Wright that Got Away, page 8
“That’s great.”
“You’re going to record them.”
Weston blinked at me. “What?”
“Masters will be done in LA, but I want to keep working with you. I like the direction for ‘Invisible Girl.’ I told my manager we’d be working here.”
“Holy fuck,” West said. “Are you sure? There are probably better people for this job, Campbell.”
“Yes, I’m sure, but if you want to bail…”
“No,” he said at once. “Absolutely fucking not. I want to do this.”
“Great. Then, you’re hired.” I nodded at him. “Let’s take a break.”
“Sure.” Weston looked dazed for a few moments and started typing on his phone. Probably telling other people what had just landed in his lap.
I should call Santi or Viv to make sure this was all right with them. Santi would bullshit his way through it, but Viv would tell it to me straight. Instead, I pulled up another number.
Blaire had texted me her number after I gave her mine. I wanted to call her and see where her head was, but even though we currently had a video that was going viral, I couldn’t seem to push myself to hear her voice over the phone. How did a phone call feel too intimate? How?
So, I shot her a text.
Saw you posted the video. My phone has been ringing off the hook. My manager is sending the rest of the band to Lubbock to figure out the album now. So, I guess I have you to thank for that.
What? He’s sending the whole band because of one video?
Probably just an excuse. I’d guess he already wanted to, and this gave him the leverage to make it happen.
Is this a good thing? It sounds like a good thing.
Yeah. I’ll get more done with the five of us than just me.
I’m glad.
I wasn’t expecting the video to do this.
I’ve had videos get a few million views. But we’re at fifteen already, and it just released a few hours ago.
I had in fact expected it to do this. I thought it would reach way more than fifteen million views by the end of the day. The rest of this happening was what had surprised me.
Are you…cool with it?
I guess. I can’t take it back now.
No, we couldn’t. It was out there for all the world to see and judge. And somehow, all I could think was how I would get to see her again.
What are you doing this weekend?
For a very long time, nothing happened. The three dots that said she was typing kept appearing and then disappearing. As if she couldn’t quite decide if I was going to ask her out or not.
It’s Fourth of July weekend. I’m going to the festival and then fireworks. Do you want to come with all of us? Hollin will be there with Piper.
Right. The Fourth. I’d forgotten about that. Normally, holidays weren’t a fun thing for musicians. We were always booked for those dates. Unlike normal people who got to experience them, we got to entertain. Since Cosmere had just gotten off a huge tour, we’d refused any Fourth of July events. Though Bobby had been pissed. I was kind of glad now.
It didn’t mean that I could go gallivanting around a summer festival though. Not without security.
I don’t think it’s safe for me.
Oh. I didn’t think about that. If you change your mind, I bet we can get you to the fireworks incognito. I’m sure someone has a Hawaiian shirt and cargo shorts for you.
I laughed at the thought. Yeah, no one would expect me to be in that kind of getup. And she must have known it would make me laugh and shudder, all at the same time. The other thing was…she was giving me another way in. She was even offering it. It still wasn’t safe for me to go, but maybe she’d say yes if I asked her out this time. Or at least, not an immediate no.
Though I didn’t know what was happening with her and Nate. What could I lose from asking?
Have to pass. But have fun.
Is Nate going to be with you?
There was another long pause. She hadn’t mentioned him when we were alone at her place. She still posted videos of them together, and they commented on all of each other’s stuff. But she had been perfectly quiet about him.
No. He’s in Midland.
Another long pause.
And we decided to stop seeing each other.
My head spun at that news. Well, thank fuck. That certainly made what came next a lot easier.
I see. Well, I’m going to watch the fireworks from the top of my hotel. You can join me if you want.
That’s a good view.
But I think I’ll watch from the park.
I hadn’t expected her to say yes. But we were talking, and that was a start. She was right about one thing: she was either invisible or everything to me. And she wasn’t invisible to me any longer.
12
Blaire
The girls giggled behind me as we walked around the Fourth of July festival in Mackenzie Park. Fireworks would be set up down the hill in an hour or two. Already, cars were filling the parking lots to get prime locations. But the festival was still full of college students who were unlucky enough to be taking summer classes, teens holding hands and sneaking kisses, and families full of toddling children, happy to eat cotton candy and ride precarious carnival rides. A band blared music from the stage, and booths were set up with food and crafts and a market to sell wares. It was a delightful summer evening despite the heat. But at least Lubbock was part desert, so the nights were windy and cooled down to almost a reasonable temperature.
“Are you watching it again?” I grumbled.
“Just one more time,” Annie said.
“Fine. One more time.”
Annie, Jennifer, Honey, and even Piper crowded in around Jennifer’s cell phone and pressed play on the viral video of me and Campbell. Which, at my last check, had twenty-seven and a half million views.
“You crossed thirty!” Honey squealed.
I couldn’t help it; I jumped to look at the screen. And, holy fucking shit, I was at thirty million views of this one video.
