Chapter 1
My name is Jennifer Stephens. I moved to California from Oakville, Alabama, a small town about fifteen minutes out of Mobile. -- At this point, I already feel I should address some unwarranted preconceptions. I am not a stupid hick. I do not talk like Forrest Gump. I know what air conditioning is, I know who Stephen Hawking is, and I know who Samuel Beckett is. I come from an upper-middle class family and graduated second in my class. My father drives a Lexus, not a tractor.
Please excuse me for being defensive. I just sometimes get tired of the look in someoneâs eye when I tell them where Iâm from. Itâs as if they expect me to be a naive Clampett to be pandered to.
Anyway, after I graduated from high school I went to the University of Alabama on a partial academic scholarship. After a few years, and being unhappy and undecided on what career to pursue, I decided that I should make a bold movement, and I did that toward the only thing I wanted: to be an actress.
Now, I had no illusions about myself and Hollywood. I didnât expect to be discovered the second I crossed the state line. I donât even care about becoming a big star; I just want to make a living as an actress.
I got a place in Newport Beach. A little south of where I shouldâve, I know, but I didnât know any better when I first got there. Sandy, a girl I knew from college had a place in Irvine, so she let me stay until I found a place. She knew some other people looking for a place and another roommate so I went in with them.
My new roommates were Stephen and Allie. Allie worked with Sandy. Stephen was just a friend of Allieâs.
The house we moved into was nice, a couple of blocks walk from the One, where there were restaurants and stores. It was a shaded little side street with horrible parking, but Iâd make do.
I got a job as a waitress right off, as I needed income. Iâd almost depleted my savings from the move, and in addition to having rent (which was way more than in Alabama) due, I also had a car note and three years of student loans to pay back (it was a partial scholarship -- and I didnât work in college).
I dropped four hundred on headshots, a hundred more on duplication, and pretty soon I was mailing headshots and resumes off to agencies and casting notices from Backstage West. I got a few calls and an interview with an agent, but to them I was mostly just another pretty blonde trying to make it.
Waiting tables was a real bitch, too. I felt like I was almost consumed by my dead-end job. Scanning the independent papers, the OCWeekly and others, the same types of classifieds and personals kept catching my eye. Some were from girls, presumably like me, just perhaps a little dumber or a little lazier, looking for sugar daddies to bankroll their acting searches in exchange for, presumably as well, being a fuck-toy. There were ads from sugar daddies looking for young girls to pamper and fuck. I had no desire to be a kept woman, though. Other ads caught my eye, as well. One âwell hungâ black guy available to fuck husbandsâ wives, couples looking for a third, others just looking to get laid. I wondered if (and how often) these ads paid off for these people. But the ones I was most interested in were the ones that mentioned money.
Some ads offered hundreds of dollars an hour for photo shoots, internet photo shoots, and video work. Though they didnât come out and say it, they were for porn. I couldnât believe I was seriously considering it. Money was tight as hell. Other choices of money was being a call girl, getting a sugar daddy, or stripping, none of which appealed to me. I wasnât going to have sex with someone for money. I knew I had a good body and a pretty face. A little nude modeling, a tasteful exposition of the human body, would be perfect. I wrote down three numbers on a notepad and put it on a bookcase shelf in my room.
Two weeks later, I lost two one-hundred dollar bills at work. Iâd worked nine hours on a Friday night and went home still owing the restaurant seventy dollars. I went to bed mad as hell -- at myself, at the job of waiting tables, at never being able to get ahead. That next day, around noon, I picked up the pad, and called the first number. A guy answered, he said his name was Roger. He sounded really high-strung, but was some-what amicable. I told him my name was Rachel. He answered my questions and set up a time for me to come and audition. He asked if I had a headshot or portfolio, which was a good sign to me. He said he had some time on Wednesday evening. I got the address and hung up the phone, wondering if Iâd made the right decisions. Auditions arenât that easy to procure. Still, the money looked very good.
That Wednesday came quickly. I didnât think about it during the days between. The audition itself and the money I might be paid had put me at ease, and that day I calmly packed a bag with make-up, clothes for different looks, headshot and resume with the name Rachel Davies on it, and made the drive.
I pulled up to the place. It was a ranch-style house in Sherman Oaks. I was a bit dubious as I knocked on the door. A man opened the door. He was an inch shorter than me, with receding hairline, lines at the corner of his eyes. We exchanged introductions, his name was Randy. He smiled, invited me in. I became somewhat more accepting of the situation when I saw the equipment inside. Professional lights, photographerâs umbrella, various cameras, computer and editing equipment. A studio was set up inside the house.
âCome in, come in,â he said. âDonât mind the mess, please, we just finished day one of a three day shoot.â Furniture was arranged in the center of the lights and umbrellas, all antique looking. He ushered me into the dining room, which was set up like a makeshift office, with more computer equipment and a laptop on the dining room table. He himself was wearing very nice clothes, though rather unkempt, expensive looking shoes and watch.
I sat in the chair he indicated and he sat next to me, across the corner of the table from me. He asked if I had a portfolio, I gave him my headshot and resume. âI see you got some acting experience,â he said. âUniversity, high school. Good, good. Thatâs basically what modeling is, acting, just bit by bit. You know, we do some film as well as print.â He scanned the resume, looked at the headshot. âDid you bring any other shots?â I told him no. He said âThatâs alright, I can basically tell you seem pretty photogenic, you look like you have a good face for pictures.â