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"There is a Time for
Playing it Safe and a Time for Risky Business"
Chapter Six:
The U-Turn |
1979 - The Year of
Living Dangerously
"In
1979, my life was always out of control whether I liked it or not."
Rick Archer
RICK'S DESPERATE GAMBLE
It was now early
October 1979. With the thought of Madame X
heading towards her fiancé, there was a lot of pressure on me to speed
things up.
Susie had broken up with me in early July. It was now
late September. Three months had passed and there was no sign
that any "Decision" was on its way from Cindy.
I figured it was time to play a little hard
ball of my own. I hatched a wild scheme. Cindy and I met on
Monday, frequently our favorite negotiating day because Cindy always had
developments to report from her weekend talks with her husband Michael.
It was time to roll the dice.
"Cindy, I have something to tell you. I have met someone else."
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Cindy just stared at me
blankly. I expected rage, but she just stared. This confirmed to me that
she really was certain I was seeing someone.
"Who is she?"
"You don't even know her,"
I lied.
The truth was Cindy did not know Madame X
by name, but would have probably at least recognized her if I pointed her out.
"Who is she?"
"Look, Cindy, we've been through this before with Joanne and Susie. We
are going to do this one my way. Her identity stays secret for now."
We argued for a while until Cindy realized I wasn't going to budge.
"What do you want, Rick? The last time I checked, you and I were
discussing moving in together." Ouch.
"I have been asking you to make up your mind for three months.
It's not my fault you left the door open. You were
married and living with your husband the whole time. "
"I would think given the seriousness of my decision you would have the
decency to at least keep your pants on till I figured out what is best
for all us."
"How am I supposed to know if you are keeping your pants on?"
"You know darn well my husband and I sleep in separate rooms!!"
"So you say. Listen, we have argued about this a million times. You are
a mess. I am a mess. Your husband is a mess. All three of us are
miserable. You say your kid cries a lot and is afraid of losing her
parents. Why not admit how senseless it is to break up a marriage for
something as risky as our relationship?"
"I need more time."
"Dammit Cindy, that is what you have been saying for six months. What is
magically going to come along to change this impasse? One month from
now it will be the same story! This has got to end."
"Rick, you forget something. I am in love with you. And you are supposed
to be in love with me."
"Cindy, I COULD be in love with you, but I can't be in love with you
unless you make a commitment to me. I can't turn my feelings on and off.
The risk of losing you is too great. I won't let myself get hurt."
"What about my threat to hurt you if you leave me?"
"I don't care any more. Your threat was valid in
September, but that time has
passed.
I will tell the world you had three months to decide. That counts for
something court of public opinion. Furthermore I will wrap myself in the
guise of being noble. I will say I broke it off because it was the right
thing to do. I will point out that we have never slept together. I will say I had no choice but to break away while you
still had the chance of saving your marriage. I will say I did it for
your kid who cries all the time and doesn't want to lose her parents."
Cindy stared at me again. She realized I was daring her to go public. I
had called her bluff, but this time I had the upper hand. She HAD waited
too long. She WAS married. She DID have a child. Everything
I said contradicted everything she said. She could very easily end up
with her Blackmail Threat backfiring. She would look like a desperate fool
who jilted her husband and crippled her child in the process if she wasn't careful.
"Who is she, Rick? Who is the other woman?"
I took a moment to think. Something was tugging at me. I decided to go
for broke and end it here.
"Look, Cindy, I know you are upset
about this new woman and I don't blame you for a moment. But you are
MARRIED and I haven't seen one ACTION on your part that makes me think you are
serious about leaving your husband. I have nothing but empty words
to show for the past six months."
She grew quiet.
"The moment you decide you are
definitely willing to become my life partner... and convince me that
my goals are goals which you can willingly embrace... that is when I
will give up any other sexual, romantic relationships I now have. I
will give 100% to making OUR relationship work. No one else. Just
you and I, doing the best we can to share our lives together.
But until that moment arrives,
I do not want to be questioned about how I spend my free time. What
we do with our free time is our own business."
