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Plumage From Pegasus: The Publishing House Always Wins
by Paul Di Filippo

“Maxim, the raucous men’s magazine, has never been shy about putting its
name out there. But nothing compares to its latest brand extension, which
will affix the Maxim name to a new hotel and casino on the Las Vegas
Strip.”

—”Lad Mag and a Brand in Las Vegas,” by Lorne Manly, The New York
Times, June 5, 2006.

****

I was in a truly crappy mood that night. I had been demoted to the
ranks of the third-tier showgirls in the “Hotties of Zenna Henderson’s The
People Revue” just because I had shown up for rehearsal drunk three
times in a row. And a pay cut just added to the sting. But even though I was
so far back on the big stage that the rubes in the audience could barely
make out my pasties, I still had to force an unending cheek-stretching
smile. The thong of my spacesuit costume was riding up my butt and my
feet hurt in my battered Capezios. But I kept up with the other girls anyhow,
kicking and prancing to beat the band.

The last thing I wanted was to lose my job here at the F&SF Casino.
Vegas was a cruel town, crueler than ever since the New York publishers
had moved in, and I knew that if I blew off this position, after all my other
notorious failures in this incestuous town, I could easily start falling and
never stop.

The song-and-dance number seemed to stretch on forever. Some
washed-up pop tart at the front of the stage, dressed like an Amish
schoolgirl—if Amish schoolgirls wore fishnets and bustiers—was singing
about Earth boys being major studs, and every sour note she shrieked
made me wince. But finally all us dancers made our exit offstage and back
to the dressing room in a fog of female sweat and perfume.

But even then I wasn’t free for the night. I started changing into the
house’s standard cocktail waitress uniform. It was modeled along the lines
of what some babe wore in a book called Glory Road.

Jeanie, who was the closest thing to a friend I had among the troupe,
said, “What’s with the queen of the cosmos getup, Ava?”
 “Aw, I took on a shift hustling drinks. Gotta make up the money I lost
somehow.”

“Could be worse. Maybe you’ll get to meet some generous
high-rollers.”

“Hunh! Not likely. This joint is strictly penny ante. Now if I was working
at The New Yorker or the Atlantic Monthly or even Granta, then maybe I’d