Underneath It All (7 page)

It was August 1984.1 was sixteen years old. I'd been in the business for seven months now, and one photo shoot bled into the next.
I was constantly hungover from something. Between the downers I took and the cocaine I snorted nearly every day, I was a walking zombie. When I was high, I could deal with life.
My "chauffeur" Roger could no longer meet the demands of my chaotic modeling schedule, saying he "had to work," although that had never stopped him before. I wasn't sure why he was suddenly distancing himself from me, but I was sick of him leering at my naked body anyway—even if it did mean spending half my earnings on transportation. At the time I was making two hundred dollars a shoot, and although that was more money than I'd ever had in my young life, it barely paid for the taxis I took from Roger's Redondo Beach house, where I'd been staying for the past few weeks, to the heart of the Valley.
One afternoon my agent, Tim North, summoned me to his office in Van Nuys. When I got there he presented me with a check for a whopping five thousand dollars.
Oh my God!
Stunned to have that kind of money in my sixteen-year-old hands, I tried to cover my shock quickly as North explained what it was for. I didn't want to appear immature or desperate, so I listened quietly as he told me I'd been chosen as the September centerfold for
Penthouse
magazine.
At the time, I had no idea what an "honor" being a Penthouse Pet was in the porn world. But I did notice several of North's favorite girls giving me dirty looks as they milled about his office, eavesdropping on our conversation. I had no idea why they were so jealous. It was just another skin magazine, hardly an "accomplishment." So fucking what? I thought, licking my lips at the thought of all the coke I could buy with five grand!
It must have been my lack of excitement that drove North impatiently to say, "This is like getting the Oscar in the porn world!" He turned his attention to the tarts milling about the office. "Right, girls?"
God, they
are
old, I thought, staring at their bleached-out hair and hooker makeup. They must be at least twenty-one, maybe even older. They smiled meanly at me. They obviously hated the amount of attention I received from North, and I couldn't have cared less. Having no friends in the porn world made it easier to keep my true identity a secret. I cozied up to North, smoothing over the tension between us. "I'm just tired," I cooed softly in his ear. Then I gave him a wet kiss that left him smiling and me desperate for a shot of tequila. I disappeared down the hallway wiping his saliva from my mouth, amazed at how easy it was to get what I wanted.
As I left North's office,
Penthouse
check in hand, I heard him on the phone talking up his new girl, Christy Canyon. He was bragging about how young she was and what a "sweet little pussy" this eighteen-year-old had. Disgusted, I stepped out onto Ventura Boulevard and took a cab to my dealers, desperate to turn down the volume on my life.
I scored a gram of coke, spending all but twenty bucks of my remaining cash, and headed back to Roger's house, check still in hand. What was I going to do with a check? How could I cash it? I didn't even have a bank account, as I'd always been paid in cash. I got high and contemplated this situation in the privacy of Roger's garage apartment. I was glad he wasn't home, thinking bitterly of the man I once trusted. Angry tears stung my eyes as I snorted line after line in Roger's room, the smell of his musky cologne everywhere.
I had been sleeping at Roger's for several weeks now and my mom had started asking questions. She knew I was gone, but she didn't know where I was or what I was up to. I still checked in with my girlfriends, and Maria told me she'd called and was worried. I'd sent a message back that I was okay, paranoid my mother might hunt me down at Roger's.
Or was it hopeful?
Regardless, Roger and I were on the outs and I had to find a new place to live. I'd been woken days before by him stroking me in my sleep. But this time when I awoke, I waited, needing to know if it was real. And it was.
I wanted to hit him and run and scream and cry, but I couldn't. I had nowhere else to go. I needed his shelter for the moment. And so I lay there, still, not moving at all, and plotted my revenge.
The next day I made my way to Hermosa Beach and walked down the Strand toward my old hang. I stood staring at the ocean and remembered how Lorraine and I used to surf those waves. I missed her. I wondered if my family knew. I wanted to call them up and explain, end the lies, stop the game. But my shame wouldn't let me.