Cindy just sat there looking
defeated. I had no way of knowing
I had just made the
single biggest mistake of my life.
"I love you very much, Cindy.
Despite all the pain and confusion, I know that we are both very
close to being what each other wants. And I still remember the time
when we were incredibly close. That's the memory I want to hang on
to."
Cindy said she needed some time to
think about what I had said. I told her I understood.
As I drove home, I smiled. This was my triumphant "Farewell" speech. I
honestly thought I was free at last.
How stupid of me to think I
was free. I would never be free.
What was my mistake? I did not realize I had given
her a choice.
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"The
moment you decide... to become my life partner... I will give
up any other sexual, romantic relationships." |
Famous Last Words of a Fool -
those words would
come back to haunt me... Soon.
THE FIRST PHONE CALL
That night Cindy called for me at Stevens of Hollywood.
I was in the middle of teaching dance class; someone came and got me.
If I had a brain, I would
have told the lady to tell Cindy I would call her back and then
conveniently forget about calling her back. But, no, not me.
I was being magnanimous. I was afraid she was upset and might need
me to cheer her up a little.
Cindy said
she wanted to talk to me. I asked if it could wait till morning. I
didn't tell her, but I intended to see Madame X that night to find out what Madame X had decided on her weekend visit.
Cindy said no, it was too important for that. I said to come by the
studio. Cindy said no, it was too important for that.
I said where. She said,
"I want to meet at your house."
Uh oh. Sick to my stomach, I said,
"I don't think that's such a good idea."
Cindy said,
"Today you had a lot to say. You owe me this request. I want
to talk in private. This is important."
Cindy was right; I owed her that much. Okay.
THE SECOND PHONE CALL
I called Madame X and told her about Cindy's request for a meeting.
She did not sound very happy. No surprise there. I asked her about her weekend. She
replied, "This is not the time."
I was floundering. I had no way of reading this woman's mind. "Any
suggestions?"
This is what Madame X said. "Go to Cindy. She needs you."
This didn't sound good. Was it my imagination or was Humphrey Bogart
going to lose Ingrid Bergman
to Laszlo?? I needed an ending to Casablanca where
Rick gets the girl.
SOMEBODY'S KNOCKING... SHOULD I LET HER IN?
I opened the door. Cindy was crying. I could see she
had a suitcase in her hand. She asked if she could spend the night.
Uh oh. Make that double uh oh.
Did I have the guts to tell Cindy the deal was off
with her standing there on my doorstep?
As I stared at her, my gut
told me not to let her come in, but I saw no choice. The woman deserved
respect. Besides, she looked pretty desperate. I did not want to
consider what she would do if I sent her away.
Cindy told me she could not bear to lose me. She said she had juggled
Michael and me as long as she could while she figured it
out. But the prospect of losing me to the Mysterious Madame X was too intimidating
for her to bear. There was something about my eyes that day that had
betrayed I was serious about this woman. Remind me to wear
sunglasses next time.
Cindy looked me in the eye
and said she had told Michael she was moving in with me. He said,
"Go for it." Michael had been going through the same misery
for six months. He wanted it to end too. Cindy said
in some ways he seemed relieved. She waited till her child was asleep,
then drove over.
There is an old saying that a woman never forgets the men she could
have had; but didn't. A man
never forgets the women he shouldn't have had.
In both of our cases, this adage was correct.
Cindy was not
willing to
spend the rest of her life wondering about me, the one she could have
had who got away.
Just moments from my planned escape, she had reached out to catch me by
the ankle. I was tackled one phone call from freedom. I had
broken my rule... don't answer the phone at night.
And as for me, I have
definitely never forgotten Cindy, the woman I shouldn't have had.
My fatal mistake was my
Farewell
Speech that morning.
Cindy said I had convinced her
beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was walking out the door. Cindy could
not bear the thought of losing me. She knew tonight was the night I was
going to "the other woman". As always, her instincts were
absolutely right.
