BEAUTY SHOP TALK

by

Vicki Charmaine Bunch

In the cultural wasteland of Axel, Texas, one spot sticks out like a sparkling doodad on the belt buckle of our mostly Baptist town--the local gym. Time flies when you're at Bodies by Brad. Before you know it, the sun's gone down and your husband calls to say he has cooked dinner--the only dish he knows--fried baloney sandwiches. So you figure you might as well hang around a while longer and help Brad fold towels.

Brad is tall, blonde and twenty-something. Strong but not too big to carry around piggy-back. Women like Brad because he's attentive. He likes the new perm, compliments you on your choice of cross trainers, can tell when you're down in the dumps. Plus, he's exotic. So unlike your husband with his pathetic baloney sandwiches. Brad cooks things like crepes and he is known in a three county area for his fabulous desserts (including the baseball cap cake he makes whenever the Rangers get into the play-offs).

Brad drinks cherry sloe gin out of a martini glass. He's more than a husband to me. Brad is my personal trainer.

I just can't help it. When he puts that tape measure around my thigh, my heart goes pitter-pat. "You've lost a quarter inch," he says, and I blush clear to my roots. I try to lose all the weight I can so Brad will pay more attention to me than he does to those sweat hogs who lean over to expose their cleavage to him at his little towel stand. I would gladly lose a hundred pounds for Brad, except then I would probably die. And then we couldn't go dancing.

Brad dances on the weekends at the Bare Hiney in Arlington. He makes $300 in tips alone. I get so jealous when I think about other women sticking their filthy dollars in his G-string. I pity those women. They have to pay to get a man to dance.

Brad dances at the gym all the time. He dreams of joining the Jacksboro cast of Riverdance when it comes to town. I would do anything to get Brad the recognition he deserves. I even wrote to Richard Simmons about him but then his Dream Maker show got canceled.

"When he calls, act fat," I had told Brad.

Simmons is incredible. How one man bawls so much, I'll never know. I wonder if Simmons realizes you have to drink Gatorade or something to replace the electrolytes you lose when you go on a crying jag like that. Losing all your electrolytes can make you really emotional, which would explain a lot.

The only time I saw Brad cry was when he didn't get the role of Stanley Kowalski in "Streetcar" at the Axel Dinner Playhouse. He disappeared for five days. We were all worried sick. Then all of a sudden he shows up, perky as a poodle. LaVerne Snodgrass swears she saw him on Oak Lawn when she took a casserole to her nephew Lance.

Showbiz is an emotional roller coaster. Believe me, I should know. "Why don't you come over to my house 'til you get yourself together," I say. "You can sleep on the bean bag chair."

But Brad is holding out for his own special miracle. And I have to settle for seeing him at the gym Monday through Friday and twice on Saturday.

All I get is a crummy baloney sandwich when I get home.