Sugar Valley (Hollywood's Darkest Secret) (23 page)

“Listen, I got to go now. But, if you have a
change of heart, me and Darell will be your partner...” Helen
walked away from Damen, and he allowed his mind to be comforted
with her kind words.

Damen just sat there on the stump, hearing
the voices behind him, rehearsing this corny but interesting game,
getting prepared for their own show-time, when he heard a voice
behind him that asked, “Would you like to be my partner?”

He turned around slowly and saw Vivian
standing there, out of breath. “Sure, I would love to be your
partner.”

She was out of breath, her makeup, and
lipstick out of place, but she still looked and seemed beautiful to
his eyes. She seemed a little hesitant, like she just saw a monster
in the forest, chasing her up the hill, but she still held a frozen
smile that was heartwarming to Damen’s sight.

“Sorry I’m late, I got held up at the
office.”

“I thought you stood me up.”

“Even if I didn’t show up, I still wouldn’t
have stood you up. Remember, we’re just friends?” Her flirtatious
tone made laughter in Damen’s lungs.

Vivian then grabbed a script, knowing that
the game had already begun, and started opening up the pages to her
character.

Damen lit up a cigarette, saw Vivian looking
at the words on the first page, and spoke, “No problem.... Let’s
begin, shall we?”

They all practiced for ten minutes. The first
couple got up and acted one part of the script out, consisting of a
fight scene; each couple got up and did one part of the scene. Jose
and his partner did a funny scene; Darell and Helen did a serious
scene. A man by the name of Peter Welch got up and did a dramatic
scene, which consisted of making his partner cry.

During this game of drama, Darell walked over
to Damen and Vivian while they were getting ready for their scene.
He had confused eyes and he said with a whisper, “Damen, that guy
was in Mr. Fryer’s office today.”

“Yeah, he was,” Vivian agreed.

“So what.” Damen didn’t care at the moment,
he was having too much fun with a game that many people would call
“corny.”

“So, I think I’m up against this guy. Am I
right, Vivian?” Darell watched Peter give a good acting performance
and waited at the same time for Vivian’s answer.

“I don’t know.” Vivian’s words were not
believable, so she attempted to ignore his question; being that she
was against Darell, as well as Peter, she didn’t want to mix
business with pleasure. Also, she didn’t want Darell to know that
she was against him, Vivian just wanted to play the game. But, she
remembered that Mr. Fryer didn’t say anything to Darell about this
so-called ‘contest’ between them, so how did he know about being
against him?

How does he know? Does he know? Just forget
about it. No, but what happens if he knows about this contest about
Mr. Fryer choosing one more actor for his agency? No, just forget
about it, Vivian. No, I can’t, just ask him, and do it now.

After Vivian fought with her thoughts,
allowing them to get the best of her, she turned toward Darell,
letting her eyes leave the script for a moment, and asked in a way
that sounded kosher, “What did Mr. Fryer discuss with you?”

Darell turned his eyes, faced Vivian with
strictness, and answered, with some secretiveness, “He told me not
to say anything... ”

Damen jumped in the conversation, interested
about the way they were discussing it with such nosiness, and
spoke, “Mr. Fryer has a lot of actors come into his office. How do
you know you’re against him, Darell? What are you against him
for?”

They all turned away from each other, and
stared at Peter, leaving the middle of the crowd, knowing that he
finished his part of the game. Then they faced each other once
more, waiting for Darell to say something.

“I don’t know; it’s just a gut feeling, I
guess.”

Damen started smiling, keeping his laughter
in, after hearing his friend say something that was beyond corny.
“Gut feeling? Darell, I’m beginning to worry about you. We’ll talk
about this later... ”

Damen and Vivian got up and walked to the
circle where everyone was sitting. He was almost positive he would
win this childish game. Damen knew, felt a positive feeling,
because this script was familiar to him. As a matter of fact, it
was familiar to Darell and Jose too, Jose already replaying it from
his memory. Before Damen could begin his performance with Vivian,
Helen came out of nowhere and grabbed their scripts, forced it out
of their hands, ripping some of the papers.

