Love at First Note

by Jenny Proctor

  He sighed. “Where’s your laptop?”

  “It’s right there on the desk. Is everything okay?”

  I watched as he opened the computer and navigated his way to an Internet browser. Curious to know if I really had received any calls, I raced back to my bedroom and grabbed my phone. I pressed the home button, lighting the screen, and my heart started to pound. I had fourteen missed calls. I walked back to the living room.

  “Elliott, please tell me what this is about.”

  He pushed back from my desk and collapsed onto the couch, motioning to the computer with a jerk of his head. “Read it.”

  He’d pulled up some sort of Hollywood gossip site where the feature photo was a close-up of Elliott and me kissing in the garden at Grove Park Inn. I felt sick. I hadn’t bothered to sit, but I suddenly needed to. I reached for the rolling chair behind me and pulled it forward, gripping the armrests as I read through the article that accompanied the picture.

  Just weeks after an announcement from pianist and Talent Hunt winner Elliott Hart’s camp that he was stepping away from the Hollywood scene to work on his highly anticipated third album, it appears Elliott’s finding ways to spend some time outside the studio as well. This picture was snagged while the superstar attended a wedding at the Grove Park Inn in Asheville, North Carolina.

  “This wasn’t even twelve hours ago,” I said. “How? Did someone follow us into the garden?”

  “Apparently so.” Elliott sounded exhausted. “Keep reading. It gets worse.”

  I scrolled past an ad in the middle of the article and found the rest of the text.

  No word on how Elliott knows the bride and groom of the elaborate Grove Park affair, but our sources say his love interest is a musical darling in her own right—violinist Emma Hill, who this spring will launch a European tour with the Cleveland Orchestra. No comment from Elliott’s team on the photo. The Cleveland Orchestra also declined to comment. As for us, we wish the couple well and hope they’ll be making beautiful music together for years to come.

  Under the article was a second photograph, this one a copy of the Cleveland spring tour ad that Greg had given me.

  “Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no.” I still gripped the armrests, needing something to anchor me, to keep my head from spinning. “Who did this?” I finally managed. “Who would . . . and where did they find that ad? And how can they just print something if they don’t even know it’s true?”

  “Websites like this don’t generally care about truth.”

  “But who, Elliott? We were alone in that garden. Who would do this?”

  “The photo credit goes back to someone named Najim Berkley. He works for Asheville News and Culture. You ever heard of it?”

  I shook my head.

  “It’s some sort of online magazine. I don’t know if Najim was a friend or if he was there to cover the wedding. The Rockwells seem like the kind of people who would warrant a little bit of local press coverage, but he’s definitely the source.”

  “I must have left the Cleveland ad on the table when we went to dance. I thought I put it in my purse, but . . .” I pushed my head into my hands. “What do we do now?”

  “We do damage control as best we can.”

  “Damage control.”

  “Yes. You need to call whoever is in charge of Asheville Symphony as soon as you can. Maybe they don’t read celebrity gossip on the Internet, but eventually someone in the symphony will, and word will get back to them. If you talk to them first, there won’t be any question about where you stand. You also need to take down your teaching website. The less people can find about you online, the better.”

  “But my students use my website. Parents send in their payments and record practicing sessions and send me e-mails. I can’t just take it down.”

  “How many voice mails do you have?”

  “What?”

  “On your phone—voice mails and missed calls? How many have you gotten?” There was nothing gentle about his voice. His tone was edgy and harsh.

  “Fourteen.”

  “How do you think those fourteen people got your number? Emma, you’ve never had to fight this kind of a battle, but I have. You have to trust me. If you leave that number up, they won’t leave you alone. At the very least, strip the site of any contact information.”

  “For how long?” It was a stupid detail to cling to, but I felt like my entire world had been flipped upside down. “What’s the point of even having a website if people can’t use it to contact me?”

  Elliott looked beaten. “For as long as you’re with me.”

