Chapter 13 – I Love You But I Miss My Dog

After being cooped up Obertshausen for nearly a week with nothing but German being spoken in my presence (except for Janelle who couldn’t say anything but ga ga or goo goo and Maria who spoke to me in English only when we were alone) I had to get out of the house. There is only so much you can take with their gigantic breakfasts with every imaginable cold cut, eggs, bacon, toast, coffee, orange juice, grapefruit juice and stuff that I wouldn’t give to a starving animal. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but I missed good old Raisin Bran or just plan eggs, hash browns and toast with a cup of strong coffee. Then there were all the questions. Where are you three going to live? Are you going to move to Germany or go back to America? Who do you think is going to win the World Cup? Even though I didn’t give a hoot about American Football, I missed seeing the games on TV. I couldn’t wait for baseball season and I wanted to watch a Dodger or Yankee game. Soon the Pebble Beach Pro/Am was going to be televised and I knew it wasn’t going to be shown on German TV. I guess you could say I was truly homesick.

 One night in early February when everyone went to bed, I waited for an hour to make sure the house was still and then I sneaked out. I crept out to the street and got into Kai’s Merkur, the Orange Crush, put it in neutral and coasted down the road until I was out of earshot then started the beast up and drove back to Sachsenhausen. The weather was close to snowing but the flurries had not materialized yet. I felt that as long as I didn’t stay out too long I could get back without anyone knowing I was gone. It was risky, but my boredom took over and ruled my decision.

Forty-five minutes later, I parked the car a few blocks from the main part of the American sector in Sachsenhausen and this time I made sure I knew exactly where it was using landmarks and whatnot. I went back to the English Pub where Maria and I were on New Year’s Eve and ordered a beer at the bar. The same band was playing American Pie again and I felt a strange sense of déjà vu. At the bar, two loudmouth Germans were in a heated discussion about something and they were so voluminous in speech it was beginning to give me an awful headache. I left the bar and walked until I found another place suitable for the subdued mood I was in. I happened into a local German bar that I knew was a little off the beaten track and wasn’t a tourist trap. They specialized in a certain drink that was called Geneva—a lot like Ouzo with as much, if not more, punch. I was beginning to get a little drunk so I went back to beer and tried to pace myself. There was a pool table in the back and I took out a D-Mark and put it on the table indicating I was up for a game. I was hot that night and won about ten D-Marks from some of the regulars. I don’t think they were too thrilled about losing to an American, especially a Jewish one. I don’t know if they perceived me to be Jewish, but I felt like that scene in Annie Hall where Woody Allen is having dinner with Grammy Hall and it cuts to a shot with him wearing payot, or peyos, and a yarmulke or a shtreimel (a black Hassidic hat). I was fortunate that they let me off the hook with a few nasty looks. There was no way I was going to get into any kind of an altercation on foreign soil. At around two a.m. I thought I had better get back and when I opened the front door the icy wind almost blew me back into the bar. It wasn’t just snowing it was a freaking blizzard. I bundled myself up and rushed back to the Orange Crush but it had taken me three times as long to get back as it would have under normal conditions. When I saw the car it was buried under a fresh blanket of snow that seemed like it was two feet thick—it was completely snowed in. I wiped off the snow the best I could with the sleeve of my leather coat then put the key in the door and turned it but it wouldn’t open. I pulled and yanked on it and wished that I had some kind of defrost spray or WD-40, but I don’t think that it was even invented yet. One last pull and the door handle broke off in my hand. I knew I was fucked, but after (pardon the expression) jimmying it with the key, the door finally opened. How was I going to explain the broken handle to Kai?

There was no way on earth I was going to make it back to Obertshausen in that blizzard, but it didn’t stop me from trying. I had to get back before the Bornemann’s woke up and they usually got up around six a.m. As I crawled down the frozen street the car was careening and swerving in the drifts. Then I saw the blue lights in the rear view mirror. I was being pulled over by the Frankfurt police. I thought I was completely fucked and would be going to jail since I was sure I was over the legal limit of alcohol consumption. They had me get out of the car and fortunately they spoke English, In fact there English was superb. I explained my situation, how I had borrowed my girlfriend’s brother’s car and wasn’t too familiar with the directions back to their village. I must say, and here is I give kudos to the German police. They not only didn’t arrest me, they offered to drive me back to Obertshausen which was more than thirty miles away and said they would tag the car so it wouldn’t get towed. I took them up on the offer. Who wouldn’t? I got back to the house at around 3:30 in the morning and sneaked back in without waking anyone up since I had found the spare key under the doormat. Why anyone keeps a spare key under the doormat and still feels safe I’ll never know. The only problem was I had to retrieve the car in the morning or whenever the weather cleared up. I knew I was going to have to fess up to my crime, which I did the next morning. I was surprised how well they took it and two days later I drove back to Sachsenhausen with Kai in his father’s car and I followed him back home.

I knew I had to get back to America soon. I loved Maria, or at least I thought I did, but I missed my dog, Bridget Bardog. I know it seems stupid to choose a dog over a beautiful young woman but that’s the way I truly felt. I had known Bridget a lot longer and we had been through so much together; moving from place to place. I thought about the first time I saw her out of my window on Radford—the day she got on the bus at the corner and then was kicked off by the bus driver. Then moving to Highland Avenue and when I left for New York how BJ had half starved her by selling her dog food for cigarette money. Then I thought about moving back to Oakhurst and her having the three puppies and I being the midwife (is that what you would call it?) which, after complaints from the neighbor, led to my mom and dad getting thrown out of that apartment, the one they had lived in for more than fifteen years, and moving in to a much nicer place in Studio City.  After that, we moved to Venice, then back to Hollywood and now I had left her with my folks and it had been more than two months since I had seen her. Yes, It was true, I told Maria, I love you honey, but I miss my dog and I said when I got back to the U.S. the first thing  I was going to do was apply for what is known as a fiancé petition which would take about three or four months to be approved.

I arrived back in Los Angeles in February of 1985 and when my dad picked me up I hugged him and he helped me with my bags and placed them in the trunk of the Mercedes. The first thing I did when I got in the car was to I turn on the radio and wouldn’t you know, Chuck Berry’s “Back In the U.S.A came on. I sang along with it at the top of my lungs much to my father’s chagrin. Oh well, oh well, I feel so good today. We touched ground on an international runway. Jet propelled back home, from over the seas to the U. S. A. I ran into the house on Canton Drive and there she was. She whimpered and circled around then jumped up and licked my face and I hugged her for a long time. She looked a little heavier than I had remembered but no worse for wear. I was back and we were together again. Can I get an Amen? AMEN!!

