by Marie Powell
“Do you know how fast you’re talking?” Lucy said softly.
“I’m-not-talking-fast-you’re-talking-slow.”
“You kind of are.”
Robyn felt a hot stab of bitterness. She had known Lucy wouldn’t understand, hadn’t she? And here Lucy was, proving she was just like all the others. A skinny, judgmental bitch.
“Just because you’re too tiny to need help doesn’t mean you get to judge me, Lucy Gosling,” Robyn said, fighting tears. “I knew you’d all judge me. I knew it!”
A tear slipped out, then another. Robyn let them come. She’d been so afraid the other girls would be this way, that Lucy would be this way — and she’d been right. She couldn’t stand it.
“Robyn, no! Please don’t cry. I didn’t mean to … I mean, I guess I did mean to say something. I honestly don’t want to be judgmental but …”
“But you are,” Robyn said. “You think I’m crazy, or too lazy to lose weight on my own. You have no idea how hard —”
“Oh no, Robyn, that’s not true!” Lucy looked like she might cry now as well. “I’m just worried about you. I want you to be healthy, that’s it. I swear. You’re my friend, Robs. I want you to be happy. That’s why I have to say —”
Relief coursed through Robyn. Of course Lucy wasn’t judging her. Lucy never judged. Sweet Lucy. She was just being overprotective.
“Right,” Robyn said, so relieved she didn’t even notice she was cutting Lucy off. “Right. And I am. I honestly am being totally healthy, Luce. I’m swimming every day and eating healthily and —”
“But, Robs … the pills …”
“Don’t worry about those. I’m fine. And I swear I won’t become a bulimic or anything gross like that. That thing at Skye’s … it was a one-time thing. I promise.”
Lucy blew out a big breath and reached out to squeeze Robyn’s shoulder. “Oh, thank goodness. I was so worried, Robyn … I didn’t know what to do! Just promise me you’ll be careful with the pills. We need you in tip-top form and that stuff can be —”
“I promise!” Robyn said. “Now, if you want me to stay healthy, you’d better come help me dance off those chips we had for dinner.”
“We’ll see,” Lucy said, her face falling again. “Not really in a dancing mood.”
“What happened?” Robyn asked, mentally kicking herself for completely forgetting that Lucy had been upset about something when she came in. “I’m so sorry, Luce. I knew you were down and I meant to ask, but then I got all wrapped up in my silly business. I’m a crap friend.”
“No, you’re not,” Lucy said. “And nothing’s wrong. Not really. I just lost my head a little, that’s all. Decided I was something special.”
“You are so special!” Robyn protested. “Who said you aren’t and how do you want me to beat them up?”
Lucy snorted a laugh. “Oh no, you can’t beat him up. It was my fault, anyway.”
“Him?”
“I completely threw myself at Trent Eisner, and of course he wasn’t interested.” Lucy shook her head. “I’m mainly just humiliated. What was I thinking?”
“That you’re a kick-ass, ultra-gorgeous, up-and-coming rock star and he’d be a fool to pass you by,” Robyn declared firmly. “Say it with me now. I am a rock star.”
Lucy smiled and shook her head.
“Come on!” Robyn demanded. “I. Am. A. Rock. Star.”
“Fine!” Lucy said, giggling. “I am a rock star. Happy now?”
“No!” Robyn declared. “I will only be happy when you go out and dance with me like the hot chick you are, so that Trent Eisner can see exactly what he’s missing.”
“Okay, deal.” Lucy reached out and grabbed Robyn’s hand. “Come on.”
Robyn took a few steps toward the door. She knew she should just go with Lucy, but … She glanced back at the toilet cubicle. It would be so easy. Then she wouldn’t feel so nauseous and she’d be able to properly focus on cheering Lucy up. Just as soon as she got rid of those chips.
“Hey, lady, I need to pee,” Robyn said, dropping Lucy’s hand, “but I’ll be on the dance floor in two minutes and I expect to see you partying like a madwoman when I get there.”
“Partying like a madwoman,” Lucy said, already looking cheerier. “You got it.” Then she ducked out of the ladies’ room.
As soon as the door was closed, Robyn stepped into the cubicle and lifted the lid of the toilet. Just once more wouldn’t be the same as breaking her promise to Lucy. Twice didn’t make it a habit after all. It was the exception really. Just once more would be fine.
Just once more.
Toni was buzzing and not just from the alcohol. She was buzzing from touch alone. Drunk on the gentle grazes of Jason’s fingers against her bare arms, the warm press of his palm against the small of her back as they swayed together in the dark. Thought was no longer part of the equation.
She wasn’t sure who had brought up the idea of dancing first. They’d been talking, that was all. And drinking. He’d bought her a rum and Coke to go with his scotch and the bartender had kept the rounds coming. Somehow, they’d ended up here.
It was a mistake. Being like this with him. She knew that.
