Free Beaches by Iris Rainer Dart Page B

Confused. Yes. Yes. She knew that everything he was saying was true. She knew he meant it, too.
    “Straight to the top in the most competitive cutthroat business in the world. Because everyone wants it and dreams about having it-and you’re one of the few who will.”
    “John … I … don’t . . .”
    “I know you don’t. You don’t know how to deal with it. It’s heady. It’s big. And you’re scared. Well, you should be. Now go back to the cast house and get some rest. You’ll be fine in the morning, and tomorrow night the show will open and you’ll knock ‘em dead. Now go on.”
    Gee Cee got up slowly. Her eyes were puffy, but she’d use some Murine and they’d look fine tomorrow. Perry put his arm around her and walked her to the door.
    “Will you be okay getting back?” he asked.
    “Sure.”
    He kissed her on the cheek and gave the caftan a little pat where he guessed her ass would be, and she was out in the night walking back to the cast house.
    Virtuoso, she thought. Baby, she thought. I’m a star. And he’s afraid of me. That’s why he’s steered away from me. She felt warm and sleepy and happy. He’s probably been in love with me since my audition, she thought. Afraid to approach me. She could see the cast house in the distance and was tempted not to go there and crawl back into her little bed but to run out onto the beach instead and scream at the top of her lungs: John Perry thinks I’m a star! We love each other!
    After all the years when the only boys who really wanted her were “shlubs,” as Leona dubbed them. After all the years when she watched all the top guys going for the other girls. Girls who-what? Were pretty. That’s what. This time, Cee Cee had finally won out. This man, this fabulous man, John Perry, was different. Because he saw past things like looks. He was deep. And that’s why he appreciated Cee Cee. Loved her.
    Cream rises to the top. That was an expression her singing teacher had used when he had promised Cee Cee that her talent as a singer couldn’t possibly go unnoticed. So, too bad, Stanley Berger, the schmuck who was supposed to be her date for the senior prom two years ago. The only reason he’d asked her to the prom was that he’d been out of school sick for a month, and when he came back, every other girl had already been asked. But then Cee Cee actually overheard Barry Rubin say, “Hey, Berger, you’re not takin’ B.P. Bloom to the prom, are you?”
    “What’s B.P.?” Stanley Berger asked.
    Cee held tight to her locker door, braced to hear the answer, but Barry Rubin said it so fast that she couldn’t make it out. All she heard was Stanley Berger laughing really loud. And she was afraid to ask anybody what B.P.
    was. Couldn’t ask any of the other girls. And certainly not the boys. She sat for hours at home that night writing a “B” on a piece of notebook paper and a “P” a few inches away, and filling in words. Bad Person, Boring Pushover, Big Prostitute. At eleven o’clock that night, in tears of fury, she finally grabbed the phone and called Stanley Berger to break the date.
    “I don’t want to go anywhere with you, Berger, you turd,” she said. “So forget I said yes to the prom, okay?”
    He wasn’t one bit disappointed.
    “Okay. I’ll take my cousin Joanne,” he said. “See you.”
    But before he could hang up Gee Cee shrieked, “Hey, wait a minute, Berger. Just tell me one thing. What in hell does B.P. mean?”
    “B.P.? Huh? Oh, yeah …” and Stanley Berger laughed. “It means Brillo Pad, Cee Cee. You know? Like your hair.” He laughed again and hung up.
    She didn’t go to the prom. In fact, the night of the prom she made Leona process her hair with some foul-smelling lotion that was supposed to do the opposite of what permanents do. By the next day, she no longer had Brillo Pad hair or straight hair either, which had been the hoped-for result. It was more matted and wiry than straight, but it didn’t look like a