“Yes, speaking,” I said.
“Hi, Ruby, it’s Suzie Blenheim here – and how are you?”
Suzie Blenheim. My stomach contracted again as I realised that this was it. I was going to find out if I had got the part of Lady Elizabeth. A mixture of emotions churned through my mind because I wasn’t ready to get this particular news at this particular moment when I had other things to think about.
At first I thought, I don’t want it, I don’t want it any more. I don’t deserve it and anyway I need to go home and see Sean and tell him I’m sorry and help make things better again. And then I thought about how much Sean must hate me at this moment, and if he hated me then Anne-Marie certainly would, and maybe even Nydia and Danny too. Perhaps I’d have to go back to school with everybody hating me and that frightened me. I’d rather live in Hollywood forever than for that to happen.
“Hi Suzie,” I said in a small voice. “Do you want to speak to my mum?”
“No.” Suzie’s voice was warm and friendly. “I think that you should be the first to know, Ruby. We are thrilled to offer you the guest spot of Lady Elizabeth to feature in six episodes of Hollywood Highl”
There was a long silence during which I knew I was supposed to say something, but nothing came to mind. My swirling mind had suddenly gone blank.
“Ruby?” Suzie repeated my name anxiously.
“I’m sorry…I am Just so surprised and…and happy!” The actor part of me finally kicked in and from somewhere I found the joy that should have greeted such fantastic news. “It’s wonderful, wonderful news – Mum will be thrilled,” I assured her.
“Good,” Suzie laughed. “Well, if I may speak to your mother then, please, Ruby. There are a lot of details that need to be ironed out. Details you don’t want to worry about, OK? You just think about starting at Beaumont on Monday and we’ll see you on set after school. The scripts are on the way to you now.”
“OK,” I said. I was about to take the phone and go and look for my mum when suddenly I heard her voice on the line. She must have picked up another extension and been listening all the time.
“Suzie, this is great news!” my mother said, and then, “Put the phone down now, Ruby.”
I was happy to oblige. I didn’t want to listen to the final details that had to be confirmed. I would be far too busy hiding under the covers of my bed and worrying about what I had done to Sean.
Chapter Ten
The rest of the day dragged by as I nervously waited for my webcam chat with Danny. Then I would really find out what was going on at home.
After Mum had finished talking to Suzie she came and found me in my room under the covers, curled up with David.
“What on earth are you doing under there?” she asked me, pulling the quilt off so that I squinted and squirmed in the sunlight. David yelped and ran off the bed, disappearing through the crack in the door. “Why are you hiding? You’re not nervous about starting at Beaumont, are you? Suzie said Adrienne and Nadine are dying to show you off. She thinks you’ll have a wonderful time. And as for the part of Lady Elizabeth – well, you could act any of those girls off the screen.”
“It’s not that,” I said. “At least not mainly.” I must have looked worried because Mum’s brow crinkled Just a little and she sat down on the bed.
“What’s wrong, Ruby?”
“I’m worried about what’s going to happen at home,” I told her. She nodded as if she understood completely and for a second I thought that she might already know about Sean.
“You don’t have to. I’ve already spoken to your dad, on the day of the audition, to tell him what we were planning. He was absolutely fine about it. He said that he thought it would be good for you to stay here a bit longer. He thought you’d learn a lot.”
“You didn’t tell me that you had spoken to Dad!” I said, temporarily forgetting Sean. That piece of news stunned me. I had been waiting for the right moment to call him myself for nearly two weeks and since all the Hollywood High stuff had happened, that moment still hadn’t come. I had rehearsed how I was going to tell him, deciding that I would make friends with him first, apologise about the way we left things and being rude to his so-called girlfriend. And then I’d tell him about Hollywood High and invite him to visit for a few days. Something to make him feel better and included again.
But Mum had cleared it with him and it seemed he wasn’t at all bothered if he didn’t see me for a few more weeks. In fact, maybe he wasn’t bothered if he didn’t see me at all. Maybe his life without me had moved on that little bit more, the little bit more that didn’t need me in at all.
