am Fame. And Fame is-”.

Valerie made a miscalculated step forward and tumbled down the cliff. She could not stop laughing as she rolled in the dirt and let the little rocks scratch her skin. She felt invincible. She closed her eyes and flung her arms up and pretended she was receiving the praise of a devoted crowd. She was laughing in their faces. Suddenly, she gained more momentum that sent her flying into the sign. She cracked her skull on the H and the lights went out. The metal carcass pierced her palms. She was crucified.

As the sun rose and the new moon was beginning to take form somewhere, Valerie’s lifeless body hung above the City of Angels, waiting to be noticed. And when they’d come to collect her, her final words would be stamped there, waiting to be read off the back of the H of the Hollywood sign. “FOREVER”.

#short story #hollywood #writing #this is a short thing i wrote a while back c:

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