Chapter 11

Lunch was a happy affair. They kept their voices low and their laughter to a minimum because there were a lot of other diners present. Allie and Sarah wanted to know more about Adam and Shelly's formative years.

"My folks were pretty cool," Adam said. "I mean they were older and we lived an hour away from anything, but they were decent people. They taught me respect and right from wrong, you know?"

Everyone at the table nodded.

"I think mine are the same way," Sarah told them. "They were highly irate when I turned down a scholarship to You Dub to run off to L.A. with my loser boyfriend. They are less happy about my career choice down here but they haven't cut me out of their lives."

"You Dub?" Adam asked.

"University of Washington," Sarah said with a blush. "I finished second in my class in high school and had a full academic scholarship to Washington. My boyfriend – the first guy who ever shown a real interest in anything but my boobs – thought he was the next famous rock guitarist. He thought he would show up in L.A., play a couple of chords and hit the big time. Didn't work out that way."

She laughed mirthlessly.

"It turns out he wasn't even the best guitarist in our building let alone L.A.," she added. "But my parents let me make my own decisions. They would point out decisions they thought might lead to consequences I didn't anticipate but they didn't insist I change my mind. So, here I am."

"See that is how my parents were, too," Allie said. "I mean, my real parents. I was only 13 when my Dad died and my Mom cracked up. I was at a friend's house for a slumber party and my house caught fire. My Dad never even awoke, I was told. He died peacefully in his sleep. My Mom never forgave herself for getting out alive. They would help me make a good decision but they didn't force their views on me. My aunt and uncle – my father's sister and her husband – were not that way at all. It was their way or the highway. Eventually, I took the highway. I wish I had finished school though."

"You should get your GED then," Shelly said. "I've been around you longer than the rest of these guys, so I know that you are really smart. You play dumb sometimes but you're not."

"Like your theory on men who watch porn," Adam said. "There was no flaw in your logic and you made a very compelling argument. I think you could have your GED by the end of summer – with some help."

Allie thought about it for a minute.

"You can take it online," Shelly said. "You don't even have to worry about anyone finding out. This summer, you can sit in on some classes with me at USC."

"Or even start classes with me at the junior college," Sarah added. "It's another decision I made on the flight home from Miami. I'm going to start taking a couple of classes a week. You can, too, Allie. You don't need to have your diploma to start classes. But they'll expect you to have at least a GED when you get your associate's degree in whatever you decide or before you transfer your credits to a larger school. That's my plan, actually. I want to take a couple of courses to get back in the swing of things but then move to USC or UCLA or maybe back to UW if it seems right."

Allie's smile broadened.

"We could do that," she said. "What do you plan to take?"

"General stuff for right now," Sarah said. "I want to be a writer – as you might have guessed. So I want to take a couple of creative writing classes. They have a ton of them for all the budding screenwriters in L.A. Plus, I might take a performing arts class, to sharpen my delivery and make me more marketable to larger productions."

"That sounds good," Allie said, nodding her head. "But, I mean, would people give us a hard time? You know, for being in porn?"

Sarah shook her head.

"Holly said a lot of girls in the business take them," she said. "Less now than a few years ago, but still quite a few."

"Why less now?" Shelly asked. Adam smiled because he already knew the answer.

"A decade ago, movies had plots," he supplied. "It might have been paper thin but it had a plot. Then the internet really took off and the industry lost a ton of money. Fifteen or 20 years ago, the only way you saw an adult movie was to either rent it from a video store or go to a theater. Most larger cities had an adult movie house. Almost all video stores had a section for adult videos. It was more lucrative for the industry because very few people were getting it for free."

"Then the Net exploded," Sarah picked up. "Just like with the music industry and all the free downloads. Musicians used to get a percentage of the profits from CD sales. So did performers. They were called 'points.' If the video agency sold 10,000 copies of a certain movie, the lead actress and actor and maybe a couple of others got a percentage of that."

"And they weren't cheap, either," Adam said. "Now you go to Wally Land and pick up a DVD for 8 bucks. Then it would cost $50 or $75 for each cassette. The first adult movie I ever saw was 'The Devil's Throat.'"

"Wow, how did you see that?" Sarah asked.

"My Dad had an old VCR tape of it," Adam said.

"I've never heard of it," Shelly told them.

"It was a blockbuster in the 1980s, I think," Allie put in.

Adam chuckled.

"Try 1973," he said. "It played in mainstream movie houses in New York and L.A. Have you heard the term, 'Banned in Britain?'"

Everyone nodded.

"That is where it came from," Adam said. "The Prime Minister of Great Britain decided that movie would promote sex and Satan worship. So the Parliament refused to allow it to be played. It caused quite a stir. It even was banned in several places here, places like Boston."

"Boston is a shithole," Allie put in. "Sorry for interrupting, but it needed to be said."

"I've never been there," Adam said. "So I'll take your word for it."

