their list, and asked to audition.
A man emerged from a back office and looked them over, head to toe. “Do you girls have an agent?”
“No,” Joan said. “We moved here a few days ago. But we can dance really well. You just need to see us.”
The man smiled and stroked his moustache with one hand. “I’d love to see both of you, sweetheart, but the shows aren’t doing so well. In case you haven’t noticed, it’s all movies these days. No one cares about live entertainment anymore.”
Joan stared, wide-eyed, at the manager’s face. He looked away and bent down to tighten his shoelace as her chin trembled.
Val stammered, “So you won’t even let us audition?”
“Listen, I’ve got plenty of experienced dancers coming by every day looking for work. I’ve got agents calling me every other minute, begging for a show, any show. To be honest, even if I did have a spot for you two, which I don’t, there are lots of other dancers I would choose first.” He reached past them and opened the door to the street. “Thanks for stopping by, ladies. Good luck.”
As the girls walked past him, he whispered in Val’s ear, “Burlesque is still going strong, I hear, especially now that the soldiers are back. You look like you’ve got good legs and a strong stomach, so if you’re willing to show a little skin, you can try the Shangri-La in Chinatown.” She gasped and stared at the man’s round, red face. “It’s a suggestion, honey, that’s all. You don’t have to take it if you don’t like it.” He nodded at Joan’s retreating body; her arms were wrapped around her chest. “Don’t take her along with you, though. Stripping can kill a girl who isn’t cut out for it.”
They tried every respectable theatre in town. Each manager said the same thing. Shows were closing; the theatres were converting their stages to movie screens. When Val looked into the managers’ faces, she saw limited sympathy. They would continue to have jobs, even if all they did was screen movies. Dancers and comics were the ones who would have to find other ways to pay the bills. It was too bad, but what could the managers do about it?
One evening before dinnertime, they walked by the Palomar Supper Club. They saw through the open door that it was full and that couples and single men waited in the lobby to sit at the bar. Val heard the music—clear and fine with a pitch like ice cubes rattling in a glass—and thought that dancing to that backdrop would be magical. If she could just keep her clothes on. She glanced at Joan’s body, which seemed even thinner in the city, and kept her mouth shut.
Joan cried when they got back to their room, her shaking hands fingering the blisters on her feet. When their landlady called them for supper, Joan refused to go, even though Val reminded her that they were paying for the food as part of the rent, and she should eat it. Val went to the dining room alone and sat in the only empty seat, between two young men. They said they were students at the university, and brushed her breasts with their hands while passing the dishes. She forced herself to eat the roast potatoes and ham, the soup with crackers, even the sponge cake—as much as she could. Later, she lay on her side of the bed, her hands cupped around her too-full and distended belly.
The day before their weekly rent was due, Val walked through downtown, stopping at every restaurant, shop and hotel to see if they had any work for her. Nothing. The managers and shopkeepers looked at her faded, floral-print dress and her scuffed shoes and simply said, “No.” As she walked down street after street, she thought of Joan, lying in bed in her nightgown, refusing to move even when Val grabbed her ankle and tried to pull her to the floor. Despite the February drizzle, Val began to sweat, and her face flushed with hot, angry blood. She kept blindly walking, bumping into men and children as she went. When they first arrived, both she and Joan had examined the face of every stranger they passed. Now, Val didn’t want to look.
Maybe they should have never left their parents’ house. At least there they didn’t have to pay the rent.
The streets began to change around her. Buildings were narrower, with balconies on the second and third