Helen laughed out, “Here’s another script, I
think you guys will find it most interesting.”

“But Vivian and I didn’t even practice this
one.” Damen was angry, felt that this was unfair to be holding a
new script, doing a cold reading that everyone else didn’t have to
do.

Vivian knew what the difference was, staring
at Helen with shock, Helen explained, “It’s basically the same
thing, but with a little difference at the end.”

They read the script back and forth. They did
a very good performance so far, dramatizing this story about a love
affair. Damen knew he had to kill her at the end in the old script
and now wondered what he had to do to Vivian in the new one. The
audience, filled with drunken people, sat staring and watching
Vivian and Damen with wonder in their alcohol-filled and
stoned-looking eyes; they were giving a good performance.

After all the wondering, in Damen’s mind,
about what the difference was in the script, knowing that it was so
far the same, they now came to the end of the page, the last page
to the small script. As Vivian acted out the last part, which was
the same in the old script, Damen read the last line, seeing it say
that he had to kiss her after she stopped yelling. He looked at
Vivian as she said her line and saw the kissing scene too. They
slowly looked up at each other and held hands. Their hearts were
beating one hundred miles an hour as their lips came closer and
closer to touching. They both were very obedient to the acting
craft, knowing that this was only acting, seeing that they must
obey the script, the same way a priest obeys the Bible; but nervous
jitters were in their stomachs. Vivian’s eyes began to close slowly
as Damen’s eyes did the same. Then, right before they kissed,
touched lips while the wind blew heat toward their talented
figures, a policeman came out from the trees and shouted, “Alright,
alright, the party’s over. This is private property. Get out of
here now...”

People started running in every direction.
Seeing that more cops appeared by the Hollywood sign, growing by
large numbers, holding handcuffs in the air to be clamped on anyone
who wandered behind, the people were scared and shocked. The liquor
that they held dropped out of everyone’s hand, making a garden of
bottles that lay on the mountain’s floor, being stepped on, broken,
and kicked by everyone who ran through these glass flowers.

Damen ran with Jose and Darell, while Vivian
ran with Helen, only having the Hollywood sign’s light that stood
behind them to guide their path into the forest of darkness; that’s
where the moon’s light would take over. Damen stopped and looked
back at Vivian, having his instincts get the best of his common
sense, he wanted to grasp ahold of her and finish what the
screenplay started. He ran after her, passing the cops and the
Hollywood sign, its reflective light blinding his eyes to reality.
Damen still saw Vivian, grabbing onto her arm and asking, “When
could I see you again?”

Vivian stared at him, looking about, seeing
people still floundering into the forest, leaving the cops to chase
after them, only to scare their drunken minds, and fixed her eyes
on this moment, this man who showed a lot of interest in his eyes.
“I don’t know...” She was trying to catch her breath, bending down
and concentrating on exhaling. Vivian’s eyes came into contact with
his once again.

“How about tomorrow?” Damen’s question had
sincerity to it, and he waited for her to say anything, even with
cops chasing people around him and uncomfortable, hot, sticky sweat
dripping from his face; he truly liked her.

“I’m working late tomorrow and the next day.
How about this Sunday?”

“Wait a second, isn’t that June 16?”

“Yeah, is that a problem?” she asked with
stronger sincerity than him. Her feet began running in place,
turning her head every so often to see if cops were coming after
them; Vivian wanted to leave this mountain behind and get to
safety.

“Yeah, I got to get my pictures done on that
day.” Damen was disappointed: he wanted to see her soon, but life’s
games were not allowing him to.

Vivian saw the cops flocking together, and
growing in an even larger number, so she said in a rushed manner,
“I tell you what, you call me after the photos are done. Just call
my number that Helen gave you.” Helen then pulled her arm, yanked
it in a desperate attempt to get her moving.

“Okay, see ya then.”

Jose then ran over to Damen and started to
pull at his arm, knowing that the cops were chasing him
already.

Jose yelled, “Come on, man, I don’t want to
spend a night in jail,” while their legs went from walking to
running.

