Stars Like Us

by Frances Chapman

  ‘Lady Fame’s a cruel mistress,’ she said, relief washing over her face. ‘I guess that’s at the top of my mind right now.’

  ‘Perfect Storm had such great love songs.’

  ‘They never really did it for me. Especially the hetero ones.’

  That was enough to remind me that she was meant to be my girlfriend and I shifted, tugging at the hem of my dress. Who was Addie Marmoset? She seemed so competent, so composed – and yet the first lyrics she’d written hinted at this inner turmoil. She always knew how to brush off a reporter, how to deflect an invasive question, but that had clearly come at a cost.

  When her assistant knocked on the door in the early hours she stretched, surveyed the notepaper all over the bed, and got gracefully to her feet. ‘Please tell me there’s some gold in there, Lily. I’ve never worked so hard in my life.’

  I grinned. ‘Leave it with me.’

  CHAPTER 33

  Carter was asleep in my bed when I got into my room. I should have been relieved – if he was in my bed, at least he wasn’t in anyone else’s – but the memory of him disappearing into the crowd last night flashed through me and my voice was hard. ‘Who let you in here?’

  He sat up groggily, rubbing his eyes. ‘God, I was foxed last night.’

  ‘Seriously, it’s a bit presumptuous of you.’

  ‘I told Reception I forgot my room key.’ He held out his arms. ‘Want to join me?’

  I didn’t move. He got out of bed and stood in front of me, but even the sight of him in boxers and nothing else didn’t sway me.

  ‘I like you in my jumper,’ he said. He smoothed my hair against my head and kissed me. ‘I missed you,’ he added, and without meaning to I grabbed hold of him. ‘I’m really sorry about last night,’ he said, his mouth against my neck. ‘It’s just … hard … seeing you with someone else.’

  That was a bit rich, coming from Carter. ‘At least I haven’t been parading my conquests past you in a conga line,’ I said. ‘It hasn’t exactly been easy for me, living in the same flat as you while you make your way through the bars of Britain.’

  He flinched. ‘I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have done that.’ He looked into my eyes. ‘I shouldn’t have done a lot of things.’

  ‘You can’t lose your shit every time Addie comes near me,’ I added. ‘We’re just friends.’

  ‘I know.’ His gaze shifted downwards. ‘I’ve never been with a girl who’s into girls before. I feel like she can give you things I can’t.’

  I wanted to laugh darkly, tell him that Ellie had had the same fears about him.

  ‘I’m with you,’ I said instead. ‘I don’t know what else I can tell you. That should be enough.’

  ‘I’ve never been with someone I liked as much as you before.’

  ‘Well, I’ve never been with a boy I liked as much as you before.’

  He smiled, devouring me with his eyes. Sunshine was filling the room. He kissed me again and led me over to the bed, pulling the hoody over my head.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about you all night,’ he said huskily. ‘Specifically, I’ve been thinking about this dress and how you had to be sewn into it.’ A laugh spilled out of me. We were on more familiar ground with each other when we stuck to the physical. He traced my collarbone with his fingertips. ‘I was wondering, if you’ve been sewn into it, how the hell are we going to get you out of it?’

  My skin was singing where he touched me. ‘I think you’ll have to tear it.’

  ‘But Lily! It’s Dolce & Gabbana!’ he said in a passable imitation of Saskia. His knee was driving my legs apart.

  ‘Actually, this one’s Balmain.’

  ‘Oh is it now?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s a bit more on-brand for me.’

  ‘I forgot you were going for badass,’ he said, pulling on the hem with both hands. The fabric didn’t give way at first, but my heart was careening like scratched vinyl. As the dress finally tore, the sound cut into my misty brain and again I remembered his cold backwards glance to me last night, the casual way he’d put his arm around the girl in the crowd. Five minutes ago he’d been apologising. Did I really want my first time with Carter to be now, when I’d been up all night, barely awake and not even sure if I’d forgiven him?

  ‘Wait.’ He sat back on his haunches. I groped for the simplest explanation. ‘I’ve never ...’

  He let this sink in. ‘You’re a virgin?’

