Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea (18 page)

My mother had actually purchased the mop for me years before, and it hadn’t been used since. I couldn’t think of a better time to get involved with my apartment’s personal hygiene. After I filled up a salad bowl with water and shampoo, I moved all of the furniture in my living room and kitchen against the wall so that I could really get at the floor.

After thirty minutes of full-blown mania, I decided to rearrange my furniture. I hadn’t had this much energy since splitting an eight ball with my rabbi at my bat mitzvah. I put in another good nine-and-a-half minutes of elbow grease before I lost any and all interest in finishing what I had started. I couldn’t imagine what my cleaning lady, Fantasia, had to hop herself up on to get through a solid eight hours of this shit. It occurred to me that it probably came easier to Mexicans, considering that they inherit the cleaning gene, but I still had a huge amount of respect for her.

All of a sudden I felt extremely wiped out. I walked back into my room, got under my covers, pulled on my eyeshades, and passed out. Two-and-a-half hours later, my phone rang. I had woken up from a dream where I was still in high school and thought it was the bell. I looked around my room in complete confusion, wondering who I had hooked up with in order to end up here. I didn’t understand why the bell kept ringing until I looked over and saw my cell phone on my nightstand. Right next to the wrapper of my turkey pesto sandwich.

I answered the phone and it was Lydia. Apparently, I had agreed to pick her up from the airport and I was an hour late. No wonder she hadn’t answered her phone earlier. I felt like I’d been in some sort of nuclear explosion. My head was pounding. I had left my contacts in and they were having trouble finding their way back to the centers of my eyes. I felt exactly the way people describe feeling after being slipped a roofie, minus the anal pain. It occurred to me that what I may have been suffering from was a sugar hangover. I hadn’t really had any chocolate in weeks, and my body was completely appalled with what I had shoved into it.

I slowly got out of bed and held onto my desk, and then the wall, as I tried to maintain my footing on the way into the bathroom. I looked in the mirror to see my hair matted to my forehead and some chocolate stuck to the side of one of my cheeks. “When did I get bangs?” I wondered out loud. What a disaster. I walked out of the bedroom and slammed my shin straight into a leg of the couch that was now sitting in my kitchen. “Fuck me!” I screamed as I hopped up and down on one foot and then fell over. I craned my neck to look around the corner at the clock in my kitchen, which read 3:59 p.m.

I got up, went and brushed my teeth, and put on a pair of flip-flops, all the time wondering why I agree to pick people up from the airport. It really is a ridiculous activity if you’re not sleeping with the person. People in their thirties need to know that if they can’t afford a taxi, then they don’t deserve to go on a trip. I reminded myself to say this exact thought during one of my stand-up routines the next time Lydia came to a show; hopefully that would get the point across.

My vision still wasn’t twenty-twenty, but I hoped that it would clear up once I got outside. I ran out the door and jumped into my dark blue Volvo. I drove to the end of the alleyway, then slammed on the breaks when I saw three young teenage girls wearing backpacks, crossing. I couldn’t have been going more than five miles per hour since the entrance to the street was only a hundred feet from my space, but I’m sure I still scared the girls, so I lowered my window and leaned out. “I’m sorry, girls,” I said as I waved.

“Fuck you, cunt,” one of the girls responded, while the other two girls gave me the finger.

I couldn’t believe my ears. These girls couldn’t have been more than fourteen years old, and they were calling a complete stranger a cunt? I didn’t even start using that word until my late twenties, and I curse all the time. Two of the girls were Mexican and one of them was white, but looked like she was trying very hard to be Mexican. In my opinion, pretending to be Mexican is right up there with wearing a mock turtleneck. Why would you
pretend
to be wearing a turtleneck?

By this time they had crossed over to the other side of the sidewalk, the side closest to my passenger door. I opened my car door and got out. “I’m sorry, did you just call me a cunt?” I asked the chunky Latina who had yelled it.

“That’s right, fucking bitch, cuz that’s what you are!” she yelled.

