by Brigid Coady
It was like watching a film in slow motion. Ed approached them and Emma felt Frankie move past her. She looked at Frankie’s face and between one second and the next it was like watching a mask fall over her face. Gone was the cold, basilisk stare to be replaced with her famously coy smile. It flicked on and she began to twirl her hair with the same fingers that had been stabbing at her phone.
She couldn’t help but recoil, she could feel her whole body involuntarily step back as if backing away from a predator. She saw that Ed’s steps faltered, as if he too wanted to back away. He looked over at Emma, his eyes wide with panic, his smile fixed like a grimace.
She tried to conjure up an encouraging smile. She hoped she’d succeeded although he was looking even more panicked. Why did this feel like she was throwing him to the lions?
And then suddenly, Frankie reached him and her hand came up, the pink tipped fingers grasping his arm. Ed jumped and squeaked.
There was a sudden screech of feedback.
She jumped as did everyone but Frankie, whose eyes were firmly on Ed. Emma looked over to see Will standing in the middle of the stage, his microphone rolling away from his feet and across the stage. His face was fierce, he looked as if he was about to go over and rip Ed away from them.
‘Hi,’ Frankie purred, as she glanced coquettishly up through her eyelashes at Ed.
‘Er… hello?’ he replied, he kept looking over her shoulder to Emma. She knew if he could’ve done, he would have turned tail and sprinted back to the safety of his group.
Frankie leant across, grabbed his face with her free hand and manhandled it so that she could press a forceful kiss to Ed’s cheek. When she leant back there was a lipstick mark branding his skin in pink. It was perfectly placed as if it had been drawn on.
There was a sudden flurry of camera clicks going from a variety of phones and large cameras that seemed to have appeared from nowhere. Emma glanced round the auditorium to check everyone who was supposed to be filming was. Amanda’s assistant had her phone out, she gave Emma a thumbs up. Excellent. That would be the video that would be released via the bogus crew account. There was always some random sound guy called Mike, that she could blame the account on if asked. She watched as the girl finished filming and dropped her phone back in her pocket.
As if it had been timed, as soon as the filming stopped Ed was recoiling back, wrenching his arm from Frankie’s grip. He reached a hand up and started to scrub at the mark, the look on his face a picture of betrayal.
It wasn’t her fault, it wasn’t. If she didn’t do this job then someone else would. It was the best for them, Emma thought, trying to drown out the voice in her head that seemed to speak with Gee’s voice. It was a means to an end. They would be thankful. One day.
It didn’t stop her feeling like shit though.
Frankie stood her ground and other than frowning slightly, the mask of sweet coyness looked as if it had never shifted.
‘Eddie, it is so fabulous to meet you,’ she purred. ‘I’ve heard so many great things about you. Maybe we can get together privately and do some personal research…’
If Emma had thought Ed had looked panicked before, she was now worried he was not only going to bolt, he was actually going to relocate to South America under the witness protection programme.
Crap, she could see Will had moved closer, Sean and Amit flanking him. This was a disaster waiting to happen. It would be like West Side Story… She had a brief flash of everyone bursting into song.
She needed to make sure the other boys never got close to Frankie. Especially Will. She had visions of what damage he could do. Especially when it seemed that Frankie was interested in making this more realistic.
It was ironic that all she’d wanted was for one of these fauxmances to turn real but… not this way. It felt unclean.
‘I… I…’ Ed stuttered, and started to gasp for breath.
‘The boys are busy with rehearsals, maybe another time,’ she said as she stepped forward trying to get between Frankie and Ed, but so that she wasn’t in any photos. The look that Frankie gave her chilled her to the bone. Making an enemy of Frankie was probably a bad idea. Damn.
‘Fine,’ Frankie said, almost spitting the word at her, the mask falling for a nanosecond before she put it on again as she turned back to Ed, leant across Emma and stroked his arm.
