The moment that my eyes had met with hers I knew that I had to find out more about her. My stay at the Beverly Hills Hotel was supposed to be brief. I was supposed to be staying for no more than about four days but I was embarrassed to say that I had extended my stay just so I could get to know her.

I had first noticed her when I checked in to the hotel over a week earlier. I had been in one of my disguises and no one batted an eyelid. She had served me at the front desk. Something about her just struck me from the moment she looked up at me with her sweet face. I was surprised though; that sweet face contained a mouth with a voice that was filled with so much coldness. She flipped her dark hair from her face and looked up at me. Her eyes reflected the color that was her name and she just had a look that was so different from any other girl I’d ever found myself checking out.

Every day I went downstairs in to the lobby and watched her. I caught her laughing genuinely just twice within the whole time I’d spent watching her. I was aware of just how stalkerish it made me seem, but I didn’t care.

Shyness had restricted me from outright asking for her number or being bold enough to ask her to meet me for dinner or something that would be easy for any other guy my age. Apparently I was supposed to be sleeping with groupies and enjoying the typical Rock Star lifestyle; but that wasn’t me.

I was aware that people didn’t know how to act around me, people were often in awe of my presence, and believe me it was more of a hindrance then helpful. I didn’t even like getting special treatment. I wished more than anything that I could be just a regular guy, that I wasn’t cursed with such an infinite sense of self-consciousness.

It was a weird transitional stage of my life that I was having a lot of trouble dealing with, and unfortunately for me, there weren’t a lot of people that I felt I could turn to. I did spend an awful lot of time with kids and of course the media had something to say about that. It was nothing sinister; it was just that children didn’t have the expectation from me that everyone else had. With them I didn’t have to live up to a reputation of being anything. I could just be me, someone that hardly anyone got to see—or even wanted to.

Don’t get me wrong at all though – I loved being famous, and nothing made me prouder than the success that Thriller was achieving, but it was so lonely. And my reasons for enjoying fame as much as I did, was probably a little strange to other people within the industry. I liked being famous because I could help people. I really, truly believed that it was what God intended me to do.

I wasn’t going to be bashful about it; I was doing well financially, very, very well, in fact. Sharing that wealth with charity and people who needed it much more than I really made my heart swell with pride. Knowing that someone else’s life could be enriched from the money that I shared just pleased me to no end. Sometimes it was the only thing that kept a smile on my face, because everything else in my personal life was just so dismal.

The media’s new thing was casting me as being a homosexual. It bothered me so much because I wasn’t. I just found it painstakingly hard to meet anyone who was worth laying it all on the line for. I needed to find someone that I could whole-heartedly trust with my entire life, and unfortunately unless the woman had no idea who I was, the chances of finding her would be slim.

Nothing stopped me from actually attempting to make friends though, I guess I was a little persistent and a hopeless romantic at heart. I truly believed that there was someone out there for me, and so I didn’t want to ignore my heart if it told me to pursue someone.

So I hatched this … idiotic plan to invite some people to my suite and have a meeting. I called it under the pretense of discussing the budget for my next single—I invited my A&R and a few finance advisors to talk it out. There would be some negotiating going on, and I knew better than anyone they were all competent enough to discuss things without me.

I don’t know why on Earth I expected it to work. I was a naïve kinda boy, I’ll admit. Sometimes I had this fantasy that everything in life was going to be cake. I knew after that night though, this girl wasn’t going to be cake to get to know—she was more like… a piece of mud pie…

She was standing before me making coffee for my guests. She looked real cute in her little work uniform. It consisted of a white blouse and a nicely fitted black vest and a black skirt. She wore black strappy shoes that would have given at least an inch or two to her height. She wasn’t very tall, probably 5’2 at the most. Oh yeah, she was real cute.

I tried not to make it obvious that I was giving her the once over. I sensed though, it was all a façade, the coldness. I’m sure beneath all of that was a young woman who wanted to be herself.

Maybe that’s why I felt so attracted to her. She mirrored me in some kind of way, as though we had something in common without me knowing absolutely anything about her – except her name and the fact that she’d been working at the hotel for years.

“I hate these meetings.” I pretended to sound fed up. “You okay back here? Need a hand with anything?” I asked her. I was just using the meeting as an excuse to spend more time with her.

“I think I’m covered.” She replied in her soft voice. I noticed that her voice changed when she was alone with me, it was as if she became more introverted.

I tried to think of something to ask her that wouldn’t allow her to give me such a closed answer. “So what’s it like working for the hotel?” I asked.

Wow, Michael, what a brilliant question!

She gave a shrug, glancing up at me for about a quarter of a second. “I suppose it’s okay. Work is work, you just do it to survive.”

I gave a vague smile at her cynical answer. “That’s a bit of a cynical attitude to have, don’t you think?” At least it gave me something to work with.

Jade looked up at me and finally looked me in the eye, “No. I don’t think it is. Of course I’m not doing what you’re doing, so I guess we’d both have different perspectives on the matter.” She replied icily.

Ouch.

