Sugar Valley (Hollywood's Darkest Secret) (13 page)

“Yes, yes, he wants us all to come in,” Jose
shouted, smiling with excitement glaring from his teeth.

Darell was full of nerves; he didn’t know
what to say to them. So, he got up, walked over to the bathroom,
and announced, “Uh, well, yeah, he said to come in at 3:00
p.m.”

Damen raced over to the bathroom, with
excitement in his stomach, mixed with butterflies, and questioned,
“What else did he say?”

“Uh, he said he wants to see me first and
then see you guys,” Darell answered in nervousness. Darell knew
that he wasn’t lying at all. He knew that Mr. Fryer said to him,
that he would see Jose and Damen later; he just didn’t stress how
much later. Darell tried his hardest not to lie, trying to go
around it as much as possible. He wanted to stretch the truth; for
his own well-being, so he wouldn’t feel guilty. He finished washing
his face in the bathroom and then stared at his reflection. Darell
closed his eyes, and prayed to God that Mr. Fryer would take Damen
and Jose as his clients also, but sometimes God leaves prayers up
to the person—and this prayer, in particular, was definitely going
to be left up to Darell. He opened his eyes, after praying his
hardest, and came out of the bathroom, ready to go out on the town.
Hoping that Damen and Jose wouldn’t mention another word about Mr.
Fryer, Darell asked, “Alright, are we ready to go out?”

“So, he’ll see all of us tomorrow?”
questioned Jose, putting his wallet full of money into his pants
pocket.

Darell paused for a moment. He knew if he
answered Jose’s question, it would either be a lie or the truth. If
it was the truth, then they would be furious toward him, but if it
was a lie, then they would be furious with him tomorrow at 3:00
p.m. He turned to Jose and Damen while he confirmed, “Listen, let’s
not talk about this anymore, let’s just have fun tonight. Let’s,
um, um, let’s celebrate by going to a nice club or something.”
Nervousness came over Darell’s mind once again, and he then began
to pray, silently, that Jose or Damen would agree with him.

“He’s right,” said Damen. Darell’s prayer was
answered, for now, and that caused some relaxation to his mind’s
body. After all, it had been through a lot of exercising today, and
relaxation was something that his mind needed to recuperate.

Darell opened the door to the motel room, and
that’s when Jose spoke, “Okay, I could agree with you on that.”
Jose forgot the last question he asked Darell, and for that, it
allowed him to totally switch the conversation, and change his
thoughts into wondering where to go tonight. That was Darell’s
plan, and it worked.

Meanwhile, Mr. Fryer marked several of the
actors down on a piece of paper. I’m only going to choose one of
them, he said in his mind. He called Vivian into his office and
explained to her that these were the actors he wanted. Darell’s
name was on the list, right under Vivian’s name. She typed them out
and gave them back to Mr. Fryer. She said, “Thank you, sir, I’ll
get their materials to you as soon as possible.”

“Call all the other actors besides Darell; I
already spoke to him,” explained Tom.

“Yes, sir,” Vivian answered before she walked
out of his office with a smile upon her face. She thought of how
her name was written on the list, and that caused a piece of
tranquility to appear in her thoughts, for the first time.

Chapter Nine

As Vivian called up all the other actors
that were on the list, Jose, Darell, and Damen were doing their own
business. The friends walked out of the motel and down the street
of Hollywood like they were in another world, a world in which some
of them thought they belonged in. Normally, at this time of night,
the boys are usually either still in the Valley, back in Ridge
Crest, or camping in the woods near their home. So this was new,
and in a way, awesome to their minds. They didn’t know what to do,
or where to go, so the first thing that came to their sights, they
would go in, whether it be a bar, or a club. The first building
came in their view was a night club called The Starbox. So they
walked over to it.

This night club was only allowed for the
stars of Hollywood to enter. They didn’t know that, of course, but
soon they were going to find out. “Hey, let’s go in here, it seems
like a nice-enough club,” Jose said, slowly starting to itch the
scar on his neck.

“Cool,” Damen agreed. Darell just nodded his
head. Walking closer to the club, they went past people that they’d
never seen before; meaning people of strange appearances. They saw
people with green hair, no hair, spiked hair, men with long hair,
and women with no hair, and even the same sex, holding hands. After
they passed this new world, culture, this new tribe of ‘different,’
they came up to the club and stopped.

