Apex

2015

---

The second they left the catwalk event, hell broke loose. Alex never really confirmed her relationship with the lovely Amy that always followed her around. There were rumors and speculation – not to mention the countless pictures of them hanging out together – but Alex never sat down in front of the camera and confirmed them. Throwing her an engagement ring in the middle of a fashion show clearly did the trick. All the fans’ suspicious were suddenly true.

On the way to their car, three security men have to fight off interviewers and paparazzi. It’s crazy. It is suffocating. Amy holds onto Alex hand tight, like she’s afraid she’ll lose her in all the spectacle. These men scare her in a weird way. They get so close that it’s hard to see which direction to go. But Alex’s touch makes her feel safe. It guides her to the safe place of the SUV that’s waiting for them. Alex smiles proudly during those long, slow seconds it takes them to get there. Why wouldn’t she? She just go engaged!

Everyone around her is screaming at her, throwing questions in the air like she has all the time in the world to answer them. Rick called and ordered her not to say a word, just a few minutes ago. The public announcement will be organized later. For now, the paparazzi just has to sit this one out impatiently.

And now they are in the car. A driver has hit the gas so aggressively that they shook off all the nosy cameras and photographers in no time. Amy can breathe again.

“Oh, God. I hope someone will write about the catwalk show tomorrow,” Alex utters with an expression of anxiety.

Amy looks at her and frowns. Her hand is still holding Alex’s.

“I mean the clothes and the designs,” Alex elaborates. “Not just you and I. The designer will kill me if that happens.”

Her lovely blonde giggles and then stares at her new piece of jewelry. The ring is gorgeous. It sparkles in the daylight. And it sparkles in her heart.

“I had my concern about you being out and proud,” she admits a few second after reminding herself to breathe. “But this is quite epic.”

“What do you mean?”

The Latina is utterly confused. She has dragged her lover along to every single event she could possibly think of. They attended fashion shows and went on holidays where they let the paparazzi shoot pictures of them from a distance. She held her hand on the red carpets. And she always left with her in the same car. Not even the most public couples of the industry do that.

“I don’t know,” Amy tells her, weirdly biting her lower lip. “You never really did anything to make me feel like I wasn’t your girlfriend. It’s just that you never really did anything to prove I was.”

Alex frowns amusingly and enlightens her fascinatingly smug face. Is Amy kidding? How has she never said anything about this before?

“I’m sorry I have never fucked you in public,” she snorts.

The driver suddenly looks at them in the rear-view mirror and suppresses a smile. Of course he heard. Drivers are like waiters and personal assistants. They hear everything and pretend that they don’t. And everyone is happy with that arrangement.

“You know I love you, right? And I may have never publicly talked about us, but that’s just because I never talk about anything personal. I like that part of my life to remain the last bit the press has to work hard for, because it’s not okay to be exposed like that.”

Amy sort of understands. It’s just that, even before they got back together, Alex’s love life has in fact always been a speculation. There were never coming out stories or statements. Most of the paparazzi pictures were the supermodel hanging out with another famous people. Men and women. Her romantic interests were implied, but never confirmed. And a lot of them involved men. Friends, of course. But no one really knew.

Alex’s eyes find those of her lover and she heaves a dreamy sigh: “I never came out, you’re right about that. Because there wasn’t anything to come out at all. I haven’t had a boyfriend since forever. But I haven’t had a girlfriend either. I had flings and hookups and sex buddies. But there was never anyone to sleep in my bed for longer than three nights. So the press couldn’t pick up on it. I was everywhere, all around the world, and whoever passed my hotel room, they were welcome to walk in. It didn’t mean anything. Because neither of those girls were you. And they knew that.”

Despite the overly gloat over her previous sexual hookups, Amy thinks Alex’s words are really sweet. She can see it all happening in front of her: Alex having casual sex with strangers or friends, just to kick them out in the morning. It probably even happened without her lifting her head from the pillow.

“And I walked around with them, you know. I strolled the streets, went out for dinner, attended parties as their dates. The press just never got the hint, simply because we never acted in love. Because weren’t. Until now. Now I hang out with just one girl. I hold her hand in public, I buy her coffee, I hold her bag and on rare occasions, they see me kissing her cheek lovingly. They are starting to get the hint.”