I looked at Mum, but she didn’t have a clue what this all might mean. So I tucked the hurt feeling away in my tummy and tried again to tell her what had happened.
“It’s not that,” I said. “It’s Sean. Sean Rivers.”
“Sean?” My mum looked perplexed. “What on earth are you worrying about Sean for?”
I told her what I had seen on C! and she immediately switched on the TV in my room. Sure enough they were repeating the same broadcast.
“Oh dear,” Mum said. “But it’s not as if you actually said, T go to this school and so does Sean Rivers’, did you?”
“No, but I said enough to get people thinking, like his dad and about a hundred tabloid Journalists. People who were able to track him down through me,” I said miserably. “He was so happy and I’ve ruined it.”
“This is bad,” Mum said. “We don’t want the public to perceive you as the kind of person who would betray a friend!”
“Mum!” I exclaimed. “That’s not what I’m worried about. I’m worried about Sean. What can I do to help him? I need to do something!”
Mum looked thoughtful and then patted my hand. “I’ll call Sean’s mother as soon as she wakes up, if she slept at all with that lot on her trail, poor woman. And I’ll talk to Art and Lisa Wells. After all, Art would rather that these bullying rumours were stopped too. I have an idea that might help both your careers.”
“I don’t want you to help me, I want to help him!” I cried.
“And you will,” Mum said firmly. “Now listen, you have to focus on the now. I’ve changed our air tickets to open returns so that we can fly back any time we like in the next six months. They are being delivered today, so remind me to put them with the passports. And your first script should be here by this afternoon so we’ll start to read it through before bed, OK? There’s not much time until you start work!”
“I have my web chat with Danny tonight,” I reminded her.
“Oh, yes, that,” Mum said. “But that will only take a few minutes, won’t it?”
“I don’t know,” I said. And I didn’t because I had no idea what Danny was going to say to me.
At the agreed hour I followed the log on instructions Danny had e-mailed me to connect my laptop to his PC. Eventually a screen came up showing his bedroom at his dad’s house and an empty chair, which meant he’d already switched his PC on and was ready. I was nervous. I didn’t know if that meant he was eager to see me or to tell me exactly what he thought of me. He was nowhere to be seen though, which made me wonder if he’d changed his mind about talking to me at all. I looked at my watch and thought that I might be a few minutes early so I sat at the desk and stared at Danny’s bedroom and waited.
And waited.
“He’s decided he doesn’t want to see me,” I said, looking down at David who was lying at my feet happily chewing the laces of my new trainers. “He’s so disgusted with me over Sean that he Just doesn’t want to know.”
“Hi, Ruby, sorry I’m late.” Danny’s voice suddenly came out of nowhere. I looked up and there he was sitting in his chair. I felt butterflies in my chest. It was good to see him, but he wasn’t smiling.
“Been waiting long?” he asked. “I got a bit delayed by a call from the new girl on Kensington Heights. Melody. She’s asked me to help her rehearse today.”
“Oh,” I said nervously. “Don’t worry about
it.”
It was hard to tell how Danny was being with me. He looked odd on the laptop screen and somehow he felt further away than when I spoke to him on the phone. But he couldn’t have changed that much in two weeks. He was still Just my Danny, after all, even if at that precise moment I had grounds to think he might hate me.
“Do you know?” Danny asked me straight out, his voice dark. “About what’s going on with Sean?”
“I just found out today. It’s all over the news here,” I said. “I feel dreadful, Danny, I never meant for this to happen. Does Sean hate me?”
I had hoped that Danny was going to tell me not to be so silly, but he didn’t.
“He feels pretty bad about it, Ruby,” he said. Only his mouth moved a fraction of a second or two after the words came out of the speakers, making them seem all the more stark. “He can’t believe that you talked about him at all.”
“I didn’t mean to, I didn’t want to,” I told him. “I was on TV and there were hot lights and an audience and this guy saying all sorts of awful things about Art and Sean and it just sort of came out – I was trying to stand up for him and Art. Has he seen the interview with Carl Vine? If he did, he’d understand that.”
