This isn't one of those nice Hollywood stories. You know the kind, where the hero -- usually the guy with top billing -- rides off into the sunset. Not this time. Not this story.

I guess you could say it did have a happy ending, if you look at it the right way. All I ever wanted was a nice place, like one of those great big houses on the 10,000 block of Hollywood Boulevard. A place with a nice big hot tub.

Well, I got it. But not the way I wanted it, of course.

There's just been a murder in one of those big Hollywood houses. The homicide squad's on its way there now, sirens wailing down that famous street. A guy's been killed: two bullets in his back, one in his stomach, his body left soaking in one of those room-size tubs.

You should hear this story from someone who knows, before those big Hollywood columnists get their hands on it, turn it into something cheap and sleazy.

Look at me, bobbing there, blood staining the expensively-treated water. Poor dope, all I wanted was a hot tub. Unfortunately the price was just a little too high.

 

I was one of those journalists you don't hear about. You know the kind, the one whose name always seems to escape being tied to a headline. Definitely not one of those columnists who get to turn tawdry into sleazy. I'd had a couple of good scores. Remember that big piece a couple of years ago, that old heartthrob that people almost forgot all about, until he got linked to that cute little high school jock? No, I didn't get the scoop, but I proofed it for the guy who did. I was that kind of journalist.

The only thing I had to my name was the cheap furniture in my cheap apartment, an ancient laptop, and my car. It wasn't much, it wasn't anything at all, but it was my life. The problem was that things were tough: my money was almost gone. I'd had to hock whatever I could and it still wasn't enough. My landlord was a nice old queen who I knew I could stall for at least another two months -- but my car was another matter. The finance company was getting more and more nasty: if I didn't pay, they'd come and drive it away.

Can you imagine being in LA without a car? It was a cruddy car, but it got me around. I was driving it that Thursday afternoon, going from one paper to another, trying to get someone to give me something on spec -- anything, I needed anything, to keep the repo man away, when the thing sputtered and died. I managed to pull into an alley off Hollywood Boulevard, down where those big old houses haven't been torn down to make way for cheap apartments like mine. The place was really overgrown, tangled weeds and vines covering the front gates and the tall brick walls all around it, but you could see that at one time it had been fantastic, all deco and style. Now it was just dirt, dust and weeds, but once it had been grand.

I noticed that the huge iron gates were ajar. I don't know why I went in, maybe part of me was curious. It was part of old Hollywood, from the era of roller disco and platform shoes. I wanted to see what was left.

Inside the gates, the place was big -- really big. There was a pool, empty of water, but full of leaves. There was a big Cadillac in the drive, once pink and now deep red with rust, sitting on four flat tires. I was just starting to walk up to the big front door when it opened.

"You're late," he said. "He expected you hours ago." When you're older, drag just doesn't work. It's just a man's cross to bear, I guess; put on a wig and you're suddenly five years older. Sometimes it's pathetic, other times it's just tragic. But he ... or she ... was old, maybe in his middle fifties, and yet somehow on him it worked. He wasn't Cher but he could almost have been Betty Davis. He wore curls as red as that rusting Cadillac, a simple white dress, and just enough make-up so he didn't look like he'd been hit by an explosion at Max Factor. His incongruous voice was a deep rumbling bass, with a hint of a German or Hungarian accent and no attempt at femme tones.

I went in. White shag, pink leather sofas, mirrors everywhere. A disco ball in the living room. A huge television on one wall, and on the other, movie posters. Some I'd seen, others I hadn't: BACKROOM BOYS, DISCO DYNAMITE, ROLLER LEATHER, and the like.

"This way," Bette said, leading me toward a brass and marble staircase winding upstairs.

"Excuse me," I started to say, "but I just came to --"

Then someone from upstairs called: "Maxine! Maxine! Is that him? Bring him upstairs this instant." Bette turned, looking down at me from the first step, and said. "He is waiting for you. This way."

So went up those stairs, following behind "Maxine", noticing as I walked that the brass was green, and the marble deeply cracked.

 

He must have been a special hamster, maybe related to some famous hamster, though I couldn't think of any. He was laying there, on a velvet pillow, his little feet stiff in the air.

It took a few minutes to get it straightened out. No, I hadn't come from the vet; no I hadn't come to take the little creature away. I was just in the neighborhood when my car broke down, and I just wanted to use the phone.

I answered his questions, trying not to stare. I knew him from somewhere. The moment Bette brought me upstairs, opening the door to the big master suite and ushering me in with a gravelly "He's here," I realized that something about him was familiar ... but from where?