I couldn't go home.
The Poop Deck was directly in front of me. Many a summer, my school friends and I had tried to sneak in for a cold one and were always promptly thrown out. But this was a different time, and I was a different girl. I marched straight through the wooden net-covered door, my tight T-shirt clinging to my breasts. Without missing. a beat I beelined For the bar and looked the bartender right in the eye.
"I'll take a screwdriver, please."
The crusty old-timer who carded me made a big deal of checking out my ID and looking me over. Finally he shrugged and brought me my drink. I paid him with my last twenty, wondering how the heck I was going to cash my Penthouse check.
Wandering out onto the patio, I perched in a corner in the sun. It was weird being near all these partying adults. I tried not to stare but was interested in how older girls acted toward men. I was surprised that these girls were as silly as the cheerleaders and surf bums I'd gotten drunk with in the past. One rather fat girl named Heidi was clearly two sheets to the wind, swaying to Billy Idol's "Rebel Yell" and raising her top to show off her multiple rolls of blubber. But her strip routine was nonetheless met with hoots and whistles from the horny drunk crowd.
I was well on my way to being wasted when yet another drink arrived, compliments of Blue Eyes at the pool table. The waitress pointed him out and he raised his glass to me. His friends were all grinning, slapping him high-fives. He reminded me of my father, though, so I escaped to the bathroom to collect my thoughts. As I came out, he stepped into my path, smiling that smile. Unsettled, I feigned indifference.
He smiled at me and I smiled back. He kicked up a tangerine-sized beanbag into the air and, when it got to his elbow, swatted it again. "Hacky Sack" was a popular sport in this beach community, and Blue Eyes was swept up into the frantic energy of beer-induced competition. I watched the crowd of drunk men fight for possession of the tiny orange sack, hanging around simply because I had nowhere else to go.
The beer was cold, the sun was hot, and I was drunk. When he offered me a ride home, I knew what he meant, I needed a place to sleep, and so I said yes. Sex was all I had to bargain with. I didn't think I had anything else of value to offer, and wondered if other girls felt the same.
Did all teenagers do battle with their hearts and bodies like I did?
I longed to matter to someone, to feel loved and needed. Was this man the one I'd been waiting for?
Was he my knight in shining armor?
As unlikely as that seemed, I was homeless and willing to sacrifice my body to bandage my soul.
He drove a motorcycle and I climbed on the back, both of us wasted. I let my dress blow in the wind, unconcerned by the gawking motorists.
He was a forgettable lover, and when I woke up the next morning, I crept out of his room ready to make a clean getaway. But I was busted by his roommate, Eric, who greeted me with a "Good morning" cup of coffee and then asked about me. I told him I was a model, my name was Krissie, and I was looking for a new apartment. He was a sweet one. I wished I'd ended up in his bed while we sat for a while chatting until the blue-eyed stranger appeared in a towel.
His name was Sonny and he was handsome, even though he had a jagged scar that cut down his check to the corner of his mouth.
God
, he reminded me of my father: blond hair, blue eyes, tan. I made a move toward the door, but he stopped me by offering breakfast and a hot shower.
Breakfast turned to lunch and once again I was tearing down the highway with a man who had gone from stranger to friend in just one night. We spent the day commiserating about life, but I was careful about what I revealed, admitting only that my real name was Nora. I needed someone to know the truth. It made me feel like I wasn't totally alone.
"Your secret's safe with me." He laughed, having no idea how many secrets I really had.
Soaring down Pacific Coast Highway, I squeezed Sonny tighter.

On a crisp fall day, only weeks after I'd first gone home with Sonny, I found myself washing his dirty underwear in the kitchen sink of a house we'd rented together in the modest neighborhood of Lawndale. I was now only about a dozen blocks from where my mother and sisters were living, and although I hadn't spoken to any of them in months, I felt better just knowing I was practically sleeping in their backyard.
