Mr. Schultz ran over to a public phone and began dialing the digits. Jose dashed over to him, holding his two suitcases, feeling them weighing down his arms, each time his legs would run closer to Damen’s figure, and said, “Damen, we just got here, can’t you call him when we get to the hotel?” But it was too late, the phone was already ringing, and Damen just waited patiently for Chuck to pick it up. “Listen, Damen, we really have to go, before anyone notices Julienne here,” he added, trying to come up with any excuse, just to get this plan over with. Yet, Damen didn’t pay any attention to him, listening to all the rings that came on the phone, Damen just stuck to wanting to call Chuck and ignored Jose, by accident.
Chuck ran over to the ringing phone, in the café, picked it up frantically, and answered with panic to his tone, “Hello?”
“Hey, Chuck, it’s me, Damen.”
Chuck showed relief to his face, saying in a father’s voice, “Damen, did you get there okay?”
Julienne and Jose just sat on their luggage, waiting for Damen to get off the phone. They wanted to get this trip over with. Not being patient to Damen’s delay, Julienne blew a gasp of air from her mouth, yearning to leave and begin her plan of abandoning him in New York stranded, alone.
Damen smiled toward the phone, replying in a son’s voice, “Yes, don’t worry, the plane ride was nice. We’re on our way to the hotel, and then we’re gonna see Vivian.”
“Listen to me, if you have any trouble, and I mean any trouble at all, I want you to call me,” Chuck said with Damen suddenly hearing the operator coming on, with her vexatious, annoying computerized voice, saying to deposit more money for the next three minutes. Chuck also heard this operator’s tone, adding with anger, “Wait a second, we’ve only been on the phone for less than a minute. You don’t know what you’re talking about, bitch.”
Damen Schultz, with his simple way of finding humor in everything, started laughing at Chuck’s words. “Listen, Chuck, I got to go now, the operator is yelling at me.”
Chuck wanted to talk to him more, already missing him, in this short time, thinking of him as a son, worrying about his well-being. He didn’t want Damen to hang up, so he said with panic, “Here, hang up the phone and call me collect then.”
“Listen, I got to go now, Dad, but I’ll call you if I have any troubles,” he chuckled in a smart-alecky version.
Click.
“Damen, hello, Damen are you still there?”
Mr. Schultz hung up the phone and turned to see Julienne and Jose’s angered faces, perceiving their gawks of anger, and their straight mouths of pressure, with their bottom lips, pressing hard against their uppers. But their images turned to a smile deliberately, not wanting Damen to know that they were upset at him for delaying, wanting, through their own private deprivations, to be as nice as possible, but not overdoing it.
Later on that day, Damen, Julienne, and Jose went to the hotel and began to get unpacked. They all got ready and put on their best clothes to visit Vivian, fixing their hair, bathing their bodies and cologne on their flesh, to smell perfectly for her. To Damen, this was a regular, conventional, orthodox visit to his girlfriend, the first visit he ever seized, so he was high-strung, jittery, and nervous, yet excited at the same time.
To Jose, this was a mission, a plan of action, to ditch Mr. Schultz in New York, so he could take his star role away from him. Jose made sure to memorize the exact things that Julienne discussed to him, playing his character like it was just a normal visit. But in his mind, it was a war of deceit, and a war to make sure that Damen never came back to California, for when the film begins shooting.
Finally, to Julienne, this trip was more than just a visit, more than just a scheme, and more than just a war, it was a way out of her lies. She was doing this for Jose, catering to his wants, knowing that if he didn’t get his star role like he wanted, then he would confess to Damen, almost every lie that he and Julienne falsified about his character, and the jealousy would also cause Jose to harm him physically for, supposedly, messing around with Julienne. All these lies, all these plans, and all these deceitful deeds that she created, all lay on this moment, in New York, where she would either leave with success under her belt, or leave with loser imprinted on her face, and her lies coming back to her tenfold. So she was careful, this was her destiny, she wanted to just get rid of Damen Schultz, for Jose’s sake, and everything would be fine, and splendid. Yet, she couldn’t predict that her lies would haunt her in the near future, and come back to her infinity fold.