He was handsome. There was no denying that. Standing by the huge round bed surrounded by gold-veined mirrors and floodlights, I was instantly struck by his beauty. It had faded, certainly; skin that had once been clean and smooth was now rugged and deeply tanned, a body that had once been strong and broad-shouldered was now stooped and softer. "Well, what are you doing here then if you're not going to take little Manuel away?"

His voice was marvelous, deep and rich with a purr that reached down and tugged at me. It was another piece of the puzzle, another clue to who this man was, but my mind was still not putting it together.

"I was just in the neighborhood. My car broke down. I just came to use the phone."

"The phone?" he said, that powerful voice slipping into a glass-breaking screech that made me wince. "You came into MY house, disturbed me, over the PHONE?" Without waiting for my response, he turned and bellowed to Maxine, standing in the doorway. "Show this gentleman out."

Then it hit me. As Maxine reached for my arm, I turned and blurted it straight out, without a clue in the world where it was going to lead me, what was going to become of it: "You're Norman Desmond. You used to be in porno. You used to be big."

"I AM big," he said, his voice ringing with injured pride, thundering with a vigor that defied the stooped shoulders. "It's PORNO that got small."

Eventually it came out that I was a writer, and that changed everything. Blue eyes sparkling like new rhinestones, he took me by the hand and pulled me past a sneering Maxine and into the hall. "Ah, a writer! Just the kind of man I need to see. Just the man --"

The hall was more white shag, more gold-veined mirrors, and rows of tiny white lights where mirrors met shag. He took my hand in a firm grip and pulled me along, our reflections becoming an endlessly duplicated couple, striding into infinity.

Norman Desmond ... there was a name that took me back. One of the greats, if not the greatest. Before Norman Desmond, queer porn was all greasy-mustached plumbers or pot-bellied sailors. Loops long on cock-sucking but short on plot. Sure they would get you off, but they didn't stick in the mind beyond the mechanics that happened between the plumbers and the plumbing. Then came Norman Desmond: handsome, strong, virile, but more than that, a presence. Norman Desmond filled the screen with attitude, with charisma. You didn't look for one of his flicks to see where his impressive cock would go, what he did with it, or who he did with it, but because of who he was.

Now I remembered those films -- BACKROOM BOYS, DISCO DYNAMITE, ROLLER LEATHER, and all the others, the movies those posters downstairs belonged to. They were some of his greatest. The best of the best. I was in shock, I was in awe.

But more than that, I was hopeful. Norman Desmond, THE Noman Desmond -- alive and well and living in that great big house full of memories and stories, right off Hollywood Boulevard. It was just what I needed. It was a story, what could be a kick ass story, and he wanted to tell it to me.

 

The backroom looked like a set, something straight from HOLLYWOOD HUSTLERS, or I LOVE THE BIG LIFE: crystal chandeliers, a big leather sofa, mirrors, mirrors and more mirrors, and right there, a hot tub. Not just any hot tub, mind you, but rather the hot tub. Sure, some may call HOT WATER derivative; I mean, how could you not, considering the plot was stolen from an old 40's film. But for me it was pure Norman Desmond. I stood and stared at it, running the flick over and over in my mind. The bubbling, steaming water where Norman took Roger Biggies from behind, his muscular ass driving Biggies till he screamed, his come mixing with the churning water in simple cinematographic genius. The water where he splashed with Tumescent Dan, taking his impressive tool down his throat in one awe-inspiring swallow. Looking at the water I felt my own cock stirring, aching for a touch, any touch.

"Here," Noman said, retrieving a thick manuscript from a table next to the sofa. Five, six hundred pages at least. It felt like a phone book. Salome: The Norman Desmond Story, it said. I looked up at him. "You're a writer, you'll be able to help. I'm not really so good with ... words. Now the pictures, that I'm good at. But this, this is something I could use some help with. I want to tell my story, to remind everyone of who Norman Desmond was. Yes, yes, to show them all that Norman Desmond is still here, just waiting for the right chance to get back up there on top where he belongs."

I held the manuscript in my hands. "You want to make a comeback?" I said, my voice catching somewhere from throat to lips.

"No. I hate that word. No, I'm going to return -- that's the word -- return to the thousands of people who have never forgiven me for deserting the screen."

I didn't say anything. I just stood there, weighing the heavy book in my hands. Older, there was still a power about him -- something beyond the crow's feet and thinning hair, the gentle pot belly -- something remaining of the legendary Norman Desmond. I also weighed my tiny apartment, and my even tinier life.

