Let’s Talk About… Michael Hutchence, INXS and Giovanni Carnevale

This post is part of an ongoing Blog Series on my Patreon page about all my crushes, celebrity and personal, that have contributed to all the Book Boyfriends you know and love. The celebrity crushes are free to read, but only patrons get to read the private tales (confessions.) Check it out! And if you want to read new, unpublished content weekly, think about subscribing to my patron page! Find out about book promotions, see all my new book covers, read about my upcoming projects... be a part of the process!

After 31 books and a score of romantic heroes, I think it’s safe to say that Giovanni Carnevale is my most popular and beloved Book Boyfriend. He is, after all, the guy who launched my career in 2012, after I published Rock Star, the second book in my Groupie Series.

Without him, there’d be no me. He is a very sexy cornerstone to the mansion of sex and inclusive romance I have painstakingly built one book at a time. And for many of my readers, it all circles back to Vanni. We all get excited whenever he pops up. He is, quite simply, larger than life.

I figure the reason for this is that he was brewing for a long, long time before he hit the page.

You could say that even though fictional Vanni was born December 21, 1978, the concept of Vanni was born around 1987, because that was where Ginger, The Groupie, was just hitting her stride.

Honestly, Vanni was an amalgamation of several crushes, and we’ll get to all of them eventually, but Michael Hutchence was definitely an important part of the Triad that brought this particular character to life. (Two celebrity and one personal.)

We'll start with Michael because he came first.

Technically, Vanni was first conceived when I saw Steve Perry sauntering down into the audience to sing for a swooning fan who didn’t know what to do with herself once a sexy rocker turned his attention her way. Labor and delivery, however, happened much later - during the MTV era, when I first saw the INXS video Need You Tonight,



I was older, arguably more experienced, and would have a little more idea what to do with a male admiration than I did when I was eleven, so it packed an even bigger punch. I suddenly wanted to be a part of it. When he was whispered, "Come over here," which I maintain is one of the sexiest things that can be whispered, I was a goner. And those EYES. My God. Those eyes. I was defenseless. When he sang, I *wanted* to sing back. I turned it into a call and response song all on my very own.

So slide over here
And give me a moment
Your moves are so raw
I've got to let you know
I've got to let you know KNOW WHAT?
You're one of my kind


I need you tonight WHY?
'Cause I'm not sleeping BUT WHY ME?
There's something about you girl
That makes me sweat

I was about 17 at the time, and still waiting for my MTV, watching the popular music video channel at any and every opportunity. Like any kid from my era, these came to affect how I listened to music. Gone were the days when I could interpret the song my way. Instead, I had a visual reference to enhance my listening experience.

Back in the 80s, it didn’t ALWAYS happen that way… some videos were… distracting. But for INXS and their sexy, enigmatic lead singer, Michael Hutchence, the medium was the perfect conduit to launch them into the stratosphere.

To be blunt, Michael was living, breathing, walking, talking sex. He took the smoldering intensity of Jim Morrison and turned it up to 11. He was wild. Untamable. And, like many other folks back in the day, I had a very primal reaction ride that wild stallion for all it was worth. I wanted to be the girl he sang about. He was larger than life, and all an invisible girl like me wanted was to be important enough to catch his eye.

Could I ever be that kind of girl? When you’re 17, and the whole world is in front of you, and all those questions are still unanswered… anything is possible. This fuels the Groupie dream.

And I had plenty of time to daydream about it, particularly in 1987. MTV gave me great fodder for my budding fantasies. When I found folks whose intensity seemed to match mine, I took attention... because when it comes down to it, THAT Is what attracts me, far more than any physical attribute.

I prefer someone whose soul is on fire, because THAT is the truest temptation.



Eventually that intensity took its toll on Michael, as did his wild rocker life. He exited this world amidst rumor and speculation, which only fed his larger than life persona. Once the debris settled, we know that he died a broken 37-year-old, whose excesses finally surpassed his pain.

That inspired Vanni as well.