She suggestively wiggles her eyebrows and starts smirking in a ridiculous way. Amy holds up their entwined hands to kiss the Latina’s slim fingers.

“And now I’ve dropped the bomb and the world needs an explanation,” Alex rolls her eyes after first lovingly looking over at the gesture of affection.

“Like an interview?”

The model nods: “Tomorrow I’m expected to join Keith Gordon on his talk show.”

Amy’s eyes grow big and an excited expression colors her face.

“Keith Gordon? Oh, my God!” she shrieks while they are just moments away from home. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Alex shrugs and acts like it’s just another day of work. Well, to her it is.

“He’s just a guy. Not even that funny in real life. And he asks the most annoying questions while you are supposed to sit there and put your fake celebrity face on. You know, the one where you smile over stupid comments and refrain yourself from killing the idiot by dramatically laughing.”

Her fiancée presses her lips tightly together and nods agreeingly: “Yeah, you’re good at that.”

The driver suppresses another silent smirk and turns left. A few seconds later, they try to get out of the car, but the photographers have now gathered around the entrance of the apartment building.

“Alex, Alex, is this your girlfriend?”

“Where did you meet?”

Hundreds of flashes blind the girls like never before. The strangers with cameras get in their faces until it’s getting impossible to move forward. The driver gets out of the car as well and starts yelling at them to back off. His strong arms push the first few intruders aside, much to their displeasure.

“Are you going to get married?”

“Since when are you gay?”

“How long have you been dating?”

Amy pushes the men back as she’s getting closer to the front door. Just a few more yards. Alex holds onto her hand tightly. How can these parasites, that dig through your garbage, your past, your dirty little secrets, have no idea that Amy Wolfe is the love of her life? How have they not talked to old classmates and neighbors? How do they interpret holding hands and going on dates as being casual best friends? Should she have been wearing a shirt that said ‘I am in love with Amy’? Are people that oblivious these days? Or are girls holding hands and being super cute around each other just a normality recently?

After escaping the madness, both girls remains panting in the hallway for a while. Residents of the apartment building are staring at them, throwing judging looks. Ever since the fashion show ended, theses poor people had a hard time entering and leaving their own homes. Alex doesn’t look up to them, sort of too ashamed to even say sorry. It’s not her fault. It’s these damn paparazzi fuckers.

“So, that was … intense,” Amy stutters, while walking over to the elevator.

Alex nods and follows her footsteps. Her heart is still racing. One thing’s for sure: the newspapers will be full of this by tomorrow. And this entire hysteria won’t fade soon.

“That was insane. I have to call Rick.”

---

“So keep a straight face, answer the questions like we practiced them and – I’m serious, Alex – don’t do anything stupid.”

Rick stares at her with an expression of terror. Because if there’s anything Alex is capable of, it’s doing something stupid. He holds the door for her while they approach the television studios. A security man and two assistants are following their every move. It’s been less than twenty four hours and people are still going crazy about the news of Alex Ochoa’s lesbian engagement. Yes, it’s the lesbian part that excites them most. Her loyal fans all knew exactly what was going on. The big newspapers just couldn’t really print anything about it, because the necessary confirmation never took place.

“I’m supposed to talk about Victoria’s Secret’s new collection today,” she mumbles while hiding her face in the big coat she’s wearing, eyes professionally hidden behind enormous sunglasses.

Rick has his hand on her sleeve and directs her to the nearby entrance. Luckily for them, the photographers can’t cross the fence in front of the building. It’s where they let you pass when you’re on the guest list or carry a famous face. As it turns out, Alex looks kind of famous. Plus, she’s on the list.

“There won’t be much talk about your angel wings today, my dear,” Rick scoffs amusingly while pressing the elevator button. “I give it three questions before he slips in the engagement thing.”

Alex squints annoyingly and pats his shoulder: “Some excitement about this engagement thing wouldn’t be terrible.”

She knows he doesn’t really mean it, it’s just that Alex’s public gesture of love kind of gave him a lack of good night’s sleep. His wife wasn’t happy. Not that Alex had her required beauty sleep as well. Amy nearly wrecked her after they came home. You know, to celebrate being fiancées.

