Love Between the Ages

...He promised he would take her if she worked it out at home, and Traci had a very good idea of just how she might do that on a weekend really soon when her Mom and Dad were going on an "Actualizations" and Weight Reduction Weekend in Ojai . A trip to New York...

...The road is choked with traffic Seoul's reputation for urban sprawl and carbon monoxide IS on a Potomac as ~t passes the Jefferson was my knowmg that I had Steve failed to show up for the Jumor SATs...

...behmd me that helped me to stand up The mistake could have possibly been to Jeff, and that was what made turn catastrophic, since Cal Berkeley badly act right to me...

...Stoller adds, "The whole nature of who has power and who doesn't can change drastically as the relationship evolves ." But wait a minute...

...After all, if Steve White, who just pulled off the biggest rain dance in the history of his firm, can't do that for a sweet thing like Traci, he's not much . And please don't give Steve any of your nonsense about how the bare fact that a grown man is trying to impress a sixteen-year-old girl by buying her a car is a sign that he feels powerless in the world of adults and can only feel powerful in relation to children . That's 11 ships the ground he walks on Steve gets up from his chair, walks out into the hall and tells Sheila, his just Freudmn claptrap, isn't ~t'~ Well, isn't it9 Well, Steve may not think there is trusty secretary, that he wants a little anything wrong with that, and maybe, She was more of a Lauren Bacall type, by some standards, there is nothing air He goes down m the elevator and and that m~ght have done wonders for own First there was the talk about wrong with it But, "for a forty-four walks across the street to the news year old man to be spending his after- stand in 1880 to look for the Recycler, White When he was after a chdd, he noon looking for a car for a sixteen just to see what cars are in the paper d~dn't want someone w~th a whiskeythat day But wait a minute Wait just year old ~s, w~thout any question, a sign and-cigarettes voice He wanted a child a mmute~ Why should he buy her a of a personality that requires constant The very best had been Dana, a used car9 Why not a brand new one9 boosting, constant pumping up," says high-school junior, whom he had met After all, how much more can it cost Paul Hyman "You can call that while she was serving pizza at The him9 How much more will she love it9 powerless or you can call that reaction Straw Hat in Canoga Park She had formation or call it anything you want, Just thinking about how happy Traci been a virtual fountain of enthusiasm will be makes Steve feel a lot better but it Is not a mark of a self-assured about his every gesture Just for giving than he ever did when he was talking personality" her a httle Walkman she had cried with to the managing partner Steve loves to buy Traci presents If he were put under However, this morning, after his meeting w~th the managing partner, Steve White ~s not talking to Dr Hyman He is not thinking about personalitles and reaction formation Instead, he is thinking that he has really broken neck tryang to close the deal with...

...He promised himself that if he closed this account with Oil, he would splurge and buy her the kind of car that would make her eyes widen and make her mouth drop open and make her friends crazy...

...Hot doesn't even do this guy justice...

...Tom had the unbelievable nerve to actually tell her that he only went out with her because Terri, one of the cheerleaders and a total queen at Birmingham, was dating some guy from Cal State Northridge now...

...That was a lot more than she could say about Tom...

...Frankly, if someone really asked Traci just exactly what the last thing her parents had done for her to show her they were interested in her might have been, she would have had a hard time answering . Her father didn't even really know what grade she was in, which seriously hurt her...

...Traci didn't know precisely what that meant, but she assumed it meant that maybe Cassie was fooling around, too, which meant that maybe she deserved just what was happening now between Steve and Traci . Not only that, but even though Steve hadn't said it, Traci figured that Cassie must not be much of a wife if she had a great guy, a really generous guy like Steve, and didn't act right enough for him to stay home...

...He went back into a with him "I can't pretend I own you," as ff h'e were big and important, not maelstrom of actw~ty at his law firm...

...Her Mom couldn't remember the names of Camilla and Diane, and that hurt her even more...

...menus and Tracl saw at the bottom of with someone telling Steve that he has Second, how dare she demand to go "You do ~'' says Steve...

...Rosen drones on about Career Day, Traci lets her thoughts go right out that window, over Victory Boulevard, out to Steve White . She wondered what he was doing right then, at that very minute when she was in her stupid little homeroom . No, she said to herself, she certainly did not feel guilty about what she and Steve were doing . After all, she had done it before "I can assure you that this kind of event would never happen in a time and place when parents were truly convinced that they owed their first duties to their children ." with Tom from English class and she was pretty damned sure that Tom didn't really care about whether she lived or died...

...gray transports of the American and South Korean mr forces are lined up on the tarmac KImpo Is less than three ItS appointed rounds, it would have minutes' flying time from North par with that of Lagos or MexJco City, Korea, where, officially speaking, the but if you approach downtown from port, which sits in a valley north and war has never ended...

...Ever since Steve White had come into her life, it had all become like Fantasy Island...

...They knew that they could count guy from Studio City, at a party whde on Steve White to get their httle g~rl she was ndmg the crest of her new home safe and sound status...

