Ok, so a couple of years ago I serendipitously wrote a fanfiction as an English assignment- only it wasn't a fanfiction. This is just, to be honest, a verbatim retelling of "Beyond The Valley of The Dolls" with some elements from "Supervixens". Again, this was written a while ago (like everything else I've posted here). I honestly have to be so self-deprecating about this though...this was rushed as far as I remember. Again, I apologize for it being simply a verbatim retelling of the film- which in retrospect...hmm, never mind. Honestly, this is probably just a POV take on the film.. Also, I had some "run-ins" with the actors- please don't tell them I'm here. Again, this was never intended to be a fanfiction. Thanks, I guess, Roger Ebert...? Sorry? Um? Those lines were clever?

I had probably been far too excited, I could feel my pulse leaping with each breath I inhaled, a strange booming sensation in my ears as if I was underwater, and the warmth of humid mid-summer air mingled with the scent of tobacco, sweat, and cologne. It all began with a simple statement and a charming pretense, words spoken amidst the fervor and sultriness of an open-air gathering, which actually wasn't being held in the open-air but had that quality about it, as the structure of the house it was being held in made it atmospherically so, "Here, have some grass, your Auntie won't see." His voice was fluid and mesmerizing and his eyes were gazing upon me curiously and cautiously, as if he was observing my movements and gestures pointedly and drawing his own conclusions from them. I felt oddly like an insect on a display case being observed. His eyes were narrow-tipped and slightly angular, but remarkably large and of a vibrant green shade, with an Asiatic quality about them. There was something profoundly sexual about his contemplative inspection, yet remarkably asexual as well. Like desire without the effort of being desirable. I wondered vaguely if he himself had accepted his own offer, but the lucidity of his scrutiny and the energy that I could see placidly residing within his powerful, well-built frame spoke otherwise. It's hard to imagine people like that being stoned. Or else, when they are stoned they become easy-going and flaccid, not cold and out of touch like some people. The kind of people you would want to take drugs with.

Naturally, I felt obliged, but instead, I blushed, and responded, "You know grass is considered kind of square these days," my eyes falling downward as I considered the truthfulness of my statement, which he countered by laughing pleasantly and saying "Depends on how you use it."

At the time, I wasn't exactly sure what he meant by those words, although I would find out soon enough.

We were walking together placidly amidst the crowd. How or why he chose me amongst all the pretty girls, I did not dare guess; his self-assured, cat-like grace was thrilling me along, and I was looking at the back of his head, feeling his fingers intertwined with mine, roused by the belief that I had somehow been "chosen".

"Just vodka would be nice," I admitted ruthfully.

"Or cognac."

"Groovy," he said. Why? He was still hastening me along, and I wished we could pause for a brief moment, though I suspected he was the kind of man who liked wild, exciting individuals; perusing the crowd like a barracuda was only a way of life to a philandering Lothario.

He likes parties, I thought. He likes being the harlequin, the MC amidst all the freaks he invites. Juice freaks and pill freaks…Stimulants, depressants, and hallucinogens…A rainbow of options to choose from.

Cold urgency, hands warm and inviting, pointing, guiding. Tightly directing. Not used to such experiences I felt my body quiver and my chest contract. It was all happening too fast. Childish mistrust leaped within me. Bodies ever so close, reeling and pawing. Freaks. Titillating. Screwing with fate. I began to shudder with concupiscence.

"I think you need that vodka. Shall I lead an expedition to the bar?"

I nodded as he placed me down upon a stool and as he sat there to renew his observation of me he asked his barman to prepare me a drink. The music being played was loud and vaguely irritating, though normally I wouldn't have minded it, or would have even enjoyed it. Narcotics never appealed to me, the sluggish mind that emerges from their embrace, the fuzzy distinctions between consent and non-consent, it was all madly uninviting to me, and now it felt as if the air was brimming with heady opiates. I wouldn't be surprised if I observed someone smoking a hookah, as I already knew they were kept and utilized here. I looked toward the band. I bitterly ascertained, sipping the alcohol, that they were probably stoned themselves. I reflected on this observation momentarily. I looked toward my companion once more; he was still leering at me. I was mildly surprised that he was not already in conversation with someone else, was I really so compelling that I, the lamb, had humbled the lion? Did he really want to go to bed with me?

I scrutinized and reflected, and thought men like that, they're more feminine than masculine, they don't let on their desires, they just inhale the tumult and accommodate, granting the given moment its hedonistic indulgence. Sex wasn't an option or a consideration for them: it was a state of mind. It held no meaning for them. It was just a biological epicureanism. An epicurean I thought, that's what he is. Like a connoisseur of fine wines, he is a connoisseur of all other tainted joys, and never throws himself too jubilantly into the frenzy of his unchecked passions.

