23 Trust
TWENTY-THREE
Trust
“It’ll be a great party, sweetie,” my friend Stella said. “You can trust everyone there.”
Stella McAmis was a semi-successful twentysomething actor I’d met at an industry party, and she filled up my nights and weekends with long dinners, strong cocktails, and gorgeous people.
I told myself fun was what I needed and that I should take it as seriously as I did acting.
Somewhere in the back of my mind I could hear Mom’s voice: “Don’t phone it in, Hayden.
Whatever you do.” Newly single and thrilled to be picking up friends, I was determined to keep giving the performance of my life.
Goodbye, stage fright, hello Hollywood high life.
There was something strange about Stella, though.
Her career track didn’t match up with how much money she spent, yet she never talked about her family or her past. No matter where we went together, she immediately made a beeline toward whatever rich and famous man happened to be there.
She’d grab me and pull me along with her, then introduce me to the men.
“This is Hayden. You must know her from Heroes.”
I always made friendly conversation, but I sensed these men’s eyes on me, and it made me uncomfortable.
Instead of feeling like Stella’s friend, it was like I’d become something else: a young commodity, ripe for the pickings.
I was freer than I’d ever been, but I certainly wasn’t cheap.
These flirtations didn’t feel right. But I couldn’t place my finger on what Stella was trying to do with me.
Sure, I was in charge of my life and she was in charge of hers, but she needed me for something. I just couldn’t figure out what.
A few months after I met her, Stella invited me to what she said would be a casual yet star-studded party at her apartment in Los Feliz.
I didn’t have anything better to do, so I said yes.
I didn’t think anything of it until she mentioned the word “trust.” This was a party she was talking about, not a secret society.
The word “trust” made the whole thing sound fishy.
I told myself I didn’t have anything to worry about, though, because Stella was my friend, and she’d never done anything but show me a good time.
A night out would be fun. So, right at the time Stella told me to arrive, I took the elevator up to her apartment.
When I walked in, I saw a tiny crowd of people instead of the party I was expecting.
“Oh, hi, love!” Stella said, coming out of nowhere. “Everyone, she’s here!”
Stella waved her arms to the side of the room, and I looked toward a small group of men who were gathered together talking, drinking, and smoking weed.
There were some musicians and some actors, all of whom counted themselves among the most exclusive people in Hollywood.
They were also all in their forties and fifties.
I was nineteen.
“Hi, everyone,” I said, waving. Then I turned to Stella and lowered my voice. “I thought this was a party? It’s more like… a meeting.”
“Do not worry, it’s a party,” she answered.
There it was again: the implication that I actually did have something to worry about, or that maybe trust—or the absence of it—was back on the table.
Stella got me a drink, then pulled me toward the men and introduced them to me one by one.
I did my best to be friendly, but I was deeply uneasy.
These men seemed to be a little too comfortable together, like they knew something I didn’t.
As a woman in a room dominated by men, it was also hard not to feel like I was being watched.
The men were nice enough, asking me questions about Heroes and whether I had plans to film more movies, and I answered them politely.
But I didn’t feel right, so I never let my guard down.
Instead, after about half an hour of small talk, with all eyes on me, I decided to figure out my exit strategy.
It had been a perfectly good night, and there was no need to ruin it with whatever was going down in this apartment.
Just as I was putting my coat on and about to say goodbye to Stella, one of the men—an Oscar-winning actor and director—approached me.
“It was nice to talk to you over there,” he said, smiling. “Are you heading home?”
“I am,” I answered. “I’ve got to be up early tomorrow.”
He smiled again, this time a little bigger. “Well, have a good night. Just be careful when you leave because someone spit their gum out somewhere, and I got some on my pants.”
“Excuse me?” I asked, stepping back.
“Look here,” he answered, pointing down. “There’s a big wad of gum on my pants.”
I looked down and recoiled. This well-respected, award-winning actor’s testicles were hanging out from his unzipped fly.
“I have to go,” I said, turning away from him. Then I pulled on my coat and ran out the door, slamming it shut behind me. It wasn’t until I’d reached the elevator that I realized I hadn’t told Stella goodbye.
Up to that moment, men in Hollywood had always been kind and respectful around me.
There may have been a peck on the lips here and an inappropriate comment there, but nothing had crossed a line.
The gum on the pants, however, was a head-scratcher.
It hadn’t hurt me and I was sure it was a drunken joke, but I’d never seen a grown man do something like that. I was shocked.
I decided not to mention it to Stella, partly because she couldn’t do anything and mostly because the moment had passed.
I was nineteen, and I assumed some older men had just grown up with no manners.
There are some really strange people out there doing lots of icky things.
Besides, Stella was my friend, and I was sure that friends always protected each other.
No one I loved had ever put me in harm’s way, and as far as I was concerned, Stella was no different.
Before I knew it, Stella and I fell back into our old patterns. She invited me out, and I said yes because I loved her company and was looking for a good time. Stella was aways there, no questions asked.
In spring 2009, Stella invited me to the south of France, and I jumped at the chance to get away.
NBC had just finished airing the third season of Heroes, and I needed distance from the show.
