Film Star (11 page)

Farrah and her staff gave a ripple of applause.

“This is the one, Ms Grant,” Farrah said. “Stunning.
Perfectly stunning.” Imogene smiled politely at Farrah but stood in front of me.

“It really is great, Imogene,” Clarice said.

“What do you think, Ruby?” Imogene asked me. “Does it make me look fat?”

I would have laughed if she hadn't been so serious. Imogene Grant, one of the world's most beautiful women, really wanted to know whether or not she looked fat!

“You look beautiful,” I told her.

“Great.” She smiled at Farrah. “I'll take it,” she said, and then she looked at me. “Now it's your turn.”

It was late as Imogene's limo pulled up outside our flat.

“What a wonderful evening,” my mum said, overwhelmed by our out-of-hours visit to world-famous diamond merchant and jewellers, De Beers. “Thank you so much, Imogene.”

“Don't thank me,” Imogene said. “I should be thanking you. Going to all this trouble to come and see my movie.”

“I can't believe that I'm going to be wearing that many diamonds,” I said for about the fourteenth time since we'd got back in the car.

Imogene laughed. “You carry them off wonderfully well. And they looked lovely with that blue silk dress.”

“Fifty
thousand
pounds worth of diamonds,” I said, still not quite able to believe that
anything
could cost that much, let alone one necklace. “All around
my
neck.”

“Yes, well,” Imogene said. “Don't forget we have to give them back at the end of the night—and the watch. De Beers will have a whole security team following us around to make sure nothing happens to those diamonds.”

“Fifty thousand pounds,” I said again.

“Come on,” my mum said, putting on her sensible voice again. “You've got lessons in the morning. Bed.”

“Bed.” I repeated the word and laughed. “I'm never going to be able to sleep!”

“Bet you will,” Imogene said, kissing me on the cheek. “See you on set tomorrow.”

“I'll never be able to sleep,” I told my mum as I sat on the edge of my bed a few minutes later.

“I'll bring you some warm milk,” she told me.

But I never got to drink it. I was fast asleep before it came.

The rest of the week seemed to whiz by, one minute in a blur of filming and lessons with Fran Francisco, and then suddenly time would stand still when I had nothing to do but play cards in my Winnebago and listen to Mum going on about Jeremy Fort and what a lovely man he was, and did I think he had a sort of sadness about him, as if he really needed to be looked after? I told her I most certainly did not, and anyway even if he did I was sure that Carenza Slavchenkov cheered him up no end.

At those times it seemed as if Friday, the premiere and seeing Danny again would never come.

I did text and phone Danny a few times during the week, leaving him a message saying that I had something to tell him. But I thought his phone must be broken again because he never replied or called me back. On Thursday night I phoned his house and his mum said he was out again. He'd been out a lot recently and I wondered who with. I asked her to give him a message. I said it was really important, but he hadn't called me back by the time I went to bed. I wasn't worried; I was certain that now I hadn't fallen in love with Sean Rivers everything would be OK with Danny. And anyway, he probably thought that as we would be seeing each other at Nydia's party on Friday, we could talk then.

I had meant to tell Nydia and to explain to her about being late for her party. I meant to, but I didn't for two reasons. First of all, I was worried about telling her; she seemed so fragile at the moment that I worried she might think I didn't want to come, not that I couldn't. So I decided that maybe it would be better not to upset her before the party and to just turn up a bit late with a movie star on my arm, which might make her forget that I had promised to be there from the very beginning of the evening. And secondly, because Sean said it was best not to tell anyone at all that we were still going to Nydia's party.

“But why not?” I asked him. “I mean when I explain it to Mum she'll be fine about it. She'll probably even drive us; we're going home for the weekend anyway.”

“Drive us!” Sean exclaimed. “Oh boy, Ruby Parker, you need to work on your sense of adventure,” he said.

“My sense of adventure?” I asked him.

“Sure,” he said. “It will be much more fun if we
escape.
Besides, my dad would never actually let me go. My only option is to escape.”

