Sugar Valley (Hollywood's Darkest Secret) (65 page)

“I don’t know.”

Gloria came back and sat down, hearing Vivian
question, “What did you give her?”

“I gave my home phone number. Since you don’t
have a place to stay, and this is a big-time soap opera, I felt you
could stay at my place,” she explained with a grin.

“What about Helen?”

“She could stay too.” Then, Gloria gave
Vivian a tight hug, adding with excitement as well, “Welcome to New
York, Vivian.”

Gloria took out her ponytail and allowed her
long, black hair to hang, suddenly hearing Vivian ask in a frantic
manner, “Oh my God, I forgot something. Is there a phone I can use
around here?”

“Why do you have to use a phone?” Helen
asked.

“I have to call Damen, I told him I
would.”

Gloria pulled out a cell phone from her black
leather purse and handed it to Vivian, saying, “Here, use my
phone.”

“I’m making a call to California, do you
mind?” Vivian pulled up the antenna slowly, waiting nervously for
Gloria to answer, hoping that she would say yes.

“No, not at all, I can afford it.”

Helen suddenly gave out a huge scream,
causing Vivian’s eyes to widen, as well as Gloria’s. Vivian spoke
in confusion, “Why did you do that?”

Helen gave her another tight hug, saying,
“Because, I’m so happy for you.”

Vivian started to dial the apartment number
on the cell phone, listening to Gloria say, “Don’t get your hopes
up, you didn’t sign a contract yet.”

Ring, ring, ring.

The phone started ringing, while Vivian
turned toward Gloria in a fast manner, after hearing her words, and
stated with a for-sure grin, “Don’t worry, I won’t, Gloria.”

Ring, ring, ring.

Back in California, Damen walked out of the
bathroom, grabbed a lit cigarette that was hanging off the coffee
table, and answered the phone, saying, “Hello?”

Gloria and Helen got up from their seats,
listening to Vivian scream, “Hi, Damen, it’s me, Vivian.”

Damen formed a huge grin at hearing her
voice, even though it was loud at first, he still was exhilarated
to hear from her. Taking a drag of his cigarette, he exhaled the
smoke while questioning with happiness, “Hey, how was your
trip?”

She paused, recessed, wanting to play a
little joke on Damen for the hell of it, she responded with a low,
sad, disappointing, and dismayed voice, “It was fine, I just
finished my audition.”

“Oh, it doesn’t sound like the audition went
well.”

She smiled, but said with seriousness, “Well,
it doesn’t matter.”

Damen got up from the couch, and walked over
to the old, brown Christmas tree, asking, “What do you mean? How
did it go?”

“Well, um, let’s see.” She paused for a
second, and then screamed with vivacity, “Oh, I think I got the
part.”

“What? Really? Congratulations, Vivian, I
knew you would.” He began taking the ornaments off the tree,
pulling one by one, adding with felicity, “Didn’t I tell you you
would get it?”

“Yeah, well, I don’t know if I got the role
yet, they said they’ll give me a callback.” Vivian then noticed
Gloria and Helen beginning to walk out of the waiting room. “Hold
on for a second, Damen.” She walked up to Gloria and Helen, adding,
“Where are you going?”

“We’re getting ready to leave, it’s already
5:30 p.m., and I don’t want to wait till it gets dark outside,”
Gloria replied, taking out her car keys.

Vivian put the phone up to her ear, asking to
Gloria, “Why?”

Damen thought she was talking to him,
questioning, “Why what?”

Gloria buckled up her winter coat,
explaining, “Because, this is New York, Vivian, no one should go
out past dark.”

“Why what?” Damen asked again.

Vivian finally acknowledged that Damen was
speaking, so she put her complete attention to the phone, and
responded, “Oh, I wasn’t talking to you, honey. Listen, Damen, I
got to go now, I’ll call you later on in the week.”

Vivian put on her summer jacket while still
talking to him, while Gloria mentioned with laughter, “You girls,
those jackets of yours will not be enough to protect you from the
cold. This isn’t L.A., you know? It’s New York.”

Unexpectedly, a needle from the old Christmas
tree pricked Damen’s finger, making him shout over the phone, “What
day are you going to call me?”