Chapter 12 - New Year’s Eve in Sachsenhausen

It was New Years Eve in Germany, and in most of the world for that matter, and we wanted to celebrate. Hans and Suzanne were kind enough to let us out of the confines of Stalag 9, (the A-frame house in Obertshausen) for the evening and had even offered to babysit for Janelle, so we didn’t even have to hire some teenage friend of Maria’s who most likely wouldn’t be available because of the holiday. I bundled up with two sweaters and the leather jacket I had acquired in Paris and Maria was wearing two pairs of black tights, two jumpers, and a black and white poncho that reminded me of a road sign with its zigzag diagonal pattern. We drove her step-brother’s orange junkheap – an early 70’s Merkur that had rust holes in the floorboards so big that if you lifted up the mats you could stick your feet through and drag them on the road and stop the car like Fred Flintstone. At least the heater worked well.

The main street of Sachsenhausen is Schweizer Straße, a cosmopolitan boulevard with bars and two of Frankfurt's most traditional cider houses, Zum gemalten Haus and Wagner. Ciderhouses that produce their own Apfelwein (applewine) can be identified by the presence of a wreath of evergreen branches hanging outside the location or a similar image included on their signpost. The Textorstraße and the old town or Altstadt have the best known ciderhouses in Frankfurt, but such pubs can be found all over southern Hesse. We parked the holy roller or Orange Crush on the outskirts of town and immediately bought a few cups the scalding hot beverage in one of the ciderhouses then headed to the bars on Schweizer Straße in the American sector where US soldiers would frequent because the bands played the hits of the 60’s and 70’s from back home which was beginning to make me feel homesick.

In the first nightclub called simply, The English Pub (pictured), the band was playing a cover of the recent hit by Tina Turner, What’s Love Got To Do With It and we bellied up to hand carved wooden bar where two obese German’s who both looked like Sgt. Schultz from Hogan’s Heroes, were drinking and shouting at each other in strident tones. I thought that any minute a fight was going to break out between them but Maria assured me that was the way they always acted and there was no need to worry. I ordered a local beer that was served in a two foot high, beveled glass mug and proceeded to get pleasantly plastered while Maria stuck to the Apfelwein not wanting to mix her alcoholic intake. I, being a professional drinker, had no qualms about mixing my booze but I was out of my element and should have followed her lead on that one. After about an hour of listening to everything from Credence Clearwater’s Fortunate Son to Don McLean’s American Pie (a favorite in these parts), we decided it was time to venture on. She wanted to go to a disco and do a little dancing, which is not my forte, but it was New Years Eve and I was fairly wasted so I agreed to go, even if I resembled a drunken orangutan when I danced—I could only imagine how ridiculous I was going to look being three sheets to the wind. Maybe it would improve my skills?

We wandered into a club that was packed tighter than a sardine can with people from all over the world. I could hear French, German, Dutch, Italian and Russian being spoken and we hadn’t even made it to the dance floor yet. Of course there was a giant mirrored disco ball hanging from the ceiling reflecting the blue and red lights which was not helping in my state of inebriation. I went to the bathroom thinking I may throw up but only leaned over the toilet seat hyperventilating. I staggered over to the sink, washed my face and hands and then pulled myself up by the bootstraps and rejoined the festivities. What I needed was a shot of Pernod to set me right. Ever since Paris it was the only drink that would settle my stomach and after a few sips I was back to abnormal. When I came back from the bar I saw Maria speaking with this French dude clad in black leather. It was obvious he was “chatting” her up and when he realized I was with her he offered us a peace pipe in reconciliation. He said it was hashish from Afghanistan and it was very strong and advised us to only take one hit. We did. Oh my God, the room was spinning like a centrifuge. I felt like I was on one of those circular rides where you lean against the inner wall and then the floor drops away while you spin faster and faster. I always hated those rides.

After midnight rolled around, and it was now 1985 we were too wasted to notice but knew something must have happened when the room exploded with cries of Happy New Year in at least ten different languages. I turned around to kiss her and saw that she was slumped down on the floor looking like a ragdoll or a marionette with its strings cut. I propped her up in the corner so she wouldn’t get trampled to death then I stumbled and weaved my way to the bar and got two large glasses of water. It seemed to help but Maria was feeling claustrophobic and had to get out of the crowded club. Somehow I managed to regain the balance to help her up from the floor and led her out to the frozen street below. We were lost.

“Where the hell is the car?” I shouted. She just gave me a blank look.

“I don’t fucking know,” she said as I threw up my hands and paced back and forth.

“This is your town, you should know better than me. C’mon Maria think.”

She started to cry. “Oh that’s really going to help,” I said as I tried to think.

“We parked on Schweizer, didn’t we?”

“I think so, but I’m all turned around. We shouldn’t have smoked that hash. I can’t think straight and I’m freezing my ass off.”

“The best thing to do is wait until later when the crowds thin out and that orange beast will stick out like a sore thumb. Come on lets go get some coffee.”

“Okay, yah...”

We weaved our way through the crowded street and found an all night restaurant a few blocks away. It wasn’t a Denny’s or a Waffle House but the coffee was hot and they were serving breakfast. I ordered some eggs over easy and she had some toast. After an hour or so we started to come back to the planet Earth. At around three in the morning we paid the bill and thought about venturing on to find the Orange Crush. The snow was almost blinding and we couldn’t see ten feet in front of us.

“Maybe we should get a hotel room?” I asked.

“There won’t be anything...it’s New Years’. Remember?”

She began to cry again so I hugged her and tried to reassure her that we were going to be okay. We went back into the restaurant and sat in by the fire waiting until the snow let up—if it ever would. At least we were warm and cozy and I didn’t know about her but I wasn’t high anymore. After an hour or so we noticed the snow was dissipating so we gathered ourselves up and went outside. We couldn’t believe what we saw. The Orange Crush was right across the street half covered in snow. We looked at each other and then looked at the junkheap and then back at each other again then laughed hysterically. We were saved. After scraping the ice off the windshield we climbed inside and it fired the beast up. It might not have been the best looking car in the world but at that moment it was a Rolls Royce or a Jaguar. The heat worked and that was a good thing—a very good thing. If this was any indication of how 1985 was going to be, I knew it was going to be a bumpy ride. I had no idea at the time how right I was going to be.

Chapter 11 – Fatherland/Poisoned in Paris

After a safe landing at Frankfurt International Airport I was waiting for my baggage at the turnstiles when I saw her. She had cut her hair and let it go back to her natural color—a honey blonde and she looked fantastic. She smiled that familiar crooked grin and waved at me from a distance of no more than twenty feet. The closer she got the more beautiful she appeared. It was more than two months since I had seen her last, when she and her mother, sister and baby Janelle had left. I could see Maria had come with another young girl who apparently had a car, but she had left Janelle at home, thinking she was too young and susceptible to strange germs one usually finds in airports after the flyers are confined to breathe the same stale air for hours on end.