  ‘I’m not a virgin.’ I breathed deeply, tried to gather my thoughts. ‘But I haven’t done it with a boy before.’

  ‘Oh, Liliana,’ he laughed. ‘That’s OK. I’ve never done it with a boy before either.’

  I smiled, but when he tried to kiss me again I pushed him off me. ‘I think we should wait.’

  ‘For …?’

  For a time when I don’t feel like you’re trying to prove everything’s OK between us.

  I said, ‘Just not right now. I’m rinsed. I need to sleep.’

  I jumped as the phone rang on the bedside table. ‘Saved by the bell,’ he said drily.

  My throat was like sandpaper as I answered it.

  ‘Reviews are in,’ Amir announced. ‘I’ll get breakfast sent to your room and come up. Have you seen Carter? He’s not answering his phone.’

  I put my hand over Carter’s mouth to stop him from laughing in the background and agreed to breakfast.

  In the bathroom, I wriggled out of the torn dress and put on jeans and a T-shirt, fastening my hair, rigid with last night’s hairspray, on top of my head in a messy bun. There was black eyeshadow all over my face and I went to town with wet wipes.

  Carter got out of bed and stood in the doorway, watching my reflection. ‘I quite like the panda look.’

  I snorted. ‘Don’t get used to it. I’m sure next week Saskia will have given up on “badass” and will be going for “demure”.’

  He squeezed me, his mouth on my neck again. ‘You might not be badass, Jimi, but you’re not exactly demure.’

  He went back to his room and I resisted the urge to fall back into bed, my lack of sleep manifesting in a belter of a headache. I was so tired I wasn’t thinking straight – that was obvious, given that I’d almost had sex with Carter. The memory of his leg between mine sent blood rushing to my head and I slid the closet door shut on the incriminating dress, gaping and torn on the hanger. Richie and Sam arrived as I pulled the bed covers straight. Amir was mid-rant as he walked in with Carter, trailed by two wide-eyed room service waiters bringing trolleys of muesli, fruit and, mercifully, coffee. ‘... Got to be where I can find you, or at least within reach of your phone. You can’t just go out for a bloody walk whenever you feel like it.’

  Carter suppressed a smile and asked me casually about my night as if he hadn’t just kissed me goodbye minutes ago. I mumbled a reply and hoped no-one was watching us too closely.

  ‘And you,’ Amir turned to me. ‘Where did you vanish to last night? You were supposed to mingle with the press.’

  We’d done interviews for hours, and it wasn’t like Carter and Richie were expected to do anything besides enjoy their party. I snapped that I had been songwriting with Addie and Amir’s expression dissolved into a grin.

  ‘You don’t have to write the song,’ he said.

  ‘I know I don’t have to,’ I said. ‘But if you want me to do a duet on Addie’s album, I want a songwriting credit. One I’ve earned.’

  ‘We’re not doing a duet with Addie Marmoset,’ said Sam.

  ‘Just Lily,’ said Amir. ‘Not you guys.’

  Sam’s eyes widened. ‘You’re cutting her off from the band?’ he said. ‘That’s a bit blatant, even for you.’

  Amir ignored Sam and held his phone aloft. ‘We’re here to talk about the reviews! There are some corkers. This one – Kerrang! – says it’s “that most rare of things – a bona fide rock record for the twenty-first century”.’

  ‘Let me see that!’ Sam snatched the phone and read aloud while I helped myself to granola and yoghurt.
‘“Guitarist and songwriter Lily Donadi has done the near-impossible: blend punk sensibilities with a big pop heart. Five stars.”’ He grinned at me.

  ‘And that’s not all,’ said Amir. ‘This is Rolling Stone, baby. “Believe the hype: the legions of tweenage fans might have got there first, but there’s still time to jump on the Lady Stardust bandwagon. There’s a lot more to this band than stomping, ironic first single ‘King Cutie’ – a smooth, New Wave aesthetic underscores ‘Cat and Mouse’, while the swirling strings in the second single, ‘Passport’, lend it maturity and pathos. Not since Arctic Monkeys have a band still in their teens arrived on the scene with such a self-assured debut.”’

  I could hardly breathe.

