Manhattan Cinderella

by Kate O'Keeffe

  I harrumph. This from the girl who called him a has-been while complaining that the Pop Princesses didn’t get to headline their own concert at The Garden.

  Cole glances my way, and I give him a brief wave.

  “I’m more than happy to foster new talent, and you’re an up and coming act,” Rex replies with a smile.

  “Can we get a picture with you?” Kylie asks while holding her phone in her hand in anticipation.

  “Happy to. Cole, will you do the honors?”

  Cole’s attention is drawn from me back to the group. “Of course.” He takes the phone from Kylie.

  As they pose for the camera and the spawn issue Cole with a stream of instructions on how to capture their good sides, I notice with surprise that Sylvia’s icy gaze has settled on me. Immediately, I look away, hoping Cole’s and my shared looks have gone unnoticed by her.

  It’s then that I spot him out of the corner of my eye: Naked Guy, the guy from Britney’s bedroom that morning last week, the poor schmuck who got turfed out on his ear by an apoplectic Sylvia. Only this time, he’s fully clothed—thank God—wearing a current Rex Randall tour T-shirt and black jeans, his straggly hair falling about his shoulders. He’s wheeling some equipment onto the stage, assisted by another guy, similarly dressed.

  He stops about twenty feet away and begins to do something with the equipment. I press my lips together, wondering how this scene will play out. Will Sylvia recognize him as the guy she unceremoniously threw out of the penthouse? And if she does, what will she do?

  We could be balanced on the precipice of an epic explosion right now.

  “Here you are.” Cole hands the phone back to Kylie. “I hope I got some good shots for you.”

  “I hope you did, too,” Kylie replies ungraciously as she begins to flick through the photos.

  “Well, ladies, we’ll leave you to your rehearsal. Remember to enjoy yourselves out here tonight. There’s something really special about performing at The Garden.” Rex nods and smiles then turns to leave.

  “Oh, I’m sure they will,” Sylvia simpers. “Good luck for tonight. I’ll be rooting for you.”

  The girls echo Sylvia’s words.

  As he passes, Rex looks my way and comes to a stop. “Hi, Gabby. I didn’t see you there.”

  If the ground could open and swallow me whole right about now, that would be great. Of course, it doesn’t. With Sylvia, Britney, Kylie, and Cole as my audience, you could fry eggs on my cheeks they’re so hot. “Hello, Mr. Randall.”

  I will him not to mention my audition, not to mention the call he’s made to the label, not to mention anything to do with me.

  “Mr. Randall? Come on, call me Rex. Are you here to see Cole?” Rex glances at my ‘All Access’ pass. “I see he got you in here.”

  “No, I—” I fumble through my mind, looking for a way to take the spotlight off me. Short of feeding Britney to the Sylvia-shaped lion by drawing attention to the fact Naked Guy is on this very stage, I come up with nothing.

  In true hero style, Cole leaps to my rescue. “Gabby works for the Pop Princesses. She’s their assistant. Which’s why she’s here, of course.”

  “You’re their assistant?” Rex asks, surprised. I nod. He turns to Sylvia. “Well, Sylvia, you’ve got a talented one here. Have you ever thought of putting her in the band? Three stars instead of two? I’m sure Gabby could hold her own with your talented daughters.”

  Oh, God. I close my eyes, willing him to stop, willing this to be over.

  “Well, I . . . that is, my two girls are the new darlings of pop,” Sylvia fumbles. “They’ve worked so hard to get where they are. Having someone new join, well, it wouldn’t be fair, would it? And anyway, Gabby’s an excellent assistant. I wouldn’t want to lose her.”

  Was that a compliment?

  Rex shakes his head. “Wasted talent, Sylvia, I tell you.”

  “Hey, don’t we have that meeting to get to?” Cole interrupts. “It’s with Terry from the label, right?”

  I shoot him a grateful smile, but I know the damage is well and truly done.

  “Sure, yeah.” Rex leans closer to me. “Good to see you again, Gabby.”

  “It’s good to see you, too. And thank you again.”

  Rex nods at the girls. “We’ll leave you to your sound check, ladies.”

  Cole shoots me an apologetic look. I shrug in response. What can I do? I know I’m going to pay for it the moment they step off the stage.