This was too much. I couldn’t believe how anyone, never mind three young girls, could talk to a complete stranger like this. These girls were clearly walking home from school, which disturbed me even more. “I’m sorry…” I had to press on. “Where do you get off talking like that to complete strangers? How old are you?”

The girls had stopped where they were at this point, and the one I was talking to started walking back toward my car with her fingers and arms waving around like an orangutan. “Because that’s what you fucking are,” she replied. “A fucking cunt. How the fuck old are
you
is the better question, and where the fuck did you learn to drive?”

“Listen, you little bitch,” I screamed, completely losing any remaining dignity that hadn’t been lost earlier when I had inhaled more than five thousand calories in one sitting. “I didn’t fucking hit your ass, and believe me it wasn’t easy to miss, so I suggest you tone it down a notch. I was apologizing to you, and then you call me a cunt? Where are your parents?”

The girl was now standing on the other side of the car, still moving her head around in circles. “Who the fuck do you think you are,
asking
me about my parents? I know
you’re
not my fucking mother, I know that! Shit!” Her girlfriends were now laughing as she turned around to join them. The fact that this girl wasn’t backing down and had no qualms about talking to me like that—when in my mind, I thought I was being reasonable—pushed me over the edge.

Fully aware of my newfound upper body strength, I walked around the front of my car toward them and yelled, “Really? You’re that tough that you can just yell at strangers? You think you’re some sort of badass? Let’s go,” I said, shrugging my shoulders and bouncing from foot to foot with my fists clenched. “Let’s do this!”

The fat girl seemed surprised by my reaction, as she should have been, knowing what I knew about my recent combat training. This little bitch was going to get what was coming to her. She was messing with the wrong person. A few months earlier I wouldn’t have been able to defend myself in this way, but I tightened my abs, jumped up and down a couple of times, and got ready to rumble. She yelled something in Spanish, and then turned around and walked toward her friends. I, however, kept going.

“That’s exactly what I thought. Think about it next time you want to shoot off your mouth!” Then, for good measure, I threw in a
“puta!”
I turned and walked back to my car, got in, and put my foot on the gas. That’s when all three girls started running back toward my car, so I slammed on the brakes and got out again.

“Oh really?” I screamed. I stayed on my side of the car while the girls stopped where they were and all four of us assessed the situation. “This is ridiculous,” I said, throwing my hands up, and went to get back into the car. Just as I did, all three girls took a few steps toward the car, and the wannabe Mexican girl kicked my passenger side door. That was the straw that broke the cameltoe’s back.

I got out, and before I could even stand up, one of the girls was on the roof of my car, and the fat one had somehow managed to airlift herself to my side of the car and had a lock of my hair in her hands. Hair-pulling is a very painful experience, especially when your head is already pounding from an alarmingly volatile sugar misfire.

Shakira was pulling me out of the car by my hair when I decided the only way to release myself would be with a left upper-cut. Disappointingly, the fist I had formed landed directly in the center of my own forehead. The girl on top of the car was screaming, “Yeah, bitch,” as the head Mexican took her one free hand and punched me in the stomach. Somewhere between that and the skinny girl spitting on me, it occurred to me that I was in a street fight and it was
not
going well.

My mind raced to remember all the new moves I had learned, but they were useless. I had spent most of my training with Brad fighting a punching bag that always stayed in the same position. I could fight a person who was standing still, but had no idea how to fight someone who was on the move.

I had to do something and I had to do it fast. I smacked the sloppy fat girl in the face, hard, and then punched her in the vagina, which resulted in her losing her grip on my hair. I ran as fast as I could, but only made it a few feet before one of my flip-flops dislodged and went flying into the air. I tripped and fell down, and just as I managed to get up and start running again, one of the girls kicked me in the ass, propelling me forward onto the pavement. Instinctively, I held both of my boobs together in order to cushion the fall. I scurried to my feet once more, and ran down the street in the opposite direction, all the while hearing the girls screaming, “Stupid cunt!”

