A Love That Heals Page 6

  “Never happening, bro.”

  “As the wise and great Justin Bieber once said, along with the even greater Jaden Smith, ‘Never say never’.”

  I laughed and playfully punched Todd on his arms.

  I was determined to not be one of Elizabeth Smith’s conquests. And no matter how many people had told me that no girl as pretty as me, working alongside her at the sets had ever escaped her grasp, I was determined to prove them wrong.

  But as Todd and I wandered the paths of Central Park in silence, and as evening finally set in and the first few stars began twinkling in the sky, I tried to think why I hated Elizabeth so much.

  Was it because of her profession? Was it due to the fact that stunt people always hated the actors they were stunting for on some level as they were always the ones putting in the work and their life on the line and getting paid less than five percent of what these big, so-called ‘action movie stars’ were getting paid? Was it the pretty girl in me who once wanted to be an actress jealous of the life Elizbeth was living? But I thought I had buried those thoughts long ago.

  As varied thoughts raced through my head, making me question my own beliefs and reasons, my cell phone beeped in the pocket of my denims and pulled it out to look at a message from the casting director of the Elizabeth Smith movie.

  I had received my contract and the only thing remaining was for me to sign the document and officially become the stunt double of Elizabeth Smith, one of the highest paid actresses in Hollywood.

  ***

  My apartment was actually very small. I always realized the fact after taking a walk in the massive Central Park and then coming back to a hole in the center of Upper West Side. And along with it being small, I left no stone unturned to keep it messy as well. Yes, I am a lazy person, but only when it comes to cooking and cleaning. My father never got me interested in those things like he did for stunts and action.

  I had already signed the contract and also read the script just to get the idea about the action sequences and when they will pop up on the big screen.

  To be honest, the story of the movie wasn’t original. It was more of an Indiana Jones with a female lead rather than an original female-centric action movie breaking barriers. But hey, at this point, I will take that as a win for female empowerment in the industry.

  The thing that excited me the most was that the second half of the movie would be shot in Egypt, right under the Great Pyramid Of Giza, overlooking one of the only surviving ancient wonders of the world, and as I had never been to anywhere outside the USA, let alone an exotic place like Egypt, I started to feel a little good about the movie and working with Elizabeth.

  As I was lying in my bed, researching the pyramids and the locations, thinking about how great it would be to parkour on the roofs of Cairo as the sun would blaze in the sky and the pyramids would shimmer in the background, I suddenly had the idea of researching a bit more about Elizabeth and her exploits in public.

  I typed in her name in the search bar and string of articles about her ‘rowdy’, and unprofessional behavior popped up on my screen and it only took me a little bit of scrolling to find out how messed up this girl was.

  From breaking paparazzi cameras, to flipping off reporters, to crashing her super expensive cars to being involved with married men and almost breaking up a family, the name Elizabeth Smith was marred with allegations of the most sinister type.

  Many of the articles went on to claim that Elizabeth’s disregard for the consequences of her actions came from her being addicted to alcohol and drugs and that no matter how hard friends and family tried to get her to check into a rehab, the infamous actress would just not agree to the fact that she had a serious problem and that she needed some kind of help.

  Suddenly, everything made sense to me. This was just another case of a young actress having reached stardom earlier than she anticipated and as a result, being unable to handle the fame that came along with it.

  And I knew how dangerous this situation was. I had seen actresses overdosing on drugs, being clinically depressed and being suicidal just because they did not know how to live with the beast called ‘fame’. And in the end, the beast usually claimed their lives.

  I closed my eyes and listened to the honking of cars and bikes in the street below, as New York hustled all around me. And in that hustle, I wondered how many people were battling inner demons that the outside world had no idea about. Perhaps Elizabeth was a victim to the same problem that usually assailed young actors and actresses. Perhaps she was alone in a world that saw her as rude, whereas the solution for her lay very close to her, a solution called love and understanding.

