"A Foot in the Door"
**********************
LADY JAYE'S LOFT
Scarlett left Atlanta to join Lady Jaye in the vibrant and sprawling metropolis called Manhattan to start her new life. Just because her military days were over didn't mean that her life couldn't be exciting. Scarlett would always cherish her military days, with the Joe team in particular, but felt that it was time to close that chapter of her life and start a new. She had taken Lady Jaye up on her offer to move into her two- bedroom loft in the ultra trendy Meat-Packing District. Lady Jaye's loft was not only spacious, but rent-controlled; a newcomer's dream come true. Scarlett was still unpacking and getting settled into her new digs when Lady Jaye came home from rehearsal. She currently held the role of a major character in the hit play "Ah, Leah!"
"I have news. Alexis needs a new understudy," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett. Alexis Rourke was the lead in "Ah, Leah!" and a notorious bitch. "They're rarely ever used but at least it will get your foot in the door. If you want it I can pull some strings for you."
"Really?" Scarlett asked in disbelief. "But Alexis is the lead! I don't have that kind of experience, how are you going to get ME as her understudy?"
"By NOT telling Peter's wife that I caught him getting a blowjob from his assistant," Lady Jaye replied with a mischievous grin. Peter Zucker was the director of the play. "He owes me for looking the other way, and for traumatizing me with that God-awful visual. Eeewww!"
"Shut up! No you didn't!" Scarlett laughed, almost not believing her ears.
"I sure did! Walked right in on them in his office!" Lady Jaye said proudly. "So do you want it or not?"
"Well - yeah!" Scarlett replied enthusiastically. "But are you sure you want to cash in your favor just for me?"
"Absolutely! How do you think I got MY first big break? It's all about who you know," Lady Jaye told her. "Besides, there are plenty more favors owed where THAT came from. And what are friends for?"
"Well okay then! Thanks!"
"Let's celebrate!"
********************
AQUARIUS SUITE
Lady Jaye insisted going to Aquarius Suite, a local club with a reputation for being a celebrity hangout. She wanted to test her star power to see if she had enough pull to get in. Lady Jaye and Scarlett walked up to the doorman, bypassing the line as people stared and talked. "Isn't that - ?" "Hey she's - !"
"Are they talking about US?" Scarlett whispered to Lady Jaye.
"You better believe it," Lady Jaye told her, "You're a SOMEBODY now! Get used to it." Lady Jaye greeted the doorman with a fifty folded up discreetly in her hand. He kindly waved her hand away from her, refusing her tip and unhooked the velvet rope for them. Scarlett swore to herself that Lady Jaye was going to pee herself right there.
"A New Yorker refusing a tip? I'm new here and I've already seen everything!" Scarlett mused aloud.
"Ask me how good I feel right now!" Lady Jaye said gleefully in triumph as they walked into the celebrity Promised Land. "Baby we have ARRIVED!"
This kind of special treatment would become the norm and it amused Scarlett to no end. Not on the guest list? No problem! Didn't I see you on the cover of some magazine or something? Right this way! No reservation? Again, no problem! After all, you're a Somebody! Sure, whatever, that's me: Scarlett Somebody. Hello Scarlett Somebody, I'm the press rep for Dior. What is your shoe and dress size? We'd love to send you some pieces that we hope you'll consider wearing. Uh, sure okay, whatever! I guess being somebody has its benefits, Scarlett thought to herself. I can get used to this.
And it was only the beginning.
***********************
BACKSTAGE "AH, LEAH!" - 1 MONTH LATER
"Alexis OD'd in her dressing room," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett. "They're taking her to the hospital right now. You're going on tonight."
"What?" Scarlett started going pale. "Is - is she going to be all right?"
"Who gives a shit, I hope that fucking bitch dies for fucking up the show!" barked the assistant director. "Hurry up and get ready!"
"Quaaludes," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett as she helped her get ready and gave her some last minute coaching. "They pumped her stomach, I'm sure she'll be okay. Though she'll probably be in rehab for a while."