Three blocks away, I found a bush and dove into it. After catching my breath while trying not to make too much noise, a couple of things crossed my mind: (a) This was not at all how I had planned on spending my afternoon; (b) My boxing classes had not paid off; and (c) I had a burning sensation over my left eye. I don’t specifically remember getting struck in the eye, but everything happened so fast, there was a good chance that I had taken a punch.

It occurred to me that my brand-new Volvo was also sitting in the alleyway with the driver-side door open and the keys in the ignition. Obviously that would be gone. Either the girls would have stolen it, or someone else walking by would have stolen it. I didn’t live in a bad neighborhood, but I knew that you didn’t have a day like I was having and not get your car stolen. I was in a defeated state of mind and was feeling confused, not only about the direction my life had taken, but also about other things, like Lisa Rinna’s career, and penguin birth.

Once I realized my Rollerblades were in my closet, and that I could use them to ride to the Santa Monica PD to file a police report, I had a moment of elation—until I remembered that my kneepads and helmet were in the trunk of my car. I had never actually worn a helmet before, but not having it handy gave me the perfect excuse not to be caught Rollerblading in public.

Then I remembered Lydia. “Fuck!” I ran back to my car as though in a drill I had seen in the movie
Sgt. Bilko
, where the soldiers bounced in and out of camouflage in order to avoid being seen by the assailants. Surprisingly, my car was still idling with the door wide open and the key still in it. No Mexicans to be seen or heard for miles. I hopped in, and carefully headed for the airport. My cell phone rang. It was Lydia.

“Yello?” I answered.

“Are you coming or what?”

“Yes, Lydia, I’m coming.” I huffed. “I was jumped.”

“Huh?”

“I said, I was jumped!”

“Chelsea, what are you talking about?”

“Jumped. You know…like, taken down by three girls at the same time. I was in a brawl!”

When I heard nothing on the other end, I said, “Lydia, do you copy?”

“Chelsea, what the fuck are you talking about? Jumped? This isn’t a Michael Jackson video.”

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes, and you’ll see,” I said as I hung up. Now I was pissed. As if I would make something like this up. The fact that I was still on my way to pick her ass up after being caught in a Holyfield/Tyson–like altercation made me feel like a really dedicated airport picker-upper, and the fact that she was not getting the significance of it infuriated me!

I couldn’t wait for her to see my shiner and know that I had been involved in a full-throttle scuffle. “Homo you don’t,” I said as a gay man crossed the street in front of my car. “Homo you didn’t!” I screamed again as he crossed slowly, all the while staring at me with a confused and disgusted look on his face. I was ready for another fight, and was pissed I had missed my golden opportunity to lay someone flat.

I arrived at LAX, and while I was pulling up to Continental Airlines, an officer told me to keep moving.

“I don’t think so, buddy,” I said, putting my car in park and stepping out. “You wanna piece of me?” I was pissed now, and no one was gonna fuck with me again.

“Excuse me?” he asked.

“You heard me, hotshot! You wanna rumble? You know what? I’m here to pick up my friend from the airport and I think it’s ridiculous that we are not allowed to stop for one second to let her get in the car. Is my friend supposed to dive through the window while the car’s moving?”

Lydia found me just as the officer was issuing me a ticket for parking my car, along with a second one for lewd behavior.

We didn’t speak for most of the car trip home, until finally she turned and asked me, “What is wrong with you?”

“Um. Is that code for ‘thanks for picking me up at the airport’?” I asked her.

“You have a huge knot in the middle of your forehead and your thirtieth birthday party is tomorrow night. How does that make you feel?”

“You know how it makes me feel, Lydia? It makes me feel like I’m mad as hell and I’m not gonna take it anymore!”

Lydia sighed loudly. I awaited her response with bated breath. I had finally taken a stand, and knew for sure my friends would have to see it my way. Someone, perhaps a higher power, was clearly out to get me.

Finally, without looking at me, she opened her mouth.