When I set out to write Groupie, I wanted to keep it real. Real is grittier, but it's also more interesting to me. Like, way more. I get the whole fantasy part of romance, but, as a storyteller, I needed conflict to keep me going after they get together. I could write a super explicit sexcapade and that would scratch a specific itch, but it hardly motivates me to sit down at the computer and crank out 100K words. In fact, it left me wondering, where do we go from HERE? N' I'm all for scratching those itches, but stories demand buildup and payoff in equal measure.

Suddenly it occurred to me THAT is where the story really lay hidden, out of sight. Waiting.

I was raised on Moonlighting and Luke & Laura, remember. I knew that getting them together could risk the loss of dramatic tension – which is death to a storyteller. Rewriting the same sex scene over and over again would make for some kickass spank bank material, but a redundantly boring book, at least for me, Reader #1.

And I know this because I TRIED this, and the story that demanded to be told could not be denied.

Confession, and a spoiler if you haven’t yet read my Groupie trilogy, I struggled greatly over whether they should sleep together right away or not. It was something I deliberated, much like the ending to the first book.

Originally, I had planned for my heroine, Andy, to meet Vanni just as his star started to rise. They would have a crazy affair, driven from city to city, and the feelings would just organically grow and voila, end of book HEA.

My hand to God, that was my original intent.

I quickly grew bored of this concept, right around that first rendezvous in New York City. It was his birthday, she was in town, and finally they were going to act on this crazy flirtation/infatuation and do the deed. They were ready. *I* was ready. I planned for the whole night to be romantic and fulfilling.

Then, I sat down to write and... nothing. The closer they got to doing the deed, the more I wanted to delay it. I wanted to savor that moment when she was the only thing he wanted. I knew it was too good to last last. That's what makes it a fantasy. Because that’s not real. Not when you love a rock star. Especially when you’re some no-name nobody from Tennessee and he’s been thrust into a world of riches, excesses and instant fame. A booty call turning into some great love affair, especially with a noted manwhore who got to scratch his itch and satisfy his curiosity right out of the gate? Unrealistic. She had to give him something he wasn't expecting... something like kicking him out of bed.

Due to what I was going through personally at the time, I knew I couldn’t write it the way I originally wanted to, even though I really wanted to. I was in desperate need of my own fantasy fulfillment when I was writing the first book, which is how the concept ever took shape in the first place. But I knew down deep in my soul that if I had had a rendezvous with my own crush, real life would squash my gratification before I even had a chance to bask in the afterglow.

I wanted to postpone that as long as humanly possible.

It was then that the duplicity began to seep in. Loving someone you don’t know, that nobody knows, but everyone wants, is a tough gig. It’s real damned easy to fall in love with an image, like some bad boy of rock and roll.

But can you hang when the trappings of fantasy fall away and there’s nothing left but a mortal man who is flawed, selfish and imperfect, just like any other dude?

Can you withstand the rumor and speculation, the misleads required to keep his image marketable?

Can you sit on every single painful disappointment?

To me, this was where the story of Groupie was hidden. I knew what it was like to be the secret guys kept, having some experience with this as The Fat Girl, which I’ll go over in my personal Let’s Talk About.

There’s so much about loving a rocker that they don’t cover in a traditionally HEA. I set out to tell the truth, sorta, inadvertently if I had to. Because I had to. And I could do this because I had loved rock stars, broken, dirty, wild rock stars – men I had always wondered if I was woman enough to tame.

Apparently, it was a story that resonated.

And… it’s not done.

Stay tuned….

Let's Talk About... David Bowie.

This post is part of an ongoing Blog Series on my Patreon page about all my crushes, celebrity and personal, that have contributed to all the Book Boyfriends you know and love. The celebrity crushes are free to read, but only patrons get to read the private tales (confessions.) Check it out! And if you want to read new, unpublished content weekly, think about subscribing to my patron page! Find out about book promotions, see all my new book covers, read about my upcoming projects... be a part of the process!

It’s not uncommon for me to crush on characters more than the actors who portray them. For instance, my crush was Luke Spencer, not Tony Geary. (Sorry, Tony.) I’m into David Addison, not necessarily Bruce Willis. (Although he has made me crush on more than a few of his characters.) I crush on Captain Jack Sparrow, not necessary Johnny Depp, Jack Tripper, not necessarily John Ritter, Tony Stark instead of Robert Dow-.... no, no, no, bad example. (We'll get to him later...)