“What are you doing, Damen? What happened?”
They all started walking toward the exit of the building, while
Vivian waited for Damen to speak over the phone; he was too busy
trying to suck the blood out of his pricked finger.

“Oh, I’m just taking the Christmas tree down.
I pricked my finger off of one of these frickin’ needles,” he
answered, kicking the tree with his legs, pricking his pants with
the needles as well.

“Oh, I thought you were yelling at me on
purpose.”

“No, I would never yell at you on purpose.
Well, what day are you going to call me?”

Gloria opened the exit door of the building,
and allowed the February frost to blow in, making Vivian and
Helen’s non-immune bodies to feel its cold presence, and feel
chilled from it. “Um, I don’t know, Damen. Listen, I got to go now,
I love you,” she replied, grabbing her summer jacket and pulling it
closer to her body.

Before she disconnected him, he stopped
kicking the tree and concentrated on the speaking end of his phone,
saying with seriousness, “Alright, I love you too.”

“Come on, my car’s across the street,” Gloria
said, starting to cross the street and stopping traffic at the same
time.

Vivian still held the cell phone in her hand,
running and dodging cars, trying not to get killed. Helen noticed
Gloria heading toward a red, shiny Cadillac, whispering toward
Vivian, “Vivian, that’s her car?”

“Yes, that’s my car alright,” Gloria replied,
overhearing what Helen asked. “I have very good ears,” she added as
Helen looked at her in a shocked manner; she couldn’t believe
Gloria heard her question.

“Where do you live?” questioned Vivian,
entering Gloria’s car and sitting in the front seat.

“Manhattan,” she answered, turning on her
engine while Helen entered the car and sat in the back seat.
“Alright, ladies, buckle up, it’s going to be a long ride,” she
added with a smile; but Vivian knew there was a deeper meaning in
what she said.

Chapter Fifty-Three

The days started to get harder for Damen as
they became weeks; everyone was gone, his girlfriend, even his best
friends. The landlord of the apartment complex kicked him out
because he couldn’t afford the rent, and every agency that he went
to for a job wouldn’t take him for a client. His depression grew
stronger as he walked about the streets of Hollywood with his
backpack and journal, seeing the true reality, authenticity, and
the consequences of trying for an artist’s career. He used all his
money up to stay at a cheap motel for a few days after he was
kicked out. But, after that, he had to turn to the streets of
Hollywood for his bed.

He didn’t know how to contact Vivian, he knew
she would call the coffee shop, but Damen’s pride was too strong to
face Chuck again. He didn’t even know if she got the part in the TV
show or not. He had no money, couldn’t even afford to go back home
to Ridge Crest and put this long, terrible experience behind him.
Damen never imagined that his life would come to this, never
thought for once that he would go as low as to living on the
streets for his dream. Damen comprehended, perceived, and
understood that he really, truly wanted to be an actor, he realized
that as he walked each night down alleys in search of a bed made
out of a cardboard box.

But, his dream was fading as each approaching
night came. Every night he would lose one more memory of his
ambition, he just wanted to go home to Ridge Crest. He was angered
by his ambition, yelling out to himself how it was only a
pipedream, and he never should have come to this horrible place,
that he thought he loved so much. The depression, as he walked like
a hobo, grew stronger, thicker, surrounding and plaguing his mind
with the thought of deceit, and how God damned him to this horrible
life with the dream of fame, that he would never reach. Yet, before
his dream vanished completely, and wiped all of its memory from his
mind, a miracle took place. It was a miracle that Damen didn’t
realize, but would in the future. This miracle took place on
January 31. To Damen, this incident changed his life for the worse
at the time, but for his dream, it changed for the better.

He was walking down a dark alley; he didn’t
know his whereabouts. To Damen, all alleys look the same, that is,
after you sleep in a high number of them. Some are just dirty, full
of garbage, debris, filth and boxes that make homes for neighbors
in the streets, and some are dark, deserted, where only crime
lurks. His dirty clothes and his uncleansed body were tired when he
decided to stop and find a place to sleep in the dark alley. The
moment he sat down, he heard a voice say, “Give me all your money,
now.”