“I don’t think he cares how it happened. He’s having a bad time of it now – he and his mum had to move out of their house and everything,” Danny said with a delayed hand gesture. “You can see why he’s feeling pretty gutted, Ruby.”
“This isn’t how I wanted our webcam chat to be,” I said sadly. “You’re cross with me too.”
“I’m not cross,” Danny said. “Just sorry for Sean. I know how hard it can be to keep your life normal when you do what we do and for Sean especially.”
“I bet Anne-Marie hates me too,” I added.
“She’s upset for Sean,” Danny said.
“But you don’t hate me, do you?” I asked, suddenly thinking I could detect a coolness in the detached voice that I was hearing through the speakers.
“No, of course I don’t hate you,” Danny said. “It’s just that…”
“Just what?” I asked him.
“It seems like you’ve been away for much longer than two weeks, that’s all…”
“What?” I asked. Danny paused, looking down at his desk top. “What do you mean?”
“I…I…dunno, Rube.” There was a long pause and I got the feeling Danny was trying to work out how to say something. “I just wish you’d been more careful. It’s a bit like appearing on that TV show was more important to you than your mates are.”
“I didn’t mean it to happen!” I repeated, certain that wasn’t what he had really planned to say.
“Yeah, well, it did happen, didn’t it, Ruby?” Danny said, and I couldn’t be sure because of the webcam, but I thought he was sulking.
Suddenly, I exploded from the pressure of the day and lost my temper.
“Well, fine!” I snapped. “It’s fine if you all hate me now because I’m not coming back anyway. I’m starting shooting on Hollywood High next week and I’m going to school here so I don’t care if you hate me. I’m not coming back.”
“Ruby—”
I slammed the laptop lid shut and cut Danny off.
I wasn’t completely sure what had Just happened, but I had a horrible feeling that Danny and I had just broken up and that I had done it. I opened the laptop up again and tried to get the connection back, but it seemed to have gone, Danny must have turned his PC off. I couldn’t guess what he must be thinking of me except that I had turned into a Hollywood diva, the kind of girl he would never want to go out with. But there was something different about him too. I was sure there was something he wasn’t telling me.
I didn’t know what to do. Should I call him or e-mail him? Or try to talk to Anne-Marie or even Sean? I wanted to, but I was afraid. I knew that they would all blame me for what had happened and I suppose they were right to, because even if I hadn’t meant it to happen, it had, because I was thoughtless and careless.
Suddenly, I felt so cut off from home, from my friends and Danny and even from Dad, that the prospect of six more weeks in Hollywood brought tears to my eyes. I was helpless. There was nothing I could do to make things better.
All I could do was wait and see what plans Mum, Lisa and Art came up with. And if that worked out and things got back to normal with Sean, then perhaps everything would be all right at home again and maybe Danny would be able to tell me whatever it was he hadn’t managed to say on the webcam.
But until then, I Just had to get on with things here. I had to throw myself into my new life at Beaumont and my part in Hollywood High. I’d have to act like I have never acted before. Because if things didn’t get better back at home, then maybe I wouldn’t want to leave Hollywood after all.
HOLLYWOOD HIGH©
A BLENHEIM PRODUCTIONS PRODUCTION
SEASON TWO EPISODE 23 ‘ELIZABETH, THE FIRST’ WRITTEN BY: SUZIE BLENHEIM, JENNY ROBERTS, SAM JENKINS, HALLE GONZALEZ, NAVEEN SMITH AND CONNIE KREMER DIRECTED BY: SUZIE BLENHEIM
SCENE tbc
EXT: DAYTIME. SCHOOL PLAYING FIELDS
LADY ELIZABETH is sitting alone at the edge of the playing fields watching the boys take football practice. She looks vulnerable and alone. HAYDEN keeps looking over at her, even though he knows his girlfriend SABRINA is watching. ELIZABETH is aware he is watching her and so is SABRINA who is sitting a little way off with NATALIE, PARMINDER and LARA. HAYDEN looks over at SABRINA who is obviously talking about LADY ELIZABETH behind her back and when the squad takes a break he trots over to LADY ELIZABETH.