If an actor is really good, the character he plays becomes another person entirely, completely unique and appealing in their own way.

Such was the case with David Bowie, Jareth and the movie Labyrinth.



Like many kids of the 80s, I saw this Jim Henson-M.C. Escher-David Bowie acid trip back in the day. It was one of the handful of movies I actually got to see in the theater, for which I am eternally grateful - as it is one of my favorite movies of all time. I'm glad I was able to experience it in such a grand and pic way.

I was a BIG fan of the Muppets when I was a kid. Like, the bestie and I watched the Muppet Show religiously. (Beaker was our favorite.)

When I moved away from my bestie in 1982, and we were forced to do most of our communication through the written word, we used Muppet stationary to talk to each other.

I pay homage to that humble start here.



By 1986, I was 16 and a little more “grown-up,” so I was ready to tippy-toe down a road that incorporated sex, rock and romance into my head-trippy Muppet fascination.

It would be years and years later before Seth Macfarlane, Robot Chicken, Seth Rogan, et al, would take all of that a bit TOO far.

Back then, we had Ziggy Stardust to ferry us across the choppy waters of adolescent curiosity. We had the Thin White Duke. We had the Starman.

We had David Bowie.

David brought an otherworldly sexiness to the antagonistic role of Jareth, the Goblin King, right down to his infamous codpiece. There was the giant hair and the unapologetic use of makeup, both lipstick AND the eye shadow that showcased his piercing eyes, one brown and one blue, an anomaly I would later learned was the result of a fight. (His eye wasn't brown at all, but permanently dilated.) Which goes to show you, what someone else does to damage you might end up being the most fascinating quality you possess.

I needed to hear that at 16. And 21. And 32. And 49...



Bowie was simply cool.

But it was the way he played Jareth with smoldering obsession that left me breathless. Luke Spencer had already primed this particular pump, I was just waiting for someone to marry it with rock music.



Add to the androgyny that Prince had already introduced and I was a goner, so much so that had I been in Sarah’s shoes (the equally girlcrushworthy Jennifer Connelly,) I might have been like, “Toby, who?” and just traded boring teen life in for being Queen of the Goblins.

It wasn't like he was going to kill him FFS, he was just going to turn him into a goblin. Isn't it a bit creasturist to suggest this was a BAD thing?

Plus all of her friends were there anyway, and her parents seemed pretty content going out and living life child-free, which is what got everyone in such a pickle in the first place.

It just would have been hard to resist, s'all I'm sayin'.



My fascination with Jareth reminded me of why vampires scare me. They will be the death of you, but they are just so appealing, compelling and seductive, you kind of jump willingly right into the web, offering yourself on a platter, ready to self-destruct for the taste of one kiss.

So, when I finally got around to writing about vampires, I decided there was really only one prototype I could use as a reference.

Today, get MY IMMORTAL for free, and see how David Bowie, or, really, Jareth, dug himself down deep into my psyche about the kind of forbidden fruit that could cost you everything.

And thank you, David, for making my coming of age a little more cosmic.

Let's Talk About... Patrick Swayze (and a free ebook!)

This post is part of an ongoing Blog Series on my Patreon page about all my crushes, celebrity and personal, that have contributed to all the Book Boyfriends you know and love. The celebrity crushes are free to read, but only patrons get to read the private tales (confessions.) Check it out! And if you want to read new, unpublished content weekly, think about subscribing to my patron page! Find out about book promotions, see all my new book covers, read about my upcoming projects... be a part of the process!

David Addison wasn’t my only crush in 1985. It was also the year I was introduced to fellow Texan and future "Sexiest Man Alive" Patrick Swayze.

I boarded the Swayze train a couple of years before everyone else took notice of him in Dirty Dancing, and it was all because of my long-standing girl-crush on Genie Francis, who played Laura Vining Webber Baldwin Spencer Cassadine yadda yadda yadda.