There she was, suitcase in her hand, with her
husband Michael completely aware of what she was doing. She had just met
my condition set long ago... all the way back in May. I had said if
Cindy told her husband she was calling it quits on her marriage and
moved out of her house, then I would be there for her. But until that
happened, we had to behave.
I never thought she would do
it. But there she was. Now I was trapped. By my own
words, no less.
There actually was a way out, but it never occurred to me at the time.
There were several
people I could have called to come over and intervene in the name of
"friendship". With a third party around, I think I could have wiggled
out of this. Too bad I wasn't that clever. I didn't actually think
of this until 2006
as I was typing this story. So much for thinking fast on my
feet.
Now as we sat in the living room talking,
I was desperately torn. I did not want Cindy
here... except that I realized I also did. This woman had just
taken the biggest gamble of her life for me. What the hell is wrong with me!!?!!?
Half of me was screaming to run like mad for Madame X.
The other half of me wanted to have the woman who had been the
object of forbidden thought, desire, and fantasy for an entire year.
Do I choose the woman who has been instrumental in launching
my career
to exciting new heights, the woman with the most charisma of any person
I had ever met, the woman who is sitting on my couch right now begging
for my love?
Or do I choose the quiet, decent woman who has been in my life for all
of a month, someone who might love me or might be getting married to
someone else?
One woman had DANGER written all over her.
The other woman had SECURITY written all over her.
Except...
that's when it dawned on me that Madame X might be waiting to tell me
that her wedding date was set. Somehow I doubted it, but it was a
real possibility.
I desperately
wanted to call Madame X and ask her if she was still available, but it
didn't seem like the appropriate thing to do.
How did I ever get myself in this position? I had to choose.
It occurred to me that I was actually curious to find out if Cindy and I
could rekindle that spark which had burned so brightly back in April.
That possibility could not be overlooked.
And then there was one more factor, the one that finally made the
difference. That morning I had promised Cindy I would be there for her
if she ever committed to me.
Mind you, it had been part of my "Farewell Speech", but now I found
myself trapped by my own words.
"The
moment you decide... to become my life partner... I will give
up any other sexual, romantic relationships."
Due to my aggressive actions that
morning, Cindy's panic
had brought her to my
doorstep in a state of near-desperation.
Checkmated by my own words. How stupid could I get?
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Cindy had taken an enormous risk.
Now that she was
here in my living room, a
divorce seemed likely. Who knows what kind of mood her husband
Michael was
in. Her whole world could quite possibly come
crumbling down.
Cindy had finally made a commitment to me. The other woman had not.
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I wasn't sure I was happy about this, but I
agreed to let her stay because Cindy had finally shown some guts. Cindy had a lot more to
lose than I did.
For me to jump off the
roller coaster ride now would be
unfair to Cindy.
After all we had been through, I owed her this much.
So with a fatalistic shrug and a very heavy heart, I put my arm around
Cindy and told her to stay.
Cindy officially became the first woman I ever lived with.
However it didn't last very long - six
days.
That
week I learned a lesson I will never
forget as long as I live.
The bond between a mother and a
child is unfathomably powerful.
Experience is a comb that life throws you
after you have lost your hair. This was another one of those lessons I learned "after I lost my hair".
Cindy began to miss her daughter from
the moment she walked through my door. Her pain over leaving
her daughter doomed our impromptu living experiment from Day
One. Cindy was constantly leaving to to be back with
her child.
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Furthermore,
she refused to bring the girl here. I quickly figured
out that until the daughter put one foot in my house, this
relationship had no chance to ever work.
You would assume that any
fool would know this ahead of time, but not me. I had come from a broken home. My
father left my life when I was nine. For the next nine years, my mother was usually preoccupied
with her own problems. I was about as neglected a child as you
might ever meet. I practically raised myself. On the positive
side, that's how I became independent. However, there was one
drawback -I had little insight into the inner workings of a
good mother. Thanks to my own rotten childhood, I assumed all
mothers could ditch their kids willy nilly. Not that I wanted Cindy to
do that, but I assumed it wasn't that hard to do.
Wrong.
Cindy was the first good mother I had ever seen up close with adult eyes.