Keith Gordon walks over to them the second they reach the floor where his talk show is being recorded. Alex heaves a big sigh, because it’ll take a lot of her to be nice today. Keith isn’t the man you want to run into every day. She has no idea why America is crazy about him. He’s middle-aged. He’s boring. His grey hair looks terrible. His Southern accent is ridiculous. Seriously, he’s not even trying to sound like he had proper training. How is Alex supposed to be interested in anything but a hot woman asking her awkward questions?

“Welcome,” he tells the gang. “I’ll walk you to your dressing room, Alex. Follow me, follow me.”

She shakes his hand and fakes a smile. Rick is very proud of her. Here comes the rehearsals, here comes the makeup and styling. It’ll take a while, but at least Amy will be here at some point. She promised. Alex yawns, due to the lack of sleep, and barely listens to anything Keith Gordon has to say. It’s mostly about his show last night and the guests in it. She just wants to doze off in her makeup chair and being woken up when it’s time to hit the stage.

---

The lights go on and the commercial break is over. The crowd starts applauding enthusiastically as Alex waves at them while the camera zooms back in on the duo. Her hair is up in a high dot and the Latina is loving the look. She’s wearing a loose, black dress with a silver belt to break the color. Her high heels are a lot more comfortable than they seem.

Keith has been asking work-related questions so far. There were three and Alex took all the time in the world to elaborate about them so she could stretch time. Being a Victoria Secret’s Angel has quite some requirements. There’s a lot of press and promoting involved. She doesn’t mind. She loves the pressure of it, even though – at times – it’s hard to combine the rest of her career with the obligations.

The host welcomes everyone back to the show and thanks them for tuning in. Alex is silently telling herself how proud she is for not mocking his accent once in this last half hour. Afterward, she’s realizing how much her cheeks are starting to hurt from faking laughter. Seriously, models don’t ever laugh this much. They just stare into the camera all seductive or angry. Plus too much laughter causes wrinkles.

“So we’re back with America’s most gorgeous supermodel Alex Ochoa,” Keith enthusiastically announces.

The crowd goes wild and for a second, Alex’s hearing is paralyzed. The fans love her. And she loves that they love her. She humbly bows her head and can’t help from laughing all embarrassed.

“So, Alex, we’ve been talking about work and being an angel.”

Alex is so trained at this, she might walk straight out a commercial.

“Yes, Keith,” she politely confirms, while tapping his hand.

They are both seated on some comfy chairs, facing each other. The decor is cosy and warm. But kind of old.

“It’s time to move on to the other thing, isn’t it? That thing that happened yesterday. That thing everyone is talking about.”

He emphasizes the word ‘thing’ so dramatically that the crowd starts laughing. Alex rolls her eyes to ridicule him in an acceptable way and suddenly finds herself blushing.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she claims, while closing her eyes.

Of course everyone knows she’s just playing them.

“Well, I don’t see a ring around your finger, but rumor has it you proposed to your girlfriend yesterday while you were doing your run on the catwalk?” he teases her.

His eyes expressively grow wide as the massive screen behind them suddenly shows a press picture of that exact same moment. You can see Alex’s majestical attitude and top notch performance on the stage, while Amy’s staring at her own hands – and that little teddy bear – with an expression of shock. Everyone around starts wooing and cheering with pride and joy. Alex quickly turns her head to check it out and recognizes the image immediately. These pictures have been circulating the internet for hours now. They popped up on Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr, massive news sites, … Her left leg is wiggling back and fort, crossed over her right one.

“Oh, that little thingy,” she playfully admits. “Yeah …”

She suddenly pulls a weird, awkward face and shrugs innocently. Her fingers are nervously tapping the side of her chair.

“Yeah,” she repeats while facing Keith again and hiding her obvious smile.

“Yeah … That happened,” she finally acknowledges, all adorable and stuff.

Keith Gordon seems genuinely amused. His eyes sparkle as he carefully analyzes the supermodel’s behavior. All of a sudden, she starts liking him.

“Yeah. It’s not really … subtle, is it?” he jokes.

Alex shakes her head and turns to the crowd. She apologetically throws her hands up in the air and shrugs. They laugh.

“So, you are engaged now?”

“Yes,” Alex proudly nods, completely shifting her attitude in a matter of seconds.

She throws an excited expression to the crowd and it’s incredible to witness how they lose their shit over her funny face.

“And is your fiancée here right now?”

“She had to work. But she did promise to drop by if she had the chance. It’s not that far away from here, actually.”