The boys walked up to the door and saw a huge
man standing over them, with broad shoulders that stifled over his
strong chest, and a microphone that was hooked up, and hanging near
his mouth. Jose asked, “How much does it cost to enter?”

“For you, it doesn’t cost anything,” the
guard replied with a menacing smile. The other guards started
giving out unnoticeable chuckles.

“Alright ... you see guys, things are going
perfectly for us,” Jose stated with excitement.

Damen grew a smile, a large one, staring at
the long line in back of him, and then staring at a red velvet
rope, that was going to open for him to enter, caused his smile to
become radiant. “I mean, your money is worthless here, you can’t
come in,” the guard added, seeing Jose’s smile slowly
deteriorating. Damen’s smile melted away, and Darell’s grin was
just ripped right off.

“Why can’t we enter?” questioned Damen.

“That’s why,” the guard answered, pointing at
a movie star passing by them.

“That’s Jennifer Wilson,” Darell announced.
His eyes widened and his finger pointed toward her with
shakiness.

“Yes, I know that, now get out of here. This
club is only for stars ... not craters like you guys,” the guard
blurted out. He laughed at his own joke, which they didn’t get.

“We’re actors,” Damen stated, pushing his way
in.

“No... No, you’re not—you guys are starving
artists. Now get out of here,” the guard demanded as he pushed
Damen into a movie star, a movie star whose name was Julienne
Wells.

“I’m sorry, Miss, that guard just pushed me
into to you, I apologize,” Damen yelled out in a sincere tone. The
movie star pushed him back, staring at the guard with anger and
then at Damen with sincerity.

The guard, knowing he could get fired for
pushing someone into a celebrity, approached Miss Wells in a speedy
fashion, while she replied to Damen, “It’s okay, really it is.”

“I’m sorry, Miss Wells, I was just escorting
these young men out of here,” the guard explained, grabbing Jose
and Damen, while another guard grabbed Darell.

“Why don’t you just let these guys in?” Miss
Wells asked, seeing the guards looking at her in confusion. She
stared at Jose with a smile on her face, and then went back to
staring at the guards. The moment of truth was about to take place;
a moment that would alter Jose Rodrigo’s, Darell O’Conner’s, or
Damen Schultz’s life for the better, and for the worse.

“We can’t let them in, they aren’t accepted
here,” one of the guards declared. “I mean, they’re not on the
guest list.”

“Well ... I accept them, they’re with me,”
Miss Wells announced, watching the guards releasing them from their
tight, fixed, and strong grip. “I know I’m on the guest list, and
these are my companions. Come on, fellas.”

They walked into the club with amazement, not
believing their luck and their sight as they stared at neon lights,
dance floors on top of dance floors, and chandeliers that hung
grand crystal from their dim lighting. They passed through the
second doorway that was passed only by those with fame under their
belt, and through that they saw the club more closely, allowing
them all to give a gulp of saliva, and breathe in the smoke-filled
air as if it was sweet-smelling perfume.

“Thank you so much, Miss Wells,” Jose said as
she walked into the seating area and sat down at a table. A guard,
or waiter, who was standing in an entrance to the seating area,
stared down Jose, Damen, and Darell, as if they didn’t belong. The
guard automatically put up a velvet rope and locked its brass clip
to a hoop, causing the boys to be segregated from Miss Wells.
“Excuse me, we’re with her,” Jose proudly stated. The guard started
to laugh in a highly obnoxious way.

“Sure you are. Listen, if you want to sit
down here, it costs five-hundred dollars per table,” the guard
laughed out.

Julienne got up from her seat immediately.
Seeing the conflict, she went up to the guard in a baby’s
heartbeat. “Um, pardon me, but they’re with me.”

The guard opened the velvet rope, saying,
“Oh, gee, I’m sorry, Miss Wells, I didn’t know.”

Without saying another word, Julienne sat
down at her table again, and the boys followed. “As I was saying,
before we were interrupted by jackass over there, thank you so
much, Miss Wells, for doing this,” Jose finished in a loud way, so
the guard could hear.