  “So, what? I’m just supposed to go underground? What about Facebook and Twitter? Should I delete that stuff too?” I sounded defensive—more defensive than I felt, but the reality of what dating Elliott actually meant was like a cold slap in the face. I’d never felt like my privacy was in question, but suddenly strangers were trolling my website, stealing my contact information for nefarious purposes. What was next? Would they show up at concerts? Call my family? The next time Elliott did something newsworthy, how far would the media attention extend? To me?

  He pushed his head into his hands. “I’m sorry, Emma. I’m sorry about all of it. My people are working to get any mention of you removed from the website. But honestly it’s an uphill battle. Other sites will pick up the article, someone will blog or tweet about it. Fighting the spread of Internet gossip is like trying to fight a forest fire with a watering can. There’s no way we’ll be able to contain it all.”

  “People. You have people?”

  “Yeah. My agent and my publicist. They’re good at what they do, and they’ll try their hardest to squelch this. I’m just trying to be honest with you about it. There’s never an easy, instant fix with rumors.”

  It was frustrating that I was going to have to explain myself, probably multiple times, to the people in my symphony, to the board, to the personnel manager, even to my fellow musicians. But more than that, it was embarrassing that a moment so intensely personal was now fodder for public speculation. My career, be it in Cleveland or Asheville, was only interesting because I was the girl Elliott Hart had decided to kiss. And that was a realization that struck me all the way down to my core. If I had any kind of a future with Elliott, everything we did would be cause for public discussion.

  “Don’t answer your phone for the next few days,” he continued. “Not unless you know the number. There’s no reason for you to talk to any press at any time. You can’t. If they think you like the attention, even for a second, they’ll run with it, pumping you for information about your personal life and our relationship.”

  “Do I need to worry about someone trying to find me in person?”

  “I don’t think so. Najim what’s-his-name, since he’s local, may try to track you down. But I don’t think anyone from the tabloids will. If they do, though, you can’t give them an inch. Do you understand?”

  I didn’t answer. I was barely holding back tears, images swimming through my mind of paparazzi and grungy tabloid journalists pouncing at me from behind the bushes in front of the house. It was like the disgusting guy at the beer festival all over again, only this time STUD guy had my phone number.

  “Emma, do you understand?” Elliott repeated.

  I looked up. “I get it, all right.” A single tear fell. “I get it. You don’t have to yell at me.”

  “No, no. I’m not trying to yell.” He crossed the room to where I still sat in the chair and reached for my hand. He pulled me up and wrapped his arms around me, whispering into my hair. “Please don’t cry.” He took a deep breath. “I hate that they’ve done this to you. I hate that I’ve pulled you into a place where you’re under such scrutiny. I don’t want this. I don’t want them to hurt you.”

  I looked up and met his gaze, a question in my eyes. He didn’t want this? Or he didn’t want me?

  He answered me with a kiss, soft at first, then with the same stupid heat that always flared between us. Even frustrated and ups
et, tears falling down my cheeks and onto his face, kissing him was still enough to threaten my sense of reason. He intensified the kiss, bracing his arm against the wall behind me, making me curse the fact it was just past 8:00 a.m., I was wearing yoga pants, and I still hadn’t brushed my teeth.

  I clung to the one logical thought pulsing through my brain and willed away the fire flowing through me. Kissing wouldn’t solve anything. Maybe it made his intentions clear, but what about mine? I realized with sickening clarity: I had no idea what I wanted.

  Him? Yes. But all that came with him? Twelve hours before, I would have screamed yes without hesitation. But now? Yes felt scarier and heavier than ever before.

  I broke the kiss and leaned into his chest, pressing my forehead against him. “Elliott, I need some time.”

  I could hear the resignation in his voice. “I know you do.”

  “Everything just happened so fast. I’m feeling a little overwhelmed.”

  He gave my arm a final squeeze and moved to the door. “I’ll check on you in a little bit.”

