Girls to Total Goddesses (19 page)

‘You’d better come and see Rose,’ I told him. ‘I hate to have to tell you this, but there’s been a bit of a disaster.’

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36

Beast arrived, looking apprehensive. Rose confronted him, gesturing at her stained dress.

‘Look!’ she screamed. ‘Look what just happened! This is the only dress I have with me, due to the fact that I’m surrounded by idiots and my tour wardrobe is in freakin’ Paris!! Do something, Harry!’

Beast shrugged and looked tense. ‘The shops are all shut . . .’ He started tugging at his hair.

‘Harry! I am literally not going on unless you can find me something fabulous!’ Beast’s eyes were wild: he looked helplessly at me, at Chloe, then back at Rose. Suddenly I had an idea. In a way it was a terrible idea, because it meant my evening had to end right here and now. But it was a possible way out of this nightmare – possibly the only way out.

‘Er, Rose?’ I asked. ‘You said you liked this dress . . .’ Rose looked at me and her gaze changed.

‘Yes! My God! You’re about my size, too!’ Her face changed from anguish to hope.

‘You’d be welcome to try it,’ I suggested. ‘It’s nothing much, but . . .’

‘No . . . no . . .’ Rose approached me like a snake slithering towards a helpless mouse. ‘Can I really try it? Would you mind?’

‘I’ll leave you to it, then,’ said Beast hastily, and he went out, only pausing at the door to give me a very strange look: of pleading, desperation and, unless I’m very much mistaken, lifelong gratitude.

I pulled off the dress and Rose dived into it. Of course, she looked fabulous. She preened herself in the mirror and did a few manoeuvres.

‘It’s OK, it’s OK,’ she said excitedly. ‘Do you mind, Zoe? I’m really grateful. You can have it back afterwards . . . I always travel in my grey jog pants.’

‘It’s fine,’ I said. ‘Go ahead. It’s an honour!’

‘OK then,’ said Rose briskly. ‘We’re in business. There’s a bathrobe in the shower room – help yourself.’

When she left the dressing room to do her set, I insisted that Chloe should go out and watch her sing, but, of course, being in bra and pants and wrapped in a big white towelling robe, I had to stay where I was. It was like those horrible dreams you have sometimes, when you’re out in public and have mysteriously forgotten to get dressed.

I sat down to listen to Rose’s appearance on stage over the PA system. I heard her being introduced and the huge wave of cheering as the massive audience welcomed her. Her band launched into their first number:
Let It Go
. She was giving it everything. What a star!

And despite being a bit stressed out and diva-ish, she’d been quite nice to us. If only I could see her now, with my dress enjoying its finest hour – on the back of a real goddess – divine clothing for a divine performer. It had been a thrill to be with her and help her get ready, though. Something to tell the grandchildren – if I ever had any.

There was a knock on the door.

‘Zoe!’ It was Beast’s voice. I jumped up, agitated. He mustn’t see me like this! My heart lurched into overdrive.

‘Just a minute!’ I yelled. ‘I’m not decent!’ I pulled the robe more tightly around me and ran to the door.

‘Zoe! Don’t you want to come and watch Rose doing her set? Come on, don’t be shy!’

‘Harry,’ I said, using his name for the very first time (I don’t know why), ‘listen. I’m just wrapped in a towel here. I look grotesque!’

‘Don’t be stupid, Zoe,’ said Beast patiently. ‘I’ve got some clothes for you anyway. Open the door!’ I hesitated in a boiling silence, tongue-tied, my pulse racing. ‘Let me in!’ Beast went on. ‘Or I’ll break the freakin’ door down!’

Cringing in my towelling robe, I turned the lock, Beast stepped in and the door slammed shut behind him. He stood there looking magnificent. All the stress and angst had gone from his face – he looked taller and his eyes were dazzling.

‘Here you are . . .’ He brandished a sports bag. ‘Lizzie at the merch stand said you could borrow these. They’re not exactly Gucci, but who cares? You always look beautiful to me whatever you’re wearing.’ He thought I looked beautiful? A huge blush exploded across my face and I stared at him in disbelief.

