Billy Lives Read online

  Al got out of bed and went over to the chair where his pants were draped across the seat. He fished through the pockets and found a pack of sugarless gum. He unwrapped two sticks and slipped them into his mouth. A poor substitute for nicotine but better than nothing.

  He lay back down on the bed, chomping moodily on the gum and staring up at the ceiling where little sparkly bits were embedded in the rough plaster. Somewhere, he told himself, there had to be a way out of this. After all these years of reaching for the gold ring, how could he crash when the prize was so near?

  Damn it, he simply would not allow himself to lose. He would not let it happen, that’s all. Many times in the past Al Fessler had come up with a way out of a tight spot. He would do it this time too.

  The first thing to do was count his assets. Not much there, he had to admit. Of course, technically he still owned all rights to Billy Lockett. Not a whole lot of comfort, owning a dead man.

  Abruptly, Al sat up in bed. A glimmer of hope. A possible out. Maybe even better than that. He just might come out of this in roses. For a full ten minutes he sat staring across the dim bedroom, running the idea backward and forward through his mind. There were rough edges and a million details to be worked out, but by God, this just might be the Big Score.

  Al grabbed the bedside phone and punched out Conn Driscoll’s home number. The phone rang and rang at the other end, and finally the blurry voice of the young PR man came on the line.

  “H’lo.”

  “Conn, this is Al Fessler.”

  “Huh?”

  “Al Fessler. Come on, wake up.”

  “Oh, hi, Al. I was gonna call you. Sorry about the kid.”

  “Never mind that, we’ve got work to do.”

  “Work?”

  “You want a job, don’t you?”

  “Sure. I thought it was all off. Isn’t it?”

  “Maybe not.”

  “Billy is dead?”

  “He’s dead, all right, but I’ve got an idea. I don’t want to go into it over the phone. Can you be in my office tomorrow? Make it early. Nine o’clock.”

  “I’ll be there,” Driscoll said.

  Al replaced the telephone and grinned. The old adrenaline was flowing again, and he was feeling fine. He looked down at the front of his pajamas and saw that other things were stirring too. Sometimes it worked that way, an idea that he knew was a winner would excite him sexually. It could be downright embarassing when it happened at the office. Right now he wanted his wife badly.

  Shoving his feet into a pair of soft leather slippers, Al left his bedroom and padded down the hall to the slightly smaller room where Madeline had slept after the first few months of their marriage. He eased open the door and looked at her in the faint glow from the night light. In sleep, as in everything else she did, Madeline was perfectly poised. She lay on her back with the covers smooth over the narrow mound of her body. Her pale arms rested straight down at her sides, the fingers gently curled. Her face was beautifully composed, not a wisp of blonde hair had strayed out of place. No wonder, thought Al, that she had chosen not to sleep with him and his incessant snoring, rolling, mumbling, and blanket-yanking.

  Madeline looked so carefully arranged there on her satin sheets that it almost seemed a pity to wake her up. Almost. Al’s desire for his wife was stronger than any reluctance to disturb the picture.

  He reached down and touched the smooth white shoulder where the flesh was bare below the blue nightgown.

  Madeline opened her eyes and looked at him. Her gaze was keen and alert. For her there seemed to be no transition between sleep and waking.

  “What time is it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. Four o’clock. Five, maybe.”

  “Is anything the matter?”

  Al tried to make his tone light and easy. “No, nothing’s wrong. I just got lonesome.”

  Madeline continued to lie on her back and look at him.

  “I thought we might … make a little love.”

  “All right.”

  She did not move toward him as he peeled back the covers and got into her bed. But she did not move away either.

  Al eased the covers back over their bodies. Over the years of his marriage he had learned to subdue his natural instinct, which was to grab her roughly and go at it balls out, so to speak, and have a walloping good time screwing. Madeline had made it clear early on that she did not care for that kind of sex. Animalistic, she called it. Although he had never felt quite at ease doing it her way, Al had made a serious effort at becoming the gentle lover she wanted.