Keith acts all offended and frowns: “Your mystery girl rather goes to work than do an interview? With me?”

It sounds so arrogant that Alex almost wants to start following him on Twitter.

“My mystery girl is a very talented editor. If she doesn’t go to work, many fans of television shows will be sad. They’ll cry. And in the end, they’ll all blame you,” she teases him.

A little, collective chuckle roams the room. Keith admits to his mistake and readjusts the little question cards on his lap. It’s started. The thing everyone is dying to hear – the questions about Amy and their relationship. Rick was right. It took him three questions.

“What’s her name?” Keith wonders.

Like he doesn’t know that yet.

“Amy. Her name is Amy,” Alex answers, with a big smile.

“That’s a pretty nice name,” he comments.

Alex shrugs: “Well, she is a pretty nice girl.”

He wiggles his eyes suggestively and she finds herself slightly embarrassed.

“Aren’t we supposed to talk about work, or something?” she giggles.

The faking part has completely disappeared. This conversation has her acting like a teenage girl and it’s awkward as fuck to her. Tough and mysterious Alex Ochoa has left the room and this new version is scaring the shit out of her.

“Are you kidding me, nobody want to hear about clothes when we have this to talk about?”

The crowd loudly agrees.

“But, truthfully, she seems to have popped up out of nowhere. You’ve been very preserved for years now. No one has ever really seen you with a girlfriend or a boyfriend.”

“There never were any boyfriends,” Alex informs him.

“So you’re telling me you’re gay?”

“As gay as a daffodil, my dear,” she quotes Freddy Mercury.

“So, no boyfriends,” he hums sort of to express a sensation of sadness.

“No girlfriends either, actually. Just Amy,” she shyly admits.

He curiously crosses his legs and leans on one of his elbows to bend over to the supermodel sitting next to him.

“Okay, but … one second the two of you are spotted downtown. The next we learn you share an apartment. And suddenly, at a fashion show, you propose to her.”

He proudly points at the massive image still being shown behind them.

“It all seems so sudden.”

Suddenly, Amy appears next to the camera. Rick, who’s enjoying this masterpiece of an interview, welcomes her to the party. The second the blonde’s eyes turn at the stage, she realizes just how big that picture is. She’ll be on national television. It scares her a bit. Alex notices her presence after a few seconds and that overwhelming, stereotypical smile appears.

“Nothing about Amy is sudden, trust me. Well, except maybe the way she can get mad at me whenever I do something wrong,” she jokes.

When her eyes find her lover’s in a secret way, she learns how amusingly offended the blonde is.

“No, but we grew up together. We have been high school sweethearts for years, actually. Then we each went our own way for a while. She went to Stanford.”

She faces the crowd with her fascinating smug face and they all start applauding. Amy is embarrassed as shit. Are there three hundred people cheering for her right this second?

She knows the whole explanation is a delusional version of the truth, but they both agreed on it late last night. Her eyes soften, because those sentences draw her back to the knowledge that Alex fought cancer while she was away. It gives her the shivers.

“To say the least, we lost touch. But I never forgot about her. After four years, we met again, at a friend’s wedding,” Alex further elaborates while Keith hasn’t said a thing in minutes – he’s simply too fascinated. “And I don’t know – It all just made sense right that second. I saw her and I didn’t fell in love again. No, I was still in love with her. So I just got a total confirmation of how important she is to me. Luckily, she felt the same. We’ve been together since and now marrying her doesn’t even look scary or drastic. Or sudden. In fact, I can’t wait to promise her forever. Because it’s been that way since I was five. Forever being with her seems easy. It will be.”

The crowd remains quiet. So quiet that it turns into something beautiful. Alex turns her head and is overcome with her own feelings. Surprisingly, once she starts talking about her lady lover, she can’t seem to shut up. Amy’s tearing up, because Alex is known to be guarded and careful when it concerns her love life. The interviewer follows the Latina’s stare and finds the pretty blonde near the camera. Her recognizes her and enthusiastically throws his hands up in the air.

“Is that Amy? Is that your fiancée?”

