Mask of A Legend (19 page)

“That’s not fair. I mean, if a person tells you that they have something to say to you, and then they don’t say it, then why do they say anything at all?”

“Well, maybe I just want to build your aspiration to high level, and your excitement. Listen, Legend, I have to go and see Dina right now, but what I want you to do is start packing. Tomorrow you have one photo session to do, and then your schedule is free. So, start packing, and then rest, because LA will take a lot out of you.” He then turned away from her sight and walked toward the door.

Legend suddenly walked fast up to him. “Stephen, why is it that you treat me so well, and with Dina, you hardly guide her with her modeling career?”

Stephen turned around to face her. He gave a deep breath, and looked at her eyes, reached out his hand and caressed her face. “Because you’re a special girl, and I want to make sure that your career is just right.”

She turned away from him and gazed at the balcony.

She turned back to face him and said with great hesitation, “Stephen, I know we’re just friends, but I want your honest opinion. This has been bugging me for a long time, but here it goes. . . . I know that I’m an idol to a lot of people, but–” She gave a deep breath. “Alright, I want to know, am I the most beautiful girl you’ve ever seen?”

He gave out a small smile, it was like he found it funny. “Legend, where did that come from?”

“I don’t know . . . it’s just I’m beautiful to everyone else, at least I think I am, and I know you judge many girls by their looks. So, I know that you’ll be honest, and that’s why I want to know if you find me beautiful. I know Mark does, and everyone else, but I want your honest opinion.”

He opened the door up and walked out into the hallway. “Legend, you know damn well that I always say you’re beautiful. As a matter of fact, out of all the girls I have known in the past, I gave, and still give you the most compliments out of them all. . . . If you don’t believe me, then try looking in the mirror sometimes, and you’ll know that answer.”

Legend walked out into the hallway. “It’s not that simple. Stephen, I have to talk about something important with you. I mean, I know you have a date with Dina, but this is majorly, highly important, and it involves you and me.” Stephen widened his eyes.

He knew it was about her liking him. But his positive outlook caused him to make a mistake as he asked with a pushy and confident voice, “You like me, don’t you?”

A shocked look came to her beautiful face. Stephen was so sure she would come up to his face and give him a kiss. “Well, um, no,” she replied. “How dare you try to figure out my mental thoughts with such a pushy tone? That was rude and highly conceited of you to say. But of course I should have known you would say something like that, only because you’re a pig.” His smile turned straight. “I wanted to talk to you, because I have to say something important to Mark. I wanted you to call him up for me, and tell him that you think I love him. Therefore, he would say his feelings about me to you, and then you could tell me, so I wouldn’t sound like an ass when I say ‘I love you’ to him.” She then paused, took a breath and added, “Stephen, you know how I feel about you. You know that I want to just be friends, but of course, knowing that you’re a pig, and are only looking for beyond beautiful girls, you had to try again at me, and see if my feelings changed. Well, Stephen, they haven’t, I want only to be friends with you, and that’s it!”

“Listen to me, Legend, I know you have some sort of feelings for me, and don’t say you don’t. I know you have to have some care for me, but you still hold up your guard, and keep me away from your feelings.” His voice grew louder at every word he said. “You are–”

“No, none of that is true. You know damn well that I’m with Mark, and you’re with Dina, and for that, our feelings are not for each other, they are for them.”

He entered her hotel room again and closed the door.

“No, Legend, I see the way you look at me sometimes, especially when we’re alone together, talking about anything. You give so many signs, so many signs that I thought I didn’t know the definition of. But now I realize that you do care for me, I know the definition of you.”

She ran over to her balcony and entered it.

“What are you talking about? I’m yelling at you, how could you know, right now, that I like you, if I’m angered toward you?” she shouted.

He lit up a cigarette quickly.

“Because, if you didn’t like me, or have feelings for me, then you wouldn’t have been so defensive when I said that you liked me. As a matter of fact, we wouldn’t be having this argument right now. As a matter of fact, you wouldn’t have allowed me to come back in here and yell at you, but you did, only because you’re in denial of your feelings toward me!” he shouted at the top of his lungs.

“That is B.S.: you think that you’re so good at judging another person’s character, when you’re directly the opposite. You know, we always have stupid arguments like this one, and for that, I let you in because I’m used to arguing with you.”

“Answer me one thing, Legend, one thing, and then we’ll forget that this argument ever happened. Why, of all people, did you ask me if I find you beautiful, when I always say that I do? And don’t tell me it’s because I know beauty when I see it. I didn’t buy that at all.”

She looked about, and around the New York skyline: she didn’t know what to say. Her confusion grew like a tumor, but she knew she had to say something quick, so he wouldn’t think he stomped her and caught her in a lie about her feelings. “Because, well, um, because I know you always look at girls, and for that–” She paused. It was the wrong thing she started to say, so she switched her words. “Because I wanted to see if you could say that to me again!”

