The killer makes friends with a woman he meets in a bar, a young actress who has come to the big city from the Midwest in hopes of becoming a Broadway star. Though she finds him morose and maddeningly secretive, she doesn’t in the least suspect his crimes. It is through her that he begins to realize his dream of “getting more culture.” She lends him books and takes him to art films and museum shows. Far more important, she turns him on to disco dancing. It is the era of Saturday Night Fever. The killer turns out to be a spectacularly good dancer who quickly establishes himself as king of the floor. When the woman encourages him to study dance, he throws himself into it, taking classes six days a week, advancing so quickly that he begins to think seriously about a professional career. Now his whole life is transformed. He has never been so happy. But when severe tendinitis forces him to stop dancing, he is crushed. Bitterly, he reflects that, no matter how big his talent, no matter how hard he works, because he started training too late he will never have a shot at fame.

The killer thinks a lot about John Travolta. It turns out that he and Travolta have many things in common: they share the same birthday, they are exactly the same height and weight, they each come from suburbs near Manhattan, they each won a dance competition doing the twist when they were kids, they each had a father who played football. But their mothers could not have been more different. John’s mother, an actress and singer herself, had encouraged him to pursue a career in show business, taking charge of his early training. Now, far worse than the pain in his legs, this question torments the killer: What kind of life might his have been had he had a mother like John Travolta’s?

More and more of the killer’s time is consumed in a state of rage against the star. Travolta’s high “sissified” voice singing “Summer Nights” becomes stuck in his head, driving him to distraction. Give him a way and he would kill John Travolta.

Instead he kills a fellow dance student, stalking him to his Brooklyn home after class one night. He also impulsively strangles a college student after having sex with her in Riverside Park.

The police fail to connect the four homicides thus far committed by the killer. While they remain stymied in their separate investigations, he continues to hang out with the unsuspecting actress (now just beginning to find some big-city success) and her circle of artistic young friends.