"Then what?"
"Well, then I suppose she'll be clean for a few months then go back to using until her next overdose - ,"
"NO," Scarlett interrupted her, "I meant the show."
"Oh, that. Till she gets back, you're it. If she goes to rehab you're looking at 28 days just for that alone," said Lady Jaye.
"Oh God," Scarlett groaned as her anxiety started to grow. "Allie, I'm not so sure I can pull this off. It's so - SOON. They're going to know I'm new at this."
"What are you talking about?" Lady Jaye asked in disbelief. "You know the entire bloody script frontwards and backwards! And anybody can act; it's just LYING. Just remember the Sense Memory Technique that I taught you. You'll be great!"
Scarlett wished that she shared Lady Jaye's confidence in her. This wasn't supposed to happen, understudies are hardly ever utilized! And the fucking LEAD! Oh, no pressure! But now here she was, with so much at stake: her name as well as Lady Jaye's for getting her the job. If she couldn't pull this off she may as well go back home in shame. Failure wasn't an option, Scarlett thought to herself as she tried to pull herself together and headed for the stage. After all, she worked best under pressure, right? Sure! She thought, let's do this thing! Then she made the mistake of glancing out at the audience from side stage. She felt as if she had looked down from a high wire and immediately went weak at the knees. She froze, paralyzed in fear as the audience and everything else around her started spinning. She leaned against a pillar for support, as she became so nauseated that she was sure she had turned green. Oh my God, give me a battlefield over this any day, she thought in anxiety to herself.
"Come with me," the assistant director ordered Scarlett as she rushed her to the restroom.
"No, I'm fine," Scarlett protested when they reached their destination.
"No, you're NOT fine," the AD corrected her. "So lets get this over with NOW so you don't make an embarrassment of yourself on stage." Scarlett looked at her objectionably. Lady Jaye didn't have to go through this humiliation! The AD knelt down beside her then changed her tone to a more soothing quality. "Look, it's okay! You'd call me a liar if I told you how many big shots have to go through this. And not just their first night, but EVERY fucking performance."
"Really?" Scarlett asked, now starting to feel like she wasn't alone in her wretch-provoking performance anxiety.
"Really. Even Wayne fucking Newton. Trust me, you'll feel SO much better."
Scarlett relented. "May I have some privacy please?"
The AD was right. Scarlett emerged from the restroom minutes later feeling a world better. It was as if poison had been extracted from her and she could function again. Well look at that! She thought to herself, one heave and I'm back to my old self again!
"How're you doing?" Lady Jaye asked as Scarlett walked out of the restroom.
"Tastes better going down," Scarlett replied sarcastically.
"Oh gross! And PLEASE don't look at the audience this time?"
"Let's rock and roll," Scarlett declared as she walked out on stage as the lead character "Leah," imagining that the entire audience was a soft white blur. No faces, just a warm inviting white light enveloping her being. The bright stage lights were a tremendous help there. Don't miss your marks, but don't look down at them, she kept reminding herself though her scenes. All that Sense Memory work she had practiced with Allie was actually coming to use. Okay here we are, the moment of truth: Leah's lover is murdered in front of her. What is this an opera? She thought to herself as she drew upon her most earth shattering experience to bring her character's horrible tragedy to life. Suddenly there she was, back in the battle for the BET. Duke has been struck in the heart by Serpentor's poisonous snake-spear, heroically saving his brother from the fatal strike intended for him. Serpentor may as well have bypassed Duke and hit her right in the heart, for her world as she knew it had been completely shattered. The excruciatingly cruel pain of having to watch helplessly as the great love of your life, your heart and soul, your SOULMATE if there ever was one, has his life force ripped from him was more than she could bear. She held him in her arms as he slipped into a coma then held vigil at his bedside as he fought for his life. It was touch-and-go and she begged him to hang on as her heart was being ripped right out of her chest. She got lucky, Duke survived. But Leah wasn't so lucky. So what if he HADN'T survived - ."