  He reached over carefully and laid a hand on her body. Madeline’s belly was so flat it was almost concave. Like everything else about her, it excited him. Al felt the warmth of her flesh come into his hand through the slippery material of the nightgown. Somehow, he always half-expected her skin to be cool.

  Slowly he moved his hand up to cover one of her breasts. He held it carefully, like a small, delicate bird. With his fingertip he drew a circle around the nipple.

  Al’s passion expanded until it seemed to fill him to bursting. Still he forced himself to move slowly, gently. He slipped the blue nightgown down away from Madeline’s breast. He moved lower in the bed and put his mouth against the nipple.

  “You don’t have to do that,” Madeline said. “I’m ready.”

  “I like to,” Al murmured without taking his mouth away. The taste of her was smooth and sweet as whipped cream.

  Madeline sighed and her nipple grew firm and erect under his tongue. By opening wide and sucking, Al could take almost her entire breast into his mouth. She placed her hand at the nape of his neck and let it rest there. The effect on Al was like that of a wildly erotic caress. He gave a muffled moan around the resilient flesh.

  When he could stand it no more, Al moved away from her long enough to pull off his pajamas and throw them aside. Naked, he knelt beside Madeline and eased the nightgown up over her narrow hips. She raised her buttocks slightly to make it easier but stopped him when he tried to slip the garment over her head.

  “That’s far enough,” she said.

  Al moved his hand over her belly, down to the pubic mound. Madeline had less hair down there than any woman Al had seen. A neat little triangle of yellow, short and fluffy as a kitten’s fur. He petted her there, wanting to kiss it, but Madeline would not go for that either.

  His fingers found the lips of her vagina. Slowly, slowly he probed inside. Al was relieved to find that she was moist in there. He hated it when they had to use the Vaseline. She never let him put it on, but made him wait while she turned her back and applied the jelly to herself.

  Madeline spread her legs for him, and Al moved over to kneel between them. He lowered his body and used one hand to guide his stiff penis into her. He wished she would do that, but she had never liked to touch him there. Early in their marriage when he had carried her hand down to his naked cock, she had recoiled as though from a snake.

  He found her lips with the head of his penis, and let himself glide into her. It was good. It was better than good, it was the best. How a woman who put as little apparent effort into it as Madeline could be such a great fuck was something Al could not understand.

  Right now he didn’t care about understanding. He stroked slowly in and out of her, trying to make it last as long as he could. He held his breath, clenched his teeth, tried to think of unpleasant things — anything to hold on a few seconds longer.

  But as always, nothing worked. It was over suddenly and explosively. Madeline closed on him, grasping his cock inside her as surely as with a fist. There was not a man alive, Al thought, who could hold back his climax when squeezed by that beautiful cunt.

  He pumped strenuously, ejaculating into her, wondering if she came with him. She said she did sometimes. He never knew for sure.

  Then he was finished, gradually relaxing on top of the slim woman, supporting most of his weight on his elbows. Her vaginal lips milked him of the last drops of semen and le
t him go. Limp and drained, he slid out of her with a long, moaning sigh.

  “Honey,” he said when his breathing had steadied, “That was super-great.”

  Madeline held him for a moment and kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Let me up now,” she said, “so I can go clean up.”

  Al rolled over on his side and watched as his wife pulled down the nightgown, then stepped out of bed and walked carefully to the bathroom. The door closed behind her, and Al heard the soft click as she punched the lock button on the inner knob. Whores were the only women Al knew who were in as much of a hurry as Madeline to douche out after sex.

  He swung his legs out of the bed and gathered up the two halves of his pajamas. What the hell, he thought, for a piece of ass like that he could overlook a few peculiar habits. He just wished it would happen more often, that’s all.

  Naked, carrying his pajamas, Al walked back down the hall to his own room. There was still time for a couple of hours sleep before he had to get up, but first he sat down at the writing table next to his bed and pulled out a sheet of paper and felt-tip pen. In the morning he wanted to give Conn Driscoll a solid outline of his idea. Once he had sketched in the outline, Al was sure the young PR man would come up with the details.

