Fame Game 03: Infamous

by Lauren Conrad

  Of course there were hundreds of A-listers who acted in plays (Cate Blanchett! Nicole Kidman! Katie Holmes!), but Trevor still wouldn’t hear of it.

  “So you think I should take the role in that stupid Vegas heist movie?” Carmen asked Laurel.

  “The one starring Vince Otto?” The producer shuddered. “No. That guy is a pig. He’ll spend the whole time trying to sleep with you.”

  “Which would be fine with you guys, I’m sure, as long as he’d be on the show,” Carmen said, half joking.

  Laurel grinned. “Yeah, I’m sure Trevor wouldn’t mind. But honestly, Carm, there are a million great roles out there.”

  “Funny, I haven’t seen any of them,” she muttered, zipping herself into the green dress. She turned this way and that in the mirror; she liked it, but she had the feeling that her mother had one very similar. “I can call my agent,” she offered. “See if he’s holding out on me.”

  “Sure. And if he’s got nothing, there are other options to spice up your arc, too.”

  Carmen put her own clothes back on and walked up to the register with the first dress she had tried on and her credit card. One perk of not shopping: She was nowhere near her limit. “I’m listening,” she said.

  Laurel smiled brightly. “Romance,” she said.

  Carmen raised an eyebrow at her, then signed the receipt and tucked her new dress under her arm. “Romance? Really?”

  “Look, your boyfriend—who won’t film anyway—is out of town,” Laurel began, heading for the exit.

  “He’s not exactly my boyfriend,” Carmen said. She wished she could say otherwise, but . . . well, all the hours they spent on FaceTime somehow hadn’t resulted in any official status updates.

  “Perfect, then,” Laurel said. “We’ll get you and Madison going on double blind dates, and—”

  “What are my other options?” Carmen interrupted. She wasn’t sure which sounded worse: going out with a bunch of would-be actors or spending extra time with Madison Parker. Also, while she and Luke weren’t officially together, she was pretty sure he wouldn’t appreciate her filming a series of dinner dates.

  Laurel sighed as she held the door for Carmen. “It really would be the easiest one,” she said. “It’d make Trevor happy. He loves romance.”

  “Yeah, he’s a regular Cupid,” Carmen said.

  “If you don’t want a dating arc, then you should pick a fight with Kate or Madison, or do something to create conflict. Because if you don’t? You’re just the background for other people’s stories, Carm. The sounding board.”

  Carmen was taken aback by Laurel’s frankness. “Wow,” she said. “Okay. Thanks. Message received.”

  “Or we could bring in the whole tabloid thing—how there are these weird stories about you all the time. . . .”

  Carmen shook her head quickly. “No, I hate thinking about it.”

  “It’d be great TV, though,” Laurel said. “There’d be this big sense of mystery. . . . Does your publicity camp have a leak? Does some blogger have it in for you? Are you really addicted to pistachio ice cream? Do you really not know how to pump your own gas? Et cetera.”

  Laurel sounded so excited by this prospect that Carmen looked at her sharply. It would be totally unethical for Laurel to have talked to the tabloids about Carmen in order to stir up drama for the show—but would she, for the sake of her job? Carmen tried to think if there was anything she’d told Laurel that she’d later read about online. . . .

  They were outside now, and the hazy January sky made the colors of the world seem bright and harsh. Carmen reached into her bag for her sunglasses. She told herself that it couldn’t be Laurel. But where did the blame lie?

  Laurel squinted at her. “You started this game with a leg up on everyone else, thanks to your family, Carmen,” she said. “I’m sure you don’t love hearing that from me—you’ve heard it your whole life—but it’s true and you know it. But so what? No one ever said life is fair, and frankly, I don’t want to see you lose your advantage.”

  Carmen nodded grimly. She got it. She’d been sitting on the bench the last few weeks; it was time to do a better job of playing the game.

  After walking up and down 3rd Street, wondering what drama she could create, getting belatedly offended by Laurel’s lack of tact, and picking up a few paps along the way, Carmen spent nearly an hour sitting in traffic on Sunset. By the time she pushed open her front door, she was ready for peace, quiet, and a very long bubble bath. She prayed the apartment was empty or—at the very least—that Drew wasn’t around. She simply wasn’t in the mood for . . . well, for anything but solitude.