  * * *

  Five hours later, Lilly found me on the couch, a list of symphony board members in front of me, half the names crossed off.

  She dropped her bag on the chair by the door. “Hey. What are you doing here? No church?”

  “I kinda had a crisis. Where have you been?”

  “I was at Trav’s. What happened? What crisis?”

  I was too overwhelmed to explain. “Go Google Elliott. Better yet, Google me.”

  Lilly sat at the open laptop and keyed my name into the search engine. “Oh my word,” she said as she scrolled through the hits. I looked over her shoulder. It hadn’t taken long for the one news story from this morning to morph into more than twenty, gossip sites and blogs reposting the picture over and over. Some just posted the picture, eliminating the details of who I was and what I did for a living, but others went the opposite direction, digging up details about my current position in Asheville, speculating about my planned move to Cleveland in the spring, and projecting how I fit into Elliott’s picture.

  Lilly shut the laptop without even closing out of the browser. “You don’t need to be reading this stuff.”

  I sighed and collapsed onto the couch, rubbing the back of my neck. I was stiff from sitting still so long, from making phone call after phone call, trying to smooth any feathers of Asheville’s symphony board. Only our personnel manager, Chloe, had heard the news. “I can assure you,” I told her, “I don’t have any plans to leave Asheville. Cleveland made me an offer, but I haven’t accepted it. This is all just a misunderstanding.”

  She accepted my explanation right away but then proceeded to grill me with questions about Elliott. How did we meet? Was my relationship with him serious? It just illustrated what had hit me so hard earlier that morning. It wasn’t so much that my career was the story. I was the story—and only in the context of what I meant to Elliott. I felt both sensationalized and trivialized at the same time.

  Lilly moved to the couch and sat next to me. “So, big night, huh?”

  “I don’t even know what to think.”

  “You wanna tell me if I’m gonna need a new roommate in the spring?”

  “Oh! No. Greg McKenzie was at the wedding. He’s one of the conductors in Cleveland, and he offered me my job back. Actually he’s been e-mailing me about it all week, but I’m not going to take it. The ad was just a mock-up of what they want.”

  “He’s been e-mailing you all week, and you didn’t tell me?”

  “Don’t be mad. I didn’t tell Elliott either. I didn’t tell anyone.”

  “Are you not even considering it?”

  “No. You know I can’t. But even if I would have considered it before, I especially can’t now. I’ve been calling symphony board members all morning, assuring them I have no intention of leaving Asheville. I feel like I have to backpedal and downplay the whole situation just so everyone doesn’t hate me.”

  “No one would hate you, Em, even if you did go on tour. It’s just business. Have you called your parents?”

  I nodded. “I called Mom first. I didn’t want her to hear anything from anyone but me.”

  “I’m so sorry.” She reached over and gave me a one-armed hug. “This totally stinks. How did the trashmags even get the ad?”

  “Greg gave me a copy. I must have left it on the table or dropped it somewhere. I guess when Elliott Hart is your date, people pay attention.”

  “That’s what upsets you most of all, isn’t it? The extra attention Elliott brings.”

  “Lilly, everything about being with Elliott last night was amazing—the mood, the dress, the location, that kiss in the photo. It was all perfect. And now it feels cheap.”

  “But it isn’t cheap. It’s still your moment. All the gossip about it doesn’t have to mean anything. It doesn’t change anything between you and Elliott.”

  I shook my head. “How can it not? He’s famous. Everything he does, people watch. He wears a disguise when he goes out to dinner. People follow him to take pictures of him with his date. I mean, I’d thought about all of that, but thinking about it and experiencing it firsthand are entirely different things.”

  “But there’s an upside too, right? Think about all Elliott is able to do because of his celebrity. He has a voice he can use for good. He has money he can donate to charity. He has organizations he can work with and resources he can use to make a difference.”