“But why?”

“I don’t know!”

“What do you mean you don’t know? Legend, why did you ask me that a little while ago?”

He stomped her words again, she didn’t know what to say. Her consciousness became greatly jumbled toward her feelings for him, feelings that she didn’t know she had. “Listen, I don’t know why I asked you that, but I think you should leave right now, before we say anything that we’ll regret.” Her eyes began forming a shield of tears.

“Fine, I’ll see you later,” he said. He turned away from her and walked back into the hotel room. As soon as he turned away from Legend, her shield of tears broke, and out came tears with a definition that was unknown to her. She felt her tears, and looked at them. She then ran into her hotel room, and walked up to Stephen before he reached her door.

“Stephen, wait . . . I don’t want you to leave on a bad note. . . . I don’t want our friendship to be misinterpreted before you leave,” she cried. He looked at her tears, saddened by them. “You are like my best friend, Stephen, and I don’t want to lose that. . . . I’m a Chicago girl, who got discovered a few months ago, and now my life has changed. . . . I’m confused about a lot of things, especially my feelings toward Mark. I mean, I never loved anyone, and I don’t know if I love him. . . . But I know for sure that I love you, but only as a friend.” He immediately gave her a tight hug, never wanting to let go.

“I’m sorry for making you cry, Legend . . . I never wanted to do that. . . . Listen to me, this is my problem, and I have to face it. All I know is I have strong feelings for you, but I’ll get over it, it’s not your problem.” He pulled away from her hug and looked at her eyes.

“It’s not?” She stared at his eyes also, and suddenly started to come closer to him.

“No, it’s not,” he replied. She closed her eyes and his lips touched hers. Rapidly, she pulled away from his passionate kiss and frantically opened the door.

“Um, okay, well, I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said, Stephen standing there with misunderstanding. “Um, yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow, have a nice time with Dina tonight.” She then pushed him out in the hallway.

“But wait.” She closed the door in his face, ran over to her bathroom, and at the same time, felt her warm lips. “What have I done?” she asked herself, closing her bathroom door, and then kneeling by the sink. Suddenly, she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror she hadn’t seen for a long time. “What are you doing, Legend?” she asked to her ugly reflection. “He is such an incredible guy, but you can’t date him, you’re too ugly. . . . Plus, you’re dating Mark.” A tear came down from her left eye, making its way down her face, and fell to the floor. “You just have to hold your ground, and not allow him to take over your feelings. You have to stay clear of him and concentrate on your career. What career? This is ridiculous, I’m wearing a mask, I’m cheating the system. He’s falling for you, Legend, and you know it, too. But the thing is, he’s falling for something that’s not real, for something that’s a mask. Just stand clear of his relationship with Dina, and no one will get hurt.

“Just concentrate on your feelings for Mark, and have him concentrate on Dina.” She felt her face, still staring at her reflection, and saw that she was feeling pimples, but she couldn’t feel them. “Why can’t Stephen have the character that Mark has? Why can’t he look for inner beauty, as well as outer, like Mark does? If only he was like Mark, then I would go up to him, and kiss him forever. But he’s not, and therefore I can’t get involved with him, I can’t go through the agony of constantly worrying about what I look like in front of him, and wondering if I’m as beautiful as he wants me to be.”

She dried her tears away and then took down the mirror. She put it back on the ground and continued. “Put yourself together, Legend . . . . And always remember that, no matter if this is a mask, you are beautiful. . . .” She left her bathroom and walked out to the balcony, staring at the heavens above. “I just wish that my beauty was real. I just wish that I could show Stephen my real image, but I’m not, and that’s it.” Another tear fell from her eye and soared downwards toward the street below. “I’m not, and that’s it. . . .”

A
man stared out of his office window, concentrating on the California sun as it slowly sank into the earth, vanishing from sight. He looked at it, and concentrated on the rays, and held onto a photo that was clenched into his grip. He looked at the photo, and then at the sun, and noticed the image was fading at every moment the sunlight went away. He then turned around, and ran across his humongous office, and turned on the lights. It was like he didn’t want this beautiful image on the photo to vanish from his sight.

He then turned around, and walked back to his window, when suddenly a knock came at his door. “Come in,” he said. The large, brown door opened. “Well, if isn’t William Drakson I see before me.” He walked up to William and gave him a hug. “So, how long has it been: three, four years?”

“Yeah, something like that, Jack,” William said. He sat down directly across from Jack’s desk.

“How’s your son, Stephen, doing?” Jack lit up a cigar and still clenched the photo with a beautiful image. “I hear he’s doing great with his modeling, and choosing models for your agency.”

“Yeah, yeah, he’s quite a kid, especially his brains, he’s incredibly intelligent,” William replied. “I don’t know what I would do if he wasn’t helping me run my business.”

