Shopgirl

lisa

LISA CRAMER’S BODY IS GOOD enough for any man or woman on this planet, but it is not good enough for Lisa Cramer. She believes that she has to be flawlessly pleasing to a man, and that she has to be an expert at fellatio. This talent is fine-tuned and polished through extensive conversations with other women and the viewing of selected “educational” porno tapes. She even once attended a class given by Crystal Headly, a down and going sex-film actress. She is not reluctant to roll out this expertise, either. Within several dates, and sometimes sooner, Lisa will demonstrate this skill to the lucky fella, thus making herself feel that she is the kind of woman any man would want. The men, however, feel confounded by their good fortune. Who is this person who goes down on them so easily? Lisa can only judge her success by the frequency of follow-up phone calls from the men, who are eager to take her to dinner, or a play. The fact that they are willing to take her to a play – low on the list of L.A. date priorities – demonstrates just how far they are willing to go. Lisa knows it is the sex they are after, but it is sex that is the source of her worth. The more they want it, the more valuable she is, and consequently, Lisa has made herself into a fuckable object.

Lisa is not interested in sex because it is fun. It is the fulcrum and lever for attracting and discarding men. They come to her because of a high hope, an aroma that she gives off, as delicious as baking bread. But when she’s done with them, they are limp and drained, and ready for their own bed. She has literally absorbed all their interest, and she wants them to retreat before they discover some horrible flaw in her that will repulse them. Thus Lisa, with all her power, never feels quite good enough for anything beyond her ability to create desire in men. In fact, several prohibitive compulsions appeared in her early twenties that keep her from widening her circle of experience. She cannot get on an airplane. Fear of flying grips her so intensely that she has forever banished air travel as a possibility. She also cannot ingest any medicine of any kind. Not aspirin, not antibiotics, not even a Tums, for fear of losing her mind. And she can never, ever, be alone, without worrying that she will suddenly die.

Lisa has developed a taste for Mr. Ray Porter, even though she has never met him. There is simply a problem hat he has selected Mirabelle and not her as his arbitrary object of desire, and Lisa is sure that once he lays eyes on her, correct thinking will occur. Lisa cannot imagine Mirabelle being an expert sex partner. Of course, Mirabelle’s lack of advanced training might be exactly why Ray Porter wants her, but this reasoning is way beyond Lisa, because she has no idea that her own sovereignty could be usurped by one square inch of Mirabelle’s skin, glimpsed under a starched blouse.

The day Lisa heard Mirabelle blab her story at the Time Clock, a vestigial memory was jarred in her head at the mention of the name Ray Porter. Lisa went home that night, concentrated, and remembered that his name had been in the air a few years ago because he had picked up and had an affair with a shoe clerk at Barneys, the fashionable department store two doors down. Then, when he came in with another woman six months after the affair was over, the salesgirl went berserk and threw two pairs of Stephane Kelian shoes at him, with one falling into an open fish tank, and she was promptly fired. Barneys has a “don’t ask don’t tell” policy when it comes to customers and employees, and throwing shoes clearly violates the “don’t tell.” Lisa also remembers that Ray Porter is powerful.

Lisa doesn’t see an interposition of herself between Mirabelle and Ray Porter as unethical. In her mind, Mirabelle deserves no one, and Lisa will be doing him a favor. What would Ray Porter do with a leaden Mirabelle lying nude on his bed with her legs open? What would any man do with a soggy girl who can’t assert herself, who has a weak voice, who dresses like a schoolgirl, and whose main personality component is helplessness?