by Skye Grace
“Aura, are you excited for Sunday?” “You said you’d send a picture of the dress you’re wearing, did you not send it?” “It’s kind of an important time to be communicating, did you get my email yesterday?” “What time are we meeting up Sunday afternoon?” “Are you still wearing black or did you change your mind?”
Enough! Aura wants to scream, but can barely inhale and exhale, let alone yell and waste what oxygen she has left with an exclamation of that magnitude. Sunday, she remembers, is the LA Season four premiere of ‘Girl Gang,’ at the Chinese Theater, followed by interviews and after parties, and that the four of them are beyond guests of honor. She slugs back the rest of the drink, despite her wish to un-drink only moments before, and sets the glass on a nearby speaker.
The worst part of now knowing the answers to their questions is the revelation that they will be doing it all again next weekend, that time on the other side of the country. Followed by a solo appearance on the Jonny Falco show the following evening. Why just me? Oh God. How much will I have to drink to pull off answering his questions on the air?! she panics.
“Aur?” the girls shout, this time in unison.
She sets her mouth on autopilot, knowing she isn’t going anywhere until their questions are answered. “Yes, of course. Emails, of course, sorry. Let’s meet at noon at your hotel, get ready together. Still black,” she reaches inside her bra and pulls out her sliver of a phone, clicking around on it until she finds the photo of herself in the black gown she discovered in the phone’s photo gallery this morning. “You like?”
The girls swoon over the style and Aura breathes a sigh of relief, followed by an even deeper sigh when she notices the interrogation is being broken by the sight of Alexis and all her co-stars, including Liam, as well as Monroe and pretty much everyone else she knows crowding around her. Alexis, with the help of Taylor and Liam, are carrying the largest cake she’s ever seen, and the DJ announces that it’s time to sing Happy Birthday. She promptly stashes the phone back in the cleavage, eyes still on the cake enormous cake. It appears to be every color known to man, mounds of frosting every shade of ROYGBIV.
“Alexis,” Aura whispers in her ear, through her teeth with fake smile plastered on thick, while the whole crowd sings. “I saw my cake over there! What’s this?”
“This is where the party begins! Blow out the candles and then smear some on us.”
“What?” she gasps.
“Just do it! To youuuuuuu,” Alexis finishes, eyes and smile wide as she beckons her to blow out the candles. Aura inhales deeply.
I wish to find true love. And I wish… to find myself. In this crazy place, she hopes to herself as she blows out all 26 candles. Something tells her that she’s not going to wake up a teenager again tomorrow, and that she needs to pull up her big girl panties and make the best of that strange but rather wonderful fact.
Everyone in the crowd cheers, and she reluctantly swipes her index finger through a puff of pink frosting and wipes it on Alexis’ white dress. The crowd’s eyes go wide to match Aura’s and someone brings a table in front of the dance floor where they stand. The boys set the cake down as Alexis and Aura each grab a handful of frosting. It appears that’s all this ‘cake’ really is, a highly pigmented pile of fluff. Both girls’ fingers are covered in globs of green and blue, respectively, as they smear them across Taylor and Liam’s crisp, white button up shirts.
What ensues is, to Aura, the very best kind of chaos. The DJ drops the beat and someone throws electric yellow frosting at him. Everyone laughs and squeals while either dancing or lunging at each other as handfuls of neon frosting are shoved into faces and splattered across white clothing. Aura laughs hysterically, still choosing the hot pink shade as she coats Alexis and Monroe’s faces with it, eyes twinkling with mischief but also with love for her friends. Not just for coming up with something so crazy, all for her, but for everything they do for her, always. She can’t exactly remember all of it now, but she feels it.
Her hands, along with many others, dive into the quickly being demolished frosting cake and she balks as she realizes a second one is being brought out. Her hands emerge with purple sugar coating them as she flies into her ‘Girl Gang’ co-stars, laughing with them as they’re plastered with the royal hue.
Aura feels a shiver run up and down her spine as a hand rests firmly on her lower back. She whips around to see Liam’s devilishly handsome and devious grin, unspoiled by color of any kind.
