Among a Thousand Stars

by Jo Bartlett

  ‘As if!’ Stevie squeezed her knee, provoking another outburst of hysteria and exasperated tutting from some of the other parents seated in the row behind.

  A few minutes later the curate turned off the lights at the back of the church hall, leaving just the stage floodlit. The young vicar had obviously decided to adopt a modern take on the nativity, telling it from the point of view of Joseph, meaning that Jamie had the lead role.

  For someone who wanted to be a scientist and who believed staunchly in evolution, Jamie gave a convincing performance. He had a great operatic voice and Ashleigh had to sniff back tears at one point.

  ‘Thank God for that!’ The interval clearly couldn’t arrive quickly enough for Stevie who, suffering from a monster hangover, had drunk four pints of water in an attempt to assuage his raging thirst – resulting in a bladder that was ready to burst at any second.

  ‘I didn’t realise you’d be quite so delighted to see me!’ The slow drawl was recognisable enough and, since he was wearing sunglasses indoors on a damp December afternoon, it could only be one person

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ Stevie’s tone was unusually aggressive. Ashleigh, aware that they’d never quite hit it off, quickly squeezed past Stevie, risking setting his bladder off in the process and kissed Zac on the cheek.

  ‘If you remember, Stephen,’ Zac stretched out the syllables of his name, so that even saying it sounded sarcastic, ‘when I said I wanted to take Ashleigh out to dinner to discuss the shoot, you told me what you were both up to today.’ She hadn’t felt more like piggy in the middle since she’d been at school, when the twins, Sadie and Kirsty, had fought until blood was drawn over who Ashleigh’s best friend was.‘So you came all the way down here to see if I was telling the truth?’ Stevie couldn’t have looked less pleased to see someone if he’d tried.

  ‘Why don’t you nip to the loo?’ Ashleigh gave him a beseeching look, she loved Stevie to death but there was no way she could afford to lose the chance she’d been waiting for to get her big break. Zac might be a massive pain in the bum, but photographing his album cover could be the start of something new.

  ‘Yes, why don’t you pop off? There’s a good boy.’ Zac’s voice was dripping with undisguised animosity. They certainly weren’t going to make things easy for her.

  Stevie bit his lip and stood up, squeezing past like a determined pensioner desperate to bag the last seat on the bus, elbows out.

  ‘What’s his problem?’ Zac raised an eyebrow and, spotting her mother, held out his arms. ‘You, my darling, must be Ash’s sister?’ It was the cheesiest chat up line in history, but Carol still shrieked with pleasure and happily folded herself, cleavage and all, into Zac’s ready embrace.

  ‘Silly!’ Carol pinched his bum; if there was ever a meeting of minds it was these two. ‘I know exactly who you are of course.’

  ‘I suppose Ashleigh’s been talking about me non-stop?’

  ‘Not really.’ Inadvertently taking the wind out of his sails, Carol was nonplussed. ‘I just love the gossip pages of the papers and you always give them something to write about!’

  ****

  The second half of the show was quite a lot shorter and Ashleigh had positioned both herself and her mother in between Stevie and Zac to minimise the chances of a slanging match breaking out.

  Carol and Geoffrey were taking Jamie out for a fish and chips supper at Triviani’s to celebrate his success. Since Jamie’s mates seemed to love Carol as much as Stevie did, they were also taking several other twelve and thirteen year old lads out with them. Tempting as the offer to join them was, Ashleigh declined. She had a good excuse; Stevie, appalled by the lack of festive cheer at her flat, had made her promise he could decorate it ready for Christmas. In truth, she just wanted to make sure she was back in time to take Tom’s phone call. The thought of speaking to him had been keeping her going all afternoon. After all, he knew exactly what Zac and Stevie were like and might be the only person in the world who’d appreciate why she’d been left feeling like an exhausted school teacher.

  ****

  Hanrahan’s was an old fashioned hardware store that had a small nursery out back. They sold the most fabulous Christmas trees, which bushed out with generous foliage and whose pine aroma drifted down the street. The shop was officially closed, as it was a Sunday evening, but Pete Hanrahan would be in the pub next door, ready and waiting to serve any local who popped in, offered him a pint and wanted to do a quick bit of after-hours shopping.