By 1985, Genie had departed General Hospital and its fictional town of Port Charles, with Laura riding off into the sunset with Luke to live a whole new adventure as they began their family off-screen. Genie, however, kept busy working on other acting projects.

She was cast as Brett Main on the sweeping miniseries North & South, based on the books written by John Jakes. I hadn’t read the books, and I wasn’t especially fond of war movies, but if Genie was going to be a part of this 6-part television saga, that was good enough for me. #girlcrush

It wasn’t that much of a gamble. ABC pulled out all the stops bringing Jakes’s books to life, which included hiring many big stars to bring the story of a Civil War friendship to life. Johnny Cash, James Stewart, Elizabeth Taylor, Gene Kelly, Linda Evans, Peter O’Toole, Olivia De Haviland and yes, even Wayne Newton, all contributed to this miniseries to end all miniseries. Its music was scored by Bill Conti, the sets were lavish, using these amazing historical locations. (I read somewhere that all they had to do to prepare parts of Charleston was toss some dirt on the streets.) And the costumes, my God. Everything was stunning.



But, again, I didn’t care about any of that. I only cared to see Genie in her new role. I settled in to watch the first episodes with high hopes that were quickly dashed. I knew from my handy dandy TV Guide what part she played, but the very first episode had a very different actress in the role… as it was Brett when she was a child.

I didn’t even get to see Genie at all until Episode Three, but by then I had found other reasons to tune in to the show. One of those reasons was named Patrick Swayze.

I hadn’t seen the Outsiders or Red Dawn, so he was unknown to me. I got to know him first as Orry Main, a Southern Carolina planter whose life would drive most of the plot.

We pick up on Orry’s story in the summer of 1842, when Orry is headed off to West Point to become a soldier. He meets the beautiful Madeline Fabray (played by the beautiful Leslie-Ann Down) on the way to the train station. Once he reaches north, he meets a cocky yankee named George Hazard.

These two relationships would alter the course of Orry’s life and drive most of the saga. The engine of this particular locomotive was, of course, the Civil War.

Having been raised a southerner, there’s a deep and abiding uneasiness that comes with the subject matter. We’re both taught to be proud of where we come from and face the grueling and vexing realization that the things our countrymen fought and died for were wrong.

There’s a lot of shame in that. More than a few folks with deep roots to the south can pull up records of their ancestors who literally owned their fellow human beings. For those of us who have evolved enough to know there is never any reason or excuse for this, it’s a tough pill to swallow. Hindsight is 20/20 as they say, and you can't really escape the horror of it as you grapple with what character you might identify with the most. Obviously I likened myself to those characters who took the risks involved to go against the grain.

In fact, I’d say of all the characters in North & South, the most challenging character was Virgilia Hazard, George’s abolitionist sister, brought to life brilliantly by Kirstie Alley.

Virgilia is on the side of right, but she’s cray. She was a smart, strong woman forced to find her place in a man's world, and didn't have much use for the social trappings that came with her lowly station as a female back in the 1800s. She constantly steps in it trying to do the right thing, much to her own detriment. But in her we see this resolute character who believes, rightly and unequivocally, slavery is an evil that needs to be destroyed, and she’s willing to risk EVERYTHING, and I do mean everything, to do that very thing.



It’s uncomfortable. The bad guys are deplorable, and play their parts so well I can't even WATCH them in anything else without holding a serious grudge. (Looking at you, Teri Garber and Phillip Casnoff.) The good folks suffer. Endlessly. The injustice of slavery slaps you right in the face as we get to see the brutality of it, both with overt violence and the watchful eye of passive indifference that posed as the cultural norm.

But it’s so damned engrossing I’ve watched both books and all 12 episodes twice a year since I bought the first VHS combo set. I truly love it, mostly because the bromance between Orry Main and George Hazard is irresistible, as they tried to hold onto friendship and honor in a time when it was nearly impossible to do either. These two friends on opposite sides of the battle lines have to find a way to maintain the close relationship they share, that started before the world started to change.

It gives you a sense of what it must have been like in that time, brother against brother. It was an unwinnable war, because we had to fight each other to do that very thing.