‘Another time, lover boy. We’re going to have fun.’ It was weirdly predatory from someone who looked like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.
‘Erm…’ Ed said as he stood hunched over, his legs and arms crossed as if he could make himself smaller and less of a surface area for Frankie to touch. Emma could feel the fine tremors that were running through his body.
‘Excuse me?’ He said it like a question, but obviously wanting for permission to get away. She wondered if she could run away with him.
‘Of course, Ed. Can’t keep the boys waiting,’ Emma said cheerily to the other woman whilst backing away as Ed turned tail. She wasn’t sure whether Frankie would chase after him. Maybe she saw Ed’s reluctance as a challenge, saw him as prey to be hunted. Emma tried to get the image of Frankie wearing camouflage and sporting a rifle out of her head. But it seemed too apt.
She turned to see that Ed had pretty much sprinted back to the band, who as soon as they saw him move, went to him. Will, of course, got to him first. He snagged him round the shoulders, and brought him in for a hug. Just before the rest of the boys piled in for a group hug Will looked at her. She wondered how he was going to make her pay.
Great, she thought. Less than twenty-four hours in Tinseltown and she already had two people gunning for her.
***
Everything was orange, Emma thought, as she stood in line at Starbucks. Pumpkins peaked from behind piles of coffee beans. The boards broadcast the pumpkin flavoured lattes. What she wanted to see was an intravenous drip, through which they delivered the caffeine straight into her veins. If they wanted to colour it orange and call it the ‘Pumpkin Pump’ to keep with the theme they could. She shut her eyes and reopened them. Nope, no ‘Pumpkin Pump’ had miraculously appeared on the specials board. They were missing a trick. Ha, trick or treat.
Her phone pinged, interrupting her thoughts from going down a rabbit hole of Halloween nonsense.
Have you wrangled the animals back into line? Gee texted.
A bit of blackmail and I promised them sweets. It worked a treat. Emma lied, but also realising she was still on a Halloween kick. She wasn’t telling Gee that the scariest monster she’d seen was Frankie Quick. What would Frankie dress up as to trick or treat?
It was too early by LA standards on a Tuesday morning, but it was afternoon in the UK. She looked at the time. 6 a.m. local time. Too early, considering the first concert was tonight and she wouldn’t get to sleep probably for the next twenty-four hours. But ever since the photos of the cheek kiss had gone viral, everyone who didn’t already know Breach Of The Peace wanted to know who the cute British singer was that had captured Frankie’s attention. And Emma had spent most of the past few days hunched over her laptop monitoring social media and adjusting plans.
It was going to get bigger after today when Frankie would be seen dancing in the VIP section of the concert.
I’m in Concorde Lounge, and hydrating before the flight came the next text.
A photo pinged up after the text, showing a bottle of champagne and the bottom half of the face of a grinning Gee.
Bit early, isn’t it?
She replied doing some quick but painful mental arithmetic, realising it was two in the afternoon in London.
Blame this one
Gee sent a photo of Lewis, grinning broadly while, flipping a two-finger salute at the camera.
Emma snorted. Of course, Lew would be heading to LA as well. He and Harry lived half their time here especially when Harry was filming.
Gee sent another selfie of the two of them with straws in the bottle, eyes crossed. She couldn’t help but smile, maybe Lew w
ould come to the show with Gee. She could do with his calm, down to earth advice.
Though he wasn’t as good as Gee. Admittedly he was nicer to her when he delivered unasked for advice, Gee was blunt. But she wouldn’t change anything.
She sighed, she still had hours to go before Gee arrived, here in the land of orange.
Reaching the registers, she gave her order, a safe double shot no foam latte. Venti. Maybe she didn’t have to repeat it twice but she didn’t want them to get it wrong. She shuffled to the pick-up area, yawning.
She needed to work out the next best pap walk for Ed and Frankie. It had to be in the next few days before the band moved to a different city.