For all her shortcomings, Cindy was a dedicated,
deeply conscientious mother who loved her child dearly.
The first morning of our new relationship got off to an ominous start.
When Cindy awoke the morning after her 'Leap of Faith', she was immediately rendered
numb and senseless with guilt.
There was no cuddling with me. There were no good-morning smiles.
There was no kiss. In
fact, I didn't exist. All Cindy could say was, "What have I
done? What have I done to my child?" That was the
entire extent of our conversation. That brings up a question.
Can you have a conversation when only one person speaks?
I didn't say a word. I
just sat there and watched her in astonishment as she threw on her
clothes. This was the most unpredictable
woman I had ever met.
Cindy was absolutely forlorn over leaving her
six year old. She quickly got dressed, and then raced out of my house to
go home and take care of her child so her husband could go to work.
Why hadn't this been
discussed last night?
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THE BIGGEST
MISTAKE OF MY ENTIRE LIFE
As she drove away, I stood there speechless.
Cindy hadn't really moved out of her house. She just came over to spend
the night. I felt tricked. How the hell did I let her fool me like this?
Now I was
sick with disgust over Cindy's bull-headed move and
stricken with fear about how this would turn out.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized how badly my
gamble the day before had back-fired.
I was filled with regret at my own
stupidity.
If I had just called her bluff and told her the Blackmail
Stuff was over, the gamble might have worked. Why did I have to add
Madame X into the mix? That was dumb too.
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On the
other hand, I didn't have a great hand to play. Thanks to
Madame X meeting her fiancé, I had pushed up
my own time table. I was scared to death of losing Madame
X. Cindy pushed up her time table because she was scared to
death of losing me. My own panic and Cindy's panic served as an example of what happens when
you start betting with scared money.
Cindy's car turned the corner
with a screech. The moment she was out of sight, waves of self-loathing came flooding in.
Marry in haste,
repent at leisure. Hmm.
In the movie
Risky Business, all the gambles
worked. In Real Life, obviously sometimes they don't.
That's why they are called "Gambles".
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I TURN, U TURN, THE WORLD TURNS
It was now Tuesday, Day Two. So which of Cindy's
personalities showed up on my doorstep that night? Sugar Cindy? Nope.
Evil Cindy? Nope. It was the return of the Helpless
Sniveling Whining Woman. Cindy began crying the moment she entered my
house.
I don't really need to
explain Day Three, Four, or Five. Each day was a repeat of the
previous one. The crying never stopped for a week.
Here is a daily synopsis of our activities.
Each morning Cindy would get
up at the crack of dawn, drive back to her
home, meet her husband Michael at the door as he went to work, spend the day
with the child, cry a lot, wait for Michael to come home to take
over kid duties, go to the studio at night, then come back to
my house to cry all night long, drive me crazy, sleep an hour or two,
then get up in the morning and start this fiasco over again.
Are we
having fun yet?
During the
Six Days, Cindy and I made a very unpleasant discovery - we did not do well as lovers.
No wild nights of passion for us. Too much distrust, too much
pain. The biggest problem was guilt. We both
felt it; we both regretted what we were doing. This wasn't the way
it was supposed to be.
The moment I would touch her, Cindy would start to cry uncontrollably. I
am not going to spell it out, but let's just say I didn't have much
enthusiasm. An entire year of lust and now this. This phase
of our relationship fizzled out like a defective firecracker. Nor
would it ever be rekindled.
Who knows? Maybe that's
another reason she moved back home. We
were both disappointed our long awaited romance had
waited too long. Now I know where the word
"anti-climactic" comes from.
Although I was sick with
dismay at how utterly
horrible this experiment had turned out, I did manage to
make a couple of interesting observations.
When it came to their
daughter, Cindy and Michael worked like a Swiss Watch. They
created a carefully
orchestrated dance to take care of their daughter. The precision with
which Cindy showed up on time and Michael showed up on time to hand the
forlorn kid off to the next shift was a marvelous display of teamwork and
cooperation.