I’d stopped reading the comments after the first hour when it went past my followers to everyone else in the world. Honey had taken over from there. It was safer for my sanity. The first few comments—from those who were mad that I was in the video with Campbell or who thought it was a publicity stunt—were enough for me to quit reading for…pretty much ever.
“That’s nuts.”
“It’s incredible,” Piper said with a smile. “I love to see your success.”
I shrugged. “I mean, I posted a video. Campbell did all the rest.”
Annie exchanged a glance with Jennifer. “Campbell might have supplied the audience, but they’re sticking around because of you. For the content you already have in place. Now, they know who you are.”
“I guess.”
“It’s brilliant,” Honey said. She smiled at me with her wide brown eyes. She’d gotten her hair cut to have bangs yesterday, and I still wasn’t used to it. She kept brushing them out of her eyes, as if the fringe was bugging her. “We’ve had so many engagement requests for your work.”
“Yeah. Who cares how they got here?” Piper asked. “You should milk it for all it’s worth.”
She was right, of course. I’d always gotten exclusives and free clothes for my minor celebrity status, but everything had blown up in the last couple of days. Among the most exciting was a speaking tour for Blaire Blush, a potential book contract around my wellness initiative, and a spot on the Today show. I couldn’t freaking believe it. All because of one video with currently thirty million views and counting.
I didn’t know what I was going to do. Or if I was going to do any of it. I needed representation. I’d been overwhelmed before this video. Now, I needed someone in my corner to figure out which of these offers was real and how to capitalize on them. Which meant…I probably needed to talk to Campbell.
And I hadn’t talked to Campbell since I’d invited him to see the fireworks today. Which still made me blush. I’d asked it innocuously. His brother and sister were going to be here regardless. But it was me asking. I didn’t know what had come over me, but some barrier had been broken down between us after that video.
It was better that he wasn’t here though.
I bit my lip and looked down at the video that was playing again. We looked so real there. As if that were reality and this disconnect and anger between us were fake. It was better that I didn’t see him right now.
“Marie?” a voice called from a short distance away.
I grimaced and froze. I knew that voice. I purposely avoided that voice at all costs.
I turned around, and there she was. Almost five feet tall with a short blonde bob that was dyed that color every three weeks like clockwork. She wore a sensible red blouse tucked into mom jeans with sneakers that were two decades out of date. She was lucky that all her old clothes were coming back into fashion. She didn’t look quite as embarrassing as she had when I was in high school.
“Hello, Mother,” I said with a vengeance. If she wanted to call me Marie, then I’d be sure not to call her Pamela, like she’d asked me to call her since I was seven.
My friends glanced at each other in confusion. Yeah, I never mentioned that Blaire was my middle name. I’d never much felt like a Marie.
“I’ll meet up with y’all at the fireworks display. Same place as last year, right?”
“Definitely,” Annie said.
“Let us know if you need us,” Piper said warily.
Honey didn’t immediately follow the other girls. As if she thought she warranted an introduction to my mother. That was never happening.
“Honey, go with the others. I’ll see you later.”
She bit her lip with a sigh. “All right. See you, Blaire.”
When Honey was gone, I walked over to where my mom stood with my stepfather, Hal. Tall and spindly with beady black eyes and a receding hairline. We’d never gotten along. Not that he’d really tried to make my life better after the divorce.
During my freshman year of high school, Dad had moved away to Michigan to be with his boyfriend. I wanted to go with him. The courts thought Mom was a more suitable parent. She was a psychiatrist after all with a large following. And my dad was gay and moving out of state with someone half his age. He’d never stood a chance. He still made an effort, writing and sending gifts every holiday. But it wasn’t the same.
“Having a good time?” my mother asked.
“Sure.” I glanced between them and nodded at my stepfather. “Hal.”
“Marie.” He looked me up and down in my jean shorts and red crop top. He was one of those modest types. Living with him had been a real joy.
“Well, this is a surprise.” Pamela adjusted the purse at her shoulder.
“It is.”
“How is your…work?” She hesitated on the word work. She’d been thrilled when I got a psychology degree. It was the most enthusiastic I’d seen her about much of anything. She’d wanted me to go on to become a psychiatrist like her. We could have been in business together. She’d honestly thought that was something I wanted after she neglected me my entire childhood. “You’re still doing that little blog thing, right?”
A spiteful part of myself wanted to tell her about the speaking engagements, the book, the Today show appearance that were all waiting in my inbox. All the things she’d wanted for herself. Things she’d never got. But I knew if I told her, then it would open a door for her to walk back into. And I was very careful not to engage with Pamela about more than I could handle in any one sitting.
“Good. It’s going good.”
Pamela nodded, glancing at Hal expectantly. I knew that look. She was done and ready to go back to enjoying her evening.
Hal cleared his throat. “Well, Marie, keep up the hard work. We’re proud of you.”
If only it didn’t ring so hollow.
“I’ll see you around.”
