Plain Fame

by Sarah Price

  “Easy, Princesa,” he murmured. “We shall get you inside and settled into a room. Then it will calm down.”

  “Calm down?”

  “You can move about the hotel freely.”

  She blinked. Hotel, she thought. She had never stayed in a hotel. She was nervous. What if she got lost? What if people stared at her? What if . . .

  He put on his dark sunglasses and took a deep breath. “You wait for the doormen to open the doors. They will escort us inside and away from the paparazzi. Don’t say anything to those people, and if they touch you, don’t respond. Let the doormen handle it. They deal with this a lot,” he said.

  “Touch me?” The thought horrified her.

  “To get your attention,” he explained patiently.

  When the door to the vehicle opened, Alejandro stepped out and, after straightening his suit jacket, reached his hand down to help Amanda out of the car. Hesitantly, she took his hand. Once outside, she was too aware that there were at least fifteen camera people stealing her image. Beyond them were screaming fans, mostly young girls clamoring for Alejandro’s attention. Amanda frowned and stared at them, remembering their visit to Intercourse, in Pennsylvania, a few weeks back when the crowd had started to recognize him.

  The girls continued to scream and jump up, waving their arms in the air, anything to get his attention. Alejandro paused, looked at them, and nodded in acknowledgment. But he did not smile or stop to sign autographs or for photo taking. Instead, he placed his hand on the small of Amanda’s back and guided her through the crowd. There were five steps, and he held her elbow. He could tell that she was overwhelmed. Between the people and the noise, it was a new and not necessarily pleasant experience for Amanda. And he understood.

  She wandered over to the doorway that led to her own private bathroom. It was dark in the room, and she left the door open as she turned on the water. The countertop felt cool to her touch. Marble. The floor was cool, too. No hardwood floors or area rugs made from old clothing to cover them.

  She splashed cold water on her face. Her eyes stung. She had cried herself to sleep the night before, hugging the strange, fluffy pillow to her chest. It took an hour, but she eventually found her sleep, although it hadn’t been a restful sleep. She had awakened several times throughout the night, listening to the strange noises of Philadelphia that penetrated through the windows.

  When she went back into the main room, Amanda took a deep breath, trying to decide what to do next. Get dressed, she told herself. Just like any other day.

  The clothing that she had packed the day before seemed inadequate. Just three everyday dresses, her Sunday dress, and a nightgown. That was all she had. So she decided to wear her blue dress. As she pinned it shut, she smoothed down the fabric and glanced in the mirror.

  It was a large mirror with a thick wooden frame painted gold. She had never seen a mirror like that before, and as she saw her reflection, she had to catch her breath. Is that really me? she wondered as she walked toward the mirror. With her bare feet and loose hair, she barely recognized herself. Usually, she only looked in the small mirror Mamm had hung in the washroom to make certain her hair was tidy. She hadn’t ever seen herself from head to toe. The image took her by surprise.

  She was thin, almost too thin. Certainly she had lost weight over the past few weeks from the stress of living under the microscope of the media. When they had taken an interest in her relationship with Alejandro and found her father’s farm, Amanda had been too nervous to eat.

  Her face looked gaunt, her cheekbones too high, and her skin too tanned. She wasn’t certain how that had happened because she hadn’t been outside too much during the past few weeks. Her dark eyes looked lifeless and scared, lacking the sparkle that she had always had. For a moment, the image of herself made her want to cry all over again.

  Indeed, she realized, I am plain.

  When they had first arrived inside the hotel, two men greeted Alejandro and escorted them through the main lobby, away from the peering eyes of the other hotel guests. Amanda stared as they walked, too aware that people were whispering to each other and pointing at her. Only this time, she realized, it wasn’t simply because she was Amish. It was because she was Amish and with Alejandro.

  She cowered behind him, shielding herself from their gazes with his body.

  When he realized that she was no longer next to him, he stopped walking, and she bumped into him. He laughed lightly and turned around.

  “Princesa? You are all right?” He reached out and put his arm gently around her shoulder. “I thought we had lost you.”

  She shook her head and lowered her eyes. His arm on her shoulder felt light yet heavy at the same time. She was too aware that people were staring. She thought she saw someone take a photo. “Nee,” she whispered shyly, wishing people would just go away.

  Taking off his sunglasses with one hand, he touched the bottom of her chin with his finger and tilted her face so that she had no choice but to look at him. When their eyes met, he smiled. “You will get used to this, Amanda.”

  She glanced at the people. “I could never get used to this,” she replied softly.

  He chuckled and tapped his finger against the tip of her nose. “We shall see about that, Princesa. We shall see,” he teased. He looked up at the small crowd of hotel guests who stood a safe distance away, gawking at the scene. He smiled at them, a kind smile, but one that also warned them to stay away.

  A man began speaking to Alejandro in a language that Amanda didn’t understand. Immediately, he put on his sunglasses again and continued walking, talking rapidly in Spanish to the man. Back and forth they volleyed, their singsong words sounding musical and fluid. Ignoring the people who watched them, Amanda tried to listen to the words. She understood nothing.

  They stood before an elevator, one of the men pressing a button. When the doors opened, Alejandro escorted her inside the wood-paneled box. The other two men joined them, and the elevator rose up to the top floor of the building.

