Make Believe

First Published 2013 by

Genevieve
Smith Publications

 
© Copyright Genevieve Smith

First Published
July 2013

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by means without prior written permission from the author.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated without the authors prior written consent by any means, in any form or binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons living or dead is coincidental.

Cover photo used by kind permission of 
Mark Wragg and P Catalin.

Designed By K Turgel.

© Copyright  Genevieve Smith

First Published 5/7/2013

All rights reserved.
  No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in any retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by means without prior written permission of Genevieve Smith.

Make Believe

Genevieve Smith

Bournemouth

Dorset

England

MAKE BELIEVE

G. S. SMITH

For Matt, Oliver and Evie,

You are my world.

xxxxxxx

Chapter 1

The tears won’t stop streaming down my face - I stand up; gather my things together, push my glass of wine out of the way, and follow Henry, the man who’s just broken my heart, towards the door.

I stand outside Solo’s bar waiting for my cab to turn up, London looks so miserable and grey on this Friday afternoon. I watch the rain as it reflects against the car headlights. Why does it always rain when you have to go somewhere?  How could he do this to me? This was my time to shine.  I have always supported him, no matter what. For god’s sake, it will only be for three months at the most. If he loved me the way he said he did, then he could wait that long surely?

When the taxi decided to eventually pull up, I climbed in. “Heathrow airport, terminal 3, please.”

He smiles noticing my resentment to talk.  I take the call sheet from out my bag and unfold it. My flight’s at 4pm.  I start to count the hours, I should arrive in LA at about 4am their time.  That will give me a couple of hours to get some sleep before I have to be on set at 9. God I’m still so nervous, this will be my first time in Hollywood working on a film production, how lucky am I having Elliott Tate’s agent ask for me personally.

My phone starts vibrating and playing, “We are young” in my bag.

“Hello, yes, Claire I’m on my way now. I know, Mia’s meeting me at the airport, she has the tickets. I had some stuff to take care of first.” I roll my eyes.

“Aha, it’s all sorted now. No I won’t let anything get in the way Claire, you know that. I realize you’re just watching my back. That’s why you’re the best agent around. Yes, I’ll call you when we arrive. Take care.”

As the cab pulls into terminal three, I spy Mia waiting at the entrance for me. 

I drag my two large cases out the boot of the car towards her, she smiles, I drop them to the floor and throw my arms around her neck.

“How did it go?” She smiles.

“Terribly, he left without even saying goodbye. That’s it we’re over. Two years of my life wasted on him. It pains me to think what I’ve given up for him. The bastard! He couldn’t even bring himself to support me when I needed him to the most. For god’s sake, it will only be for three months. He’s so controlling, because it’s not on his terms and he doesn’t agree. That’s it. When I think about how I’ve supported him, I moved to bloody London, left my family and friends and for what, so he can kick me to the curb when it suited him.”

She smiles pulling back.

“Yes you did Jess. And you’ve made the right decision, and don’t ever doubt that. Look how your career has taken off, we are on our way to Hollywood to work with one of the biggest mega stars of our time, and my god we are so lucky. But more importantly than that, if you hadn’t moved here you would never have met me. Imagine how boring your life would be then!” She teases.

I smile trying to hide my true feelings. Henry was a selfish arse. But he was my first love, the boy I lost my virginity too, my first proper relationship. Without him in my life, I didn’t know what I was going to do.

“Hey chick, don’t give him a second thought. We have much bigger things to play with now. Who needs a doctor when you can have Hollywood’s biggest heartthrob?  Do you realize Jess how god-damn attractive Elliott Tate is? He’s 28years old, 6ft 3, olive skin and a body to die for, I tell you girl if you’re not playing for him I certainly will.” She sighs.

“I’ll have you know, I am the most professional make-up artist around. Unlike someone else I know.” I giggle.

“Hush, you. It was just that one time; he was too much of a good offer to turn down. I mean, he was in a band.” She says imitating a teenage girl.

“Enough, we will miss our flights if we’re not careful, can you imagine that conversation with Claire!” We laugh.

I hate to fly, it’s my biggest fear. I sit staring out the window as the Virgin plane starts taxing the runway.

I feel myself clutching the armrest of my seat - grasping away at it as if my life depends on it.

“Jess, it’s going to be fine, hey look who’s on the front cover of the magazine.”  She points trying to distract me from the ordeal in front of me. I feel the plane rear up into the sky going full throttle higher and higher. I close my eyes, feeling my head fall back, I whisper to myself. “It’s ok, its ok, its ok, its ok, people do this every day.”  I try to block out the sounds from the engines as they appear to be getting louder.  I rummage around in my jeans pocket searching for my iPod, anything to take my mind of it, damn where did I put it?  I hate these seat belts, they restrict you so much my body feels tense and it’s uncomfortable to sit back.