Her flirtation with Jason had been just for laughs at the start. She hadn’t meant it to be more than that. But apart from the flirting, she enjoyed simply talking to him. He adored jazz as much as Toni did and he loved her stories about touring with her granddad when she was small. It had been so nice to have someone to talk to who wasn’t a seventeen-year-old girl that she’d found herself seeking him out more and more frequently. Toni liked her bandmates, but five girls together all the time was enough to drive a person mad. Somewhere in between rehearsals and random texts and laughing at each other’s embarrassing anecdotes, she and Jason had become proper friends.
And now, here in the sweating lightning storm that was the center of the dance floor, he was something else entirely.
The music was slow now, the primal beat like a pumping heart thudding around them.
“Toni,” Jason said, his voice a hoarse whisper under the pulse of the music. “You should go back to the girls. Now.”
She knew what he meant. He wanted her to leave before something happened between them.
Part of her wanted to go. To do the smart thing and find Harper and Lucy and drink enough to forget any of this had ever happened. But that part of her wasn’t strong enough to stop her speaking.
“I don’t want to.”
He grabbed her hand and squeezed it hard. He looked down at her so intensely that, for a breathless moment, Toni thought he was going to kiss her right there in front of the world.
Then he turned and strode off the dance floor, pulling her behind him. Moments later, they were alone in a dark, close hallway that smelled of cigarettes and sour drink.
Jason pulled her into the darkest corner. “This is a horrible idea,” he breathed.
“I know,” Toni replied. “But —”
And then he was kissing her.
Toni sank into the kiss and let herself drown. It was like time had just given up and gone on holiday, leaving the two of them wrapped up in each other, the only citizens of a blind, silent world of sensation.
She had no idea how long they lingered there before the sharp tick-tack, tick-tack of high heels on the linoleum floor shattered their sanctuary. Jason pushed her away, sending her stumbling against the wall just as Harper came round the corner.
Harper shot Toni a penetrating, ice-blue look. Toni replied to the silent question with a shrug. Harper had grown on Toni over the last six months. They were almost friends. But she was still the last person on planet Earth who needed to know that Toni had just shared the most amazing kiss of her life with their manager.
“What do you need, Harper?” Jason asked, his voice still a bit hoarse. He cleared his throat and
tried again. “Everyone okay out there?”
“Ye-ah,” Harper replied slowly, clearly still trying to compute exactly what was happening in the dark back halls of Blvd3. “Everyone’s great. I was just looking for Toni, since we hadn’t seen her for a while. Iza was worried that she had got herself kidnapped or something.”
“Well, here I am, right?” Toni said, trying to hide the fact that she couldn’t quite catch her breath. “Quite un-kidnapped. We were just discussing a, um … new …”
“Publicity campaign,” Jason jumped in as she floundered for an excuse. “I wanted you girls to take one of the endorsement deals we’ve been offered, and Toni was arguing against it so loudly I was afraid the whole place would hear. So we found a, er, quieter place to talk.”
“Right,” Harper drawled, casting a dubious gaze from Toni to Jason. “I’ll just let the two of you get back to talking business in an out-of-the-way corner conveniently far away from our friendly neighborhood paparazzi.”
Cheeky witch, Toni thought. She knew. Or she suspected, which might be worse.
“Right, well,” Toni said, trying not to sound worried. “You’d better head back. Wouldn’t want Iza to think you’d been kidnapped as well.”
“Sure,” Harper drawled. “You two have fun with your … publicity talk.” And with a toss of blonde hair, she was gone.
When the tick-tack of Harper’s heels had faded into silence, Toni looked up at Jason. She could feel the pull of him, making it impossible for her to look away. She really ought to go after Harper and make sure that she didn’t suspect anything, or at least make sure she was sworn to secrecy. But instead Toni reached out and took Jason’s hand, guiding it back to her waist. She couldn’t resist, couldn’t force her brain to think of anything else.
“Now,” she whispered. “Where were we?”
8. Dream + Nightmare
Iza wondered, as she’d done several times in the past couple of weeks, whether LA was meant to look as though it had been constructed by time travelers. Only in this place could buildings that looked straight out of the ancient black and white films her mother loved share the same block with structures that could have been built in ancient Greece and glass towers that might as well have been dropped in by invading aliens from the future. She’d even seen more than one house built to look like a miniature castle.
But standing outside it, Iza thought the Walt Disney Concert Hall was perhaps the strangest and the best of the lot. It somehow looked old and space-age at the same time, like an armored giant from the future, rising from its resting place beneath the city. Iza could hardly believe that her very first date ever was going to be in this hypnotically beautiful building. She could hardly believe she had a date in the first place.
For a moment she wished Luke had picked somewhere that would involve more disgusting-but-helpful tequila, but she shook the thought away. A private tour of a world-famous concert hall from a cute boy was miles better than anything places with tequila shots could offer. If Iza could play a full house at the Hollywood Bowl and not faint on stage (which had been a very real possibility after a few minutes under the burning hot spotlights), she could certainly do this.
“Iza.”
The sound of her own name startled Iza out of her musings so abruptly that she let out a shriek of surprise.
Oh hell. What was wrong with her? It was only Luke, and here she was screaming like a nine-year-old who’d sneaked into a zombie film. And, as if emitting noises so high-pitched that only dogs could hear them wasn’t unattractive enough, she was positive she was now the color of ripe tomatoes. Perfect. Absolutely the best way to start a first date. Hands down. Perhaps she could manage to sink into the cement below her feet and disappear, too.
