No Lifeguard on Duty: The Accidental Life of the World's First Supermodel (36 page)

“I know this!” he said. “It is Halloween already, yes?”

“For some people it is.”

They woke me at ten and I had breakfast and took a cab to the costume shop. It was a dank, musky place. The old woman who ran it found an antique nun’s outfit in the storage room. It was clean but needed a good pressing. She took care of it. I tried it on. It was a little big and she did what she could on such short notice and I wore it out into the street and flagged down a cab. I gave the driver the name of the church but he didn’t know it. We lost our way and went around in circles until an old man told us he knew the church and pointed us in the right direction. I paid the cabdriver and got out and went through the heavy front doors. There was no one there. It was beautiful inside. And deathly still. It was like a cathedral that had been shrunk down to manageable size: grand but small, if you know what I mean. My footfalls echoed on the marble floor. The bells began to toll. I looked at my watch. It was twelve on the button.

At that moment, the heavy doors opened and a priest entered. I looked away, embarrassed, afraid of getting caught. I thought,
If he talks to me, I’ll tell him I’m an
American nun. If he asks me to explain my vestments, I’ll
tell him I belong to an old Italian order of nuns who make
their home in Brooklyn and believe in having a good time.

The priest began moving toward me.

272 J A N I C E D I C K I N S O N

“Please,” he said. His voice was familiar. I turned. It was my friend the director, also in disguise. With a theatrical sweep of the hand, he indicated the confessional. This looked like it might be fun. I got into my side of the confessional. He got into his. I could see him through the latticework. He slid back the small panel.

“I’m listening, child,” he said. He was very serious.

He was really into it.

“I’ve been bad, Father.”

“How have you been bad?”

“Oh Father, I’ve been bad in every way it’s possible to be bad. I wouldn’t know where to begin. We’d have to go away for a weekend just to get through the first few chapters of my badness.”

“Perhaps that can be arranged.”

“So you’re one of
those
priests,” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “I want to fuck you.”

“Oh heavenly Father!”

He left the confessional and came round to my side and helped me out. I followed him through the empty church to a small alcove in back, and he lifted my robes and fucked me against the cold stone walls.

“You’re a dirty slut,” he said.

“Yes, I am,” I said. (But I make a pretty good nun.) He drove me back to the hotel after we were done, and as we were pulling up we saw Alberto getting out of a cab.

I ducked down and he sped past and parked around the corner. I was still wearing my nun’s outfit. I told my priestly friend I would see him later and got out and hurried back to the hotel.

Alberto was still in the lobby. He turned as I came in, and his jaw dropped.

“Janice!”

“Hello, Alberto. What are you doing here?”

N O L I F E G UA R D O N D U T Y 273

I walked across the lobby to the bar. He followed me, still in shock, his mouth still open.

“What is the meaning of this?”

“I’m thinking of joining a convent,” I said. I reached the bar and ordered a Bellini. There were few people at the bar at that early hour, but even a blind man would notice a nun at a bar, drinking. They stared. The bartender stared. He set the flute in front of me.

“Janice, I asked you a question.” Alberto was in serious daddy mode.

“
Now
you’re paying attention to me?” I said, and kicked back the Bellini like a truck driver. I looked out the window: They were towing the Ferrari.

He told me his friend the actress was worried about her husband. “She thinks something is going on with you two.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I came to Rome dressed like a nun and fucked him in a little church about a mile from here.”

“Janice!”

“He was dressed as a priest. With no underwear.”

“You are making me very angry,” he said.

“Well, I have news for you, Alberto. I don’t give a shit.”

It was over.

By the end of the month, I was gone.

Milan was history.

CITY OF ANGELS

ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª

In 1988, at the age of thirty-three, I moved to Los Angeles.

I wanted a fresh start. I wanted to reinvent myself. And I’d been told Los Angeles was just the place for it.

I moved in with my flamboyant friend Angelo DiBiaso, a hugely successful hairdresser. He was a big favorite with the rock stars. David Bowie, Duran Duran, even my old pal Mr. Jagger, all availed themselves of his talent. Angelo took me everywhere with him. He showed me the city and introduced me to his friends.

Meanwhile, I buckled down and got to work. Or
tried
to, anyway. I heard about a bathing suit shoot in Maui and really lobbied for it. I didn’t get it. Then there was a shoot in Ojai—I could’ve driven there; it’s a lousy hour and a half from L.A.—but I didn’t get that, either.

One morning I was flipping through
Playboy
—God only knows what Angelo was doing with a copy of

Playboy
—and came across a spread of Elle McPherson, shot by Herb Ritts.
That should have been me,
I thought.

But I knew I was kidding myself. Elle looking fucking great. I wondered if my best days were behind me—in terms of modeling, anyway—and the thought filled me with terror. I signed up for acting classes and yoga, went on long hikes in the surrounding mountains. I tried to fill every minute of every day so that I’d go to bed exhausted, N O L I F E G UA R D O N D U T Y 275

and sleep sweet, dreamless sleep. It worked, sometimes.

But the truth is, I was going through withdrawal. I had become addicted to seeing myself in magazines and on billboards and smiling at the world from the sides of buses; addicted to the spotlight. Suddenly I didn’t have that anymore, and I felt lost and empty. I needed validation. Don’t we all?