Her family had a large A-frame house near the Black Forest in a small town about thirty miles east of Frankfurt by the name of Obertshausen.  It was a four bedroom house with a bonus room upstairs—like a loft where Maria and I slept in a rollaway bed and Janelle stayed in a crib on the warmest part of the room near the heating vent. I guess her step-parents were rather progressive or they thought that I was going to marry Maria therefore had no problem with our sharing the same bed. Hans, her stepfather, had a wine cellar in the basement and an assortment of every kind of Bavarian beer you could imagine. I was still bending the right elbow at the time and we shared a few choice brews as well as many other local types of liquor, much to my delight. It was very odd living in a house of strangers who thought that they had taken in the “token Jew” to their household. Suzanne had explained to me that when she was a little girl back in the early thirties she had joined the Nazi party. She said at first it was a lot fun, they would sing songs and have cookouts and campfires. Her mother said she never trusted Adolph Hitler at all—he reminded her of a used car salesman. She warned Suzanne that her association with the Nazi party was going to lead to big trouble. One day Suzanne noticed that one of her best friends, the daughter of a Jewish family, had suddenly vanished off the face of the earth. One day the family was living there a few doors down and the next day the house was empty without any forwarding address. Soon all the Jews in the small town were gone without a trace. Her mother said it was because of Hitler and his hatred for the Jews. Suzanne left the party soon after that.

Not only was Suzanne an ex-Nazi but she was a very active member of the Church of Scientology. Upstairs in her office (she was also a dentist, who reminded me of Laurence Olivier’s character, Szell, in Marathon Man) was her e-meter, originally known as the Hubbard Electrometer, is a device the Scientologists use to reflect or indicate whether or not a person has been relieved from spiritual impediment of past experiences. One evening at supper, I had asked her about her involvement in Scientology and expressed a curiosity about the e-meter. She asked me if I wanted to give it a try and me, being the kind of person who never backs down from a challenge or a new experience, decided to give it a go.

Her office looked like a shrine dedicated to everything L. Ron Hubbard. She had all his books on the shelf (even the weird science fiction ones) and literature in piles scattered about the room promoting the benefits of Dianetics, L. Ron Hubbard’s theory on which Scientology is based. I sat down on her office chair and she connected the wires from the e-meter to various parts of my body. I felt like Frankenstein’s monster getting ready to be re-animated and had to stifle a laugh looking at the primitive apparatus. It looked like something I might have constructed with my Erector Set when I was a kid. I could hear her humming and hawing behind me and it made me wonder what kind of readings she was getting. Was I going to pass the test? Would I have past life problems that would inhibit my relationship with her step-daughter?

She silently unhooked the wires from my body and I get up from the chair. “Well, did I pass the audition?” I asked.

“You did fine. It looks like you are a very old soul,” she said but I could tell she was holding something back.

“What do you mean, old soul?”

“You have had many past lives, hundreds and hundreds of them. If it is alright with you, I would like to take you down to the Center and have you tested by our leader.”

“Uh, well you see...” I didn’t really want to get into a whole rigmarole since I was only going to be in Germany for a limited time and Maria and I were booked to go to Paris by train in a couple of days. “I think I’ll pass on the invitation, if that’s all right with you.”

“Yes, of course. I only thought you might want to take it to the next level, only out of interest in the lives you might have led in the past.”

“I think I’ll concentrate on the life I’m living now, but thanks just the same.”

That night Maria and I went into town to a Chinese restaurant and sat in a booth behind an ornately carved wooden wall. There were all these L shaped patterns in the carvings and when I inspected them more closely I could see they were connecting Swastika’s. The food was good but I told Maria that I felt uncomfortable there and there was no way I was going to go anywhere near the ovens. We left before the fortune cookies arrived. I had had enough messages for one day, thank you very much.

Maria and I left Frankfurt on the train bound for Paris two days later. The scenery was beautiful—the snow covered Alsace Lorraine hills and valleys nearly took my breath away. We got a cheap bottle of wine and some German cold cuts for dinner and within a few hours I was feeling sick to my stomach. It felt like I was coming down with some kind of virus or flu, feeling weak and dizzy. Of all times to get sick, It was my first time in Paris—the city of lights. When we got off the train Maria had to help steady my slow and deliberate gait to the pharmacie, thinking they might have some medication that would help, or maybe they could direst me to a doctor—preferably one who spoke English. She said there was a fine physician in the next building. I staggered over there and to my chagrin the doors were locked. I looked at the directory and couldn’t figure out which one was the doctor the lady at the pharmacie had recommended. I told Maria to go back and get the name of the doctor while I leaned against the door. I saw a woman leaving the building so I waited for her to exit then I grabbed the door before it closed. I was now in the building but didn’t know much more than that. I walked into the first office I came to and sat down in the waiting room.

The receptionist didn’t speak any English so I did my best to communicate my situation to her. I thought I was going to pass out but managed to remember my basic French from high school. “Je suis tres mal,”  I said.

“O oui. Un moment,” she said.

After a few minutes I was directed to a room where the nurse had indicated for me to lie down and remove my shirt with hand signals. I could understand that much since taking off one’s clothes translated nicely in any language, so I complied. Soon a young doctor with a pencil thin mustache came into the room. Fortunately he spoke English and told me to lie back while he examined me. He took my blood pressure and stuck a thermometer in my mouth. I had a low grade fever, so he had ruled out some kind of influenza. Then he looked at my feet and could see they were swollen around the ankles.

“My friend,” he said. “You have food poisoning. What have you been eating?”

“I had some wine and cold cuts on the train from Germany,” I told him.

“Ah, the train. I wouldn’t have eaten anything those pigs serve on those trains. I always bring my own food. But, it is too late for that. I am going to give you some medication to help with your stomach cramps and diarrhea, but what you need is rest and to drink plenty of fluids. The sickness should pass within 12 to 24 hours.”

“Great! I am only in town for a couple of days. Isn’t there anything else you can give me to speed up the process?”

“I’m afraid not. The poison has to run its course.”

I left the office and saw Maria in the lobby. She was a little upset that I hadn’t told her where I was but she understood when I told her about the food poisoning. She was smart and had not eaten any of the salami or pepperoni and had luckily avoided the sickness.

We checked into the hotel somewhere near Notre Dame de Lorette but all I saw the first night was the view from the bathroom. The next morning I was feeling a little better but I was so nauseated with the thought of any type of rich food entering my system. That night I was able to eat some Spaghetti Bolognese; it was the only food I could digest without getting sick to my stomach. What a shame to be in one of the greatest culinary cities in the world and be limited to Spaghetti Bolognese. At least I could manage to down a couple of shots of the green fairy, Pernod Absinthe (the favorite drink of Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald), without giving it all back to the lavatorie—vivé la France.

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Chapter 10 – Mother and Child Reunion

The dog days of August were upon us and I was devoting every waking minute to her. Even my dreams were filled with anticipation and dread of what was going to be. I had all but given up on selling typewriter ribbons and lift off tape with David and my music was all but forgotten. I knew I was storing it up for a future time when I would be able to write all of this craziness down, but for now I was concentrating on her and her needs. While my friends were going on about their daily business, Chas was making a name for himself as a producer and songwriter, Larry was off in stockbroker land concentrating on the almighty dollar and writing instrumental “mood pieces”, Stephen was living in Venice with his new love, Portia while keeping a vigil on his all but forgotten goddess of love, Renee Russo. I couldn’t talk to any of them without receiving some kind of lecture about the misbegotten waif that I was spending way too much time and energy on. They all said I was going to be hurt and left without a pot to piss in, but I knew I had gone too far to turn back.