...Oty, a writer-producer m Hollywood and h~s h~gh-school senior girlfriend who comes to h~s office after her classmates choose a s~te for the Spring Pacmc Men m middle age, sohdly m rmddle age, going with g~rls who hterally r~de their bicycles to their rendezvous Thls, again, is not something wayward and extraordmary any longer, but something tolerated and defimtely encouraged w~thm many orcles m Los Angeles and m Cahforma generally The man who has a black Porsche on any street m Los Angeles IS nobody The man who has a seventeen-year-old girlfriend has status The high-school VOL 18, NO 1 / JANUARY Robert Stoller, M D, a psychmtnst at UCLA Me&cal School "Power relationships are at the heart of all sexual fantasy Now, a classic power/weakness fantasy--that of the powerful older man and the httle glrl--~s allowed to happen m both fact and fancy, and that creates great exotement It could only happen m a society, hke ours, m which &stlnct hnes between the unconscious and the conscious are rapidly &sappearlng " "The magazines and the TV shows tell you that you have only one hfe to hve," says Paul Hyman "They tell you that you have to get ~t while you can and not let any 'worthless' rules get m THE AMERICAN SPEcTATOR JANUARY 1985 1985 your way The m~ddle-aged men hear ~t and the girls hear it, and they act on It ') The result is that well-known powers m the TV producUon business appear at Ma Matson w~th sixteen-year-old girlfriends and no one casts a stone Corporate powers walt outside h~gh schools w~th gifts of airplane uckets to Lake Tahoe and the lucky girl's friends are enwous "It's frightening," says Paul Hyman Thoughtful words from Drs Hyman and Stoller, but right now they don't mean a thing to Trao Wenders, who has j u s t showed up at B~rmmgham High School with, can you beheve it, a httle ctrcle pm of dmmonds and emeralds from Cartier They aren't rhinestones They're real and they're not fake and they're causmg qmte a commotion right now in Tracfs homeroom, where the sun coming in off Victory Boulevard ~s making them sparkle hke the Ice Castle m Superman H Frankly, Trao feels damned good about it She is a pretty httle girl, with long black hair and a troy button nose and big hght brown eyes ("hazel, really," she says) that change to hght green and then to gray at different times of the year And she's always had a few friends, but never really been part of the Birmingham High School "mcrowd" of the hippest boys and g~rls She never got invited to the really biggest parties given by the kids who walk on water She and her pals Camilla and Drone have always been sort of out m the cold together, and now, now with the pin this week and the v~deo tape camera last week, Tracl ~s really startmg to get noticed in a serious way S t a t u s toys are an important ~tem at Birmingham High School, and they can make or break you as a jumor For almost two years now, Tmcl had to look on foohshly as everybody else got a Honda Prelude or a VW Rabbit convertlble and a whole hne of Esprit clothes and weekend trips to Snowbird . fraci would always laugh at them and call them show-offs, but inside it hurt . It wasn't that her parents were poor...

...For the first ume, I was wanted to see Jumor SAT scores Traci able to keep a boyfriend, just knowing had to have her parents speak to the I had Steve there" prmctpal of Birmingham High to ask She also presumably knew, for the for permission to take a specml makefirst time, just how powerfully she up test, specmlly scheduled for her could hold onto men and have power The problem was that IPact's Morn over them So there were no tearful self- and Dad had already planned a trip to her She could just see that she was get- recriminations for Tract, only a steady Yosemite, and they really did not want diet of cheery phone calls from Steve, to miss it just to talk to Tract's prinsame kand of looks, as the cheerleaders and an occasional trinket cipal about some test The person who or the daughters of owners of major Little by httle, the sexual part of the did take off from work, who did shopping centers She was, for all in- relaUonshlp faded away He stdl gave reschedule a trip to New Orleans to talk tents and purposes, a new, far more her presents He still hstened to every to the prmctpal, was Steve White self-confident Trao, and it showed Jeff word she had to say He had a hold on However convoluted the route that had and Tract talked for a long time about her that mere sex could not possibly brought him there, he was the one who New York (Jeff had grown up on Long duphcate...

...Why not a telephone calls, and now he had come along, and it was like Fantasy Island every day (Come to think of it, Tracl had used the exact same line He would have to tell Aaron Spelling ) Except for Cathy, who was really an lmposter, all of the girls had been wonderful But now they were all gone Ann had a clothing shop m Aptos Annie was a painter in Mendoclno Dana out of anything he needed once he stepped reside the door In addition, there were always teenage girls there shopping for their moms When Steve first saw Traci, he knew she had possibdities She was wearing a baggy white La Coste shn't and baggy Madras shorts, so that she looked like a child-suburban housewife from you got not only pulmonary and carDarien She was also studying the diovascular exercise, but also musclelabels on the bread as If she were a child Ralph Nader To Steve, who had a good eye, these were s~gns of a restless, interested teenage personality The first thing he said to her, and in a way, the perfect summary of his entire relationship w~th her, was, "Excuse me, but I really can't tell Are you a child or a grown up 9 1 really can't tell " Tracfs answer, which was a gem of her own attitude, was, "I'm not really sure I'm sixteen " Perfecto) That was all she had to say for Steve to know she was his kind of together then brand new one...

...Why should he buy her a used car...