It wasn’t Milo’s presence on the set; we were both professionals, and we didn’t let the fact that we’d broken up interfere with our jobs.
Besides, there was no bad blood between us.
I also still looked forward to going to work every day, but season two had let me down.
The plotlines were confusing, the writing was often stale, and some of the characters’ motivations and dramas no longer rang true.
Heroes was a show based on the supernatural, but a lot of viewers and critics also complained that they’d been forced to suspend their disbelief a little more than they were comfortable with.
After ratings plummeted during the second season, two of the executive producers—who also worked as writers—were fired, but the problems remained all the way through season three.
The rest of the cast and I were frustrated and upset, but there was little we could do.
We did everything in our power to make the characters as interesting to watch as possible, but at the end of the day our influence was limited.
Ultimately, decisions about direction and writing were out of our control.
We also believed in the show, so we forged ahead.
Now, being thousands of miles away was just what the doctor ordered.
I landed in France and promptly boarded a yacht that Stella had somehow rented for a week.
This wasn’t just any old yacht, either; it was a super yacht, like the kind oligarchs dock in international waters to avoid paying taxes.
There were multiple decks, dozens of rooms, and a kitchen, crew, and bar prepared to meet our every need.
It quickly became apparent, though, that the main deck was where the action was. Stella kept the party going up there, and when I walked from my room, freshly showered, to meet her, she handed me a drink.
“Here, sweetie. Welcome to France! Enjoy.”
“Cheers,” I answered. Then we clinked glasses, turned our faces toward the sun, and tried to forget all our troubles, which lay on the shores beyond the deep, blue waters of the Mediterranean.
The first few days on the yacht were heaven.
One night Stella hired a DJ, and we danced on deck all through the night, then at six in the morning escaped to the galley, where the chef had cooked bacon, eggs, and pancakes and piled them high on individual plates.
There was always champagne flowing, someone famous or beautiful lounging on the deck, or a card game or deep conversation happening in one of the many lower-level lounges.
I spent mornings sleeping in and afternoons in the sun, with dips in the warm, blue water whenever I wanted.
Good times and Stella were one and the same.
Honestly, I would have had to try to have a bad time.
Toward the end of my stay, I was filling my plate up with tiny sandwiches and my wineglass with chardonnay when Stella approached me and asked me to come downstairs with her.
“There’s someone I want you to meet,” she said. “Follow me.”
I put my plate down and smiled. “I’ve been here for days. I thought I’d met everyone.”
Stella laughed. “No, he’s new,” she answered. “Just trust me.”
There was that word again. Trust. I pushed any worries I had to the side, though, and followed Stella down a set of stairs. After walking through a narrow hallway, we reached a door and knocked lightly.
“Come in!” a voice with a British accent said.
“Go on in, Hayden,” Stella said, smiling sweetly at me. “I’ll be right behind you.”
I walked into the cabin and saw a famous thirtysomething British singer-songwriter lying in a bed. He was shirtless and propped up on a few pillows with his arms positioned behind his head. From the waist down, he was covered by bedsheets, and I could see the outline of his body underneath.
Oh my God, I thought. Is he naked under there?
Stella leaned down and whispered in my ear. “I want you to get in bed with him. He has a huge dick.”
She pulled back the covers on the unoccupied side of the bed, and I did as I was told.
My thoughts were a blur, but I’d spent my life trusting that others had my best interests at heart.
Being “managed” was routine, to the point where I lost faith in my intuition.
I could feel my heart pounding, as I settled in underneath the sheets, I disassociated.
My body no longer felt like my own. The shock was so great it didn’t even occur to me to say no.
Stella was one of my closest, most trusted friends, and this couldn’t be real.
There was no way she’d ever let anything happen to me.
“I’ll leave you two alone,” Stella said as she left the room.
As soon as the door clicked close, my survival instinct kicked in, and I squirmed out from under the sheets.
“Look,” I said, “I don’t know what she said to you, but this is not going to happen.”
I jumped out of the bed, pivoted toward the door, and ran into the hall.
I sprinted up a flight of stairs, then down another hall, and ran till I reached my room.
I knew I had to get off this boat, away from this horrible woman and whatever she was up to.
When I was safely inside my room, I found my phone, booked a hotel, and started packing my bags.
I wasn’t scared, but I felt like I’d been kicked in the face.
Stella had become my wingwoman (or I’d become hers).
She’d confided in me, pampered me, and treated me like her best friend—then turned around and treated me like a call girl.
I deserved better than that, by a lot. I needed to be with sane, normal people who didn’t care so much about fame, parties, and press and never, ever used people for their own benefit or ends.
I told myself I had Annie, the DASH girls, Jansen, and a dozen other close friends, and they all meant the world to me.
Truly, I wasn’t alone, even if sometimes I thought I was.
Then, all of a sudden, I thought of the last person who’d looked past the flashbulbs of the paparazzi and treated me with respect.
It was someone who not only didn’t care that I was famous, but who also didn’t know who I was till a few months ago.
We hadn’t seen each other for months, but I’d thought of him often.
I decided that as soon as I was off the yacht and back in the comfort of my own home, I’d call Wlad. If there was anyone who was the opposite of Stella McAmis, it was him.