  So when she nearly tripped over a tanned, muscular guy wearing pleated chinos and a black shirt with SOCAL SECURITY embroidered on the pocket, she let fly a very long and impressive volley of curse words.

  The guy, who was in his mid-twenties, with green eyes and a deep cleft in his chin, said, “Sorry about that, mama.”

  Carmen ignored the apology. “Who are you?” she demanded.

  He stood up (he’d been viewing a laptop that was displaying a video feed of their front door) and held out his hand for her to shake. Carmen pretended not to see it. She was normally a polite person, but this particular moment was an exception. She blamed it on the traffic. (And maybe a little bit on Laurel.)

  “Rick Hales,” he said. “Personal security expert.”

  Carmen’s first thought was that he had come because of her. She was the famous one, after all, and she’d grown up around security teams thanks to Cassandra’s superstardom. (Cassandra had had more than her share of crazy fans.) And what with all the negative ink the tabloids ran on her, she certainly seemed to have an enemy. “Why are you—” she began.

  “We’ve been hired by PopTV to keep an eye on your roommate,” Rick said. “Seems she’s been getting a number of questionable letters. I don’t want to worry you, of course, but the network did feel that she—and you—would be better off with some extra security.”

  Carmen felt like screaming at the top of her lungs. All this giant hassle was because of Kate? But instead she leaned against the cool taupe surface. “So I guess you’re going to be hanging around the apartment all the time now,” she said, sounding less than thrilled.

  When Carmen was little, she hadn’t been able to tell all the beefy security guys apart. Also, she thought they’d been hired as her playmates. She couldn’t understand why they never wanted to color in her coloring book or play Barbies with her.

  “I prefer the term ‘monitor,’” Rick said.

  “Oh, okay, because a different verb makes it less of a hassle,” Carmen said, tossing her bag on the floor and stepping around him.

  Kate was in the kitchen, nodding as another security guy—this one older and wearing a suit—explained the guards’ schedule to her. She looked up and smiled at Carmen, brushing her new and startlingly platinum bangs away from her forehead.

  Her expression was slightly embarrassed. But it seemed to Carmen that there was also a twinkle of pride in Kate’s pretty blue eyes. She was clearly loving this.

  “Hey,” she said, sounding breathless. “This is kind of insane, right?”

  Carmen opened the refrigerator and scanned the contents. Wasn’t there a tube of Toll House batter she could devour? Why wasn’t there anything but ketchup, peanut butter, and packets of soy sauce in the fridge? “Um, yeah, kinda,” she said.

  It was annoying enough to have one guy living in her apartment, and now there were going to be a dozen others. She wouldn’t be able to walk around the living room in her nightgown anymore, or leave her clean bras dangling from the shower rod. She’d be too embarrassed to do her yoga and she would now never, ever be alone.

  If there was any silver lining to this, it was that Kate might stop leaving her dirty laundry and old magazines and candy wrappers all over the apartment.

  Her phone buzzed; it was Fawn calling. Carmen sighed and picked up.

  “Hey, girl,” Fawn cried gaily. “I’m in your
’hood. Can I swing by?”

  “It’s kind of hectic over here at the moment—” Carmen began.

  “Are you throwing a party or something?” Fawn asked. “Without me?”

  “Hardly—”

  “Well, good. I’ll come over and make it a party.” And then she hung up.

  Carmen opened the fridge again, as if some delicious treat would have miraculously appeared in it. But sadly: no.

  When Fawn arrived, mere moments later, her eyes grew wide. “Who are these guys and where did you get them?” she whispered. “They are hot.”

  “It’s Kate’s new security team,” Carmen said. She flopped onto the couch and closed her eyes. “Personally, I don’t know why we couldn’t have gotten a Rottweiler or given her some pepper spray. This feels a little dramatic.”

  Fawn cackled. “Because why would you want a dog when you could have a hunk? Excuse me, I’ll be right back.”

  Then Carmen heard her introducing herself to Rick, and after that, the high giggle of her laughter. Fawn was such a flirt.