And even though I am not very good at rebelling, and really don't like to be in trouble, there was something about the daring twinkle in Sean Rivers' eye that made me think it might be fun to turn going to Nydia's party
into an escape adventure. After all, I reasoned, it wasn't as if I was doing anything really bad, and I was sure Mum wouldn't be too cross or worried as long as I phoned her as soon as I got there.

“What do you think?” Mum asked anxiously.

“At last,” I said without looking up from my magazine. We had all gone to the same hotel I had my second audition in, the Waldorf, to get ready for the premiere, and Mum and I had our own room and even our own hair and make-up lady, Maxine, who Art had hired just for the evening.

I had been ready for ages, waiting for Mum and Maxine to come out of the bathroom, sitting patiently in my blue dress and diamonds, my hair just left long and natural and with hardly any make-up on at all, despite me trying really hard for some blusher. As I waited, it felt strange to be looking at a magazine full of properly famous people walking up red carpets, knowing that very soon I would be doing the same thing. It felt strange but sort of not real, which meant I probably wasn't nearly as excited as I should have been.

I turned around and looked at Mum. I'd expected her to make an effort but I hadn't expected her to look the way she did.

“Mu-um!” I exclaimed in shock. “What
do
you think you look like?”

Mum's face fell, and I knew instantly that I had hurt her, that somehow she thought that a long green satin dress cut far too low in the chest area and worn with matching high heels she could never walk in in a million years were appropriate for a woman of her age. A woman and a
mother
of her age.

She had gone totally over the top. Mum clasped her hand to her chest and looked down at herself with dismay.

“Do I look terrible, really?” she asked me.

I looked her up and down. Since Dad had left she'd been to a slimming club, so at least she fitted into the dress without too many bulges. And the green colour did suit her complexion and newly auburn hair, which Imogene's hairdresser had dyed for her so that no grey bits showed any more. And at least she wasn't wearing too much make-up; in fact, Maxine had somehow managed to make her face look sort of glowy, if a bit miserable.

“It's not that you don't look nice…” I began, feeling a bit mean and maybe ever so slightly wrong. “It's just that…”

There was a knock at the door. I looked at Mum, who stared at me with an expression of terror.

“Ruby, if I look really terrible I don't want anyone to see me…”

“The door was open,” Jeremy Fort said as he entered the room, “so I just thought I'd pop in and see if you needed an escort…” He stopped and looked at my mum standing by the window.

“Janice,” he said, his deep voice almost a whisper, “you look stunning.”

I watched my mum's face light up as if the sun had just risen inside her head. I looked at Jeremy looking at my mum and thought what an amazing actor he was. He looked at her like he really meant it, like she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

“And you too, Ruby,” Jeremy said, still looking at my mother. “Quite wonderful. May I escort you downstairs? They have various limos waiting for us. I wish you were travelling with me, Janice, I'd love to walk you down the red carpet looking like that—but I'm afraid they have a separate car for parents and guardians that will take you to a side entrance.”

“Oh, well, of course,” Mum said, fluttering her lashes. “I mean, who am I? I'm no one.”

“Nonsense,” Jeremy said, hooking her arm through
his. “You are Janice Parker and there's only one of you in the whole world.” I followed them to the lift, trying to look anywhere except at my mum giggling like an idiot at every word Jeremy said and wishing that he wasn't quite so kind, because really he was only giving my mum false hope.

As we walked out into the chilly evening, Sean was waiting by one of four limos in a pale blue suit and white shirt.

He was wearing sunglasses even though it was dark. On anyone else it would have looked idiotic; on him it looked totally cool. When he saw me, he smiled that famous smile, and for a moment my heart did skip a beat. Because from a distance, in that suit and with that smile, he wasn't my friend Sean, a fifteen-year-old boy bored out of his mind with acting and movie sets and all of that rubbish, he was Sean Rivers, heart-stoppingly-handsome teen-movie star.

Suddenly I realised that Sean was two people—that despite his claims to the contrary he really was a true movie star because he could do what only true stars can: when he needed it, he just turned his starriness on like a thousand-watt light bulb, shining as brightly and as far as a beacon, making it clear as day that he was not just an ordinary person.

