Golden Orange by Joseph Wambaugh Read Free Book Online Page A

freebie and actually put a quarter of his own into the ancient Wurlitzer, beating out a spoon-fed accompaniment to Bobby Darin’s “Beyond the Sea.”
    When Winnie lurched out of the saloon that night, he heard Guppy cry out to the sleeping she-turtle: “I got boffed and left on the beach! I know what it’s like! How was it for you? Did the earth move or what? Did it, Irma?”

5

    Star-crossed Lovers
    T he invitation to “The Champagne Brunch and Fashion Show” carried a suggestion of “Big Apple attire.” The Big Apple had come to The Golden Orange! Which meant that there were a lot of women wearing red or black, and everybody hoped to be described as either chic or sophisticated, this on the southwestern edge of North America, where, despite some of the most expensive residential property in the nation, only a few of the most chic and sophisticated restaurants suggested jackets for gentlemen. At its most formal, The Golden Orange dress code mirrored the Costa del Sol in summer, but ordinarily, Pago Pago casual was okay. The gentlemen’s dress code just about anyplace on the Gold Coast was: shoes, and a shirt with a collar. The salespeople in shops and department stores pay no attention whatsoever to how a customer is dressed. But they can spot a $10,000 Swiss watch faster than anyone this side of Zurich. They address themselves to a customer’s wrist.
    The afternoon fund-raiser suggesting the Big Apple duds had Tess Binder agonizing, but she settled on a persimmon and white nautical jacket with braided trim and brass buttons, over a white skirt. She’d worn the outfit two or three times and hoped anyone who’d be there wouldn’t have seen her in it. She couldn’t remember where she’d worn it last and worried that it made her look heavier. Tess wore only a size six, but there was a time when she wore a four. The years were tumbling by so fast, Tess couldn’t even remember when the hell it was that she went to a six! She’d begun perspiring even before putting on the jacket. Oddly enough, when she thought of Win Farlowe it calmed her.
    Tess got stuck in a traffic jam on MacArthur Boulevard, caused by a two-car fender bender. Traffic in this, the fastest-growing area in America, was increasing at a terrifying clip. And everywhere Tess looked there were brand-new high-rise towers of tinted glass and steel. Tess Binder was surrounded by unimaginable wealth and awesome economic power. Driving to the brunch, she felt lost in a wilderness of looming dark towers.
    The fashion show raised a good deal of money that afternoon, but for Tess it was a disaster. She lusted for the pantsuits and capes, and the “little dresses with big impact,” but prices for virtually nothing were starting at about $1,000, and one jacket she adored went for $15,000.
    The women looked thinner because so many were wearing black. Fuller lips were definitely in: big swollen pouters, sometimes obtained by collagen injections or even fat cell transplants for more permanence. The fat cells were often siphoned from the fanny and funneled into the lips, which seemed ironically appropriate to the Gold Coast daddies who footed the bill. Most of the women just got the bee-stung effect by applying lipstick liner and matching lipstick, set by matte brushed powder, thus making themselves look poutier than John McEnroe. What with all the Manhattan black and blood-puddle red and swollen lips, the hot mommas resembled a coven of vampires.
    At table number one were the Woodcrests. Morton Wood-crest wasn’t just “seven-one-four” rich—the dialing code for Orange County and title of a name-dropping local publication—he was “F.F.H.” rich, 292nd in Forbes ’ 400. Tess thought that his wife, Zoe, was no longer just willowy, but so emaciated her spine jutted into her dress like a string of beads. Before Morton settled on his fifth wife, half the hot mommas at