By September, when the Santa Ana winds were blowing hot and strong— the winds of change gusting. We would meet with the adopting couple, the Jewish film director (let’s call him Will) and his matronly wife (let’s call her Jennifer) from time to time and each meeting was getting stranger and stranger. I was starting to have my doubts about them. They were acting more and more disinterested in the well being of their surrogate mother to be—all they seemed to do was talk about themselves and their own lives. I don’t know how it happens, but I have heard tales that when a woman who is barren in the womb and told that she would never be able to conceive a child of her own can get pregnant when all the pressure is off. Sometimes a vacation to a warm and tropical place, or an unexpected windfall, maybe winning the lottery or the jackpot in Vegas or Monte Carlo, but for Jennifer it was when she found out that she was chosen by us to be the mother of Maria’s child—she was now pregnant. Maybe that was the justification for the decision that we made, the hardest decision I ever had to make in my thirty-one years of life so far.

By the middle of September, Maria was looking like and over-inflated balloon and we knew it was going to be soon. On the night of the twenty-fourth her water had broken and I rushed her to Cedars of Lebanon hospital in my Porsche. Fortunately I had the foresight to take Bridget over to my parents Leave it to Beaver house on canton Drive the night before. Even though the wanted no part of my life with the Nazi-girl, they did love me and my dog, and couldn’t see having the poor dog suffer being locked up in an apartment for hours, even days if Maria were to go into labor. Maria was in terrible pain and wasn’t one of those women who gave a shit about natural child birth or anything like that especially if it was a child that she would be giving up—so she got the epidural and was feeling a lot better in less than twenty minutes. By midnight the contractions were getting closer—about two minutes apart and we knew it was going to be soon. I was staying awake on coffee and nervous energy and at four AM on September 25, 1984, Maria gave birth to a beautiful ginger-haired little girl—she was perfect.

Maria tried to hold back her tears as the baby was taken from the delivery room to the room where they kept the other newborns, but as soon as her little girl had left the room the river of tears flowed like a fountain. I tried my best to console her, and told her it was for the best and how her baby was going to have a great life, go to the best schools and be well taken care of, but deep down I felt that we were making a mistake. My feelings were intensified when I called Will and Jennifer at four-thirty.

“Hello, is this Will?”

“Yeah, who is it?”

“It’s James.”

“James who?”

“Maria’s boyfriend, you know— the mother of your soon to be adopted child.”

He sounded like he couldn’t care less who I was and acted irritated by be awakened before the crack of dawn. “Oh yeah. What do you want?”

“I’m sorry to call you so late but I wanted to let you know that Maria had the baby. It’s a lovely little girl.”

“Oh yeah, that’s great. Goodbye.”

He hung up the phone without any further questions. I was shocked. You would think that he would want to know more about the baby, what she looked like, if she had all of her fingers and toes and so on, but nothing. I felt confused and a little pissed off, but I thought I should probably keep these feelings to myself and not let on to Maria how insensitive Will was on the phone.

I went back to Maria’s room in the maternity ward and fell asleep on the lounge chair next to her. Around ten o’clock in the morning a nurse had come by the room with the baby in her arms. She probably wasn’t told that the baby was going to be put up for adoption, some kind of communication breakdown, but she handed the baby to Maria to try and get her to nurse the infant. I thought it was a terrible mistake. She was going to bond with the baby and it was going to be next to impossible for Maria to let go after that. A few minutes later the head nurse came in and took the baby away from Maria and most likely read the other nurse the riot act for what she had done. But the damage was done, and the connection already made and the mother and child connection is the strongest bind there is on the planet. Nobody could argue with that.

I felt like I was being torn apart at the seams, and I could only imagine how Maria was feeling when the next morning they had the baby all bundled up in a pink blanket and handed her over to Jennifer and Will and we both watched in silence as they rounded the corner and left with the two day old Janelle. Later that day Maria was released from the hospital and we drove back to the apartment on Fuller without uttering a word. There was a cloud of doom and depression so thick you could cut it with a paper knife. I thought after a day or two things would begin to lighten up, but they only got worse. I thought she was going to jump out of the window or slit her wrists in the bathtub. I couldn’t take it anymore so I said, “Why don’t you call your mother in Germany.”

“What good is that going to do?” she asked knowing that it had been almost a year since she had spoken to Suzanne and they didn’t exactly leave on the best of terms.

“Just call her.” I said.

After a few minutes of silence she called. When Suzanne heard what had happened she was shocked and appalled that she could do such a thing.

“Is there any way you can get the baby back?” she asked her adopted daughter.

Maria was aware of the California law that the birth mother had three months, maybe longer, to reverse her decision and have the baby returned to her, and she told Suzanne this.

“You call those lawyers and get that baby back. I will fly out in a week or two with Anna and you will all come back to Germany. Is that understood?”

“Are you sure?” Maria asked, having doubts that her step-mother would take such a proactive stance in the matter.

“Of course I am sure. This is your child we are talking about.”

She hung up the phone and I was about to make the hardest phone call I ever had to make.

“Hello, is this Will?”

“Yes. Who’s calling?”

“It’s James. I don’t know how to tell you this but let me get right to the point. Maria has decided to get her baby back.”

“What! You’re kidding right?”

“No. I’m sorry. Roger will be in touch with you. I am really sorry.”

I hung up the phone with a lump in my throat as big as the Holland Tunnel. What had I just done? The only saving grace was knowing that Jennifer was pregnant and was most likely, if everything went well, she and Will were going to be parents of their own little boy or girl.

A week later I was in the waiting room of Roger’s law office while Maria was signing papers. Will and Jennifer had just come by and dropped off Janelle. It would have been more than awkward if we had bumped into them so they made sure not to call us in to the office until they knew the adopting couple was long gone. After the ink was dry, the t’s crossed and the i’s dotted we entered Roger’s office. There, lying down between two leather office chairs that were pushed together and barricaded by stacks of law books on each side, was little Janelle. Maria picked her up and smiled for the first time in months. I felt like I had done the right thing. There was a circle of events in her life that had to be broken. Her mother had abandoned her and she had abandoned her baby. It had to stop, I and was going to do something about it, or so I thought.

Two weeks later, in the middle of October, Maria, Suzanne, Anna and Janelle were boarding a plane bound for Frankfurt, Germany. I had some loose ends to tie up, one of them being selling my beautiful Porsche, and as soon as I could, I would be joining them. I asked my mom and dad if they could take care of Bridget and they agreed. They thought I was insane to go, but they knew I was, or thought I was in love, and tried to be understanding. In mid December I was on a plane heading east to their Fatherland.

Chapter 9 – The Baby Biz

It was official after her eighteenth birthday on June 7, we were an item. After a month of sleeping, yes only sleeping, next to this punk goddess, we had consummated our relationship. She was young and fairly inexperienced so I was considerate, gentle and careful. I knew she couldn’t get pregnant again since she was already bitten by that bug, but I did feel a little strange making love to her in that condition, even though she had barely begun to show. After a week or so, I put the question to her again: “So what are we going to do about the baby?”