‘A double pumpkin spice latte and a cold brew vanilla sweet cream with a shot of pumpkin spice for Ed,’ the barista called out.
What the… she turned to look, but this wasn’t her Ed. Her heart rate settled. Not that it would be a surprise if Ed did order something pumpkin flavoured, it seemed like something he’d like.
She was staring blankly at a large gourd when her order was called. She grabbed the coffee cup with two hands and took a hit.
Bliss.
Whether it was the hit of caffeine or divine intervention, the idea of the obscene pumpkin in front of her collided with Ed and…
She had the best idea for a pap walk. It was so cute it would make anyone puke.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Just landed.
The text came in as Emma relaxed on a sofa in the corner of one of the dressing rooms. The boys weren’t due on stage for another couple of hours and were getting ready for their meet and greet. The kick from the latte had worn off hours ago, and her earlier run in with Ed and Will had exhausted her.
Who knew he was so against pumpkins?
‘You want me to pick out pumpkins with her?’ He looked incredulous. ‘Who does this?’
‘I found this famous pumpkin patch in LA where people go pick them out. And lots of people get photographed there.’
‘That is weird,’ Will interjected. ‘And kind of childish.’
‘Frankie’s people love it,’ she replied. Loved it so much that they’d dived on it almost slavering at the mouth. Supposedly this sort of sickly sweet date would be perfect for her fans. Emma was convinced she just had a lot of Halloween or animal-themed knitwear that she wanted to wear.
‘She would.’ Will rolled his eyes.
After a half hour of negotiating and cajoling, Ed had agreed.
If she could’ve fitted in a massage between then and now it would’ve been heaven. She relaxed back against the cushions. She smiled as she looked at the text. Her heart had thumped hard but then she could feel herself relax, Gee was here. Even knowing he was in the same city made her feel better. She didn’t want to wait till tomorrow to see him. She worked out timings, he could make it.
Fancy going to a concert? Lew can come too.
If Gee was here, then maybe it would help. He could distract people just by being Gee Knightley.
Is it your teenyboppers? He texted back.
As if you haven’t been a teenybopper yourself, she replied. Anyway, I sent you the video. They’re good.
They aren’t too bad and if it means I get to see you tonight… I suppose so. Lewis is going home to be all lovey dovey.
He sent the puke emoji.
She sighed and held her phone to her chest. Everything was going to be fine. No matter what happened tonight she would be able to deal with it. Emma didn’t look too closely at why she suddenly felt like the world was a better place.
She picked her phone back up and dialled a number.
‘Hey Paul, is it too late to get an access all areas pass?’ she asked.
‘Should be okay, what name do you want it under? I’ll get one of the lads to take it to the box office.’
‘Gee Knightley,’ she said.
‘As in the…’ he started.
‘Thanks, that’s great. I’ll see you later.’ She cut him off and put the phone down before he could finish.
***
There had been screaming fans outside the Nokia Theatre when Emma had arrived there earlier that afternoon and now there were just as many inside.
She’d watched the price of resale tickets online start to steadily increase since the Frankie photos from the rehearsal had hit the internet.
It was working. Just like she predicted. She was good at her job. She couldn’t help but smile.
Having left the comfortable sofa, she moved to the office that had been set up for her backstage. A quiet place she could check the social media. She needed to make sure she knew what was happening especially when fans spotted Frankie in the audience.
Okay. She stretched her hands above her head; she was going in. She logged in and checked the feeds and trending hashtags.
Bears.
What the hell? Why was the word ‘bears’ trending with all the other BOTP hashtags?
She checked. Not just bears but specifically rainbow bears…
She clicked on one of the photos attached to a tweet that used both hashtags and tagged in the band’s Twitter account.
