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Monday, June 8, 2015

8 Born to Make the Kill

The closer Natalie Beaumont drove to the address, the worse the neighborhood looked. She had followed Tony’s directions so she knew it had to be near, but the ramshackle houses with dirt yards, broken down cars and chain link fences brought back the keep-your-distance feeling she had when she first met Tony. Street after street of unseen barking dogs in the yards of dark houses with streetlight shadows on steel bars over doors and windows added fuel to her despair, but she pressed on until a warehouse district appeared.

The surroundings there weren’t much better, but she could feel the threatening air begin to lift. As she rounded the last corner, she saw the building Tony had given her as a landmark. Voices in her head shouted, “Turn around and get out of here,” “Stardom is too far a reach,” “What if he is an ax murderer?” but she refused to listen. She had come too far. She wanted this too much and was determined to make it happen.
She pressed on through the gate.

Above the man-size door, she saw the address numbers Tony had given her—“9797.” This is it, she thought, and her heart skipped with both anticipation and anxiety as her mind raced forward to the scene she was about to do for Ansell’s approval. The sweep of her car’s headlights fell on the only other vehicle in the parking lot, a large dark sedan she judged, at first glance, to be at least forty years old, maybe older. She saw that much of the brown paint had faded or rubbed away to bare metal, and some of that had been replaced with gray primer. The body, the lower edge eroded with jagged rust holes, also presented with dents and scratches under a fresh coat of LA smog. As Natalie glanced at the old classic, she felt that something about the car didn’t set right. But with the next step in her career waiting, she pushed the warning and uneasiness aside. She proved she could take care of herself the day Alex attacked her in the cornfield and, as self-sufficient as she had been over the last two years, she could do it again now. It’s just nerves, she convinced herself.

 
While the others made the final preparations, Tony Alonso stood at the make shift desk and shuffled papers. With the hungry look in Natalie’s eyes in the studio parking lot yesterday, he knew what he tendered would have been beyond mere temptation for her, there was no other decision she could have made. So her confirming phone call came as no surprise. With that knowledge, he could induce her to do anything he wanted, but if she was the chosen, she would volunteer to begin the passage.
Always at the base of Tony’s thoughts, Ma demanded his attention. Over time she had revealed enough truth about his beginning to know he was no accident. The rest grew from a distorted view of his truth.

Ma had only been a girl when John Lennon recorded “All You Need Is Love.” She took it literally. Her search became both her obsession and her addiction. Her abusers—johns, pimps and dealers—substituted for what she needed, but didn’t fill the void.

Then, from the depths of her exploitation and hopelessness, the answer opened itself like a fresh spring tulip. It seemed so simple, so obvious. A baby! In her work, no shortage of men could provide the missing element—the seed. Not only would he never know he fathered a child, but she wouldn’t know who the father was. The plan was perfect. No one would ever vie for what she created, what she craved. Conception would cleanse her. Birth would bring forth that one perfect thing.

Her anguished drive, though, had a perversion all its own. Love was an act she sold to any man with a wallet. But her quest could only be fulfilled by spawning someone who must give her the unconditional love and utter dependence for which her soul ached. No other human relationship could bring her to the heights of nirvana.

But the bondage to her daily work trumped the dream. No matter how much she willed otherwise, her weakness couldn’t control the damage she heaped like blazing coals on her only child. By the time Tony could form sentences, so she wouldn’t be fettered to the needs of the boy, she forced him from her studio so the parade of men could tramp at will up and down the stairs of the brownstone walk-up.
Tony pulled a document from a manila envelope just enough to expose the heading and studied the name written across the top—“Natalie Beaumont.” He thought, Could she really be the one?

The squawk of a dry hinge pulled his attention away from that thought. He realized it was most likely the signal that Natalie had stepped inside. His tan, tweed jacket lay in front of him. He slipped his arms into it, and then reached to the small of his back to make sure the coattail concealed the pistol tucked into his waistband.

Meanwhile, Natalie stepped inside and let the door close behind her. With a dull thud, it slammed to an abrupt stop on a small stick wedged into the doorjamb. Her mind, focused on her future, dismissed what should have appeared as an apparent breaking and entry, and glanced down the long stark hallway. It was poorly lit by incandescent bulbs in steel mesh fixtures suspended from the ten foot ceiling. At the other end, some fifty feet away, she could see light stream through another door opening.
She began to walk.

The click of her black boots on the concrete floor and the swoosh of leather against leather as the arms of her black jacket swayed forward and back with each stride, made a confident sound. But self-assured she was not. With each step fear, like that fourteen year old standing in front of the contemptuous cheer-squad queen, washed over her. She wanted to do her best tonight, to capture the scene perfectly so when Ansell viewed the tape, he would know he had discovered his next costar. But, like the nightmare where the pursued needs to run but each step pulls deeper into quicksand, Natalie felt that with each tread her legs gained ten pounds. Her heart responded with heavy throbs under the strain.
When she reached the opening, another man-sized door, she stepped into a large warehouse room out of breath and exhausted with emotion. She stopped just inside and allowed her eyes to adjust to the brighter light.

Her heart slowed to normal as she took in the room. Around the walls she saw rows of appliances in brown cardboard boxes. The sizes of the cartons varied. Some large enough to contain refrigerators and freezers while others were small enough to protect washers and dryers from shipping damage. They were stacked on top of each other and reached high enough to almost touch the rafters. Some of arrows on the “This Side Up” stickers pointed towards the floor. Can this be a sign? she wondered.
She focused on the middle of the room. Several neat stacks of pallets piled at least ten feet high formed a row across the center of the open area. At the far right end a shorter stack rested. She recognized the tan jacket and dark ponytail of Tony Alonso. He stooped over the pallets like a work bench.

“Come on in, Natalie,” he said without turning around.

She hesitated for a moment longer and then walked with purpose toward the lone figure. She stopped a few feet from him, like last night in the parking lot, just out of easy reach.
“Mr. Alonso.”

“Tony, please. Here for your screen test?” he asked with his back still toward her.
“Interesting place for a shoot, Tony,” she said, and took another look around the room.

“Yes, but if you use your imagination, it’ll be the perfect setting. Won’t you step over here?”
She took three steps forward and could see he had several papers spread out on the makeshift desk. Her eyes fell on a manila mailing envelope with a document partially exposed at the open end. It looked much like contracts she had signed under the guidance of her agent. Enough of it was exposed so she could see her name at the top.

“Are we signing a contract tonight?” she asked, and couldn’t thwart the hope that eased her soul.
_____

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