“Please take surface streets.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Mini-Me

I
got an upsetting letter from the mother of a midget, who wrote that she had watched an interview of mine on television and, “as the mother of a little person, was deeply offended” by my comments regarding little people; above all, the fact that I referred to them as “nuggets.”

What this woman doesn’t understand is that I am not the enemy. Next to fat babies, midgets are my favorite things to hold. I love them so much, and I want to help them to do adult things like drive cars, Jet-Ski, and lip-synch. I’m in awe of their little limbs, their large craniums, and their medicine-ball asses. I love the little baby steps they take while shifting their weight from side to side, and the fact that when you knock one over accidentally, he flails like a turtle on its back that can’t get up right away.

Let me make one thing clear: I do not have a midget fetish—I like to think of it as more of a healthy obsession. And because I adore them so much, I want to raise midget awareness and prevent their further exploitation by others. I am deeply offended by midget pornography and by people who hire midget strippers for bachelor parties. That type of behavior really crosses the line in my book. What I’m truly interested in is dressing them in evening wear, more along the lines of the attire Miss Piggy used to wear on the
The Muppet Show
, or the little man from Monopoly. I’m talking about tuxedos, sequined ball gowns, and fedoras.

More important, I’m interested in helping midgets realize that their height should never be a limitation. I want to challenge them with outdoor sports such as skydiving, bungee jumping, and water polo. To help them, I would also videotape these activities and review the footage with them afterward with some chalk and a pointer, much in the same vein as a football commentator. If a bunch of Elvis impersonators can get together and skydive out of a plane in groups, there is no reason midgets shouldn’t be allowed that same opportunity. I can’t explain where these feelings come from, and they are rivaled only by my deep affection for penguins. (The only difference being, once you catch a midget, they are much easier to hold on to.)

My midget fantasies were finally realized when I was on a hidden-camera television show called
Girls Behaving Badly
. In its fourth season the producers called me into their office and explained that a very cute midget had written in, begging to be on the show. “She’s really cute and lives in Pittsburgh. We thought since your birthday is coming up, as your present, we’d fly her out to do a bit with you.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. “Let me see her,” I demanded as I leaped over the chair that stood between me and my producer’s computer screen. He opened the file and I nearly passed out. Her name was Kimmy and she looked just like me, but with smaller features. She had blond hair that was pulled back in a ponytail, was three-feet-eleven, and weighed fifty-two pounds. I know this because as soon as I got her on set, I immediately weighed and measured her.

The picture she sent showed her standing with one hand on her hip and one leg splayed out like a Rockette’s. The other hand was holding a lit cigarette. She was wearing a pink leotard with light pink tights, through which I could make out five miniature toes on each foot that were eerily reminiscent of my favorite appetizer, popcorn shrimp.

“Two questions,” I said, barely able to contain myself. “Can she stay at my house, and do I get to take her to a water park?”

A few weeks later the producers flew Kimmy to Los Angeles to be on the show. We decided we would incorporate her into a bit I did called “Officer Handy.” This was a recurring character I played, a security officer who takes herself way too seriously and gives out citations to people for ridiculous reasons, such as not staying within the lines when crossing in a crosswalk, or speaking too loudly while shopping in a mall.

They flew Kimmy in the night before we started shooting, so the first time I saw her was on set. I made sure to get there bright and early that day, as I wanted to make a good impression. She walked in with our talent coordinator and squealed, “Hey, everyone!”

Kimmy was even more than I expected. She had on a pink T-shirt with a pair of pink jean shorts and pink high-top Nikes. I wondered whether she actually needed them for ankle support or if she was on a midget basketball team. It took everything in my power to hold myself back from launching out of my seat like a rocket and tackling her.

She was heading toward me, smiling and waving, and I stood up from my seat and kneeled down on one knee, bracing myself for a hug. My body’s reaction was far stronger than I could have anticipated; I was magnetically drawn to Kimmy, mostly because of her little sausage fingers and Chicken McNugget toes. With arms spread wide open, I couldn’t wait to squeeze her. My eyes were popping out of my head and I had the slow, steady look of a rattlesnake just about to strike a mouse.