It was a blurry snapshot of a pair of rainbow furred bears, like the sort you could buy from Build-A-Bear Workshop. The larger one sported a large fake handlebar moustache made from duct tape plus a pair of aviator sunglasses. And the smaller one also wore sunglasses but was wearing a large pink sombrero on its head, so large it was almost drowning it. Both were wearing glittery red boots and, she peered closer and zoomed in, there seemed to be stickers on their feet. Smiley face stickers – that didn’t actually look that smiley, more grumpy.
But what really caught her eye was that they were surrounded by pumpkins of all sizes. As if they were in a pumpkin patch.
What the hell?
Where were these photos from and what did they have to do with the band? She’d never seen anything like this before.
Emma zoomed out of the photo, and clicked through to another account and another photo from a different angle.
Oh. These were photos from the stage, the one just down the corridor from where she was sitting. The bears were smaller than she thought and seemed to be sitting on a piece of the stage that stuck out into the security area. Close to the fans but not enough to touch.
And someone had directed coloured spotlights on them, so no one could miss them.
Very cute, she thought, clicking out. She wondered who’d had the idea to engage with the fans like that.
She looked through the feeds. It wasn’t something that Dan would think up. Maybe Jamie? But he’d have told her. And how had he managed to get the bears here from London and set them up?
She’d worry about who was behind it later. This was good though, starting speculation around the band, buzz that would amplify once the narratives came into play
The speculation online was ridiculous, how did people make these kinds of tenuous connections? The theory that the coloured stickers matched up with the colours that BOTP used on their microphones wasn’t too bad, they did have specific colours – blue for Will, green for Ed, red for Amit and orange for Sean. But one twitter theory seemed to be saying that the boys were the ones who were behind the bears. So silly. As if they would be setting stuffed toys to talk to the fans.
This was wasting time, she stopped reading and moved to the feeds that were talking about Ed and Frankie. The hashtag #Freddie was trending. She clicked on one tweet.
OMG how cute were #Freddie in those rehearsal photos? My new OTP, I’m a #Freddie 4evah
Excellent, the fans were already seeing them as a ‘one true pairing’ – fans had even started identifying themselves as Freddies. This was what made her job so exciting. Now she had established the story the big part of the plan began, moving these fauxmances along with a touch here and a touch there.
As soon as the idea of Freddie was embedded, she’d start to do more work on Will and Tina’s fauxmance. With Amit and Jessie, she’d handed that over to Jessie’s tea
m for the day to day. But she needed to make sure that they were following the script. She quickly checked the schedule. Yes, coffee shop photos were due in Denver next week when Candy Rebels were in the same town. Then it would make Amessie official.
All these new names were going to confuse her.
She watched as the mention of Fred and Freddies escalated along with the BOTP follows and mentions. This was the first night of their winter tour. And it looked like it was going to be a hit.
The concert started at eight-thirty. She could hear the dull muffled thump of the bass filtering through into the backroom. The screams couldn’t be heard anymore. She could relax, most of the social media now would be about the music. She wouldn’t be needed until someone spotted Frankie. She glanced at her phone waiting for confirmation from her team that she was in the building. Nothing, but then a text flashed up.
They aren’t too bad, Gee texted.
Emma smiled. Come backstage after, she replied.
She’d be handing social media monitoring over to Dan and Harry back in London as soon as the gig ended so she’d have time for Gee. Even with the work she had to do to smooth over some last-minute prep for the pumpkin festivities.
Why did her life seem to be all about the orange?
***
Except for the expected spike in mentions when Frankie was spotted dancing around at the front of the VIP section, there wasn’t much to do. Although some eagle-eyed fans noted that Ed never went anywhere near the VIP section and that the other boys went out of their way to be extra touchy with him. She looked at the video, it didn’t look too bad, and it wasn’t anywhere as near touchy feely as they could be.
She heard the crescendo as they played their encore and suddenly the screams were back and reverberating around the building. She could hear the boys as they came off stage, shouting in hoarse voices. She got up and looked through the doorway to see them running down the corridor, sweaty and almost bouncing off the walls.