  With Cole and Rex gone, I’m left with Sylvia and her legendary wrath. She pastes on a smile I know all too well, the one where she pretends to be kind all the while stabbing me in the back with a poisoned dagger.

  It’s super fun.

  “So, Gabriella. I think you have stories to tell us. Starting with when exactly you snuck off to perform for Rex, without asking me.”

  Britney and Kylie suck in air, shocked. They share a look before returning their attention to me, like ancient Romans in the Colosseum, hoping for blood.

  There’s no point in lying. The cat is well and truly out of the bag now. I ball my fists at my sides and bow my head. “I auditioned for him a few days ago.”

  She crosses her arms and glares at me. “What about the Pop Princesses? What about your job? Were you planning on just abandoning us? Where’s your sense of duty, your sense of honor?”

  My anger ignites. “My sense of honor? Are you kidding me? You promised Dad before he left I could sing in the band. You promised him, Sylvia. But you’ve never followed through. I had to do this. I had to make it happen for me because no one else is going to. Can’t you see that? If you’d kept your end of the bargain, I wouldn’t have had to do what I did.”

  “It’s always about you, isn’t it, Gabriella?” She spits at me. “You and your sister doing whatever you want.”

  Agog, I blink at her as my jaw hits the floor. Is she serious? How could she even think it’s all about me when I spend my life running around after her and her daughters, the daughters who sleep in our bedrooms, the daughters who have the singing career I was promised. “About me?”

  “Maybe I should have a little word with the record label, tell them you’ve changed your mind? After all, Terry and I have known each other for years. The right word in the right ear and I’m sure your little dream can be dealt with quite easily.”

  “Rex has much more influence at the label than you. You don’t scare me.”

  “Are you willing to gamble on that, Gabriella?”

  I take a step closer to her. “Sylvia, please don’t. This is my big chance. I promise to be the best band assistant, the best stepdaughter, the best everything you want me to be.”

  Her artificially plumped lips curve into a sneer Billy Idol would be proud of. “You go behind my back, Gabriella, and you get what you deserve.”

  In a sickening, soul-destroying flash, I see my hopes dashed by the woman I’ve been working to get away from, the woman who’s made my life a living hell. And I can’t let that happen. I won’t let that happen.

  With a strength I’ve kept buried for far too long, I square my shoulders and pierce her with my gaze. “Do your worst, Sylvia. I’m not afraid of you.”

  She arcs that one eyebrow, the way I’m sure she learned in Evil School all those years ago. “We’ll see about that.”

  A girly giggle pierces the thick silence between Sylvia and me. We turn to see Britney wrapped in an embrace with Naked Guy on the other side of the stage.

  “Not now, Dwayne,” Britney says, her words at complete odds with her body language.

  “You?” Sylvia gasps.

  If I thought she was angry before, she’s positively furious now. She stomps across the stage toward them. I’m sure I see sparks bursting out of her head, her body rigid as her footsteps reverberate around the arena.

  “Let go of my daughter!” Her voice is shrill, cold, and completely uncompromising.

  Naked Guy throws his hands up in the air as though Britney has scalded him. “Look, I don’
t want any trouble.” He takes a step back, and another.

  “Dwayne, don’t go. She can’t do anything to hurt us,” Britney says. Clearly, Naked Guy Dwayne has other ideas as he backs away and then turns to scamper.

  I watch the scene unfold, momentarily forgetting my troubles at the sight of him beating a hasty retreat, his straggly hair sailing behind him.

  “He’s a roadie for Rex Randall? A roadie, Britney?” Sylvia spits her venom.

  “That’s right, Mother. Dwayne is a roadie. Just like Dad. And that didn’t stop you from falling in love with him, and it won’t stop me, either.”

  The girls’ father was a roadie? No wonder social-climbing Sylvia has such a problem with Britney’s choice in men.

  Britney tosses her hair and calls after her lover’s retreating form, “Dwayne, wait up.”

  As Britney turns on her heel to leave, Sylvia grabs her wrist. “I will not have you do this.”

  Britney pulls her hand away. “I’ll do what I goddamned want, Mom.”