“I guess I’ll call that lawyer guy, if you want me to.”

“It’s your decision, Maria. Is that what you want?”

“I guess so.”

The law offices were on South Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills and we were sitting in the reception area looking through brochures and pictures of happy couples with lovely little darlings wrapped in their arms. It all looked so peaceful, pleasant and harmless, but I knew it was going to be difficult for her to give up the baby, and probably hard for me, too. First things first, we had to be accepted by the “firm” , but I really had no doubts that a baby by a Nordic, blonde beauty was going to be anything but accepted, hell, they would most likely throw rose petals at her feet as she walked down the corridor to the office.

The receptionist opened the glass window, the partition that separated the staff from the clients and told us that the attorney was ready to see us now. I held her hand and guided her into the office that looked like any other law office, with floor to ceiling law books, magazines relating to motherhood and parenting, and a few Sports Illustrated mags and Golf Digests for the men. The attorney, let’s call him Roger, was a tall man, thick of chest, with thick salt and pepper hair and an expression of compassion hiding his true lust for money and power. When he took one look at Maria I could literately see his eyes pop out of his head.

“Hello, Mr. Haymer and Ms. Bornemann, I’m so glad you could make it down this morning. Can I get you anything, coffee or a soda?”

“I’ll have a coffee, please,” I said politely.

“Could I have a Diet Pepsi?”

“Of course,” Roger said in his most accommodating voice.

He reached behind his desk and pick up the phone and in a manner of thirty seconds our beverages were set down on the wrought iron and glass coffee table by a pretty, red-headed woman in her late twenties, or early thirties.

“Mrs. Lowery has filled me in on the details and she told me you both are aware of what we do here. As you know, we are not a baby shop and don’t buy babies and ship them off to Africa or anything like that. This is a completely above board operation in every sense of the word. But I’m sure you have questions and I would more than happy to answer any and all of them.”

“How does it actually work,” I asked. “I mean do we pick the adopting parents out of a brochure or catalogue?”

Maria nodded at me as if I was asking a good question, one that she would have asked first herself.

“Something like that. We have several books,” he pointed to a group of books that looked like photo albums stacked neatly on the desk in the far corner of the room. Let me show you.” He pranced over to the other desk and gather up a handful of photo books then set them down in front of Maria. “Why don’t you browse through some of these to get an idea of what I’m talking about.”

She opened the first book and I squeezed in close to her so I could see, too. There were all sorts of happy looking couples, some very young, some twenty-something’s, thirty something’s and forty something’s, some white, black, Asian, European, South American, you name it. Some were Jewish, Catholic, Protestant, Buddhists, Atheists, Agnostics and everything else in between. Some were the same age, some had wide age differences, some were different religions and races. It was a very mixed bag. There was a couple that caught my eye because the man was Jewish and the woman was Protestant. He was a filmmaker and the woman was a housewife. They both appeared to be in their mid to late thirties.

“Look at this couple,” I said to Maria. “They would be perfect, don’t you think? He’s Jewish, like me and she’s Protestant, kind of like you, and they’re definitely worth considering.”

“As long as they’re not Scientologists.”

“I assure you Maria, Is it okay that I call you that?” Roger had asked as a mere formality.

“That’s fine.”

“I can guarantee they are not Scientologist. Although we can’t discriminate, we frown at any cult affiliations.”

We left the attorney’s office feeling like we were making the right decision, even though it was going to be a tough one. Important decisions are usually tough, aren’t they? We had both thought that the couple, (the Jewish film director and the Christian housewife) were a heads up favorite in the race for the adopting parents to be. We had come to an agreement with the law office on the compensation package as well. She was going to get sixteen hundred dollars a month that would be retroactive from the first of May. This would include food rent and other amenities. Of course all doctor visits would be gratis and we were given a list of obstetricians to choose from. We ended up going with the first one we visited with since she didn’t want to get too busy with the details; as long as he or she wasn’t a complete creep, they would be fine in her book.

Since the place on El Cerritos was getting a little cramped we thought it would be a good idea to move into a bigger place, maybe even a two bedroom. It was back to Homefinders again. The lists came out twice a week, on Tuesdays and Fridays, and you had to be there at eight in the morning to get a good jump on the prime candidates. The early bird catches the worm, and all that. We saw a listing for a large room in a huge house in the Hollywood Hills off of Pacific View Terrace right off Mulholland Drive. We called right away and this English woman answered the call. She sounded like a cross between Emma Peel and the Queen of England and she said she would be delighted to meet up with us chappies (pip, pip, cheerio and all that rot; eh what?)

The excitement was mounting as we drove down Mulholland in my Porsche with Maria in the passenger seat and Bridget in the back. Maria was starting to get used to my dog, even though she was drooling on her left shoulder at the moment. I thought it would be best to bring the beast (she was a rather large dog) so the landlady could get an idea of what kind of dog (the sweetest in the world) she was and if it would be agreeable to rent to all three of us.

We parked the Porsche on the street and went looking for the address. The house was below the street level and we had to walk down thirty or forty steps to even catch a glimpse of it, but once we did, we could see it was huge. It was a Spanish bungalow style house surround by palm tree and jacaranda. There were rose bushes lining the walkway and Bridget could hardly contain herself from sniffing every bush. I rang the doorbell and after a minute or two an Amazon woman with long silver-blonde hair with a Virginia Slim cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth and a tall glass of what looked like a vodka and tonic answered the door.

“Are you Nicky?” I asked.

“Ah, you must be James, and this lovely lady is Maria, eh what? Please, do come in.” She was everything that I imagined she would be when I talked to her on the phone. Very British and very attractive, around thirty-five or forty, I imagined. Bridget, who was behind the rose bushes, finally came to the door and made herself at home. She saw a big gray cat on the couch and immediately began to chase her. Not a good start.

“Oh my God, is that a dog or a mountain lion? She’s huge!”

“That’s Bridget Bardog.”

“Bardog? Now that’s a good one.”

I regained control of Bridget and we were invited in and we gathered around the fire in the living room. Nicky invited us to sit on the wicker couch and asked if we wanted a cup of tea or anything.

“A cup of coffee would be great,” I said as I followed her into the kitchen. I knew Maria would want her usual Diet Pepsi.

“Is instant okay?” she asked as she went to the fridge grabbed a bottle of Stoli out of the freezer and refilled her tumbler and it was only ten-thirty in the morning. I could tell by the slight slur in her voice that it wasn’t her first. While waiting for the water to boil we starting talking about our situation and I mentioned my family’s British connection and all the Anglo-Saxon musical relationships I had in the past.

Back in the living room Maria sat there smiling and smoking her Marlboro 100’s and only spoke when she was asked a direct question. After about an hour of laughing, drinking coffee (for me) Diet Pepsi (for Maria) and Vodka (for Nicky), she told us that she would have to speak with her landlord about the dog. Pets were allowed, she said, but one the size of a horse would be something she would have to get approval on from the powers that be.