“You’re face looks a little… too perfect!” she cackles while streaking whatever’s left of the purple across his indeed perfect, broad forehead and down his high cheekbones. He bares all his teeth. “I don’t know if you should have done that,” he responds, holding up a fistful of lime green frosting in front of her. She feels his hand on her waist now and realizes he’s backing her slowly away from the commotion.
“A lot of time was spent on this makeup…” she warns him, “And I don’t think-” PLOP! The soft, chartreuse fluff is all she can see, long, dark lashes fluttering through the thick coat of green. She can’t even be mad, his laugh is so beautiful. She can feel, but not exactly see, his gentle fingers clearing her face of all the excess.
“Well, at least it tastes good,” she laughs as he comes back into focus.
“It does? Hmmm… Here, let me be the judge of that,” he says, low in her ear, before moving his lips softly onto hers. She takes a step into him and he supports her with that hand hot on her low back, his other hand sticky sweet on her cheek, temple, running through her hair. That’s gonna be a mess to get out in the morning. His tongue darts across her bottom lip and then it’s gone. He kisses her, lips closed this time, before breaking from her slowly.
“Was I right?” she whispers, purple fingers falling from his dark hair, suddenly wishing there were exponentially less people in this room, like everyone except for the two of them, gone.
Liam licks his lips, “Very,” he answers slyly, and she laughs at the sight of him, green smudged all around his mouth. The obviousness of it all makes her giggle uncontrollably. She notices how close they are to the DJ booth now, and that everyone at the party has crowded around them. Everyone seems thoroughly coated in color by this time, and friends attack Aura with whatever is left to make sure she’s completely covered.
She remains acutely aware that Liam’s hand remains on her back and just the thought of it makes her want to pass out. She doesn’t even think about there being two Aura’s anymore, their thoughts seem to be one now and they’re all pretty much focused on Liam, happy they can agree on anything at this point. Everyone else is a blur of color around her, the beat reverberates from her heels and up through her whole body, the crowd positively pulsing. She feels fingers thread through hers and it takes her a moment to realize that the pink and yellow frosted vision before her is Whit, smiling and kissing a bright blue kiss on her cheek. She can feel Whit’s need for her attention and lack of concern that she is, or maybe was, having a moment with Liam.
“It’s so weird not having you in the city!” Whit yells over the bass.
“I know!” Aura shouts back. In a good way. I don’t want to go back, can’t go back. Not for Season five, not now anyway. Not anytime soon. The thoughts flow through her and Aura feels there’s a lot she has to say to Whit, and knows immediately that now is not the time.
“I miss you,” Whit nearly pleads, and Aura isn’t sure why she doesn’t realize this is a very wrong time for a heart to heart. Thank God her dolls seem to sense it. The teen icons surround her, dancing her away from Whit, and yet Liam remains by her side, until they are up against the booth, bass booming, and Monroe appears next to the DJ with a mic in one hand and the ‘real’ cake balanced on the other.
“Hungry?” the pop star laughs into the mic before she drops it, ripping off the top tier of the cake and tossing it down to Aura. Servers dressed as red queens pass out perfect petit fours that say ‘Eat Me’ and tiny, potent cocktails in little bottles that say ‘Drink Me.’ Liam takes two drinks
, one for each of them, and Aura eats the little cake before she can realize what they’re really for.
“Food fight!” Monroe growls into the microphone as chunks of colorful cake rain from the DJ booth and she starts singing one of her hits as ‘deejay rabbit’ spins for her. The crowd of friends laugh and dance as pieces of cake big and small are hurled left and right. Liam chuckles as Taylor and Alexis crust his white shirt with chocolate, and Quinn and Sage coat his back with every shade of pink frosting.
Aura breaks up pieces of her Mad Hatter’s hat cake topper and throws it into the crowd with a squeal. Liam smashes a little cake into her mouth and she can feel the bravery swelling inside her chest as she swallows the sugar. Like magic. She downs the little bottle and he follows suit, drinking it down quick, before she suddenly pushes him up against the front of the booth. Her hands are in his hair as she crushes her pink lips against his. She’s barely cognizant of their crew’s gasps and giggles as she feels his hands around her waist. His lips part and she takes the opportunity, her tongue on his, exploring his mouth deeper as her fingers tighten their grasp of his hair as she presses her body into his.