But if all that got too heavy, there was some 80s night-time TV drama, sex and eye candy to help salve the wound.

I noticed Patrick early on, because how could you not? It meant a lot to me that his character hated slavery and took a stand against brutality. (Not as much as Genie's character Brett, which makes me even prouder, as she befriended the people they used to enslave, she set them free and stepped up to do the work of her own plantation. She even put her life on the line to save her best friend Semiramis, who was once her slave, but became her sister of choice.)

But Orry had ethics and morals even as a pre-Civil War southerner, when his views were still slanted due to his upbringing. I remember when he returned from West Point and met Salem Jones, the new overseer his father had hired to get work out of the slaves. He found out Salem had been sleeping with (i.e., raping) Semiramis, and brutalizing her brother, Priam, whenever he naturally fought against it, and Orry was D.O.N.E. with that kind of thing. He took a stand against his very own father, who basically told him to remember his place, that he wasn’t running the plantation yet and had no business butting into it while he was off playing soldier. We saw how conflicted Orry became when he came face to face with his best friend, George, who had NO illusions how wrong slavery was. Orry felt compelled to defend the situation even when he himself didn’t agree with it… but he was forced to hold his tongue out of honoring his own father and his entire way of life. Seeing how he struggled with this and grappled with his own moral code and the traditions under which he was both raised and prospered, made him a good guy… or at least a good-er guy than people like Salem Jones or Justin Lamont, a neighbor of the Mains who is every bad thing you think of when you envision slave owners.

That Orry befriends a northerner at the dawn of his becoming a man of his own, then, becomes his saving grace, and you hang in there to see that change. You champion this friendship, this bromance, because you WANT to see him overcome. You want to see him legit turn into the “Good Guy.”

Patrick plays Orry with amazing depth. He isn’t just a purty face (though he is a purty face.) He plays the Southern Gentleman to a T, with poise, grace and elegance. (The outfits didn’t hurt. I was already primed from Prince to love a man in ruffles with long, luscious hair, and here Orry sported boots and capes and these beautiful silk vests. It was beautiful. HE was beautiful.)

In short, Orry made me give a damn about this character even though he fought on the wrong side. I understood him even if I didn't always agree with him, and it made all the "wins" that he had, where he DID come to terms with the changing world around him, that much more gratifying.

I loved Orry so much that it was hard for me to transition to Johnny Castle years later when I watched Dirty Dancing. Gone was the Southern Gentleman and in its place was a tough Northerner who danced to survive.

I got on board after one of THE sexiest scenes ever to be shot in any movie ANYWHERE.



I ended up paying homage to this scene in Beauty and the Bitch. Mine wasn’t as sexy as that, but it wasn’t written in any way to compete. I wouldn’t even dare.

By the end of Dirty Dancing, I was a Swayze fan. I went into Roadhouse a fan of both Patrick AND Sam Elliot, another crush that started in 1985 thanks to the movie Mask, because I mean, really....

I fell in love with bikers and gravelly voiced older men all in one fell swoop.

Roadhouse would go on to HEAVILY influence the first book I wrote, which has now become Chasing Thunder. Way back in 1989, I cast Patrick as Cooper “Snake” Scoggins, my romantic hero whose gravitas was equal to my badass heroine, M.J., who was in the unenviable position of trying to save her from herself (and Sam as her dad, who was one the main reasons she had both had to and refused to be saved.)

***

M.J. was as mad as a wet hornet when they finally pulled to a stop in the high desert of San Bernardino County. She flew off the bike and turned on Snake in a rage. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” she shouted.

“I was coming to your rescue,” he explained casually as he dismounted. “White knight,” he said, pointing to himself. “Noble steed,” he added, pointing to the bike.

“When did I ever ask you to save me?” she demanded.

“Darlin’, you were pole dancing in a seedy strip club. That’s not a cry for help. That’s a bloodcurdling scream.”

“I had it all under control,” she informed him coldly, and he held up a hand.

“Oh, I could tell. Only the best dancers get dragged off to a back room somewhere.”