  I tried to clear my thoughts and decided that I would walk on set without any premade judgments about the actress, and if possible, I will try to help her. But when friends and family aren’t able to help her, I wondered how I would be able to make a difference.

  I looked at Elizabeth’s picture one more time on the computer screen, where she was flipping off a horde of reporters wearing black shades in the middle of the night, hurrying off to her car with a male model on her arm, which I know was just a front to hide her sexuality.

  The more I kept looking at her, the faster my heart raced. The infamous, sexy actress with a drug problem, unable to come out of the closet because of her career, was suddenly not someone I hated, but someone who began to intrigue me.

  Someone who I thought was not all bad.

  Someone I thought I could save.

  Chapter Two

  In a week, I was on set of the movie which was now tentatively called ‘The Sphinx’. All around me, people were buzzing like bees, and the atmosphere of the movie set was lively.

  I could see Todd, talking to a group of cameramen, trying to get the angles perfect for the shot, the director sitting on his chair, going through the script one more time before Elizabeth walked out of her van to perform the scene, and light people, spot boys, and a variety of other people from the crew rushing to get the smallest details of the shot scene perfect.

  I was sitting on a small wooden chair, and we were all assembled in a gigantic warehouse with towers of wooden crates rising all around us, and it was from the top of one of these shaky, vulnerable towers that I had to jump on to a pick-up truck and then crash through the windshield and drive out of the warehouse to complete my first action sequence. But it would not be me who would be shown driving the pick-up truck, but Elizabeth, who would jump into the driving seat as soon as I would crash through the windshield and drive away, while I jumped out of the passenger window to get out of the final shot.

  Yes, it was tricky. But that was how action scenes were shot. And do not expect the scene to be okayed in the first take. There was a high chance that I would be jumping from the tower of crates multiple times until the director was satisfied with what he had on film.

  My eyes kept scanning the tower of crates and the mattresses that were placed all around the base of the boxes to cushion my fall if the tower was to topple over and take me down with it.

  It wasn’t the best safety precaution, and nowhere near the ‘technology’ promised by the producer, but I had worked in harsher conditions and I knew I would have no problem doing a good job. The only thing remaining was for Elizabeth to walk out of her van and stand beside the pick-up truck so that she could enter it as soon as I crashed through the windshield.

  But Elizabeth Smith was nowhere near to be seen, and I was getting impatient.

  “Todd!” I shouted on the top of my lungs.

  Todd signaled me to wait for a minute as he finished talking to the guy operating the overhead camera and walked towards me, his shoes kicking up the fake dust that had been sprinkled all over the floor of the warehouse to give it an old, forgotten feel.

  “Yes?” he said, clearly annoyed that I had disturbed him in the middle of his busy schedule.

  “How much longer do we wait for the queen of England?”

  “Who?”

  “Elizab
eth. When will she grace us with her presence? I am getting impatient, and I think you might have forgotten, but I have to jump off a thirty feet tower of boxes that looks ready to fall if the wind suddenly picked up in here.”

  “Get used to it. This is going to be the norm. Elizabeth likes to take her own sweet time. Why don’t you relax and plan your jump or something?”

  “Plan my jump? Are you kidding me? I am not about to do rocket science, you know. I just go to the top of that tower of doom, and jump, while Elizabeth stands on the ground, looking all pretty,” I scoffed.

  “So you noticed that she is pretty?” I noticed the dry humor in Todd’s sentence.

  “She looks like me. Of course, she is pretty,” I remarked.

  Todd hen left me to sizzle in my impatience, and with each passing minute, I could feel my blood boil.

  How could someone be so unprofessional?

  After a wait of about twenty-five more minutes, I saw Elizabeth stroll down the aisle of the warehouse opposite me, wearing the same exact clothes that I was wearing, tight khaki shorts, a black crop top and leather boots that came up to her knees, with her hair tied back in a high ponytail.