Her hair stands on end as she hears a stern “Aura?” being barked from behind her. She whips around to see a more than slightly annoyed yet gorgeous man staring at her with an, ‘I’m not angry, I’m disappointed,’ face. The face is attached to someone who could have created the phrase, ‘tall, dark, and handsome,’ but pissed or perturbed are also quite fitting adjectives for him at this moment.
“Sebastian?” she squeaks. “You’re here.”
“Kind of regretting that now, Aur, but yeah. I’m here. Can we talk?”
Aura, riding high on her lip lock with Liam, turns to him with her cutest, sorriest little smile and whispers, “Be right back.”
She follows Sebastian until they’re far away enough from the crowd. Sebastian turns to face her and she doesn’t know whether to kiss him, slap him, or just storm away, one of new Aura’s favorite moves. His lush, dark curls frame an inhumanly handsome face and chiseled cheekbones. His chin is covered with that swarthy, black five o’clock shadow male models always seem to have. She can hardly handle how pretty he is, that teensy, crescent moon shaped chip from his front tooth, his dreamy, light blue eyes framed by dark brows. How does everyone around me have such beautiful blue eyes? It’s really not fair.
“Aura? You ask me to your birthday party and then I get here and you’re making out with… who is that, anyway?”
She sighs. Her mind swirls with memories of him, the way she reeled him in, there was so much power in that. The late nights on the patio outside his NY apartment, the off again, on again, the sinking feeling of being ignored, the plight of the girl trying too hard. Despite his beauty, she just feels so done. With all of it.
“Liam Kennedy,” she states lamely. “Lex’s co-star. He actually, you know, wanted to be here. Said he was coming, showed up on time. Texted me happy birthday this morning, first thing.”
“Come on, Aur, a teen soap star? What is this, payback? You wanted me to come to LA. I’m in LA. Are we going to make this work or not?”
She starts to feel guilty. Did I really ask him to move here? For me? Now I feel like the bad guy. The longer she looks into his baby blues, the more she remembers about the past two years. How hard she’d tried, how much she’d liked him. How he always said he ‘didn’t do relationships.’ Had he really changed his mind?
“That’s what you want, living here with me? Commitment? Attending all our events together, mentioning each other in interviews?” She searches his eyes for love and all she can see is masked terror as he backtracks.
“Aura, you know I… I’m always going to be coast hopping. And you know I’ve always had a place here, too. I’ll try to be here more often, you can stay there when I’m here, or in New York when you’re back.” Sebastian sucks in a deep breath, “I just, I can’t give you the public relationship you want. You know I can’t. You know that’s not me.”
Her eyes start to water but she stops herself, knowing he’s not worth any more tears. She knows it’s the same old story it always was. “It’s not about the publicity, Sebastian…” She stops. She decides to save her breath. She grabs a vile off a nearby server’s tray and downs the drink in one shot. She knows she’s said it all before. She turns back towards the dance floor, towards her friends, towards Liam.
“Aura,” Sebastian’s hand on her shoulder. It doesn’t have any real grip to it, no hold that shows it will really hurt him if I walk away.
So she does. She gives him a final look, her best ‘goodbye, you’ll miss the hell out of me’ look, and heads back to the crowd. Sebastian doesn’t follow her.
Aura grins as she teeters on her heels outside the nightclub hours later. Liam has an arm around her, hand resting on her hip, steadying her, while Monroe holds one of Aura’s hands in hers. Alexis stamps her foot as the driver she’s hired waits patiently.
“Aura likes to sleep at my place when she’s been drinking, and a lot of her stuff is already over there,” Monroe pleads, motioning towards her own driver, smiling while holding the door open for the girls.
“I’ll drive her home, it’s really not that far, I want t-” Liam offers, but is interrupted by Alexis. The last thing she wants is for her two friends’ first time together to be one that Aura won’t even remember, and she can tell by the look in Aura’s eyes that that’s all she has in mind.