  “Get back here!” Sylvia screeches, both anger and panic obvious in her voice. “Don’t make the same mistake I did. You’re famous, you have the world at your feet. You’re worth so much more than some roadie.” Sylvia chases after her daughter, who has quickened her pace to catch up with Dwayne and get away from her mother.

  Kylie and I stand side by side and watch the scene unfold. We share a shocked look between us. I can barely believe my eyes.

  Britney picks up the pace, heading to Dwayne—and her freedom. One misstep in her high heels and her ankle gives way, sending her hurtling off the edge of the stage. The last thing I see of her is her butt in the air as she falls to the unforgiving ground below.

  And it’s then that I hear it. We all hear it. That dulled, sickening thud as soft human flesh meeting cold, hard ground. There’s a momentary silence before her blood-curdling scream rings out, filling every corner of the arena.

  Chapter 18

  Cole

  Pacing back and forth on the sidewalk out front of the E.R., I feel tense, worried, like an expectant father back in the fifties having been banned from the delivery room. At the sound of that scream back at The Garden, Rex and I had hurtled out to the stage. I was terrified something had happened to Gabby. My relief was short-lived when I took in the scene: a screaming, hysterical heap of Pop Princess on the floor, Sylvia’s screams almost as loud, a stunned Gabby and Kylie, and one of Rex’s roadies looking like he wanted to be anywhere but there.

  Eventually, after Oscar-worthy dramatics, a hysterical Britney was brought here in an ambulance. A frantic Sylvia screeched at anyone who came within a five-foot radius of her daughter, trailed by a glum Kylie and a stressed Gabby.

  The roadie seems to have disappeared.

  Not exactly my idea of the ideal way to spend a morning.

  I might be pacing, but I’m not worried about Britney. Sure, by the screaming bloody murder and unnatural angle of her bent leg, she’s likely broken it. Thanks to a mishap on the football field back in high school—that left me with a fractured tibia and a cast for weeks—I know that hurts like a bastard.

  My concern is for Gabby. From what she’s told me, Sylvia’s a Class-A bitch, and man, it pisses me off that she treats Gabby like a piece of crap stuck to the bottom of her shoe. The way she was yelling at Gabby, saying that Britney’s injury was her fault… She was virtually foaming at the mouth in irrational fury.

  And this woman is her stepmom?

  “Hey, Cole.”

  I turn to see an exhausted Gabby walking toward me. Her shoulders are slumped, her head drooped, and the bags under her eyes look like they’re packed for a week’s vacation in the Caribbean. I rush to her and collect her in my arms. She nestles into me, murmuring her thanks.

  “You don’t have to thank me. I want to be here.”

  “You do?”

  “Well, not in there, exactly.” I nod at the entrance to the E.R.

  “It’s a wise move to stay a safe distance from the cray-cray.”

  My thoughts dart to my mom, the way she got hysterical over Grandpop’s declaration about Rex. “Me and overly-agitated women don’t mix.” I smooth some hair from her face. “I’ve been concerned about you, Kermit.”

  “I’m okay.”

  “But she was so horrible to you. I mean, she blamed Britney’s fall on you. What the hell was that about?”

  She shrugs. “It’s all part of the deal when you’re the unwanted stepchild.” Her flippant tone belies the pain I’ve seen lurking in her eyes. She lets out a heavy sigh and adds more honestly, “It’s not easy, but what choice do I have?”

  “We’ve always got a choice.”

  She shakes her head. “Cece doesn’t.” A cloud passes over her face, and my heart expands for this woman sacrificing her happiness for her sister. “Anyway, the x-rays came back. She’s broken her tibia. The doctor says it’s a displaced fracture. She needs surgery to realign the bones.”

  “That sucks. Hysterical drama queen or not, you gotta feel sorry for the girl.”

  “Yeah. Britney may not be my favorite person, but I wouldn’t wish this on her.”

  A thought occurs to me. “Shit! What about the concert?”

  “She’s been talking about that.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “Talking?”

  “Okay, you got me. She’s been screaming about it. Repeatedly. She’s having surgery tomorrow. How can she perform? Of course, Sylvia’s having a major cow over it all.”

  “Having a cow? Is it your turn to go country now?” I try to lighten the mood with some humor.