I tried not to show how much her answer had thrown me. “Perhaps.” I answered in a restrained voice. Damn, she was bitter. She showed no apology for her sharpness with me and for some reason I admired her ability to be so frank considering who I was. I wasn’t used to people being real with me.

The question that plagued me was, is this person who she really was? Or was it just a mask?

“I don’t always enjoy my work, though.” I continued, “Like now, for instance… there are lots of elements of my job that I don’t enjoy and a lot that I do. Can you honestly say that there is nothing about your job that you enjoy?”

At least my question made her think. She looked at me and shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. “Not really.”

I didn’t quite know how to respond. I actually felt sorry for her. I couldn’t imagine being forced to something that I didn’t want to do just to survive. However, I was intrigued. I wondered what her passions were. “Why don’t you look for another job, something that you'd enjoy?”

She looked up at me and put down the pot of coffee. I was expecting her to tell me to mind my own business, but surprisingly, the coldness in her tone dispersed and she gave me one glimpse of her true self for just a second. “It’s much easier to stay in a comfort zone.” She said very simply.

That one remark told me a million words about her.

As a musician it was extremely difficult to make a transition from one style of music to another. Going from 70s disco music to transcend my career and break out of that genre in to contemporary R&B had been the riskiest path that I'd chosen to take to date. It was one of those things that I felt that would either make or break me. It was a case of just leaping in to the deep end without anything to hold on to. My fear of failing almost halted me from releasing Thriller altogether, but I knew that it was my best work yet and I figured that it would bother me more to have to always wonder if it could have done well.

I knew that Jade’s fear of failing had obviously succeeded in holding her back from whatever dreams she really wanted to achieve. She was so guarded and it made sense. She had a fearful heart. She’d probably been hurt before, and it was probably seemed much easier for her to never have to leave herself open to be burned a second time.

She made me so curious.

I decided to just pluck up the courage and be bold about it. “Can I call you sometime?” I blurted out. I wished I had of been able to craft my question a little more eloquently. “I mean—“ I interrupted myself, “Away from your work environment… Cause I…” my mouth was going dry. Because why, Michael, because why? I knew my question was random, and it wasn’t supposed to be. “I guess I want to talk to you more—without this…”

She seemed shocked by my question but quickly composed herself. She gave me what I deemed to be a feeble smile. “You don’t have my number.”

I squeezed out a chuckle trying to disguise the fact that my heart was pounding hard in my chest and my palms had began to grow sweaty with anticipation. I felt my cheeks burning. “This is the part where you’d offer it to me.” I prompted her.

She stared me down, I knew she was wondering what on earth I would want from her. I couldn’t tell her because I honestly didn’t know. I just wanted to talk. I wanted to try to get beneath her façade and find out about her. “Is this some kind of joke?” She asked me suspiciously, finally looking back down to continue what she was doing.

Oh goodie, and paranoid to boot.

I wondered why I always tortured myself with the high maintenance types. I wished I could be like my brothers and have the same hit it and quit it attitude, but I didn’t. Hell, I was a twenty five year old virgin. She had to be damn special. I wanted my first love to be perfect. I’d had girlfriends, but none that really grabbed me and made me want to give up my heart and body. I loved my last two girlfriends, but I’d never been in love with them.

“Why would you think it was a joke?” I asked, my forehead creased with concern that she would pick me for being some kind of jerk. “It was just a question.”

“Well I’m not like other girls, I’m sure you can find someone else who’d be more willing.” She informed me, her icy tone returning. It became more than evident what she thought I was getting at and it quite frankly offended me.

“And I’m not like other guys.” I told her, using the same tone she had told me. “You know, it’s easier to say a simple no rather than making assumptions about me before you even know me.”

I was damn tired of people thinking they knew me. I wasn’t going to let her get away with thinking my intentions with her were impure.

Jade mumbled an apology but it seemed rather insincere.

There came a time where I had to just give up. It was one of those moments. I didn’t say another word, it was clear that she had nothing left to say so I went back to the dining room and took a seat. I didn’t listen to a single thing that they discussed. Instead all the thoughts that danced around in my head were about Jade.

I think what struck me the most about her, was that her shyness and petite exterior didn’t stop her from standing up for herself when she felt threatened. And the fact that she didn’t treat me like I was famous—well, let’s just say that was a bit of a turn on.

After the meeting ended, Jade went back downstairs without so much as a goodbye to me. I felt defeated and pretty much realized that it was a lost cause that I would have to accept. I’d get over it, I always did.

**

Just before I went to bed that night I went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. I noticed a slip of paper on the counter and it immediately caught my attention. I looked at it for a second trying to figure out what it was. I could feel a goofy smile spreading slowly across my lips.

It was a phone number carefully printed. She wrote nothing else, just the digits. There was no name and no note. I wondered what had made her change her mind. I almost wanted to go and pick up the phone and dial it, but I realized she probably wouldn’t appreciate a call at 3:30am.

I felt pleased with myself as I carefully put the number on my bedside table where it wouldn’t get lost and laid down to go to sleep.