  When he had filled the page with notes, he folded the paper twice and tucked it into the inside pocket of the jacket he would wear tomorrow. Then he walked back and dropped into bed. He pulled the blankets up around his chin and was asleep in ten seconds.

  CHAPTER 4

  Off Sunset Boulevard a couple of miles east of the Strip, in a block of tire dealers, appliance stores, and parking lots, there is a commercial court, in the Art Deco style of 1930’s Hollywood, that calls itself Crossroads of the World. The blue and white central building is supposed to resemble a cruise ship, complete with portholes, a railing along the flat roof, and a 40-foot mast topped by a revolving globe. A travel agency occupies the front of the ship, and a restaurant the rear. Surrounding the asphalt sea on which the makebelieve ship sails are a dozen or so small shops and offices. They include a photographer, an underground publisher, a yoga studio, and Al Fessler’s office.

  The atmosphere of seedy nostalgia, Al told people, suited his clients better than the intimidating posh of Century City or the high-powered hype down on the Strip. Furthermore, the rent was considerably cheaper.

  At nine o’clock Monday morning Conn Driscoll pulled into the parking lot at the rear of Crossroads of the World. He left his car in one of the unmarked spaces and headed for the white Morocco-style bungalo that housed Al’s two-room office at the far end of the court.

  The receptionist in the small anteroom recognized Driscoll and invited him in with a smile. The inner office was bright as a candy store. Garish pop posters and blowups of Al Fessler’s clients covered the walls. Prominent among the photos was the guileless, blue-eyed face of Billy Lockett.

  Al Fessler sat behind a blond wood desk wearing a brushed cotton leisure suit that did not look good on him. Al had the kind of face that goes with pin stripe suits, black shirts, and white ties. However, the world in which he operated demanded certain concessions to mod fashion. Al drew the line at beads and puka shells, but he occasionally wore a neck chain with his sun sign, Aries.

  Driscoll, at ease in a tan sport jacket and dark green turtleneck, took the visitor’s chair at the side of Al’s desk.

  “What’s up, chief?” he asked, recognizing the excitement in the other man.

  Al leaned close to him, and Driscoll got a whiff of powerful aftershave lotion. “Tell me this, what do you think of when you hear these names — Rudolph Valentino … James Dean … Judy Garland?”

  “Did you get me down here to play word-association games?”

  “Come on,” Fessler coaxed.

  “Okay.” Driscoll put a hand to his forehead and thought for a moment. “Let’s see … acting … movies … sudden death …” Driscoll stopped talking and looked sharply at Fessler. “They all died suddenly. The two men were fairly young. And after their death they all had a surge of new popularity.”

  Al Fessler beamed at him. “Very good. Now how about these — Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix?”

  “More sudden death. Rock stars who died at the peak of their popularity.”

  “Right! Now, what’s the difference between the first bunch and the second?”

  “Al, are you going to tell me what you’re driving at or are we going to spend the morning playing Hollywood Squares?”

  “Humor me,” Fessler said.

  Driscoll sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “They’re different generations. Other than that I give up. Tell me, professor, what is the difference between Joplin, Hendrix, and Morrison and the others?”

  Al Fessler jumped to his feet and stabbed a forefinger at Driscoll. “Promotion!” he said. “Good old-fashioned promotion.”

  Driscoll waited for him to go on. Obviously, Al was going to do this his own way.

  “What happened when Valentino died? The women went crazy at his funeral. All his pictures were re-released and did better box office than ever. Every year a woman in black visits his grave. Boffo!

  “Take James Dean. Three movies the kid made, and who really knew if he could act or not? Then the flaming crash in a souped-up Porsche and pow! — he’s the symbol of a whole generation.

  “Then Garland dies, and all of a sudden she’s not a drug-shriveled old woman any more, she’s Dorothy, everybody’s little sister. Today female impersonators build a whole career out of pulling on a dress and doing Garland.”

  Driscoll lit a cigar and watched Al Fessler stride back and forth on the orange carpet, jabbing the air with his hands to emphasize points.