I somehow felt as if it wasn't enough to refuse what I deemed his exorbitant offers, I had to get away somehow, but his hand was firmly placed on my wrist and I couldn't escape, all I could do was smile and look upwards at him. I had to admit, he was a remarkably attractive man; tall, of good proportions, with broad shoulders, and a slender waist encased in one of those slim-fitting suits that had been recently popularized, a colourful cravat tied jauntily around his neck. And young, older than me, certainly, but in his early 20s to be sure, and it was that youth that was eye-catching. He was a professional: successful, appealing, and well-endowed, wealthy, alluring and vigorous; omnipotent for a girl such as me; capable and glamorous, but above all, it was his youth that was the most commanding, because men such as him were not supposed to be young, attractive. "Is this Hollywood?" I asked myself. I never imagined I would run into such luck.

He was leading me somewhere, his eyes toying, and his iron grip pulling me unwillingly along, his words rushed and heated. I was pleased, yet slightly unnerved, and above all excited, experiencing what might have been called a "contact high". I felt my skin burn when he opened a door leading into a bedroom, only he didn't stop walking, he only continued, hastily jerking me along through some more entrances where occasionally we might meet a couple, sitting or chatting, always in an undeniably provocative way, but never involved in anything too risqué. I wondered what he thought about the antics of those men and women capering through his house looking for a private room to "have a conversation in". In fact, he seemed to be proud of it, judging by the sheen in his eyes, which only glowed more strongly as we met two men in a compromising situation; something which was rapidly corrected when we entered their presence.

"What is this, a studio tour?" one of them growled, as the other righted himself and flirtatiously straightened his waistcoat before gamboling out of the room, followed by what I assumed to be his bedmate, a look of bloody murder in his eyes.

I attempted a smile, and my companion's eyes wandered over my frame lasciviously, as I considered the warped nature of fate. Confused and ashamed, I slunk towards the luxurious ends of the room, observing the scene before me of oddly structured medieval furnishings combined with a modern four-poster bed as well as a great deal of drapery and furs of tiger and leopard.

"Can you dig it?" he asked.

"Yeah, it's real nice, man. I've always wanted a room like this."

He stepped toward me in what might have been interpreted as an offensive way, his shoulders rippling.

"Over here," he motioned, grasping me again, as we entered into a similarly luxurious poorly-lit cave of ferns and off-white furnishings. It contained within it a monstrous tub encroached upon by massive hunks of varying grades of unpolished granite and sandstone, adorned by mock gold vessels probably containing oils for bathing. This environment, this behavior, it was all so bizarre and deviant for me, as if I was a blind peasant being lead through all the levels of Dante's sinful inferno of pleasure, and I was only in the First Circle, toeing the line of the Second. I suppose that was the only way to describe my situation, wandering through a terrible, wonderful hell.

"Class," I interjected.

"The idea came to me one evening in a vision."

I wanted to ask him what kind of vision this had been, how exactly he had received it, and how I too could be blessed with such mesmerizing all-seeing episodes, but then I thought better of it.

I realized in this moment, how very lost I was. I was lost in this "inferno", and I couldn't navigate out of it. I suddenly felt intensely dizzy; the heat in these rooms was stifling, even outside the humidity was crushing and there seemed to be no relief. I was used to constant fresh air and breezes, and this house, this gathering, and its intense depravity meant I was spiraling deeper and deeper into the underworld, leaving me shamefully unrestrained.

"Are you alright? You look a tad ill." His voice was flat, concerned, but flat. That's all I could remember of his tone.

I leaned over scandalously close to him, until his cologne shot up my nose, my head pounding. I felt him place his hands on my shoulders and view me, a dash oppressively, while I attempted to steady myself.

"I just feel a little dizzy. It's the heat is all, it sometimes makes me headachy."

I looked up, attempting to appear a smidgen more light-hearted; I had no intention of appearing priggish before a free-wheeling libertine.

"That's alright, I really feel fine." While attempting to not make my smile look in any way strained, it may have appeared as being somewhat benumbed in the process, a little too euphoric, a little too high, a little too blissful. I placed my hand on his upper arm and simpered tenderly some words which I couldn't recall after having said. While I wasn't actually narcotized, I was tired. It was late, and I was not used to such high-flying society affairs.

He led me out of the room, holding me in a way I wished I could interpret as having been tender and gracious, gentleman-like even, as I clutched him desperately, a mixture of emasculated lust and moderate distress flowing through my veins. I sighed with respite as I gulped in the cooler whiffs or air flowing in from the ocean. A breath of wind had picked up, and now, the sweet, salty smell of the sea had erased all memories of pungent debauchery from my distraught mind. It turned out we weren't actually as far from the main sitting area as I thought; it appeared that with our constant movement and what had seemed to me to be vacillating, mercurial wanderings, we had actually come full circle and arrived back where we had started.

