Danger Zone

Prologue: "The Boys Of Summer"

Jules had just finished her morning workout in her little home gym and gotten breakfast when she decided to check her emails.

At 43 years old, she was at her peak, or so she had decided. A good ten years ago, she hadn't been. Because that was when she had worked herself into a burnout that had literally brought her to her knees. The reason? That prick of an ex boyfriend. Everything had been nice and well between the two, although she at times felt a bit unprofessional that she, as a PR guru, had started seeing her Soccer Dude, but what can you do if you fall in love? She snorted. Yes, she was over him, eventually. But she had paid the price. An extremely ugly breakup followed, dirty laundry included. In which she obviously had the upper hand a bit, since she'd been working with Soccer Dude for several years. But the mudslinging fortunately didn't last too overly long and she couldn't be arsed anymore to check what Soccer Dude was up to nowadays.

After that fiasco, she had set up one rule for herself: "I don't date my clients!"

And she didn't intend to ever change that rule.

She strictly kept work and private life separated and knew she was better off that way.

Another thing she had learned the very hard way: she was now only free lancing. She felt safer that way. She knew she had the assets and talent, knew her way around, spoke German and English fluently and stood her ground. She was headstrong, too. All in all, her friends, especially her Ride or Die Nora, called her a "badass", and she certainly didn't mind. On the very contrary! You had to be or else it'd be Sayonara.

Putting on some music, she opened her laptop and hopped to her inbox immediately. One email caught her eye directly: "Job Offer – German representative for actor"

Now this sounded interesting, definitely, albeit vague. She decided to open that email.

"Dear Julia", it read at the beginning. Yet another reminder that while she had legally changed her name from "Julia" to "Jules" after her burnout when she felt she had to reinvent herself, her old name was still everywhere on the web and her international resume. For some reason, unbeknownst to her. "Whatever", she mumbled, opened the email – and gawked.

"We are reaching out on behalf of Mr Tom Cruise who is looking for a German speaking representative."

She read that line over and over. Why on Earth would they contact HER? Good ole Jules who was a free spirit? THE Tom Cruise? FUCKING TOM CRUISE!? The actual face of Scientology? "Y'all are taking the piss, seriously", she mumbled. This could very well also be a trap, since she knew well how passionate he was about that sect and that there was a branch of those not too far away from where she lived here in Berlin. "What the fuck does he want here? Promoting Scientology?" She scratched her head.

It was so comical that she almost burst into laughter. And yet, she felt honored as well. Because if – and she used that "if" extremely loosely – she did get that gig, he'd be the highest, as in A-list, profile person she'd ever worked for. That alone made the whole thing so absurd. Yes, she did have an extensive profile, working with athletes, musicians and now a lot of various publications, but this? "Someone please tell me it's April 1 and this is a joke..." A quick research revealed that it was indeed his team and not some kind of tomfoolery, in the truest sense of the word.

But still – she absolutely had better things to do than finding out that this whole stint was just to get politicians and all to finally recognize Scientology as an official religion in Europe, and especially Germany. "Dude ..."

Moreover, Nora, her best friend and side kick, had expert knowledge on the "church", given that she had interviewed, talked to, and accompanied a great deal of people who had seen the light and run away from Scientology as soon as the brainwashing didn't do its job anymore. She had lost count of how many essays and other things about Scientology ex members Nora had published, but it was a whole lot. So IF someone knew about Scientology and its inner workings, it was her Bestie.

And yet ... that job offer was tempting. Way too tempting, actually.

She re-read it a couple of times and eventually decided it couldn't do harm to accept the invitation to the interview. "Come as you are", was what the email also told her. She breathed a sigh of relief, because she absolutely hated having to dress up for a job of whichever kind. Hence also why she preferred her freelancing gigs. She also still had a good 10 days to prepare for this. Time to consult Nora about a thing or two, and other than that, she decided she'd simply wing it.

"A little voice inside my head said 'Don't look back. You can never look back!'
I thought I knew what love was
What did I know?
Those days are gone forever ..."