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“You haven’t told anybody about this, have you?”
“Are you nuts? Do you think I want the whole world to know we’re perverts?”
They left the park walking side by side, a dozen pairs of male eyes following them.
Fleur’s daily runs had firmed her muscles, and as the extra pounds melted away, her sexuality emerged from its long hibernation. The flow of water over her body in the shower, the slide of a soft sweater on her skin—everyday acts became sensual experiences. She wanted to be held by someone who shaved, someone with biceps and a hairy chest, someone who cussed and drank beer. Her body was starved for male contact, and as part of her self-improvement campaign, she began dating a personable young actor named Max Shaw, who was appearing off-off-Broadway in a Tom Stoppard play. He was Hollywood handsome, a rangy blond whose only drawback was a tendency to use phrases like “practicing my craft.” They had fun together, and she wanted him.
She donned jeans and the black tank top she’d bought on the clearance table at Ohrbach’s for their date the night of her twenty-fourth birthday. They’d planned to go to a party, but she said she’d had a tough week and suggested they skip it. Max wasn’t stupid, and half an hour later, they found themselves in his apartment.
He poured her a glass of wine and settled next to her on the foam slab that served as both couch and bed in his studio apartment. The smell of his cologne bothered her. Men should smell of soap and a clean shirt. Like Jake.
But her memories of her treacherous first lover were shackles made of dusty cobwebs, easy to break free of, and they drifted away as she kissed Max. Before long, they were naked.
He pushed all the right buttons, and she had the release she’d been craving, but she felt empty afterward. She told him she had an early meeting and couldn’t stay. After she left his apartment, she began to tremble. Instead of feeling energized like Kissy after one of her casual encounters, Fleur felt as though she’d given up something important.
She saw Max a few more times, but each encounter left her more depressed, and she eventually ended it. Someday she’d meet a man she could give herself to with all her heart. Until then, she’d keep things casual and direct her energy into her job.
Christmas arrived, then New Year’s. The longer she worked for Parker, the more she disagreed with the way he ran his business. Olivia Creighton, for example, had spent most of the fifties as the queen of the B movies, specializing in torn dresses and being rescued by Rory Calhoun. With those days gone, Parker, along with Olivia’s personal manager, a man named Bud Sharpe, had decided to capitalize on what was left of her name with commercial endorsements. But Olivia still wanted to act.
“What do you have for me now?” The actress sighed into the telephone when she heard Fleur’s voice. “Laxative commercials?”
“Florida condominiums. The company wants a more glamorous image, and they know you’ll give it to them.” Fleur tried, but she couldn’t manufacture any more enthusiasm than Olivia.
“Did anything happen with that new Mike Nichols play?” Olivia asked after a moment’s silence.
Fleur toyed with a pencil on her desk. “It wasn’t a lead, and Bud wouldn’t consider it for you. Not enough money. I’m sorry.”
Fleur had argued with Bud and Parker over Olivia, but she couldn’t convince either of them to let Olivia have a shot at the Nichols play.
After she hung up, she slipped into the loafers she’d kicked off under her desk and went to see Parker. She’d worked for him for a year and had gradually assumed so much responsibility that he’d begun to rely on her for everything, but he still didn’t like it when she questioned his judgment. The new Lynx album was bombing, Barry got lazier all the time, and Simon had started talking about setting up his own group, but Parker behaved as if Lynx would go on forever, and he used Fleur to pacify his other clients. Although she was gaining valuable experience because of his neglect, she didn’t believe this was the way to run an agency.
“I’ve got an idea I want to talk over with you.” She sat on the plush burgundy couch across from his desk. His squished-in face looked even more unpleasant than usual.
“Why don’t you send me another of your memos?”
“I believe in the personal touch.”
His voice dripped cynicism. “But I look forward to all those bright college-girl suggestions. They make great toilet paper.”
It was going to be one of those days. He’d probably had a fight with his wife.
“What is it this time?” he said. “More nonsense about computerization? A new filing system? A frigging newsletter for our clients?”
She ignored his testiness. “Something more fundamental.” Acting under the flies/honey/vinegar theory, she adopted her most chipper manner. “I’ve been thinking about what happens when we negotiate a contract for our bigger clients. First, we have to clear everything with the client’s personal manager. Then, after our legal looks it over, the personal manager studies it, passes it on to a business manager, who passes it on to another lawyer. Once the deal has gone through, there’s a publicist, and then—”
“Get to the point. I’m dying of old age here.”
She carved a column in the air with her hand. “Here’s the client. Here we are. We get ten percent for finding the client a job. The personal manager gets fifteen percent for directing the client’s career, the business manager five percent for handling money, the attorney another five percent for studying the small print, and the press agent gets two or three thousand a month for publicizing. Everybody takes a cut.”
Parker’s high-back chair squeaked as he shifted his weight. “Any client who’s big enough to have a team like that is in the top tax bracket, so all those commissions get deducted.”
“They still have to be paid. Compare that to the way you operate with Lynx. You’re their agent and personal manager. We do their tour publicity, and the pie isn’t split so many ways. With some smart expansion, we could make that kind of service available to your best clients. We could charge twenty percent commission, which is ten percent more than we’re getting now, but fifteen percent less than the client is paying out to all those different people. We make more, the client pays less, and everybody’s happy.”
He waved her off. “Lynx is a different situation. I knew from the beginning that I had a gold mine, and I wasn’t letting it get away from me. But an operation on the sca
le you’re talking about would be too expensive to run. Besides, most clients wouldn’t want their business centralized like that, even if it cost less. It would leave them too open to mismanagement, not to mention embezzlement.”
“Regular audits get built into the package. But the current system leaves them open to mismanagement, too. Three-quarters of these managers care more about their own cut than their client’s interests. Olivia Creighton is a perfect example. She hates doing commercials, but Bud Sharpe won’t let her accept any of the parts she’s been offered because they don’t pay as much as condominium commercials. Olivia has some good years left, and that’s shortsighted management.”