"Me, either," Sarah said. "The farthest East I've ever been until this week was Minneapolis. I was like 7 when we went there."

"I grew up about two hours east of here," Shelly said. "I've been to Nevada and Utah and Arizona but nowhere else."

"Tell us about your life," Allie said. Adam was amazed at how easily the conversation flowed and changed course.

"Not much to tell," Shelly said. "I was a bookworm. The town I grew up in small. I mean really small. Eric was my only boyfriend in high school. His dad owns one of the only businesses in town so he was a big deal. When he got up here, he wasn't such a big deal. His dad is a pig and his mom is a doormat. Eric expected me to act that way and until I saw I didn't have to, I did. My Mom and Dad think Eric is the greatest thing. He is smarmy enough to always be polite to my parents. I'm surprised I haven't gotten a call to return home immediately to patch things up. My Mom is going to be surprised as hell when she gets that call. I got a scholarship. I don't need the piddling amount of money they send to me.

"They send me a hundred bucks a month. The meal for four of us will cost more than a hundred bucks. They have no concept of the real world. Sure, given what Adam has told me, things are more expensive in Mount Dupont than they are in the rest of the world. But they are nowhere near as expensive as they are here."

"My dad owned the farm where he worked," Adam said. "We get subsidies from the government – some in the form of cash to not raise a certain crop so the prices remain artificially high, but that's another matter. My mom worked at the local hospital as a bookkeeper. She didn't have an accounting degree or anything but she had 30 years of experience. She made $2 an hour more than I made as a clerk at the copy house and as a waiter at the coffee shop. Two stinking dollars more than I made at a job that requires absolutely no knowledge or skill to do. Of course if I had the same job in Corinth, it would be minimum wage -- $6.15 an hour or whatever it is now. Here it pays $10.50. I did my parents taxes for them last year and again this year. They had a combined income of less than $100,000 a year. Combined. In eight days, from Thursday to today, I made almost $2,000. To put that into perspective, in one-one-hundredth of the time, I made one-tenth of their wages."

"But our apartments rent for $30,000 a year, too," Allie put in.

"And a loaf of bread is $2 and a gallon of milk is $5.50 and a gallon of gas is $4.50," Adam said with a nod. "At home, a loaf of bread is a buck and a gallon of milk is three bucks. Gas, the last time I was there, was at $2.45 a gallon."

"But Adam's parents recognized that," Shelly said. "They told him, up front, if he wanted to come to USC, he was going to have to pay most of the incidental costs himself. They were not under the illusion than a $100 a month would help in the slightest. My parents thought I should be able to see to anything I wanted outside of tuition, room and board with that $100. The first time I called home and told them that my textbooks cost almost $1,200 for four classes, my Dad called me a liar. If Eric hadn't convinced him that I was telling the truth, that the books for each class were $300, he'd still think I was lying."

She shook her head.

"We'll figure it out, Shell," Sarah said as she put her arm on Shelly's shoulder. Shelly laughed suddenly.

"Chelle is Rachelle," she said. "I am Shelly – no 'e' before the 'y.' You have to keep that straight or you'll baffle everyone."

"Oh, I think everyone will be baffled anyway," Adam said as he tried to give the waitress money for the check. Allie shoved his hand away and produced a credit card.

"You can leave the tip if you want," she said. "Cash works better for them than waiting for their money from the company. At least it did for me while I was working at a place like this."

Adam frowned but nodded.

"You're just going to have to get used to hanging out with three young ladies with higher earning potential," Sarah added with a smirk.

"You can ask Sean and Walt for pointers," Shelly dropped in. "They both should be used to it by now. What are you two planning to do this afternoon?"

"Sleep," they answered in unison, then laughed.

"So Adam and I go and slog away at classes and you two sleep," she said with mock disdain. "It must indeed be nice to be queens of the manor. But it is extremely rude to rub it in. Sarah, are you going to your old apartment or your new one?"

She hazarded a glance at Allie.

"You can come out and visit," she said. "I have sheets and stuff in a spare room."

The little minx licked her lips.

"Or you can share a bed with me," she added. "But only for sleeping."

"Well, after today, I'm as horny as a three-peckered billy goat," Sarah said. "So I probably should use the spare room – and maybe stop by my place to get sheets and, uh, well, sexual aids."

The group laughed as they headed for the car.

"I was serious," Sarah said. "Like Shelly isn't planning on rubbing one out before she goes to class."

"If we hadn't stopped for lunch I might have," she admitted. "But now I don't have time. I need to go to my dorm, get some panties on and head clear across campus to my class. It's going to be close."

"Then we'll wait and they can drop us off and take the car wherever they need to go," Adam said. "We can catch the bus home. We've done it before. I'll meet you at North Hall."

"We can pick you up," Allie said.

"Not if you're napping," he replied. "Look, Sarah is just off an overnight plane and you've had a long morning. I doubt you're usually up at 5."