Joe DiMaggio was a big man with slick black hair. He was a New York Yankee, the biggest baseball star there was, a monster in the batter’s box. Americans of all stripes adored him; New Yorkers revered him as an Italian saint. Mrs DiMaggio was Marilyn Monroe, the woman who wore those sexy bikinis and figure-hugging dresses with the high slits, who paraded in front of the soldiers in Korea to keep their fighting spirits high, who could draw a crowd with the wink of an eye, or a song whispered in her childlike voice. Marilyn did not love DiMaggio anymore, but had she ever really loved him? They were the perfect couple, every bit an illusion. All of America had rejoiced in their union, but Joe DiMaggio was a possessive and violent man, jealous of his wife’s popularity. Outside the diamond, he was a bad-tempered homebody and had spent their whole honeymoon watching TV. A sex symbol at his fingertips, and he’d let her go to waste for a TV show. Failing to honour her attractiveness was an affront his wife could not easily forgive.
Marilyn had fumed, not about to let some no-good husband tarnish her stardom. She needed a new target, a new passion, a new pair of hands to undress her. She needed to feel that thrill. To be desired by a man was the only thing that could make her feel alive, and electric. Marilyn had only ever existed in men’s eyes, but Joe now saw her only as a rival, pushing him from the spotlight. He no longer devoured her with his eyes or his mouth like he did at the start, he no longer bit at her rounded shoulders or her plump lips, he no longer grabbed her by the waist to pull her close to him, he no longer tousled her hair, no longer loved her, and worst of all, no longer desired her. Tonight they were going to a party hosted by her agent, Charles Feldman. He had a gift for organising the hottest, most A-list parties, attended by Hollywood stars and powerful people. The guest list was long. Joe DiMaggio hadn’t wanted to come. “I see you’re whoring it up again,” he’d remarked as Marilyn powdered her cheeks. She had not answered. She applied her eye shadow, her bright red lipstick and more perfume. Her scent was sweet and enveloping, drawing in men like butterflies to the net. She looked at herself in the mirror and blew her reflection a kiss, steeling herself for the game. She was perfect. Her dress made her breasts look amazing; firm, powerful, fatal. “Stay and watch your TV,” she’d finally responded. Joe had almost slapped her but held back. She didn’t want him there. What more could she do to humiliate him, to affront his manliness and his honour? “You’d like that, wouldn’t you honey? Oh, I’m coming. And you’d better behave yourself.” But Marilyn wasn’t listening; she was already far off, far from their dull, brutal existence, already flirting with some handsome young man who’d be secure enough in himself that he didn’t need to keep his wife in any cage.
“That’s a lovely dress,” Senator John Kennedy told her.
“Why thank you,” Marilyn replied. “I didn’t know that Jackie called you Bunny.”
“Well, she calls me a lot of things. But when I like a woman or I’m talking to a lady who inspires me, who makes me feel at ease, who’s just so beautiful and out of this world, she likes to take me down a peg by calling me Bunny.”
“You’re full of compliments, Senator Kennedy!”
“My pleasure,” he smiled.
Joe DiMaggio tried to ignore the creeping intimacy between John Kennedy and Marilyn. His wife was a harlot. He downed his fourth glass of champagne in one go. He met eyes with Jackie Kennedy. She was better at concealing her jealousy than he was. She was so elegant, so stately, a real socialite. Why couldn’t he have married a lady of her standing? A woman he wouldn’t have to be ashamed of, who wouldn’t tramp on his pride by parading in front of journalists like a doll. Joe felt threatened in front of Bunny. If Jackie called him Bunny, it was for a reason. He was a rabbit who nibbled at skirts, always looking for a hole to jump down. John Kennedy was known for his many conquests and his predilection for young starlets, for women desperately seeking attention, seeking love, for those vulnerable beauties he gobbled down without hesitation before throwing them aside like old shoes. But Marilyn knew what she wanted, despite the ditzy image that people projected onto her. She was a lioness, no less a hunter than the senator was. She wouldn’t be devoured without getting a few scratches in. She was excited. She observed the game that was playing out gently between them, what was coming so inescapably into being. He was powerful, and his winning smile caught women like flies in a trap; she was irresistible, there wasn’t a man in America who hadn’t fantasised about her. They were made for one another, she was now sure of it.
Alan Alfredo Geday