Starcrossed

You know the movie stars you watch on that huge screen? Does it surprise you that they are humans just like you and I? Would you be amazed to know that they eat like you do, sleep like you do, and, yes, that their shit clogs toilets, just like yours?

I work at a hotel, alone at night. Yes, I said alone. We didn't have the huge five star hotels in that little town her company chose to shoot production in. The hotel where I worked was the best available. We didn't have a chef on duty twenty-four and seven. We had a cooked to order breakfast available from six ack emma to ten. And we didn't have a full staff to wait on her "majestie's" every silly little whim. There was just me.

Well, there were two of us on the weekend. But, her nibs and the rest of the one hundred people involved in shooting that movie didn't stay over on the weekends. They fled back to "civilization" on Friday and returned on Monday as a one week stay turned into five before they managed to get what they wanted.

That first week, I almost didn't have a job. Saying "no, ma'am. I can't do that." is evidentally not something the big kahunas are used to hearing. Frankly, probably the only reason I did keep my job was due to a fight behind the grocery store next to us. Evidentally, the way I handled it and the subsequent heart attack one of the boom operators had when it broke out under his window impressed the security people. At least that's what I was told. I told them I was just doing my job. Apparently, that... bothered her? I'm not sure "impressed" would be accurate. "Bothered" is probably the best term. It bothered her that I would treat anybody the same way I treated her and her people. In her mind, I should have treated them better than anybody else, I suppose.

By the third week, there were no more spacey oddball requests and she and I had entered into a... wary nodding acquaintance. I said her security people were impressed by me. I had no idea at the time just what a compliment it was to me that they would let her hang out in the atrium near my station with only one of them awake and reading the paper nearby at three in the morning. I just wished they wouldn't have me babysit.

"God, do you people roll up the sidewalks when the sun goes down or something?" She said one night.

"No ma'am." I smiled down at the paperwork I was shuffling into order for the day accountant. "We leave them out until one in the morning. Then we have to take them in and wash them down for the next day. All the blowing dirt, you know."

"I'll say,. The damn dirt ruined another shot today. I'm never getting out of this dustbowl." She sipped on her glass and looked around at the atrium empty except for myself and her security guy. "But, what do you people do for fun?"

"Well, ma'am." I scratched my head and tried to fight a grin. "I guess you could alway get some liquor at the bootlegger and go tip some cows."

"What would cows do with money? Or do you mean the waitresses?"

I had to look up to make sure she wasn't joking. The security man's newspaper was bouncing up and down so that I know he couldn't actually read it.

"Uh, tip them over." I said after a moment. "Cows sleep standing up and you tip them onto their side."

"What for?"

"It's actually a prank country boys and girls play on city people that don't know cows." I explained. "See, it's very rare to catch a cow just right so you can actually push it over. So, this city slicker will be pushing and pushing and nothing will happen. Or if they get lucky and do manage it, the cow will go apesh-... ah, that is, the cow will be a little cranky at being woke up that way."

"That sounds dumb." She wrinkled her nose.

That didn't sound like it called for an answer, so I didn't. I finished putting the papers in order and sealed the envelope to slip under the accountants door. If I could ever get the asses to go their rooms so I could leave the desk.

"But, what is there to do around here at this time of night?"

" At this time of night?" I smiled and shook my head. "You can work, sleep, or get into trouble. About the same as anywhere I imagine. If it's three in the morning and you aren't working and you aren't sleeping, somebody with a badge is probably going to get a call from someone."

"Yeah, from someone boring." She said.

See what I mean? The words sounded like we were speaking the same language, but there was zero communication. Most of our conversations were like that once she started talking at me. I say "talking at" because I'm not convinced she talked to me.

Not until the last week they would stay with us, anyway. I'm trying to be careful not to give name or anything a legal beagle could fixate on. But, I guess it's safe to tell you she had a break up with her male actor signifigant other. I mean, every weekend some hot movie box office couple splits up, right? So, saying that isn't giving away too much, I don't think.

I'm going to admit something here that probably won't make me very popular with the female segment of the population. A woman's tears make me horny. Hey, don't blame me. I figured it out when she cried on me.