When they all reached their motel room,
Darell and Jose fell asleep in a heartbeat. Being a little drunk,
and tired from climbing, running, they deserved this pleasant night
of shut-eye. As for Damen, he stayed awake thinking of nothing else
that night but Vivian. He wrote in his journal about how this night
was the first time he ever thought of anything else but his dream.
And, even though he didn’t know it, it wouldn’t be his last.

Chapter Fifteen

June sixteenth finally came around. Like a
clock with lazy hands that stops every second and rests for an hour
was how this day, this moment, this new reality came forth for
them. The guys left early that day, with the California rain
blowing down like a hurricane, new clothes on, and no hair on their
faces; Darell’s razor burns could be seen a block away, and as for
the others, their cuts seemed like knife slashes. Arriving at the
address that Mr. Fryer gave them with excitement in their minds, it
was a new day, they felt, a day they would get their first
headshots taken.

Getting out of the cab and finding themselves
on Rodeo Drive was a different experience for them, it was a whole
new world; a world they didn’t want to leave, but had to. It was a
world of riches, royalty, and dignity, seeing people driving past
them in fancy new cars, seeing the way they shimmered with the sun;
it was enough to go wild. Watching people of all races walk slowly
by them, with posture like a board, and clothes that showed their
wealth through the fancy, colorful material. “It must be great to
be rich,” Jose said, noticing a limousine passing by.

Of course, Jose always stereotyped and
believed the clichés of everyone that he saw. If he saw a bum, he’d
say, “He must be a drunk.” If he saw a priest preaching in the
streets, he’d say, “He must be crazy.” And, if he saw rich people,
he’ll say, “It must be great to be rich.” Before Jose walked into
the building that had the address Mr. Fryer gave them on it, he
looked at a fancy car parked on the street, saying “In the future,
my car’s gonna look better than that.”

As Darell walked behind Jose, before he
entered the building, he stared at the fancy car parked on the
street also. He spoke, “Wow, that must have been very expensive to
buy, I bet he’s a drug dealer.” So, in actuality, Darell was a
little bit like Jose with the different clichés he learned when he
was in Ridge Crest. Yet, the one thing that separated him from
Jose, was when he said, “When I get enough money, I’m gonna buy
that exact same car.”

Before Damen entered the building behind
Darell, he looked at the car that he was talking about, saying,
“Darell, he’s not a drug dealer; the owner probably worked hard to
get that car.” He was the one person that helped make Jose and
Darell think twice about the stereotypical comments they heard and
repeated; his intelligence on society was very rich, and full of
common-sense that the other two lacked, but wanted desperately.
With Damen, he just stared at the car, imagining that he was in it,
and didn’t speak any more about it. He enjoyed the silence a bit,
imagining his own perspective on these cars, Damen smiled at them
and gave a nod with a positive hint to it; it was like he knew the
car would be his someday, and as long as he was the only one who
knew that, it was enough to satisfy his hunger, craving, for a car
that rippled riches to its texture. But, his imagination was
interrupted when Jose came out of the building.

“Are you sure this is the address?” Jose
questioned, looking up at the sign on the building that read
Beverly Hills Photographer.

“Yeah, that’s what it says on the paper,”
said Darell after he stepped out of the building also and realized
he didn’t pay the cabdriver.

After he paid him, they all walked into the
building that looked like it was made out of glass, pure crystal
that shimmered the reflection of the sun’s image. This building
stood ten stories high and was covered with mirrors on the inside,
looking like a maze of reflections, creating light for the inside
through what the mirror saw and showed; three lights were above one
great mirror, that caused a reflection of a thousand lights. The
glass structure looked as if it came out of the twilight zone,
being formed into a place of mystery.

After they entered it, a man approached them
from behind, staring at their backs through one of the mirrors;
this man finally tapped Jose on the shoulder, causing them all to
turn around in fright. He asked in a curt manner, “Do you have an
appointment?” Noticing that this man had the same dialect as a
young teenage girl, made the boys see and enter into another form
of life they’ve only seen in movies: homosexuality.