  “Now take Joplin and Hendrix. Not Morrison so much, he was not really a single, but with the right promotion any one of them could have been big. I mean big.”

  “Yeah, but all three of them were dopers. That could have been a problem.”

  “Hell, not with the people we’re trying to reach. Dying of an OD was cool. Look at Lenny Bruce. A standup comic with a dirty-words shtick who died in a toilet shooting smack. They got books and plays and movies about him, and today he’s some kind of a saint. Anyway, here’s my point — Joplin and Hendrix died, had a little flurry of interest, and were forgotten. Why? Because nobody promoted them. With the right campaign Hendrix could have been a black James Dean. Joplin, hell, she could have been Joan of Arc. Do you see where I’m heading?”

  “I think I do,” Driscoll said. “You’re suggesting we do a job on Billy Lockett to whip up interest in him even though he’s dead. No, make that especially now that he’s dead.”

  Al Fessler returned to his chair and perched on the edge as though he were about to spring forward. “You’re on my wavelength,” he said. “In six months time I want to make Billy Lockett the most talked-about dead man since … who was that cat in the Bible who got raised up from the grave?”

  “Lazarus.”

  “Yeah, Lazarus. We’ll make people forget Lazarus. I want Billy Lockett’s name better-known than Coca Cola. In six months’ time I want the whole world talking about Billy.”

  “Why the deadline?” Driscoll broke in. “What happens in six months?”

  “The concert, baby. The Billy Lockett concert at the Forum.”

  “Just a minute, Al. Possibly we can make the kid as famous as Lazarus, but it’s asking too much to have Billy Lockett walk out on that stage in September. You’re not putting me on? You don’t have him stashed somewhere?”

  “No, Conn, like I told you on the phone, Billy’s deader than the cha cha. That’s the beauty of it,” Al said, then added hastily, “in a manner of speaking. What we do, instead of putting on the Billy Lockett concert, which was after all just another rock superstar concert, we stage it in memory of poor, dead Billy. The Billy Lockett Memorial Concert. Has a nice ring, don’t you think? We round up as many good acts as we can, maybe set up some kind of a charity dodge so they’ll work cheap, and start
the tickets at ten dollars. If we don’t sell out the Forum with that, I’ll eat a Fender bass.”

  Driscoll searched Al Fessler’s face for any sign that he was kidding. Finding none, he drew on his cigar and blew a streamer of smoke toward the ceiling.

  “What do you say, Conn, are you in?”

  Driscoll examined the glowing end of his cigar for a moment, then looked up at Fessler. “Al, that is one of the most tawdry, vulgar, disgusting proposals I ever heard. I’ll do it.”

  “I knew you’d like it,” Al said happily. “I’ll leave all the details up to you.”

  The PR man leaned back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head, eyes closed, speaking as the thoughts hit him. “Okay, the machinery is already set up to promote Billy’s Forum concert. We make a few changes in the theme, and that goes ahead on schedule. Now, we’re going to want to hit people fast and hard with Billy Lockett. We’re lucky he died the way he did — spectacular. It got us good coverage in the Times this morning, and the Herald-Examiner will be even better.

  “We’ll want a billboard on the Strip, naturally. That’s already rented for the month of August. Posters, both to plug the concert and to sell to the kids in the pop shops along the Boulevard. I’ll get an artist on it right away.” Driscoll rose from the chair and struck a pose — feet apart, arms out, eyes to the ceiling. “Something like this. Christlike.”

  Al Fessler popped a stick of gum into his mouth and nodded with enthusiasm. “Yeah, yeah.”

  “We’ll get a batch of T-shirts made up,” Driscoll continued. “They’re a hot item right now. And, of course, lockets.”

  “Billy Lockett lockets,” Al said. “That’s good, that’s good.”

  “Little picture of Billy inside,” Driscoll went on, warming to his subject. “We’ll make anybody not wearing one feel naked.”

  “I love it,” Al said.

  “The funeral has to be a biggie. I’ll schedule it for Saturday, then we’ll have the rest of the week to drum up interest.”

  “Where do we hold it, Forest Lawn?”