rebecca hell

That is a picture of my friend Rebecca; I used to work with her at the Stormy Leather factory/corporate offices, located on a particularly grimy stretch of Quesada Avenue in San Francisco's Bayview Industrial Park. She was a lot of fun, actually. In addition to processing invoices, making collection calls, and other administrative financial things, I also assisted her in the design of a lot of the sex toys she used to create. She dreamed of owning her own lingerie line called "Rebecca Hell" along with sex toys and other fun things to wear on your body (or insert into it).

For example, she was designing a slave hood one day. Now, I was already wearing a leather body harness AND a Kings Road collar WHILE processing invoices (I was helping her out on another design as well) and she walked up with the hood.

"Chad, would you mind slipping this on?" she asked, smiling, her head tilted slightly to the left.

"How could I say no?" I said, and pulled the hood over my head. She made a few measurements, and some markings, and suddenly, the phone rang. "MMMFFMMPHFF!" I managed to say, because the mouth was zipped and fastened shut.

"Sorry, babe." Rebecca undid the mouth.

"Stormy Leather, this is Chad," I answered the phone, in a slightly muffled voice. At this time the UPS guy walked in, and I had to sign for a package like that. He was used to us by that time, and he just smiled and shook his head when he saw me.

And so went a normal day at work.

Another time she was designing a ball stretcher, and once again asked me for my assistance. Sighing, I got up from my desk and walked into the bathroom. She followed me in, and helped me put it on. I really didn't care, I figured, I'm gay, she's straight, and we were so not interested in each other's genitalia.

"Ow!" I yelled, as she pulled the straps tight.

"What? What?" she asked, trying not to laugh.

"Guys aren't built like this is designed. My balls are too big for this thing."

"So how should I do it?"

"For one thing, make a bigger chamber for my balls, there's barely enough room in here for a puffy labia."

"I love you, Chad Fox. You're a friggin PORNSTAR!" Rebecca laughed. That was her nickname for me, PornStar. She thought my name sounded pornish, so she made a big sticker that said "PORNSTAR" and stuck it on my mailbox. The name stuck, and everyone there called me that.

Chad Fox Pornstar. Great. Add that to "Chad Fox Sucks Cocks" (how they taunted me in high school...and also Daigle, who repeats that constantly) and you pretty much can see how people continue to make fun of my name even in my adult life. I don't care, actually. I actually like my name.

Rebecca and I used to go hang out and lean against the cinderblock wall of the auto repair garage across the street on our breaks, and smoke cigarettes and talk about boys, sex, and growing up in Cleveland (me, obviously), and Montclair, California (Rebecca). We'd soak up the warm San Francisco sun and watch the pitbulls running loose through the neighborhood, sometimes taking up residence in abandoned cars. We'd eat lunch together out there as well...and just talk about our dreams and aspirations, and how perverted our co-workers were. I was standing next to her on September 11, 2001, and we stood on the sidewalk right there on Quesada Avenue and watched a China Air Lines jumbo jet fly overhead, flanked by two USAF F-16 aircraft. It was absolutely surreal...and a bonding moment between Rebecca and me.

Our lives were changing, forever.

Once, while driving past Montclair Plaza on I-10 in Montclair, I called Rebecca to say "I'm driving past the big huge 'M' on the 10, gurl!"

"Oh my fucking GOD I used to ditch school and hang out in the JC Penney parking lot and smoke!" she laughed.

Another time I called her from an antique train car hitched to the back of Amtrak as we rumbled through West Oakland, where she lived at the time. "Hey, I'm in your neighborhood."

"Where are you?"

"See that train rumbling through?"

"The Amtrak?"

"Yeah."

"See that wierd old car hitched to the back of it?"

"Yeah."

"See that guy on the very back waving?"

"PORNSTAR! You're a freak! What the fuck are you doing on that train?" Rebecca never knew when I was going to call her.

She also threw really dirty parties...she once invited me to a shindig in Oakland, and handed me a flyer. It said, "Cum to the Pervy Porno Pecker Party!" It was all perverted porn stars, cool Oaklanders, and a few DJ's. Too bad I had plans that night...I should have gone.

Another time she threw an insane party at the Market Street Ramada in San Francisco. I walked in, and a friend of mine who was becoming a girl but hadn't had The Operation yet, threw herself at me and said, "Hey! I'm a whore! Fuck me!"

"You still have a penis."

"You can figure it out!"

Rebecca then walked up to me, placed a shot of tequila in my hand, a beer in the other, and said "Welcome!"

Interestingly, I did sell my old Volkswagen GTI to my tranny friend and taught her how to drive stick shift, but that's a different story altogether. Teaching a tranny who has NEVER driven stickshift in her life how to drive stick on a quiet street in San Francisco's Inner Richmond District is NOT the easiest thing in the world to do. Boy were we loud. Lots of cussing and gear-grinding.

So...that was Rebecca. A hard-rocking, boy-chasing, off-the-charts creative lingerie designer, and an intelligent, irreverent soul.



Recently, Rebecca and her long-time boyfriend moved the hell out of Oakland, bought a house in beautiful Calistoga, California, located in the equally-lovely Napa Valley, just a short drive north of San Francisco and Oakland. They were in the process of restoring an old house, and they had just had a new furnace installed.

Unfortunately, it was installed incorrectly, and about 2 weeks ago, they went to bed one night and never woke up. The two of them died in their sleep; they were killed by carbon monoxide poisoning.

Rebecca waa 39 years old.

The photos I have here are from her friendster profile, which is still up, but I don't know for how much longer. Here is some stuff from her profile, completely unaltered, in her words:

Hobbies and Interests: music, fashion, weird people

Favorite Books: Anything by Magarite Durass

Favorite Movies: Terminal USA

Favorite Music: Country Teasers, The Fall, Male Nurse, Birthday Party, Butthole Surfers, The Stooges, Phantom Limbs. Old punk, old funk, old country, old blues. 70's disco and Okinawa folk.

Favorite TV Shows: Don't watch much-but love Southpark and Sex in the City

About Me: When you figure me out let me know.

Who I Want to Meet: My dog Zippo in the next life, when he comes back reincarnated as a human. We'll have a beer, and I will ask him about his nights at the Hump and Whine.

********************************

God fucking dammit, Rebecca, I can't believe you're gone. We're never going to talk dirty, or tell dirty jokes, or play with rubber penises, or make fun of certain co-workers (not you, Thomas), or jumpstart your shitty Honda with my equally-shitty GTI, or get drunk at the Ramada, or have random phone conversations...ever, ever again.

God, I'm going to miss you. :-(

Here is a photo I took...it was part of a study I was doing, but never finished the project because my camera broke. I planned on giving this to Rebecca...I was thinking of her when I took it.

Here ya go, Rebecca. Save a spot for me at the dive bar in the sky.