Once Upon a Now; Entry

Once Upon Now Entry: Midnight Beast

This is my "Once Upon a Now" contest entry. It's where you have to post a modern original version of a fairy tale. What I did was mash up two fairy tales and set them in a modern time. I used Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast with traces of other themes and tales. I worked really hard for this. If I win, I could get published and THAT would be EVERYTHING to me.

As always, love and support would be incredible. You guys are my everything. So please, VOTE! Voting has already started and if you vote, I could win.

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Midnight Beast

"No matter what you do...Don't lose the shoes."

I was told at least a million times. Probably more than that. A billion. It was said by everyone in the office of Kingdom Magazine, the #1 most popular lifestyle magazine in America and the entire globe. It was said between breaks, in the bathrooms, across the entire penthouse floor of the headquarters in New York.

And yet...I lost the shoes.

I began to breathe rapidly, the rainfall heavy on the sidewalk outside. The city looked wet and dark. I was in the lobby of the Gaston Hotel, a couple hallways down from where our annual ball occurred. I hoped nobody came out to find me here.

Every year, our ranking or sales would rise and the president of Kingdom would throw a giant party. Every celebrity, writer, editor, and everyone famous in between came. This year's theme was masquerade, one of the more popular styles our guests liked. It was incredibly hard to convince my team manager to let me go. As an intern, I was the bottom of the bottom. I was a nobody.

Priscilla and Dorlene, the other two interns who managed to get a position here like I did, were the manager's favorite. They were flawlessly perfect at everything they did for our marketing team and also impossibly snobby. Since their ideas sold well, they somehow bossed me around everyday, despite the fact we were all on the same level technically.

They barely even had to ask for invitations. It was as if they were guaranteed an entrance. I, on the other hand, had to pick up clothes for the next photo shoot, go through all our daily reports, calculate the next sales, and more to impress the manager. I was close to fainting from exhaustion before the manager simply rolled her eyes and shrugged half a centimeter as a permission to attend. The only condition was I would be "working" and not just attending.

And now I had lost the shoes. The shoes.

Kingdom's newest hype and the center of attention from the entire planet, the Glass Heels were the most beautiful pair of shoes anyone had ever laid eyes on. Crafted by hand and made to perfection after an entire year, they were the only pair in the whole world that all top designers had collaborated on. Chanel, Michael Kors, Hermes, Marc Jacobs, etc. No matter what branch of work they did, everyone who was anyone had collaborated on these shoes. It was my responsibility tonight to bring it to the ball to showcase.

And I had lost them.

"Do you need assistance, miss?" I looked up, the voice tearing me away from my own state of panic. It was a bell boy, a smile on his face. "Perhaps...to hail a taxi? It is no problem for me to go out in the rain for you."

I shook my head, braving on a smile of my own. I couldn't show anyone I was inwardly dying. "No, thank you." I began to pivot. "I-I have to go."

I ran down the hallway to where the ball was being held. It had started an hour ago. At midnight, I had to bring the Glass Heels to the stage where our employees would show them off and talk about them. I had thirty minutes left.