She didn’t have time for this. She pulled out her phone. Snake was quick to grab it. “Gonna call your new partner in crime?” he asked as he held her phone out of reach. “Or should I say new partner in fighting crime? Since when do you work with cops, M.J.?” “Since never!” she spat as she jumped for the phone. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Please,” he scoffed. “Bob from Scottsdale? Give me a fucking break. I nearly had to tie him down when that guy grabbed you. So who is he, M.J.?” Snake demanded in a softer tone, his eyes angry and hurt.

“Are you serious?” she exclaimed. “That’s what this is about? You’re jealous?”

“Fuck you,” he said in a cold voice. They had a brief staredown before she backed off. He was a bastard for forcing her hand like this. Time was of the essence now. She still had one very important thing to do and had to depend on a wiseass cop to do it. She’d cave a little, and make him pay later. “Fine. He’s a cop. But I only used him to get inside the building. He was nothing more than a convenient tool, emphasis on tool, to execute the plan. Can I have my phone back now?”

The phone rang as he held it. He powered it down and then tossed it out of view into the dark shadows.

“I can’t believe you did that,” she said. She started to round the bike, but he grabbed her by both arms. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

“I know one thing I couldn’t have done,” he said. “I couldn’t have gone one more night without doing anything.”

She saw the holster inside his jacket. “Snake, no.” She tried to wrench away, but he pulled her back against his solid chest. He cupped her face in one hand, drawing her closer.

“Like I ever had a choice. Can’t you see what you do to me, M.J.?” Her eyes met his.

“Can’t you see that if you ever got hurt—” She couldn’t even finish the thought. She looked away, so he tipped her chin with his thumb.

“Hurt?” he repeated. “I never know if you’re okay or if you need help. If you’re alive and well or dead somewhere in a ditch after pissing off the wrong person. You get hurt, you don’t tell me. You’re in danger, you take off and say nothing. It’s like having you and losing you all at the same time. And I never know which is which until you show up on my front door. You don’t think that hurts?”

She swallowed hard. She needed him, every bit as much as she needed to protect him. She had been weak because she missed those big strong arms holding her together, and the familiar scruff of his beard against her face that made her feel at home no matter where they happened to be. When she felt unsure, she knew she could draw from his endless well of strength. She knew it was unfair. But he had never sent her away for good.

Maybe if he did they would both be better off.

But it was the last thing she wanted as he lifted her up against him. The shirt she was wearing fell open, and her breasts swayed free against the thin cotton of his shirt. He groaned as he carried her back to the bike.

He sat astride while she straddled his hips. His hands slipped into the open shirt, sliding behind her and cupping her ass as he pressed her closer, grinding her down onto his lap. He captured her bottom lip tenderly in his teeth as he ended a kiss, and their eyes locked and held. “You break my heart, M.J.,” he murmured as he pulled away. “And only you can put it together again.”

***

Yeah, I poured all of my love for Patrick in Cooper. My love for Patrick helped me fall in love with Vida Boheme in 1995, ten years after Orry, developing my first girlcrush on a boy dressed like a girl. He played a drag queen so convincingly it was a shock to see him as a man anywhere in that movie.



And I can’t EVEN with the movie Ghost anymore. I haven’t watched it since he died. So, it was my honor to pay homage to him in the only real way I can… through my own creative work.

You can get to know Snake in CHASING THUNDER. If you have Kindle Unlimited, you can read it as part of your subscription, but today it’s free for everybody.

Enjoy! I know I sure did. ;)

Let's Talk About... David Addison

This post is part of an ongoing Blog Series on my Patreon page about all my crushes, celebrity and personal, that have contributed to all the Book Boyfriends you know and love. The celebrity crushes are free to read, but only patrons get to read the private tales (confessions.) Check it out! And if you want to read new, unpublished content weekly, think about subscribing to my patron page! Find out about book promotions, see all my new book covers, read about my upcoming projects... be a part of the process!

If there’s anyone to thank for this particular blog series, it’s David Addison.