  Stevie lined up a couple of pints for Pete on the bar of the Lord Nelson public house and was rewarded, in return, with a set of keys to the back door of the nursery. Having known Ashleigh for years, he was more than happy to trust them with the keys to his empire, as Zac trailed along behind. Stevie was like a whirling dervish in the shop, picking up armloads of decorations and selecting an oversized Norwegian Blue pine. He tallied up the bill and expertly ran the transaction through the till, charging the cost to his own credit card. That Saturday job at Top Shop in his teens hadn’t been a waste of time after all.

  ‘Let me pay.’ Ashleigh didn’t want Stevie to bankrupt himself with false bravado in front of Zac. She’d seen the bank statements at his flat and he could ill afford to splash the cash.

  ‘No, consider it an early Christmas present.’ He winked and they shared a private joke. ‘That way, you won’t get any nasty surprises on Christmas day.’ Every year, Stevie bought her something to wear in the vain hope of persuading her to embrace the latest trend, regardless of whether or not it suited her voluptuous shape. Over the years, she’d opened and never worn a range of items ranging from rah-rah skirts to harem pants.

  ‘Only diamonds would do for someone like you.’ Zac flicked open his wallet ostentatiously to reveal a stash of credit cards in gold and platinum.

  ‘Yeah, well, they don’t sell those here, mate.’ Never had the word mate been uttered with less sincerity. ‘Only diamante baubles. Perhaps you could use a couple of balls though?’

  ‘Okay, are we done?’ Ever the peace-maker, Ashleigh scooped up the bags of shopping, leaving Zac and Stevie to argue over who was going to demonstrate his manliness by being the one to carry the Christmas tree home.

  Having dropped the keys back to Pete in the pub, the three of them began to trudge along the increasingly frosty pavement of Sandgate high street, towards the flat.

  ‘Shall we leave the tree outside while we work out the best place to put it?’ Ashleigh didn’t fancy witnessing a tug of war between Zac and Stevie, whilst the tree turned from a lovely bushy specimen into a crispy brown twig, with pine needles carpeting every inch of her floor.

  ‘Okay.’ Zac grudgingly relinquished possession of the tree and propped it up in its temporary home, outside the entrance to her flat.

  ‘How about here?’ Inside the flat, Stevie indicated the corner in front of the large picture window that gave the best view of the sea. ‘Imagine it all lit up, twinkling against the back drop of the lights from the boats out there.’ Stevie’s face was glowing. His first love had been interior design and Ashleigh sometimes wondered if he’d be happier doing that. After all, sitting rooms didn’t answer back or moan that sea breeze blue really wasn’t their colour.

  ‘You’re right, it would look fabulous there.’ Zac’s voice was low and quiet, almost as if he couldn’t bear to be heard agreeing with Stevie about anything.

  ‘There it is then.’ She wasn’t going to argue with them. If they’d managed to reach a consensus then that was good enough for her.

  ‘Great, well you two bring it in and I’ll start sorting out which decks to put on where.’ Stevie had taken over and was in his element, bossing them about as though they were a couple of interns sitting in on one of his photo shoots for Glitz.

  Outside the sudden drop in temperature caught Ashleigh’s breath, the frost on the step making her stumble slightly as she leant fo
rward to take hold of one end of the tree, causing her to canon into Zac who had been about to bend down to pick up the other end. Catching her mid fall, he steadied them both for a moment, before pulling her towards him and kissing her as though his last chance of oxygen depended on sucking it out of her. The kiss couldn’t have been more unexpected, yet at the same time predictable. If she’d been asked to guess what kind of kisser Zac was, she would have described the experience down to a tee. He’d clamped his lips so firmly over her mouth that she was finding it difficult to breathe, even through her nose. The kiss was forceful, yet somehow passionless and he was sharing more than a little bit too much of his saliva for her liking. Hadn’t she made it clear enough that she wasn’t interested? Perhaps a knee in the groin was called for.

  ‘I appear to be interrupting something.’ The voice was dismissive, exactly as it had been that first day in his office. She extracted her lips from Zac, with a noise not unlike plunging a blocked sink. There was a muscle going in Tom’s cheek. ‘I thought I’d pop in and surprise you.’ He fired the words like bullets, through clenched teeth. ‘Only it seems like I’m the one who’s got the surprise.’

