Chapter 14

Because it was still early in the evening, the group moved outside the complex swimming pool, which was desolate this early in the spring. The apartments catered to younger people, college age and slightly older, who lived with roommates and friends. There were few families in the complex and the ones who did live there kept mostly to themselves.

"So what's it like, really?" Rachelle asked Sarah and Allie. "If I'm not being invasive."

"What's it like really to be boned by Adam?" Sarah giggled. "Or what is the industry like in general?"

"Both," Rachelle said without any remorse.

"I'm not a good one to ask about the industry in general," Sarah said. "The scene I shot in Miami was my seventh. I can say, with only one exception, every guy I worked with – I've done five guy-girl scenes and one girl-girl – every guy has asked me afterward if I wanted to 'party' later with him and his friends. That's what I meant by feeling like a plaything. The one that didn't ask, well, you can probably guess who that was, so I invited myself to party with his friends later."

Everyone laughed and Sean nudged Adam in the ribs.

"Is it like that a lot?" Mary wondered. "I mean, I guess it is. It seems like it would be."

"You can't take other peoples' views into consideration," Walt said. "If we did that, we'd have missed out on meeting some pretty great people."

"Thanks, Walt," Allie said with a smile. "Sadly, she's right. You have to understand, most of the girls in the business aren't like Sarah. They're like me: undereducated and without anything to fall back on. So they do what they have to do to survive. There is a growing segment of society who views what I do as somewhat glamorous. You only have to look on the internet at all the amateur porn tapes and amateur porn sites."

Adam took a second to glance at Shelly but she betrayed no emotion.

"It's not glamorous," Allie said. "Today was fun. I'll admit that I had a great time today. But that is because I was with someone I liked and who liked me. Most guys don't give a rat's ass about who they're fucking. I don't mean just those in the business. I mean in general. Most guys would stick their dicks into anything warm and wet if they knew they wouldn't get caught. The guys in the porn business just get paid to do it. Sorry, Walt, Sean, I don't mean to lump you with the rest."

"You're not wrong," Walt said. "It's just the getting caught and castrated thing that makes me stop. It's the same reason I don't rob liquor stores or drive 150 miles per hour on the freeway. It's not that I don't want to. It's that I know better and I know the consequences."

"You appear farther up the evolutionary ladder than most," Allie said. "But stupid girls who lack the wiles and self-esteem are perfect prey for those guys. Truly, if I hadn't have run into Sarah in Miami, I probably would be doing a gangbang scene Monday instead of sitting here having a nice chat with you guys."

"But you don't appear either stupid or naive," Sean said. "I would have guessed you are as least as educated as the rest of us here."

"I dropped out of high school in my senior year," Allie confessed. "I'm not proud of it and I would have graduated if I stayed. But graduated would be all I would have done. I wasn't going to college. I wasn't going to the military. I would be expected to nab a nice man and become a nice wife. It isn't what I wanted for myself. Sadly, I didn't know exactly what it was I wanted so I wound up here, doing what I was doing there – stripping in a dingy bar for drunks and lowlifes."

"You stripped in high school?" Shelly asked. "How old are you?"

"I won't be 20 until the fall," she said. "I started stripping when I was 16."

"I didn't even have tits when I was 16!" Rachelle said.

"Me either," Allie replied with a shrug. "It didn't make any difference. In fact, with most of the guys, it helped. I could shave my box and pretend to be the dude's 12-year-old niece while I was on stage."

She shook her head.

"I don't think highly of men, it seems," she concluded.

"Just the ones you've met," Mary said. "Hang out with Walt and Sean for a while, your opinion of men will go even farther down."

"Actually, the three guys here are the first ones in a long time who don't look at me as a piece of meat on a stick," Sarah said. "Of course, when they see me laying out here by the water in the next few days, that'll change. It's perverse but I like it when a guy looks at me and tries to picture me dating him. Mostly I like it because it won't happen in this lifetime and it puts them in their place. Most of them look for a second, tuck their tales between their legs and scamper away. Those who stay for a second look usually run when I give them my patented, 'You've got to be joking. Me? With you? Get real and run back home to your mama' look."

She demonstrated it on Walt. It was a mixture of disdain, revulsion and possibly indigestion.

"It would work on me," he said as he slid behind Mary.

"You're the type she keeps it for, sweetie," Mary said as she patted his leg.

