The Wicked Ingénue

A vignette of sorts about the dark side of Las Vegas.

* * *

It’s a warm desert morning in April of 2004. I’ve been out drinking and debauchering* all night, trying to forget about the fact that I’d recently been fired from my latest dancing gig. My boyfriend had walked out on me a month earlier because he knew I was being unfaithful. As usual, I’ve just spent my last dollar on various vices, but this time there’s no one around to pick up the slack. The rent due date has come and gone, and it’s now several days after the grace period.

Being as it’s six years later, I don’t remember exactly what I was thinking when I climbed the stairs and saw the eviction notice taped to the apartment door: NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. I was probably thinking about my next drink. I certainly wasn’t thinking about scraping together $875 to pay my rent. I guess I thought my ex-boyfriend would come to my financial rescue as he had so many times before.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. The words were etched into my brain slowly and painfully, like the Dante verse I have tattooed on my left shoulder blade. Pay or quit. At the time, I’d become a paradoxical quitter: I was able to quit everything that was good for me and unable to quit everything that wasn’t. And I’d quit caring.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. I had three days to get out, and I blew the first two trying to decide what to do. Do I beg my ex to come back? Do I live in my car while I figure things out? Do I show up at the home of one of my various lovers and panhandle for money? Do I go to the homeless shelter over on West Bonanza Road? It’s hard to believe, but calling my family and/or returning to Los Angeles never even crossed my mind.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. When the final day arrived, I spent the whole day fucking off at the pool in the apartment complex. I walked by the leasing office and waved at the woman behind the counter, she being unaware that I was the evictee in #206. I chatted with my fellow residents about the grand opening of the Wynn, President Bush’s recent visit to town, the early summer we seemed to be having.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. Those black block letters swam with me in the pool, sizzled with me in the Jacuzzi, followed me back up the stairs and resumed their rightful position on the apartment door. My water had been shut off, so I washed the chlorine out of my hair with a bottle of Evian and some shampoo stolen from the last hotel I’d worked in. It smelled like coconuts, like money, like the promise of fame and fortune under the watchful, knowing smirk of Las Vegas neon.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. I tore the place apart and tried to decide what I could and could not live without. I left behind the shoes, but took the clothes. I left behind the utensils, but took the pots and pans. I left behind the pictures, but took the books. Those pictures of my ex and me smiling for the camera only to rip into each other the second the flash went off. I didn’t give a fuck about those pictures.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. After my ancient Honda hatchback was stuffed like a sausage, I took one last look around. It was the sixth time I’d moved in three years, and I’d grown accustomed to leaving things behind, leaving in haste, leaving bits and pieces of my whirlwind life for the next person to find. By that time, possessions were temporary and meant nothing to me.

NOTICE TO PAY OR QUIT. Every other time I’d moved, there’d been a new place to go, a new person to live with, a new person to take care of me. Now, for the first time, I was completely on my own. Every bridge I’d built in town had collapsed. My entire life had collapsed. I’d officially been served by reality.

I’d been given my final notice to quit.

_______________________________________________

*Not an official word, but a favorite in the Brownell dictionary.

If you follow my blogs here on The Wicked Ingénue or if you follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter, you’re probably aware that I’m four months away from earning my B.A. in English (with an emphasis in Creative Writing and Shakespeare. I get credentials and everything for these specialties. Now I can really claim to be a Shakespeare scholar without getting the ol’ eye-roll).

This may not seem like a big deal to some people. People graduate from high school, they go on to college, they earn a degree in something, they enter the job market, they get married, they have kids, they live the American Dream. This systematic process has become less of a hope parents (and society, for that matter) have for their children and more of an expectation.

But, as you may well know already, I didn’t follow this process (click here for a detailed explanation of my six-year detour in Las Vegas). Ironically, I dropped out of high school four months before graduation. Exactly ten years ago this month, I officially left high school and followed my heart’s desire to the middle of the desert.

I’ll never forget my last day as a high school student. For the first time in months, I attended every single class (I’d ditched class so much that I’d been sentenced to Saturday detention every day until graduation), participated in the discussions, ate lunch with my friends, poked around in the library, flirted with the guys hanging out in the auto shop garage. I thought this day was going to be my last day ever as a student, and I wanted to savor it. I never hated school or being a student – quite the contrary. I just hated everything else about my life. Mostly, I hated myself.

