Sugar Valley (Hollywood's Darkest Secret) (43 page)

Jose looked at her in an angry way,
defensively answering, “Yeah, but it’s Julienne’s premiere dinner,
not Darell’s.”

“Well, premiere dinners are only held in one
building, at least that’s what I thought. So, you probably will see
Darell there if you do go,” Vivian spoke in kindness.

“What are you talking about, Vivian? I am
going to the dinner definitely.”

“I know, but there still is a chance you
might not go. Think about it, Jose, a movie star coming up to you
and taking you home on that very same day, and then later on,
asking you if you want to go to some premiere dinner so that you
can get discovered. I don’t know about you, but that sounds
suspicious to me.” Vivian was trying to help Jose, but he didn’t
realize that; he thought she was doing this to hurt him.

“You’re just jealous,” shouted Jose, looking
down at her scar. Instead of feeling bad about starting this
conversation about Darell and Mr. Fryer, he felt great for doing
it; the anger caused this change in feelings.

Vivian noticed he was staring at her scar
through the darkness, so she covered it up with her hand, and
ordered, “No, I’m not jealous, just drop it.”

Damen saw that this conversation was getting
out of hand, seeing that it was directing itself into a hurtful
territory, he also ordered, “Yeah, just drop it, you two.”

Vivian whispered, “Alright.”

Damen went up to Vivian’s ear, saying, “We’ll
talk tomorrow about this matter at the restaurant.”

“Oh, that’s right, I forgot we had a date
tomorrow.”

“What date?” Jose asked in a confused
fashion.

Damen stared at Jose through the darkness,
seeing his silhouette, he spoke, “Do I have to tell you everything,
Jose? Vivian and I are going on a date tomorrow, or actually, we’re
going today.”

“Wait a second, what time are you going?

“After work, and I don’t know what time
that’ll be,” Damen replied, not seeing that Jose’s eyes widened
with jealousy.

“Hey, did you forget? You and I were supposed
to go to L.A. after work. Remember, we planned to go bar hopping?”
Jose looked at Vivian through the darkness and then turned to look
at Damen, jealous toward her and angered toward him.

Jealousy filled up in Jose’s mind, showing
itself through his eyes.

“Oh, that’s right. I tell you what, we’ll go
another day.”

“What?” asked Jose. His thoughts ran around
his head, overflowing with jealousy and deceit.

I knew Damen before her, this isn’t fair.
Thank God I’ll be out of this dump in a week...

That’s when the evil set in Jose and the
hatred for Vivian and Damen began.

“I’m sorry, Jose.” Damen then looked at
Jose’s face turning away from them and then turning back, but this
time with a plan. A plan to hurt Vivian again and tick off Damen at
the same time.

“Oh, that’s okay. Besides, when Darell comes
back, we’ll have plenty of time to go bar hopping.” Jose’s first
part of his plan was complete. “Hey, I wonder if Mr. Fryer got
Darell into any more movies?”

Damen looked at him again in shock for
mentioning that name once more, saying in a fast manner, “I don’t
know, Jose.”

“You know, I think Darell’s very lucky for
finding such a nice agent like Mr. Fryer,” spoke Jose, lighting a
match to ignite his cigarette, and looking at Vivian’s scar with
the flash from the match.

Damen asked in an eager voice, to try and
change the conversation, “Okay, Jose, could we please talk about
something else?”

“I bet Mr. Fryer is going to be with Darell
all the time,” Jose added, seeing Damen staring at him in
confusion.

“Yeah, that’s great,” said Damen, knowing
that Jose was saying that name on purpose. Getting up from the
couch, Damen questioned, “Um, Jose, could you help me with
something?”

“What do you want me to help you with?” he
asked. Damen then grabbed him by his shirt.

“I want you to help me with something outside
in the hallway. Ladies, we’ll be right back.” He pushed Jose out
into the hallway and closed the door, staring at him with
unbelievable anger.

“What is it, Damen?”

“You know what it is.”

“No I don’t. Please, enlighten me.”

“What the hell were you doing just now? Why
did you keep on bringing up Mr. Fryer? You know Vivian gets upset
at that name. Why did you keep on mentioning him?” Damen
whispered.