...Sometnnes, when Steve when a deal fell apart at the firm He locked m as a chent that he d~d not Wlute talked to 13-act after school, she even have tune to see Tract for almost told him about her fights wath Jeff He two weeks H~s wife was m Santa Bar- always told her she was a wonderful gld him when a chent behttled hnn bara for a week at a conference about and Jeff was lucky to know her "It was exactly his telhng me that," racism and sexism (It was at the San- of the drama, as far as I know, had 1Pact stud, "that allowed me to put up ta Barbara Bdtmore, and the part~cl- nothing to do with Steve driving over with that nut and make h~m treat me pants could also, ff they chose, get a a chff or Tract's hfe being wrecked and twice a day massage and lectures on hke I had something worthwhile going patched by a Judd Hlrsch clone The on reside me, which was something I nutrmon to prevent aging ) last act that I know of was only a few He talked to Tract everyday when she SOUTH KOREAN CROSSROADS Matthew Stevenson writes f o r a number o f national magazines I t was Korean /Mr Lines flight had the misfortune to draw duty on number 001, not its doomed sister fhght 007 stup, that took me to Seoul I boarded Had that plane been able to finish at Narlta airport, forty-two mdes northeast of Tokyo, and the 721-mile landed at IOmpo International Airhop across the Sea of Japan was routine, save for a cone's-eye vaew of west of Seoul On all sides are the Mt Fujiyama shortly after the 747 lifted off the runway But as I flunk the Korean landscape The travel back now to those two hours In the mr, an image of the a~rhner's crew haunts me They were all remarkably young was when I arrived, It looked like a I think of them occasionally, wonder- mecheval dungeon, with the shaded ing which crew of such boys and girls Prosperity and uncertainty below the DMZ...

...I want you to have friends someone to be swept under the rug He was so busy tr3nng to get...

...Steve White really wanted to know every little thing about her life...

...happens to throw her way Especially after he has just taken her to New York She was a child after all, with the in- But this is hfe By any reasonable City by First Class nocence and fears of a child For Tracl definition, Steve White is m love with What happened to the girl who was to have been so overwhelmed by the Tracl By any reasonable definition, m tears of joy after she got a Sony prices--wluch he could easily afford to Tracl is m love with Steve The socml Walkman9 pay, especially on the firm tab--was and psychic motivations may be What happened to the httle gn'l who touchingly infantde More than that, it strained, even pathological But they curled m on his chest and slept after was a powerful jolt of his own bigness have enormously strong feelings of afshe had her milk and cookies~ and wealth fection for each other When Steve IS Little g~rlfnends are not supposed to For her part, Traci was happy that in a jam, Tracl wants him to feel betask, "What have you done for me late- Steve White was looking at her with ter She does this because she loves him, ly?', What happened to the httle girl who trouble buying Tracl a three-hundreddollar bicycle or a three-hundred-dollar used to be perfect 9 vldeogame Those are the proper gifts for children But a plum colored neghge'e from Bergdorf Goodman is What happened has to do with for a grown woman, not for a little power and control and assertiveness fident human being But he wants a little, weak human being Also, Tracl that godfather look agam She was really getting scared back there at Bergdorf's and at the hotel He seemed like a different person She didn't really know him that well What ff he were some kind of maniac 9 What was she doing in a strange city with a maniac Steve has made Tmo a much more con- a year older than her father~ It scared her But now that she was looking like a always, at some remove, wanted Steve child and was so obviously impressed not only to love her, but to be under her control "After all," says Dr is riding the tiger of being the provider Stoller, "these relationships are about of all gifts, and if he starts to chsmount the man redistributing power from his mother to himself, and the girl redistributing power from her father to herself Once the man really likes the girl, the power re&stnbutlon goes into high gear Once the girl really hkes girl after all, hadn't she9 She even the man, he can m~,est her with any slurped at her onion soup because she quality he wants but she still has a whip He dislikes whips " "The problem is that once into real tells Tracl that maybe they should just Besides, he looked so happy and so stay in that mght and have room ser- hfe," says Paul Hyman, "the dynamic dignified in his dark blue wool suit, vice Tracl pulls a long face and says changes so much from the fantasy almost hke John Forsythe on "Dynasthat she was counting on going to ldeahzatmn of each partner that ty," and he was obviously taking such another French restaurant ("I hke those without growth, the relatlonslup dies " good care of her, spending more on snarl things") and especmlly to riding These are chmcal, value-neutral, droner for her than her mother made back from it m a carnage, just like last soenUfic words from a soenmt...

...As if that were not bad enough, Traci Is watching a movie on the tube wRh Shirley MacLaine Steve and Traci start to discuss movie stars, when suddenly Traci says how much she loves Warren Beatty patina of childhood, it was that When the captmn handed them the If this were a TV movie, it would end neghge'e...

...The child as a sex object is a perfect crystal clear example of taking a situation which would be frightening for a man, i .e., having sex with a woman who might hurt him and have power over him, and changing that situation so that it is the man who has all the power over the child...

...Rosen tells them they'll have to go to the principal's office if they don't shut up, so Traci just sits back in her chair and lets the sun catch the diamonds THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1985 and emeralds in the pin her "godfather " gave to her...

...I'm sure," says Traci and then Mr...

...What is all this talk about powerlessness...

...hypnosis and a gun put against his temple, he would have to admit that he loves to buy her presents not because man could have done a httle more than they encourage her to sleep with him invite Steve to a two-bit lunch at the Steve hopes and believes she would do L A C C , which Steve hates anyway that out of love alone (Although he Consldenng what Steve just pulled off, would not stake his life on that ) But the old guy's gratitude was definitely he loves to see in her eyes just how imon the restrained side That's the way ~t is in every godportant she thinks he is, just how BIG he is for being able to buy her the damned thing Steve White does He things she has always hoped and was m college in Monterey Now, the works like a slave, making small talk only real live girl he had on hand was dreamed of with this turkey from...

...Camilla whispers to Traci . "Is it your Mom's...

...The adult who has a romantic interest in a child is usually acting out a fantasy relationship in which he has complete power over the child and is reversing feelings of powerlessness that he had as a child," says Robert Stoller, M.D...

...I don't even have a godfather...