I remember it being unseasonably warm that day. You could smell the honeysuckle in the air, the warm asphalt, the freshly mowed grass, the promise of spring. I walked to my car, got in, and sat there in the parking lot for a long time. Until everyone else was gone. Later that night, I snuck out of the house, hid in my friend’s closet, and she drove me to Las Vegas the following morning.

It goes without saying that the rest is history, and I thought my days as a student were history, too. I mean, college? Ha! Not in the cards for Kristen. I was the rebel, the person who wanted to prove she could make something of herself without the input of authority. No more pencils, no more books. School quickly became a distant memory.

* * *

Fast-forward to last November. It’s my senior year of college, and I’m applying to graduate school. I considered several PhD programs, but ultimately decided that none of them had the writing emphasis I was looking for. A straight-up MFA program – Master of Fine Arts – seemed to be the best fit for my needs. A Shakespeare/Creative Nonfiction PhD would’ve been right up my alley, but hey, a girl can’t have it all.

For various reasons, I decided that I wanted to stay in California. There aren’t many MFA programs here at the UC (University of California) level – only three, to be exact – and only one of them offers an emphasis in Creative Nonfiction, which is my main area of interest and the genre of writing I excel in most, I think. So the very short list included UCSD (San Diego), UCI (Irvine, which is where I am now), and UCR (Riverside). Riverside is the only program of the three that has the Creative Nonfiction emphasis, and for this reason it became my top choice. That and the fact that they offer an excellent financial aid package.

The applications went out last fall, and for the past three months I’ve been waiting and wondering and hoping and wishing and praying and contemplating Plan B. I’ve been stuck in limbo, essentially. Then about three weeks ago, I received a rejection letter from UCSD. It was my last choice, but still – rejection stings. It got me thinking, “Dang, if I didn’t get into my last choice, what’re the chances I’ll get into my first and second choice?”

So yeah. I’ve been worried.

Fast-forward even further to yesterday. I’m sitting there watching “Notorious” (I give it three out of five stars) when my Blackberry lets me know I have an email. I ignore it until the movie’s over. Then I check. It’s from the director of the program at UCR:

Dear Kristen,

Congratulations!  You have been recommended for admission to the MFA in Creative Writing and Writing for the Performing Arts Program here at the University of California, Riverside.  We would like to thank you for choosing our program.  It would be our pleasure to have you here.

And the letter goes on. I must admit I read it several times and verified the email address and sender’s name and whatnot just to make sure I was correct in acknowledging that I’ve been accepted into my first MFA program of choice. I’ve been trying to catch my breath every since.

* * *

If I had to pick a starting point for my memoir – the Prologue, if you will – I’d say it was that last day of high school when I wrote off any inclination I had to pursue higher education and, more importantly, my inclination to write. Back then, the idea of graduate school was laughable. The idea of my writing a memoir and publishing said memoir was laughable. The stuff pipe dreams are made of. No one believed I could get through my undergraduate studies, let alone go to graduate school, and how could I blame them? I didn’t even get through high school.

But now the moment of accumulation is finally here. I’ve always wanted to end my memoir – the Epilogue – with an anecdote about graduate school, but wasn’t sure things would fall into place the way I hoped they would. Securing a spot in a program that accepts ten students a year – ten out of thousands – what were the chances? Reflecting on my B.A. degree at the end of the memoir probably would’ve sufficed, but the MFA degree – the mother of all writing degrees – this, I feel, is the moment I’ve been pointing toward since the day I left Vegas.

I think the years I’m going to spend at UCR will be an invaluable experience for my memoir and for my future as a writer, and I thank you all so much for supporting and encouraging me along the way.

With my 28th birthday being tomorrow, I’ve found myself reflecting on birthdays past. More specifically, embarrassing birthdays past. The following are a few of my greatest hits (which others should avoid if at all possible).

1. Drink too much champagne and fall into the Bellagio Lake…while the dancing water show is going off (to Andrea Bocelli’s “Con Te Partiro”).

2. Go to an IMAX show that simulates underwater exploration of the Titanic the morning after consuming six bottles of wine…then upchuck all over your mom’s dashboard.

3. Have your hair catch on fire while blowing out nineteen candles on the cake…and try to put out the flames with Gordon’s Vodka.

4. Hurl while dancing on a table in a nightclub…with your casino executive bosses sitting directly below you.

5. Run across Las Vegas Blvd. without using the crosswalk…in the middle of 45+ mph traffic.

I guess it’s no coincidence that most of these incidents occurred in Vegas, eh? So glad I’ll be bringing in 28 quietly and with a few select people I really care about. It’s still fun to look back and laugh, though.