“You wouldn’t be a millionaire, that’s for sure,” William began smiling. “So, is he still chasing the girls?”

“Yep, I guess you could say he’s been practicing a lot with trying to find the right one.”

Jack blew a puff of smoke that resembled a circle directly into William’s face. “Well, you know what they say, practice makes perfect!”

“You got that right,” William joked.

“So, I heard about your new find, your new discovery. People say that she looks like an angel, but I didn’t believe it, until I saw this.” Jack handed the photo over to William. “When I saw this girl, I knew I had to call you in for a meeting.” He got up from his chair and walked over to where William was sitting.

“I know, she’s beautiful, and so is her name. . . . So, what is it you had to discuss with me that involves her?”

Jack began circling his chair. “Well, I heard that Legend is supposed to shoot with John Fisher today, for
MG
magazine. So, since she’s going to be in our neck of the woods, I felt that I had to take the opportunity in having her do something that no model has ever done before.”

William smiled.

“What’s your idea?” William asked with suspicion.

Jack grabbed onto Legend’s photo and paced over to his window, looking out at the California night. He looked at Legend’s image, and then back toward the night, when suddenly he turned around to face William, and gave out a matching smile. “William, we have known each other for many years, and throughout those years, you have made me a rich man, allowing my contracts to be signed by many of your discoveries. . . . When I heard about Legend, I right away began to study her career, but I didn’t want to see what she looked like – you and I were taught not to look at beauty right away. Just like the Angelica story that your father told us when we were kids. But when I saw her for the first time, and stared at this photo, I knew I had to do this.

“William, every girl whom I wanted from you, to sign my contracts, I always would imagine what they looked like before I saw them. And every time I finally saw them, they never quite reached my expectations, my imagination. But when I saw Legend, she went beyond my imagination of a beautiful girl. That’s why I want to do this!”

“Do what?”

“In two days, the Glamour Association, which is made up of some of the top modeling agencies in the world, is going to be giving a charity event for women who were, and still are abused by their spouses. Well, I want Legend to give a speech at that televised event, while the whole world is watching, and allow her fans, which are mainly made up of teenagers, to grow into a group that is made up of women in their twenties, thirties, and even forties,” Jack said.

William got up from his seat and walked up to him. “But why her?” William grabbed the photo away from Jack in a delicate manner and glared at it.

“Because she’s beautiful, stunning, and also because she’s known as ‘the girl who doesn’t like to look at her reflection’. I mean, in every article, in every magazine that she’s done, they always mention how she’s so beautiful, but yet she has a phobia with mirrors. That’s amazing. She’s a symbol to all women, and for that, her voice has to be heard at this event.”

“But what should she say?”

“Well, I heard from a source that her father, and even her mother, used to abuse her. That’s perfect,” Jack replied. William showed confusion on his wrinkled face. “William, don’t you see that she’s the perfect girl for this job? She’s beautiful, but yet she doesn’t like her reflection. She’s stunning, but yet she was abused by her parents. She’s an angel to many, and for that, they will listen to her speak.” Jack’s voice was so excited that William could feel his energy strike his own.

“What’s in it for you?” William asked, grinning and looking at Legend’s photo.

“Well, all Legend has to do is wear one of my new garments, and then say at the end of her speech that she only buys my clothing.”

William turned away from Legend’s photo and looked at Jack with concerned eyes. “Listen to me, Jack, I don’t think that Legend would agree to talk about her personal life, to a large number of people, for such a reason as that.” William walked away from Jack and sat back down in his seat.

“William, she doesn’t have to know the real reason, it would just be between me and you.” William looked at Legend’s image again, and suddenly felt like he should guard Legend, protect her as if he was her father. Her smile caused him to feel this way, but that all changed when William walked up to him, grabbed the photo away, and said, “She doesn’t have to know!”

“What’s in it for me?”

“Well, that depends on what your price is. It would be just like old times, William, I give you the payment under the table, and no one knows.” William smiled, but suddenly remembered Legend’s face, and turned his smile into a concerned grin. “I’ll give you three million!”

William’s grin rose to a smile again. He forgot about Legend’s face, and turned to the face of money, his eyes shining green, big money signs within them. “Alright, it’s a deal, she’ll be there in two days, just give me the address,” William said. He shook Jack’s hand vigorously and then got up from his seat. Jack handed him a card with the address for the charity event on it, when suddenly William’s cellphone rang, while it stood in his pants pocket. “Alright, I’ll see you, probably tomorrow, to pick up the money,” William said. He shook Jack’s hand and then grabbed onto his cellphone. He left Jack’s office, lifted up the antenna on his phone, and pressed the power button. “Hello, William Drakson speaking, who is this?” He stood by the elevator and pressed the ‘down’ button.