The Game

staring right back at her.
    She screamed, leaped off the couch, and ran to the hotel mirror. Her mouth hung agape as she looked her reflection in the eye.
    “Oh my God,” she said to her reflection. “I did that.”
    It was as if she had to look at herself in the mirror to make sure that what had just happened was real.
    “Whoa,” she gasped. “I did that.” She was like a little girl seeing Britney Spears for the first time. She was her own fan.
    “I just knew that it was seven!” she announced as she galloped back to the couch. Of course she knew. That was the first magic trick I learned from Mystery: If you have someone chose a number between one and ten randomly, seventy percent of the time—especially if you rush their decision—that number will be seven.
    So, yeah, I had tricked her. But her self-esteem needed a good boost.
    “See,” I told her. “You already know all the answers inside. It’s just that society trains you to think too much.” I really believed that.
    “Cool interview!” she exclaimed. “I like this interview! This has been the best interview of my life!”
    Then she turned her face toward mine, looked me in the eye, and asked, “Can we stop the tape recorder?”
    For the next fifteen minutes, we talked about spirituality and writing and our lives. She was just a lost little girl going through a late emotional puberty. She was searching for something real to hold onto, something deeper than pop fame and the sycophancy of her handlers. I had demonstrated value, and now we were moving on to the rapport phase of seduction. Maybe Mystery was right: All human relationships follow the same formula.
    Rapport equals trust plus comfort.
    However, I had a job to do. I started the tape recorder and asked the questions I’d given her at the start of the interview, plus all the other questions I had. This time she gave me real answers, answers I could print.
    When the hour was up, I stopped the tape recorder.
    “You know,” Britney said. “Everything happens for a reason.”
    “I truly believe that,” I told her.
    “I do too.” She touched my shoulder and a broad smile spread across her face. “I’d like to exchange numbers.”

After our hour was up, Britney left the room to change for an MTV interview. She returned ten minutes later with her publicist.
    As she sat down in front of the cameras, her publicist looked at me strangely.
    “You know, she’s never done that with a writer before,” she said.
    “Really?” I asked.
    “She said it was like the two of you were destined to meet.”
    The publicist and I stood next to each other in silence as the MTV interview began.
    “So you had a crazy time out the other night,” the interviewer asked.
    “Yeah, I did,” Britney answered.
    “What was the energy level like in the club when you walked in and surprised everyone?”
    “Oh, it was just crazy.”
    “And how much fun did you have?”
    Suddenly, Britney stood up. “This isn’t working,” she told the crew. “I’m not feeling this.”
    She pivoted on her heels and walked toward the door, leaving the crew and her assistants befuddled. As she passed me, the corners of her mouth turned upward, forming a conspiratorial smile. I had gotten to her. There was something deeper to Britney Spears than what the pop machine required of her.
    The game, I realized, works better on celebrities than ordinary people. Because stars are so sheltered and their interactions limited, a demonstration of value or the right neg holds ten times the power.
    In the days that followed, I thought often about what had happened. I had no illusions: Britney Spears wasn’t attracted to me. She wasn’t considering me as a potential mate. But I had interested her. And that was a step in the right direction. Pickup is a linear process: Capture the imagination first and the heart next.
    Interest plus attraction plus seduction equals sex.
    Of course, maybe this was all just self-hypnosis. For all I knew, she exchanged phone numbers with every journalist to make him feel special and ensure a good story. She probably had an answering service set up at that number specifically for gullible writers who thought they were pickup artists. Or perhaps it was a scheme of the publicist’s to make journalists think they had a special connection with her artist. Maybe I was the one being sarged, not her.
    I would never know the truth.
    I stared at that number every day, but I couldn’t bring myself to dial it. I