Chapter 2
“Okay, I’m here, honey. What do you need?” Charles sing songed as he came into her apartment the next morning.
Lorna had called him to come over for coffee and talk. She needed his advice on what she should do about the Dallas Dalton situation. They sat down with two cups of fresh brew and she told him how things had unfolded.
“Jesus, Lorna. Have you lost your mind? Do you not even read social media? You can’t go to a producer’s room like that!” Charles gasped.
“I know, Charles, but I’ve never heard anyone say a bad word about him. I thought it was safe.”
“Apparently, you were wrong about that, honey.”
“Boy was I. The question is, what do I do?”
“Well, obviously, you did the right thing about leaving and his threats are most likely just idle. He can’t blackball you to the whole acting community. Who’s going to even know you met with him other than the tiny circle around that production. Sure, you might not get any work with that particular studio, but there are still plenty of them out there.”
“So, I just keep my mouth shut and let him get by with that then? What if he does it to other girls?”
“That’s not your problem. Let them deal with it. Hopefully, they will be smarter than to go to a man’s hotel room alone,” he said, eying her critically.
“I don’t know. I feel like I should say something, Charles. I only went because I had no idea he was like that, so it makes sense that other girls might make the same mistake. I wonder how many already have or how many gave in to get somewhere? God, what if he forced himself on any of them?”
“And what will you do about it then? It’s your word against his. No witnesses. He is a very wealthy and powerful man. You are an unknown girl who can barely pay her bills. How can you even fight that? You will only bring more trouble on yourself. Maybe warn anyone you’re friends with and let the rumor mill handle it, but don’t go too public with it?”
“True. I just don’t know.”
In the end, Lorna had done exactly that. She had warned those she knew, but hadn’t pursued it past that, but it hadn’t made a difference. He had somehow managed to get her shunned from any audition. She hadn’t been sure until someone confided in her that the rumor mill worked both ways and that he had been telling people that she tried to seduce him and that when he refused, she began making outlandish claims to others about him. He made her look like some sort of unbalanced obsessive stalker who they would want to stay as far away from as possible.
Several months passed without so much as a call back and she had sat through several cattle calls without ever even being given a chance to audition. In a moment of frustration, she had posted on her social media just two words and a hashtag.
Dallas Dalton #metoo
To her, it had seemed just a harmless way to blow off a little steam, but it had quickly spiraled out of control, going viral within a matter of hours. She was slammed with both supportive women and trolls who said the most horrible things she could imagine in response to her seemingly simple expression of frustration, but the real kick in the teeth came in the form of being served by his lawyers for defamation of character.
She would have loved to have fought him, but she knew it was futile to go up against someone like him. She had declined all offered interviews and deleted her original posting, making all of her accounts private to ward off the hate messages that continued to pour in. The word was out and even if she had to leave it at that, other women were now at least warned. If she was a stronger person, maybe she could pursue it further, but she had already lost so much and could lose more if she insisted on following through with any sort of litigation.
Struggling to pay her rent with the meager wages she was getting from waiting tables part-time, she opened the Craigslist ads to see if she could find a better job or at least one that paid better. Everything listed was either just as shitty as her current job or she was underqualified for it. Then, she saw the ad for surrogates. It was good money, very good money and she was already several weeks late with her rent. What did she have to lose? A part of her felt like being pregnant would interfere with her acting career, but she had to admit to herself that she might well be out of the acting business anyway with the damage Dalton had done to her reputation. Like him, he had to desist making statements, but also like him, the damage was already done. She called the number and waited while she was connected to a woman on the other line.
“Margaret Stanford. How may I help you?” the woman said.
“My name is Lorna Dunne. I’m responding to your ad for surrogates.”
“Great. Great. Where are you located, Miss Dunne?”
“Los Angeles.”
“Fantastic. We do have a few clients in that area. I can set you up with the local clinic we use for tests and if you qualify, I would be happy to come out and talk with you further about our program.”
“Tests? What tests?” Lorna said doubtfully.
“Our surrogates are required to possess certain blood markers and other considerations. Unless you meet those standards, it is a waste of my time, and yours, to discuss things further. Of course, you would be paid a small fee for coming in to be tested. Basically, $100 for less than two hours of your time. We will even be happy to arrange for transport to and from the clinic for you.”
“I see. Well, I guess it can’t hurt to try,” Lorna replied, not really certain she would go through with it, but why turn down money just for a few blood tests or whatever?
“Fantastic. Let’s get you an appointment. Are you available in the morning?”
“Yes.”
The woman conference called her in with another woman at a nearby clinic and they set up an appointment for nine a.m. and a private car to pick her up. The clinic was a little further away in Beverly Hills, but that was okay since she didn’t have to pay for the taxi. Once they finished up, she hung up the phone and put her tablet away. She laughed to herself. How desperate had she become that she was looking at getting paid to have other people’s babies.
Lorna had been star struck when she had come to this town with dreams of stardom. Now, it just seemed like some sort of personal hell full of disappointment. She was lost in thought when the phone rang. It was a young woman with a local theatre group asking if she could come in for an audition with them. It was the first call she had gotten in months and she accepted eagerly, already rethinking her thoughts on becoming a surrogate. Maybe Dalton’s reach was wearing off or just didn’t extend as far as the theatre groups. It was something to hang a little hope on, anyway.
The following day seemed fairly uneventful. Her appointment at the clinic involved filling out some forms about her personal history and health, giving some blood for tests and a brief physical exam from a female doctor. It all seemed very legit and she received a cash payment before leaving. All in all, not a bad deal, so far, but she knew that had just been the easy part. Later that evening, she had her audition with the theatre company, which seemed to go very well and ended with them telling her they would be in touch within the next few days.
She decided she would let her success or failure dictate her next move. If she got the acting gig, she would hang in there and try to fix her broken career. If she got accepted as a surrogate, she would go with that and hope the money might help her get through this rough patch. It would most likely be months before she was inseminated and more until she was even showing, so she could continue to act in the short term and maybe do some maternity ads or modeling if she couldn’t get acting roles in her future condition.
She considered that she might get both and wasn’t sure how that would work out. She supposed it depended on how long the theatre run was. If she was lucky, maybe it would fall in line with surrogacy and end before she was showing, allowing her a few months off until she delivered and could get right back into things. Her head swirled with possibilities and hope, mixed with a fear that she would get neither and end up sleeping in an alley somewhere or worse, returning to the trailer she had grown up in, back in West Virginia. It had been her good looks that had gotten her out of there and their effect on a certain producer might be what sent her back.