  Carmen felt the cushions sink down beside her. Reluctantly she opened her eyes. Kate was right there, biting her lip.

  “The Boring One is really sorry,” she said.

  Carmen was still annoyed, but she tried not to be for Kate’s sake. It wasn’t her fault, after all. She had a beautiful voice and a sweet personality—of course people would love her, some to unreasonable degrees. “You’re not boring,” she said. “You’re trouble.”

  Then she smiled, and Kate smiled back. Still friends.

  14

  THE TIME OF MY LIFE

  The red velvet ropes parted and a smattering of cameras flashed as Madison and Gaby approached the entrance to Blok. Gaby smiled and waved, but Madison gave a single, coy over-the-shoulder glance. Five paparazzi were there, and by now Madison practically knew them by name.

  Gaby teetered in her stilettos and reached out to Madison to steady herself as they stepped into the dim room, eyes still adjusting from the flashes. Gaby hated being so short, which was why she always wore such ridiculously high heels. Madison dreaded the day Gaby learned about surgery to lengthen shinbones. As awful as that sounded, she was sure Gaby would jump at the chance.

  The PopTV camera followed them as they entered the loud club. Madison sighed immediately, because she knew that every word she spoke tonight would be unintelligible and would have to be dubbed over in a sound booth. There went half her Saturday.

  The girls made their way to the table in the VIP section, where another camera was already set up and recording the two guys they’d come to meet: Jay and . . . whatshisface? Madison almost laughed; she’d already forgotten her date’s name. All the dating reels she’d watched had blurred together. Was he Connor? Trey? Paul? Well, this was clearly going to go great.

  He was blond and handsome (like most of the guys Trevor and Laurel had dug up; there’d been a few brunets and one authentically ugly, rich dude), and he stood as they approached the table, smiling. “Hey, I’m Drake,” he said, and then leaned in, forcing her into an awkward half-hug.

  “Nice to meet you,” Madison said, thinking, Drake? Is that his real name or his stage name?

  “Totally,” he said, nodding happily. “I’m so stoked.”

  Stoked. Well, that was a bad sign.

  Jay called out a greeting, which Madison ignored. He slung his arm around Gaby and said, “I missed you, babe.”

  Gaby fluttered her eyes at him. “I missed you, too,” she whispered, snuggling up against him.

  Madison knew she could live to be a thousand years old and she’d still never understand what Gaby saw in Jay. She was reaching for the bottle of Dom, but Drake stopped her. “Allow me,” he said, expertly filling her flute.

  He must be a bartender, Madison thought. She wondered why Trevor never found her an actual professional. Someone who was already something, instead of still trying to become something. A lawyer, say—or maybe a dermatologist, because it’d be nice to get a friends-and-family discount on her next microdermabrasion. . . .

  Of course, she knew why these people were never options on her dating reels. They would be too old. Too serious. Too unlikely to show up to a party in shorts and combat boots, or to crack lewd jokes, or to try to belch the entire alphabet—all things that fan-favorite Jay specialized in.

  “Babe, I brought you something,” Jay said, his voice artificially loud. He handed Gaby a small velvet bag.

  Gaby nearly squealed with delight. “What is it? Is it jewelry?”

  Jay thrust his chin out. “Open it,” he said, his voice proud.

  Madison and Drake watched as Gaby clawed at the bag, and eventually pulled out . . . a spark plug.

  Gaby frowned. “What is it?”

  Jay grinned, obviously pleased with himself. “It’s a spark plug, babe.”

  Gaby looked at him in confusion. “What am I supposed to do with it?”

  “Nothing! It’s, like . . . how do you say it? It’s a symbol.” He reached out and took it from her. Then he held it up above the table, as if they were all supposed to admire it. “The spark plug, see, is part of the internal combustion engine. Without it, the engine won’t run. And so here’s the cool part. Like, the internal combustion engine is my heart, right? And you’re the spark plug. If I don’t have you, I don’t work.”

  “You don’t work,” Madison said. But Jay didn’t hear her.

  Gaby held her hands up to her reddening cheeks. “Oh, Jay, babe, that is so sweet.”