“Hi, you crazy bitch!” she said as she ran into my embrace. “I fucking love you!”

This was music to my ears, as I already knew I felt love for her. I knew this was what a mother bear must feel after giving birth to a cub. I loved her even before I met her, and I would do everything in my power to see her in a tracksuit.

“I’m so happy you are here,” I said as tears began to well up in my eyes. “Look at you!” I picked her up and spun her around to get a closer look at her ass. I stared at the back of her ponytail, trying to determine whether or not her hair was real or a clip-on.

“Don’t you think we look identical?” I asked her as I kept spinning her around. Once I put her down, she took a couple of unsteady steps before she was able to gather her footing, and then she sat down. “Sorry, I’m a little dizzy.”

Kimmy’s best features were her head and triceps. She wasn’t as fat as I would have liked, but she was extremely muscular, which made her shape very aerodynamic. I immediately started fantasizing about pinning a cape to her back and tossing her off the roof of my apartment building.

I didn’t want to seem desperate by throwing myself at Kimmy. I had to play it cool. “Why don’t you go get into wardrobe and I’ll get you a script,” I said. I had to approach this in the same way I would deal with a guy I was interested in: give her a little taste of me and then take off while she still wanted more.

The producers decided to have her play my deputy sheriff at a winery in downtown Los Angeles. How they grow grapes in a part of town that is mostly populated by gangs and high-rises is beyond me, but when alcohol is involved, I rarely ask questions.

The prank would take place during a routine wine tasting, with me pulling people over as they went from one tasting to another just three feet away—much like getting pulled over for a DUI, but on foot.

We dressed Kimmy up in a mini police woman’s uniform that basically made me foam at the mouth. I have never in my entire life seen anything cuter. Not only was Kimmy the same size as my three-year-old nephew, she was also flat chested. Even though I had no intention of getting intimate with Kimmy, if I had my druthers, she would have had two cantaloupes taking the place of her mosquito bites.

I had a barrage of questions to ask her and had compiled a series of flash cards to remind me. For starters, where did she shop for clothes? Were her parents human-size? Were her tiny fingers able to handle a set of chopsticks? How many people had she been intimate with, and what were their shapes and sizes? Was she able to take showers? And last but not least, can two midgets produce a full-grown person?

We didn’t have much time before the shoot, so I decided to hold off on my questions until after we were done. We went through the motions of what would take place. After I had questioned our unsuspecting victims as to how many glasses of wine they had consumed and what they intended on eating to soak it up, I would speak into my walkie-talkie, requesting backup. That would be Kimmy’s cue to come charging onto the scene and help me give our victims a field sobriety test.

The plan was for her to enter through a side door, run under one of the tables the wine was on and slide through, finally landing at our feet. Then I would tell the victims that we had no choice but to give them a breathalyzer to check their alcohol level. At this point I would pick Kimmy up and hold her in front of a person, asking her to breathe into Kimmy’s face. “She is trained to detect alcohol, not unlike a police dog,” I would tell the person.

The first woman I pulled over was outraged. This was the perfect type of person for our show. The more enraged she became, the funnier the bit was.

“Excuse me, Miss?” I asked as I pulled her away from a group of about eight patrons. “I’d like to ask you a couple of questions. First, I’d like to ask you for your license and registration.”

“For what?” she asked, confused.

“Well, I’m Officer Handy, and this is my beat,” I said, standing with my legs spread apart, gripping my nightstick. “I’d like to make sure you are not intoxicated.”

“This is a wine tasting,” she reminded me.

“Yes, I’m aware of that, but you seem to be enjoying your wine a little bit more than the crowd you’re running with.”

“Running with?” she asked, looking over at her friend, who was completely ignoring the fact that I was conducting an interrogation. He was the one who set her up to be on our show and had been instructed not to get involved. “I don’t know any of these people,” she said. “I’m just here with my friend.”