  ‘What about the NME?’ Carter asked. He didn’t meet my eyes. I wanted to reach for his hand, but it was too risky.

  Amir looked blank, like the safest thing was to pretend he’d had a malfunction and had to be rebooted. I strode over to the bedside table, grabbed my phone and googled. I scanned the review, holding my phone at arm’s length as though I could physically get away from it.

  ‘Well, don’t leave us in the dark,’ said Richie, brittle with nerves.

  I read aloud: ‘“Overall, the album feels amateur. In the moments where Lily Donadi’s voice begins to sound stretched, production kicks in to distract. ‘King Cutie’ might have a great hook, but there are so many other tracks cut from the same pop-punk cookie cutter that the album begins to sound derivative. Irritating ballad ‘Passport’ feels like a rip-off of a much cooler track. What she lacks in technical ability, Donadi makes up for in attitude – an attitude which has blinded her young fans to her musical failings. For beneath the surface, there’s not much here.”’

  Carter shivered as though he could physically shake that off. My throat constricted. Amir was watching me like I was a science experiment and he wanted to record my reaction.

  ‘Who wrote it?’ Sam said. ‘I bet it’s Verity, back from the dead and working for the NME.’

  I looked at their faces and felt suddenly claustrophobic. I needed to be alone, somewhere I could process this. I grabbed Carter’s hoody from the floor and marched out.

  Sam called after me as I charged down the corridor. The lobby would be crawling with fans and reporters, and the last thing I wanted was for someone to take photos of my panicked face, but if I went back Sam would want to discuss the review, Carter would pigheadedly insist that we didn’t care what they thought, and Richie would make a cavalier joke about suing the NME. I couldn’t bear it.

  ‘Donadi ...’ Sam was behind me.

  The lift doors dinged open and I jumped inside, pressing a random button and hoping he wouldn’t reach me in time, but he got in just as the doors closed.

  ‘Where are we going, then?’

  ‘Leave me alone.’

  He shot out a hand and hit the emergency stop button. The lift shuddered and thumped and I grabbed the rail to stop myself from falling.

  ‘So that’s what that does,’ he muttered. ‘Always wondered about that.’

  The tears came fast and I slumped to the floor, my face between my knees. Sam sat down beside me and pulled me awkwardly into his arms.

  ‘It’s just some idiot with a pen.’

  ‘It’s not just some idiot, it’s the NME,’ I sobbed. We’d pored over the back issues between sessions in the boathouse, dreaming that one day we’d be featured. He didn’t say anything, just rubbed my back.

  ‘And they’re right,’ I added. ‘Everything they said was spot-on. “King Cutie” is derivative. And I don’t know what I’m doing.’ I took a deep breath, wiped my nose on the back of my hand, and tried to still the flow of tears.

  ‘Well, I think you’re being too hard on yourself,’ he said. ‘You’ve done something those reviewers haven’t. Anyone can be a critic, but to really create something – that’s hard. We know how hard that is. It must be nice for them, tearing apart other people’s work, but until they put themselves out there for judgement, I’m not interested in what they have to say about us.’

  I pressed my fingers into the corners of my eyes. Sam always knew how to make me feel better. I desperately wanted to tell him about Carter, about my night of songwriting with Addie, about all of it, but I couldn’t find the words. I leaned into him.

  ‘But you know who did like it? Rolling fucking Stone. Kerrang! Melody Maker. So fuck the NME and their “derivative” bullshit.’

  •

  When we arrived back in England, everything had shifted. We had an album out, and people really liked it – it was getting streamed so often that it was already in Spotify’s Global Top 10. Jack called and told me Dad had bought forty copies on CD – how analogue – and hand-delivered them to everyone he knew, including the local patisserie where we used to get our croissants on Sundays, which was now playing it on a loop. Dad and Jack booked tickets to come and visit at Christmas, and I started mentally planning their visit – all the London landmarks we’d visit that I’d been too busy to see. We had a few days off over the holiday period, and on New Year’s Eve we were scheduled for our first full-length gig since the album launch. I couldn’t wait. Sam seemed to have relaxed a little now that we’d be playing for a paying audience, and Carter was ecstatic that the show was at the Royal Albert Hall, a prestigious venue his dad had always wanted to play.