She called the next morning.

“James, this is Nicky Graham, the woman on Pacific View.”

“I know who you are, Nicky. I could hardly confuse you with anyone else.”

“Right. I just wanted to say that I am dreadfully sorry, but the landlord wouldn’t approve your application. I had to tell him about the dog. It’s a dirty rotten shame, too. I really like both of you so much. We would have had great fun together.”

“Well, I appreciate that, Nicky. Thanks for getting back to us so quickly. I guess it’s back to the drawing board.”

“James, anytime you and your lovely lady want to come by for a visit, just give me a holler. I mean it.”

“Thanks. We just might take you up on that offer.” Goodbye.”

“Cheers, James.”

We didn’t get the room in the house but we did visit her. In fact, we became really good friends. She was one of the only people that supported me in my situation, and it was good for me to have that support. I felt I was all alone,(except for Maria and Bridget) and having someone to talk to about things was something I desperately needed, even though she was a sweet but hopeless drunk.

We eventually found a two bedroom, downstairs apartment on Fuller Street between Santa Monica Boulevard and Fountain near La Brea with a small backyard with orange and eucalyptus trees. It was in a very Jewish part of town, which made Maria feel like the token Nazi or something. There was a market right down the street which would later become a Trader Joe’s and a Russian restaurant which had cheap lunch specials, things like beef Stroganoff , corned beef and cabbage and borscht—except I hated borscht. We had plenty of room in the apartment and I rented a piano and promised to give Maria lessons. We began to eat healthy. I cooked stir-fry in the wok my mom had given to me and lots of salads. I only drank beer and Maria had quit the booze and drugs completely. She still smoked like a chimney; well two out of three isn’t bad.

It was now nearing the first of August and the doctors had told us the due date was going to be the end of September of the beginning of October. I had no idea she was that far along since she was only now beginning to show, although by the middle of August, she did look like she swallowed a ten pound bowling ball. It wouldn’t be long now, and I wondered if she was really going to go through with it. She would have to give up a child, just like her mother had done to her. It was a vicious cycle of heartbreak and denial. Yes, I wondered what was going to happen. She tried not to think about it.

Chapter 8 – Sex Trap

“You’re what?” I shouted in complete and utter shock.

“You heard right.”

“How far along are you?”

“I don’t know, maybe four or five months.”

I couldn’t believe what she had just laid on me. There she was smoking Marlboro 100’s and doing cocaine and she was with child. I had to make her see the error of her ways. But wasn’t this the pot calling the kettle black? I wasn’t exactly Mr. Clean and Sober, not yet anyway.

“What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know. Forget about it.”

“Forget about it? Whether you like it or not, you can’t forget about it. In about five months there is going to be a big surprise coming out of your uterus. That is something you just can’t wish away.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Really? I think we should, Maria.”

After going through two abortions with my first girlfriend, I had a generous amount of guilt stored up. I felt like this was an opportunity to make things right, at least try to make up for the hasty decisions I and my girlfriend had made in the distant past—at least it seemed like another lifetime ago.

“Whatever you decide to do, I will back you up one hundred percent. If you want to have this child, have an abortion, which may be difficult at this late stage, or give it up for adoption. These seem like your only three choices.”

“Right now I want to get high and forget about it.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea. Think of the baby. It could be born dependant on drugs. I’ve seen some TV specials about it, and it is not a pretty sight. Is that what you want?”

“No.”

“Good.”

About two weeks before I met Maria, a friend of mine, Jon Lowery’s wife, Beverly, had been approached by an attorney when he found out that she was pregnant. He asked her if she wanted to put the baby up for adoption. She adamantly said, “No way!” But he gave her his card nonetheless. I was over their house in The Valley buying an amplifier from Jon when I mentioned that I was living with a young German/Finnish girl who was pregnant and was confused about what to do. “Is it yours?” she asked point blank.

“No, I met her under that condition.”

“Good.”

She then gave me the phone number of this attorney in Beverly Hills, the same guy that approached her. I thought it may be a good thing to do. Not only do they pay your expenses, they let you choose the adopting couple from a file with pictures, ages, religious background and everything you need to know to make a rational decision. I was going to run it by her when I got back home.

Meanwhile Maria was hustling these so called “Sugar Daddies” for money. She swore up and down that she wasn’t sleeping with them, but we weren’t sleeping together so it was really none of my concern, although I did care an awful lot about her.

Let me tell you a little about this almost eighteen year old woman/child that was sharing my bed, an frustrating the hell out of me because, as of yet, we were not doing the deed. Her real mother was a Finnish woman by the name of Rita Surhasko living in the house of a German woman and working as an au pair, (a domestic assistant from a foreign country working for, and living as part of, a host family). The Borneman’s were the host family, the mother’s name was Suzanne and her husband was Hans. They had two children, Ana and Kai.

So three year old Maria, whose real name was Jutta Marja Surhasko, lived in an upper middle class home in Obertshausen and shared a room with her single mom, Rita. One night when Rita went out for a drink in nearby Frankfurt, in the American sector, she met a United States Army soldier and they fell in love. This soldier was scheduled to leave for America in a couple of weeks and had asked Rita to marry him, unfortunately for Maria and Rita, he didn’t want any excess baggage tagging along—no kids, at least no kids from another marriage. I don’t know if Rita was despondent or even depressed about the choice she had to make, but she finally came to a decision to marry this soldier and leave her three year old daughter in the care of the Bornemann’s. After a year or so little Maria was legally adopted by them and Rita and said soldier moved to Riverside, California and remained there until her death in the nineties.

Suzanne Bornemann was a force to be reckoned with. Not only had she grown up as Nazi (she had joined a Youth for Hitler club), but she was a full-fledged Scientologist—an O.T. level five, which is very high up in the ranks of that organization. What a lethal combination. While the Bornemann’s were on a sojourn to Clearwater, Florida, with the entire family (including seventeen year old Maria) to bask in the light of Scientology, Maria had run away. After many days and nights of hitchhiking (with her looks I imagine it wasn’t too hard to find a ride), she finally ended up in Hollywood, California. While in Hotel Hell she met a young punk rock skateboarder dude named Rusty and they became an item. He was the father of her soon to be child, if she decided to go through with the pregnancy, or if the fates deemed it to be.

What a tragic story, I thought, and there had to be something I could do to help this poor, beautiful but unfortunate woman/child. I couldn’t get her off the cigarettes, but she did cut down to a half a pack a day. As far as the cocaine, I insisted that she give it up and what was good for the goose was also good for the gander. I was almost sober now, except for the occasional beer and joint, and she was as well. She never did indulge in marijuana saying it made her paranoid, and I could understand that since pot is the bullshit eliminator—it is impossible to lie to yourself and have a good high.