Amy wasn’t supposed to actually take part in the interview. She was reluctant enough to agree to let them show some pictures of them as a couple on a screen behind the set somewhere throughout the whole thing. Now she gets waved at to join her lady lover. And the pictures aren’t even up yet. Rick asks her if she’s willing to do this, but Alex’s proud eyes are the ones that make her change her mind. She gets geared up with a microphone and Keith Gordon himself walks off stage to guide her to the couch her fiancée is seated on. Alex’s face is worth a million bucks. She’s playfully clenching her teeth as Amy nervously heaves rapid sighs. They sit down next to each other and remain pretty neutral for a while, keeping their hands politely on their lap. But once Keith sits down again after calming down the cheering audience, he notices just how naturally the girls’ fingers find a way to entwine.

“Welcome, Amy.”

The blonde chuckles nervously and realizes how impressive it is to sit in this chair. She nods politely and then quickly glances at Alex.

“We – uhm – just found out that you got engaged last night. Congratulations on that.”

His hands starts clapping and the room gets filled with the loud noise of a crowd following his example.

“Thank you,” she shyly says.

Alex thinks she’s adorable. For a girl not going through the makeup department first, she looks beautiful as hell. She’s wearing some jeans and a fashionable shirt she stole from Alex this morning. Her hair is just casually hanging down her shoulders, but it looks like a whole crew of hairdressers put an hour of work into it.

“How come we don’t know anything about you? You’ve been spotted with this little angel around the world, yes, but nobody actually knew for a fact that you were Mrs. Future Ochoa,” Keith teases.

“I’m a pretty private person,” Amy explains. “And it’s not like we go out every night or do a lot of interviews. We are kind of boring, if you must know. We love watching movies at home or invite friends over. But it’s not like we’ve been hiding or anything.”

Keith nods with understanding and thinks about his next question. Nothing about this is going by script anymore. No one actually expected Amy to join in. Suddenly the pictures appear behind him. The ones the girls selected. It are sweet memories. Some even from when they were five.

“So you’re telling me Alex Ochoa is a nerd?” he dryly asks.

Alex’s eyes flare up at the two of them and she amusingly shakes her head with denial to convince the crowd. But Amy spoils her secrets and admits to the fact.

“She is. There’s no bigger nerd than this one.”

Her thumb points at the girl sitting next to her, who’s faking an annoyed expression.

“But, let’s be real, you are marrying a supermodel now. How does that feel like? Does it feel like marrying your idol?” the man wonders.

Amy numbly shakes her head, while Alex is already rolling her eyes. Everyone notices.

“She’s not my idol,” she speaks up casually. “I know her far too well for her to be my idol. I know disgusting things about her people shouldn’t know about their idol.”

Alex immediately giggles over that comment and asks her to stop, but Amy isn’t done yet.

“My idol is Michael Kahn. Amazing editor. A true artist,” she finishes.

It’s clear that everyone thinks this hot blonde is also a smart-ass woman. She talks in a very well-educated way and discusses important things.

“Okay, Alex, I need to ask. Simply because Twitter is exploding and my producer is whispering in my ear.”

Keith can’t help but giggling over that fact and tries to pull himself back together.

“You never really took a stand, did you? I mean, before, you never really said: I’m gay, I’m loving the ladies, this is my girlfriend.”

The Latina nods while thinking about her answer and licks her lower lip. How is she supposed to answer that question? There has always been this reputation she carried around. Ever since she entered the scene, Alex Ochoa was rumored to be a party girl. She attended parties, took friends along, hung out with different people every day. At the beginning, the paparazzi didn’t hunt her down as often as they do now. So Amy stayed a bit off the radar when they were younger. Of course, when she did attend some public event, David and Eli were there as well. No one ever zoomed in on their relationship or their friendship, simply because nobody ever asked. After Alex left to get cancer treatment in Belgium, Amy didn’t appear next to her for four years. She completely misguided the press about her whereabouts and all that popped up where old magazine pictures or behind the scenes stuff. Rick would post some holiday pictures here and there to keep the crowd happy, but nobody realized she was in fact fighting for her life.

And when she got back into the public eye, Alex had no one to show off. She had flings and hookups and left their house early in the morning like it’d been normal pajama parties.

“I didn’t,” she eventually start explaining the lack of coming out, “but I didn’t feel like I had to. You know, if I would’ve had to walk up to a camera and be all ‘Hey, I’m in love with a girl, I want to marry her and there’s nothing you can do about it’, it would’ve been like I had to prove something. And with Amy, I never had to prove anything.”

