Chapter Twenty

The sound of someone knocking rattles me from my sleep.

"Knock, knock," they yell out.

I pull the covers over my face and hide beneath the comfort of my blanket. I'm usually a morning person, just not after late, long nights. It doesn't help that in order to wake up, I'll need to splash cold water on my face.

From the small peep hole in my blanket, the aroma of freshly cooked eggs and bacon is the first thing to get my stomach grumbling in protests of hunger. I lift the blanket up, just enough to see the bony hands of Alex standing in front of me with a tray full of food.

"I appreciate the thought, but next time I'd like some warning so that I can get dressed into something appropriate for your viewing," I yell from underneath the cover.

"Right." He grins, "the whole mask thing, where is it?" he asks.

"Just wait outside, I'll only be a minute." If I could see his face, I bet he would have nodded and awkwardly retreated from the room. A pang of guilt settles in my stomach, I wasn't that mean, was I?

Once I hear the bedroom door close, I throw the blanket off my body and climb out. I rush to my suitcase and grab out an outfit to wear. Lucy packed a beautiful warm blue coloured dress with a lace trim at the bottom and decoration on the top section. I pair the outfit with white sandal heels, a white clutch bag, and a plain white laced mask.

I spare a couple of minutes to wash my face and brush my hair. I apply the essential beauty products to my face before joining Alex in the kitchen.

He's standing behind the counter with the food tray in front of him.

"Thank you." I smile, "Room service?" I ask.

"Exactly that." He chuckles.

"Did my Dad leave a note or something?" I ask.

"Not sure." He shrugs his shoulder, "I saw a man leave your hotel room when I was collecting my room service, so I thought I would order something for you," he explains.

"That's strange, usually he tells me when he's going," I say.

"Maybe it was urgent?" he offers.

"Maybe." I shrug it off.

"Do you want to watch TV?"  Alex asks.

"Why not." I smile.

With the tray firmly in my grasp, I plop on the couch next to Alex. I take the lid off the tray and examine the food on the plate.

"I didn't know what to get, so I got something standard."

"That's okay, thank you."

Alex flicks on the television and starts surfing through the channels quickly. I never got how people could barely look at the screen before deciding to move onwards. How do people even know what's on the channel?

"What are we even watching?" I ask.

Alex settles on one channel, "TMZ," he says.

"Has our thing been aired?" I ask.

"I think we're just in time." Alex looks at the screen and turns up the volume.

"Alex Bray, one of the hottest bachelors in the music industry was caught leaving the beach with a female companion," the woman starts saying. "There isn't a clear photograph, but rumours and blurred images are surfacing the internet. It's thought to be The Masked Singer, the girl who was recently discovered for her talents off of YouTube."

Her co-worker laughs, and then joins in on the report, "The blurry image shows a woman with blonde hair. Despite her arm obscuring the view of her face, you can slightly make out the bottom piece of a mask." A new image flashes on the screen with a red circle around what she's talking about.

The image is a picture of Mitch and his crew trying to clear a pathway. Alex is holding my hand, and I'm covering my face.

The first woman takes over the next part. "With this outing photographed, accusations have been fired up as to why the pair is together, and how they met. There's a speculation Alex might be co-writing songs with The Masked Singer for her debut album, people wonder if there's a romance element forming between them."

Then the second woman gets excited over her next lines. "Besides the sad news that our hot bachelor might be off the market, can we focus on the fact that this is our first sighting of The Masked Singer in public!"

"At least we can confirm she's a real person," they laugh.

"It'll be nice seeing her roaming the street, it's a good reminder she's a real person behind that screen."

"I honestly don't blame her. It's hard to go from nobody to somebody overnight. It takes some readjusting to your lifestyle before you could get used to it."

"Hmm," I mumble, "it's weird listening to people talk about me."

Alex wraps his arm around my shoulder. "Just wait until they start making up stories to go to images, it gets worse," he teases.

"I don't like it when people talk about me," I admit. "Besides, why to people pay so much attention to made up stories?"

"Because people either want to be a part of your life, or they'll do anything to hate you for it," explains Alex.

"Then why do you watch these things?"

Alex continues to smile at me. "Because I like to see the creative stories they make up. Some of them are rather entertaining," he admits.

"Whatever floats your boat?" I frown.

Alex claps his hands together, breaking our silence. "How about you finish getting ready?" he asks.

"I will." I nod. "I need to look good for the paparazzi."

Alex rolls his eyes and laughs at me.

"Says the boy who has a tone of wax in his perfectly styled hair," I yell.

"I have to look my best! I have standards to maintain," he defends.

"Exactly!" Getting up from the couch, I clean up my mess before making my way back into the bathroom.

I grab my curling wand out and plug it in.

"I thought ahead, and decided we could start writing – I figured you'd be awhile." He eyes off the curling wand.

"Are you serious?"

"Deadly! Where do you keep the pen and paper?"

I give Alex the location of my stuff, and soon enough he returns with a book and pen. He takes a seat in the doorway and looks up at me expectantly.

Shrugging my shoulders, I focus on the beeping curler and my frizzy hair. Alex takes it upon himself to open the book and start scribbling things down. I wrap a piece of hair around the wander and wait.

"I didn't know you started writing more lyrics without me," Alex suddenly says.

I jump to the realisation that he must have picked my lyric book, not the blank exercise book. I quickly place the curling wand on the sink and race over to retrieve my book from Alex's wandering eyes.

"It's just old junk." I snap the book shut.

"They sound like beautiful songs, just a bit of assembling and music, you'd have a full album in no time," he explains.

"They're horrible. Let's just write new songs."

"I've never seen so much heart and soul crammed into lyrics before," he mutters to himself.

"We can write better lyrics in no time," I confidently say.

"Yeah, but with a lot of late nights."

"Then we better start writing." I giggle.

Alex grabs the other book and opens it to a fresh page. He leans his back against the bathtub and scribbles a heading and a date on the top of the page.

"Did you have any inspiration last night?" he asks.

"Yes." I nod my head, "but it's a secret," I tease.

Alex's mouth drops open, and then does a really cute, hurt sad pout.

"You're going to have to wait until the studio."

"What am I supposed to do? Watch you curl your hair?" asks Alex.

"You can do many things, which is an option though."

He shoots me a glare. "I'm only helping because I want to get to the studio sooner rather than later." Alex climbs to his feet and pinches the curling wand out of my hand, "And don't tell anyone I did this for you."

With the curling wand in hand, he grabs a chunk of hair and wraps it around the wand and waits.