  ‘It isn’t what it looks like!’ Even as she protested, she was aware the words sounded trite. Wasn’t that what everyone said in these circumstances, having been caught out? She turned to Zac for some back up. He had to explain it had been a spur of the moment thing and entirely his doing to instigate the kiss. Zac, who was looking a bit embarrassed, had almost shrunk into the shadows, clearly deciding that saying nothing at all was the best policy in this situation. ‘Oh for Christ’s sake!’ Ashleigh grimaced, he had less backbone than the average garden worm. ‘Nothing’s going on. Zac just seems to have got caught up in the Christmas spirit, that’s all.’ Surely he’d see that she wasn’t remotely interested in Zac? But Tom was already turning away from her.

  ‘Whatever you say. Look, this was obviously a mistake on my part so I think I’ll just leave you to it.’ He strode back towards his car, her protestations vanishing into the night air as he disappeared from view. Either he hadn’t heard her or didn’t want to. She suspected the latter. Tears of frustration at the unjustness of it all, which she absolutely refused to cry in front of her new nemesis Zac, burned at the back of her eyes.

  ****

  Tom thumped the steering wheel of the car. What the hell was wrong with him? Christ, if he reacted like that in negotiations on behalf of his clients, he would have gone out of business years before. It wasn’t like he and Ashleigh had promised each other anything and she wasn’t the sort to fall into Zac’s arms hours after she’d been in his bed, which made his reaction all the more illogical. Much more likely that it was Zac’s doing, an aging rock star trying to prove something to himself. So why had he reacted like a schoolboy? If this was jealousy, he didn’t like it – no wonder people said it was an ugly emotion. Whatever it was he was experiencing, he’d never felt it this strongly before. So why the hell had it started now? He hit the steering wheel again at the exact moment his phone began to ring.

  ‘What?’ He’d seen Francine’s number flash up on his phone and the last thing he wanted was another lecture about what a mistake he was making with Ashleigh. Francine would be in the know, the gossip about him and Ashleigh at the wedding no doubt spreading like wildfire between the staff at Glitz and Rushworth Associates.

  ‘It’s Chloe.’ Francine wasted no time with niceties. ‘She’s about to lose us millions of pounds, if you don’t get back up here and sort her out before she chucks her career away.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Responsibility weighed him down. There were always someone else’s problems that had to take priority over his. Chloe was a girl with genuine talent and vulnerability, probably the one client he would prioritise before making things right with Ashleigh, but it was typical of Francine to put the money before the person. How much of that had come from working with him? It was a depressing thought.

  ‘Her mother had a heart attack and evidently Chloe’s lost the plot and been wandering around semi-naked.’ There wasn’t a trace of empathy in Francine’s voice. It was all about the business, same as ever.

  ‘Oh God, is Gilly okay?’ Tom swallowed hard. Chloe relied on her mum and, like him, had few other people she felt she could trust.

  ‘I’m not sure.’ Francine sighed. ‘Does it matter? Regardless of that you need to get up here and sort Chloe out, the business needs you.’

  ‘Yeah, but will it keep me warm at night and make me laugh?’ Chloe wasn’t the only one losing it.

  ‘Are you drunk?’ Francine’s tone was sharp. ‘Look, I’ll send a car if you need one, you just need to get back here.’

  ‘I’m not drunk and I’m on my way.’ He shook his head, attempting to dislodge the thoughts that were clouding his judgement. Maybe it was for the best that Francine had called; something was happening to him and he didn’t like it. Perhaps she was right about what was important. People would come and go in life and more often than not they ended up letting you down, but work was his one constant. It was a sentiment he repeated to himself all the way back to London.

