by Alexis Daria
In the end, Yadiel won, standing with one foot on Ashton’s chest and crowing his victory. Ashton, sprawled out on the rug, wondered how the hell he was going to pull this off.
That night, after Yadiel y los viejitos had gone to bed, Ashton sat at the kitchen table and accepted the cold beer Ignacio passed him. It had been a long day—hell, a long week, a long summer—and he was tired.
Ignacio sat across from him. They clinked their bottles together and drank. “How’s the production?” he asked.
Ashton scratched at the edges of the bottle’s label, wet and peeling with condensation, to keep from picking at his own fingers. “I think it’s going well.”
Ignacio took a long swig. “Are you still keeping to yourself?”
Ashton sighed. “Not like I was before, no.”
He didn’t mention Jasmine, or how twisted up he was about her. His father was easygoing, and even when Ashton had suddenly found himself in the role of single dad, Ignacio had never been judgmental. But Ashton didn’t know how to talk about Jasmine with him. Not yet.
Leaning back in the chair, Ignacio crossed his arms and sent Ashton an impassive look. “You can’t be alone forever, mijo.”
“I’m not alone.” Ashton spread his hands to encompass the house, even though the rest of the family was sleeping upstairs. “I have all of you.”
Ignacio just shook his head slowly, and when he spoke, the words were laced with a resigned sadness. “It’s not the same.”
Even though she’d never lived in this house—Ashton had grown up in Guaynabo—at times, the absence of his mother could be keenly felt, like he expected her to turn the corner into the kitchen at any moment. Sometimes the feeling of loss faded, more like a forgotten task nagging at his attention, or a misplaced item waiting to be found. But it never truly went away.
“I miss her,” he said.
They didn’t talk about his mother often. It had been ten years since she’d passed, after a quick and devastating bout with cancer, and they’d fallen into new rhythms. But Ashton still wished she could have met her grandson.
“I miss her too,” Ignacio said, and then he polished off his beer. “But she would’ve wanted you to be happy.”
“I’m fine, Pa. Really.” Although lately, he’d been thinking more about what it would be like to have a companion on this parenting journey, and for Yadiel to have a mother figure in his life.
The fact that these thoughts popped up more since meeting Jasmine unnerved him.
“Well, if you say you’re fine, you’re fine,” Ignacio said, but his face and tone implied he didn’t believe it.
Ashton finished off his own beer and stood. “It’s late. I’ll let you get to sleep.”
“Tomorrow?”
“I’ll leave after Sunday mass.”
“Fair warning, Yadiel wants to go to a baseball game in New York.”
Ashton gave a brief smile. “I’ll break out the hat and sunglasses.”
“You sure you don’t want a trench coat and a newspaper with two holes cut out, Señor James Bond?”
Ashton smothered a laugh so he didn’t wake the others. “From your lips to God’s ears.”
Ignacio collected the bottles to dispose of them. “Buenas noches, mijo.”
Chapter 27
Jasmine arrived at the studio the next morning in high spirits. The summit had been great press, the show was going smoothly, and Ashton . . . Well, she was trying to avoid examining her feelings too much, but it was safe to say she was happier than she’d ever been with a man. Real happiness, too, where she felt valued and like it was safe to open up to him, not performative happiness that relied on stuff like gifts or PDA. She was scared to hope for more, scared to identify where she was on the Jasmine Scale, and her conversation with the Primas of Power hadn’t offered much in the way of clarity. But in all other regards, her Leading Lady Plan was on track. She’d even received some congratulatory texts from her family after Michelle sent them the video of Jasmine’s Latinx in the Arts interview.
Abuelo Willie: good job nena
Abuela Esperanza: You looked so beautiful! Love you!
Followed by a link to a cream for neck wrinkles.
Most surprising of all, her parents had chimed in on their group text chain.
Mom & Dad: Proud of you, honey!
Even Sammy had apologized for his behavior at the barbecue, and asked if he could get Lily’s autograph for his daughter.