...He really loves to give me presents . A pin like this is nothing for him...

...Well, doesn't it...

...And that was before she had even become his "girlfriend," so she knew that he really cared about her...

...THE AMERICAN Cahforma and m America generally T i n s Is a story of adults who act hke g~rl who has Esprit sportswear filling I see this pmrlng phenomenon m ac- ctuldren, and of children who act hke her closet ~s one of many The g~rl who uon all the ttme a Vtce-Presrdent on adults It ~s m many ways a story of tins can tell her friends about weekends m the Burbank Stu&os lot and a jumor amr and tins place, m which old codes Carmel has cachet at a parochml girls' high school, a and rules have been swept into the Now, to be sure, older men have desptsed corner of the obsolete Th~s manufacturer of highly advanced always had fantasies about httle girls rmcro-orcults m Sunnyvale and a lugh- story could have been told as an The accountant f~xated on the school sophomore m Los Gatos, a ~solated curiosity, even as a crime, at cheerleader ~s a staple of romantic fanfabulously successful speculator m any t~me, m any place But as a staple tasy But m Cahforma, m 1984, the hne precious metals and a lugh-school stu- of dmly hfe, it sings of America m between fantasy and reahty no longer dent from an ehte girls' school m 1984, even more of Cahforma m 1984, crests for many people Holmby H~lls, a producer with when the cults of self-obsession, self- "Thts kind of blurring of fantasy academy awards m his study and a absorpUon, and anything goes mingled and reahty actually heightens the sexhigh-school dropout from Panorama w~th the fashions of "me first" as a ual stimulation of the SltUaUon," says virtue "I can assure you that th~s kind of event would never happen m a Ume and place when parents were truly conv~nced that they owed their first duties to their chtldren," says Paul Hyman, M D, psychoanalyst to the rich and powerful on Los Angeles's West Side "It would never happen if children beheved that their parents were interested m them and taking care of them even half as much as they were interested m themselves " What Paul Hyman refers to ~s the practice, perhaps the malpractice, of m~ddle-aged men routinely hawng teenage girls as their girlfriends here m Los Angeles Thts ts not the occastonal p~ckup of the wayward teenage g~rl by the man offering candy from a passlng car We are here dtscusslng the event of teenage girls going w~th men in their thirties, forties, and fifties as tf those men were their high-school sweethearts Nor are we talking about teenage m~stresses The relationships m this instance have almost nothing to do with money changing hands They have to do with a more drastic and amazing redirection of psychic and emotional currents, w~th the unorthodox meeting of personal psychic needs, the absence of emotional reward m the home, and the ehmmauon of any clear hne between the fantasy and the real here m Benjamm J Stem is a wrtter and producer m Hollywood 10 SPECTATOR Benjamin J Stem I VE BETWEEN THE AGES Trac~ ~s 16, Steve ~s 44, and they've g o t a t h i n g going...

...But Steve had told her that he and Cassie had been having problems for quite a while now, and that Cassie wasn't entirely innocent either...

...Off your own age...

...We're talking here about Steve White, who just happens to be so hot right now in the law business that his neighbors in 1975 Century Park East are hosing down their ceilings just in case...

...She had been the bitch She really never child or an adult, he was certainly behad that wide-eyed look that he liked ing given an open invitation to do a httie experimenting on that subject on his someone, but it did nothing for Steve Algebra II Then there was an exchange of phone numbers, so Steve could help her with her algebra Then Steve took her to a store and bought her an HP-41CV calculator so that she could do all her algebra in a flash Then he took her to lunch at La Serre on a day when there was no school By the time the waiters had fimshed bowing and scraping to Tracl and bringing her a Long Island Iced Tea w~thout any quesgratitude She started sobbing about tions, Steve was certain he had a new how her father didn't even return her friend He gave her the videotape outfit the first day they went to Steve's hideaway on Manhattan Beach Boulevard That was also the day they became lovers, so on the way home, Steve stopped and bought Traci three THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1985 girl If she didn't know if she was a videotapes Aerobwtse, Ratders of the Lost Ark, and Star Wars He wished he could also have bought her Snow Whtte, but she was not interested in it and had never heard of it The next time they went to the apartment m Manhattan Beach, Steve looked at Traci and marvelled at how poised and confident she was "Demon child," he said to her in a half whisper "Demon adult," she said back to him He laughed and felt wonderful for two days What were Tracfs Mom and Dad doing all this tlme~ Where did they think their little angel was when she was at Steve's apartment making love with a man one year older than her father9 Traci told them that she had a parttime job with a lawyer named Steve White It had been advertised in the vocational guidance office at Birmingham, according to Tracl, and she had been lucky enough to get it Tracfs Dad did not really have time to dwell on the subject for too long because he was just starting to take up "heavy hands" logging That was the system in which you held small weights in your hands while you jogged so that building exercise Morn was at a meeting of wwes who wanted to start a stock club, so she did not hear about it at all When the flood of gifts became a torrent, when Tracl could no longer hide the videotape camera or the pin, did Traci's parents act surprised9 Not at all Tracl told them that she was just borrowing these toys from Steve White, and that he was very happy with her work, and might even help her pay for college if they were still working How did Tracl's Dad react to the of- Side Story," says Tract's Dad "You'll fer to help Tract with college9 Once, when Steve called to fmd his demon child, TracI's Dad answered the phone Did he challenge Steve or try to learn more about him9 Not at all take care of her, won't you 9'' "You bet I will," Steve answers Then he hangs up He's not lying He will take very good care of Tracl In fact, he wtil take the kind of care of Tracl that Traci has always hoped and wished for He will take her m the first-class cabm He will make the stewardesses bring her ice cream and cookies, and wdl cover her up with a blankie so she can take a nap after she watches the lnfhght movie--Rocky III He has the "Listen, Steve," said Traci's Dad, "Tract tells me you can get a table at La Serre any time you want I'm going to be takmg some Japanese engmeers to lunch next week I've never been to La Serre It would sure be good-ff you could help me get a table Thmk you could do thatg" stewardess brmg Tract hot chocolate when she wakes up from her napple...