  Cardboard boxes were piled high around the flat, and most of our furniture had already gone to our new penthouse in Pimlico, which was a reward from Beatnik. Saskia had framed the Iggy Pop poster we’d first put up in the boathouse and it leaned against the hallway wall, wrapped in plastic. Carter and Richie salvaged the Xbox from a carton and set it up in the living room. I sat cross-legged on my bed and started playing around with a riff.

  Lady Fame’s a cruel mistress, Addie had said. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard the expression – my own band was called Lady Stardust, which basically meant the same thing – but, combined with her scribbled lyrics, it gave me an idea. Beatnik wanted another love song, like the ones Perfect Storm was known for, and Addie wanted to write about something more personal, more meaningful to her – but why couldn’t we have both? I grinned to myself, still finding it hard to believe I had Addie Marmoset’s scrawled thoughts in front of me, and began to make notes between her lines, changing her original idea into a song about a relationship: fame as an enticing but dangerous lover.

  You wanted this but you’re not sure

  You don’t think you can trust a thing

  But when the stargirl knocks upon your door

  You better let her in

  She whispers softly in your ear

  ‘You’re perfect, you’re so beautiful,’ she says

  She sprinkles stardust in your eyes

  She lies down on your bed

  Sam put his head around the door and asked if I wanted to join him and Tish, who was visiting, for dinner, but I was too absorbed to come out. I could feel the edges of the song at my fingertips and if I broke my concentration now it might evaporate. It was the word ‘Stargirl’ that had done it. It sounded more modern than Lady Fame, and I liked the reference to my own band.

  The stargirl knows what you desire

  The stargirl knows your dreams

  Her glitter promises, her empty smile

  She’s much more than she seems

  But this was meant to be a duet, so I had to include two voices. I started scribbling some ‘glitter promises’ for the ‘stargirl’ to sing, my mind on Saskia and Amir and that first Beatnik meeting.

  Let me lead you away from here

  I’ll show you how it’s done

  We dance we sing we play our roles

  We’re having so much fun

  You have to pay a price of course

  But that’s nothing when you think

  Of everyone who’d trade your place

  In one glitter-dusted blink

  And then the final verse would be Addie’s again.

  This is what I always
dreamed

  Her glitter promises, her empty smile

  But when I look back at what’s behind

  I wish I’d stayed awhile

  The image of Addie at the academy mingled with my own memories: looking wistfully across the lawn at the boathouse, the thrill I’d get when Carter touched my arm in the dining hall, the way the air had been thick with possibility and dreams. I remembered the way he’d asked if he was in with a chance under the willow tree. At the time it had seemed cavalier, but after his declaration this morning – I’ve never been with someone I liked as much as you before – I wondered if he’d been wearing his confidence as a shield.

  •

  It was late by the time I finished the song. I tiptoed into Carter’s room and found him in bed, his face lit by the green light of his phone. He moved over and I slid in beside him.

  ‘I thought you must’ve passed out,’ he said. With each breath, his chest expanded against me. ‘I’ve been lying here wondering if it would be creepy for me to sneak in and go to sleep beside you.’

  I giggled, possibly for the first time in my life. Being with Carter changed me somehow. ‘That would be pretty creepy.’

  ‘Sweet sentiment, though?’ He sounded hopeful.

  I kicked off the covers and we started kissing. Sweat prickled on my skin despite the chill as his fingers traced the line of my bra through my T-shirt, and a yearning sound escaped me.

  ‘Shhhh ...’ He grinned, his teeth white in the dark, but didn’t take his hands off me. ‘You want someone to hear us?’

  We kissed again, and I forced myself to stay quiet. When he drew away from me, there was a question in his eyes. If I wanted to back out this was my chance, but I didn’t want to stop, despite the nerves thudding in my ears. His mouth found mine again and he shifted on top of me. When we’d made out before it had all felt so fragile, so easily disturbed, but tonight there was no-one to interrupt: no Verity waiting in the pub, no Amir on the phone, no reason to stop.