I’ve been promising to post an update blog about the progress of my memoir, so here it is. If you’re fuzzy on what my book is about or you just found out that I’m indeed writing a book, the following is a brief synopsis. If you’re familiar with the nature of my memoir, feel free to skip to the second half.

* * *

In 1999, I dropped out of high school at age seventeen, ran away from home, hitched a ride to Las Vegas, and moved in with a guy I’d had a one-night stand with (a guy I typically refer to as The Ex). I went to Vegas with nothing – no money, no car, no diploma, no support system (because, you know, I’d written everyone off), no work experience, no relationship experience, no life experience – and I had no idea where to start. After a shock period that lasted three months (I spent most of that time locked in The Ex’s bedroom [which was covered in posters of marijuana leaves and various porn stars] watching “Revenge of the Nerds” over and over and wondering if my parents had figured out where I was [which they didn't. It took them almost four months to discover the truth]), I finally landed a job as a dishwasher in a restaurant on the Strip.

While working at the restaurant, I met a girl who was a dancer in Siegfried and Roy’s show at the Mirage. She encouraged me to send my photo to the talent agency that represented her, which I did, and within a few weeks of doing so I’d landed my first professional dancing gig (belly-dancing at the Aladdin). I worked my way up from there and began to make a name for myself in the Las Vegas entertainment industry. While my career was soaring, my personal life was in the toilet. Not even the toilet – the fucking sewer. The Ex and I had only been together for a few months before he started physically abusing and cheating on me, and I put up with it for a year and a half until I caught him fooling around in our bed. He kicked me out and I had nowhere to go, so a week before the September 11th terrorist attacks, I moved back to California.

But it doesn’t end there. Against my better judgement, I went back to Las Vegas. And that’s when things got really bad.

I went back to dancing, and this time around I got involved in various vices including street drugs, prescription meds, excessive drinking, gambling, and casual sex. Although the abuse and cheating continued (except this time, the cheating was mutual), The Ex and I couldn’t completely stay away from each other. We were on and off constantly, but at this point I had a bevy of men to take care of me whenever we were off. I always ended up going back to him, though. And when I showed up to work drunk and drugged out of my mind one night, fell onstage, injured my knee, was subsequently fired and blackballed in the industry, got evicted from my house, and moved into a motel room, The Ex was the only one who’d have anything to do with me.

During the last year I spent in Vegas, I fell into a deep depression. I landed a job as a cocktail waitress on Fremont Street, and it was like taking a huge step backward. Then, after I was mugged at knifepoint one night after work, I quit that job and spent three months in bed, which was oddly reminiscent of the marijuana and porn star poster days. Throughout my life, writing and books had been my only solace, and I hadn’t written one word or touched a book in years. College crossed my mind often, but I thought my best days were behind me. I felt that the mistakes I’d made were irreversible and that I was doomed to live life in that shitty motel room on Las Vegas Blvd. with a man I’d grown to hate.

On March 30, 2005, The Ex and I were arguing over a phone call I’d received from an ex-lover. It was the worst argument we’d ever had, and unspeakable violence ensued. A neighbor called the cops, and The Ex was arrested. My face looked hideous – bruises and cuts everywhere, black eye, fractured nose – and I had no medical insurance or money to see a doctor. At that point, I was accustomed to being valued solely for my looks, and I’d grown to believe that was the only thing I was good for. With my face being in such bad condition, I was convinced my life was over. And with The Ex in jail, I had complete access to his pain and anti-anxiety medications. I took the remainder of his Xanax pills – I don’t even know how many I swallowed – and fell into a coma on the bathroom floor.

Miraculously (and as you can see), I survived. When I woke up on April 1st, I felt that I’d been given a second shot at life. I know that sounds cliche, but most people who’ve been near death can vouch that this is truly the feeling you have when you come to. I packed up my stuff and returned to L.A., intent on going back to school, writing, and chasing my dreams. With several publications under my belt, a nearly complete manuscript, and college graduation just around the corner, I’d say the chasing is in full force.

* * *

Okay, so that wasn’t so brief. But you have no idea how much of the story I just skipped over. Seriously.