After they catered to their own presentations, they took a taxi to the destination, the location where Vivian lived, and discovered she wasn’t in her quarters.
Damen knocked harder on Vivian’s apartment door, saying with aggravation, “Damn, I knew we should have called first.” He kept on knocking, louder and louder, harder and harder, where his fists were beginning to hurt, forming a numbing sensation around his knuckles, as if he was pounding on sharp dry-ice.
Knock, Knock, Knock, Knock.
Jose saw the fatigued aggravation in Damen’s knocks, comprehending that he was about to vanquish this obstruction in her aperture of a doorway, and knock down the door. He didn’t want to get in trouble for Damen’s loud beats against her closed entrance, so he spoke, “Well we just have to come back tomorrow.”
Knock, Knock, Knock, Knock.
Damen continued his annoying knocking, noticing that a door, next to Vivian’s apartment, was opening slowly, but he kept up his beat still. In a way, besides wanting Vivian’s door to open, he also yearned to show Jose and Julienne, that he didn’t travel all this way, just to have a vacant apartment, without Vivian being there; he hungered to show that he was upset.
Knock, Knock, Knock, Knock.
An obese man with hairy side burns, and a ripped, cleaved white undershirt on, came out of his doorway, saying with infuriated irritation, “Excuse me, but would you mind not pounding on that door so loud?”
Damen discontinued his annoying pound, speaking, “Oh, I’m sorry.”
Julienne was appalled by this man’s presentation, seeing that he was a slob, and a low-class person, noticing his cleaved shirt, and appearance of an unlikely gentleman. Yet, she always, perpetually in her existence, knows how to get what she wants, seeing that this man was looking at her in a flirtatious way, she walked up to him slowly, and questioned in an alluring and seductive verbalization, “Excuse me, honey, we were wondering if you knew where a Vivian Gryer lived at? Because, we’re not sure if this is her place or not.”
“Yes, sir, we would appreciate it,” said Damen. Julienne turned around and said “shut up” in a silent tone to him, and then turned back to this man of disgust.
She asked again, in her same, flirtatious way, “Like I was saying, do you know if this is her apartment, cause you look like a kind, knowledgeable man, and a gentleman of great qualities?”
Damen and Jose were smiling, catching onto her act, finding humor in it. The man started itching his belly, while his ripped, smelly, and tight pants were revealing his underwear. Looking at Julienne more closely, widening his eyes, he questioned with vivacity, enthusiasm,
“Hey, aren’t you that Julienne Wells chick?”
“Why yes, yes I am.”
“Oh, my brother is crazy about you. Could I have your autograph to give to him?” the man asked, pulling a pen out from his tight pants pocket and holding a newspaper against it.
“Well, I’ll give you an autograph, but only if you tell me where Vivian Gryer lives. Does she live here?” Julienne pointed to her door, seeing that the man was confused about the name, and gawked at him, waiting for an answer.
The man handed her the pen and paper, answering with, “Yeah, yeah, she lives there.”
She began signing the newspaper, but still stared at this man. “Do you know where she might be at now?”
“Yeah, she’s probably working on that dumb soap opera.”
“Do you know the address?”
“Yea
h, um, let me think, Oh I got it, I believe it’s 3421 West 34th Street.”
Damen stared down at the newspaper, and saw the way she was signing her name, what her penmanship was like, and what style she created of her own. Julienne then finished her autograph, and handed the pen and paper back to the man, without even saying a word to him, without even acknowledging his existence. That’s the way she was, once she has what she wants, she leaves that person be, only using them and making them feel used. They all walked away, while Damen turned around quickly, saying, “Thank you very much.”
“Yeah, thanks also for the autograph.” The man then looked and saw that Julienne had signed Minnie Mouse instead of her name.
While they all walked with fury and quickness to their heels, Damen turned to Julienne and questioned, “Hey, why did you sign ‘Minnie Mouse’? Why didn’t you just sign your name?”
“Because he said his brother was crazy about me, he didn’t say he was too.”
They took a taxi to the address that the man gave. Exiting the taxi, they ran into the building that looked like a warehouse, big to its size, with two big doors that were as immense as King Kong himself. Entering into it, they went to a security guard and began asking him questions.