“Hello to you, too,” Luke said.
He was trying really hard not to laugh. Less than thirty seconds into their date and he was laughing at her! What was she thinking, coming here? She was Izabella Mazurczak. She didn’t go on dates.
Iza considered just leaving, but then a flash of Headmistress Littleton’s condescending smile played across the back of her brain. Iza wasn’t going anywhere. This date was going to go well, no matter how many colors she turned in the process.
“Um, sorry,” Iza said, regaining her grip on the English language. “You startled me.”
“Sorry about that,” Luke said. “You were communing with the building; I shouldn’t have interrupted.”
“I wasn’t communing, I … Well, yeah, actually, I suppose that’s actually a good word for it. It’s so beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“I love it, too. When I’m here for rehearsals, I come outside to eat my lunch, just to look at it. It’s almost, like, alive.”
“Absolutely,” Iza said, amazed. He always knew exactly what she meant, no matter how mental she was being. It was as if they shared a brain, even though they hardly knew each other at all. “Pictures just don’t do it justice.”
“You haven’t seen anything yet!” Luke held out his hand. “Ready?”
Iza reached out and took his hand, letting his long, callused fingers twine through hers. Yes, she was ready. She was ready for anything.
Luke was right, too. The inside of the hall was even more astounding than the outside. The glowing wood of the stage, the sweeping curves of the ceiling, the jagged beauty of the pipe organ — which Luke said was designed to look like fallen logs.
“I kind of grew up here; my dad was directing the Phil when I was in grade school. I used to do my homework right in this very spot,” Luke said a few minutes later. He pulled Iza down to sit beside him in a snug corner of one of the boxes that spread above the stage like wings.
“How did you ever manage to focus on studying with a view like this?” Iza asked.
“I’m probably the only kid in the universe whose parents threatened him with not being allowed to practice the violin in order to get him to do his homework,” Luke mused. “When I got an A, I was allowed to play on stage in the off-hours.”
“You got to play up there?” Iza breathed. “I mean, before now? When you were little? That must have been just … beyond brilliant.”
“It was,” Luke agreed, grinning. “Wanna try it?”
“No,” she exclaimed. “You’re not serious. I can actually go down there? I can play the piano on the stage of the Walt Disney Concert Hall?”
“Why not?” he said, his grin growing even wider. “I’ll race ya.”
“Hey!” she called as he took off across the wing. “I’ve no clue where I’m going! That’s cheating!”
“Then you’d better run faster!” he called over his shoulder.
Iza was glad she’d chosen a pair of soft gold ballet flats to wear today as she pounded up the aisle of the main floor. She was hot on Luke’s heels, though she suspected he was deliberately letting her catch up.
He made a grab for her as she ducked past him up the aisle.
“Too slow!” she crowed, darting up the stairs to the stage and half sliding the last few feet to the piano.
She started to play without even thinking, still laughing so hard she could barely see the keys. Her fingers picked out something familiar. Gershwin. The same song she’d played the night she’d met Luke.
The first few notes quieted the giggles that fizzed in her throat. With a single keystroke, you could fill the entire hall with sound. Even the quietest brushes of her fingers produced tones that swelled to fill the space — delicate, effervescent bubbles of sound that burst from her fingers and sparkled around her like crystal.
Suddenly part of her was terribly sad. She loved Crush, but they would never play here. There would never be a moment when she’d hear notes tumble from her fingers and ring around her like this while on stage with Crush. But she’d never have had the nerve to play on any kind of stage in front of other people without the girls, much less had the chan
ce to play at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. She couldn’t regret being in the band — ever.
Iza didn’t realize that Luke had come to sit beside her on the piano bench until she let the last riff roll free, swimming up into the golden wood of the ceiling.
“That was …”
“Incredible,” he said softly.
“Yes, it’s incredible,” Iza said in the same half whisper. It seemed wrong to waste the perfect sonic harmony of the place with words. “This place … it’s just incredible.”
“No,” Luke said, laying one of his big hands over her slender ones. “You’re incredible.”
Their eyes met, and the quiet that filled the room around them was the most beautiful melody Iza had ever heard.
And then Luke leaned down and pressed his lips to hers.
Robyn thought it was extremely weird that her left leg was twitching.
If she hadn’t looked down and seen it, jumping rhythmically against the brown vinyl seat of her booth in the 101 café, she’d never have known it wasn’t sitting still. It was as though her body had consumed way too much sugar and forgotten to tell her brain.
She had consumed too much sugar, actually — two milkshakes and a green salad without dressing for dinner. It was a wonder she hadn’t vibrated right through the damn bench.
She looked up at the clock again. Where the bloody hell was Tomas? They were meant to meet here at half past nine and now it was almost half past ten. In another ten minutes she was leaving. She’d have gone long ago if she wasn’t out of pills.
Robyn needed her pills. Desperately. They really helped her to not feel hungry, but even with watching the little she ate, and getting rid of what she shouldn’t have eaten, she still was a size away from her goal and the final show was only five weeks away.
