“You mean a bakery?”
Hyde snickered. “Sure.” Then his smile melted. “I miss my grandparents.”
“Oh, did they pass away?” She wanted to reach out to him, but she had already seen him move away from her. She didn’t want him to totally recoil from her.
Hyde shook his head. “No. Too much work and school. We never have time to stop and visit like we used to.” He sniffed and ran his finger across his nose.
Tassia tapped his pad of paper. “What are you doing?”
Hyde peered up at her. His hypnotizing stare froze her in her spot. She had even stopped breathing for a moment, which made her nervous. She never got nervous around boys.
“Writing.” He quickly dropped his stare back to the paper and adjusted his cap.
“Oh. Homework?” She snickered. “I hate having to do that.”
He shook his head. “Writing songs.” He smiled. “I like writing songs, and I’m learning how to play the guitar.”
She sat up taller. “Really? My daddy put me into piano lessons.” She scooted over closer to him. “So what kind of songs are you writing?”
“Um, country songs. I like the ones I hear on the radio.” He nodded toward the person she assumed had to be Hyde’s father. “My dad, who is also my manager, thinks he can get me a recording deal.”
“Wow. That’s cool. I wouldn’t be surprised if you did get the deal. You’re the most popular one here in the R.R.F.C.” She drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. “Can I see what you’re writing?” She leaned closer and reached out to him, and he recoiled back, a reaction that felt like a punch in her stomach.
“No. It’s not ready.” Hyde shook his head hard enough that his hat had almost flown off his head.
Tassia drew her hand back. “Oh, okay.” Not willing to give up this conversation, she continued. “Christina just told me about a rumor she had heard.”
“What’s that?” Hyde put his paperwork down for a moment to give his full attention to her.
“That the writers are going to pair us up. I mean, not you and me necessarily. But that could happen. Wouldn’t that be cool?” Tassia remembered how her stomach knotted as she waited for his response.
Hyde shook his head. “Sounds like you won’t have an opportunity to shine on your own.”
Tassia knew her heart had stopped. Sounded like Hyde didn’t want a singing partner or to even be on a show with other children.
He looked at her. “We can’t keep doing this show for the rest of our lives. That’s what my dad always says.” He pointed to his dad, who had his arm draped over the shoulders of the set nurse. He seemed to make friends a lot with various women around there. “What do you plan on doing when our time ends?”
“Um, I don’t know.” She looked down at the paper he held. “Maybe write songs, too. I sing really well, so maybe start singing, too.”
“You write songs? I’d like to see them.” Hyde’s eyes widened.
Tassia hadn’t even finished her homework let alone written a song. Why had she even lied to this boy? Her parents would have been so disappointed had they heard her telling these tall tales.
Before she could explain herself, she heard raised voices, and one sounded strangely familiar. She peered across the room and saw her normally cool and calm father storming toward her.
“Is that your dad?” Hyde pointed to him.
“Yeah, he looks kind of mad.”
The story about her little lie couldn’t have gotten to him yet.
“Looks like he cares.” Hyde returned his attention back to his paper.
“Come on, baby girl. We’re leaving.” Burt put his hand out to her.
“Leaving? What do you mean, Daddy? We’re about to start filming soon.” Tassia pointed to the crew, who now had all stopped moving to look at the spectacle in the room.
“You don’t have to worry about filming. You no longer are a part of the Ratty Rat family.” Burt looked back over his shoulder to the table full of producers. “You and your talents aren’t appreciated here.” Then he had glared at Hyde, who looked shocked. “It’s apparent who they think is the true star of this show. Let’s go.”
Tassia grabbed her father’s hand and he helped her up to her feet. “But—”
“We’ll go home to Maryland. You can go back to being a kid.”
Sounded nice except Tassia had started to like this grown-up world of filming and being on a TV show, even one on a public TV channel. She also started to like Hyde, even with the little bit of interaction they had between takes. With this abrupt exit and now that she would be going back to the east coast, she knew she wouldn’t see Hyde again. At the time, she didn’t even know if she would be continuing in the business. Fortunately for her, Tassia had continued on her own.
She jumped out of the chair. “Turn that off.”
“Aww, come on. Isn’t it nice to reminisce?” One of the dancers asked.
At that moment, a back-up singer started singing the Mary J. Blige song of the same name and getting the entire room, except for Tassia, to sing and dance with her.
When the song ended, a female dancer looked at the screen and shook her head. “Even as a chubby kid, Hyde was cute. Now he’s F.I.N.E., fine.” She grunted. “I mean, did you see his last video where he was singing in the rain and not wearing a—”
“No.” Tassia snatched her skirt from her case because she knew—or at least hoped—that they would be on stage soon and could stop talking about Hyde Love.
Truth be told, Tassia hadn’t really stopped thinking about Hyde Love, but only when he became an adult and really blew up in entertainment. Time did right by his body. He no longer carried extra weight around his middle. He had a swimmer’s body, long and lean with just enough bulk to have her fantasizing about holding him.
