The Girl With No Name

The Girl with No Name Part Two

Author’s note:

This story is a prequel to my book STARSTRUCK, currently out from Random House. It’s the first in a glamorous saga of romance, mystery, and dark secrets set in the glittering world of 1930’s Hollywood—a Golden Age.

LOVE ME, the sequel to STARSTRUCK, hits stores 2/11! You can order or buy both now books from your favorite retailer. Hope you’ll check them out. 

The truth was, she already had a name picked out. The name she’d been born with, Norma Mae Gustafson, already seemed like it belonged to somebody else. Somebody she never wanted to see again. Somebody she’d be more than happy to forget had ever existed.

The name she’d been calling herself in private, in the story of herself that she kept running in her head, was something else entirely. It was romantic, mellifluous, elegant. She thought it sounded like someone had a life of beauty, and safety and love, like a princess living happily ever after at the end of a fairy tale.

It was going to be her name if she got the jobs at Bullock’s Wilshire. When she got the job at Bullock’s Wilshire. Which, incidentally, looked as much like anything out of a fairy tale as she’d ever seen.

It was like being inside of a diamond. The windows sparkles. The marble glittered. The mirrors and chandeliers shimmered. Behind every gleaming counter, a salesgirl stood at attention, surveying the customers with a mixture of pride and disdain. Each one was trim, attractive, immaculately groomed, and all dressed in black. Somehow, this surprised her. She didn’t know exactly what she expected them to be wearing—surely not ballgowns in all the colors of the rainbow?—but these dresses, while clearly expensive, were awfully plain.

Well, she thought, catching the reflection of her creamy skin and fiery hair in one of the department stores many, many mirrors, at least I look good in black.

One of the salesgirls, a cool and pale blonde, fixed her with an appraising stare. “Is there something I can do for you?”

The tone was impersonal, but icy. She bit the insides of her cheeks hard to keep herself blushing, a trick she’d taught herself years ago when she could hear the old biddies in church back in Oklahoma whispering about her as tried to slip inconspicuously into her pew. “I’m here about the job,” she whispered.

The blonde narrowed her grey eyes. “What job?”

She bit her cheeks even harder. “In the ladies’ department.” With a trembling hand, she held out the crumpled advertisement from the newspaper. Her palms were sweaty and the ink had started to leave dirty-looking gray streaks on her skin.

The woman wrinkled her nose. “I don’t think that job is still available.”

“But this is only from yesterday’s newspaper,” she protested. “You can’t have already filled the position.”

“I don’t know.” The woman smiled tightly. “But I can tell you, I’m sure you’re not what they’re looking for.”

“What who’s looking for?”

She spun around to see a large man with a mustache standing behind her. A white carnation decorated the lapel of his expertly tailored dark suit. “Oh, Mr. Caldwell,” the blonde woman simpered. “This girl was just asking about the job in the newspaper. I told her the position was no longer available.”

The man raised an eyebrow. “And how would you know that?”

“Well, naturally, I just assumed…” the woman fluttered a hand next to her throat, giving the man a knowing look.

He pretended ignorance. “Assumed what?”

“That the position had been filled.”

The man smirked. “You’d better let me decide that, hadn’t you?” He turned back to her. “Come along with me, and we’ll talk about that job.”

Gratefully, she followed him across the shimmering floor, all too aware of the disapproving glares of the black-clad salesgirls. She knew why they were looking at her like that; it was because of the way Mr. Caldwell, who it seemed, was the manager of the store, had looked at her. She’d seen that look from men all her life, and it usually meant nothing good. But this time, just once, she was glad. This time, she thought, I’m going to make it work for me. This time, I have to.

He led her through a door marked “Employees Only” and into a windowless office at the end of the hall. “Please,” he said, motioning towards a velvet sofa, “sit down.”

She did. He sat beside her, pointedly ignoring the large walnut desk from which she imagined he normally conducted official business. “Now,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “Why do you want to work here at Bullock’s Wilshire?”

She was ready for this. “It’s a beautiful place. It would be an honor to come here every day.”

“And?” He made a little gesture with her hand, urging her on.

Might as well try the truth. “And I need a job,” she said quickly. “Very much. And I’ve always loved clothes. I don’t know that much about high fashion, but I’m a quick study. I know what fits, and I know how to sew. I’ve always made my own dresses.”

“Did you make this one?” He reached out and fingered the color of her flowered dress.

She shivered. “No. Not this one.”

“And do you have experience?” His hand was on her knee now.

She had never bit the inside of cheeks so hard. Think about the job, she thought. The job the job the job. “The ad said no experience was necessary.”

The hand inched higher. “That’s not what I meant.

She wanted to scream, but something told her to stay put. She felt immobilized, outside of her body again, like she’d been so many times before. The only thing that kept her in the room, in this office, was the sickly sweet scent of the carnation in his lapel as it hovered next to her nose.

“What about the job?” she forced herself to ask, when it was over.

“We’ll let you know,” he said.

He hadn’t even asked her name, and she wasn’t sorry, because she sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him. But before he sent her out the door, he shoved a $20 bill into her hand.

She wanted to shove it back at him. She wanted to shove it down his throat. Maybe empty the contents of his stinking ashtray down there too. And a couple of lighted matches. And that stinking disgusting carnation.

But $20. That was a enough for a room of her own for at least two weeks. A room with a ceiling, and a bed, and breakfast included. And there might even be enough left over for a new dress.

She’d just chalk this up to another terrible incident in the life of Norma Mae Gustafson.

This hadn’t happened to Amanda Farraday. Amanda Farraday was still going to have a perfect life.