I *met* David in 1985, when “Moonlighting” first debuted. It was a genius show brought to us by Glenn Gordon Caron, which basically launched Bruce Willis’s career. It was witty, exciting, sexy and romantic – it was one of those shows that had a little something for everybody and the first few seasons had some of the finest writing ever seen on network TV. It was a series fueled by sexual chemistry, and every week we all tuned in to see “Will they or won’t they?”

They finally did, and some will tell you that was where the show jumped the proverbial shark.

Re-watching it, especially knowing what I know on the show business side of things, I don’t think it was the sex so much. (In fact, where David and Maddie finally get together remains one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen on TV.)



Basically Cybil Shephard, who played Maddie Hayes, got pregnant, which one could argue accelerated the timeline for the two characters consummating their relationship and led to a bunch of unfortunate storylines to write a pregnancy into plot.

It was like a giant game of hot potato, except we all got burned.

But for nearly three glorious seasons, I had an ongoing love affair with the wise-cracking David Addison, a well-meaning guy’s guy who could have had me by the pilot. I never understood Maddie’s reluctance to jump him at the first opportunity. I was a goner from the first smirk. He was sexy, he was funny – God, was he funny. When he slicked back his hair, donned those Wayfarers and started to sing for absolutely no reason at all, I was reduced to a teen puddle. He made life fun.



Maddie, on the other hand, often came across as a giant stick-in-the-mud. She didn’t care for any of the things that made me love the guy. In “My Fair David,” she even attempted an unfortunate makeover, to make him more responsible and serious. A “grownup.” Part of that? He couldn’t sing. Even just one "do-wap" and he'd have to fire a couple of their underworked employees. But David... without singing? You might as well tell the sun not to shine. And, of course, she had to bust his balls (gleefully) about it.



It was enough to make Agnes Dipesto, their eccentric but mild-mannered receptionist, turn against her beloved boss. “You de-Daved him,” she accused, telling Maddie that she really didn't think she liked her anymore.

Hell, it was one of the reasons I never really liked her ever. I mean... how could she not love him, every single do-wap and all?



Like Dipesto, I loved David exactly the way he was. Just when he would pop off with some sexist comment that made you want to smack him, he’d say or do something so sweet it would make you swoon. In “In God We Strongly Suspect,” we find out that it’s David, not Maddie, who believes in the Big Guy Upstairs.



He’s horrified to find out she doesn’t believe in God, so much so he puts in a good word for her himself.



It’s not every day you’ll find a guy like David, who both wants to get into your pants and pray for your eternal soul. And that SMIRK. My God. I still haven't developed a defense against it. (Mostly because I haven't wanted to.)

From the start, the writing on this show was absolute brilliance. They broke all sorts of rules, including breaking the fourth wall at every opportunity. That, I think, was what REALLY hooked me in. It was like David was looking at and talking to ME, some overweight, acne-ridden fifteen-year-old smack-dab in the middle of nowhere.



God, he was perfect. Then and now, David Addison might just be my Absolute Guy. He wasn't perfect, which is a key theme in the guys I seem to pick. Perfect men intimidate me. There's no competing with that. Flawed guys? Gimme, gimme, gimme. A fixer-upper? I got all the tools. Let me pop the hood and tinker around a bit. And I wouldn't De-Dave him like Maddie did. The Daviest parts about him were always my favorites.

David Addison has inspired every smirking smartass I have created, but I think if we're going to find his DEEPEST influence, it's Caz Bixby. In Masked in the Music, my hero Rudy meets Caz for the first time, but the echo of David Addison was *everywhere.*

“That was brutal.”

I shot to my feet and spun around, peering into the darkness just beyond the light’s edge. I saw the bright tip of a burning cigarette, though when the smell hit me, I knew it wasn’t an ordinary cigarette. The man stepped from the shadows, coming more into view. He sported a tux like nobody’s business, tall and beautiful, roughly around thirty, with sun-bleached sandy hair that flopped over one of his incredible amber eyes. He offered the joint.

I didn’t refuse it. When other people walked through the doors, he motioned for me to join him in the shadows, where we could partake in private.