For the first time since I had met him, he had turned that light on.

“Steady on,” I whispered to myself under my breath. Because even though there was no way I could fall for my friend and fellow actor, Sean, I didn't think it would take very much at all for me to get really silly over the gorgeous star of
The Underdogs.

“Hey, Ruby Parker!” he called out. “You're in this car with me!”

I tried turning my own star quality on as I walked over to meet him, but when I did it felt more like next door's toddler's nursery night-light in the middle of a power cut. Whatever it was in people like Imogene or Sean that made it impossible for people to stop looking at them—I didn't have it. And that was a fact.

Sean looked at me over the top of his shades as I approached. I braced myself for him to say something romantic and flattering like Jeremy had said to Mum, because I knew if he did my knees would give out and I would need resuscitating.

“You look like a Christmas fairy,” he said, winking at me. Not exactly the response I had been expecting, but on the bright side at least I could still walk and breathe. He opened the door and I climbed into the back of the car, discovering that it is far easier said
than done in a long tight dress. Sean got in next to me and took off his shades.

“Our own limo,” he said. “Awesome! Lisa told me they want to highlight the young actors in our film, get a teen audience interested. So we're on our own, kiddo.”

Sean looked around the interior of the car, found and opened the fridge.

“Want a Coke?” he asked me, holding out a bottle. I shook my head.

“Lip gloss,” I said by way of explanation, not wanting to tell him I was scared that if I drank too much when I was really nervous I'd end up really needing the loo and would have to run instead of walk up the red carpet to make it to the ladies.

Sean grinned at me. “Can't get used to you all dressed up,” he said, peering at me. “Are you in there somewhere, Ruby Parker?”

I let out a breath and laughed. I was relieved to see that in the back of the car he was just Sean again and I didn't fancy him at all. Sean sat back in his seat and sipped his drink.

“So,” he said, “I've worked on our escape plan for later. First we do the red carpet thing and then…” His words washed over me as I thought properly for the first
time about walking up that red carpet. Suddenly my heart was thundering in my chest and my stomach was clenched as tightly as a fist. In a few minutes I'd be doing the “red carpet thing”. I'd be walking up a red carpet and thousands of screaming fans from all around the world would see me stepping out of a limo, look at me and think, “Who
is
that?”

“Ruby Parker?” Sean seemed to be repeating himself. “Are you listening?”

“I'm having a mild panic attack,” I said, sounding as if I had inhaled the contents of a helium balloon. Sean laughed.

“Seriously, don't worry,” he said. “No one is going to be looking at you.”

I opened my mouth to protest but realised that actually he was probably right. No one would be looking at me. It did sort of take the pressure off, even if it was a bit disappointing.

“Sorry,” I said, taking a deep breath. “Sometimes I go all over the top about things. So tell me your plan.”

Sean peered out of the window. “Too late,” he said. “I'll have to tell you later. We're here.”

I looked out of the window just as the limo pulled into Leicester Square.

Rows and rows of people were lined up behind
barriers, three or four people deep, and all of them cheering and shouting. Some girls had a banner held up, a bit like the one that the girls outside the café held up for Danny, only much bigger and much better made.

“Blimey,” I said.

“I know,” Sean said, chuckling. “Blimey.” He peered out of the tinted window at the crowds. “Imogene will go in first with the other actors from
Lizzie Bennet
—you know that English guy that's in all of your movies? The one with the floppy hair and the stupid voice?”

“Oh, him,” I said.

“Exactly,” Sean said. “And some other grand British thespian, oh, you know, what's her name? The one that's a lady, or a duchess or something?”

“Dame Judi,” I said, biting my lip at the thought of one of my all-time heroines and forgetting completely about my lip gloss.

“That's her,” Sean said. “Then it'll be Harry, Art and Jeremy. And then us.”

Sean rolled down the window a crack and we listened as the cheers grew. From where we were parked we couldn't see the length of the red carpet, but we knew who was on it by the names the fans called out as they went by.

