The SoCal Years 18: Pink Shots On CD

The Riveting Adventures of A Filipina-American Actor-Girl in the Southern California Jungle

The SoCal Years hubs comprise a series of narrative essays from the late 1990s, pre-9/11, immediately after grad school when, knowing she would run screaming back to the East Coast in the end, a young-ish Pinay New Yorker, armed with her new Drama MFA, decided nonetheless to dip her toes into the Hollywood swamp.

exceptional models wanted

neither of these is me

Found a little studio in West L.A. A nice address, in between all the chic neighborhoods. I'll be living across from the Baptist church.

The landlady is a little Hawaiian grandma who married a hauli (white guy) named Everkotski. She's a trip. I'll be regaling you with stories, then.

I'll miss Kiki's big kitchen and the antiques in my bedroom. She's not too happy I'm leaving though she had to know it was inevitable. I think she's been holding her breath a while.

So I'm out of here a couple of days before Valentine's Day. I could say the search was hairy, but the truth is that it took so long because I didn't stress enough about it, or give it too much focus.

Met some kooky characters though. Here is the end to the adventure that began behind an iron gate. Brace yourselves. It's an epic poem.

On second view, Robert seemed even more innocuous. A thin, aging boy scout with a cute, young face. Not a dynamic individual—someone you probably hardly noticed in high school. Not really even a nerd, he probably quietly passed his classes with a C average.

On this day he showed me the main house, where Don the real estate developer lives. It is unbearably sumptuous and elegant. There were two dogs in the yard—yes, just like in the song—only these were the most gorgeous pups you ever saw. Golden retrievers, big and clean. Two years old or so, with beautiful faces.

Easily excited, they jumped at me through the fence, then through every window in the house as I went from room to room.

From the kitchen, Robert phoned Don to come sit with us, and he appeared a couple of minutes later, escorted by the best animal yet: a great dane—a giant—exquisitely groomed, of sweet disposition, elegant and well-mannered, bearing himself like a prince.

Less significantly, and almost as pretty, was Don's son, Blair, who looked at me politely and shook my hand like a gentleman. Handsome young bugger—probably desensitized to women. I gather he's been exposed to enough lovely nude models spreading their legs for Robert's camera, in what Robert termed "pink shots."

The three men displayed a disturbing lack of interest in flirting with me—significant as that was, in light of what I found out later, as it was what began to confirm my suspicions about the "position" I was applying for.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Robert made us each a cup of tea, then we walked down to the lower guest house, which I'd seen on my first visit to the estate, right before the New Year.

Oh! The luxury of the spaces he showed me—this day he added the upper guest house to our tour of the grounds. It was in renovation and in somewhat of a shambles. It was still clearly, however, a prize among living accommodations, with a natural rock swimming pool in the front yard and an attached spa (nautilus room, sauna and steam room, jacuzzi in the space with the tumbling stone wall over which cascades a waterfall fountain).

Of course I knew the answer, but I still hoped that my suspicions were unfounded and that I could live in this paradise in exchange for 12 hours a week of light typing and some data entry—maybe make and fetch a cup of coffee now and then...

In response to a little prodding, once we reached the cottage, Robert launched into an exposition of what I now gather is his primary production venture—photographic products for adult internet websites. In particular, he sells photos of what look like teenage girls, in scant or no clothing, in various sexual poses. Lots of pink shots on CD. He pulled out a few girlie magazines as examples to show me. I didn't let on that I knew I was being tested.

He assured me they were all at least 18. I took him at his word. You would've too.

He went on to say he works harder than anyone he knows. That he's extremely dedicated and workaholic. That because his day is so full—his and Don's—there are days they never even leave the estate grounds. So that since they can't always go out for entertainment, they often have entertainment "brought in" to them.

He never f-cks with the models, he said. Doesn't consider that good business. And that's where his "assistant" would come in.

I was applying in part to be Entertainment.

Was very crisp and straightforward myself. Told him I'd had an inkling about it all along, lied about having a boyfriend, asked him whether he wouldn't prefer to find love at any rate.

No time for love, was his reply—just got out of a 5-year relationship.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Robert kept me long enough to talk about other ways I might be useful and in which he could help "put some money" in my pocket. We talked about webpages and photo retouching. We talked about the adult inernet site he's launching once its designed.

He told me that the next immediate need his company has is for ethnic models for nude photography. Black and Asian. He said he'd pay me $100 for each Asian model I find for him. He'll pay them over $350 a shoot—no hanky panky.

On the way out he invited me to scout around for any "cute Asian girls" who are "looking for a sponsor." Would the position be servicing both him and Don, or just him, I wondered. Either/or, he replied.

Any takers? Email me.

They pay these "entertainers" handsomely. Well, I saw the living accommodations on the grounds alone. Turns out they have girls all over the city, compensated for their entertainment services with fabulous apartments, cars, college tuitions—you name it.

I wondered to myself whether any of these employees had ever demanded the cost of a new soul.

Robert ostensibly wears the coat of exploitation well. But there was something in his demeanor—in his quickness to make amends for possibly having offended me—that made me wonder whether there hadn't once been a pre-porno, pre-Hollywood Robert. A Robert who had entered a relationship that then lasted five years, and who might have dreamed about a future of love without a price.

• • • • • • • • • • • •

Went to see Carrie on Beverly Glen, a couple of streets over, immediately afterwards. Related my adventure with the appropriate balance of amusement and disdain. Carrie gasped and rejoined, "Well why don't you do it?

"I can't, Carrie," I replied in exasperation.

"Well, I'll help you!" she insisted.

Carrie is the hippest sixty-something you'll ever meet. Actually, she might have kept both Don and Robert perfectly satisfied by herself. I gather Carrie is done with entanglements of the heart.

Painful as they've been, I, however, am not. ◊