Homesick, I longed to push the pause button on the jagged life I was living. I wanted to take it all back, to close my eyes and hear the voice of my history teacher, Mr. Atteberry, lecture the class on war. I was sure of only one thing: you can't go back; you can only go forward.
I felt like a crazy person, terrified of what I'd do next. My tears soaked my boyfriend's clean underwear.
Sonny was far from the storybook prince little girls dream about, but his presence provided me with a little comfort, making me feel I wasn't totally alone in this big, scary world. There were things about him that scared the crap out of me from the start — his unpredictable temper for one — but for some reason I was still drawn to him. I was the moth — and no question, he was the flame.
Looking back, it's clear to me I stayed in that relationship because I needed an adult in my life, someone who might save me from myself. Just about anyone would do, and Sonny picked up right where Roger had left off.
Life was about survival and drugs were my salvation. I used coke on a daily basis, as getting high was the only thing I looked forward to each morning. My world was jagged and sharp, accompanied by a constant screaming in my head that needed to be stopped.
Sonny, my ever ready drug buddy, encouraged my partying lifestyle. He was always fine the next morning, though, whereas the morning after our binges would find me feeling desperate, worthless, and utterly hollow inside. I was like a sleepwalker in traffic, unable to wake myself. Another fix would take me away from it all, so I moved through the days feeling like an outsider to my own body.
I went along with Sonny's whims without a word of protest. I stood stupidly by as this twenty-two-year-old speed freak spent my money, slapped me around, and sadly made me feel right at home. But as much as I loathed the drama, I couldn't leave him; instead, I confided in him and pampered him. I ignored the bruises and bloody noses he gave me, feeling like I deserved all the pain I got.
At age sixteen, I found myself living a version of my parents' abusive relationship. And just like my mother, I was secretly plotting an escape.
Signing over my five-thousand-dollar
Penthouse
check to a car dealership in Torrance, I bought a shiny black '67 Corvette. Since I hadn't made it through driver's ed before I'd dropped out of school, my driving skills were primitive to say the least, so I had to ride shotgun as Sonny took control and peeled off the lot.
The speed and power of that car both scared and excited me. I was wide awake, alert, had adrenaline pumping through my veins as Sonny tore through a middle-class neighborhood toward the wide open Pacific Coast Highway, where I would take a crack at mastering the gas and brake pedals of my future getaway car. We ended up celebrating my clumsy but accident-free arrival home by scoring some blow en route, and spending the rest of the night snorting coke.
That evening he told me tales of his marine corps days and confided in me that he'd been AWOL for nearly a year. I wondered if being AWOL was a crime and stored away this drug-induced confession. I was pretty sure something would happen if I were to tell on him, but what?
Could this be my out? Who would I tell? The police?
No way! I was a sixteen-year-old runaway nude model—I wasn't going anywhere near cops. I was afraid of what they'd do to me. What would they do to me anyway?
Was nudity a crime?
Stop it! I ordered myself, snorting another line and searching his blue eyes. Wow . . . he was in the same boat as I was — on the run and always looking over his shoulder.
Sonny rambled on about the jagged three-inch scar that crossed his face, saying his father had given it to him. Apparently, he'd been taken away from his parents several times as a child and was only four years old the first time one of those beatings sent him to the hospital. I listened as his body shook with emotion, feeling that I understood him now. His pain flooded my heart with sympathy, pity, and total rage.
How the fuck do these things happen to children?
I wanted to tell him that I understood what he felt, but stayed silent, stuffing the words back inside, doubtful I'd ever tell my deepest, darkest secrets to anyone. I knew then that I would never hate Sonny. But I also knew that the time bomb ticking in this man was even closer to exploding than my own, and I was terrified of being around when it did.
Besides Roger, Sonny was the only person who knew how old I really was and what I really did for work. He was an adult—six years my senior—and I believed he had to understand the world better than I did. He'd known my age for a while, and although I hadn't intended to tell him what I did, it just sort of came out one evening.