“Imogene always talks to as many fans as she can,” Sean said. “So we'll be here ages while people get her to pose for photos and phone up their grannies and things like that.” He wasn't wrong. It seemed like an eternity that we sat in the back of that limo, listening to the crowds cheering as I chewed every last bit of lip gloss off my mouth and dug my short nails into my palms.

And then suddenly the limo door opened and the noise was magnified by about a hundred million times.

Lisa Wells was there telling us we had to get out of the car. As I stepped out she looked me up and down and then, pulling a tube of lip gloss out of her bag, she reapplied some to my mouth.

“Don't look so scared, Ruby,” she told me. “You look great. Off you go.”

“Off I go where?” I asked her, but before I knew it Lisa's team of publicists had swept me away from the safety of the shelter that standing in Sean's shadow provided and they propelled me forward the last few metres until I was suddenly all alone.

All alone at the end of the red carpet.

It seemed to me as if everyone and everything fell silent. The crowd, the press, the traffic, the pigeons—they were all quiet—as if God had pressed the mute button on his cosmic remote control. The whole world was silent, frozen still and waiting for me. Waiting for me to move.

I tried to but I couldn't. Every time I tried it felt as if I was glued to the spot. I tried to turn on some star quality, like Sean did. And when that didn't work I tried to just smile my average smile, but even then nothing happened. I was like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming juggernaut. All I could do was stand there and stare at it getting ready to run me down.

Somewhere in the tiny part of my brain that was still working I realised that the moment I had dreamed about for so long was going horribly wrong. That tiny part of me knew that my first—and at this rate quite possibly my last ever—red-carpet experience was a disaster, and that I'd be rooted to that tiny patch of red carpet for ever and ever like one of those dreadful mime statues you see hanging around Covent Garden.

“Hey, Ruby Parker,” Sean's friendly voice whispered in my ear. “I'm glad you waited for me. I could do with someone to hold my hand.”

And in that moment it was just like when Prince Charming wakes up Sleeping Beauty with a single kiss. The sound of Sean's voice in my ear had exactly the same effect, and before I knew it the deafening noise of the crowd rushed in all around me and I was back in the world again. Sean held tightly on to my hand and I knew that as long as he did I could make it from where we were standing to the other end of the red carpet in one piece.

“Let's knock ‘em dead,” Sean said, switching on his starriness, and we stepped out into the glare of the lights and glitter of flashbulbs, hand in hand, side by side.

“Sean! Sean!” Hundreds of reporters called Sean's name as we made our way towards the entrance of the cinema. Sean squeezed my hand and led me to the first in a row of microphones, each carrying a badge marked with a different TV station or show logo.

“Sean.” The first reporter, Tilly James from
Celebrity Central,
grabbed Sean's arm. I had done an interview
with her once but she didn't even glance at me. “Great to see you in London, but tell us, why are you here supporting Imogene Grant's new film?”

“Well,” Sean told Tilly, with a relaxed smile, “I'm working on a new film along with Imogene, Jeremy Fort and Ruby Parker here.” Sean nodded at me but Tilly didn't take her eyes off his face. “It's an action adventure called
The Lost Treasure of King Arthur
and we're shooting it right now at the Elm Tree Studios. Imogene invited us along tonight, and you know I never like to miss a party!”

“And what do you think of London?” Tilly asked Sean.

“I
love
London, I love this country—especially the weather!” Sean said, laughing as a fine cold drizzle started at that moment. The reporter turned to the camera.

“That was Sean Rivers talking exclusively to
Celebrity Central,
exclusively on…”

We moved down the line from reporter to reporter, me standing behind Sean and waiting as he answered almost exactly the same question from each reporter with almost exactly the same answer and the same incredible smile.

He must have repeated himself at least ten times as gradually the haven of the cinema doors grew closer. It
was just as I thought we were nearly there that I realised we still had one last thing to do.

Pose for the paparazzi—the ruthless pack of press photographers that followed celebrities everywhere they went and would stop at nothing to get a good picture.