“Liam, it’s too out of the way for you, besides, you and Quinn have to be on set early tomorrow. Monroe, she needs to be in her own bed. Let me, please,” Alexis insists, grabbing Aura’s free hand and leading her into the car. Aura’s feet are killing her after hours of dancing, and though she wants nothing more to be in a car alone with Liam, she feels her butt hit the seat and is totally relieved just to be sitting and being taken care of by Lex.
She waves goodbye to him sheepishly and blows Monroe a kiss as the car door closes in her face.
“You’ll thank me tomorrow,” Alexis assures as she slides in next to her, buckling her as the car takes off.
“But… Liam…” She attempts to argue feebly and Alexis just laughs.
“He’s pretty perfect, huh?”
Aura nods, “Very.”
“Aur… I think he really likes you. I mean, he hasn’t had a girlfriend for as long as I’ve know him. And I’ve known him how many years?”
Aura wonders if that’s a good sign or not, but doesn’t worry too much about it as she snuggles into her best friend, leaning her head against the blonde’s shoulder.
“Honestly, I’ve never seen him kiss anyone but Quinn, and she told me that he’s never kissed her off-screen, really! You know they like to hang out, but it really is totally platonic with them. Never! Never seen him kiss someone like that before tonight!”
Aura’s thoughts drift to Liam and his soft lips, his hands on her face, in her hair…
“So, I saw Sebastian. Spill,” Alexis demands and she groans in response. Ugh, Sebastian. Anything but that.
Her head feels made of fuzz as she attempts to find the best way to explain what happened. “I think, in not so many words, I told him… that I need someone who can love me in public, not just in private. I mean, I don’t think I said that, exactly, but he got the gist. I need someone who can go with me to events, be there for me, drop things to be with me when I need them. Not throw a friggin’ hissy fit when a photographer takes a photo of us! I need someone who’s proud to be with me, I want… I want to be someone’s priority.” Oh god, I’m babbling. Okay I’ll stop.
“Well, he was definitely pissed when he left. I can’t believe he walked in and you were kissing Liam! God, you should have seen the look on his face when he saw you and, ugh, you told him off! And he left! And you went right back to macking on Liam. I’ve seen you do a lot of badass things Aura, and this definitely makes the list!”
She smiles at her best friend, knowing that if no guy ever works out for her, she’d still hav
e Alexis, and she’d have her badass self, and decides that it would be enough.
“Why is everyone always talking about me? Why can’t we talk about Taylor? How perfect he is? He’s literally the coolest person to exist, and kinda looks like a young Johnny Depp. Why aren’t you guys together like right now?”
Alexis sighs, “Aur, we’ve been over this. We’re, like, too close. We imploded. We tried to make it work and it just didn’t. He’s seeing someone and honestly, I hate her stupid face, but she seems really nice. Ugh, can we drop it?”
“Yes, baby,” Aura coos, “Thank you for tonight, it was the best birthday ever ever.”
“Better than the NY club filled with beds? Better than the Justin Timberlake concert with front row seats? Or the dance party on the beach in Maui?”
The memories are fuzzy, just like her head, but Aura squeezes her friend tightly because she remembers that she was the one who coordinated all of those, as well. And that they were definitely amazing.
Aura smooches her all over her cheeks, “Better.”
Chapter Seven
Some sort of relentless autoharp racket is projecting from Aura’s phone for what feels like forever when she finally smacks her fingers against it in just the right way and the noise stops. Her eyes creak open slowly and fuzzily focus on the words on the screen ‘10 AM - Mark - Alarm Snoozed.’ There’s that name again, Mark. She closes her eyes and ignores the questions, squashing them to the back of her mind until her phone begins ringing this time. She opens just one eye this time, ‘Mark calling’ the phone reads.
“Mark?” she whispers, answering the call.
“Oh, I’m glad you remember me, I was beginning to think you forgot,” the loud, joking male’s voice, glowing with friendship and familiarity and bit of New York accent, says with a little laugh.
“No… I, of course I do. It’s… it’s been a really long… few days,” she croaks.
“I bet!” the man chuckles playfully. “How were the festivities, birthday Princess? How ya feeling?”