She gently slaps their entwines hand with the one she has left and shrugs.

“She’s just the person I fell in love with. The person I share a connection with that I can’t even translate into words. Admitting to it would’ve been like excusing myself for being gay and I’ll never do that. I don’t feel like anyone ever should. We shouldn’t have to come out, we shouldn’t even have to be having this interview now. We should just walk down the street and be in love and people shouldn’t have to care less. I didn’t fell in love with Amy, the girl. I fell in love with Amy, the person.”

She suddenly turns her head to the crowd and scrunches her nose: “Though I can’t deny she has amazing boobs.”

They are loving that comment. Amy buries her face in her hands and starts shaking her head with embarrassment. She can’t believe Alex said that. Still, it’s too funny not too laugh. Keith, a man that should be a little bit conservative about topics like this, appears to be a lot more openminded that Alex anticipated. He cheers them on and in a rather awkward sort of confession, he admits that the girl isn’t wrong. Amy bursts into laughter and loudly wonders why she agreed to sit down on this couch in the first place. The Latina’s shoulder shoves hers in a cute way.

“So we could talk about your boobs, obviously,” she teases.

Keith nods: “Obviously.”

It’s no surprise that everyone on this earth adores Alex. She teases the shit out of everyone. On certain behind the scenes videos, she randomly pulls down colleagues’ pants or pulls weird faces behind their back. It’s adorable. And childish, but everyone loves childish.

“Okay, enough about boobs,” Keith suddenly decides while waving his question cards like a hand fan to cool himself down. “I want to know about the family. You two grew up together, you say?”

Alex and Amy both nod.

“Inseparable,” the blonde explains.

“What about your parents?” he asks Alex. “Do they love Amy?”

The girls both burst into laughter and a raw scoff escapes Alex’s mouth.

“Love?” she ridicules him. “Are you kidding me? My dad adores her. You need to understand …”

She turns toward the crowd and expressively starts throwing her hands through the air to represent her little situation.

“I grew up in this house where there were men and boys all around. My mom died when I was born and all I knew were my dad, my uncle, my granddad and my cousins. All boys, all the time. Nothing but testosterone and football and baseball. No tea parties, no princess-themed parties. No, we were pirates and cowboys.”

Amy secretively smiles over that explanation. Those days were epic. She was allowed to roll in the mud at Alex’s house and climb trees and that was such a change from her own upbringing.

“So Amy walked in and she is so much different than I am,” Alex continues with a surprisingly dramatic voice, so the audience start laughing. “She’s girly, she’s well-mannered, she’s tactful and soft. She says please while I just yank things out of people’s hands. I was raised by men, you see, so I’m rude and snarky and I can never completely put that off. Amy is their Goddess. When we fight and I go to my pack for moral support and back up, they totally yell at me. I never win. They are always like: ‘Stop driving that sweet girl crazy. Do you have any idea how impossible you are?’”

By that time she’s mimicking her own father and the crowd starts laughing. Keith can’t believe how much fun he’s having, while Amy can’t do anything but nod affirmatively.

“Poor Alex,” Keith utters. “But at least her parents must love you?”

He’s teasing her and she doesn’t mind. Alex nods and obviously forgets to mention the part where Eleanor and William hated her for four years.

“They are wonderful. They are the sweetest people and I’m lucky enough to have found their daughter,” she says and she means it.

“So they agree with you when the two of you have a fight?” Keith says while pointing at her.

Alex shakes her head right after exploding from laughter and cups her own face with both hands.

“No, like I said, I never win,” she admits.

---

They go on their first public, romantic date ever after the engagement storm later that week. It’s a restaurant called RiverSide on Sunset Boulevard. The place looks magically cosy and sort of reminds its guest of a terrace somewhere on a tropical island. It’s furnished with wood trellises. They make you sit down on cushioned booths and there’s green everywhere. Plus, the food is great.

The date sort of is a trick to lure the press to the restaurant, only to have them wait for the girls’ arrival and departure hours later. But it’s a statement thing. It’s to make sure they know exactly where they are and who they’re with. So when Amy and Alex’s driver pulls over the car right in front of the entrance of the RiverSide, a turmoil of paparazzi gather around the back seat doors to snap pictures. Luckily, the windows are shaded. A nervous Amy grabs Alex’s hands and they get out as soon as possible. The girls look amazing – so pretty that they each told each other just how hot they were at least five times the last fifteen minutes. Flashes blind them on their way in. All they want is to get through that door as quickly as possible. Luckily, the waiters assist them by opening up for them the second they are recognized.