  Her smile transforms her face from worn out to bright and beautiful, and I’m hit by the force of my feelings for this woman. “Either you’re rubbing off on me, or it’s a case of watching too much Simpsons,” she says.

  “You can never watch too much Simpsons, you know. That show taught me some important life lessons.”

  She laughs, and it’s music to my ears. “Things like not to hit the wrong switch at a nuclear power plant?”

  “Exactly. That’s a key life lesson, but maybe more specifically for people who work at nuclear power plants.”

  “That’s a good point.”

  “It also taught me you can be a baby with a pacifier for, like, thirty years.”

  “Gotta love Maggie. Oh, I’ve got another: smoking will give you a voice like Marge’s sisters.”

  “See? Life lessons.” I pull her in for a kiss and enjoy the feel of her body against mine, her lips warm and soft. “So, what are they going to do about the concert?”

  “Who knows? Kylie says she’ll perform as the Pop Princess, but the label’s not happy about it at all. I overheard Sylvia on the phone to them. I bet the band can’t perform now.”

  Something occurs to me, and if I know Gabby, it’s occurred to her, too. It’s the most obvious solution in the world. “Why don’t you suggest you perform?”

  Her laugh is bitter. “Sylvia give me a chance? Never.”

  “Well she’s desperate, right? And you know all their songs and moves.”

  “But—”

  “Gabby, come on! You’re the perfect solution here. You can save the Pop Princesses’ butts.”

  “You’d think.” She shakes her head.

  “You suggested it to her?”

  “I did, and it went down like a cup of cold vomit.”

  “Nice thought.”

  “Right? Anyway,” she hooks her hands around my neck and gazes up at me with her beautiful green eyes, “Rex has the label interested in me now. I don’t need Sylvia or the Pop Princesses anymore.” She plants a kiss on my lips. It’s sweet and tender and perks me right up.

  “Can we get outta here?” I kiss her again so she knows exactly what’s on my mind.

  “Well, Sylvia did tell me to get out of her sight.”

  “And you’re more than happy to oblige?”

  “After the morning I’ve had, I say ‘hell to the yes.’”

  “I’ve got to ge
t back to Rex soon, but I can give you some time now.”

  “So good of you,” she deadpans, “you big shot musician.”

  “Oh yeah, that’s me. One song with my old man tonight and I’m suddenly a big shot.” I wrap my arm around her shoulder, and we walk down the street. As I raise my arm to hail a cab—my skills in this department have improved tenfold in the last week or so—we hear a voice call Gabby’s name.

  “Gabriella! Where do you think you’re going?”

  Sylvia.

  “Oh, I thought you said I should leave?” Gabby faces her, her tone uncertain.

  “Not leave, leave.” Her hands are on her hips, and her expression reads as more than pissed. “Do I have to explain everything to you?”

  That woman…

  I watch as Gabby shrugs and pastes on a totally fake looking smile. She takes the few short steps back to Sylvia. “Of course. I must have misunderstood. What do you need, Sylvia? Is Britney okay?”

  Seriously, this girl should be a diplomat. She could stop wars.

  Sylvia taps the toe of her high-heeled foot on the sidewalk. “I’ve spoken with the label, and now that they know about you, thanks to that little display you put on for Rex last week, there’s nothing for it.”

  “I don’t follow,” Gabby says.

  “I wouldn’t be asking this if we weren’t in a complete state of emergency.”

  Gabby shoots me a quick look. “Asking what, exactly, Sylvia?”

  “You know! Don’t make me spit it out, child.”

  Child?

  “You’re the only one who knows the songs and the routines,” Sylvia says.

  “Plus, the label knows she’s amazing,” I add, earning an icy glare from Sylvia.

  Gabby’s eyes almost pop out of her head when she realizes what Sylvia is asking her to do. “You want me to perform as one of the Pop Princesses at the concert tonight?”

  “No, I don’t want you to. There’s absolutely nothing about this that I want,” Sylvia spits. “You have to do it. Otherwise the label is going to drop us from the lineup, and that will be a total disaster for my girls.” She pinches the bridge of her nose. “My darling girls’ career over before they’ve even had the chance to achieve their dreams.”