As many of you know, the process of writing this memoir has been difficult for me. The problem has more to do with the emotional/psychological challenges of retelling all of these awful events and less to do with the actual writing itself (although I have struggled quite a bit in regard to the structure and sequence of the story). Not everything about my time in Las Vegas was tragic – I have quite a few good memories as well – but most of the worst things that’ve happened in my life took place there, and I think about those things every day as a result of writing this book. I can’t just sweep them under the rug or put them in the closet like most people do. I mean, I could, but then I couldn’t tell my story with the honesty and integrity it deserves.

And then there’s the fear of making all of these things public. I never imagined I’d share half of the things I’ll be sharing in this book with anyone, let alone the entire world. And once these things are shared, there’s no going back. I will be criticized. I will be ridiculed. I will be used as a scapegoat in certain instances. I’m going to have to be stronger than I ever thought possible.

But then I think about how much good this memoir can do, and that’s what keeps me going. It can open up conversations about things our society doesn’t like to talk about. It can help other young women realize that there’s someone out there who understands the anger, the pain, the loneliness, and the unhappiness they feel and that they can overcome it. I’d like to use whatever success I have with this memoir to be an advocate for causes like domestic violence, addiction, family planning, women’s rights, and countless other things.

So that’s why, no matter how hard it is sometimes, I can’t give up. Therefore, you’ll be happy to hear that I’ll be taking this memoir project to graduate school in the fall, finishing it, and publishing it by the time I earn my MFA. It’s hard to say exactly how much longer it’ll be before you’ll see it in stores or as an e-book, but rest assured I’ll keep you updated. The only major change I have to report is that I’ve decided to condense the memoir into one volume instead of a trilogy as I’d originally planned.

The short of it is that yes, I’m still working on it, yes, it will be published, and yes, I’ll always remember the support you’ve given me during the process. Writers don’t acknowledge this very often, but we are nothing without our readers and supporters, and I want you all to know how much I appreciate your interest and enthusiasm in my work. It means so much.

About three weeks ago, I started my senior year of college. In case you didn’t know or forgot, I’m working on a B.A. in English. English with an emphasis in creative writing, to be exact.

I knew college would end eventually, but the end has closed in more swiftly than I imagined. I can almost see the “Welcome to The Rest of Your Life” banner at the end of the track. There’s also some balloons, a bottle of champagne, applause, and the ever-present student loan lenders waiting to collect. I can see them standing at the finish line holding a silver platter with a bill on it. The bill is resting on a ruffle of cheerful green lettuce. Lettuce the color of all that money I’m obligated to pay back.

(On a side note, did you hear that the U.S. dollar will most likely be replaced as the world currency? That’ll be an interesting transition)

Four years seems like a long time when you’re starting out, but to be honest, it goes by fast. Too fast, maybe. But I’m happy to say I’ve taken the time to enjoy every minute of it. The fun isn’t quite over yet, though. Because the finale of my academic endeavors is right around the corner: graduate school. Hopefully.

Originally, I was going to apply to ten MFA (Master of Fine Arts) programs. A couple of them were in Southern California, which is where I live, but most of them were back east. I’ve always had this romantic idea of going to the heart of the world to study writing: New York City. I thought about it all summer and asked myself if it was realistic. I mean, $50,000 a year? Finding an inexpensive place to live that isn’t in the ghetto? Learning to live without a car? Being 3,000 miles away from my family and friends? $50,000 a year? Seriously.

In the end, I decided that I’m going to stay in L.A. Going to New York is too expensive, too far away from my support system, and too far away from Hollywood, which is where I want to start my career. I’ve already begun applying for internships at all the big television and movie studios in town. I think it’ll be a good experience to have while I continue work on my memoir.

And then there’s Las Vegas. There’s always Las Vegas. I know this sounds funny, but I don’t like the idea of being so far away from my city. I like the freedom of being able to go there whenever I want. I like that I can drive there in the middle of the night, watch the sun rise from Red Rock Canyon, visit a couple of my best friends, do research for my book, and have a $5.99 prime rib meal all within 24 hours.

If I could live in Las Vegas, I would. But we all know what happens when Kristen lives in Las Vegas. And if you don’t, click “The Vegas Diaries” tab up there on the right.

Anyway, I’ve started the application process and I’m taking the GRE next month (it’s like the college equivalent of the SAT), so wish me luck. My list of ten has been cropped to four, and I haven’t decided what I’m going to do if I’m universally rejected. Just be a peon at a movie studio for a while, I suppose. And sell my memoir. Hopefully.

I know some of you might be interested in hearing about the progress of my book, so I’ll post something about that in the near future.

For now, back to writing.