They sit down at a table not that very far from the window, so the photographers still can curiously look at them from a distance. It’s a trick. A marketing trick. The girls don’t mind, though. After ten seconds, they have forgotten about the secret agenda. Because looking into each other’s eyes from each side of the table drags them into the mythical dimension of an AA-meeting.

“Here’s to us,” Amy whispers, while holding up her glass of wine.

Alex toasts to that and mysteriously smiles. She can’t help but feeling utterly happy. This is their first official date as a couple – to the world, that is. They’ve been out and about a million times before, in fact, but nobody really ever noticed. To the world, they were just friends. Roommates. Platonic acquaintances. Now it’s out in the open – it’s a public masterpiece. It’s a spectacle. But to those two young girls, it’s just another evening together. Until a distant flash disturbs their private moment momentarily.

“I feel like we’re sixteen again and everyone’s staring at us until we kiss.”

Alex chuckles over the blonde’s comment and nods.

“And then they’d stare at us more because we just kissed.”

Amy remembers. Those were crazy days. They didn’t care, not even for a second, about what others would think. Most of the time, people seemed to ignore the fact that they were two girls. The girls were together all the time. A kiss in public changed so little. But when they did – oh, the boys went crazy. And the girls got curious.

“You look amazing,” Amy whispers over her glass, suggestively wiggling her eyebrows.

“I want to impress you,” Alex shyly admits.

But the blonde doesn’t believe it for a second. She throws quick glances through the room and counts the people subtly observing their every move. The world is enchanted when Alex Ochoa enters the room. For God’s sake, even Amy is enchanted after all those years.

“You don’t dress to impress,” she scoffs. “You dress to depress: so good that others feel bad.”

The slim fingers of the supermodel caress the skin of her fiancée like they are silk. Like they are meant to be touched. Except nobody’s allowed. If another person but Alex would touch this divine person the way she does, Alex would kill them. And she’d actually enjoy doing it.

---

Two hours later, the girls run into some friends of Alex. They gather around one table, after asking the restaurant manager if it’d be okay to have some drinks at this place. Of course he agrees. Any restaurant in this town would die to have a bunch of supermodels, actors and singers to spend a high-profile night out at theirs. There were twenty paparazzi bastards lined up outside of the building when Alex and Amy entered. The second her friends walked in to have dinner and accidentally ended up at their table, that number tripled. The large amount of dinner guests have left the establishment and the manager subtly turns the music volume up. A talented bartender shakes up some cocktails and distributes them to the famous guests. It’s starting to get a little too comfortable around this place. Nobody minds.

Another hour and one of the world most known singers is situated on top of the counter, dancing her ass off with one of her best friends. Amy adores the complete normality of these people. They earn so much money, they get stalked by photographers around the clock and produce the most amazing work of art. But in here, without the designer high heels and pressure of the entertainment world, some seem more ordinary than her. They seem like regular people instead of fairies.

Alex downs a tequila and expresses the most disgusted expression in her life. For the first time ever, Amy’s not attracted to her. But as soon as Alex returns to her normal face, that changes. They used to go out all the time. There were friends and strangers. Dances and drinking games. Always so much fun – always so carefree and joyous. Their teenage life was so simple and pure. Everything about life felt genuine and honest. Few things feel that way right now. Los Angeles is a strange city to live in. Fame and power does a lot to a personality. It makes it impossible to completely rely on others, to trust them without hesitation, to commit to someone without fear. Another one of Alex’s old colleagues seems to realize that same thing a while later.

“I can’t even remember life before this. Like, how does it feel like to leave your house without creeps around the corner.”

Another gorgeous woman picks up on that. She’s completely wasted.

“Or makeup.”

They all pull weird faces, except Amy. She still walks out the door like that all the time. Alex pats her leg under the table, to reassure her she’s not the strange one here. As a way of convenience, she leaves it their, gently stroking the skin in a teasing way. Amy starts to smile mysteriously and looks at her. She’s had a few drinks too. The buzz is starting to kick in and, in all honesty, she’s really enjoying this evening.

“We were pretty awesome when we were in high school,” Alex suddenly reveals to her peers.