Jasmine was riding high when she strolled into her dressing room. She’d just set her purse down when the door flew open and Lily burst in.
“Jasmine, I’m sorry.” Lily’s face was flushed and she looked to be on the verge of tears. “It was taken out of context, I didn’t mean to—”
“What happened?” Jasmine started to go to Lily, but then a jingle played from her bag. She stuck her hand in and pulled out her phone. Ava was calling.
Lily seemed to be in emergency mode, so Jasmine silenced the call without picking up and returned her attention to her on-screen hermana. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
A text flashed from Michelle. Out of habit, Jasmine swiped to read it.
Michelle: Turn off your phone.
With a dawning sense of dread, Jasmine turned to Lily, who held out her own phone. It was open to Buzz Weekly’s website. And there, above a photo of Jasmine and Ashton taken at the Latinx in the Arts Summit, was the word, REBOUND.
Jasmine’s heart sank as the world narrowed to the few square inches on Lily’s phone. She took it and peered closer. Following the headline were two speculative questions: BEHIND-THE-SCENES ROMANCE? OR LOVE TRIANGLE?
Underneath those, a byline: Kitty Sanchez.
Of course.
“I was chatting with some bloggers at the summit,” Lily said in a rush, tripping over her words. “One lady asked what it was like working with everybody on Carmen. I didn’t think anything of it, you know? She asked other questions too. But she must have asked me about you guys, and all I said was—”
Jasmine didn’t need her to continue. It was right there, a little ways down from the photo.
A source close to the couple tells us they get along really well and spend a lot of time together.
When Jasmine imagined Lily saying the words, they were innocuous. But taken out of context, as an anonymous quote? They were heavy with implied romantic meaning.
Fuuuuuck.
Jasmine continued to scroll, skimming past text and more photos from the event, both posed and candid. Farther down, another photo loaded under the word, EXCLUSIVE!!!
Her breath backed up in her throat. The picture was blurry, like it had been zoomed in too much and taken with an unsteady hand, but it was unmistakably the two of them. They stood close, with Ashton’s arm around her while she smiled up at him, caught in a totally candid—and private—moment.
Somehow, Kitty Sanchez had gotten her claws on the photo taken by the grocery store employee.
“She twisted my words,” Lily went on, sounding anguished. “I really didn’t mean—”
At that moment, Ashton rushed in through the open door, eyes wild and hair disheveled.
“Look at this,” he said, and held out a crumpled issue of Buzz Weekly.
They’d made the cover. The posed photo was largest, probably because it was higher quality, but off to the side were two boxes. One showed a paparazzi photo of Jasmine holding hands with McIntyre as they were leaving one of his concerts. The other was the grocery store photo. REBOUND was printed at the top in bright yellow, the word glaring at her just as accusingly as DUMPED had.
In a detached sort of way, Jasmine wondered why and how gossip rags still existed. Wasn’t the print magazine industry dead?
Lily’s face turned even redder and she slipped past Ashton. “I’ll let you two talk,” she muttered, and beat a hasty retreat, shutting the door behind her.
In Jasmine’s hand, her phone rang again. It was Riley this time. She almost picked up, but Ashton was looking apople
ctic, so she sent it to voice mail instead.
“All right,” she said, trying to sound calm. “Don’t freak out.”
“Don’t freak out? How can I not freak out?”
His accent had thickened, and she realized her own Bronx accent—kept under control, for the most part, except on the word “coffee”—was showing. Shit. They were both freaking out.
“It’s not that bad,” she told him. “It will be good promo for the show, and it will blow over quickly.”
These were all things her agent and cousins had told her after her split with McIntyre had blown up, and they hadn’t helped. But she didn’t know what else to say. She remembered the first time she had made it onto the cover of Soaps Monthly magazine. She’d been thrilled. But this kind of exposure? It hurt, and there was no getting around that. For someone like Ashton, who was fiercely protective of his privacy, this had to feel nerve-racking and intrusive.
