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“What?” Kathy stammered. “What are you talking about?”
This was somewhat of a momentous occasion. The girls rarely got a chance to catch Kathy in a vulnerable position. She prided herself on staying ahead of the curve and didn’t like people thinking they could take advantage of her.
“So.. you’re telling me,” started Jane. “That you feel normal one minute.. before you and Charlotte come to an agreement of some kind.. And then after you come to this agreement, that SHE really, really wants.. you feel great and euphoric.. Euphoric? I can’t stress that word enough— Euphoric? And full of love? And you want to go up to her and hug her.. and tell her how much you love her? And you think she didn’t hypnotize you?”
Lost in the translation, nobody actually processed the unintentional humor that emerged from Jane’s final sentences, including Jane herself. It simply went over everyone’s head. Kathy’s head, however, bobbed up and down and back and forth as she stared-down each one of her doubters with her jaw slightly clenched. This was exactly what she hated. All of her big sisters coming down on her at once.
“Gina, what did I tell you?” asked Kathy.
“That you prefer herbal shampoo?”
“No… I told you I was too smart to be hypnotized.”
“And I didn’t believe you,” said Gina.
“That’s not what you said,” Kathy refuted.
“Well, not in so many words,” said Gina. “And I’m telling you right now, I still don’t believe you.. And neither does anyone else.. You need to get off this high horse of yours and come down to earth a little bit. You’re not smarter than everyone else in this world… And you’re certainly not invulnerable to all that goes on, either.”
“YEAH,” blurted Belinda, emphatically.
The silent stares that everyone gave the lovely lead were all meant to be riddled with sarcasm.
“Good one, Babe,” remarked Kathy.
“Well, Gina took all the words I wanted to say,” said Belinda with a dejected pout.
“Look.. guys.. I am not hypnotized, okay? I would know if I was,” defended Kathy.
“You wouldn’t know,” said Jane. “It’s just like anything else… And Gina said it best. You’re not invulnerable to all the crap and corruption that goes on in the world.”
Kathy couldn’t take the reverberating doubt any longer.
“I’m not gonna listen to this,” she said as she started to exit the room. “You can all go home if you don’t believe me.”
The rest of the group capitulated to the deafening sound of defeat.
“Wait, wait, don’t go,” pleaded Belinda, stopping Kathy momentarily with her hand.
“It’s not that we don’t believe you,” stated Jane. “It’s just that we want you to consider all the possibilities… Okay?”
Kathy seemed willing to accept this.
“Yeah, I mean, come on… Don’t you think it’s a little strange.. and a bit of a coincidence.. that Charlotte just happened to want you to participate with her on such a thing.. and then never really gave you a reasonable explanation as to why?” asked Belinda.
“YEAH!” blurted out Gina, imitating Belinda from a few seconds ago.
Although she wanted to hang on to her foolish pride, Kathy was just as satisfied with the fact that everyone wanted to appease and comfort her. As to be expected, the girls had grown a lot over the years, and this was another one of those examples.
“Alright… I get what you guys are saying,” she humbly pontificated.
“Well, what do we do now?” asked Gina. “We got more immediate things to tend to.”
“It’s not going to take them very long to figure out where I might be,” said Belinda. Her feelings of fear and insecurity were now starting to kick into high gear.
“The first place they’re gonna look is your house, Gina. You’re the one who helped her escape,” Jane observed.
“You know what? Let’s get some news goin,” said Kathy, as she walked over to the coffee table and picked up the remote control device. “Maybe we can pick up some insight on what the cops might be doin.”
Kathy clicked on the T.V. and began scrolling through the channels until she got to one of the three major networks. She placed the remote back down on the table and joined the other three as they all gathered around the bar to freshen-up their drinks.
It didn’t take long before Belinda and Gina became more reportedly famous than they already were. After searching through the channels again, Kathy stopped at KTLA to hear what good ol’ Hal Fishman was yappin’ about.
Gee, what a surprise— He was yappin’ about our Lucy and Ethel.
“Repeating our top story tonight, Belinda Carlisle, famed lead singer of the pop band The Go-Go’s and television program of the same name, escaped from the Kaiser Medical Facility tonight, allegedly, with the help of her co-star on the show, Gina Schock…”
“CO-STAR?!!!” Gina yelled-out. “CO-STAR?!!!”
All attention turned towards Gina.
“I am not your fucking co-star on that show!!!” she ranted.
“Gina, calm down,” said Jane.
To hell with the all-important news. As usual with famous people, their ego far overshadowed anything that was actually happening in real life. Kathy frantically waved her hand towards Gina to get her to shut her mouth.
“Gina, we need to hear this,” she said.
“Police have begun searching for Miss Carlisle at all the familiar places she might be, including her home in Beverly Hills and the homes of her four bandmates,” continued Mr. Fishman.
The girls all stared at each other with their mouths hanging open. They all knew it was just a matter of time before a knock would come upon the door of Kathy’s house.
Kathy impulsively clicked-off the T.V. in order for the four of them to respond to the urgency of the situation.
Urgency? What urgency? Gina had far bigger issues to deal with.
“I… am not your fucking co-star on that show,” she repeated. “I get more fan-mail than any of you from that show.”
As might be expected, the girls all threw up their hands and rolled their eyes at the ridiculous things that were coming out of Gina’s mouth.
Still, like the good, little, celebrity soldiers that they were, they all understood and let her continue—
“Where do they get off saying that I’m your co-star?” she asked.
“Gina, I hardly think this is the time to worry about things like that,” said Belinda.
“Easy for you to say,” responded Gina. “You’re the star of the show,” she mocked with the appropriate hand gestures.
“We gotta’ get the fuck outta’ here,” warned Jane. “Otherwise, they’ll bust all of us for associating with this psychotic criminal over here,” she kidded, poking her hand towards Belinda.
There was a moment of silence before Kathy conjured-up one of her brilliant responses to Gina’s overt unhappiness with the local news’ perceived pecking-order of her place on the show’s credentials.
“Gina? Do you still wanna jam?” she asked.
Along with everyone else, Gina herself glared at Kathy as if she had lost her mind.
“Huh?” she grunted towards Kathy.
“Maybe it might help you relax,” she offered back.
“We don’t have time to jam!!” Jane yelled-out. “We gotta’ get outta’ here and figure out what we’re gonna do with Belinda! How can you even think about such thing, Kath?”
Once eager to form the aforementioned quartet, even Gina had to agree with Jane on the absurdity of Kathy’s request.
“Yeah, really, Kath. That’s a little crazy, don’t you think?” she suggested, dryly.
Kathy had everyone right where she wanted them.
“No, no, I’m serious,” she began. “We can jam for a good half-hour or so… Ya’ know.. to get all of this tension out of us.”
The girls all shook their heads in disbelief. They couldn’t believe what Kathy was suggesting.
And then, Kathy broke the tension all on her own—
“I think it’s a good idea,” she reiterated. “Belinda, you can sing lead vocals.. and Gina.. you can co-star with her on the drums.”
Gina looked up from staring at the ground. She glared at Kathy with fire in her eyes.
Based on the instantaneous snickering that poured out from Jane and Belinda’s nostrils, Kathy had indeed broken the tension.