I said something, probably "Yes" or "I'll do it," but to be honest I don't remember. All I remember is his hand on mine, piercing blue eyes looking straight into me, filling me with some of his boundless determination, looping me into his dream of returning to the movies, and tugging at my memories of the great Norman Desmond.

So that's how it happened, the very first step. I had no idea at the time where it would lead me, or just how far it would go.

At first I only came by the grand old place on Hollywood Boulevard a couple of times a week, but quickly I realized how empty my apartment was compared to the grandeur of Norman's house. My old laptop and knock-off furniture just couldn't compare to the hundreds of films, the thousands of fan letters. Being back at my place reminded me how small I was, how pathetic. One day I was sitting at a huge steel coffee table in Norman's living room while he was upstairs watching and rewatching his films in the tub room. Maxine was puttering around, dusting the furniture and polishing the mirrors. Looking over Norman's manuscript, I guess I muttered something, commenting to myself on some detail of his fantastic life as one of the true legends of the porno screen. Maxine must have overheard, because he stopped polishing and walked over to me. "He was the greatest of them all," He said. "In one week he received 17,000 fan letters. Men bribed his hairdresser to get a lock of his hair. There was a prince who came all the way from England to get one of his jocks. Later he strangled himself with it! You are privileged to be here, privileged to be allowed to work on his return to the screen."

Eventually I was living in a tiny room above the garage, spending most of my days going over \the book. At first occasionally, then frequently, Norman came by to check on my progress.

It wasn't all work, at least not on Desmond's part. Not by a longshot. The fragile ego that was Norman Desmond required constant feeding. First there were the fan letters that arrived every day, brought to Norman by Maxine on a silver salver, opened and gushed over with great enthusiasm. "Wonderful," he would warble in his melodic voice (the very same voice that had demanded, "Suck my cock" in ALLEY TAILS and "I'm going to fuck you long and hard" in BEACHFRONT PROPERTY) as he opened them.

Then there were the movie nights. He'd escort me upstairs to the tub room and we'd sit and watch movie after movie. The steam from the water made clouds, catching stray fragments of light from the old projector. I'd seen a lot of them before, of course, but having Norman there was like a personal tour through the heyday of Hollywood queer smut. I heard all about the stars, the directors, the gossip, and the dirt. It was fascinating, and I began to look forward to those nights more and more.

Then everything changed.

I'd been working on the book, finally starting to realize what a mess it was. The heart was there, the passion that was Norman Desmond the legend, but it was lost, polluted by bitterness, delusion, and outright fiction. I had to be careful, very careful, about what I cut and what I didn't. It was starting to be a problem, with Norman screeching in a piercing falsetto -- a tone that made me realize the commanding Norman Desmond of ARMY BRATS might be done -- over any suggested change.

Then Norman walked in. Readying myself for what I expected to be the usual fight over the book, he shocked me by putting a hand on my shoulder and saying in his good voice, his purr of firm masculinity, "You look tense. Why don't you come up and soak in the tub for awhile?"

The tub. To be honest, I'd never really thought of Norman as someone who'd have any interest in me. Not that I'm a troll -- I never had to look hard to find a date on Saturday night -- but I was simply not in his league. I worked out just enough, I took care of myself just enough, but I definitely could have done more. And yet here he was, the legend of 8mm loops, of BACKDOOR ROMEO, inviting me up for a soak.

I felt like I was walking into a loop myself, standing in front of that famous hot tub. I realized it was just like the one I'd always wanted, wanted because I'd seen it, this very tub, in one of his movies.

Norman stripped quickly and efficiently, as if performing some kind of magic trick they taught in porno movies. It was as if he was in one of his old loops, clothes simply vanishing from one scene to another. I sat on the edge of the tub, dimly aware that the bubbling, steaming water was soaking my pants and shirt, but I couldn't continue. Norman Desmond was a very handsome man. Very. Age had come on him slowly. He had all the evidence: wrinkles, sags, that little belly, the thinning hair, a few liver spots on his arms, a few rose marks on his chest. But these insults were restrained, at least for a while, by his overwhelming determination to remain an idol, to freeze himself at the height of his career.

My cock was instantly hard, And Norman was instantly aware of it. He still projected in the flesh what he'd delivered so many times on the screen: a tremendous sexual presence. Part of the arousal, too, was that I was getting naked for the man who had been part of my sexual dreams for so long. Wrinkles couldn't take that away; in fact, I doubted anything could.

Naked, hard, I stood in front of him, bubbling waters of the tub behind me, adding to the heat that rose and kept rising in my body. I was sweating, gleaming, but only partially from the steam.