You've seen this woman cry on a huge screen with several other people around you. One glistening tear rolling out of the corner of her beautiful eye and sliding down her cheek. The image was lovely. She was even nominated for a certain prestigious award for that scene.

Yeah, what she was doing when she walked out of her hotel room and stumbled across the atrium to where I stood wasn't that. Her eyes were red and swollen. Her nose was running and she was rubbing at it with one sleeve. Not a picture for her FHM pictorial, I assure you.

Her security goon opened his door and when he saw the scenario, glanced around to make sure no one was watching. I glared at him, wanting him to stop whatever was about to happen. He shrugged and smiled at me and went back to scanning for anyone who might happen to come out of their rooms.

"Do you think I'm pretty?" She asked.

"I don't think you need me to tell you that," I said, glancing past her for a clue what was up. "You don't make top billing if you aren't pretty. And weren't you in some magazine for sexiest women or something lately?"

"Yeah, I guess." She wiped her nose on her sleeve again and looked down at the counter as she began to trace designs on it with her finger.

I took the chance to raise my hands in a "what the hell" motion to her security guy. He shrugged and covered a yawn with his hand and motioned for me to keep going.

"Seriously," I said. "Teenage boys all over the world have your picture on their closet doors or in their lockers. They wouldn't do that if you weren't pretty, would they?"

Her security guy slapped his forehead and shook his head. I could see him laughing at me. I made the "what" motion again. He pointed at us. At me.

"Um. Yes," I said, catching on. "You are very pretty."

The security guy mimed clapping. I shot him the bird and quickly changed it to scratching my head as she looked up at me through a curtain of hair.

"Do you think I'm ... shallow?"

Oh, God. How the hell do you answer that without being a complete dick? I couldn't exactly tell her that the only way she could be more stuck on herself was if her press on nail glue leaked.

"I think... there could be more than meets the eye with you," I said after a moment. "But, I think, maybe, that you play so many roles that you don't really know who you are."

"What do you mean?"

"Well," I scratched my head and wondered how to put what I was thinking into terms she could understand. "You are always on stage. I mean, even when you aren't, you are. You have an image you have to maintain. Right?"

"Of course," She wrinkled her nose at me and wiped it again.

"So, any time someone else is around, you have to act the part, right? You have to be who they want you to be."

"I... I guess."

"So, who are you when no one is looking?" I shrugged.

"Someone is always looking," She laughed. "Trust me. There is always someone looking."

"I wouldn't know about that," I shrugged and grinned. "My baby sister got the looks in the family."

"Oh, I don't know." Her hands reached towards my chin. I fought not to jerk away. She took it gently in her fingers and tilted it a little to one side. "I mean, with the right touches, you might could be the rugged male star. Fix your hair a little. Some makeup."

"Ah." I took her hand away from mine and held it gently on the counter. "But then I would be acting like someone I'm not and then I would end up crying my eyes out and asking some strange hotel clerk I hardly knew embarrassing questions like 'am I sexy?' in the middle of the night."

"I must look horrible." She rubbed at her face with the sleeve of the arm I wasn't holding.

"Actually, I've never seen you look better," I shrugged as she glanced at me with wide eyes. "This isn't an act. This is real."

She stood there and looked at me a moment. Suddenly, her hand was behind my head and her lips were on mine and my eyes were the ones that were wide while hers were closed.

"Wh-what are you doing?" I asked as she broke the kiss and tilted her hand down.

"I'm being real," she whispered. Then louder, "Charlie, watch the desk."

Charlie stepped forward and raised the gate of the counter as she led me towards it with my hand in hers. She stopped before we got there and waited for me with her hand stretched towards me.as I neared Charlie.

"What the hell?" I whispered to him.

"Just go," He muttered back. "And if you hurt her, I do have a gun."

You want to talk about performance anxiety? Was he talking literally hurt or figuratively? Would he pull his gun if I said, "no"? Most guys would have shot me to be in my shoes! I mean this girl was a fox, even if she was a bit towards the shallow end of the think tank.

I was at a loss. As with all men, when lost while dealing with women, I blindly followed her lead as she took my hand and lead me to her room. As the door closed, behind us, she stood with her eyes closed and her head tilted back. The room lighting was perfect on her face, following the sculptured lines of her high cheek bones. I couldn't stop my fingers from tracing the delicate line of her jaw.