Buzz, buzz, buzz. I glance up, and above us the seat belt signs have gone off. Thank god. I can get up and move around.  Hopefully this will fill the void of my fear. I walk to the toilet and notice that there is a commotion up ahead in first class. I can’t help but notice the air stewardesses are fussing about, preening themselves, looking in the mirrors, doing their makeup, brushing their hair. What’s up with them? A woman tries to walk past one of the stewardess who is stood guarding first class, she tells her to go back to her seat immediately. God, they must have someone really famous on board to be so on touchy.

Normally in club c
lass you can get away with going into 1
st
class but not this time. As I clamber over Mia into my seat, I realize what she meant about ‘look who’s on the front cover’, he really does seem to appear everywhere: Elliott Tate gracing the front cover of Vogue magazine.

I snatch it up to have a better look. I suppose I should start researching my new subject.  I look deeper into the photo of him. I can appreciate what everybody is talking about. He really is very good looking, but not in your usual American boy next door way. His eyes glisten when you look into them. Their colour is so unusual - grey/blue - and they are big. They are feathered by these amazing dark eyelashes, which any woman would pay good money for. His hair is dark but with sun kissed ends; the messy style he wears frames his face perfectly, his skin is flawless and his mouth is amazing it’s the perfect shape with fuck me lips and whiter than white teeth - he really is faultless, unbelievably so.
Maybe he’s been photo shopped? That would make sense. Most people have, who graced the glossies.

What I really love most about my job is you get to see them for real, with all their flaws, they may have bad skin or bags under their eyes, or the odd spot, it makes them human. Not that it stops them from being prima donna’s half the time; they are so up their own arses with their yes people surrounding them. They’re not use to being contradicted, they don’t like it if you to have too much to say about their look. It’s just do your job and do it fast. But maybe this time it will be different, now that I had been promoted to senior artist on set - I’d get to call the shots – decide the look, and who works on who. It will be my responsibility if it all goes wrong, I’ll have to work 24/7 making sure it all runs smoothly. Jeez that in itself is quite a pressure.  Maybe I’ve been too hasty rushing to accept this job. Perhaps I should have given it more thought and the consequences it’s brought with it.

I banish these negative thoughts from my mind as quickly as they arrived. There’s not a lot I can do about it at 36,000 feet anyway.

“Jessica, it’s time to wake up. We’ve landed.” I felt Mia gently tapping me.

“Huh, already? I feel disorientated, it’s like I’ve only been asleep five minutes.”

The air stewardesses are panicking again, I guess they are trying to get their mysterious guest off with as little disruption as possible. The senior flight attendant walks over to Mia and me.

“Excuses me ladies, is it possible that we can get you to stay seated just for five more minutes? We need to exit the first class passengers through this exit door here.” She points to the door in front of us. She smiles but her meaning is obvious: this is what’s going to happen whether we like it or not.

With that she leaves and returns with two other blonde attendants, who open the door and stand on either side to shield the view. I notice a tall blonde-headed guy walking along towards us. He’s casually dressed, wearing a denim jacket, a black t-shirt and black jeans, he’s fairly good looking, tall and skinny. He’s distracted whilst he’s talking to the other guy behind him. The second man appears, looking more distinctive, wearing a baseball cap, sunglasses, blue jeans and a blue checked shirt. You can’t help but notice he’s very good looking even though he’s trying to hide behind his disguise. The closer he gets the more the stewardesses start to smile and pout. God, it’s such a sad sight watching women fall over themselves for a man.  Finally when he reaches the doorway, he stops and takes a quick glance at us, he then half smiles, as if we are in on his joke. He leans forward and whispers something into the taller stewardess’s ear, and in return she giggles as if she’s been told the funniest joke. He then smirks again and whispers something to the other air stewardess who blushes instantly. He then leans in again and kisses them both on the cheek; he’s so sleazy.

“Come on Elliott, leave these bitches to get on with their job!” he booms and laughs.

The other man pulls his cap down even further and heads off the plane.

I feel my mouth fall open; God knows how those poor women must have felt.

“What an absolute bastard,” I remark to Mia.

She just smiles.

“What’s that smirk for?” I tease. “Well?” I insist.

“Do you really not know? That’s your new client.” she smiles.

“What, which one? Not the asshole? Mind you they both looked like assholes!”

“The guy with the baseball cap. I would recognize that mouth anywhere.” Her cheeks flush red.

“Oh God!  I knew this whole thing seemed too good to be true.”

“Only three months, Jess, that’s all,” she teases.

Chapter 2

“Oh my God, is that the time?”  I bellow down to Mia.

“Yep it’s 7:30a.m.”

Shit, I’m late. God, why didn’t my alarm go off? Or maybe it did but the jetlag had crept in and I didn’t hear it.

I throw on a pair of cargo pants, a white vest and a necklace. I brush my strawberry blonde hair up into a high bun on my head and slathered foundation on my face, then a bit of mascara on my very green eyes hoping to cover the evidence of no sleep, and I’m ready. Not a great look for my first day on set. You would think that a makeup artist would insist on looking perfect on her first day, but oh no, not me.