Ashton opened the magazine and flipped to the article about them. Before Jasmine could tell him not to read it, that it wouldn’t help matters, he said, “I can’t believe they would print this. People are going to think that we—”
“Ashton.” She waited until he looked at her. “We are.”
“I know, but I don’t need anyone else knowing that.” He went back to the magazine, a look of disgust on his face.
Excuse me? Before Jasmine could find her voice to respond to that insulting statement, a sharp knock on the door interrupted them. “It’s Tanya,” said a muffled voice.
Ashton’s gaze flew around the room, as if looking for somewhere to hide. His eyes locked on the bathroom door.
“Who cares if someone sees you here now?” Jasmine hissed at him, giving the magazine he held an irritated flick as she moved past him to open the door. Tanya stood on the other side. In her hands was another copy of Buzz Weekly. Shit, were the paps stationed near the studio’s gates handing them out as people arrived for work?
Jasmine stepped aside to let Tanya in. “So you’ve seen it.”
“Of course I have.” Tanya handed it to Jasmine, who threw it directly into the trash. “I’m amazed they thought this was cover material.”
Or Kitty Sanchez had been waiting to pounce on a new story about Jasmine, and the summit photos plus Lily’s innocent quote had given her what she needed. Out loud, Jasmine said, “They’re using me.”
“That they are,” Tanya agreed. “Ready to spin this?”
“What’s the plan?” Jasmine asked.
“We have some interviews lined up,” Tanya replied. “I won’t lie, if you wanted to play this coy, it would be great for ratings. But I’m not about abusing my actors or making up stories that aren’t there, so the simplest thing to do is say you’re just friends and leave it at that. Good?”
Ashton looked like he was going to throw up, but he nodded. “We need to shut this down immediately.”
Jasmine’s heart ached for him, even as she wished he’d pull his head out of his ass. She understood where he was coming from, but she needed his support on this, damn it. She’d already gone through it once on her own.
Tanya headed for the door. “Ashton, you’re going to need more prep. Come with me.”
Ashton shot Jasmine an anguished glance, but he followed Tanya out the door.
Jasmine took a deep breath, then shut it behind them. Alone again, she went to her purse. Her phone buzzed incessantly with incoming calls and texts, so she took Michelle’s advice and turned it off. After setting it aside, she pulled out her wallet and removed a folded piece of notepaper with her grandmother’s name across the top.
She hadn’t looked at the Leading Lady Plan since she’d written it, but this seemed like a great time to remind herself what was at stake.
Leading Ladies only end up on magazine covers with good reason.
Leading Ladies are whole and happy on their own.
Leading Ladies are badass queens making jefa moves.
And then there was the fourth mental item she hadn’t dared write down: Leading Ladies do not rebound with their costars.
With a weary sigh, Jasmine dropped onto the dressing room sofa. Had she really thought she was on track? She was one for four, if she counted being honored by the summit as a “jefa move.” But since it had led to her ending up on yet another magazine cover—specifically with the word “rebound” on it—it was hard to consider it a win. She might as well rip up the Leading Lady Plan and flush it down the toilet.
Was a man really worth potentially ruining all her plans for herself? Once upon a time, she would have said yes. Well, actually, she would have said no, but thought yes.
But that was before McIntyre had destroyed her self-image and then left her to fend for herself against the wolves in entertainment media. Sure, he’d said lovely, sweet things when they were alone, making her feel like the only woman in the world. But when they were in public . . . Looking back, she could see he’d treated her like shit. Around his entourage, he would sit with his arm draped over her shoulders as if to say, This is mine, but he’d barely even looked at her. He certainly hadn’t listened to her or cared about what she had to say.
At the time, it had felt like enough. She told herself it was enough. All she wanted was a little attention. To feel loved. Was that so much to ask?