Tim North was pushing me to go further in my modeling sessions, and I was rattled by the pressure, so I scored some blow to take the edge off. Sonny came back later that night and sometime during our private coke party, I confessed to being a nude model. Waking up the next day, I had a pounding headache and totally forgot it had happened until my boyfriend reminded me he knew my secret. Instantly, I regretted telling him, scared he would use it against me —and later he did. He got off on it and started bragging about how he was dating a centerfold girl.
As the weeks passed North continued to turn up the heat, pushing me to do hard-core stills and porn movies, and warning me that if I didn't I'd be out of work. Panicked at the thought of not being able to buy food or pay rent or, more important, buy myself some peace-providing drugs, I sought Sonny's advice. But when I told him I might actually be fired, he had a fit and threw a lamp across the room. He was unemployed and intended to stay that way. He said he needed time to develop his skills and slapped me when I asked exactly what those skills were. I realized I'd better change my tone quickly. You're gonna pay, fucker, I thought as I put on my sweet sexy voice to smooth things over.
It's just a matter of time till I'm gone.
The next morning I called North and apologized for being difficult. I asked him for work, but he told me I was all "shot up" in the centerfold world. If I didn't believe him, he said, I should look for myself. I did, and found out he was right. As I stood in front of the magazine rack in the liquor store on the corner of Inglewood Avenue, minutes from where I lived, I felt violated by the image of some freaky version of myself on the cover of several sleazy skin magazines. They didn't even make me look pretty, I thought, feeling like the ugliest girl alive. God... I was hyperventilating.
What do the pictures on the inside look like? Were they even worse than the "Pump Paula" pictures the jock at school had confronted me with?
I couldn't look.
Forget it . . just forget it. . . . North did this on purpose. . .
He's trying to fuck with me... motherfucker....
Buying my beer, I practically ran out of the store.
What North said had been true.
I'd posed for every magazine on the rack by now, and the business was all about new meat. I pictured myself lying in the butcher's case at the supermarket, the plastic wrap covering my body and a red "Reduced for Sale" sign on my forehead. The image seemed very real. I was going off the deep end. I had to shake it before I ate a bottle of pills. I was thinking about death a lot lately, and that day I felt like I was daring God to strike me dead.
North's words echoed through my head. Frantically, searched the house for drugs looking for Sonny's stash. As I sniffed the white powder, my mind raced to thoughts of warm summer rain washing all the insanity out of my life, making it better.
It's just a transitional phase, I told myself. Any day now someone will find out about my magazines and tell my mom. She'll go to the police and I'll be in trouble, but I'll live through it.
I had no idea my mother had already made several trips to the police department. But no one had done much about it, since I was just another runaway lost in the system. I fantasized about being able to tell all my secrets. It'd be like a dam breaking, and when it spilled, Ricky, Roger, porn . . . none of it would matter anymore. But what then? Would I be free?
I got high in our bathroom, paranoid that Sonny would come home from wherever he went and catch me doing his drugs. Screw him, I thought.
It's my money that bought them.
He'd been living off me since we met, and I was over it. Unable to stand the thought of seeing him, or being seen by him, I raced out of the driveway and onto Pacific Coast Highway in my new shiny Vette. I soared along the highway blasting Pat Benatar on the stereo. "Hell Is for Children" screamed through the air.
Isn't that the truth,
I thought, wondering if I could bring myself to drive off a cliff and be done with it.
I abandoned the thought in favor of liquid. My mouth was twitching from the coke. I needed to balance it out and ended up at my designated perch on the patio of the Poop Deck. I was just finishing off a pitcher of Budweiser, grooving to the soothing sound of the Eagles and feeling like nothing really mattered, when Sonny came waltzing in. He picked me out of my chair and wrapped me in a hug. He kissed me softly, singing "My angel is the centerfold" loud enough for the whole bar to hear.
