Catherine Asaro - Fortune and Misfortune.pdf

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Lisa Goldstein: Fortune and Misfortune
First appeared in Asimov’s Science
Fiction, May 1997. Nominated for Best
Short Story.
------------------------------------------
This is my story, but first I have to tell
you about Jessie.
Jessie and I met at an audition. My agent
had told me they were looking for someone
to play a contemporary high school kid so
I dressed the part–torn baggy jeans, white
T-shirt, red flannel shirt tied around my
waist.
I’d been waiting for about five minutes
when Jessie walked in and gave her name to
the receptionist. She wore one of those
dress-for-success costumes that make women
look like clowns–skirt and jacket of
bright primary colors (hers were red), big
buttons down the front, hugely padded
shoulders. She looked at me and then down
at herself and laughed and grimaced at the
same time. It was an oddly endearing
expression, the gesture of someone who
knows how to poke fun at herself.
"You’re so clever," she said. She glanced
at her outfit again. "I’ve probably blown
it already."
She looked as if she wanted to talk
further, but just then the receptionist
called her name. I felt annoyed–I’d been
waiting longer than she had, though I knew
that that had nothing to do with
Hollywood’s pecking order. She was
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closeted with the casting people for about
ten minutes. When she came out she looked
at me, held her palms up and shrugged
elaborately. Her gesture said, clearly as
words, I have no idea whether I made it or
not.
I didn’t think about her until the next
cattle call, when I saw her again. She was
wearing the same clothes–I wondered if it
was the only decent outfit she owned. I
was reading a magazine, but she sat down
next to me anyway.
"Did you get called back for that high
school thing?" she asked.
"No," I said.
"Neither did I. I’m Jessie."
"I’m Pam."
The receptionist called my name then. I
felt a rush of pleasure at being called
first–this woman wasn’t all that far above
me after all. "Listen," she said as I
stood up. "If I get called next, wait for
me and we’ll go to lunch. I don’t know too
many people in this town."
"Okay," I said.
She did get called next. I waited, and
when she came out she offered to drive us
to a coffee shop in Westwood.
I had already pegged her as someone very
much like myself, just barely getting by
on bit parts and commercials and
waitressing jobs. So I was surprised to
see her walk up to a white BMW and turn
off the car alarm. She must have noticed
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my expression, because she laughed. "Oh,
it’s not mine," she said. "I rent it for
casting calls. You have to play the game,
make them think you’re worth it."
I’d heard this before, of course. In an
image-conscious town like Hollywood every
little bit helps. A fancy car isn’t enough
to land you a part, though, and I wondered
if she had any acting ability to back it
up.
I got in the car and she drove us to the
restaurant. When we were seated she looked
directly at me and said, "So. Where would
I have seen you?"
I told her about my few commercials and
the made-for-cable movie I’d done. "I was
Iras in Antony and Cleopatra at the San
Diego Shakespeare festival," I said. "I
was also the understudy for Rosalind in As
You Like It, but the damned woman refused
to get sick."
She seemed a little puzzled at this.
Wondering why I bothered with Shakespeare,
maybe. "What about you?" I asked.
"I had a bit part on a soap," she said.
"It was a great gig, until they killed my
character off."
"I’m sorry," I said, and she laughed.
Los Angeles, they say, is where the
best-looking boy and the prettiest girl
from every high school in the country end
up. You can’t sneeze in this town without
infecting a former high school beauty
queen or football quarterback. Even so, I
thought this woman astonishingly
beautiful. She had deep sea-blue eyes,
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dark lashes, and a mass of dark hair. More
than that, though, she had some subtle
arrangement of bone structure that
compelled you to look at her. She might
just make it, I thought, and felt the envy
that had dogged me ever since I had come
to town. Next to her all my faults stood
out in sharp relief–I was too short, too
plain, my mouth too thin. I hate myself
when I feel this petty, I struggle against
it, but I don’t seem to be able to help
it.
As penance I made an effort to like her.
And really, it wasn’t that difficult. She
had probably been told that she was
beautiful since before she could
understand the words, but for some reason
she didn’t seem to believe it. She
ridiculed herself, her ambitions, the idea
that she could make it in Hollywood where
so many others had failed.
"My parents are sure I’ll come crawling
home within the year," she said. "You
wouldn’t believe the arguments I had
before I left. Well, it’s the old story,
isn’t it–young girl from the country goes
to Hollywood."
"Where are you from?"
"A farming town in Wisconsin. You’ve never
heard of it. What about you?"
"Chicago."
"And how did your parents take it?"
"Actually, they’ve been pretty
supportive," I said. "Especially my
father. He did amateur theatricals in
college. He said, ‘I think you’re good
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enough, but unfortunately what I think
doesn’t count for much. You have my
blessing.’ And then he laughed–he’d never
said anything so old-fashioned in his
life."
"That’s great." She was silent for a
while, no doubt thinking about the
differences between us. "Listen, Pam," she
said. "I’m going to an audition next week.
It’s another high school student. Ask your
agent about it."
"Sure," I said, surprised. I would never
tell a rival about an audition. Jessie was
someone to keep, a caring, genuine person
in a town full of hypocrites. "Thanks."
"See you there," she said.
We saw each other a lot after that. We
went to plays and movies and critiqued the
performances, took the white BMW to cattle
calls, made cheap dinners for each other
and shopped at outlet clothing stores. We
took tap-dancing lessons together, from a
woman who looked about as old as Hollywood
itself. Jessie told me about auditions
coming up and I began to tell her if I’d
heard anything, though each time it was an
effort for me.
She got called back to her soap–they
wanted her to do a dream sequence with the
man who’d played her lover. We rehearsed
the scene together, with me taking the
lover’s part.
It was the first time I’d seen her act.
She was good, there was no question of
that, but there was something she lacked,
that spark that true geniuses have. The
envious part of me rejoiced–this woman, I
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