Out of sheer curiosity, I followed. I gave him back the joint and he inhaled deeply. “God, I hate these things. Fucking boring as hell. That’s why I bring my own party favors,” he grinned before he exhaled a cloud of fragrant smoke.

“Then why do you come?” I asked as I took another hit of my own.

He shrugged. “It’s a good cause. Besides, wearing a tux, dancing with all the pretty girls and drinking from a full bar all night isn’t a bad way to make a living.”

I peered at him even closer in the low light. Why did he look so familiar?

He answered my unspoken question with an outstretched hand. “Caz Bixby. In case you’re wondering where you’ve seen me before.”

My eyes opened wide. His reputation had definitely preceded him. He was the one who had demolished an entire presidential campaign when he came out as the potential first lady’s boy toy for hire. He was probably the best known male escort on the planet, hence why he’d be working a party like this one.

I took his hand, which he held for just a beat longer than necessary. “And you are…?” he asked with one cocked eyebrow.

“Rudy Renfro,” I supplied. His smirk deepened.

“Please tell me you have a job worthy of such a celebrity name,” he teased.

“I play guitar in a band,” I dismissed easily.

“A rocker,” he surmised as he glanced me over. “Not what I would have guessed. Good for you.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know what I am anymore.”

He chuckled again as he took one last hit, before he snubbed it out on the stone wall. “You’re not in love with that pretty girl, you know that much.”

“Yeah,” I muttered as I glanced back at the patio.

He clapped his hand on my shoulder. “Hey. Don’t beat yourself up. You can’t help it you’re gay.”

My eyes shot to his. Even in the shadows of the darkened gardens, I could see how they pierced through my armor to see right to the very heart of me. It was one thing for my sister to see it. She’d known me her entire life. It was another for Tony to see it, because he could see physically how I reacted to him. But a stranger I just met? I stammered as I tried to find my footing. “I’m not… I just… what?”

He pulled me into the crook of his arm. “Don’t panic, Rudy Renfro. Your secret is safe with me. And before you drive yourself crazy with the question, no. I don’t think everyone can tell. But it’s my job to see what people lack so that I can give it to them. And dude, your frustration is full-tilt.”

My gaze narrowed. “Is this where you give me your card and tell me to call you for a little alone time?”

With the flick of his wrist, he offered his card.

“Sorry,” I said as I pushed away. “I don’t think I can afford your rates.”

He chuckled as he followed me through the darkened garden. “You are probably right about that, young Rudy. I’ve never been in one but I’ve heard bar bands don’t pay for shit.”

I made a face he couldn’t see. He could read an awful lot for such a short acquaintance. “So I guess you’re just wasting your time.”

I could feel his shrug. “Maybe it’s the mood of the evening, but I’m feeling kind of charitable.”

I spun around to face him. “I’m not interested, okay?”

His grin deepened. “Is it the whole virgin thing, or are you just that tied up in knots over the guy who won’t return the favor?” I gaped at him. He stepped forward.

“So it is what’s behind Door #2. Again, your secret is safe with me.” He put his card into my breast pocket. “But if you ever need a friend, especially one who has many friends in the music biz, call me. No strings. No hourly rate.”

I cocked an eyebrow. “You mean you’d fuck me for free?”

He chuckled as he stepped forward, till we were practically nose to nose. “I don’t give away freebies to men,” he assured as he bent closer, his mouth above mine. “But you remind me of someone I used to know. And I guess I kind of like you, baby.”

With that he kissed me. It wasn’t sexual—just a peck. It floored me all the same as he patted the pocket where his card now hid and left me alone in the darkness.

If either David OR Caz were real men, I'd be in big trouble. I'm not Maddie, not by a long shot. I'd have jumped them practically from the time they said hello.

And because they're imperfect, not bound by conservative, traditional rules, they'd let me. But because they're good guys, deep at the core, I know I'd be safe.

And maybe that's the biggest appeal of all. Guys like this aren't out to protect us from ourselves. They can barely protect us from THEM. And it's what we all want anyway so... what's the problem? Let's give in to those temptations and have a little fun... cuz what else is living for if you're not singing, laughing... or feeling good?

Thank you, David Addison... for DECADES of feeling good.