Lying in bed with her night after night and not even touching her was starting to get to me. I told her I wanted to change the status of our relationship and asked if we could make love on her eighteenth birthday which was less than a week away. I didn’t want a pity fuck, I needed to know if she was attracted to me, and if so would she be able to let go of her problems for a night. I know you might think, it was sleazy to want to make love to a teen-age pregnant woman, but honestly she still had a flat stomach and I wondered if she wasn’t making the whole story up so I would have sympathy for her. How sleazy was it really? I thought I was falling in love with her and there was only a thirteen and a half year age difference between us. Look at all the seventy year old men (movie stars and directors, artist and sculptors etc.) that sleep with eighteen year old girls and are well respected members of society. I felt okay about it; even if the general consensus was that I was robbing the proverbial cradle.

At this point, everyone I knew was against me and my decision to harbor a teen-age runaway. My father and mother, sister and brother, Chas, Stephen, Paul Downing, and Larry Harrison—everybody tried to talk me out of helping Maria, but I had gone too far to turn back now. The only one who seemed to like her was good old Bridget Bardog. On the third of June, four days before her birthday, Chas was having a belated birthday party for himself on Milner Road, which was a few blocks away and a year or so later it would be directly across the street. I told Maria I was going and if she wanted to come along that would be fine. She said she had some “business” to take care of and declined the offer. I hopped in my Porsche and drove the half mile to Chas’ duplex while the party was in full force. Chas always had the best parties, always lots of women, booze and food, and this one was no exception to that rule. I was determined to meet an older woman (at least twenty) that would distract me from my feelings for Maria. There was this very attractive dark haired, dark skinned woman standing by herself in the corner looking around to see what her next move was going to be. It was me. I asked her if she wanted to sit in my Porsche (even though it was a glorified VW, it still looked the part of a sex trap) and talk, maybe listen to a cassette of some of my music. For the life of me I can’t remember this young woman’s name but I do have a good sense of what she looked like—she was pretty and kind of intelligent, and she was in my car. After getting to know her a little we started to make out in the front seat of the car. I knew I couldn’t invite her back to my place since Maria might be there, but it would serve her right to bring home another woman, at least it would force the issue. Instead I got her phone number and promised to call her in a day or two, and then we went back inside to join the party.

I left the party a little after midnight and went home expecting to find Maria there, but she wasn’t, only Bridget, who was in desperate need of a walk. After the dog did her business outside, I came back in to the apartment and noticed a note and a cassette on the bed. It was from her and it was scented with rose oil. She had written that she really liked me a lot but was so confused in her life, and if it weren’t for me, she would be lost. She went on to say that her words could not express her feeling but it would be better expressed in the song, More Than This, from the album Avalon by Roxy Music featuring Brian Ferry. What can I say? I was touched.

When she came back to the apartment an hour or so later, she saw me reading the note, (I had read and re-read it about a hundred times). She broke down and cried and we spent the night in each other’s arms. I can’t tell you if we made love that night, and I can’t tell you that we didn’t. You decide.

Chapter 7- Watching the Detectives

I was at my parent’s house on Canton Drive, not the one where Robbie and Carol’s wedding rehearsal was, it was across the street. The owner of the first Canton home was a man by the name of Pat Senatore, who is best known for playing bass in The Tijuana Brass, Herb Alpert’s famous band. He still is the Artistic Director for Alpert’s Vibrato Grill Jazz in Bel Air, California where he performs and books the music. Pat had decided he wanted to move back to his old haunting grounds and gave my parent’s a generous three months notice. The found the “Leave it to Beaver” house across the street with three bedrooms and a nice, but steeply inclined yard with eucalyptus trees, bougainvillea and low hanging ferns. It wasn’t as artistic as the last place, and there was no guest house, but it was very homey and they were relatively happy there. There was plenty of room for Danny and J, the two puppies that Bridget Bardog had given birth to the year before, to run around in.

 I was there that afternoon in March talking to my mom and dad about the strange series of phone calls I had received the night before. They thought it was insane, but they thought my life was generally insane, so it was par for that course. I asked my dad if he knew anything about Nastassja Kinski, if he had ever worked with her and such. He said he thought she was a wild child and was very beautiful and was the daughter of Klaus Kinski—that’s all he knew on that subject. When I got home to my apartment on El Cerritos, I noticed that my phone machine was flashing indicating that there were unheard messages. I thought that it would be amazing if one of those messages was her, or maybe Bowie. I rushed over to the Phone Mate and pressed the button. The first call was from Chas asking if I wanted to go down to the Sports Connection to work out. The second message was from her.

“James, this is Nastassja. I wanted to thank you again for saving David’s life and if there is anything I can do to thank you, I will. Cheers for now.”

That was it. I was over the moon with excitement. Was it really her? If this was a joke it was going too far but I had to be sure. I made a copy of the message on my double cassette recorder and listened to it until the magnetic backing on the tape was wearing thinner than an anorexic junkie. Her voice was low and sexy and there was a hint of some kind of European accent that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I just wanted to put my finger (and a lot more) on her. I figured I would call Chas back and talk it over with him, which I did on the Lifecycle exercise bike next to him at the Sports Connection.

“James, are you bullshitting me?”

“No Chas, this really happened.” I told him the whole story and he stopped pedaling and listened skeptically.

“Jeez, James. Why do things always happen to you? I remember when you walked through the check stand at Ralphs and all the computers went crazy, and when you drive under a street lamp they frequently burn out.”

He had a name for me—the human sunspot. I told Chas to keep this whole thing to himself and he promised he wouldn’t tell a soul but it was a moot point since there was a girl behind us who had overheard the brunt of the conversation. Her name was Karen and she was known as the mouth of West Hollywood and not just for oral sex. I thought I was in trouble now and soon the whole town was going to know the story after I had promised David and Nastassja that I would keep it under wraps. I turned around to face Karen and told her that I was only kidding about the story and it was only an idea I had about a short story or a song. She smiled and said, “Sure James, I won’t tell a soul about your little story idea,” but I knew she wasn’t buying it—I was screwed.

I went to the local video rental shop (Blockbuster hadn’t even come into existence yet) and rented every Nastassja Kinski film I could get my hands on. There was Stay as You Are with Marcello Mastroianni and The Hotel New Hampshire (it had just come out that week). Of course there was Cat People with that theme song by David Bowie called Cat People (Putting out the Fire). This was the movie where she met David and where their intimate relations had started. I didn’t have a VCR machine so I went over to the house on Canton Drive and watched them. I thought I was Sam Spade or a modern day Sherlock Holmes, listening to every line she spoke then rewinding it and comparing it to the voice on the answering machine tape. It was very similar but I had to be sure and the only way to be sure was to have the tape analyzed.

The next morning I got a call from some woman from the National Enquirer, a tawdry newspaper that prints articles about babies born with three heads from outer space or the latest Elvis sightings, that kind of tabloid. She had heard about the David Bowie story from the mouth of Hollywood I assumed, or from some other loosed-lipped individual. The aggressive woman on the other end of the line was offering me fifteen hundred dollars for an exclusive story about the events of the other evening. I laughed. “I don’t care if you offer me fifteen thousand dollars, there is no way am I going to divulge anything about David Bowie, Nastassja Kinski. I felt like it would be betraying a friendship and I am not one to do that. It would be sleazy and cheap. Now maybe if they had offered me a million dollars I would have definitely considered it, but I knew nobody was going to offer that kind of money. I didn’t even know if the whole escapade was for real or not, but I did have a recording of Ms. Kinski, or from a woman who claimed to be her.