When you factor in that both people had to be in deep pain,
this precision becomes even more impressive. For two people who
hated each other at the moment, they sure made good teammates. They were both deeply
responsible, committed parents. It breaks my heart seeing how much they
cared for that kid and how they were absolutely filled with grief
and guilt over this mistake.
My other observation was that even though I was theoretically a key
player in this Greek Tragedy, I sometimes wondered if I was really just the
pawn in a gigantic domestic power struggle.
I felt like I had been set up. I clearly had NEVER wanted to
break up their marriage. I didn't ask Cindy to show up on my
doorstep. But technicalities like this tend to get overlooked
depending on who tells the story. I was now certain I was going to be the Bad Guy in
this Passion Play.
What a chump I was. I had no doubt if
husband or wife were to do the rewrite, I would certainly be cast as
the villain. I asked myself over and over how did I ever get myself
into this mess.
Mercifully, Cindy's "Leap of Faith" didn't last very long. This
unhappy charade
ended after one week. As she rose on the sixth morning, Saturday, Cindy began to
pack. When I asked what this meant, Cindy announced she was moving back home.
She said she had made her mind up that night.
This was quite
a surprise. I tried my best to look sorry, but the truth was I overjoyed.
I do not recall experiencing any joy that entire
week. Cindy cried practically the entire time she was at my house. This
experiment had been an exercise in non-stop SHEER MISERY!
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MORE BLACKMAIL
The Return of the Snarling Tiger Woman
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Later that morning,
Cindy called me to explain her decision. She said that yesterday,
Friday, she had consulted an attorney
regarding how to protect herself thanks to her husband's divorce threat.
She was worried about losing custody of her child and with
good reason. The attorney said she stood vulnerable to an accusation of
"abandonment" unless she moved back home immediately.
Last night between
sobs, Cindy had thought it over and decided to move back home.
She just didn't have the heart to tell me.
At this revelation, I silently rejoiced. Aw, gee, what a
shame. This may be the only time in my entire life that I ever said
'thank you' to a lawyer and I didn't even know who he was.
This whole
U-Turn mess
revolved around her daughter. In the year I had
known Cindy, she had made no attempt to involve me in her
daughter's world. Furthermore, during her six-day U-Turn
Week, there was
no mention of fixing up the extra room in my house for her daughter.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized Cindy's
decision to show up on my doorstep was a stupid, spur of the
moment impulsive act that she would probably regret for the rest of
her life. Why
didn't she think about her child in the first place?
Now I began
to speculate what would come next. Did I dare hope my
liberation was at hand?
Would Cindy cry her head off and beg her husband for
forgiveness? Would she crawl back to her security
nest and try to restore her Sunshine Life? Would she
listen this time when Michael banished her from the studio?
That would free me up to rush into the arms of Madame X!
We would rekindle the spark that had burned so brightly at the
start. Perhaps we would get engaged and take a romantic
trip across the seas.
And we would all live happily
ever after!
Yeah, maybe in the movies. But not in my life.
Events swiftly took a darker turn.
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To my
unimaginable shock, once Cindy returned home, she
actually got strong again! The woman seemed to
have dark magic to call on. In my opinion, that house of
hers strengthened her powers just like Count Dracula's castle.
After Cindy moved home, she
quickly reverted to the Blackmail Monster.
Quickly Cindy threw me not one, but two major curveballs.
First she said that just because she had moved back home,
since we had finally had sex, I was now officially her boyfriend. Where she lived didn't
matter - I was hers and she was mine. I pointed out the
little technicality that
her husband was still there. That's when she threw a
little surprise at me - at her insistence, Michael had begun
to look for his own apartment.
Cindy informed me that she had taken the
greatest risk of her life, she had done it for me, and for me to
desert her at this point would prove to the entire world that my
promises had been hollow and empty.
That meant Madame X would
have to go.
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Second, the lawyer had
informed her that in his opinion, she had a strong case
against me for wrongful termination if I tried to get rid of
her at the studio. In fact, Cindy had been told she would be entitled to receive a
fair share of my business or at least compensation for her many
contributions... FIRST she would collect her money and THEN
she would go ahead and
ruin me for good measure.
