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I’m so shocked I can’t even talk.
“Well, she got me out of it too.” Roxy laughs.
“Yes. Indeed.” Lisa smiles at us both. “I got lucky and so did you! Now, what the hell are you two doing in here on a weekend? Get the fuck out!”
Roxy leaps up and grabs my hand. “You don’t have to tell me twice. Let’s get out of here!”
I let her pull me up and start dragging me out of the office. I try to turn back to Lisa to say thanks or something, anything… But she’s just twinkling her nails at me, making ‘shoo’ gestures.
Roxy pulls me tight against her. Lisa’s right. I’ve got more important things to do today than work.
Thirty-Four
Roxanne
I’m so nervo
us, I think I might choke on my champagne. I’m trying not t overdo it, I really don’t want to get drunk here.
Lisa decided on a gala event to open the new section of the magazine. She loves it so much she’s launching it as an extension of ‘Girl on Girl Glamour’. She told Helen it was just going to be a small party with a few local editors and publishers.
There is easily five hundred people here. I move through the room, some parts of me wishing that I could be as invisible as I used to be.
That would be impossible, with a twenty-foot size print of my face on the wall. It’s from our very first shoot. The pic focuses on the web tie along my back, but the way I’m looking over my shoulder and Helen has captured the light—it makes it look like I’m crying shadows.
Too close to the truth, maybe.
I’ve been accosted by several models already, asking about my ‘method’ and how I relax for a shoot. I looked them straight in the face and told them I take drugs. I have no idea if they believed me or not.
They can read all about it in the ‘Roxy expose’ that Sharon’s doing. Once she started helping Lisa edit the article, she apparently went wild over my pics just like everyone else. She decided that she would put together a big story about my tragic background and sell it as a digital companion to the magazine. With a ten percent markup on print copies.
I don’t know what any of that means, but apparently it’s all money in the bank.
I sip my champagne and keep moving through the crowd. The foyer of the hotel is all shining like glass or crystal, the floor so clean it’s reflective. Small glow lights hang from the ceiling and gather at the corners of the room.
It’s really like walking through some kind of fairytale palace.
But where’s my princess?
Everyone I see smiles and turns to me. They all know me, but I don’t know them. Finding a familiar face is going to be pretty damn difficult in this biz. I’m trying to make friends as quickly as I can. Sharon got all up in my face when I told her a new photographer was my ‘friend’. She said if he pays you well, then he’s an associate. Don’t make friends. Make money.
It’s all going to take a hell of a lot of getting used to. I thought that staying still would be a problem for me, that sooner or later I’d get the urge to move, like a gypsy. But every morning when I wake up the only thing I feel is contentment.
I can’t find Helen. There are just too many people here. I turn my eyes away from my own face on the wall and push back through the crowd. As exciting as this world is, the fake conversations and insincere smiles grate against me. Not a single one of them can answer a question honestly.
Lisa tells me to keep my raw grit as long as I can. The industry needs it and if I keep my integrity intact, my work will stay in top form.
I still don’t get what people are talking about when they say that. I don’t try, I don’t compete. I just get in front of the camera and stay still. I’ve done several photo shoots now and I can honestly say, I’m not doing anything different to what the other girls are.
Well. Maybe not so obviously loving myself. You never know.
Just when I’m about to start crowing Helen’s name above everyone’s heads, spotlights focus on a podium at the bottom of the stairs. Lisa is there with her black hair piled on top of her head, stunning hourglass figure strapped into a glittering gold dress. She takes the mic and roars for everyone’s attention.
“Thank you, thank you all for coming! This is to celebrate the formal expansion of Girl on Girl Glamour, and launch it’s sister publication, ‘Pink Kink Zone!’
Clapping roars around the room. It just sounds a bit dull to me, so I add a few whoops.
“Here we have the woman of the hour, the creator of Pink Kink Zone, Helen Shaw!”
