#4: Rendezvous with MTV
#4: Rendezvous with MTV
"Everything gleamed with fun fun fun."
(Last time, the guys tried to climb a mountain.)
Our plans changed again the next day. Instead of heading toward the Appalachian Trail, we instead aimed at Seaside Heights on the Jersey Shore. While watching late-night Loveline, Pat had seen an ad about how Amelie Darfani—underwear model and conjurer of teenage male erotic manias—would be featured on the next day’s MTV Beach House. The cable channel had set up a giant backyard BBQ party, where celebrities performed and pitched products in front of a crowd of teens and college students.
“Who?” Danny had asked that morning.
“Who? Who?” Pat’s questions stabbed the air with incredulity. “Seriously, Danny, you gotta get out of the lab more. Her body is incredible from every angle. If I were still a teenager, I’d have her pictures up on my bedroom wall.”
Descending from the mountains to the Garden State Parkway, we drove through the sprawl of American commerce: fast food, video rentals, and the shadowy behemoths of malls. Golden arches, giant blue ticket stubs, cartoon giraffes—we saw them all. We scrounged for change at one toll booth after another.
Someone Ralph knew from college had snagged a PA gig with MTV, and Ralph had called him on his cellular phone. “Fernando says he can get us on the set.”
Off the parkway, we turned onto the road leading to Seaside Heights. We passed more strip malls and glimpses of neighborhoods with small homes. The water under the bridge leading to Seaside Heights itself sparkled in the sun. The moments streamed. The many shades of light ran over the windshield so that it seemed to ripple like the surface of the water. We coursed amid the grains of pollen carried on the air as bee thighs blended flower into flower.
The island of Seaside Heights was thick with traffic and people and the ferocious pursuit of leisure. We paid at an all-day parking lot and got out of the car. “Fernando says that we should just keep walking until we get to beach. They’re right on it. We should see the trucks.”
We did indeed see the trucks—and the security cordon around the filming location. A magical land of spectacle glimmered just over the shoulders of the men in yellow “Security” shirts. “We’re looking for Fernando,” Ralph said to one of the hulking guards, with a neck that rippled like a pack of hot dogs.
“Who?”
“Fernando,” Ralph repeated.
A skinny guy walking by in a black “Offspring” t-shirt suddenly stopped. “Hold on, I’ll get him.” He lifted the walkie-talkie to his mouth. “Nando, there are some guys here for you.”
Constantly licking his lips and darting his eyes back and forth, Fernando looked like a tanned iguana. “Ralphie, good to see you,” he said as he gave him a big hug. His shaved head glistened in the sun. He leaned close. “Bro, you came at just the right time. We’re going to be checking out a rave tonight, deep in Jersey. You and me there together, Ralphie—we’ll knock ‘em dead.”
Ralph and Pat grinned. Danny looked queasy—or at least concerned.
Fernando led us through a labyrinth of cords and cameras to the backyard of the beach house. PAs, technicians, and security swarmed around us. On screen, the beach house looked fun and spontaneous, but it took an army to conjure that illusion of ease. “Just be cool and act natural,” Fernando said. “We can just fit you in right here.”
Being in the crowd was like returning to a polished version of college: surrounded by youthful, eager, and attractive people. Immersion in such a performance of glee caused my head to spin. During commercial breaks, the PAs had us bounce around giant beach balls. They encouraged girls in bikinis and tanned shirtless boys to dunk themselves in the pool. A skier from the last Olympics stood next to a mini-grill cooking hotdogs while a producer leaned over her like a grinning alligator. Everything gleamed with fun fun fun.
And everywhere the cameras—filming, watching, absorbing. The camera cords wove like snakes through the scene. Twenty-somethings in baseball hats moved through the crowd, searching for any detail. Nothing could be missed. Every drop of fun, quirkiness, and enticement had to be wrung out of the assembled youths. I couldn’t see anyone over forty. The aged were in the corporate offices and sales meetings and citadels of accountants. We were there to sell something, after all: acne products and CDs and Victoria’s Secret underwear—but mostly the sense of coolness.
“Hey, welcome back to the Beach House,” the host said after yet another commercial break. We had been told to cheer, so we did. He paused theatrically. “Hey, it sounds like someone’s at the door.”
The sliding door behind him opened, and Amelie Darfani walked into the sunlight and the cameras’ hungry gaze.
Burnished-copper hair poured over her shoulders and down her back. The wind pulled back the bottom of her partly-buttoned plaid shirt, revealing a bellybutton like a winking eye. Boot-cut jeans clung like eager hands to her legs. Her skin seemed like it was stretched between bones. She waved, and a single golden bracelet on her wrist flashed. The air around her shimmered with sex and celebrity. The crowd watched. The crew watched. The cameras watched. The millions watched.
“Woooo!” Pat roared with the rest of the throng. His elbow shot out in a spasm of excitement.
Over Pat’s shoulder, Ralph rolled his eyes.
She was there to promote a movie. “Yeah, well, it’s a little naughty.”
Woohoo, the crowd bayed.
“So is it true,” the host asked, “that you didn’t want your mother to see it?”
Laughter.
“Well, there’s this one scene with a striptease…”
More ejaculations from the crowd.
Then she smiled with such practiced poise. “…but it’s with Jason, not me.”
The PAs started to clap over their heads. Our applause and laughter dutifully followed.
“That’s all the endorsement I need,” the host said. “A striptease with a dude. Amelie Darfani, thanks for joining us at the beach house. Stick around, because we’re going to put some of our audience here to the test. And there might be a little musical surprise. We’ll be right back…”
I suddenly noticed that Pat had somehow pushed to the far edge of the crowd. He was right behind Amelie Darfani. I saw the camera in his hand.
Apparently, so did one of the security guards. “Hey, you—freckles—no pictures.” He pushed through the crowd as Pat tried to scramble away. “How’d you even get that in here?”
More security was coming from the other direction to grab Pat and escort him out.
“I think it’s time to escape,” Danny said.
The Break
“What is it?” I asked. It was like something had been haunting the corner of her eye—something heavier than the usual shadow that stalked both of us in those days.
Gina blinked and then looked at me. “When I go out to Seattle, it will be alone.”
I sank down on the bed. “What?” Somewhere, my head was rolling around. Somewhere, my blood echoed in its ears.
“I’m going by myself.”
“What?” Then, confusion corkscrewed into anger. “What!?” All that talk about apartment-hunting, job searches for me, the perks of Seattle—all that dissipating like smoke?
“I think I need to work on myself.” Her voice revealed the invisible script—the fake pauses between words, to pretend she was actually grappling what to say next. No, this was all packaged. No, this was a trap.
I should have been angry. I should have felt betrayed, maybe. Instead, I felt hollowed out by an ice-cream scoop from frozen Pluto. I knew—I knew—but I had to ask. It was a last-ditch hope; it was a lust for misery. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying…” she sat down on the bed beside me. “I’m saying—” She took a breath. I knew that was real—that wasn’t in the script. “I think we need some time apart. Haven’t you wanted to breathe?”