  “He can do that, but being that exposed is not the life I would have ever imagined for myself.”

  “Do you care about Elliott?”

  “You know I do.”

  “Then maybe he’s worth it. Just give it some time. Things will settle down, all this Cleveland business will blow over, and then you can really sit back and think about what this means for the two of you.”

  I was huffy, my voice edgier than it should have been, but I was weary and worn and completely overwhelmed. “What it means is that if we’re together, every important decision we make will be the subject of a press release. It means magazines buying the rights to photos of our wedding, of our first kid. It means scrutiny and gossip and attention and . . .” I tried to keep the panic out of my voice, but it was creeping in, stressing my words, making my hands shake. “I don’t know if that’s what I want.”

  “Oh, honey. That’s the very reason Elliott fell for you so hard. Because you don’t care about any of that garbage. You’re exactly what he needs to stay anchored.”

  “But what about me? What do I need?”

  She shook her head. “That’s something you gotta decide. Is he worth it?”

  A heavy silence settled between us.

  “I don’t know.”

  The words left a bitter aftertaste in my mouth. Of course he was worth it. I couldn’t let my fear get the best of me. I needed to see Elliott, to hear him tell me everything was going to be okay. “I’m gonna go find him.”

  I knocked and waited only a moment before he yelled from inside, inviting me to come in.

  “Where are you?” I called from his living room.

  He appeared in the hallway, holding a shirt. “In here. Come on back.”

  I followed him into his bedroom. There was a suitcase open on his bed, half filled. He gave my hand a quick squeeze and kissed me on the cheek. “How are you?”

  “I’m . . .” Not fine, I wanted to yell. Especially if he was packing that suitcase for himself. “Are you leaving?”

  He sighed. “I have to go back to L.A.”

  “Why?”

  “To try to fix stuff with the label, I guess. They still aren’t happy.” He picked up a pair of shoes and dropped them onto the bed.

  “I don’t understand. Because of the wedding? Why does it matter how you spend your Saturday nights?”

  “It only matters if it looks like I’m partying in Asheville instead of working on an album.”

  “But you have been working. You’re composing, writing stuff they’re going t
o love. Isn’t that what they want?”

  “What they want is an album they think they can sell, and that’s not what I’m giving them.”

  “But how do you know? They haven’t even heard your new music.”

  He scoffed, dropping a stack of T-shirts into his suitcase. “They have heard it. And they don’t love it.”

  My heart sank. That definitely made things worse. But any record producer who didn’t love what Elliott had been working on wasn’t worth his time. His compositions were brilliant. He shouldn’t have to compromise. “Elliott, why are you trying to fix things with a label that clearly doesn’t understand what you’re capable of? Let them be mad. You’re better than the music they’re asking you to produce.”

  He turned his back to me and ran his fingers through his hair, then faced me, his hands on his hips, his shoulders tense. “You have to stop saying that. The music they’re asking for is the kind of music that made me famous. And it’s still mine. I realize it isn’t what you love, but that doesn’t make it bad.”

  This wasn’t at all how I’d expected our conversation to go. “That isn’t what I meant. I know it isn’t bad, but I just thought . . . You’ve talked about doing an album of your own music, and you’ve been working so hard. I thought you wanted to do something different.”

  “And it’s that easy, right? Just because I want it I can make it so?”

  I didn’t want to sound simpleminded, but yeah. When you want something bad enough, you work to make it happen. “I’m just saying you should fight for what makes you happy, for what you really want.”

  “You gonna give that same advice to your sister?”

  What the . . . what? “What is that even supposed to mean?”

  “Is your sister allowed to fight for what makes her happy? Because she’s tried to tell you more than once, and you’re not willing to accept it. She doesn’t want to play. You’re telling me to stand up to my label, to just tell them what I want, but you’re not letting Ava tell you what she wants. You can’t have it both ways.”

  His words stung bad. “I don’t understand what my sister has to do with any of this.”