Hollywood Hills by Joseph Wambaugh Read Free Book Online Page A

younger brother, Terry, after their father had deserted the family when the children were still in elementary school.
    Experiencing Hollywood wasn't anything like Megan thought it would be, especially after she learned how expensive everything was in L . A ., but things went well enough until she was persuaded by her roommates to experiment with some of their trendy pharmaceuticals, like Xanax and Percocet. Those drugs led her to Vicodin and finally to OxyContin, by far the most addictive and powerful of the prescription drugs available to her, and OxyContin led her to Jonas Claymore, whom she met through a girlfriend at work.
    Jonas was a valet parking attendant at upscale restaurants and he made good tips. He was tall, rail-thin, cute, and goofy, with a bush of cinnamon hair and a gap-toothed grin. He made her laugh easily and sold her OxyContin twice a week when he'd come by her apartment.
    When they got high together for the first time, he said, "You won't be offended if I drop trou and show you something, will ya?"
    "Show me what?" she said uneasily.
    "This," he said, turning away from her and lowering his jeans and underwear. On one buttock was tattooed what. On the other buttock was tattooed ever. When he pulled his pants up he said, "Most of the girls I know think it's kinda funny."
    After several drug experiences they became sexually involved, but it was never satisfactory for either of them because of Jonas's drug-induced ED problems. Megan liked the other oxycodone products, like Vicodin, referred to as "norcos" or "watsons," and she liked the Percocet, aka "perks," but nothing could beat the 80 mg OxyContin, called "OC" or "ox" or "80s" or "beans." Soon, Megan Burke fell passionately in love, not with Jonas Claymore, but with smoking ox. He loved it even more than she did and always seemed to have it in abundance. Then her life quickly fell apart. She lost her job at the Gap and got a part-time job at Denny's as a waitress, but she lost that, too, and came to dread the desperate phone calls from her mother when the college plans were abandoned.
    Megan finally sold her old Hyundai when money ran out, after she had been living with Jonas for nearly a year in a cheap apartment in Thai Town, but not with the knowledge of his landlord or her despairing mother in Oregon. By then, Megan had begun avoiding most of her mother's phone calls and would not reveal her address or anything about Jonas Claymore, not wanting her worried parent to know how far she had fallen and how fast had been the descent.
    After reading and seeing TV reports that members of the Bling Ring smoked ox, it had made Jonas Claymore proud that it was also his drug of choice, Ox was far more expensive than the crystal meth he'd formerly adored, and more than other pharmaceuticals that he'd use when he didn't have enough money for the OCs. H e w as barely hanging on to his current job of parking cars at two of the newest Melrose Avenue restaurants.
    It wasn't often that Jonas actually read the L . A . Times or anything else, but when he thought there might be something in the paper about the Bling Ring, he'd run to the supermarket and buy or steal one. He adored reading about the designer wardrobes that the Bling Ring coveted and plundered, and especially the Chanel merchandise, Louis Vuitton purses, and Rolex watches they'd looted during their crime spree. They'd even stolen underwear that they could wear themselves while they dreamed. Jonas couldn't get enough of the stories and searched for more on television and especially in the tabloids.
    One summer evening, Jonas was sitting in the front seat of a BMW 535i that he'd parked, engrossed in juicy Bling Ring coverage. At the same time, his boss, a chesty and bossy Russian lesbian who ran the valet parking concession for both restaurants, was looking for her young employee in the parking lot. The lanky lad was disappointed that there was no photo of Paris Hilton in this particular story, and he was only