“Please, call me Julienne.” She made a hand
gesture for the guys to sit down at her table. “So, where you boys
from?” A waiter then came up to her with a glass of champagne. “A
couple of you sound like you’re Southerners, just a little
bit.”

“We’re from Missi’,” Damen replied before
Jose kicked him in the leg; he wanted to stifle him from saying the
truth.

“We’re from the upper part of New York,”
assured Jose. He just stared at her blue eyes, like he was staring
at an angel. “Some of our parents are from the South, so it kind of
rubbed off on us, but not that much. Being out here, I can sense
that we’ll get rid of the accent in no time.”

“You’re right about that. So, New Yorkers. I
have a condo in the upper part there. What upper part are you
from?” she asked after she sipped her champagne.

“Uh ... well, we’re from the rich part,” Jose
made certain, with a brief stutter to his voice. The waiter then
brought them some champagne also, and that diversion helped end the
conversation, by Jose taking a huge gulp of the liquor. But, the
diversion didn’t last for long.

“You must be from Manhattan. What are you
doing all the way over here? Are you on vacation?” Julienne
questioned, taking a second sip of her drink.

“Something like that,” answered Jose.

“What Jose is trying to say, is we’re here
for a chance to become famous and get discovered,” Damen mentioned
as Jose looked at him with a ticked-off smile.

“Oh, really? Well, how has your trip to fame
been so far?”

“It’s been good,” Darell replied.

Damen and Darell explained everything to her.
They explained Mr. Fryer and they explained the situation about the
photos and resumes. Jose didn’t say a word; he just stared at her.
He was under a trance, a trance that most people call “lust,” but
he called it “love.” As the talking progressed, the champagne
bottle became empty. The waiter brought another bottle every moment
that Jose looked at Julienne, and he looked at her a lot.

“Well, it’s a good idea to get the photos
done by a good photographer, that way you’ll have good pictures and
save money in the future from getting any more photos taken,”
Julienne explained. Her champagne was finally making her get that
drunken feeling, and her words were starting to trickle
together.

“So, what about the resume? I mean, I have
all the practice in the world, but Mr. Fryer said I have to have a
resume,” asked Darell, finishing his sixth glass of champagne.

“Don’t you mean, we have to have a resume?”
Damen asked. He looked at Darell in a very aggressive way.

“Yeah, that’s what I meant, we. So anyway, do
we have to have a resume?” Darell questioned again. Julienne and
Jose were flirting with each other by their eye contact, causing
her to not even pay attention to Darell’s important question.

“What? Oh, yeah, you most definitely should
have a resume. But sometimes you don’t need one, you just get
lucky,” she replied before Jose got up. He walked over and sat next
to Julienne. That’s when he began kissing her. His first kiss to
her was a kiss that would change everything.

Damen and Darell got up and walked around,
feeling uncomfortable that they were around such drunken lust. The
anger, jealousy, and stifling aggression began to build up inside
of Damen, seeing Jose kiss every inch of Julienne’s lips. “How
could he do that?” Damen questioned, staring at Jose and
Julienne.

“What do you mean?” asked Darell.

“Did you forget that Maria is Jose’s
girlfriend?” His voice showed anger to Darell’s ears. “How could he
do that to her?”

“Yeah, that’s right. Do you think we should
say anything to him?”

“No, kissing is harmless. I know Jose, he
wouldn’t go any farther than that,” Damen confidently assured him.
Suddenly Darell changed the conversation.

“Hey, Damen, why is everyone coming up to
Jose and talking to him? Why don’t they come up to us?” Darell
noticed people coming over to Jose and talking to him, as if they’d
known him since birth.

“I don’t care. What I really want to know is
why no one’s going to Julienne and talking to her?” Damen’s
observation showed interest to Darell; the way he began to nod his
head and agree with Damen, he knew Mr. Schultz was right. “I mean
look, everyone is coming up to Jose, but they’re staying away from
Julienne,” he stated as he pointed his finger toward them. It was
highly suspicious that no one came to her and talked to her, this
caused Damen’s mind to be confused. Through the darkness, through
the people dancing with bright dresses on, and expensive suits, and
through the smoke from cigarettes, Damen and Darell watched Jose
and Julienne, as if they were sent there to spy on them.