"Nope," Sarah said. "Actually Walt would stand a chance at dating me if you weren't here."

Walt mimicked strangling Mary, which she found less than amusing.

"It is usually guys like Adam who draw my stare," she continued after shaking her head at Walt's antics. "Guys like Adam – normally now – think they are God's gift. They think every woman should bow and scrape for a chance to be seen on his arm. They give you that disarming smile they've practiced in the mirror a million times or use a tried and true conversation opener that's worked a hundred times in the past. Honest to God, the last time I went out in L.A., some guy saw me across the dance floor and motioned for me to come over to him. I gave him my stare and it didn't even faze him. He motioned for me again so I ignored him.

"When I sat down with the girls I was with, he came over. He said, 'I want to dance with you.' The stare worked better close up. I wondered if maybe he needed glasses or something. 'Keep wanting, pal, because it ain't happening, ' I told him. He was pissed off. Like no one ever told him no before. Maybe they haven't. Adam, have you ever been told no before?"

"Sure," he said.

"By a woman you've asked out?" Sarah clarified.

"Well, there haven't been that many," Adam said.

"The answer is no," Shelly said. "Every woman he's asked out has been willing to go out with him."

"Wait, that's not fair," Adam said. "Walt, have you ever been turned down for a date?"

Walt thought for a second.

"I don't think so," he said.

"I don't think I have either," Sean supplied. "I worried for months about asking Rachelle out. Finally I just blurted it out. She said yes anyway."

"Because I was going to ask you out if you didn't ask me," she said as she slapped him lightly on the arm. "Men are so dense. Look at Adam over there. He thinks he's made a point."

"I have made a point," he insisted. "Most guys only get turned down if they try to bat out of their league."

"Are you saying that Chelle and I are in these dorks' league," Mary said scornfully.

"Well, no," Adam replied with a smile. "Guys only get turned down if they bat too far out of their league. Is that better?"

"Much better, since 'too far' is so general," Rachelle said as she nudged her boyfriend. "But your statement still has no point."

"Sure it does," Allie said. "The guy at the bar saw a hot, young blonde girl and he thought 'bubble head.' He didn't realize he was batting out of his league but he was. Then to save face, he got angry. He is used to dealing with the typical club-goer. Rachelle, you're from around here, you know what I mean."

Rachelle nodded.

"Well, the guy was nice looking enough," Sarah said. "He was clean. If he hadn't been a prick, I would have danced with him at least once. I only turn down really offensive guys. But I've found it is more often guys who look like Adam who think a girl owes them something than guys like Walt."

"Are you saying I'm a troll?" Walt wondered. Everyone else laughed but Sarah blushed.

"I'm not saying that, at all," she assured him.

"Good, because I've always thought myself more the hobgoblin type," he said.

"I can see hobgoblin," she said with a twinkle in her eyes.

"Did you send your script to Daystar?" Shelly asked, apropos of nothing.

"As soon as we left you off at campus," Sarah said.

"I want to read it," Shelly insisted.

"I tucked a copy in your bag," she said with raised eyebrows. "I'm sure you've found it already. It was on top..."

"Oh, I just pushed it aside then," Shelly said as a blush crept over her face. "I'll read it tonight."

"Just don't go acting out any of the scenes," Allie advised with a smirk. Adam decided to fill in the group at large.

"Daystar – the company we shot for today – might branch out into feature-length adult movies," he said. "Providing Mary's magic can keep costs manageable, that is. To that end, Sarah has submitted a script for consideration. How did your work today go?"

Mary shook her head.

"I didn't get anything," she said. "The guy sent me an e-mail telling me the scene was canceled because the girl was out-of-date. I didn't know what that meant. I assumed her twat had curdled."

Adam couldn't help but laugh.

"Her disease testing was too long ago for Daystar to work with her," Shelly clarified. "So, are you still going to do stuff for them?"

"Oh, yeah," Mary said. "He said he has recast the scene and he'll send it to me tomorrow. He asked me to have it back to him no later than six weeks. Six weeks, can you believe that? I'll have it back to him Monday, Tuesday at the latest. I've already gone through and made a digital database of faces and movements. It's just a matter of plugging them on the bluescreen and bringing in the other actors. He said it was only about two minutes of footage and he still wants to pay me $50 an hour."