She opened her eyes and looked at me. I remember thinking that it was odd I'd never noticed that her right eye opened just a little less than her left. I remember finding it strange, because for me it was my left eye. The one I'd almost lost to a childhood injury. It's funny how the mind fixates on little details when you have no clue what is happening isn't it?

"I don't know if I can do this." She whispered.

"Um, what?" I asked. "Play backgammon?"

"I love backgammon," She laughed. "I meant this. Us."

"At the risk of sounding like a complete idiot, um... huh?" I shrugged. "I'm here, in your room because you led me here. If you want me to go, just say so and I'll leave you alone."

"Alone." She whispered. "You know, there was a time I liked being alone. I never used to be much for being around people."

"It must have been strange for you then." I said. "Going into a business that is all about people."

"It was." She nodded. "I don't know why I did it sometimes."

"Probably because you are human," I answered. "You, like all people, see yourself as others see you. People like to look at you and tell you you are pretty, so you see yourself as pretty." I took a lock of her raven hair between my fingers and allowed it to slip through. "If people still thought blond hair was prettier than black, would you dye it?"

"No." She pulled away and turned her back on me. "No, I wouldn't."

"Right." I said, causing her to turn back to me. "But, because they like your long raven tresses, it means something. If you had to dye it, it wouldn't be you they liked."

"Tell me you love me," She whispered.

"No."

"Why not?" She turned and frowned at me.

"Because I don't know you, really know you." I said. "The real you. Not well enough to have those words mean anything."

"I flew three thousand miles and you can't say that one little word?"

"Not and have it mean anything." I shrugged. "Besides, people say it to you all the time. 'Love your work, babe.' 'I love your hair.' That word just doesn't mean anything if it's said all the time for everything. When I do say it, it's real."

" 'It's real.' " She whispered to herself and stepped close to me again. Her hand reached out to touch me. "Not an act. Real."

"Yes," It wasn't a question, but I felt compelled to answer. "When I say it, it's real. Not a line in a script or a part I'm playing. It means that I would lay down my life to protect the one I say it to. It means that if my face offended them, I would wear a bag for them. It means that their happiness is more important to me than my own."

Her full lips were on me as the last word left my mouth. Her hand was twisted in my shirt. I could feel her ripe full breasts pressing against my chest as her hand held the back of my head.

I closed my eyes and lost myself to the feeling of her. I tasted salt and opened my eyes again to see the tears flowing freely from her eyes once more.

Suddenly, she stepped back and her hands went to the buttons down her front. I watched in awe as each button came undone in her fingers. I noticed that her thumb looked odd. It sounds strange to admit that I was looking at her hand while those glorious orbs that have so fascinated men and boys came into view.

I caught her hand and held it in mine for a moment. She tried to curl her thumb in. I straightened it. The end was short. She pulled the front of her shirt together and wouldn't meet my gaze.

"What happened to your thumb?" I asked.

"It's a deformity." She pulled her hand away and cradled it to her. "I was born with it. Okay?"

"Okay." I nodded. "You know, when someone loves you they see your deformities. They don't just want you in spite of them. They want you because of them. Our scars, our imperfections, make us who we are. If you don't let them see them, then they don't see the real you."

A sob wracked her petite frame and she wrapped her arms around me once more. I stood there and held her while she cried.

"God," she sobbed. "Every man in the world wants to see my tits and you compliment my thumbs. You are the strangest boy."

"I'm not a boy," I answered pushing her back a step and sliding the shirt from her shoulders. "Half the population is born with breasts. Yours are very nice, I admit. But, a lot of other people have them too. What you have to decide for yourself is whether you want to be a pretty face and a pair of breasts or if you want to be a whole person."

"A whole person," she whispered as I lifted her dainty hand to my mouth and pressed my lips to her shortened digit.

"May I see what other imperfections make up the magnificently, beautifully flawed you?" I asked. "Are there scars you would show me?"