“Never mind him,” I said, referring to her friend and spreading my legs wider, with my arms crossed like the Terminator. “I’m going to need to know exactly how many drinks you’ve had since you arrived and how many you had before you got here.”

“None!” she exclaimed, incensed. “I didn’t drink anything before I got here. It’s noon!” After a couple of minutes of me asking ridiculous questions about her driving record, I yelled into my walkie-talkie that I needed backup.

Kimmy then hauled ass through the side door, slid under the table, and landed on top of my feet. The woman I was harassing was horrified as she looked down at my deputy. At this point I had to turn around to hide my laughter. We were in our fourth season of the show, and by this time I was having a hard time keeping a straight face during any of our filming. The jokes we were playing on people were becoming more and more ridiculous.

The woman didn’t know what was happening and was getting angrier by the minute. “First of all,” she said, “I am not intoxicated, and I don’t appreciate coming to a wine tasting, where you are encouraged to drink, and then being pulled over by a security guard.”

“Security officer,” I corrected her.

“Whatever,” she responded, still staring at Kimmy.

“Security officer!” I screamed as her shoulders jumped a little bit. I used this tactic on the show when people got indignant, and more often than not it succeeded, and I quickly regained control of the situation.

I grabbed Kimmy under her arms and lifted her up so that she and the woman were face to face. “Please exhale deeply into Deputy Kimmy’s face,” I ordered her. She looked at the group of people she had been separated from, who were now all watching. She took a deep huff and then blew into Kimmy’s face.

“Again!” I ordered. I had to stall before I put Kimmy down because I was laughing so hard, and she was the only thing blocking me. She was heavier than I thought she’d be and my muscles were starting to atrophy. There was urine running down my leg inside my uniform, but I just had to accept it until I could compose myself. I realized rather quickly that that was never going to happen, so in order to not have our victim catch me laughing, I put Kimmy down suddenly and ran out of the room.

The next two people we played this joke on reacted much the same way, and I was finally able to keep it together for the third person. So far, this was the best day of my life.

After I had changed my underwear and we were done with the day’s shoot, I told Kimmy that I was performing that night at The Comedy Store and that I would love for her to come. She was elated.

I picked her up at her hotel at 7 p.m. I was half hoping she was still in the police uniform she had worn during the shoot, but was also half wishing I could see her in a brand-new midget outfit. She came out to the car and climbed into the passenger side. She was wearing jeans that I had seen before at babyGap, her high-top sneakers, and a pink, rhinestone-studded tank top that was skintight, and barely covering either of her nipples. I was completely flabbergasted.

“Whoa, Kimmy. You’re really serious about having a good time tonight,” I told her, eyeing her tank top.

She started to laugh maniacally and said, “Girl, I have never been to a city like Los Angeles, and I am ready to rock!” Then she took out a Marlboro Red 100 that was twice the length of her fingers and lit it up.

She was a little firecracker and I loved it, but I also feared for her safety in such a revealing top. We headed toward a restaurant called The Stinking Rose, where I had made reservations after the hostess assured me they had high chairs.

The whole way to the restaurant, Kimmy went on and on about how grateful she was for my friendship and how this was by far the best experience of her life. Home life was not so good, she implied. I would have to wait until dinner before I pressed her for more details. This was just the way I imagined myself acting around Nancy Grace—available, yet distant.

Once we sat down at dinner, it didn’t take me long to realize that I would gather more information than I could have ever bargained for. The waiter came over and she ordered a Captain Morgan and Coke.

“Are you even allowed to drink?” I asked her.

“Sure,” she cackled, as she pulled out her ID for the waiter. Apparently, she was twenty-five.

“Wow, you look really young for your age,” I told her.

“Thanks, Chelsea,” she said. “I have to tell you, when I married my first husband, I wasn’t even eighteen.”

“What?” I blurted out. “Your first husband? How many husbands have you had?” I couldn’t believe this little nugget was having grown-up sex, and I’d be lying if I didn’t say I was horrified.