...Oil, and now he is going to get some respect for himself The managing partner was grateful, but Steve could tell that there was just a glint of jealousy and cunmng in the old man's blue eyes For Christ's sake, the But wait a minute...

...Steve White has just gone to the top partner in his firm, a legal institution with over one hundred and fifty lawyers, and told him that he, Steve White, has just gotten a promise from , the President of a VERY BIG OIL COMPANY, that from now on, Steve's firm can represent all of their merger and oil lease acquisition work . He has actually taken that account away from a white-shoe New York law firm that would have coronary thrombosis when they got the news . Except for one other client, a TV network, this will be the biggest client in the firm . This will mean twenty new associates, at the very least...

...It might even end with Steve drivthere, only it's three-hundred dollars, ing his BMW off Mahbu Canyon Road and Tracl wonders if that's too expen- in an excess of guilt and agony over the sive for Steve They go over to the fourth floor of Bergdorf's and have a look, and Steve cannot believe what he's seeing First of all, Steve likes giving Tracl presents But for her to ask for a threehundred-dollar present is an entirely different thing Little children do not ask for three-hundred-dollar negligees They ooh and ah about whatever you choose to give them Second, Steve would have had no child If Tracl sees herself as a child, that's proper and correct If she sees herself as a grown, seductive woman, maybe she's not right for Steve When he asks for a child, he wants a child Still, Steve buys her the neghge'e He and start telling her what she can and cannot have, the whole relationship will change drastically But, as they go back to the Palace, with Tracl proudly carrying her purple bag from Bergdort~s, Steve has to wonder what lie's gotten himself In for She even slurped at her onion soup because she knew Steve White liked it when she ate That alone had melted Steve's heart with Lutece, Steve was happy agmn As for Steve, he is not, by any conTracl could see right away that he liked celvable standard, out to victimize her to act In a certain way, sort of like Tracl Yes, he is a seriously frightened she had a few years ago when she real- and confused person Yes, he has severe ly was a small child If Steve White problems relating to reality But she wanted her to act that way, It was fine sees him as caring more about her w~th her She had gotten into this whole welfare than anyone else ever has, and situation just so she could be his little knew Steve WhRe hked it when she ate like a little kid The problem gets worse when Steve like a little kid...

...Killer," says Camilla . "Radical," says Diane . Traci waits a few seconds for this to sink in, then she puts in the zinger . "Next week," she says, "he's taking me looking for cars . Toyotas," she adds . "Celicas ." "Wow," says Diane...

...Are you Tract's Dadg" "No," he said, "I'm not " "Uncleg" asked Mr Jacobsen "No," said Steve White as Tract smded at him "Any relation at all 9'' asked the principal "Yes, indeed," stud Steve Wlute, "I'm had never really felt before I thmk it weeks ago, when Tract mistakenly "l~act's godfather" [] Matthew Stevenson In less than thirty years, Seoul's 15...

...Forget about it...

...This, she later tells a friend, is the way it should be, with her at last getting some attention . As Mr...

...Traci had seen a similar situation on "Dynasty" with John Forsythe and Joan Collins, and she knew these things happened . Not only that, but Steve was going to New York on business soon, and Traci had figured out a way to go with him...

...This is from Cartier, that fancy store on Rodeo Drive...

...He can hear some talkmg m the background is that Steve and Tracl have just come back from a French dmner at Les Pleiades on East 76th Street Steve has even hired one of those horse-drawn carriages to take them back through the park There is a lap robe and a cool snap m the mr, and Trac~ is dehciously tired after her meal and her flight Steve has his wool-stated arm around her in the back of the carnage She can smell the fall leaves and the grass and that smoky, thick smell of New York City which she has never smelled before...

...Maybe yours would like to adopt me...

...Traci knew that her parents were not supposed to be tied down to her, and they were entitled to have a life just like everybody else, but sometimes, when she watched ancient reruns of "Ozzie and Harriet," she really wondered what had gone wrong . She had this really weird problem of even starting to cry when she saw how Ricky's Mom was always there, always interested in everything he did, coming to his high-school dances and even the ones in junior high . Of course, that was back in the fifties, when life was really bogus, but even so, "Ozzie and Harriet " made her cry...

...I was m col- the page that dinner was apnxfire $75 behaved like a cad It might also end lege for a while with Warren Beatty" out to a French restaurant9 Children per person, she had looked stricken with Tracfs parents reahzing that they "You were ~'' Tract asks with don't do that How dare she say that with guilt "I had no idea this place was have neglected her and that their the room service menu is "a little so expensive," she says "Should we go astomshment, and that hurts neglect has forced her into a monstrous Still, they smooth things over until home~ Maybe we can just get a piece limited ''~ She is supposed to ooh and relationship The MOW nught also end ah and feel appreciative of any idea he late in the afternoon, when Steve wants of pizza near the hotel " with Tracl realizing that she hated this to show Tmcl Wall Street and the finan- psychopath all along, going into a cial district Traci does not want to see group therapy session and coming out Wall Street She wants to go back to a happy teenager again, playing with Bergdorf Goodman See, she saw this her pals filhng out apphcatlons for colreally great plum-colored negligee lege...