  Madison eyed the bottom of her empty glass. Wow, where had all her Champagne gone so quickly? She reached for the bottle again and glanced over at Gaby: That was seltzer she was drinking, wasn’t it?

  Madison turned to Drake. “Do you have a screwdriver to give me or something? Maybe a socket wrench?”

  “Uh . . .” Drake patted his pockets, and after a moment produced a packet of wintergreen Life Savers. “Um, okay. So these Life Savers are my very special gift to you. They are symbolic of our relationship, which began approximately five minutes ago. Without you, Madison, my breath would never have such minty freshness.”

  Madison laughed and helped herself to a Life Saver. It was possible that Drake wouldn’t turn out to be such an awful date after all, which would be nice. Besides, thanks to Jay, the companion bar hadn’t been set very high. And then maybe she and Drake could go on a second date—not because she thought she’d actually like him, but because she’d like a break from meeting guys for the first time on camera and having to pretend like she was enjoying herself. At this point she’d given up on compatible. She’d settle for tolerable.

  (Because if she couldn’t have Ryan—and she couldn’t—what was the point?)

  Gaby had the spark plug back and was stroking it like a pet. “Isn’t Jay sweet?” she asked Madison, her dark eyes shining.

  Jay knocked back a glass of amber liquid and cleared his throat. He began to address the table (and by extension, the cameras). “I’ve been thinking about how, like, your feelings have no mass, or energy, or whatever, but they totally control what you do, right? It’s like they only exist in your mind. But no one’s going to tell you that they’re not totally real. Which is why I don’t care when scientists say that ghosts are only in your mind, because that doesn’t make them not real. Just because something’s in your mind doesn’t make it fake or made up. Do you know what I mean?”

  Madison had no idea what to say. Why on earth had Jay started talking about ghosts?

  But Gaby nodded. “I know what you mean,” she said. “Science is all in your mind, too, right? Like numbers and things. But numbers are totally real.”

  Jay said, “Yeah. Ghosts and numbers, man, ghosts and numbers.”

  Madison could feel the camera focusing in on her for a reaction shot, and she knew she was expected to look dumbfounded. (Which, actually, she was.) She widened her eyes, and then let a tiny smirk play in the corners of her mouth.

  Drake leaned forward. “Are they serious?” he as
ked.

  Madison nodded. “Oh yes,” she said. “Unfortunately.”

  Drake looked over at them as if wondering what stupidity they’d think of next. “Do you want to dance or something?” he asked.

  Madison turned around to scope out the small dance floor. It was mostly empty still, though the retro disco balls sparkled and spun while the DJ played catchy mashups.

  “No thanks,” Madison said, offering Drake a small, apologetic smile. “Not right now.” She hadn’t been to this club before and she was starting to suspect it was lame. Who’d scouted this location—that idiot new producer, Stephen Marsh? She really had to do something about him. . . .

  “Okay, negatory on the dancing,” Drake said, shrugging. “Maybe later.”

  He looked a little nervous, Madison thought. Of course he wanted the date to go well. If it did, they’d go on another one, and maybe he’d have a shot at being a regular. Like Jay. And then he could quit his bartending job.

  Madison missed Ryan with a sharp pang right then. He was about the only person in her life who she knew wasn’t using her for fame. In fact, he wanted nothing to do with her fame.

  Not that Ryan was really in her life at the moment. But they’d finally talked the other night, when Madison made the mistake of answering her phone without looking to see who was calling. (She did want to hear Ryan’s voice, but she’d decided it was better if she didn’t—so until that particular fumble, quick texts had been their only means of contact.)

  He’d told her that he missed her, and that all the animals at Lost Paws still missed her, too. His sisters had asked about her, he said, and when he and his mom had had lunch at Rosa’s Café, he’d thought of the date they’d had there.

  “Sometimes I wonder if we made a mistake,” he’d said. “Do you ever think that?”

  Madison had managed to dodge the question. For one thing, there was no “we” to discuss: He was the one who’d broken up with her, so if there had been a mistake, he’d been the one who made it. For another, she still wasn’t really sure how she felt.