He reached out and wrapped his hand around my hard cock. He held me that way for a good long time, never once looking at anything except my eyes. Locked on me, rigid, he slowly smiled as he looked deep into me. Then, never taking his hand from my cock, he led me into the hot, churning water.

It was good, as good if not better than I thought it would be. But there was something else, something that skated over the surface of my mind, refusing to come together until much later when I'd cooled down. He took my cock in his mouth, and brought me close to tears. I touched him, amazed by the noises he made, the way he played his body like a fine instrument. He stroked me, working my cock like a master -- which he was. I felt self-conscious returning the favor, but he seemed to truly enjoy himself and when his come followed mine into the steaming water, I smiled at his deep, rumbling growls of pleasure.

We spent a long time in the water. The heat of the tub added more and more steam to our play. My fingers wrinkled, and my head started to swim from too many bouts of near overheating, but we kept at it. I remember details of it, captured crystal clear as if on one of Norman's old reels: the pebbled texture on the bottom of the pool; the white, almost translucent plastic; the moment when Norman playfully took a deep breath, vanishing into the wildly boiling water to take my cock in his mouth; looking up and catching myself and Norman reflected back and forth in the mirrors, seeming to superimpose us like actors in one of his films. Finally he started to tire and we climbed out, toweling off. I worked back into my clothes as he slipped on a big terrycloth robe held out for him by Maxine.

As I walked the long, mirrored hallway back to my room -- the intimacy of actually sleeping with Norman Desmond never occurring to me -- he called my name. I turned, seeing him at the far end of the corridor, silhouetted against the wavering light from the hot tub room. "You see," he said, his voice breaking slightly, "you see, I can still do it! I still have it! Soon it'll just be me, the cameras, and those wonderful people out there in the dark!"

Suddenly chilled, I gave him my best smile and returned to my little room over the garage.

We quickly settled into a nice little routine. I continued to work on the book, and Maxine continued to dust and clean and deliver, every day, a new stack of fan mail for Norman. At night, it would be me and Norman in the tub, me in awe of the great porno star, he needing my fresh, new admiration. It was good, at times very good, but there was also something else there; an vague feeling that hovered, like something you can just barely see out of the corner of your eye, but can't define.

Sometimes Norman would be sucking my cock as I stood in the burbling water and I'd look down to catch him gazing off into the distance, playing for the cameras -- the audience -- that wasn't there anymore. Other he'd prance a bit too much, or work too hard at sucking or stroking me, acting for the director in his mind.

His comeback began to obsess him more and more. The world could have burst into flame and shrunk down into ashes and all he'd have cared about would be that there wouldn't be enough fans left to send him mail. I started to stand in front of the window, stare out at those high walls and their dead creepers, and wonder about the world. Sure, it hadn't been a great world -- at least not to me -- but it was real. It was a world that revolved around the sun, and not Norman Desmond.

I started sneaking out at night, rather than returning to my little room over the garage. Exhausted from Norman's tongue, lips, and hands night after night, I tried to walk as far as possible just to prove to myself that the world hadn't ceased to exist.

One night, Maxine was waiting for me at the door. The Master was asleep, but he was waiting for me all the same. At first I was ashamed of leaving the all-encompassing light that was the great Norman Desmond, but then I felt a stab of anger. "What is it, Maxine? His highness miss my adoring presence for ten minutes?"

He glowered at me through his thick black lashes, hands clenched. "You are not worthy of him. He is Norman Desmond and you, you are just a distraction. He is great, one of the greatest that ever lived."

"Take it easy, Maxine," I said, seriously wondering for a moment if the old drag queen was going to have stroke. "I just needed a breath of fresh air. No harm done."

"You do not realize how important he is. How carefully I have maintained him for the moment when he returns to his rightful place on the screen. I will not have you ruin him for that great time when he is accepted back as the legend that he is."

I was getting very tired of the worship Norman game. I had taken my walk, I had seen evidence that, even at night in the dark, there is more in the sky that the Great Norman Desmond. "He's a big boy, Maxine. He can take care of himself."

"Do you really think so?" He answered, stepping back and starting to close the door, leaving me to tramp around to the side entrance. "Then I suggest you check the handwriting on those fan letters."

The next night that feeling that had been lurking at the edges of my mind was right there in my face, obvious and more that slightly grotesque. It happened after a worshipful showing of THE PLUMBER RINGS ONCE, after Maxine floated through the flickering lights of the tiny 8mm projector to hand us our martinis. Norman stood with a flourish, saying, "Maxine, you may go. We want to be alone."

There we were: me, Norman, the hot tub, and the precious myth of the famous porn star -- a myth that was more important, and more real, to Norman than anything else.