...Steve White is not only an ace litigator, but a very top-notch client getter, or rainmaker, and to call him powerless has to be a bad joke...

...Doesn't it...

...he stud...

...Not at all . Her father was an engineer at Litton out in Agoura and her Mom worked part-time at a card shop in the Galleria . But they spent most of what they made on Dad's classic Ferrari and Mom's clothes, and even though Traci never wanted for anything, really, it always seemed to her that her parents just weren't really aware of what they should be giving her to help her keep her end up in school . Truth to tell, however, the real problem was not about things...

...But in a week, that she just had to fall m night Frankly, Steve IS a little jet- Traci Wenders and Steve White are the love with him all over again Maybe it THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1985 14 wasn't exactly hke Fantasy Island, but It was still awfully wonderful She just hoped he wouldn't look so angry again, like he had back at the Palace That was creepy And now, as the psycluatnsts say, we may perhaps begin The true beginning is that although the sooal moUvatlons are confused, although there is a tremendous quantum of psychic confusion In this relationship and all others like it, Zracl and Steve really have feelings for each other way he has behaved not for a diamond pin or a Walkman He actually has been better to her than any man m her whole life He is the first man who really cared whether she was happy or sad, lonely or excited, confident or let down She is only sixteen, but she has had sex with two other males who didn't care if she lived or died She doesn't care that Steve IS older by almost thirty years He is her grown-up and she needs him she is not nustaken To get slightly ahead of ourselves, the time will come soon when Steve and Tracl stop sleepmg together But the time will never come when Steve does not help Traci with her college essays or her plane fare for a trip to Lake Tahoe L i k e most real-life stones, this one has no "fixed end There is no sudden realization by Traci's Morn and Dad that they had been neglectmg their daughter They got home from school She had were not there at the airport when brought back "I Love Central Park" Fhght One of American Airhnes ar- T-shirts for the best pals, Camdla and rived on a Saturday afternoon They Diane, and a framed laser photograph were atten&ng a get-acqumnted session of New York for the Bn'mmgham High at an "Adults Only" Health Faclhty m School hbrary For a week, she was a their neighborhood, right on P.avers~de celebrity Then she met Jeff, that ftew Drive...

...Diane asks in a rush . "My godfather gave it to me," Traci says...

...He was actually respectful to Steve White d~d not r them He brought Tract home safe and tmg the same kind of attention, the sound On the way, he stopped at Bullock's and bought Tracfs Morn a half ounce of Nma Rtcct perfume He thought that would be enough, and they wouldn't care where they got ~t, as long as they got It for free (He was right 1"fact's Morn even sent a note, thanking lum, but certmnly not even Island, wherever that was) She even about her, and no adult before ever mentioning any payment ) There was no sudden access of guilt for Steve White...

...This will mean a new floor in Century City and a big bonus for every partner, especially for Steve White...

...But that's all changed now, ever since Steve White came into her life . Now, instead of feeling that she's missing something, Traci feels as if she's holding up a big 12-ounce can of Life and it's so filled up, it's overflowing . "Where did you get it...

...m any renewed the expressway running alongside the conflict the mrport would be one of the banks of the Hart River the city seems sharp, jagged peaks that distinguish first targets hit less threatening The hills around The ride from the airport to the wtuch the modern city has grown fmntguides describe it as the "Land of capital follows roughly the course of ly resemble those of Seattle or San Morning Calm," but at dusk, which the First Manne Division which landed Francisco, and the Han, though the behind the lines at Inchon In guide books forever liken it to the September 1950 and qmckly moved inland to recapture what remained of Memorial, actually looks more hke the Seoul Today sentries still stand at Susquehanna flowing through peaks appearing as gargoyles Nevertheless, the reality of Korea as a modern nation living at the edge of checkpoints along the route--their ex- Harrisburg war also emerges at Kimpo Somber pressions as rigid as the M-16 rifles at THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1985 their sides...

...Maybe, because the fact is that Steve has to be back early from a lunch at the Los Angeles Country Club so that he can be over to Birmingham High School by 3 :30 so he can take Traci shopping for a car...

...In a way, this is the nature of all sexual attraction . The dynamic of power and the mirroring of feelings of powerlessness, the turning of them into feelings of power, is basic to all sexual interest...

...You didn't steal it, did you...

...He showed her that he cared started to see Jeff on occasion She told had She had a hold on him that mere Steve about ~t and he stud ~t was fine sex could never beat She made hun feel was always there for her when Jeff stood her up She was always there for Unhke a TV mowe also, the last act pleaded Tract's case to an overworked Prmopal Jacobsen After much to and fro, after &scusmon of how a young hfe could be wrecked by one inadvertent error, Mr Jacobsen signed the papers for the make-up SATs As he did, he said, "You're a hell of an advocate, Mr Wlute...