The audience watched in anguish as Scarlett let out a primal scream that even she didn't recognize as her knees buckled underneath her, clutching her head and hair in her hands. "NO!!!" she cried helplessly as the floodgates to the waterworks opened. She was at the BET all over again and it wasn't any easier the second time around. As soon as the curtain closed she ran off stage and got sick again. She then made a beeline to her dressing room, formerly Alexis', and picked up her cell phone to make what felt like the most important call of her life.
"Hey gorgeous, how's the Big Apple treating you?" Duke greeted her.
"God it's so good to hear your voice," Scarlett sighed in relief as her voice still trembled. She needed verbal confirmation that he was still alive and well and she got it.
"You okay?" Duke asked in concern. "You don't sound okay."
"I need to see you, so I can tell you how much I love you in person."
"I'd love to see you too and I'll be happy to come up, but I already know that you love me, baby!"
"You have no fucking idea," she said. But this audience does, she thought. She never was the same after the BET ordeal. Something deep inside her had changed. Maybe some of the poison of Sepentor's spear made its way into her heart as well. A piece of her innocence was lost, not that she was very impressionable to begin with. It was the beginning of her disenchantment with life in the military. It would be soon time to move on.
"You know how fantastic you were tonight, don't you?" Lady Jaye asked, entering the dressing room.
"I don't feel fantastic," said Scarlett wearily, emotionally wiped out from reliving her trauma. "I don't know how you Method actors do this shit without losing your minds."
"Who says we don't?" Lady Jaye shrugged. "You were at BET, weren't you?"
"How did you know?"
"Because I was there, remember? I was watching you all over again and it broke my heart."
"Mine too," Scarlett sighed.
"Well you should know that Alexis wasn't even that convincing. Probably too doped up on 'Ludes to feel anything. Rave reviews will be in store for you tomorrow, mark my words," Lady Jaye told her with conviction. "Come on, lets go get a drink or five."
Lady Jaye was right about the reviews, not that Scarlett cared much. Duke was coming to see her and that was all that mattered.
*********************
**********************
LADY JAYE'S LOFT
Scarlett left Atlanta to join Lady Jaye in the vibrant and sprawling metropolis called Manhattan to start her new life. Just because her military days were over didn't mean that her life couldn't be exciting. Scarlett would always cherish her military days, with the Joe team in particular, but felt that it was time to close that chapter of her life and start a new. She had taken Lady Jaye up on her offer to move into her two- bedroom loft in the ultra trendy Meat-Packing District. Lady Jaye's loft was not only spacious, but rent-controlled; a newcomer's dream come true. Scarlett was still unpacking and getting settled into her new digs when Lady Jaye came home from rehearsal. She currently held the role of a major character in the hit play "Ah, Leah!"
"I have news. Alexis needs a new understudy," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett. Alexis Rourke was the lead in "Ah, Leah!" and a notorious bitch. "They're rarely ever used but at least it will get your foot in the door. If you want it I can pull some strings for you."
"Really?" Scarlett asked in disbelief. "But Alexis is the lead! I don't have that kind of experience, how are you going to get ME as her understudy?"
"By NOT telling Peter's wife that I caught him getting a blowjob from his assistant," Lady Jaye replied with a mischievous grin. Peter Zucker was the director of the play. "He owes me for looking the other way, and for traumatizing me with that God-awful visual. Eeewww!"
"Shut up! No you didn't!" Scarlett laughed, almost not believing her ears.
"I sure did! Walked right in on them in his office!" Lady Jaye said proudly. "So do you want it or not?"
"Well - yeah!" Scarlett replied enthusiastically. "But are you sure you want to cash in your favor just for me?"
"Absolutely! How do you think I got MY first big break? It's all about who you know," Lady Jaye told her. "Besides, there are plenty more favors owed where THAT came from. And what are friends for?"
"Well okay then! Thanks!"
"Let's celebrate!"