He was holding me by the hands now, pressing his back against a wall and looking at me with a new intensity, his eyes slit-like as he questioned me. "A new test?" I thought to myself uneasily, at the same time aroused by how tightly he was holding me to him.

"So, you're into a heavy scene, aren't you? Don't sweat it; it can be a drag…"

With those words, I began to contemplate how far I had really fallen in the short time I had spent here. I wasn't a bad person, I told myself, I never really fell, I had just been pushed. I could just as easily float angelically upward again. I was simply too easily and too unwittingly influenced by all those around me, unwittingly, but with some degree of internal realization and resignation.

I vaguely remembered what something or someone had told me about Hollywood, "Perverts and fruits..." the rest escaped me.

I realized I was staring at his lips; they were moving, but it was almost as if I had checked out, and was no longer listening to the words coming from his mouth. His lips and his eyes, which were moving in a cultivated continuum were dominating me benignly yet unscrupulously, so that it was not clear to me what possible control I had over the situation. Could he be offering me something, some form of allowance, some opportunity that I was not fully grasping?

Suddenly, I jumped up and down eagerly against him, to his surprise, something made evident by the slow, salacious grin, filling up the entirety of his face, only rivaled by the brilliant vibrancy and ebullience in his eyes, which were boring into me relentlessly. I wondered briefly, how did that change come upon him, the change necessary to produce such an air of delight? Does he practice to achieve that expression of counterfeit astonishment? I couldn't help feeling foolish as I let my arm fall down his neck, reveling in the feeling of his silky strands of hair between my fingers. He was treating me remarkably seriously, and I halted, considering the significance of those actions, but at the same time I was bewildered. I reminded myself that he was young…and the chilling combination of youth and experience was intoxicating to me. I tried to remind myself of all the boys I had known, he could have been one of them, I tried to tell myself- but it was impossible, it was like attempting to convince myself that a Roman Emperor could live among his slaves or a god among mortals. My thoughts were becoming increasingly distracted and wanton, and it was becoming challenging to resist. What there even was to resist seemed to me increasingly groundless and practically hallucinatory. I could no longer recall if I had taken any drugs or not. Did I really become one of those naïve, sensual creatures when stoned? My behavior was already starting to alarm me, at this point I was on the verge of fondling, and I didn't have the audacity to look my partner in the face.

I let my arm drop limply over his shoulder, as I heard the chords to a new song being played ring out over the crowded gathering. I looked upward to see inquisitive eyes, lips slightly parted in cool rapture.

"I left home when I was only seventeen, met a guy, he and I dropped down to New Orleans,"

Well-shaped, I thought admiringly once more, as he stepped nearer. From somewhere I heard in my mind, "-the bedroom eyes, the firm, young body; these are the tools with which he plies his trade, all are available for a price."

"He seemed to know his way around and I thought I could land a sweet talking old C-C-Candy Man,"

I felt the ludicrousness of the entire situation bearing down upon me, felt my sins and the sweat upon my brow, and did not know how to ensnare it, how to treat it, how even to capitalize upon it. I simply felt limp as a rag doll.

"On his bed, kept him fed, and oh, I loved him so, but I got to cry aloud whenever he would go,"

For some reason, in my distorted, delusional mind I began to think of Catherine the Great, and of the many lovers she kept; some dumb and beautiful, others intelligent and witty, others powerful and well-equipped to manage her royal affairs. Stallion-in-chief. Emperor of the Night.

"I guess I was just too young to really understand, a sweet talking old C-C-Candy Man"

Velvet. I hadn't realized his suit was velvet until now. I hated the texture of velvet, but that didn't mean I didn't wear it myself anyway.

He was playing with my hair, lips still slightly parted.

"Do you have any other suits?" He laughed uproariously: "Oh, lots!"

"And cravats too?" "Oh, sure! You want to play dress-up?"

It was all so juvenile, rings and pomades and shirts and pants…

I suppose I kept forgetting that he was rich.

But, if he was rich, then, why…?

My mind was in relentless turmoil. I could not comprehend the actions being presented before me and their implications.

"And played around and brought me down, and finally threw me out. I got burned, but I learned what life was all about,"

I felt sick. What was life about? Pants and pomades and neckties I could bet. And money. Why was I all of a sudden thinking about money?

I looked again at him, desperately, almost lovingly, my teeth grinding against each other; a strange sensation of tenderness was coursing through me, a strange feeling of pathetic ardor mingled with acceptance.

I realized that as little as I cared for drugs and alcohol, I cared very much for being rich and being loved, in whichever order they came in.

That slow fire of ecstasy welling up inside of me was making me dizzy again and I had to lean against him once more for support. Flesh, sweat, desire; rings, cravats, and colognes. Falling. Money. Lust. Lust. Lust for…

"And I often think of him, every now and then, that sweet talking old Candy Man."