...There is a car and drwer to meet them at the mrport and take them mto the "Of course," Steve Wtute stud "Just tell me what day" After Steve promised to make the call, Trao's Dad said, "Hey thanks for hotel It's really true Steve ts takmg helpmg me out By the way, Tracl's "Dynasty" level care of Tract, "Falcon Morn and I are really happy about Crest" style care what you're doing for little Traci She Traci is m paradise The days when tells me you're thlnkmg of helpmg her out with college" she felt neglected, out of it, all on her own, are over Long over Now she ts "If she wants to go," said Steve the center of her godfather's attenUon White, holding his breath She ts the apple of his eye She is get"That would be wonderful," Tract's tmg the kmd of care that every chdd dreams of, but very few recewe Dad said effuswely "Mrs Wenders and I have been wantmg to go to Europe for years now, and ff you helped out with the school, it would mean a lot to US " There ts this one httle problem of confusion Traci ts thmkmg of Steve as ff he were a father He ts not her father He lS her lover In a word, Tract is feel"I want to make Tract happy," Steve mg fairly straightforward feehngs of White said daughter/father affecUon towards "And you're domg a lot to help her Steve, but Steve is not her father He parents, too," said Tract's Dad, and is sleepmg with her He ts a boyfriend, that was the end of that an mamorato, a lover, who has won her heart by treating her hke a daughter and posmonmg himself as a father Agmn, the catch is that he ts sleeping Time passed and what was only a hope ts now about to happen Steve with her The web of feehng would be White ts talong Tracl to New York City) more or less straightforward after lunch he ts going to meet a Yes, yes mdeed Steve ts going to a con- transference of affectlon-for-father- slxteen-year-old-gtrl wtth that dense, ventton about oil leasmg and the deple- feehngs mto romanUc feehngs, which smooth skin that only children have uon allowance The thmg lasts four is not rare, except for two httle thmgs They would go CRAZY He looks days, but Steve only has to stay for one first, m terms of her feehngs for Steve, around the room at the representatwes session, so he's totally set with his ht- she really feels as ff he ts her father, not of od compames and white-shoe law tie Tract hke her father, and second, he appeals firms What do they know9 Really, As it happens, she does not even to her not because he is reviving long have they ever even hved9 Have they buried feehngs of affecUon for her ever seen how happy a s~xteen-year-old father, but rather because he is thefirst gtrl is when you take her to La Serre~ deeply comrmtted father figure she has ever known have to ask her parents if she can "stay at a friend's house" She can tell that they want her to go to New York with Steve After all, ff she does that, they certamly won't have to spend any But, agam, these are complex conmoney on an expenswe vacation for her cepts, perhaps best not even exammed that summer Tracl tells them that Steve The only thmg that really matters now will get her a room next to his at the Helmsley Palace Morn and Dad do not have further questions Just before she and Steve take off, Tracl's Dad does put m a call to Steve, however "Listen," he says, "when you're m New York, do you suppose you could pick up some Nma Raccl perfume for my wife9 A guy at the office told me It was much cheaper there than tt ts here" "Be glad to," Steve White says...

...She hoped that at this particular moment he was thinking about her, even though she knew he was really busy over in Century City...

...Oil, pretend- Tracl That feeling of largeness that he can lng to admire the old fool's incredibly see reflected in Tracl's multi-colored He met her in the bread section at poor game, even looking away when eyes is his reward, and not the after- Gelson's Cassie hated to grocery shop, the guy changes his he, and throwing noons he spends with her at his httle and Steve loved to grocery shop, so it his weekends into the trash heap for s~x condo on Manhattan Beach Boulevard was a perfect arrangement Steve loved months, and this is what he gets a In a world of eqmvocation and cun- the overflowing bounty of grocery promlse and a handshake and a stores There was so much meat and ning and an endless effort to walk chicken sandwich at the L A C C This through the swamp of adult life, Steve fish and chicken and vegetables and apis no way for the firm to treat its ace White can count on the big eyes and ples and margarine and orange juice rainmaker, its crown prince, Steve gratitude of TracI In a world of that Steve felt as If he would never run White hooded eyes and measured responses Just for old time's sake, Steve White and "let's have lunch," Steve White can starts to call Cassle at home in Toluca get a full measure of unnuxed apprecmLake to talk about how cheated he tion from TracI Wenders, and from feels But he hangs up the phone even Tracl Wenders alone before she comes on the line What's Frankly, if she wanted a Jaguar the point ? She'll just tell him he's X J-S, it would be worthwhile for what wrong, that everybody at the firm loves he gets out of knowing her him, that he's a prince of a guy not on- That is exactly what Steve White has ly at the firm but everywhere, and then always loved about children their enshe'll tell him he needs a rest Cassie thusiasuc wholeheartedness Steve has means well, but she really hasn't had had other teenage girlfriends, of the number that can help Steve for a course, and he really only had one he good long time now didn't like to this day First there were the two sixteen year olds from San Francisco that he had dated when he What does help, what really makes was a twenty-six-year-old law student Steve feel on top of the world is to take at Boalt Hall, Anme and Ann--best Traci somewhere and buy her some- friends Often, "when he felt sad, he thing great that makes her want to could still remember how Ann would do anything for him A videotape he m bed with him and read him poems set-up, a little pm from Cartier, a by Ezra Pound to chase his fears away little car, maybe a Rabbit, maybe a Toyota Cehca, and she simply worThen there was "the sixteen-year-old wonder," a tall, blond aristocrat from 12 Marlborough School named Catherine...

...If Cassie was that much of a fool, surely that was not Traci's fault . Steve White had the biggest heart of anyone Traci had ever met . If he was unfulfilled at home, he was just too nice a guy to ignore...

