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place is because I buy you everything you ask for,” she reminded her, offering a smile so Loretta wouldn’t get too upset. “I’ll think about it. You have some real expensive tastes, so I guess it wouldn’t hurt if you did start makin’ your own money.” Then Maureen gave Loretta a weary-eyed look. It was the look of surrender that Loretta had come to recognize as another one of her mother’s numerous weaknesses. Loretta decided that Maureen had already given her consent to let her pursue a modeling career.
    Loretta ran up to Maureen and wrapped her arms around her waist. “Sometimes you can be the best mama in the world!”
    â€œNot so fast now. I said I’ll think about it,” Maureen sighed, knowing that she was already going to give in to Loretta’s latest demand.
    The next day Loretta ran up to Maureen again. This time she didn’t just hug her; she grabbed Maureen’s hand and covered it with hungry little kisses. “You goin’ to let me be a model or what?”
    â€œI told you I would think about it,” Maureen responded with a weary sigh.
    Each day for the next week, Loretta gently badgered Maureen until she gave in.
    â€œAll right, Lo’retta. You can try it out for a little while, but only on weekends and after school as long as it’s not too late in the evenin’ and only on the days that you don’t have a lot of homework. If your grades slip, you have to give it up.”
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    The following Saturday, Maureen began to drive Loretta around Miami in her three-year-old Taurus from one photographer to another, hoping to find one who would put together the kind of photo portfolio Loretta deserved. Loretta was hard to please, though. She decided that one photographer was too old. Even though he seemed like a nice man and he was very professional, he kept calling her “LuAnne,” which meant his memory was on the blink. A geezer like him would probably cancel appointments due to one age-related ailment after another, Loretta predicted. Another one was too fat and slovenly. Loretta didn’t think that it would be good for her image to be associated with a slob, and there was not a chance in hell that she was going to work with the one female photographer they had encountered. Had Loretta known that L. B. Spencer was a woman, she never would have made an appointment with her in the first place. A woman! A woman with so many tattoos on both arms they looked like sleeves!
    â€œMama, did you notice how long and hard that lady photographer stared me up and down? She’s a straight-up dyke,” Loretta complained with a frightened look on her face as soon as she and Maureen made it back to their car.
    â€œShe didn’t look at you any longer and harder than the other photographers did,” Maureen countered. “If you feel like that about a woman in this business, there is no tellin’ what a male photographer might try to do.”
    â€œThat’s why I need to be careful which one I decide to work with. Some of these photographers are up to no good from the get-go. They think models are stupid, so they take advantage of as many of them as they can. I read about a dumb blonde in Hollywood who was so stupid, a couple of photographers passed her back and forth until she got pregnant.”
    â€œI bet that blonde won’t let somethin’ like that happen to her again,” Maureen commented.
    â€œShe sure won’t because she’s dead. One of those photographers strangled her when she tried to blackmail him.”
    Maureen looked at Loretta and shook her head. “That’s a horrible story! Maybe we need to think this modelin’ thing through some more. I didn’t know they had photographers runnin’ around loose, takin’ advantage of young girls and then killin’ them.”
    â€œMama, you know me. You know that when somebody gets out of line with me, I tell you about it