The truth was, Ashton wasn’t anything like McIntyre. She didn’t even have to do the whole “compare the new guy to the awful old guy” thing, where the new guy looked better by comparison. Ashton made her feel valued. She could be herself around him without fear of judgment. And maybe part of it was that she was back in New York. The city felt like home in a way nowhere else did. She didn’t have to put on an act to fit in, like she had in Los Angeles. But even so, she suspected she still would have felt okay being vulnerable with Ashton.
She knew it was a bad idea, but she retrieved the offending copy of Buzz Weekly from the garbage can and opened it to the article. Might as well know what was being said about her.
Despite the sensational headline, Kitty Sanchez had actually included information about Latinx in the Arts, along with quotes from Nino’s and Lily’s interviews and a group photo of all of them with a reminder to watch Carmen in Charge when it hit ScreenFlix. Unfortunately, the positive press was sandwiched between wild speculation about Jasmine’s relationship with Ashton and how McIntyre played into it.
The photos themselves were mostly pretty benign. The article included another one of her with McIntyre, plus a different posed photo with Ashton. There was also a candid photo of them from the Latinx in the Arts Summit, but since Jasmine hadn’t spent a second alone with Ashton while they were there, the picture must have involved some creative cropping to remove the others.
The grocery store photo, though . . . that was damning.
And fucking annoying, since it had been taken before they’d started sleeping together.
Jasmine left the magazine on the sofa and got up to make a cup of coffee, hoping the caffeine would jump-start her brain so she could wrap her head around what was happening here.
Because as much as she loved being with Ashton, she had to admit she was way off track with her plan. And this article? It was going to throw him into a tailspin.
Not that she blamed him. Ashton already struggled to let her in when it was just the two of them. Now, everyone’s eyes would be on them. She wouldn’t be surprised if the crowd of paparazzi outside the studio had doubled since Buzz Weekly hit newsstands that morning. Shit, they’d probably be around the hotel too. The Hutton Court staff and the local NYPD precinct were well-versed in keeping photographers and celebrity spotters away from the hotel entrance, but once the paps found out the photo was taken at the local grocery store, they’d be sniffing around the whole neighborhood.
Jasmine pressed her face into her hands, indulging in a moment of despair. She had a strong feeling she knew how Ashton was going to react to all of this—he was going to pull away from her again, like he’d done at the beginning. And it was going to
hurt. A lot. More than before, because now she’d know what she was missing.
She’d miss his jokes and the questions he asked her about herself, as if the answer to each one was the key to unlocking the secrets of the universe. She’d miss the way he held her close as she fell asleep. The way he kissed her and touched her, as if she were a treasure to be adored.
She’d miss the way he said her name, like she was someone who mattered.
The single-cup coffee maker sputtered and filled her travel mug with Café Bustelo, thanks to the pods Ashton had gifted her. Jasmine checked her face in the mirror and dabbed at the corners of her eyes. She couldn’t sit around all day moping. They still had scenes to shoot, and damage control interviews to fit in.
And then there’d only be one thing left to do. She would have to distance herself from him first. Just the thought of it made her feel sick with stress, like her stomach was full of snakes. It was the absolute last thing she wanted to do, but if she was right, he was going to go back to being the old closed-off version of himself anyway. For the sake of his own comfort, she’d give him space, and in doing so, she’d give her Leading Lady Plan another chance.
Time to get to work.
After ripping the magazine in half and tossing it back in the garbage, she headed to hair and makeup.
Her stylists were her ride-or-dies on set. Every morning after she arrived, Jasmine sat with them for hours while they worked their magic on her hair and face. Ashton usually had a slightly later call time than she did, since he required less beautification.
Today, Jasmine could sense her friends in hair and makeup were bursting with curiosity, but thankfully, no one asked her outright, “Are you and Ashton . . . ?” And since no one asked, Jasmine didn’t have to lie.
When it was time to film the interviews, Tanya had negotiated every aspect in advance, so all Jasmine and Ashton had to do was smile charmingly and repeat, “No, we’re just really good friends,” in twelve different ways. It was hard to pretend he meant nothing to her, but they were actors. It was just like playing any other role.