Julienne looked at the guard, thinking that he was going to notice her as being a movie star, she thought that this was going to be simple. So, after a few seconds of her staring at him, smiling away, she asked, “Excuse me, but I was wondering if you knew where Vivian Gryer was at?”
“Yeah, but you can’t see her now, she’s in her dressing room,” the guard explained, looking down at her from his 6’ 7” figure.
She turned her attention to Jose and Damen, then back at the guard, protesting with a snotty voice, “Excuse me, but we know her, we’re her friends.”
“Yeah, that’s what everyone says.”
Julienne looked back at the boys and then faced the guard once more, questioning with a conceited, proud smile, “Listen, do you know who I am?”
“No.”
“I’m Julienne Wells. I’m a movie star.”
“I don’t care if you’re the First Lady, you’re still not going to see Miss Gryer,” the guard proclaimed, gazing at Julienne with attitude in his eyes.
Damen then noticed Vivian from a distance, staring through all of the props and different sceneries that this studio consisted, and spotting her face. “Vivian,” yelled Damen before Julienne put her hands up to her ears.
“Would you mind not screaming in my ears?” Julienne shouted in aggravation.
Vivian noticed them, hearing her name being called out; she pointed her eyes to where the echo began, and saw Damen, Julienne, and Jose by the guard. She started running toward them with Damen saying to Julienne, “Sorry.”
Vivian ran up to them, giving Damen a big hug and asking, “My God, what are you guys doing here?”
“We decided to come out here and visit you, baby.”
Julienne smiled, turned her eyes toward the guard, and spoke with an attitude, “You see, I told you we were her friends.”
“Hi, Jose. Hey, Julienne,” said Vivian, shaking Julienne’s hand and giving Jose a little hug. “Wow, this is a big surprise. Come on, I’ll introduce you to the cast.” She grasped onto Damen’s hand and started guiding them into the studio, while he was in his glory with her, yet Julienne and Jose were still a little bit nervous.
Two nights went by, Julienne and Jose prepared for the plan that was about to be brought on. Miss Wells gathered all of the plane tickets together while Damen Schultz was sleeping. Jose already left early to go and see Vivian, and Julienne stayed to wait till Damen woke up. Before he did, she just ogled at his sealed eyes, showing a bit of remorse for him, lighting a cigarette and still gazing at his sleeping figure. The newborn sun, shooting its new light through the white drapes of his room, revealing Julienne’s silhouette, standing next to the window, gazing over at his body, his face of rest. The silhouette of her smoke also showed through the sunlight’s presence, draping over every bit of lasting nicotine-smoke that it caught, allowing the smoke to look like it was a cloud, levitating in this room, showing its beauty of oxymoronic qualities. With every exhale of the cigarette’s body, she would grin a little bit toward his sealed eyes, finding it exhilarating that today was the day, that all of her plans, the lies, and deceit would be gone for good, abandoning Damen in a web of crime. Julienne comprehended and understood that no human being, after having this happen to them, could possibly still not give up, and continue on their dream’s road, its path of hardness and labyrinth-like endings. She felt, that this was it, once they left him here there was no way, as she thought, that Damen could possibly be a threat to her or Jose, ever again. A human’s mind could only withstand so much, but once they reach a sector, a boundary where pain of mental anguish and tears comes to their presence, they give up and leave the hard road that they thought, as in Damen’s case, was finally over with.
She found this funny, seeing Damen’s sleeping body, noticing a smile on his face, wondering what he was dreaming about. Maybe he was dreaming about the Oscars, and having the host call out his name? Or maybe he was dreaming about the movie that he was going to star in very soon, and how this will be the beginning of a career that he had to go through hell to realize, almost, its full reality? Who knows, but Julienne still gaped at him, knowing that once he awoke, the beginning of her plan would start, and Damen’s inevitable fall, after the plan was executed, would occur in a matter of seconds. To her, it was very funny, comprehending that an actor could work his whole life, and finally become a star, and it only took a couple of seconds for that star to fall, and begin at the starting line again; like a mountain climber, striving his way to the mountain’s glorious top, and then falling from it, having death hit him in ten seconds.