********************
AQUARIUS SUITE
Lady Jaye insisted going to Aquarius Suite, a local club with a reputation for being a celebrity hangout. She wanted to test her star power to see if she had enough pull to get in. Lady Jaye and Scarlett walked up to the doorman, bypassing the line as people stared and talked. "Isn't that - ?" "Hey she's - !"
"Are they talking about US?" Scarlett whispered to Lady Jaye.
"You better believe it," Lady Jaye told her, "You're a SOMEBODY now! Get used to it." Lady Jaye greeted the doorman with a fifty folded up discreetly in her hand. He kindly waved her hand away from her, refusing her tip and unhooked the velvet rope for them. Scarlett swore to herself that Lady Jaye was going to pee herself right there.
"A New Yorker refusing a tip? I'm new here and I've already seen everything!" Scarlett mused aloud.
"Ask me how good I feel right now!" Lady Jaye said gleefully in triumph as they walked into the celebrity Promised Land. "Baby we have ARRIVED!"
This kind of special treatment would become the norm and it amused Scarlett to no end. Not on the guest list? No problem! Didn't I see you on the cover of some magazine or something? Right this way! No reservation? Again, no problem! After all, you're a Somebody! Sure, whatever, that's me: Scarlett Somebody. Hello Scarlett Somebody, I'm the press rep for Dior. What is your shoe and dress size? We'd love to send you some pieces that we hope you'll consider wearing. Uh, sure okay, whatever! I guess being somebody has its benefits, Scarlett thought to herself. I can get used to this.
And it was only the beginning.
***********************
BACKSTAGE "AH, LEAH!" - 1 MONTH LATER
"Alexis OD'd in her dressing room," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett. "They're taking her to the hospital right now. You're going on tonight."
"What?" Scarlett started going pale. "Is - is she going to be all right?"
"Who gives a shit, I hope that fucking bitch dies for fucking up the show!" barked the assistant director. "Hurry up and get ready!"
"Quaaludes," Lady Jaye informed Scarlett as she helped her get ready and gave her some last minute coaching. "They pumped her stomach, I'm sure she'll be okay. Though she'll probably be in rehab for a while."
"Then what?"
"Well, then I suppose she'll be clean for a few months then go back to using until her next overdose - ,"
"NO," Scarlett interrupted her, "I meant the show."
"Oh, that. Till she gets back, you're it. If she goes to rehab you're looking at 28 days just for that alone," said Lady Jaye.
"Oh God," Scarlett groaned as her anxiety started to grow. "Allie, I'm not so sure I can pull this off. It's so - SOON. They're going to know I'm new at this."
"What are you talking about?" Lady Jaye asked in disbelief. "You know the entire bloody script frontwards and backwards! And anybody can act; it's just LYING. Just remember the Sense Memory Technique that I taught you. You'll be great!"
Scarlett wished that she shared Lady Jaye's confidence in her. This wasn't supposed to happen, understudies are hardly ever utilized! And the fucking LEAD! Oh, no pressure! But now here she was, with so much at stake: her name as well as Lady Jaye's for getting her the job. If she couldn't pull this off she may as well go back home in shame. Failure wasn't an option, Scarlett thought to herself as she tried to pull herself together and headed for the stage. After all, she worked best under pressure, right? Sure! She thought, let's do this thing! Then she made the mistake of glancing out at the audience from side stage. She felt as if she had looked down from a high wire and immediately went weak at the knees. She froze, paralyzed in fear as the audience and everything else around her started spinning. She leaned against a pillar for support, as she became so nauseated that she was sure she had turned green. Oh my God, give me a battlefield over this any day, she thought in anxiety to herself.
"Come with me," the assistant director ordered Scarlett as she rushed her to the restroom.
"No, I'm fine," Scarlett protested when they reached their destination.
"No, you're NOT fine," the AD corrected her. "So lets get this over with NOW so you don't make an embarrassment of yourself on stage." Scarlett looked at her objectionably. Lady Jaye didn't have to go through this humiliation! The AD knelt down beside her then changed her tone to a more soothing quality. "Look, it's okay! You'd call me a liar if I told you how many big shots have to go through this. And not just their first night, but EVERY fucking performance."