Immediately, a dozen eyes are pointed at her.

“We’d go to illegal parties, make out in the closets – which is so ironic now you think of it.”

Amy wiggles her eyebrows and nods all amused. It is.

Alex continues unrestrained: “And then I met Rick Spencer, my manager, and I gently told him to fuck off because he was way too old to hit on me.”

Amy snorts while laughing: “She totally did.”

But the divine Latina waves her hands down her own body and shrugs: “Still hired me, though.”

“Still can’t believe that. You were always an asshole when we went out,” Amy tells her.

“What do you mean?” Alex curiously wonders, while wiggling her nose with excitement.

“You’d always challenge some guy to fight you whenever they talked to me. It was ridiculous.”

“Oh, those guys were lucky you stopped me. I could’ve handled them all,” Alex claims.

But her lover isn’t convinced about that: “You are very skinny. You struggle with opening heavy doors. You couldn’t have taken on those men. This is typically you being stupid when drunk.”

Alex just shrugs: “I’m sorry, but I do stupid things when I’m sober as well. Remember when I got those seven stitches across the knuckles?”

She’s practically proud of it.

“You’re an adult,” Amy reminds her.

And it’s the most childish, playful reaction Alex ever had when she reacts to that: “Yeah, but not like a real one.”

Suddenly, Amy’s memories bring her back to old times. Times when Alex proved to be more than the dork she’s secretly trying to be at this age.

“Remember when you used to sing me that song?” she asks, while yanking Alex’s arm.

“What song?” the Latina asks, only to express how desperately she wants it to remain a secret.

Of course she knows the song. She hates the song. It’s the one that appears when her heart explodes with love and that’s only preserved for her blonde lover. It disgusts her how cheesy she can be at times, so Alex’s eyes force Amy to shut up and never speak again. But the sweetest memory of memories gets the upper hand.

“That ridiculous song,” Amy betrays her. “Something like … It’s love. It’s love. It’s love with you. You love me and I love you.”

She starts wiggling her butt and throws her hands up in the air to reenact Alex’s past movements. The model is embarrassed to the bone and throws an apologetic look to her friends, the bunch of top models and actors that don’t know this side of her. Their enchanted smiles show just how fascinated they are by the story. Their smiles are magical.

“I’m never scared. I never hide. But when I look at you, I know it’s right.”

The blonde starts singing and though it’s sweet, she starts to chuckle over the words. Alex tackles her on the wide couch to make her shut up, but eventually it’s Amy’s own hysterical laughter that keeps her from singing along. The crowd of famous friends are strangely impressed by the cuteness overload and look at each other all adorable.

Amy wipes the tears from her eyes and forces herself to breathe again. After that, she has one thing left to share.

“The last line of those lyrics were ‘Me and you is gay times two’. It was the best thing I ever heard in my entire life.”

Alex rolls her eyes and pouts.

“You are the worst.”

“And yet, you asked me to marry you,” Amy teases.

---

When they decide to get their jackets, it’s late. In a few hours, both girls are expected at work. They don’t feel like it. They are drunk enough to embarrass themselves in front of the cameras in a few minutes. Those long awaited pictures will be worth it. Twitter will agree.

The woman working the coat check in the room next to the toilets is long gone, so they go searching for their belongings on their own. When Alex looks into Amy’s eyes for too long, the atmosphere shifts. Those eyes. The way they sparkle. The desire to be read, the love that stops a heartbeat. Amy remembers the lingering touch of Alex’s fingers on her lap earlier. She remembers the tingling feeling it shot through her body.

It takes them exactly three seconds before a primal urge has them forced against the nearest wall. Alex’s fingers disappear in Amy’s panties and a hasty, aroused gasp escapes the blonde’s mouth. The way the model’s movements make her moan sometimes drives her crazy. Amy asks her to be careful, because so many people are around. But the fingers just thrust into the blonde’s skinny body deeper. And deeper. And deeper. And as Alex pants, Amy sighs and moans – like an animal. Like she’s not able to control herself. She shrieks over the excitement until, at a certain point, Amy wouldn’t even care if her own mother would walk into the room. All Alex is determined to do is fuck her lover. To enchant her. To dazzle and corrupt her until they reach the apex of their connection. And Amy lets her. Oh, boy, does Amy let her.

---

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