“Just because she didn’t get Mr. Fryer as an
agent, doesn’t mean I can’t bring up his name,” Jose defended.

“Listen, you did it on purpose, I know you
did, Jose.”

Jose’s voice traveled through the
urine-smelling hallway, saying with jealousy, “Damen, I knew you
first, she didn’t. It’s supposed to be me, you, and Darell. Not me,
you and Vivian.”

“Is that what this is all about? Is it?”

“What do you mean?” asked Jose, trailing his
eyes away from Damen’s.

“I mean your jealousy, is that why you’re
acting like a five year old?”

Jose then flicked up the middle finger toward
him.

“How dare you say I’m jealous, I’m not,” he
defended with hesitation. Jose recognized he made a mistake by
starting this argument, needing a lie to construct in his words, a
lie to help him get out of being thrown out of the apartment by
Damen, at least till the end of the week.

“Jose, you’re a bad actor when it comes down
to lying right in my face,” Damen spoke with a grin. “Listen, I
love her, but it doesn’t change our friendship. You and Darell are
like my brothers. Nothing is going to change that.”

“You promise me that?” Jose questioned,
looking down at the floor like a little child; he knew that his
acting was working.

“Yeah, I promise,” he replied, shaking Jose’s
hand. “You know, Jose, sometimes I just don’t understand you. One
day you’re a jerk, one day you’re an ass, and one day you’re the
Jose that I knew back home.”

“Well, you better get used to that. Listen, I
want you know one thing,” Jose said as Damen put his hand on the
doorknob, but then paused suddenly, waiting to hear his voice
continue.

“What’s that?”

“Whatever I do in the near future while I’m
in Hollywood, I want you to know that I’m doing it for a reason.
So, if I become a movie star before you and I start acting
conceited about it, just slap me in the face. Will you do that for
me?” Jose knew that by adding those last words to his act, he would
definitely deserve an Academy Award.

“Jose, you didn’t even have to tell me that,
I would do it anyway.” Damen opened the door a crack, adding, “What
I want you to do now, is apologize to Vivian.”

“Alright, I’ll do it right now.”

They both walked inside and closed the door.
Jose grinned and conveyed in his mind,

I did it, thank God. Now I have to apologize
to that bitch in there.

That night, Damen stayed up for a while. He
got out of bed and walked over to the lightened Christmas tree. He
took out his Rosary and kneeled in front of the tree, praying,
“God, if you could hear me, I want you to help all of us. I’m so
confused about my friends and why we came here in the first place.
Sometimes I wonder if Jose is lying to me, even after he says he’s
not. I want you to help me, and I pray that you help me help them.
Lord, there is so much confusion in their eyes. Vivian, Jose, and
even Darell’s eyes are full of something that I can’t explain. It’s
like they are ready to betray me sometimes, betray me for their
dreams and ambitions. The only one that hasn’t done it in a long
time is Darell. Darell gave me a speech, a speech before he became
famous. It was like a warning to me, a warning that I never thought
he would say. He said it to me when I had my eyes closed. Jose gave
me the same speech, Lord, but he gave it to me while my eyes were
opened. They both told me when they become famous, if they get out
of line, I should just remember to hit them and knock some sense
into them. Lord, why did they say that to me?” Damen’s eyes became
heavy, adding, “Thank you God, thank you God for making Darell’s
dream come true. The next one is Jose, and Vivian. Then, it’s my
turn, that’s if you really want to help me.”

He then dropped his Rosary in the darkness.
“Oh no.” Damen tried to feel his way to the Rosary, but fell asleep
trying. He fell asleep by the tree that held an angel ornament near
its top: the angel that Damen was praying to.

Chapter Thirty-One

Walking in an airport, back and forth,
trying to make time run by faster, breaking his knuckles over and
over again, grinding his teeth and biting his tongue, Darell was
starting to hate these places. The way the airport staff smiled,
but when you asked them for help, they never gave it to you, but
still they grinned away, like it’s in their contract, their
procedures of daily chores to take on. So many things pressed
against his head, like the seats by the airport terminal, skinny
and uncomfortable, but you still have to sit down in them, upright,
and stare at people of all kinds, either sleeping and snoring, or
wide awake, trying to talk to you. The echoes in the airport,
sounds of children singing their screams, and chanting their wants,
mothers pulling their hands, and yelling to stop their cries,
Darell couldn’t take it anymore, his mind was ready to explode into
an oblivion. To make matters worse, a man with his head shaved,
blue jeans that had ripped marks in them, showing his dirty flesh,
and smells, aromas that came from him, smelling like a lamb’s feet,
chewing gum loudly, with his jaws smacking down to gather his
nerves from breaking out of his mouth, knocked into Darell without
even apologizing. Darell really wanted to move. But, he saw that
all of the skinny, minute seats were taken by other strange humans,
so he just waited it out, watching the terminal screen, waiting for
his flight to say “boarding.”