As she thought, smoked her cigarette, and felt a little remorse for what she and Jose were about to do to him, Julienne whispered, “Well, Damen, I’m sorry that we have to do this to you, but you know what they say, “every man for himself.” I just hope you don’t write a book about this; then again, you won’t, because you’ll never know about it. And I’ll make sure that you never know, Mr. Schultz, I’ll make sure that you never find out about who told these lies. You guys were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. I’m sorry for ruining your friendship with Jose, but I need him, more than you do. For me, and from my point of view, you guys were in the right place at the right time.”
He then started to wake up, so she panicked, put her cigarette out on the red carpet of the room, and then changed her character to a frantic one, questioning with stress, “Um, where’s Jose?” The plan, this fraudulent, deceitful, and unscrupulous mission began, and Julienne made sure to play her part very carefully, using her canny, her astuteness, wit, her intelligence to overcome this battle that, oddly enough, she began.
Damen opened his eyes, yawning, “What do you mean? Isn’t he here?”
“No, when I woke up he was gone. The plane leaves in two hours. If we don’t find him, he’ll miss it.”
Damen got up from his bed and quickly put on his winter coat over the clothes he slept in, hearing the frantic voice of Julienne, knowing that this had to be serious.
He handed Julienne her jacket, saying in a soothing voice, “Calm down, it’s gonna be alright, we’ll find him.”
As he turned around to face the doorway of the hotel room, Julienne pulled out a letter that she made Jose write, from her pocket, and placed it on a coffee table, inconspicuously, unobtrusively. She tried not to be that suspicious, so she put on her best acting face, and questioned, “Wait a second, what’s this?”
“It’s a note from Jose; it says he’s at Vivian’s work. He wants to say goodbye to her,” he read out loud. When he finished reading it thoroughly, he crumbled up the note and became a little resentful, jealous. “It also says that he has something really important to talk to me about.”
“Why would he go to Vivian’s work now? And why would h
e go without us?”
Damen still stared at the note, feeling the jealousy growing in his veins, having Julienne there to help feed the fire. As he looked up at her, she saw a labyrinth of confusion to his eyes, wanting to know why Jose went to Vivian’s work, this early in the morning, this close to their flight schedule, and alone, without them? “I don’t know. I thought we said our goodbyes to Vivian yesterday?”
“We did, we all said ‘goodbye’ to her last night.”
“Come on, let’s go,” he spoke with panic, opening up the door to the hotel room. Damen then noticed their plane tickets, sticking out of Julienne’s pocket of her coat. “Wait a second, why are you taking the plane tickets with? Why don’t you just leave them here?”
She looked at the tickets, then gazed at him, saying with massive hesitation, “Oh, um, because, it’s just in case the maids come in here and, um, accidentally throw them away.”
“Oh, alright, let’s go.” Damen ran out of the hotel room with Julienne behind him, her being prepared for what they would see when they reached the studio, and having Damen clueless still to the outcome that he would reach exceedingly soon.
Chapter Sixty-Three
So many thoughts, so many plans, so much confusion that had a mask to another’s eyes, but they all still pushed forward with their missions and attempted to make them complete to their own satisfaction.
Damen and Julienne rushed over to Vivian’s work while Jose was doing a little exhibition of his own. He sat in Vivian’s dressing room and told her about how Damen kissed Julienne. Trying to get the major part of Julienne’s and his plan over with, he began rushing a little bit, because he knew Julienne and Damen would be showing up very soon. It was a race against precious time, confessing to Vivian about Damen’s hanky-panky with Julienne, he didn’t have any duration to slowly prolong, to start out with having a short conversation with her, and then build it up to telling her about it. He had to cut right to the chase, right to the main reason of why he was present, in her dressing room, hours before his plane left. Of course she didn’t believe him, the way he got to that subject so quickly, it looked as if he was surely lying, draping the real truth of why he’s here, with a ridiculous, non-believable story like this; but the thing is, then why was he there? That was the question that she had to think of, wondering around in her confused, denial-filled mind, showing and shoving different reasons for him being present, to her thoughts, but never adding up to a satisfied answer.
Sugar Valley (Hollywood's Darkest Secret) Page 58