Damen looked up at the dark figure and began
laughing in a crazy manner. “You idiot, I think you’re robbing the
wrong person, I don’t have any money.” Damen got up and asked in a
snotty form, “Do you think I would be sitting in an alley if I did
have money?”

“Oh, I think we got a smartass here,” the
figure conveyed when two other figures came out from behind a
dumpster and walked up to him.

One of the figures pulled out a knife, Damen
seeing its silver glow by the moonlight above. His fear started to
show now, vocalizing, “Listen, I don’t have any money.”

“Well, we don’t care,” one of the men
shouted. The man then slit Damen’s arm with a black, stained knife,
while holding another luminous, silver one in his other hand.

Damen ran away from the evil silhouettes,
heading deeper into the alley and screaming, “Please, just leave me
alone.”

The three men grabbed Damen and pulled him to
his knees. One of the men pulled out a silver gun and put it up to
his head. “Nick, check his pockets and knapsack, he must have
something with value.”

“Nope, nothing, Chris, all he has is a few
clothes and a journal.” The man named Nick kicked Damen in his
chest, and he fell to the alley’s floor on his stomach.

Chris put the gun up to the back of his head
and asked, “Well, boy, any last regrets?”

Damen heard the gun being loaded, and clicked
back, feeling this moment of terror, having his life flashback
before his terrified eyes. In a way, Damen wanted him to pull the
trigger, thinking that he will finally be ripped from his misery,
but then the thought of Sugar Valley flashed before him, and the
wantings of seeing it one last time. He realized, if this man
pulled the trigger, then he would never see Sugar’s body again, and
never see if he would have actually made his ambitions real. Damen
looked at the gun, and saw this devil, Chris, slowly pushing the
trigger, feeling sweat dripping down Damen’s forehead, he
concentrated on the trigger, seeing it slowly being pushed down
more, and more. He started to imagine what would happen if the
trigger was pushed down an inch more, even before it reached that
inch, and what pain he would feel, what world he will see when that
bullet strikes his temple and pulverizes his mind.

Suddenly, the trigger came to that inch he
was thinking, but the bullet still didn’t exit the gun, so he knew
that the trigger had to be pushed, tempted, forced just a little
bit more, a tap, till his life will be over. This rapture of
manipulative terror, overfilled his mind with massively thick
anxiety, waiting for the bullet to exit the gun, wondering how long
it would take till this man pushed it down, to the point of no
return, and the bullet does its job on Damen. But then, he thought
about what type of job it will do on him: would it kill him? He was
hoping that it would, that its sharp, pointy body would kill him,
instead of leaving him here, bleeding and feeling great agony for a
while. He wanted it to be painless, striking his brain with all of
its unnatural but eccentric force.

Abruptly, without warning, another man
appeared behind the three figures, saying with solemnness, “Yeah, I
want you to put the gun down before I shoot you myself.”

Damen looked up for a glance and saw that it
was Chuck, standing behind the men, with a gun pointing at Chris.
Damen was relieved, whispering, “Thank God.”

“What are you gonna do, old man, are you
gonna shoot us all?” Chris questioned, slowly turning around to
face him. “All I have to do is pull the trigger on this little
shit, and boom, he’s dead.”

“Listen, if you don’t leave right now, then I
will shoot all of you, including that little shit who’s laying on
the ground,” Chuck said, tricking the robbers into believing he
didn’t care about Damen. “This is a private alley, now get out of
here,” he yelled out. The three men pulled Damen to his feet and
began walking away from Chuck with him. Chuck pointed toward Damen
and screamed, “Leave him.”

Chris asked in a smart-alecky style, “Why do
you care if we leave him or not, I thought you told us all to
leave?”

A police car shot down the alley, showing its
sirens, hearing its lights. “Run,” one of the robbers yelled. Chris
kicked Damen for the last time and caused him to fall to the
ground. They vanished from sight, and left Damen there, laying his
beat-up body on the ground, staring at Chuck with remorse,
penitence, and fright.

Chuck walked up to him, dawdling his old body
toward his body, and helped Damen up to his feet. “Damen, are you
alright?”

A cop exited the police car, flashing his
large flashlight toward Damen and Chuck’s figures, questioning,
“What’s going on here?”