The Empty Ones Read Free

great!
    Nelly: I hear you had a little trouble with the kids on the first season—
    Marco: The Rollerblading! That’s right. Some of these kids, you know, they get themselves into bad situations. They steal, they do drugs, they get into gangs, so I thought—if you’re gonna get them out of something bad, why not get them into something good, like Rollerblading? We had some spills along the way, but they got pretty good by the end. We’re gonna have some fun on this next season, too! I’m thinking bungee jumping! Haha, scary!
    Nelly: But you ran into a little trouble with at least one teen last year who—
    Marco: The only trouble we had was finding a nice smooth spot for Rollerblading! I love LA— amo mi cuidad —but they gotta work on those roads, Nelly!
    Nelly: I was referring to the incident with—
    Marco: Haha!
    Nelly: I … yes, it does sound like a … rough situation.
    Marco: You got that right!
    Nelly: Haha, okay. Thanks for coming down to talk to us today, Marco.
    Marco: Thanks for having me. Muchas gracias!
    Nelly: And be sure to check out the second season of Marco Luis’s From the Barrio to the Bellagio, only on E! But first: Up next, how low can J. Lo go? It’s a Lo down dirty shame, and we’ve got the pictures to prove it. Jennifer Lopez does the limbo—commando—and shows her no-no. Oh no! Back to you, Tad.
    Â â€¦
    You could feel the tension break as soon as the camera flicked off. Nelly let out a sigh that lasted for an entire minute. She wiped at her watery eyes, blinked her contacts back into place, and smiled at Marco. Genuinely, this time. It was a more subdued expression. No more cheeks stretched taut to show off the glimmering wall of teeth. It was a small, nervous smile. A little sad.
    â€œSo how did you stop that dolphin?” she asked Marco. Her voice was twenty decibels lower off camera. A slight southern accent chased about the edges.
    â€œWhat.” Marco responded. There was no intonation at the end to mark it as a question. His voice was flat and still.
    He had also lost his camera mask, but while Nelly’s had been replaced with a version of herself ten years older and a hundred IQ points brighter, Marco’s was replaced by nothing at all. A mannequin sat in his place, perfectly still, just waiting for somebody to come and put him away.
    â€œThe dolphin?” Nelly tried again. “The one that wanted your son’s ice cream? How’d you get it away?”
    â€œThere was no dolphin,” Marco stated. When she looked confused, he continued: “It was a cute story. People like cute stories about famous people. It makes them feel like they are like us. Like we are just the same as them. I have people that write down cute stories for me to tell. That was one of them.”
    â€œOh…” Nelly tried to think of something else to say, just to keep the conversation going, but she came up blank. She pulled at a thread in her tight pencil skirt instead.
    â€œIf I had to stop a dolphin,” Marco continued, seeing that something more was expected of him, “I would hook my fingers into each of its eyes and push up and in until they popped.”
    Nelly’s mouth went dry.
    â€œEverything has eyes,” Marco said. “Eyes are always a weakness.”
    Marco stared at her, unblinking and unmoving. Nelly got the sense he was not awaiting a response from her, or even trying to discomfort her. It was just that his face was already pointed in her direction, and he saw no reason to look elsewhere. She felt sweat spring up on the back of her neck. She tried to think of a polite reason to walk away. Then an impolite one. Then she just tried to get her legs to work. They would not.
    Steele, her wardrobe assistant, paused as he walked by them. He frowned deeply at Nelly and made an extravagant series of noises.
    â€œNow why do you have to pick at your skirt like that, Miss Nelly? Nasty