To make matters even more terrible in
irritation, Darell turned, noticed a poster suddenly on the airport
wall with his face on it, advertising his movie. So, he crunched
down in his chair, covered his face, and just waited for that damn
screen to say his flight was about to board. That’s when he became
excited, just like anyone would, when he heard Tom say, “Come on,
Darell, that’s our flight,” after a woman came over the intercom
and announced their flight number.

The chauffeur, who drove Tom’s agency’s limo,
came up to Tom and handed him his suitcase, while Darell
questioned, “Why are we leaving two days before the premiere?”

“Oh, now you don’t want to leave. Didn’t you
say that you missed your friends?”

“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t answer my
question,” Darell replied, walking to the terminal with Mr. Fryer.
“This is moving way too fast,” he added, seeing Tom stopping dead
in his tracks.

Even if it may be that Darell wanted to run
to that terminal, and leave the echoes of annoyance and strangers
of irritation behind, he still wanted to make a point, by adding
some clarity into the way he felt about this career so far, and how
it was moving with great thrust.

“What do you mean by that, Darell?”

Darell just stood there motionless, it was
like he was afraid of flying, when in actuality, he was afraid of
the pressure that fame would bring, or had already brought so
far.

“I mean acting and Hollywood. I didn’t think
it would be this fast, I thought it would take at least a few
years. Let alone, at least five years till I would go to my own
premiere for a movie, a movie that I’m the star of,” Darell
answered, dropping his bags on the airport floor and starting to
look at Tom with shaky eyes.

“Listen, you can’t back out now. You just
can’t do it, especially to me. You can’t do this to me, I’m your
agent.” Tom didn’t want Darell to be like his other clients in the
past, his other clients who didn’t last five minutes at the top in
Hollywood.

Mr. O’Conner saw the craving in Tom’s eyes,
how they craved and needed him to go along with Tom Fryer; Darell
wanted to make Tom understand, that no one owned him. “I could
quit, I could quit whenever I want to,” stated Darell. He picked up
his bags and walked opposite from the terminal, Tom thinking that
either he was trying to prove a principle, or he was really walking
out on him.

Tom didn’t know what to do, seeing his client
walking through the airport, away from the airplane terminal, his
anger built very rapidly. He shouted, “Hey, I own you, Darell.” His
cruel voice caused Darell to stop and turn around slowly.

“What do you mean by that? No one owns
me.”

“Well, I do. I own you for a year. Remember,
you signed a whole bunch of papers back at my office? One of those
papers was your contract. Lawsuit, if you know what I mean? So,
pick up your bags and get going to the terminal, we’re going to
miss our plane.”

Darell began to walk again, walking farther
away from the terminal. Mr. Fryer ran up to him and grabbed him by
the arm. He said in a low and pleasant tone, “Okay, okay, listen
Darell, I’m sorry for that. I just see so much potential in you, I
don’t want you to throw it away. Listen, you came to Hollywood only
seven and a half months ago and already you’re on your way to fame,
you already have a billboard with your picture on it. Don’t you see
how lucky you are?”

Darell just stared into his eyes. He knew
that Mr. Fryer didn’t see potential in him, all he saw were dollar
signs, great big ones that overshadowed the past, present, and even
future.

“Alright, once my contract is up with you,
I’m going to another agent,” Darell said. He began walking toward
the terminal, adding, “That should be in about another five months.
So, in five months I’m gone. I’m sorry, but you move too fast for
me.”

Tom was pleased to hear he was going to stay
still; knowing that he still had five months to change Darell’s
mind, he showed a smile. He giggled, “Boy, I have never had a
client as pigheaded as you.”