...That meant a lot more to her than the presents, although she liked the presents quite a lot, too . It was true that Steve White was married . Sometimes, Traci felt a little bad about that . She knew that if she were married, she wouldn't want to have her husband fooling around with a sixteenyearold . Not only that, but Traci had seen Cassie White a few times at Gelson's, and Cassie didn't really look like a bad person . Traci really wished she didn't have to hurt her like this...

...She ts m heaven Her godfather ts right there takmg care of her and "Rosemary says to be sure to keep your eye on Tract so she doesn't run off what could be wrong~ wtth any Puerto Rlcans, hke m West Back at the Helmsley Palace, back THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR JANUARY 1985 Not only that, but if people he knew Palisades, could see Tracl, they would die of jealousy Everybody always thought Steve was such a nothing with girls He didn't even have a date for the Senior Prom and now, here he is, with a girl easily as cute as any of the cheerleaders he went to school with Not only that, but she hangs on his every word She is simply madly in love The lawyers drone on about depreciation of drilling apparatus but Steve is only thmkmg about how much Tract loved getting room service, how she ate the milk and cookies while she ("Something that you noUce m these relauonshtps ts that the girls may act says Dr Paul Hyman, "but they take on the affect of a small cluld when they are with their older boyfriends They learn very qmckly that the men are mterested tn them not as adults but as children Not only are they responding to what the adults want, but they are showmg how they want to be treated They do not enter these relauonshlps to be treated hke a mature woman pampered child, who happens to have sex with the pamperer ") After the meetmg, on his way across the few blocks that separate him from Tract, Steve actually starts to hum a Bob Dylan song Appropriately enough, the words go somethtfig hke m their room, they can see the spires of St Patrick's silhouetted against the back In high school, back in Pacific New York skyhne There are mints in httle green foil wrappers on the pillow There are thick, satm ruffled covers on the bed The whole thmg would just make Camilla and Diane go crazy with jealousy, Trao thinks, and It's just plain perfect After they he m bed for a wlule, Tracl feels hungry Godfather orders more hot chocolate and a tray of cookies with him, that's all from room service He falls asleep readmg some of his boring old legal papers Tracl watches him sleep on top of the covers, watches the sky turn dark blue over St Patrick's For the tenth time that day, Tract lay next to him m bed thanks her lucky stars that she ever met this man who would make every day Fantasy Island It doesn't even really very sophlsUcated with their peers," matter about how jealous Diane and Camilla would be, and it does not really matter that Tom would kill himself with jealousy ff he knew The mmn thmg is that after a llfeUme of nobody noticing that Tmcl ts really a very good httle girl, someone finally cares She watches hts chest rise and fall and eats another cookie Fantasy Island In the mormng, Steve sets out for his meetmg He leaves Tract m Bergdorf They want to be treated as a loved, Goodman with his American Express For three hours he hears about depletion allowances, severance taxes, royalty trusts, and offshore production He stts m a windowless room at the St Regis with a group of old men m wool stats But ff they could knowW HaW If they could only know that hack m hts room She aches just like a woman Yes, and she takes just like a woman And she makes love, just like a woman But she breaks just like a little girl The irony 1S not lost on Steve, and he 1S laughing as he is singing when he gets back to the room on the thirtyfifth f o o t of the Helmsley Palace That's when his heartache begins--~ 13 lagged, a httle faugued from the the turn of events The fn, st problem is that Steve is staging the Bob Dylan song, and it 1s strange music to Trach so she looks up from her room service club sandwich to smile at him and asks what it IS "The great Bob Dylan," says Steve White "The greatest " "Oooh, I love him," Tracl says "My he says "You enjoyed it a lot last night " "I know I did," she says "But it's got a really limited menu compared with what we saw at that French Dad's got all these really old records by him I remember hearing him when I was in kindergarten Is he still alive ~'' white mice in the laboratory and right meeting, and severely disappointed by now they are hurting like hell and, exceptions to Dr Hyman's rule, they are "I'd really rather have room service," also growing like hell At dinner, at Lutece (Tracl saw it advertised in the New Yorker), between the snarls and the sea bass, Steve looks at Traci and sighs She still looks hke a child Her eyes almost comically big and sweet, restaurant I don't see any snarls or like the eyes In one of those Keene pmntmgs Her lipstick gives her a circus clown look In the ultra-sophisticated room at Lutece, she looks hke a wmf of Innocence and allure who has onion soup or anything," she says Now Steve ~s m a multiple bind He is still angry at Tracl about the neghge'e If there was one stroke which could remove from her all the dewy wandered in by mistake...

...Wait just a minute...

...But the child happens also to be a woman, so now the man has the perfect solution to his problem : a sexual relationship with a woman in which he, the man, has all the power, at least in the beginning ." Dr...

...Let them talk about sophomores at Cal State Northridge . Big f---ing deal . Steve White had lunch almost every day with people she just read about in People . He was important . Traci had even seen his name in the newspapers, and her Dad once said he was a really important lawyer in Los Angeles . So, as far as Traci was concerned, she had left the world of Tom and Terri and the losers far behind . Not only that, but Steve White was really interested in every single thing Traci did . The very first time she met him at Gelson's on Riverside and Laurel Canyon, he had asked her about those schoolbooks she was carrying in her shopping cart . She told him she was terrible in Algebra II, and he had told her right then and there a really simple rule for rationalizing factors in complex quadratic equations . He called her every day and asked her what her homework was . One day when she was totally stuck on a paper about the budget deficit,, he had done it for her and delivered it to her, in her mailbox, all typed with her name and the course in the upper right hand corner like they were supposed to be...