  Great! She plays an archaeologist but dresses like a stripper. Way to go, Hollywood!

  “Let’s get this party rolling, folks,” she shrieked like a little girl.

  I could not help but notice how cute and sexy she looked at the same time. No wonder she could get girls to follow her to her vanity fan whenever she wanted.

  She was a walking bomb.

  I got up from my chair, ready to have the small crane hoist me to the top of the tower, from where the action sequence was to commence.

  “Hi, Megan, was it? Nice to see you looking almost as good as me,” Elizabeth smirked.

  “I will take that as a compliment,” I said with a forced smile.

  “Oh, please do. Not many girls can look ‘almost’ as good as me. Many try, but fail miserably. But you know what would make you look even better?”

  “What?” I asked, looking away from Elizabeth’s face and trying to avoid her intense gaze.

  “If you open these,” said Elizabeth and began undoing the buttons on my crop top, until my boobs were spilling out, and my cleavage was on full display.

  I wanted to stop her. I wanted to catch her wrist and shove it aside, but I couldn’t.

  Her fingers grazed my neck, and then slowly slid down my collar bone and when she finally undid the last button, the tips of her fingers were caressing my cleavage, and no matter how hard I wanted to decrease the pace of my beating heart, I could not. For a moment, I thought she would hear it beating, or feel it thumping against her hand.

  Perhaps she did. Perhaps she found out that I liked it. And I hated myself for it.

  “Alright! Enough of horsing around. Are we all ready?” asked the director from his chair, wearing a cowboy hat that was too large for his head and a shirt that was too small for his chest.

  A few people murmured their approval, while Elizabeth gave me a stare, while her fingers lingered on my cleavage for a few more seconds, before turning and walking towards the director.

  My eyes traveled to her ass, and its swaying movement had me mesmerized for a moment.

  Am I going insane?

  In about a few more minutes, I found myself looking down on a variety of cameras, all pointed at me, while standing on top of a tower, with the Ford pick-up truck waiting for my arrival at the bottom.

  Elizabeth was standing beside the door to the driving seat, but out of the shot. She was looking up at me with what I thought was a curious expression.

  Eyes of the entire crew were on me, and the director was crouched behind the line of monitors showing whatever the cameras were filming. I still did not know what I was running away from, as there were no goons behind me, but I was assured there would be some kind of creatures and that was made evident by the massive green screen behind me.

  I was waiting for the director to shout, ‘Action’, and every particle of my body was charged up. Adrenaline was pumping through my veins, and I was in a state of nirvana.

  This was what I was born to do.

  “Action!” the sound hit me like a truck and I was off.

  I jumped off the tower, and felt the ground rushing towards me. Everything went numb for a second, and adrenaline took over my senses, but the impact of my body hitting the bonnet of the pick up truck brought everything back to reality, as I rolled and then crashed through the fake glass of the pick up truck and crashed into the driving seat of the car with a thud.

  Before I could regain my senses, the door on the passenger’s side burst open, and Elizabeth rushed into the truck with a calm look etched on her face, beads of sweat glistening on her forehead, and eyes showing a ferocity that could match my own at the moment.

  I threw myself out of the window of the driving seat, only to hear the engine try and come to life.

  I got up in an instant, brushed off the fake dust from my clothes, and saw the tower of boxes wobble.

  Panic struck me like a speeding bullet train. Elizabeth was still trying to get the truck to start, while the tower of wooden crates, weighing more than two massive SUVs, was about to come crashing down on the Ford vehicle, and Elizabeth inside it.

  I could not move for a millisecond, as my muscles froze. But when I saw that no one had noticed the swaying of the tower, I rushed into action.

  I opened the door to the driver’s seat and hurled myself inside. I did not wait to cry out, and neither did I wait to ask Elizabeth to leave the vehicle.