In his hands, he had a copy of the most recent
Penthouse
with Vanessa Williams on the cover. I only knew who she was because a few weeks earlier all of Sonny's friends wanted to check out the swimsuit competition of the Miss America pageant and her name had come up. But at the time I had no idea how her girlie photos were going to affect my life. Now, there she was, Miss America, on the cover of
Penthouse
smiling with George Burns at her side, and while this normally wouldn't have affected me at all, I was, in fact, the centerfold of that very issue.
I flipped to the center of the magazine. It really was me, and I was shocked to see how pretty they made me look.
I couldn't remember taking those photos, but I must have because there they were. Sonny was jazzed to be with a
Penthouse
centerfold model and I was stunned at the attention directed my way. The bar was hopping with both men and women, and I was suddenly the main attraction. Patrons were going to the liquor store next door and coming back with their own issue of
Penthouse
for me to sign.
Signing my very first autograph as "Traci Lords," I corrected the misspelled "y" to an "i" and felt important for the first time in my life, giggling about how they didn't even spell my made-up name right. I was cocky and arrogant. Becoming the life of the party, I danced with Sonny extra sexy, showing off, and lifting my skirt as I'd seen fat Heidi do on my first visit to this bar. I was completely aware of the jealous looks from the women and lust from the men. At the time, it didn't occur to me that perhaps I looked as silly to them as Heidi had looked to me. I only knew that I was "Miss Tracy Lords, September 1984 Pet of the Month," and it felt good to be Her.
By the time my buzz wore off the next morning, the reality of what was going on hit. I knew there was something wrong with my body being available for the world to view in a porn
magazine, and although it wasn't the first time I'd seen myself in a nude layout, it hadn't actually registered until that moment.
Still, I couldn't stop myself. I was in way too deep and couldn't possibly turn back now. I had North to answer to, Sonny to feed, and my unrelenting hunger for approval to satisfy. Besides, now I was a star.
That became the best selling issue in the history of
Penthouse
. While the TV reporters continued to gossip about the lesbian photos Miss America had done, there I was, right in front of the world, a naked fifteen-year-old girl staring up at them.
The attention that issue of
Penthouse
magazine brought me in the porn world sealed my fate. It was October 1984 when I graduated to doing porn films.
It just kind of happened.
The first time I walked onto a porn movie set I was wired. I hadn't slept a wink the night before, and as I drove myself to the location I was exhausted and overwhelmed by the anxiety of imagining what it would be like. I had one line, which I'd practiced a dozen times the night before. North had told me my line was "I know what gets me hot," but I had no idea what it referred to. All I knew was I was getting paid four hundred and fifty dollars a day with a guarantee of two days' work and no nudity.
I'd made every excuse I could think of to North, trying to convince him that I was worth more to him as a centerfold model than a porn star. But it didn't matter. My time had run out.
Needing the cash, I agreed. North told me it was a soft-core porn film for cable. I was hired to walk around looking pretty, and was asked to bring several bikinis and a selection of high heels. Stopping by the liquor store on the way there, I stashed a couple cans of premixed vodka and orange juice in my backpack for courage.
The movie was being filmed in a mansion deep in the San Fernando Valley. When I arrived on the set early, I couldn't find anyone who knew where I was supposed to go. I was told I
should look for Richard, the director, who would tell me what to do. Continuing my search up the stairs, I crossed paths with several half-naked girls with very large breasts. They were laughing and seemed to be having a good time. I thought this was a good sign and continued along the hallway feeling more at ease.
I'd sat in traffic for almost two hours and I had to pee like a racehorse. Pleased to find a bathroom in the direction of the noise I was following, I walked in and was greeted with what looked like the hygiene aisle at the drugstore. There were condoms, jellies, foam, and douches of every flavor on the counter. An empty beer bottle sat in the sink and from the smell in there, someone had been smoking pot.
I relaxed even more. These people were just having a good time, partying and hanging out. As for all the products, I guessed someone had serious hygiene issues. I was a bit creeped out by that, but I put it out of my mind and laughed at my lack of experience with such things. A guttural moaning coming from somewhere down the hall startled me.