Celia and I would have too much to drink, and then we would run into crowds of young men who’d also had too much to drink—and the whole lot of us would crash together and behave exactly the way you might expect us to behave. We would go into bars with boys whom we’d met in other bars, but then flirt with the boys we discovered in the new bar. We caused fights to break out, and somebody would take a wicked shellacking, but then Celia would choose among the survivors for who would take us to the next bar, where the uproar would begin all over again. We would bounce from one stag party to the next—from one man’s arms to another man’s arms. We even traded dates once, right in the middle of dinner.
“You take him,” Celia said to me that night, right in front of the man who was already boring her. “I’m going to the ladies’ room. You keep this guy warm.”
“But he’s your guy!” I said, as the man reached for me, most obligingly. “And you’re my friend!”
“Oh, Vivvie,” she said to me, in a fond and pitying tone. “You can’t lose a friend like me just by taking her guy!”
—
I had precious little contact with my family back home that summer.
The last thing I wanted was for them to know anything about what I was doing.
My mother sent me a note every week, along with my allowance, filling me in on the most basic news. My father had hurt his shoulder playing golf. My brother was threatening to quit Princeton next semester and join the Navy, because he wanted to serve his country. My mother had defeated this-or-that woman in this-or-that tennis tournament. In return, I sent my parents a card every week telling them the same stale and uninformative sort of news—that I was well, that I was working hard at the theater, that New York City was very nice, and thank you for the allowance. Every once in a while I’d toss in a bit of innocuous detail, such as, “Just the other day I had a charming lunch at the Knickerbocker Club with Aunt Peg.”
Naturally, I did not mention to my parents that I’d recently gone to a doctor with my friend Celia the showgirl, in order to get myself illegally fitted for a pessary. (Illegal, because it was not permitted back then for a doctor to outfit an unmarried woman with a birth control device—but this is why it’s so good to have friends who know people! Celia’s doctor was a laconic Russian woman who didn’t ask questions. She suited me right up without batting an eye.)
Nor did I mention to my parents that I’d had a gonorrhea scare (which had turned out to be nothing more than a mild pelvic infection, thank goodness—though it had been a painful and frightening week until it all cleared up). Nor did I mention that I’d had a pregnancy scare (which had also cleared up on its own accord, thank God). Nor did I mention that I was now fairly regularly sleeping with a man named Kevin “Ribsy” O’Sullivan, who ran numbers around the corner in Hell’s Kitchen. (I was dallying about with some other men, too, of course—all equally unsavory, but none with such a good name as “Ribsy.”)
Nor did I mention that I now always carried prophylactics in my pocketbook—on account of the fact that I didn’t want any further gonorrhea scares, and a girl can’t be too careful. I also didn’t tell my parents that my boyfriends regularly secured these prophylactics for me as a kind favor. (Because you see, Mother, only men are allowed to purchase prophylactics in New York City!)
No, I didn’t tell her any of this.
I did, however, pass along the news that the lemon sole at the Knickerbocker Club was excellent.
Which is true. It really was.
—
Meanwhile, Celia and I just went right on spinning—night after night—getting ourselves into all manner of trouble, big and small.
Our drinks made us crazy and lazy. We forgot how to keep track of the hours or the cocktails or the names of our dates. We drank gin fizzes till we forgot how to walk. We forgot how to look after our security once we were good and tight, and other people—often strangers—would have to look after us. (“It ain’t for you to tell a girl how to live!” I remember Celia yelling one night at a nice gentleman who was politely trying to do nothing more than escort us back home safely to the Lily.)
There was always an element of peril in the way that Celia and I thrust ourselves into the world. We made ourselves available for anything that might happen, so anything could happen. Often, anything did happen.
You see, it was like this: Celia’s effect on men was to make them so obedient and subservient to her—until the instant they were no longer obedient and subservient. She would have them all lined up before us, ready to take our orders and serve our every wish. They were such good boys, and sometimes they stayed good boys—but sometimes, quite suddenly, those boys were not so good anymore. Some line of male desire or anger would be crossed, and then there was no coming back from it. After that line had been crossed, Celia’s effect on men was to make them into savages. There would be a moment when everyone was having fun and flirting and playing taunting games and laughing, but then suddenly the energy of the room would shift, and now there was a threat of not only sex, but violence.
Once that shift came, there was no stopping it.
After that, it was all smash and grab.
The first time this happened, Celia saw it coming moments before it occurred, and she sent me out of the room. We were in the Presidential Suite of the Biltmore Hotel, being entertained by three men whom we’d met earlier in the ballroom of the Waldorf. These men had a great deal of loose cash, and they were clearly in a dubious line of work. (If I had to guess, I would wager that their line of employment was: racketeers.) At first they were all in service to Celia—so deferential, so grateful for her attentions, sweating with nervousness about making the beautiful girl and her friend happy. Would the ladies like another bottle of champagne? Would the ladies like some crab legs ordered up to the room? Would the ladies like to see the Presidential Suite at the Biltmore? Would the ladies like the radio on or off?
I was still new at this game, and I found it amusing that these thugs were so servile to us. Cowed by our powers, and all that. It made me want to laugh at them, in all their weakness: Men are so easy to control!
But then—not long into our visit to the Presidential Suite—the shift came, and Celia was suddenly crammed between two of those men on the couch, and they were no longer looking servile or weak. It wasn’t anything they were doing per se; it was just a change of tone, and it frightened me. Something had shifted in their faces, and I didn’t like it. The third man was now eyeing me, and he didn’t appear as though he were interested in joking around anymore, either. The only way I can describe the change in the room was: You’re having a delightful picnic, and then suddenly there’s a tornado. The barometric pressure drops. The sky goes black. The birds go silent. This thing is coming straight for you.
“Vivvie,” said Celia in that exact moment, “run downstairs and buy me cigarettes.”
“Right now?” I asked.
“Go,” she said. “And don’t come back.”
I made for the door, just before the third man reached me—and to my shame, I closed the door on my friend and left her in there. I left her because she’d told me to, but still—it felt rotten. Whatever those men were about to do in there, Celia was on her own. She’d sent me from the room either because she didn’t want me seeing what was about to be done to her, or she didn’t want it done to me, too. Either way, I felt like a child, being banished like that. I also felt afraid of those men, and afraid for Celia, and I felt left out. I hated it. I paced the lobby of the hotel for an hour, wondering if I should alert the hotel manager. But alert him to what?