One morning, Angelo and I were having breakfast at

Hugo’s, on Santa Monica Boulevard, when he indicated a man across the restaurant. “That’s Simon Fields,” he said.

“He runs a big production company. They do lots of

videos. You should get to know him.”

Simon looked up at that very moment. He was paying

his bill. Angelo waved. Simon left some money on his table and came over. He smiled at me. He had a big gap between his front teeth, like Alfred E. Newman.

“Hi, Simon,” Angelo said. “This is my friend Janice Dickinson.”

We exchanged numbers. He was very sweet. He called

me the next night and asked me to dinner. He gave me directions to his house and cooked a fantastic meal. I think I fell in love before we got to the main course.

Yeah. I know. It’s crazy. But that was the pathology. I couldn’t be without a man. I didn’t know who I was without a man. If I wasn’t being wanted, loved, ached over, fought with—well, I just plain didn’t exist at all.

And Simon fell in love right back (though he probably waited until after dessert). He was wonderful, witty, funny, whip-smart, and immensely talented. He was making

videos for MTV: Madonna, Prince, Peter Gabriel, Michael Jackson, Rod Stewart, Paul McCartney. He had energy. He loved life. He was great. He made me feel great. We were great together.
I
was great.

Four months later, lo and behold, I was pregnant.

276 J A N I C E D I C K I N S O N

So I moved in with him, of course. And I started spinning out my future in my head. I was going to have a family, the one I’d always dreamed of. I loved the way my body began to change. I loved the feeling of life growing inside me. I started developing breasts and hips. I stopped drinking and smoking. I wouldn’t eat a lousy hot dog because I thought the nitrates might harm my beautiful little baby. Don’t get me wrong. It wasn’t smooth sailing every day. When those hormones kicked in—
get back,
motherfucker!
I was the Devil, disguised as a lovely, glowing, pregnant woman. But I always came back, became the glowing pregnant woman again. I was giddy with happiness. My jaw ached from smiling. I laughed out of context all the time. And I cried a lot. For no reason. For MY GOOD FRIEND LIONEL GEORGE AND MY

BRIDEGROOM, SIMON, AT OUR WEDDING.

ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª

((((((((((((((

PREPARING FOR THE

WEDDING WITH DEBBIE.

I LOVE MY SISTER.

every reason. For the

life ahead of me. For

the life I was leaving

behind.

For the

life

inside me. Those
fucking
hormones. Still, when all is said and done, I felt

completely
right
about everything for the first time in my life.

This was
it.
This is what it was all

about. Motherhood. Children. Family.

On the appointed day, Simon and I were in the hospital together, having our baby. Or trying to, anyway. It was the most painful experience of my life. I was in labor for twenty-three hours. I couldn’t stop screaming and cursing.

(Think of
The Exorcist
—on crack.) Our son, Nathan, refused to come out. I began to think that some sixth sense was telling him I was going to make a lousy mother. In the end, the nurse was practically sitting on my stomach, and the doctor was down between my legs, with some kind of suction pump. And then—there he was! A little baby boy!

In my arms. He was gorgeous. His little lips were searching for my wonderful big new tits. He was crawling around on my belly, groping, mewling, trying to find his way, when,
boom!
—our eyes met and I started to cry. I just lost it. Completely. I had never felt love like that in my life.

Right then and there I swore I would give Nathan everything I had been denied. “Thank you,” I told Simon, still blubbering. “You’ve made me the happiest woman in the world.” God. Taking him home. What an experience! We’d 278 J A N I C E D I C K I N S O N

bought the regulation car seat and everything, like they told us to, and an orderly came to fetch me with a wheelchair. It was hospital policy. I sat down, holding my tiny baby in my arms. Simon walked beside us to the elevator, and down the corridor to the exit. I looked up at him, the good wife. He was beaming his proud-papa beam. People looked and nodded and smiled.
Life is good, motherfucker!
I was so in love! With my child, my husband, the whole fucking world.

We got to the car and strapped the baby in and pulled away, and I began crying in earnest.

“What are you crying about?” Simon said. “This is a great moment. You should be happy.”

“I am happy. I’ve never been happier in my life!”

Motherhood. I was so in love with Nathan. I couldn’t stop taking his picture. That’s all I did all day. Love him and shoot his picture and glow. I’d glow when I drove him to the market. I’d glow when people stopped me on the street to tell me how beautiful he was. I glowed when he

laughed and glowed when he cried and glowed when he shat. It’s a fucking miracle I didn’t short-circuit from all that glowing.

My mother came to visit. She cooed at Nathan and

talked about the Good Lord and his mysterious ways and I didn’t hear a word. I was so besotted with Nathan that the world didn’t exist. There was only Nathan and me: The rest didn’t matter. Certainly my mother and her problems didn’t matter. She sat there in our house in Beverly Hills, a house that had once belonged to Liz Taylor, crotcheting a little blanket for Nathan and talking about the rat bastard.
He’s
very sick,
she said.
His heart is bad,
she said.
He has
Alzheimer’s.
“Sometimes I come home and he doesn’t recognize me and beats me.”