There was a private detective that had an office in the 9000 building on Sunset Boulevard that I had met before through Larry. His name was Tony Pellicano. He would later be known as the P.I. to the stars having clients such as Michael Jackson, Tom Cruise, Steven Seagal and many others too numerous to count. He later would serve a thirty month sentence in jail for wiretapping, racketeering and obstruction of justice. Tony had just arrived from Chicago and had met Larry at, where else, The Rainbow Bar and Grille. When I called Larry about my dilemma, he was the one who set up the meeting with Pellicano.

As I sat in the waiting room firmly grasping a cassette in my sweaty hands, I looked at all the photographs on the wall. There were signed pictures of Sylvester Stallone, David Carradine in his Kung Fu garb and his brother Keith. There was another photo of him arm in arm with billionaire, Kirk Kerkorian. He called me into his office and I told him the story and asked him if he could authenticate the voice on the tape by comparing it to some of her dialogue from a film that she had made. He said he could do it but it would cost me a hundred bucks to get started, and that was him doing me a favor since I was a friend of Larry’s. Usually for something like this it would cost a grand just to get started. I told him I would get back to him about it since I didn’t have a hundred bucks to spare at the moment. He smiled and shook my hand saying, “Okay Jimmy, when you get the cash I can get started. It shouldn’t take me more than a week or two to get some kind of result for you.”

“Thanks, Tony. I will call you as soon as I get the money, thanks.”

I left his office feeling a little dejected. Did I really want to invest a hundred dollars just to find out if all of this was on the level? Wouldn’t it be better to wait until she called again and arrange a meeting with the starlet? I thought that would be the more prudent way to go. I went home and threw on my roller skates to get some exercise for myself and Bridget. Our usual route was to go down the stairs and hang a left on El Cerritos and another left on Hollywood Boulevard past Grauman’s Chinese Theater heading east. Winding our way through the pedestrians and tourists I saw a couple of young punk rock girls with shaved heads and safety pin earrings. They couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen and looked like they hadn’t had a decent meal in days.

One of the girls called out, “You got any spare change?”

I stopped on a dime and turned around as Bridget sniffed them out. They seemed harmless enough to both of us.

“If I give you some money what are you going to do with it?” I asked.

“Get some food,” the second and less attractive girl said.

“I’ll tell you what. Let’s go to the pizza place down the street and I’ll buy you both a couple of slices. How does that sound?”

They looked at each other and nodded their heads in agreement. The next thing I knew they had followed Bridget and me to Tony’s Pizzeria on Hollywood and Wilcox and I ordered four slices and four paper cups of water, one for me, two for the girls and one for Bridget Bardog. They began to tell me their life stories of how they came to Hollywood to meet rock stars and do drugs and ended up on the street. They were obviously runaways. I knew they weren’t going to tell me who, what and where they were running from, so I didn’t ask. After they scarfed down the pizza like there was no tomorrow I asked them, “How would you girls like to earn ten bucks each?”

“Yeah, I suppose you want some head or something,” the prettier of the two said.

“No, I don’t want to get arrested today, thank you very much. Are you girls handy with a mop, brush and vacuum?”

“What? You want us to clean your place?” the less attractive runaway asked.

“Exactly. We could stop by Savon and get some Mop and Go. My apartment is just a few blocks past that. Are you game?”

They looked at each other with suspicious eyes then the pretty one said, “Sure. Ten bucks each?”

“Ten bucks each.”

After tying Bridget to the bus stop bench we went inside the Savon. While paying for the cleaning supplies at the cashiers I spotted a stand with Star Scrolls so I picked out an orange Scorpio scroll. I didn’t really believe in those Astrology cons, but I liked them for cheap entertainment, and sometimes they were fairly accurate. Unwrapping the scroll, I read that on May ninth, which was only a few days away, I was going to meet the sweetheart of my dreams who was going to knock on my door, completely out of the blue. I thought that was reaching a little and laughed as I rolled the scroll up and put it in my pants pocket.

When we got back to El Cerritos, they asked me if they could stash their backpacks in the bushes in the back of the apartment complex. I said it would be alright. Then we walked upstairs and they surveyed the work they had committed themselves to and realized that I was getting off cheap. There was so much dog hair you could weave a carpet from it. After three hours of sweeping, vacuuming and mopping they were done. I gave them both ten bucks each and a couple of cokes. They thanked me and I returned the favor.

“I wouldn’t leave your backpacks past Tuesday morning, that’s when the gardeners come with those blowers and they might steal them.”

“Okay,” the pretty one said. “You are pretty cool for an older dude.”

I laughed. I guess to them I was an older dude, but I was just thirty-one, and a young looking thirty-one for that matter.

The next day they came back with a couple of other girls and asked me if they could hang out at my place for a little while. They looked pretty rough and tired. I said it would be okay and the three of them came inside. I made them all tuna melts, (my specialty) and gave them each a soda. They thought I was the greatest thing since sliced bread, or lines of speed, whatever floated your particular boat. I took it as a compliment.

On the night of May 9, 1984, I was alone in my apartment wondering if the Star Scroll had lied. I was supposed to have the sweetheart of my dreams knock upon my door and it was 11:30. I resigned myself to thinking it was all a bunch of bull and then took off my pants and turned on the TV to watch the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (in my opinion he was the greatest host of that show ever. He would retire in 1992). I was settling in for the night thinking I should get some rest, maybe make a few call backs in the morning on some sales leads I had secured for Independent Data Supply and after that I would put the finishing touches on a new song I was writing about Nastassja called Messing Around With the Wrong Heart, when there was a knock on my door. It was one of the runaways who had brought a friend to hang out. I was dumbfounded because there was this punked-out vision standing in my doorway was drop dead gorgeous even with half of her blonde hair shaved and a long string of paper clips dangling from her ears. She looked like a model, or could have been one if she cleaned up her act. She spoke in a German accent and said her name was Maria. They stayed until four in the morning and I thought I was going to die from frustration. She had the bluest eyes I had ever seen and she was tough as nails on the outside but inside I knew she was just a hurt kitten. She said that she was living in an abandoned and condemned building on Hollywood Boulevard they had aptly named “Hotel Hell”. I said she could stay here at my place if she wanted for awhile to get away from that environment. She said she would think about it. She did stay. Damned if those Star Scrolls weren’t right on the money. Little did I know at the time she would be more trouble than a jar of nitroglycerine on a rollercoaster. Live and learn, right? Not always.

After a week with Maria I had forgotten all about Nastassja, Tony Pellicano and David Bowie. I was much too busy with Maria now. I found out she was a few weeks shy of her eighteenth birthday so having sex with her was out of the question—for now. Then she dropped the bomb. She told me she was pregnant.