My Body(32)
When I searched online there wasn’t much to find except a few pictures of him looking sweaty in nightclubs with Paris Hilton and some vague information about his production company.
“I’m sure Leo will be there, and a bunch of other people you’ll know, or, er, recognize. You know their movie is up for five Academy Awards next month?” I could tell Evan was excited about the idea of going to the Super Bowl with this crew.
“I don’t have to, like, do anything specific, right?” I asked. Was being at the Super Bowl my only task or was there some other more covert expectation? Evan told me he’d insisted to Jho Low’s contact (another question: Whose job was it to call up celebrities’ managers to get them to go to events with your boss for a fee?) that he accompany me, “Just to make sure you feel comfortable. You mind if I bring a date, too?” That was fine. I knew Evan was coming along as a chaperone or a buffer; but what he was protecting me from exactly, I wasn’t sure. The money, which he would commission at ten percent, would be wired ahead of time. “I’ll make sure it hits before Friday,” Evan promised.
I couldn’t remember what team the Seattle Seahawks were playing, only that my dad had said on the phone the day before that it should be a “good game.” I’d never cared about football, but my father did. When I told him I was going, he yelped, “Ah, Emily! I’m so jealous!”
It was February, and as a recent transplant from the West Coast, I didn’t have a proper coat to wear outside at a football game in the winter. My modeling agent managed to call in a favor and get hold of a white Moncler jacket for me. It was lent just for the weekend, to be returned early on Monday morning. “Don’t get anything on it or they’ll make you pay for it. They’re a fortune,” she warned.
Evan had suggested I hire a professional hair and makeup team for the game, but I decided not to spend the money. Instead, I tried to replicate what they did for red-carpet events: I put on more makeup than I usually wore and secured a janky hair extension to the back of my head. There would be no photographers, so I was grooming myself for just one person: the mysterious Jho Low.
We’d been instructed to meet at the Plaza, where we were directed immediately onto a bus. Evan had been right about the other guests: there were two famous models whom I’d never met before, one known for her recent appearance on the cover of Sports Illustrated’s swimsuit edition and the other for her stint as a Victoria’s Secret angel. There were a few male actors, accompanied by their posses. The rest of the group was composed of people who seemed to work for Jho Low. He boarded the bus last, wearing a hooded puffer. Although I had seen his picture online, I was surprised by how young he looked in person, younger than 31. As his short, pudgy frame moved down the aisle, Evan jumped up to introduce me. Was it part of the job to act excited? I mustered some enthusiasm.
“Thanks so much for having me,” I offered, smiling up at him.
“Yeah, yeah, sure, sure.” He nodded and grinned distractedly before taking a seat in the back.
Several police cars and motorcycles appeared, surrounding the bus. Over the rap music playing from a speaker, Evan explained that we were being escorted to the stadium to avoid traffic. “The city shuts down an avenue so that people who can afford it get this treatment.” He chuckled, shaking his head. “Nuts, right?”
“Only way to do it,” a small man cut in, introducing himself as Riza. “I produced The Wolf of Wall Street with Jho Low,” he said. He took a seat across the aisle.
As an adolescent, wealth was an abstract concept to me. I had a rough idea of my parents’ income, but I’d been clueless enough to ask my mother only a year earlier if forty thousand dollars was a reasonable amount for a person to live on for a year. “That’s certainly not enough money to be comfortable,” she’d said, without expounding further. I was not yet able to grasp the difference between rich fathers from my hometown and billionaires like Jho Low. There were no tiers when it came to rich people; to me, rich was just rich.
I started making my own money at fourteen. I thought it important to never be indebted to anyone. In high school, I once paid for a date with a boy I wasn’t interested in, just to ensure that I wouldn’t have to go out with him again or, my worst fear, owe him something sexually. I didn’t have my driver’s license yet, and I was concerned that I’d have to repay my date for picking me up; I offered to pay for his gas money. I plunked down a wad of cash at the Mexican restaurant where we ate. “Really, it’s no problem. It was super nice of you to pick me up,” I said. Paying made me feel that I was in control. I’d prided myself on being free of obligation.
* * *
When I moved to LA and started working full-time, there was a girl, Isabella, who had a look similar to mine: thick brown eyebrows and big features. Even though we were both nineteen, I felt older than Isabella. She was soft-spoken and timid, using her long hair to cover her body. We’d see each other frequently at castings, where we bonded over the loneliness of living in a new city. She told me she’d recently started going out to clubs with her housemate, Chloe, a blond model who was almost six feet tall. “You should come with us sometime,” she offered.
I’d only spent a handful of nights in clubs, but I knew that I didn’t particularly enjoy them. I didn’t like the music they played or how drinks spilled on my bare legs or someone always seemed to be groping me. Still, it seemed stupid to turn down an opportunity to meet new people. I was desperate to start an adult’s life in Los Angeles. We made plans for the following week.