HAYDEN
(Awkwardly) Hi there, are you a football fan?
LADY ELIZABETH
(Looks down as if she might blush, but doesn’t) Who me? I think it looks very interesting but I don’t really understand it. In my country football is something completely different. This looks more like rugby to me. My brothers play rugby, they are rather good at it. If I’m honest, I just came here because it seemed like a place where I could sit on my own without feeling too embarrassed.
HAYDEN glances over at the group of girls who are trying to pretend they are not watching him. SABRINA is looking in a compact, reapplying lip gloss.
HAYDEN
Those girls have been giving you a hard time, haven’t they?
LADY ELIZABETH nods sadly and looks as if she might cry (she doesn’t).
LADY ELIZABETH
(Voice wobbles slightly) I thought at first that we could all be friends. I don’t know what I’ve done to upset them, but they aren’t talking to me any more. It’s hard to be a new girl at a school in a foreign country without any real friends.
HAYDEN sighs and looks over again at SABRINA who is intent on ignoring him. He seems to come to some decision.
HAYDEN
How about I walk you home after school? I could tell you about some of the cool places to hang out.
LADY ELIZABETH
(Shocked and flustered) That would be wonderful, but what about Sabrina?
She glances over at Sabrina who is now glaring at her with naked fury. HAYDEN doesn’t see it but LADY ELIZABETH smiles ever so slightly at SABRINA.
LADY ELIZABETH
Won’t you get into trouble with your girlfriend?
HAYDEN
I like Sabrina a lot and we’ve been dating for a while, but sometimes I don’t understand her. I think it’s wrong of her to treat you so badly, when you’re new. She’s just jealous because a lot of the guys think you’re cute. Well, let’s give her something to be jealous of. When she sees that you and I are just friends and that you’re not a threat to her, she’ll soon come to her senses.
LADY ELIZABETH
You’d do that for me?
HAYDEN
(Nods) And for Sabrina too. She’s a nice person really. It’s just that sometimes she forgets it.
HAYDEN goes back to football practice and LADY ELIZABETH looks on as SABRINA marches off, followed by her friends. LADY ELIZABETH takes her cellphone o
ut of her bag and makes a call.
LADY ELIZABETH
Jenkins? It’s me. Please tell Daddy that I won’t be needing the chauffeur today. I’m walking home. (Pauses) Yes Jenkins, me, walking, it is a miracle isn’t it?
Chapter Eleven
Considering that I am only thirteen, I have had some pretty nerve-wracking moments in my life already.
Having to do my first-ever screen kiss with the boy I used to have the biggest crush on, Justin de Souza, was pretty freaky. Auditioning in front of Art Dubrovnik and Imogene Grant was so frightening that I was actually sick. And next to being almost arrested for grand diamond theft, appearing on national US television in a show that was watched by twenty million people tested my ability to hold on to my last meal quite severely.
But I don’t think that I have ever been as scared as I was on my first day at Beaumont, because it wasn’t only my first day at a new school, it was my first day at a new foreign school where, as far as I knew, everybody would hate me just as many of the characters in Hollywood High hated Lady Elizabeth. And it was also my first day of shooting for some exterior scenes at Beaumont, which Hollywood High used for location shoots.
It was also my first day without Danny Harvey being my boyfriend, as far as I could tell, and the first day I could remember when I wasn’t sure if Nydia was my best friend any more. I had tried to call her mobile several times since I spoke to Danny, but she never answered. She hadn’t replied to my e-mails either. I had half expected that Danny would call me back, or e-mail at least, to try and make things up between us, but he didn’t. I didn’t hear from him at all which I supposed was all I needed to know about where I stood with him. We were finished. I knew that in my head, but because of the way it happened it Just didn’t feel real.
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