Of course, she had seen the video that the dancer had mentioned. Who hadn’t? In the video, Hyde wore jeans, boots, and his trademark backward baseball cap, now in blue. For whatever reason, the director had him singing his song shirtless in the rain. Tassia had never wanted to lick water off a man’s body more than in that moment.
They must have kept that set cold. Hyde’s pink nipples looked small and hard. His large hands had Tassia wondering what he could do with them on her. Where would he touch her? How would he touch her? Would he stare into her eyes as he did?
Those same mesmerizing eyes that stunned her as a kid still did that when she had seen one of his videos or saw him in a magazine. Whenever the memories of their tainted past came back to focus, she gave up the fantasy.
“I’ve been too busy with my own career to pay attention to old colleagues.”
In unison, the group screamed, “Colleagues?”
A male dancer stopped her from going into the bathroom to finish changing by draping his arm around her shoulders and facing her toward the TV. “I mean look at the two of you. You in pigtails, and him in overalls. You two could be the country and R&B versions of Beyoncé and Jay-Z.”
The group laughed. Tassia found no amusement in his teasing.
“I don’t think Dorian would like hearing you marry me off to another man.” Tassia jabbed her elbow into the dancer’s muscled side.
“That stagehand?” He snickered. “Your boyfriend is a stoner and a wannabe rapper. You need to cut your losses and go.” He jutted his thumb over his shoulder. “Drop that zero and get with a hero.”
Tassia stared at the screen. For a brief moment, she had worked with the talented star for only a year. In the shot, they both sang the kiddie version of a current popular pop hit. Hyde glanced at Tassia. Back then and now, her breath stopped. Hyde had that certain thing about him that she couldn’t explain.
“I haven’t seen Hyde in years. He probably wouldn’t know me if he saw me in public.” She shook her head.
“But you know—”
“And there’s nothing I need from him.” Tassia went into the bathroom and had to lean against the door to collect herself before changing into her skirt.
She didn’t need to tell the group in the room how Hyde had dismissed her, not once, but twice. Actually, the first dismissal came by way of Hyde’s father. It had happened on her last day of shooting. When Burt had removed his child from the set, he had revealed to her in the car all the changes that the producers had wanted to make, and they all involved Hyde and only Hyde.
Tassia couldn’t blame Hyde for that. No way a kid could manipulate adults like that. Her second run-in with him had been different, and placed the nail in the coffin on this former colleague at least being friends with her. Being ignored hurt her, but she refused to wallow in the memory or let it break her. She had a job to do…whether she liked it or not.
* * * *
“Baby, let’s get naked and let me ride on you all day.” As soon as Tassia sang the infamous hook in the popular song by Aaron, another Charisma artist, her stomach knotted despite the smile on her face.
Singing the song with the chart-topping R&B artist, who the media loved to link her with romantically, didn’t help her current relationship situation. She glanced off to the side of the stage and spotted Dorian sitting on a large black-and-silver crate backstage while he busied himself on his phone, his other constant companion when he didn’t consume all his time with work.
Hell, even wearing a skirt short enough that the front row could see the color of her underwear and singing a seductive song like the one she sang now that put her name on the musical map couldn’t hold her man’s attention.
Tassia didn’t need any more signs to let her know what she felt in her heart. Even the dancers and back-up singers knew she and the immature roadie didn’t belong together.
The sudden brush against her body by Aaron when he danced by her snapped her out of her personal thoughts and back on her performance.
She smiled. She swayed her hips. She sang her hook. Then she employed every muscle in her body to help hold down the digested food in her stomach threatening to make an appearance.
The large crowd in an arena in Charlotte, North Carolina, screamed as soon as she sang that line. Some of the fans even sang with her. Seeing them mouth the words didn’t ease her guilt about singing them in the first place.
Tassia danced around on stage while Aaron commanded the crowd. One day, the roles would be reversed. She would be the lead and she would have others backing her. Hopefully, she would sing something better than songs like “Ride Me.”
Singing the tasteless ditty paid her handsomely, better than the Ratty Rat residuals, but at least she hadn’t written the song. Tassia would have to keep reminding herself that she could write and had written better songs.
When her part of the song came up again, Tassia steeled her nerves, smiled, and sang her heart out. When she noticed small, pre-teen kids in front of the stage singing that same titillating line, she had to look away. These fans matched the age of Tassia when she worked on the TV show.
She shivered as she thought about her time on the show and her subsequent abrupt departure, courtesy of her father.
Suddenly she felt a body behind hers and an arm around her waist. Tassia turned her head enough to see Aaron’s face before she brought her attention back to the audience. Touring for over a year and in every show and rehearsal, Aaron had never touched her. Now the last show of the tour, he must have decided to change it up this time. The unexpected bump-and-grind routine would fan the flames of their rumored affair. None of it true, but the lie the media told attracted more readers and viewers than the truth.
Tassia glanced to the backstage area again where Dorian had been. When she didn’t see him again, she decided to go with this impromptu change, moving her body along with Aaron’s as he rocked back and forth, occasionally grinding against her.