We got into the famous tub. Norman was in fine form, and for a long time the suspicion and depression were in abeyance. It was just Norman and me. He kissed me, something he hadn't done before. Standing in the hot water, bubbles nibbling against my balls and my quickly hardening cock, he gently bent forward to touch his lips to mine. His lips were soft, something I knew very well from having them attached so often to the head of my cock, but with that kiss I realized they were almost too soft to feel. Cautiously, his tongue touched mine and time seemed to stop. We stood there, water teasing our hard cocks, and just kissed. It was good. It was just very, very good.

Soon we really started to heat up, and only partially because of the steaming tub. As we kissed I gradually became aware of his cock touching mine, an unconscious dick dual in the gurgling water. Then he broke the kiss and smiled at me. Norman. Not Norman Desmond, just Norman. I thought, I wanted, really and truly, to believe.

Then he pushed me back against the edge of the tub. Before I could say or do, anything, his lips were on my cock, the water smoking and boiling around his tanned shoulders. Good before, fantastic now. I knew he was older, that he had his share of wrinkles and gray hairs, but none of that mattered. Yes, he was fantastic.

He worked me for what felt like hours, maybe even days. Finally when I was ready to explode, he released me, a thread of saliva vanishing into the steam. He stood, facing me. Then he said it, and it all fell apart: "Jerk off for me."

It took a few minutes for the words to reach the part of my mind that was actually capable of thought. It was an uphill battle, struggling through all that lust, long minutes with my hand wrapped around my cock; stroking myself slowly, then faster, the water like a thousand hot little tongues on my shaft and head. I was close, so close, when those words hit me. Not just those words, because I'd heard those words before, but rather the way he said them, the way he was standing, the look he gave me -- looking for the camera again. THE PLUMBER RINGS ONCE. Action for action, word for word, a performance. On stage, always on stage. I had been wrong. Norman wasn't there, probably had never been there; it was all Norman Desmond, the great, the legendary, Norman Desmond.

Cold water. Not hot. No, not hot at all. Cold. Ice cold. I stopped, with a pearl of pre-come just forming at the head of my cock, which slowly dropped into the hot water. I stood stock-still. Anger flared through me, my body rock-hard with fury and tension. I climbed out. He might have said something, standing there looking lost and alone in the bubbling water, but I didn't hear it.

"Darling, come back, darling!" I finally realized he was imploring me as I furiously thrust on my discarded clothes.

"No," I finally said. "No, Norman, I'm going. I have to get out of here. I have to get out of this damned museum. I have to breathe real air, not this dusty celebration of who you used to be."

"No!" he screeched, "you can't leave me! I'm Norman Desmond. You have to love me, just as all my fans love me."

I stopped, looked at him. I was angry, but seeing him, careful hair mussed by lust and hot water, face scarlet with emotion, I was also sad for him. I was sad for the lies he spun around himself, the fantasies that had become more important that reality. "Do yourself a favor, Norman. Look at the handwriting on all those letters, and talk to Maxine about it." Then, and I really did mean it: "I'm sorry, Norman. I really am."

"I'll kill myself," he said, those perfect blue eyes unhinged with fury. "I will, you watch! You watch!" He walked over to a small table, opening a drawer. The pistol was small, like a toy in his big hands. I knew what it was and what it could do, but seeing it in his hands only reinforced the sadness of him -- how far down someone so talented, so hot, had gone.

"No, Norman, you won't. Wake up. There wouldn't be anyone to appreciate the gesture. It's just you and Maxine in this empty house."

"This isn't over," he said, his voice slipping back into the thunderous command of those long-ago loops. "I'll be back, you'll see. I'll be back up there on the screen where I belong. I'll be back. I swear it! I'm Norman Desmond!"

"No," I said, "You used to be Norman Desmond."

Then it happened: Three shots. Two in the back, one in the stomach. There wasn't a lot of pain, which surprised me. The bullets hit and spun me around, slamming me face down into that famous hot tub, maroon blood unfurling in the bubbling water.

This is where we came in, at that famous tub, the one I always wanted. It's morning now, and everyone's here: police, photographers, and those trash-talking columnists, too. But don't believe them -- believe me, I was there. After all, who are you going to believe: them, or the corpse himself?

Like I said: not exactly a happy ending. I got my pool -- but not in any way I could really enjoy it.

Norman? Norman put on quite the show as they lead him away in handcuffs, as the flashbulbs pops and the hacks called for statements. He may have gotten the best deal of all -- walking out into infamous celebrity, the star of tabloids for years to come. It may have been his last close up -- but he was more than ready for it.

©2001 M. Christian - Contributor's Bio