  “Princesa,” he said softly, switching back to English. “They will bring your suitcase to your room. I have it adjoining mine so that I am nearby if you need me. It’s a secured floor, so only people who have rooms on it can access it.”

  “Secured?”

  He glanced at the two men. “From paparazzi,” he explained. “And these two men will also be nearby. They are my security guards when I travel.”

  “Security guards?” What type of life, she wondered, does he really live? If she had pondered with curiosity about his life at some point, now she knew she was thrown directly into the middle of it. “Are we in danger?”

  “No,” he replied, a simple answer that needed no further explanation.

  When the doors opened, Alejandro took her arm and led her down the hallway. There were mirrors and paintings on the wall. She glanced at them, but Alejandro seemed determined to get her to her room. No time for exploring now. She wondered if she’d have time later to stare at those beautiful pieces of art that hung on the wall.

  “This is your room,” he said as he opened the door for her.

  He stood back and let her walk through the doorway. He did not enter behind her, giving her the privacy that she needed and that he had promised her. “We will only be here two nights. We can talk more tomorrow about what will happen next.”

  She glanced at him over her shoulder. “What happens next?”

  He laughed at the surprise on her face, realizing that she hadn’t thought much further than the moment when he had come to rescue her and take her away from the paparazzi frenzy on her father’s farm. “Well, we aren’t in Lancaster County anymore, no?”

  She smiled, glancing around the room. “Nee,” she conceded.

  “So we must come up with a plan, sí?”

  “Ja,” she answered.

  “Now I have some things to do. I will be next doo
r, Amanda,” he said, pointing toward a door by the dresser. “It locks on both sides. I will keep my side unlocked in case you need me.”

  “Need you?”

  He raised an eyebrow that peeked up from behind his sunglasses. “In case you get scared or lonely,” he responded.

  And with that, he shut the door and she was left alone in the middle of the strange room in an even stranger city. Left alone to realize that she had stepped far outside of her world in what she feared was a rash decision. Perhaps she should have left her community for Ohio. Perhaps she should have just permitted the bishop to have her sent away. Perhaps she never should have left with Alejandro.

  “What have I done?” she asked out loud, grateful that no one else but herself could hear the doubt in her voice.

  The loud ring of the phone on the desk made her jump. She turned away from the mirror and stared at it, wondering who would possibly be calling her. Immediately, she realized that it had to be Alejandro. No one in her family knew where she was yet. In fact, she realized, she herself didn’t even know where she was.

  She padded across the thick white carpet. It felt soft and warm under her bare feet. The floors at her parents’ farm were all made of hardwood with throw rugs scattered throughout, except in the kitchen, which was a cream-colored linoleum. None of their rooms had anything like the plush carpet that tickled her toes right now.

  By the fourth ring, she reached for the phone and lifted the handset to her ear. For a moment, she hesitated. It felt strange to answer a phone in a room instead of visiting the phone shanty by the barn. “Ja?” she said into the receiver.

  “You are up, sí?”

  She smiled, feeling as if her heart fluttered, and she bit her lip, happy to hear the excitement in his voice. “Alejandro!”

  He laughed. “Of course it is Alejandro, Princesa. Who else would call you this early? Who else knows where you are?” Still chuckling, he didn’t wait for a response. “Now, Amanda, I imagine you are hungry, no? So I want to take you to breakfast. There is a dining room downstairs with a lovely menu.”

  Breakfast, she thought. In a hotel, with Alejandro. Now she felt the sensation of butterflies in her stomach. It was all innocent; she knew that. But it would certainly be something to cause raised eyebrows from the bishop and elders at home.

  “I . . . I could eat something, ja,” she replied shyly. She had never had food at a restaurant with a man. Only courting couples did that. She felt nervous, knowing that just because it was courting in Lititz, did not mean that it was courting in Alejandro’s world. And he certainly wasn’t about to let her starve, so it was only natural that he would ask her to breakfast.

  “Bueno! Then I shall knock at your door in just a few minutes to get you,” he said before bidding her good-bye.

  She hung up the phone and stared at it. Communication is so much easier in the world of the Englische, she thought. With her family and friends, plans had to be made well in advance. Of course, she could use a neighbor’s telephone to make and receive phone calls, but the inconvenience of walking to another farm, leaving messages, and trying to connect with people made it easier to just make plans after church service or to visit in person using a horse and buggy. Now, in the world of the Englische, the telephone sat right there, on the desk, and Alejandro Diaz had just called her to invite her to breakfast.

  The feeling of butterflies returned to her stomach as she moved away from the phone and chewed on her fingernail. Her eyes wandered back to the mirror, and she saw herself, standing before it. Indeed, she looked Amish in her blue dress held together with straight pins instead of zippers or buttons. Her dark hair was hidden beneath her white heart-shaped prayer kapp, the strings hanging over her shoulders. She shut her eyes and waited for the knock on the door, realizing that, for the first time in her life, she wished that she wasn’t plain.

  About the Author

  The Preiss family emigrated from Europe in 1705, settling in Pennsylvania as part of the area’s first wave of Mennonite families. Sarah Price has always respected and honored her ancestors through exploration and research about her family’s Anabaptist history and their religion. For over twenty-five years, she has been actively involved in an Amish community in Pennsylvania. The author of over thirty novels, Sarah is finally doing what she always wanted to do: write about the religion and culture that she loves so dearly. For more information, visit her blog at www.sarahprice.com.