Despite the close proximity, she felt nothing from him. No hardness. At least Aaron kept himself somewhat composed. That didn’t stop her from subtly pushing her elbow back against his midsection to get him to back up a little. Tassia would do anything to put on a great show, but she wouldn’t compromise her dignity.
Tassia’s part of the song approached. Before she could muster the strength to belt the line again, Aaron planted a kiss on her temple before releasing her to jump around on the stage.
Singing this damaging line did, at least, put her out there in front of audiences. She had spent years in the background singing back-up for lots of singers including Chantel Woodley when she used to be known as Shauna Stellar. She knew she wanted more.
“Thank you, everyone!” Aaron raised his hand in the air. When Tassia came down to the front next to him to bow alongside with him, he immediately said, “Good night!” He walked off without allowing her to bow alongside with him. She had spent all this time on the road with him, and he couldn’t give her the courtesy or the consideration to bow next to her, give her a proper and graceful exit.
Now Tassia felt like a prop, like a back-up dancer, good enough to grind against, but not on Aaron’s level to bow next to, even at their final show on the tour.
Embarrassed heat flamed her cheeks as she walked off the stage behind Aaron. The singer who had a lighter skin tone than Tassia’s chestnut colored one paced offstage as though waiting for something.
Tassia listened to the crowd and heard them screaming, “One more song! One more song!”
Aaron clapped his hands and skipped around. “They want more of the kid. Let’s go.” He ran back out on the stage.
One of the back-up singers in all black held Tassia’s arm. “You going?”
Tassia shrugged. “Why? He’s not doing ‘Ride Me’ again, and I’m done doing the back-up thing.” She saw Aaron jumping around on the stage. “You had better get out there.”
Tassia continued on to her dressing room. She took the opportunity to get in a shower before the other singers came to the room to strip and do the same. She washed off all the glitter and makeup. As she stood under the hot streaming water, she let everything go down the drain. She would forget about the state of her career or the types of songs she sang for the moment. She would even push out the embarrassing reminder of her time working with a rat…and she didn’t mean the guy in the costume.
After the shower, she got dressed in leggings and an oversized T-shirt in time for the other background singers to arrive to the room. Along with them came Dorian. In his oversized button-down plaid shirt and baggy jeans, he looked like he wanted to look like a teenager. It didn’t help that he kept his Afro cut in a high-top fade.
When she first met the roadie, she thought he looked cute. He made her laugh, and became the life of the party no matter where they went. He made her remember that she should still have fun in her life.
The unfortunate part of her current career had to be that she had become a media darling. She didn’t like the media making up stories about her, like the fact that she had left countless lovers in her wake once she hit the music scene, and that she basically slept her way to the middle once she got there. Everything Tassia had she earned through hard work. No one gave her anything, and she didn’t have to rely on gimmicks to get to her spot, although after her sudden exit from the children’s TV show, her name had been transformed to mud in the industry.
“Right now, I just want to see the insides of my eyelids until I can take a long vacation.” She grabbed her suitcases and dragged them out the door.
She would have thought Dorian would have helped her. He followed her out to the tour buses. Gentleman all the way.
She took a breath. For half of the year, her man had been hauling around large crates and cables, making sure the set and sounds stood up to a mega star’s standards. He had to be just as worn out as she felt.
Tassia stopped next to the bus. “Look. We’ve had a lot of fun on this tour.”
Dorian reached for her. “Yeah, girl. In the hotel, in the bathroom, on the stage.” He licked his lips and leaned down like he wanted to kiss her neck.
“Yes.” She smiled despite the public display of affection. Never her thing, but with Dorian, she would roll with it. “And we’ve both worked really hard. I know you must be just as exhausted as I am. Now we can go off and do that secluded island thing. I know of a great spot in—”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Dorian held Tassia’s shoulders and pushed her back. “Secluded island? That sounds like we would be alone.”
Tassia fought hard not to laugh in his face. “That’s the whole point of a vacation.”
He shook his head. “That doesn’t sound cool to me.”
She blinked. “Vacationing on an island with me after the grind of the road after all this time doesn’t sound like a good thing to you?”
He snickered and stumbled back from her. “Nope. To be on an island with just you would make me feel like my parents or something, like we should be playing shuffleboard or Bingo.” He laughed.
Tassia didn’t. “We’re both twenty-five. We’re young.”
“Yep. Young, black, and gifted.” He nodded while keeping his hands on her hips.
“So we can walk around on a beach and wear bathing suits all day if we want. And now that the tour is over—”
“Yeah, now that the tour is done, we can go off and do our own thing…with other people.” Dorian’s face became solemn. “This was all for fun, right? I mean you had fun with Aaron, right?”
Tassia stared at Dorian. “Singing. That’s it.” How could she miss seeing that he hadn’t taken her or what they did together seriously? “You don’t want to keep seeing me?”
Dorian shrugged. “I just see two different things for us. I’m working on my career.”
“As a roadie? That’s your career?” She put her hand to her head.
Crazy on You Page 2