  I grabbed the tall actress in my arms, and heaved with as much strength as I could muster, and pulled Elizabeth out of the car through the windshield and onto the bonnet. We could just get off the bonnet and fall to the ground before the tower finally collapsed and the crate on top of the tower came crashing down on the bonnet where we were stranded just a few seconds ago.

  Other crates followed, and soon, the pickup truck was squashed like an ant by a boot under the impact of boxes while dust particles swirled upwards, enveloping the movie set in a cloud of yellow haze.

  Elizabeth was still in my arms as she began to cough.

  I helped her to her feet and saw the look of white fear on her face, as her green eyes doubled in size and her hands began to shake.

  “It’s all right. You are safe,” I whispered, patting her back.

  But Elizabeth was too shaken to be pacified with just patting, and so she crashed into me, and wrapped her arms around me, and began to sob. Elizabeth was a strong, fierce girl, but a near-death experience has the power to shake even the bravest people to their core.

  I timidly wrapped my arms around Elizabeth as well, and soon, I too was clutching her tightly. The feel of her body pressed against mine was something I had not experienced before. My heart was racing, not because I had just escaped certain death, but because my senses were loving the smell of Elizabeth’s hair, and my pussy was loving the feel of her boobs against mine.

  Soon, the medics were all around us, and we were made to part as two teams of emergency units wrapped us in blankets and led us to the medical van waiting in the back of the warehouse.

  I knew we weren’t hurt, but the medics would check us for post-traumatic signs, and it would be some time before we would be allowed to leave their care.

  I looked at Elizabeth one last time, and saw her staring at me with tears in her eyes.

  Those green eyes never looked more beautiful.

  ***

  “Are you sure?” asked Todd in a concerned voice.

  “Yes, I have done this many times. I just need to go home and sleep this off,” I said, putting my arm through the sleeves of my overcoat, “It’s Elizabeth that needs more care right now.”

  “She is still under the influence of medicines. She will wake up by tomorrow,” said Todd, opening the door of the hospital for me, as we walked out into the light snow, and an overcast sky.

  “Good. She will be fine by tomo
rrow. She is a strong girl.”

  “She may want to meet the girl who saved her life,” said Todd, hailing a cab for me.

  “Well, I’ll just meet her on set,” I said, as the cab came to a halt in front of us.

  “I don’t think we will be able to commence the shoot any time soon. The media will have a field day with this.”

  “How long of a wait are we looking at?” I asked, while signaling the cab driver to give us two minutes.

  “At least a month. Until then, take some time off, and please meet Elizabeth if she asks for you.”

  “Of course I will meet her if she asks for me, Todd. I may not like the girl but that doesn’t mean I will not meet her when she clearly needs people around her. Have her family members showed up?”

  “She has no family. Not that we know of,” said Todd in a melancholic voice.

  I nodded, and felt a stab of sympathy in my stomach.

  “Tell me if she wants to meet me. I’ll be there as soon as I can. And thanks for everything, you handsome devil,” I said, and kissed Todd on the cheeks and then stepped inside the cab, where an annoyed cab driver drove me off towards my home.

  So she really was alone. And I wondered if the friends she must have had at one point were still there in her life after she began living her outrageous lifestyle.

  It was late in the night when I reached my room, and what I saw on the doorstep of my little apartment shocked me.

  At least twenty bouquets of various sizes and assortments were neatly arranged on the doorstep, and I did not have to guess to know who they were from.

  Amidst the splash of colors that welcomed me home, I saw a small card with a handwritten note, and I picked it up, along with most of the bouquets that I could carry.

  After entering my apartment, I crashed onto the sofa and read the pink colored card which smelled like roses and daisies.

  Dear Megan,

  This note is from Elizabeth, along with all of the bouquets that you must have found on your doorstep. Elizabeth asked me to thank you for saving her life, something she personally wished to do but was too weak to accomplish. She wants you to know that she will forever be grateful for your quick thinking, and bravery, and she would love your company tomorrow in her hotel.