She looked me in the
eye. She told me in no uncertain terms that she was planning to stick around.
This was her dance studio too and, based on the brief
week we spent together, I was officially her boyfriend
in her eyes and the eyes of the world.
In essence,
I was stuck with her now whether I liked it or not.
I felt the noose tighten.
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For starters, I was stunned
by Cindy's supernatural will. For an entire week, I
had watched this once proud woman reduced to a never-ending bucket of
tears. She moaned continually how she had made the mistake
of a lifetime and ruined her wonderful marriage. She
had about as much strength as a boxer laying on the mat
after a knockout punch.
I should have put a stake through
her heart when I had the chance.
Too late now. Just like in the movies,
Cindy had miraculously
regained all her power! She had just risen from the Undead!
I had to admit Cindy's otherworldly strength definitely caught me
off guard. This time I did not open my big mouth.
I just listened to what she had to say.
I didn't
like what I heard.
I was ready to fight back, her
new strength notwithstanding. I did not appreciate being
dictated to by a woman I was now positive I did not love. I was prepared to stand up to her.
I had been thinking about Cindy's Blackmail. Now that
she had pulled her U-Turn, her position had weakened
significantly.
I believed I had a fighting chance to win the PR war.
After all, hadn't I given Cindy the chance she asked for?
Didn't Cindy
beg to be let in the door? Didn't I let her in the
door? And didn't she move right back out of my house of her own free will
six days later?
In essence, Cindy turned her back on me. That gave me a
huge edge in any he said/she said PR battle that might arise.
Let her keep her job. Fine. But she didn't have any
papers on me. I was ready for the Revolution to begin.
NOT SO FAST, BUDDY
The night
Cindy left, I visited Madame X to see where she
stood.
During Cindy
Flipflop's
one-week stay at my house in October 1979, I had
been in
constant communication with Madame X. We
talked nearly every day. Madame X said she had
told her fiancé she wasn't ready to set a date, but that
she was still his fiancé. In other words, she
simply bought
herself some more time.
I
tried to explain to her that this experiment was certain to
fail. It had been a fiasco from the start. But my explanations failed to calm
Madame X's fears and
disappointment.
She was completely and totally traumatized.
For starters, she didn't like sharing me with Cindy
one bit. She knew full well that Cindy and I had
finally crossed the forbidden line.
Madame X kept telling me that I should be with
Cindy, that Cindy needed me. Mme X never said
it out loud, but I
think she was pretty angry at me for letting Cindy move in. She was also disgusted with my weakness. It
seemed whenever Cindy snapped her fingers, I would
obey.
Madame X was skeptical I would ever have the
strength to get rid of this woman. I didn't dare tell her
that Susie had said the exact same thing many times.
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"Look, the woman showed up on
my doorstep in tears. Cindy said I had
promised her if she ever moved out of her home, I
would be there for her. What was I supposed to do?"
"You could have just let her
in. There was no reason why you had to sleep
with her."
"Cindy insisted. She said
she had just thrown her marriage away and left her
child for me. Now it was my turn to prove my
love for her."
"My God, you should listen to
yourself. There are plenty of ways to prove
your love for her that have nothing to do with sex.
Bottom line, you had a choice. You chose her
over me. I will never forget that. How
do you expect a relationship with me to work when we
both know you chose another woman at a critical
moment? How do you expect me to ever trust you
again completely? This moment will stick in my
mind for the rest of my life!"
"You self-righteous jerk!
Here you are engaged to be married and you think you
have some sort of goddamn moral high ground that
gives you the right to point a finger at me?
If you had ditched your fiancé like I asked you to,
we wouldn't be in this spot to begin with. I stood
up to Cindy on Monday morning because I was scared
to death of losing you!"
That shut her up, but it
didn't bring her back to me. We both took a
deep breath and tried to calm down.