  ****

  Following Tom’s departure, Ashleigh had left Stevie and Zac to bicker over the best way to decorate the flat. No doubt Zac had given Stevie his version of what had happened and Ashleigh had retreated to her bedroom with a box of apple pies, three Kit Kats and her mobile phone. She’d sent Tom a text to tell him what had really happened and was determined that she wouldn’t contact him again if he didn’t reply. Three apple pies later and her resolve, like the pastry, had started to crumble. By the time she’d eaten all three Kit Kats, she’d sent him no less than six texts without a response. The texts had got progressively more abusive. Fuelled by her frustration, and the lack of response, she’d ended up telling him he was a bastard and calling Zac even worse names. Now she not only had the waistband of her trousers cutting into her, and what looked threateningly like a spot about to break through on her chin, she’d probably come off looking like a psycho and certainly not employee of the year material.

  ‘Morning honey.’ Stevie was stretched out along the window seat, next to the newly decorated Christmas tree, which any editor of Homes and Gardens would have been proud to include in the December special.

  ‘Where’s Zac?’ She wasn’t sure she wanted to know. As much as shooting his album cover was pivotal to her career plans, right about then she’d have been happy to do time for his murder.

  ‘Gone.’ Stevie sounded equally relieved. Even in her abject misery it was obvious that the atmosphere in the flat was lighter for Zac’s absence. ‘A chauffeur driven Merc turned up about midnight last night and whisked him off. He said he’d see you on the twenty-third.’ Stevie suppressed a grin. ‘Oh and he said chin up or something equally uplifting.’

  ‘Pratt.’ Just the very hint of a smile threatened for a second. She could well imagine Zac saying something that crass. Who the hell did he think he was anyway, assuming she’d still be willing to turn up for the shoot on the twenty-third after all that had happened? Okay, so she was willing to, but he had a damn cheek for making that assumption. She drained her first cup of coffee without taking a breath and poured a second cup from the pot that Stevie had thankfully had the foresight to make.

  ‘So, I suppose he told you what happened last night?’ She could hardly bear to think about it. Tom had over-reacted and, if she’d cared less about him, she might even have written him off for the way that he’d behaved. Susie-Anne’s betrayal must have had more of an effect on him than even he realised and he didn’t seem to trust anyone. Now she and Zac had made things worse.

  ‘Yeah.’ Stevie gave her a rueful smile. ‘Zac told me, well his version of it anyway.’

  ‘Let me guess? I pretended to trip so he could catch me in his arms and I’d get the opportunity to leap on him, irresistible sex god that he is of course?’ There was a desperation about Zac t
hat was much more of a turn off than Tom’s brief flash of insecurity. Yet there were still plenty of groupies lining up to spend a night with him and perhaps get the lifestyle that would go with becoming fiancée number eight. If she hadn’t been so angry with him, she might have felt sorry for him. Despite the seven fiancées, it was quite possible he’d never really been in love or had anyone really love him. He loved himself, of course, but in the long run and with the gradual diminishing of his fame that might not prove enough.

  ‘Yeah, it was along those lines.’ Stevie put a slice of bread into the toaster. ‘I know you probably don’t feel like eating, after that mountain of chocolate you consumed last night, but you look like you could do with it. You’ve got a greenish tinge to your face, which really doesn’t complement the festive décor that I worked so hard to create. It’s altogether the wrong shade!’ Stevie ducked as she threw a scrunched up Kit Kat wrapper at him, which had been stuffed into the pocket of her jeans. ‘Hey, take it out on Zac, not me! He said Tom seemed really pissed off and stormed off before he had a chance to explain.’

  ‘Zac never even opened his mouth, except to clamp it over mine and virtually suck the teeth out of my gums.’ She shot Stevie a look and he grimaced. ‘I think things are pretty much over with Tom.’

  ‘He’s obviously the jealous type. Are you sure you want to be with someone like that?’ Stevie put his arm around her shoulders as she heaved a sigh.

  ‘I think it’s probably a moot point.’ At least she still had Stevie. What would she do without him? ‘I can’t say that I wouldn’t have reacted the same way had the boot been on the other foot. If I’d seen Tom kissing someone else yesterday I’d probably have reacted a damn sight worse.’

  ‘If he’s got any sense, honey, he’ll realise you’re not that sort of girl. He probably feels like a prize dick right now.’ Stevie squeezed her shoulders.

  ‘I’m quite insulted he thinks I’d go for someone like Zac. I’m definitely not that sort of girl.’ They both jumped as the bread popped up from the toaster.