July (Calendar Girl #7)(33)
Everyone knew that it was easier to ask for forgiveness than permission. This was absolutely one of those times.
The stylist walked me to the new stage, hemming and hawing over the pieces of fabric, glitter, and jewels. When I say jewels, I mean those bedazzled rhinestones with the flat bottoms and the multicolored tops. The tips of my breasts were covered in gemstones that were glued in a way that the nipple and areola were covered but the fleshy globe was enhanced. A tiny thong, again made of sparkly gems, and a line of diamonds around each hip covered my hairless sex. Another thing Wes didn’t know about yet, as we’d done that horrific part in the private bathroom while he had lunch. All of that was hidden beneath the slip of fabric that really couldn’t be called a dress. Especially since I knew it was going to be ripped to smithereens in a couple of seconds once those cameras started rolling.
Carefully, I climbed up onto my pedestal. The heavy beat of Anton’s song surrounded us. Lighting flashed, blinked in a strobe effect making it hard to see without blinking. The wind machine hit me with that soft sensuous flow making my hair move wild and free. The loose curls drifted in the current of air in what I’d hoped gave the appealing result Anton and his team desired.
Wes stood in the darkness directly in front of me. I could primarily see his face, mostly those green eyes. His arms were crossed over his chest and his gaze focused on me. The room fell away. Dancers mingled around me as I pumped my shoulders, swayed my hips, and inhaled and exhaled as Maria had taught me to in order to achieve the breathy affect that made men stupid. Her words, not mine.
Anton’s character started in the back, I felt his hand stroke up the side of my body. I closed my eyes and opened them again, seeing nothing but Wes, and what I saw ricocheted up my spine and landed heavily in my gut. Lust. Carnal need so strong it hardened my nipples, the jewels pinching favorably. In the middle of a scene with a hundred people around me, Wes lit up my body like a torch. Anton continued to dance around me, touching me, lip syncing, begging. Every so often he’d touch a piece of the outfit and make a point by ripping a shred off. I jolted as instructed, as if he was tearing off pieces of my armor. I guess that was the abstract view. Him removing the armor of his seductress so she would be his.
The dancers dressed in swaths of black, gaping holes showing glittery skin whirled around me like phantoms. The metaphor in the choreography that Maria crafted alongside Heather’s suggestions was truly one of a kind. As the song came to a crescendo, the dancers crowded around me. The cameras were at every angle. At a hard thrust of Anton’s hips as he stood directly in front of me, each dancer tore away a piece of my outfit, and the rest fell away, leaving me in my jewelry lingerie. Anton dropped to his knees, I acted confident and powerful, really getting into the part. When Anton lifted his hands up, as if in prayer, begging to be mine, I cupped his cheek with one hand pressed the other against his chest, and the camera zoomed in close. With measured movements, I puckered my lips and mouthed the last words of his song perfectly in sync with the female voice on the soundtrack.
“Forget me.”
Then, as the cameras backed up, I crossed an arm over my breasts, shoved him back, and moved the other hand down to the apex of my thighs. Then I closed my eyes tilted my head to the side and down. The lights faded out.
“Cut, cut. That’s a wrap!” the director called out, a robe was thrown over my shoulders, and I was in Anton’s arms.
“Lucita, you were a genius!” He kissed my cheeks, my forehead, temples, hairline, and finally, cupping both cheeks, he stared deeply in my eyes his intent clear. He leaned forward and kissed me softly on the lips. A mere whisper of a kiss but it was enough. The best part of the kiss was the fact that there was absolutely no fear. No flashback, just the comfort of a friend congratulating me. He held onto my biceps but then dropped them suddenly and a grin played against his features.
“I think that’s quite enough of you touching my girl, eh, amigo?” Wes spoke in a monotone.
Anton turned around and pulled Wes into a man-hug complete with hard slaps to the back. “You’re good for her, amigo. Now we celebrate!” One arm across my shoulders and another at my waist nestled me between Anton and Wes even in spite of Wes’s earlier warning remark. Anton didn’t seem to care; he lived life in the moment, and ignored Wes’s initial pissy attitude. That alone made Anton a special man. He lived life in the present, enjoyed his friends, his work, and celebrated it as often as he could.
Heather and Maria met us at the edge of the set with hugs and a bottle of Cristal. “Big spender,” I noted dryly yet sipping the awesome liquid, letting the golden, bubbly nectar swirl against my taste buds and dance on my tongue.
“You were amazing!” Heather pulled me into a tight hug.
“I had a great teacher,” I beamed at Maria, unable to contain my enthusiasm. Having this video play all over the world, knowing that people everywhere would see me…there really wasn’t a way to describe it. Amazing. Wonderful. Unbelievable. It was all of that and more. Couple it with having Wes, and three new friends, the world as I knew it rocked!
***
Bags packed, TV on low as the news reported the happenings around Miami. I zipped up the last bag filled with all the clothes Heather and Anton had picked for me. I’d take them to California and put them in storage along with all the other crap I needed to box up and move out of the Cracker Jack box apartment I rented.