When the conversation resumed, I told Madame X that I felt deceived and manipulated. The more I analyzed
Cindy's suitcase at the doorstep move, the more I realized
her desperate move didn't
have a snowball's chance of working. Why
didn't I confront Cindy
about her plans for her daughter's
well-being? If I had done that, maybe we
wouldn't be in this mess.
Cindy's selfish move hurt me, hurt her husband, and
hurt her daughter. What was she thinking?
But I had kept my end of the bargain - I had said I
would never have an affair with her behind her
husband's back, but if she would leave Michael,
then I would be there for her. It was not my
fault Cindy moved back home, but when she did, her
actions released me from my obligation to her. And I
was pretty sure I could communicate this point of
view to the students at the studio if Cindy went
scorched earth on me.
Now I asked Madame X to forgive me. If she would
stand by me through whatever turmoil Cindy stirred
up, then I would do everything in my power to move
my life in a direction away from Cindy. Let's
try again. Please?
 |
No so fast, Buddy.
Madame X pulled the rug out from under my feet.
She said she wasn't buying it. Madame X was clearly unhappy. She told me
she was deeply traumatized by the utter
insanity of my day-to-day life. She believed that even if I stood up to
Cindy, this woman would make my life miserable for a long
time.
"What's next, Rick? Do you have any clue what
Cindy will do? She is unpredictable and dangerous.
There is no way you can have a public fight with Cindy
and expect your studio not to be damaged."
Madame X was disgusted by the drama. Madame X wanted
STABILITY in her life, not this insane nitroglycerine volatility known as
'Cindy Flipflop' attached to my ankle. She
wanted out
|
Faint
Heart
Madame
X was an accountant. People who become accountants
prefer an ordered world where things add up. Madame X did not enjoy being out
of control in the slightest. My life was a never-ending
insanity... and it affected Madame X deeply.
I had betrayed her.
Even worse, Madame X accepted that her own indecisiveness had
played a big part in my decision. She blamed me, she
blamed herself. She could have me if she wanted me, but
how was I ever going to get rid of the chains attached at my
ankle?
Madame agonized
constantly over what to do. She began
to lose weight and lose sleep. She had trouble
concentrating at work.
Madame X couldn't take it
any more. She was losing her mind! She had to find a
way to put her house back in order. She knew that Cindy
now considered me to be her boyfriend. She was worried that a
confrontation between her and Cindy was inevitable if she
stayed in my life. Madame X knew what had happened to
Susie and Joanne. She dreaded having to
go face to face with the notorious dragon slayer!
Madame X
decided to withdraw. Before the U-Turn, I was single and
available. Now in Madame X's eyes, I belonged to another woman.
She had no desire to share me.
I pointed out the obvious
inconsistency in her code of honor. After all, she had
been quite willing to be my lover and be engaged simultaneously.
Maybe so, but Madame X said she had to follow her feelings. She said
in her heart, she "felt" like I belonged to Cindy now, not
to her. Previously she felt like I belonged to her.
It hurt like hell to let that witch have me for that week.
And she had no guarantee it wouldn't happen again. She wanted to back off.
A memory crossed my mind. I remembered how furious I had
been when Susie decided to fly to LA to see if she could
rekindle any flames with her old boyfriend George.
What I had done to Madame X with Cindy was a hell of a lot worse than
that. Madame X had every right to be furious with me.
Madame X had every right to be hurt.
Confronted by Madame X's cold feet, I was fit to be
tied. I had been ready to fight Cindy for my studio and for this
woman I cared about. All I needed was some encouragement.
Madame X shook her head. Go to Cindy. Take care of Cindy.
I looked at her carefully. Here was a woman who was fearless
when performing risky acrobatics, but had zero guts when it
came to fighting for her heart. Go figure.
I swear - Just one sign of encouragement from Madame X and I would have risked
standing up to Cindy. But the X-Factor would not give it to me.
The other possibility was she didn't care about me as much
as I thought she had. But I didn't believe that. More likely, she was just too
hurt to want to try again, at least not right now.
Either way, without any encouragement, what was the point of
going up against Cindy alone?
I did not
see what I would gain from
jeopardizing my relationship with Cindy and putting my studio at risk if
this woman would not stand by me.