She nodded and stepped back. The shirt she had been wearing pooled around her feet as she unbuttoned her pants and began to slide them down her legs. I didn't say a word as she pulled one foot and then the other from them to stand before me in nothing but a bra and panties.

"I thought you wanted to show me some imperfections." I smiled at her gently. "I'm afraid you will have to point them out, because I don't see them."

"You'll have to look closer," She said.

I wondered how much closer she wanted me as I stepped towards her trembling form. When her foot jerked as if to take a step back, I stopped. Our breathing and the music of the fountain splashing in the atrium was the only sound. I lowered myself gently to one knee and then the other, placing my hands between my quads and calves.

"Show me," I smiled up at her.

Slowly, she placed one foot closer to me, then after a moment another step. She stopped when her abdomen was almost touching my nose. I could see baby fine hairs stirring to each of my breaths.

"I used to cut myself." She whispered.

Now that I knew what I was looking for, I could see the thin lattice of scars, barely visible even as close as I was, here and there on her body. I leaned forward slowly, giving her ample time to pull away, and pressed my dry lips to one thin trace of a scar.

"I'm sorry your soul hurt so much you had to do this to let the pain out," I whispered against her skin. "You aren't alone. Unless you want to be."

"I don't." She lowered herself to her knees so that we were eye to eye. "Right now, right here, I don't want to be alone. I don't know if I can do ... everything. But, I don't want to be alone right now. I want to be with someone who sees all of me. The real me."

"We'll only do what you want," I assured her. "Nothing else."

Her lips were as gentle as they had been forceful earlier. I took my cue from that and tenderly caressed her arms where they rested on her knees. She shivered and flinched from the touch.

"Why don't you get on the bed?" I asked, breaking that tender kiss. "I'll give you a massage if you like."

"That sounds nice." She said. "I haven't had a good massage since Tony closed his shop."

"I doubt Tony and I are in the same league," I smiled. "But, why don't we see if you like my technique?"

Some minutes later, as I was trailing the backs of my fingers up her calves and across the backs of her knees, she turned her head and looked at me.

"I don't think I've ever had a massage like this." She said. "Where did you learn this?"

"A playboy video, 'The Art of Sensual Massage'." I winked at her. "It works better if you don't talk or even think of anything except the feel of my hands."

"Well, that has to be the most subtle way a boy has ever told me to shut up," She laughed and turned her head to face the headboard. I considered slapping her panty-clad butt, but that would have spoiled what I was trying to achieve.

For thirty minutes, I touched, kneeded, caressed and stroked every bare inch of the skin on her back, her arms, the back of her legs, her rounded buttocks. She flinched when I undid the clasp of her bra. I pretended not to see, but kept stroking and caressing. Soothing.

Her hand caught mine as I took the waistband of her panties in my fingers. I looked up to see her staring at me a little wild eyed.

"It's up to you, little one." I whispered. "Women tend to carry their stress in the gluteous. I was only trying to help you relax."

Finally, she took her full bottom lip between her teeth and nodded. Her hand came away and she turned to face the headboard once more. I could feel the tension in those rounded cheeks humming like an overtuned piano wire as I slid those panties over them. Her quadriceps tweaked and spasmed as the silky material slid along them. Her calves jerked and her knees started to bend I my caressing fingers slid past with that delicate scrap of material held in them.

I paused to drop them to the floor with my left hand, careful to keep contact with my right. And then I began the process again by pressing her achilles tendons with the thumb and forefinger of each hand. Her skin was like finely kept velvet beneath my fingers as I stroked and caressed my way back up her legs. Her head came up as my caresses touched that vulnerable crease where roundness gives way to the plane of the leg.

"I'm not a fan watching your face on the screen." I whispered. "I'm really here with the real you. You don't have to put on an act. I've seen your thumbs and toes. I've seen your scars. And I'm not turning away."

She sobbed and buried her face into her pillow. I felt the bunched muscles in her ass begin to relax as years of stress and tension began to flow away. The only scrap of clothing was the straps of her bra on her shoulders where it hung loosely.

I took her shoulder in my hand and gently pressed to let her know I wanted her to roll over. As she did, I slid the strap of her bra along the smooth skin of her arms. I continued stroking and caressing her from the tops of her feet to the delicate sweep of her neck.