‘I realised I was still crazy about you when I saw you dressed up as a little old man!’ said Beast. His voice was husky and he was trembling. ‘It was the warts and the baldness that did it for me.’ He laughed nervously. I uttered a strange hysterical squeak, and clapped my hand across my mouth.

‘I know you told me to get lost once, and you can tell me to again if you like,’ he said. ‘But Chloe promised me you wouldn’t be so harsh this time.’

‘Chloe promised . . . ?’

‘I saw her just now, backstage,’ said Beast. ‘She told me you might not mind if I asked you out again . . . ?’

For some crazy reason, I burst into tears. Beast dropped the stuff he was carrying and swept me up into his arms. He squeezed every breath out of my body. My poor little heart pounded away like mad, and through the white fluffy towelling robe, I could feel his heart thumping, too.

‘What . . .’ I asked feebly, when I got my breath back ‘. . . what about Charlie?’

‘Charlie was never even on my radar,’ he said, his breath hot on my hair. ‘She’s a fantasist. It was always you I wanted.’ Then he kissed my ear. He kissed one of my horrible weird ears! He must really like me, then. I gave myself up to a delirious moment of sheer melting bliss, whilst Rose continued belting out
Let It Go
.

‘The last few weeks have been really tough,’ whispered Beast. ‘I thought you still hated me.’

‘Well, I do, of course,’ I croaked, clinging on for dear life.

‘I didn’t know . . .’ said Beast ‘. . . what you were thinking . . . what was going on . . .’

‘I didn’t know, either,’ I murmured, the lovely citrus smell of his skin washing over me.

‘I’ve changed,’ Beast went on, ‘since you ripped into me that time and told me how revolting I was. You were right. I was an animal.’

‘A beast,’ I agreed. ‘But please don’t change into a naff prince in tights. That would be gross.’

‘I promise,’ whispered Beast. ‘And you’d better not change one tiny detail, either. I like you as you are: warts and all.’ Nigel throbbed in ecstasy. I think he was a little bit in love with Beast, too.

We sank into a kiss which lasted about ten thousand years, and caused all the bamboo forests in China to bloom. Then Rose’s song finished and there was a storm of applause. Our kiss ended.

Beast looked up at the PA system. ‘Seems as if the audience enjoyed that as much as we did.’ He grinned. ‘Look, much as I’d like to spend the next five days standing here like this, we have to see Rose’s set. Here . . .’ He reached down into the sports bag and offered me the stuff he’d brought: a big Jailhouse Rock sweatshirt and a pair of footless tights. I took them into the bathroom and dived into them, then emerged and put on my killer heels.

‘Beautiful!’ said Beast with a grin. ‘Come on, we can watch Rose from backstage!’

He led me through another maze of corridors and then into a dark area at the side of the stage. We had a great view of Rose strutting her stuff in my pink dress. Beast stood behind me with his arms wrapped round me. I could feel his breath on my hair and neck. I couldn’t believe it, after all my weeks of anguish: here I was being hugged by Beast, something I’d decided was never going to happen.

‘She looks great in my dress!’ I yelled.

‘You really got me out of jail tonight, babe!’ roared Beast. ‘Giving her the dress off your back! You’re a legend!’

‘Well, Rose is a goddess!’ I shouted.

‘Just an ordinary goddess, though!’ he roared in my ear. ‘She can’t compete with the one and only Zoe Morris!’ And he gave me such a squeeze, all the breath in my body shot out of my mouth in an unattractive bark. Luckily the music was so loud, nobody heard.

Suddenly I caught sight of Chloe across the stage, watching from the wings opposite. Our eyes met and she grinned in delight, giving me the thumbs up. Rose finished her number and the whole place shook in another eruption of cheering.

‘OK!’ screamed Rose. ‘Let’s hear it for all our brothers and sisters in jail for their beliefs! Justice for them! Freedom!’

I realised that I had somehow got out of a private jail of my own. At last, wrapped in my Jailhouse Rock sweatshirt, wrapped in my Beast, with my hair all over the place and my make-up smudged by his shoulder, I actually felt like a goddess. It was nothing to do with hair or clothes or fitness or any of that, it was just the kind of divine moment that could happen in anybody’s life, and I sent out a silent
thank you
to the big, black, mysterious, echoing universe.