Pamela smiled softly, one reserved for patients and not family. Well, I’d only ever been a patient in her eyes. “Have fun, sweetheart.”
Then, they were gone. And I was all alone. Worse than I’d felt in years.
All this success. Everything I’d worked for. And my own mother couldn’t seem to carry on a conversation with me. We were both trained professionals, and we couldn’t bridge whatever this was. She was too willfully ignorant to how she’d treated me as a child, choosing to guilt me into getting over everything rather than feeling any form of repentance. And I just…couldn’t deal with her.
I swallowed down the resentment. Nothing I could do with it today.
I headed toward one of the last vendors in the line. They had funnel cakes, and a good dose of sugar felt like the way to fix this.
I almost reached the winding line when a group of girls stepped into my path. They were of the college variety—impossibly thin with middle parts and matching outfits.
“Hey, you’re Blaire, right?” the first girl asked. They were all blonde, tanned, toned, and nearly indistinguishable.
“Uh, yeah, I am,” I said with a smile.
I’d had a few people recognize me around town, but it didn’t happen very often.
“You were in that video,” a second girl said.
“With the lead singer of Cosmere.”
“We’re Campbell Soup girls,” the first one said vibrantly.
I blinked at that name. I’d heard it before, but I didn’t really get it. They were, like, his groupies? I wasn’t sure.
“That’s nice.”
“So, are y’all dating?” the second asked, pressing closer.
I tried to take another step away, but we’d drawn a crowd somehow. I’d not been paying attention, but more people had filled in around me. They’d heard Cosmere, Campbell, and dating, and suddenly, everyone wanted to know. I’d never felt like this in Lubbock.
The closest was that time I’d been in a mosh pit at Austin City Limits. I didn’t have a way to get out, and my claustrophobia kicked in so fast. I’d hardly been able to breathe or think or do anything. If it hadn’t been for one nice guy who had noticed my symptoms and gotten me out of there, I had no idea what I would have done.
“Uh, I don’t really want to comment on Campbell,” I said, my voice wavering.
Another group pushed in closer to the first. “Oh my God, it’s the ‘I See the Real You’ girl.”
“Because he hasn’t said that he’s dating anyone,” another girl said, anger in her voice.
One girl grabbed my arm as I tried to draw away from them. “Wait, is he here?”
“N-no,” I stammered out.
“Are you going to see him?”
There were questions everywhere. I was very alone in a sea of people that I didn’t know. I couldn’t breathe. I was going to have a panic attack. No amount of proper meditation from Pamela’s reserves had ever fixed the claustrophobia. The only thing that had ever helped was surrounding myself with friends who I could use as a buffer.
But my friends were gone. I’d sent them away so I could deal with my mother. Now, I was alone. There was a girl touching. People asking questions. Everyone closing in. Someone was recording. Oh fuck, I couldn’t have a breakdown. I couldn’t be seen like this. I needed to find a calm way out, or this would show up all over social media. I could see the headlines now—“Crazed Internet Star Flees Fans, Sobbing.”
It didn’t matter if it was real. It didn’t matter how I felt. Perception was all that mattered.
“Excuse me,” I forced out. “I need some space.”
Then, heedless of the people swarming in around me, I pushed my way out of the crowd. Only when I was away from the mob and past the last row of vendors did I take off at a sprint. My fight-or-flight kicked in, and all I did was run. Run as fast and as far as I could from the point of fear.
And I could run. I’d played soccer most of my life. Even though I was small, I was fast. Which was how, a few minutes later, I had no clue where I was, and the sun was setting.
I tried calling Piper, and she didn’t answer.
“Fuck,” I said, kicking a nearby rock.
Next, I rang Jennifer and then Annie and even Sutton Wright, who was probably too busy with her kids to pick up her phone but it was worth a shot. I should have tried Honey. She was always waiting for my call. But I wanted to be reassured, and while I loved my assistant, she was not reassuring.
“Fuck, fuck.” I stared at my phone and then dipped my head back. “Fuck,” I said one more time.
Then, I dialed Campbell’s number.
It rang twice before he answered. “Hello?”
“Hey,” I said, my voice shaky.
“Are you okay?”
“I was kind of…mobbed at the festival by people who were Campbell Soup girls, and I ran away.”
“What?” Campbell sounded suddenly furious. “You met Campbell Soup girls, and they attacked you?”
“Not exactly. Crowded me in and asked a lot of questions. One girl grabbed me. They were asking if we were dating.”
He paused, as if putting the pieces together. “And you’re claustrophobic.”
I swallowed back the tears threatening to escape. “Yeah. It was…not ideal.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know. Somewhere in the park. Why?”
“I’m coming to get you.”
13
Blaire
Fifteen minutes later, Campbell’s Range Rover pulled up in front of me. My friends still hadn’t called me back. Though I’d relented and texted Honey to let her know that I was leaving. She’d sent back a series of frantic texts that escalated so much that after I told her I was okay, I muted my phone.