"Really?" Scarlett asked, now starting to feel like she wasn't alone in her wretch-provoking performance anxiety.
"Really. Even Wayne fucking Newton. Trust me, you'll feel SO much better."
Scarlett relented. "May I have some privacy please?"
The AD was right. Scarlett emerged from the restroom minutes later feeling a world better. It was as if poison had been extracted from her and she could function again. Well look at that! She thought to herself, one heave and I'm back to my old self again!
"How're you doing?" Lady Jaye asked as Scarlett walked out of the restroom.
"Tastes better going down," Scarlett replied sarcastically.
"Oh gross! And PLEASE don't look at the audience this time?"
"Let's rock and roll," Scarlett declared as she walked out on stage as the lead character "Leah," imagining that the entire audience was a soft white blur. No faces, just a warm inviting white light enveloping her being. The bright stage lights were a tremendous help there. Don't miss your marks, but don't look down at them, she kept reminding herself though her scenes. All that Sense Memory work she had practiced with Allie was actually coming to use. Okay here we are, the moment of truth: Leah's lover is murdered in front of her. What is this an opera? She thought to herself as she drew upon her most earth shattering experience to bring her character's horrible tragedy to life. Suddenly there she was, back in the battle for the BET. Duke has been struck in the heart by Serpentor's poisonous snake-spear, heroically saving his brother from the fatal strike intended for him. Serpentor may as well have bypassed Duke and hit her right in the heart, for her world as she knew it had been completely shattered. The excruciatingly cruel pain of having to watch helplessly as the great love of your life, your heart and soul, your SOULMATE if there ever was one, has his life force ripped from him was more than she could bear. She held him in her arms as he slipped into a coma then held vigil at his bedside as he fought for his life. It was touch-and-go and she begged him to hang on as her heart was being ripped right out of her chest. She got lucky, Duke survived. But Leah wasn't so lucky. So what if he HADN'T survived - ."
The audience watched in anguish as Scarlett let out a primal scream that even she didn't recognize as her knees buckled underneath her, clutching her head and hair in her hands. "NO!!!" she cried helplessly as the floodgates to the waterworks opened. She was at the BET all over again and it wasn't any easier the second time around. As soon as the curtain closed she ran off stage and got sick again. She then made a beeline to her dressing room, formerly Alexis', and picked up her cell phone to make what felt like the most important call of her life.
"Hey gorgeous, how's the Big Apple treating you?" Duke greeted her.
"God it's so good to hear your voice," Scarlett sighed in relief as her voice still trembled. She needed verbal confirmation that he was still alive and well and she got it.
"You okay?" Duke asked in concern. "You don't sound okay."
"I need to see you, so I can tell you how much I love you in person."
"I'd love to see you too and I'll be happy to come up, but I already know that you love me, baby!"
"You have no fucking idea," she said. But this audience does, she thought. She never was the same after the BET ordeal. Something deep inside her had changed. Maybe some of the poison of Sepentor's spear made its way into her heart as well. A piece of her innocence was lost, not that she was very impressionable to begin with. It was the beginning of her disenchantment with life in the military. It would be soon time to move on.
"You know how fantastic you were tonight, don't you?" Lady Jaye asked, entering the dressing room.
"I don't feel fantastic," said Scarlett wearily, emotionally wiped out from reliving her trauma. "I don't know how you Method actors do this shit without losing your minds."
"Who says we don't?" Lady Jaye shrugged. "You were at BET, weren't you?"
"How did you know?"
"Because I was there, remember? I was watching you all over again and it broke my heart."
"Mine too," Scarlett sighed.
"Well you should know that Alexis wasn't even that convincing. Probably too doped up on 'Ludes to feel anything. Rave reviews will be in store for you tomorrow, mark my words," Lady Jaye told her with conviction. "Come on, lets go get a drink or five."
Lady Jaye was right about the reviews, not that Scarlett cared much. Duke was coming to see her and that was all that mattered.
*********************