I told Madame X it was time for me to go. She nodded
her agreement.
As I walked down those stairs
from her apartment, I had never felt more
depressed in my life. I was losing a woman I thought I loved
for another woman who spent her time manipulating
me, blackmailing me and making me miserable. But without any encouragement, what choice did I have?
I resigned myself to my fate. From this point on, I
assumed the role of being Cindy's sometime boyfriend.
Maybe with time Madame X would regain her courage...
|
THE SECOND GAMBLE
At the same
time that my love life was in total shambles, I had a second problem on my hands.
In
September 1979 I had taken the two biggest gambles of my
life.
One gamble - telling Cindy about Madame X - had failed
miserably.
Now it looked like my other gamble - accepting the
Meyerland Club opportunity - was
about to fail as well. I was in deep trouble.
Failure was my constant companion.
|
|
|
|
COMPLETE RISKY BUSINESS/URBAN COWBOY TIMELINE |
|
1978
June |
Dance
Performance Disaster at the Ritz |
|
1978
August |
Rick
meets Cindy at JCC |
|
1978 August |
Rick
sees his future dance instructor Glen Hunsucker at the Pistachio
Club |
|
1978
September |
Joanne
arrives at Stevens of Hollywood |
|
1978
October |
Rick meets Susie at Stevens |
|
1978
October |
Cindy organizes her first of many dance classes at Stevens |
|
1978 December
|
Cindy
organizes Pistachio I, a Disco party for 300 people at the Pistachio Club. |
| 1979
January |
Bitter
fight with Susie, Dangerous Liaison with Joanne |
| 1979
January |
Cindy
is upset same night when she notices Joanne has a crush on me. |
| 1979
January |
Susie
returns
from LA, wants
to kiss and make up |
| 1979
March |
Cindy's first month as a
Disco dance teacher. |
| 1979
March |
Pistachio
II. Joanne's crush
on Rick gets her the twin "evil eye" from Cindy and Susie |
|
1979 March |
Joanne decides to quit the Disco
scene. She starts to learn C&W dancing |
|
1979 April |
Rick teaches Disco
lessons at the Meyerland Club (which led to Western lessons in
September) |
|
1979 April |
The Rubaiyat closes, then reopens as the Bullwhip. A dozen
other Discos
across the city go Country |
|
1979 April |
Cindy and Rick begin taking private dance
lessons together |
|
1979 May |
Cindy announces she has a crush on me. |
|
1979 May |
Rick visits Joanne's Country Club, aka the
Cactus Club. Totally
disgusted by what he sees, Rick's resistance to C&W dancing
grows |
|
1979 May |
Susie goes nuts and calls
Cindy's husband; Cindy and Rick make an Agreement |
|
1979 June |
Dance performance
disaster with Susie at Spats, the Clear Lake Disco |
|
1979 June |
Joanne gets razzed for going country, then
completely quits the studio to join her "Country Club" |
|
1979 July |
Susie and Rick break up |
| 1979
July |
Dance
Performance disaster with Cindy at Lighthouse |
|
1979 August |
Cindy gets cold feet |
| 1979
August |
Dance
Performance disaster with Cindy at Foley's |
|
1979 September |
Madame X makes her
appearance |
| 1979
September |
The
dangerous Meyerland
Club Gamble - Joanne returns to help Rick learn C&W
Dancing |
|
1979 September |
Dance Performance
disaster with Cindy at Annabelles |
| 1979
September |
Cindy
makes her Blackmail Threat |
| 1979
October |
Risky
Business - I involve Madame X in a dangerous Gamble |
| 1979
October |
Cindy's
infamous U-Turn |
|
1979 November |
Cindy begins the two and a half year Limbo
Period as she struggles to chose between two men |
|
1979 November |
Madame X and Rick come
close renewing their relationship, but barely miss |
|
1979 November |
Rick asks Madame X to go skiing. After
careful deliberation, she turns him down. |
|
1980
January |
Madame X tells Rick goodbye and leaves town
for good |
|